Patrollogs
Isaiahs Ghost Banishing 241011
In the eerie confines of Arkwright Cemetery, a chaotic scene unfolds as Isaiah and his companions find themselves embroiled in a ghost banishing operation. Amidst the gloom of the night, surrounded by the unsettling ambience of the graveyard, the group faces an ominous challenge. The air crackles with dark magic as a demon with twisted horns and menacing red eyes appears, pointing a gnarled finger at Isaiah and beginning an unintelligible chant. The situation grows dire as Isaiah feels a vice tightening around his heart, the threat of the demonic presence palpable. With Ash prepared to use their ritualistic magic and Kah, alongside Autumn, engages in combat against the swirling black mist and its conjured monsters, each individual plays their role in a desperate attempt to fend off the encroaching danger.
As the battle against the supernatural forces intensifies, the ancient struggle between magic and might is laid bare. Ash's attempt to cast a binding circle is accompanied by the protective measures of Kah and the ambivalent position of Autumn, who is neither friend nor foe. The air is filled with the pastel flames of Ash's casting and the violence of spectral combat, creating a volatile atmosphere that tests the resolve of each participant. Isaiah, grappling with the physical manifestation of the demonic curse, leans on Kah for support, revealing a complex web of alliances and enmities that complicates the conflict. In a climactic moment, the concerted efforts of the group culminate in the expulsion of the demonic forces, but not without leaving its mark on both the physical and metaphysical landscape of the cemetery. The struggle underscores the pressing necessity for unity against common threats, despite underlying tensions, and illuminates the unpredictable nature of engaging with the spirit world.
(Isaiah's ghost banishing)
[Thu Oct 10 2024]
On the Sprawling Hillside of Arkwright Cemetery
It is night, about 56F(13C) degrees, and the sky is covered by dark grey stormclouds. There is a waxing gibbous moon.
There is the sudden smell of brimstone that fills the area, and along with a rising, black mist: smoke, coiling along the surface of the graveyard. It seems to form strange whorls and shapes, and as they draw close to %n they begin to look more and more like creatures -- horned creatures, with red eyes full of menace.
Ash says "Oh, thank *gods* I picked this up in time."
Ash says "You bustin' or bindin', Izzy?"
Long strides carry Kah into the area with a silent, looming presence. His face briefly breaks into a small smile at the sight of Ash and Isaiah before tundral blue eyes turn with a more neutral expression toward someone. His head tilts aside with a slow blink, before the coalescing smoke draws his more immediate attention. His lip curls up at the corner of his mouth, revealing one pristinely white canine in a silent look of disdain.
Long strides carry Kah into the area with a silent, looming presence. His face briefly breaks into a small smile at the sight of Ash and Isaiah before tundral blue eyes turn with a more neutral expression toward Autumn. His head tilts aside with a slow blink, before the coalescing smoke draws his more immediate attention. His lip curls up at the corner of his mouth, revealing one pristinely white canine in a silent look of disdain.
Some figure forms in the smoke: tall, it has twisted horns and red eyes. It levels a gnarled finger at Isaiah, beginning to chant in an unknown language as the air begins to crackle with magic. Immediately, Isaiah can feel something like a vise closing on their heart.
"You do the magic- I'll keep them off of your ass," Isaiah tells Ash, leaning his large, tattooed form in against Kah comfortably as the larger male approaches. It's a reassuring sort of touch, and then he slips his knife from his pocket, twirling it between his fingers a few times. "Use me as the conduit- they'll come for me, but I know how to fucking defend mys- Hurhck..." Except against that, and Isaiah immediately drops to his knees, clutching at his chest as that smoky demon points in his direction. "Fuh-huck..."
Walking slowly towards the grave, Autumn peers around with a tired look before she sees the rising black smoke. "Let's hope no Disruptors around," the woman speaks, keeping her gaze on the formed figure as she holds her left hand out. The runes on her bracelet starts to glow red-orange as her mouth moves in silence.
Kah growls reflexively, the white hair atop his head coming into focus as his head dips low enough to look at Isaiah with that sound that comes from inside the depth of his mountainous chest. He places a hand on the man's shoulder, and murmured words come close to their ear. When he rises, his eyes cut back to Autumn. "Who is this?" He asks of Ash, since Isaiah is having trouble talking.
Ash fills the air with ghostly little pastel flames, will o' wisps that float and move like jellyfish in the night air. Ash holds their quartz aloft, and the little flames lift it up. Looking over Kah, they step away, making the circle larger, before hissing, "You protect him, I'll bind, sorry if this isn't enough space for you." At least, it's bigger and free-er than the Cauldron basement. They growl as the demons attack, but focus on their ritual, instead. They let go of the prism, before reaching up and clenching their fingers into fists. The flames pop like water balloons, dowsing the african american schoolgirl in glowling liquid. "Autumn. She is neither enemy or ally," they add to Kah.
Kah nods at Ash, turning his attention back to the thing chanting at Isaiah. Made of smoke, the man will still try to disrupt it, disappearing and reappearing before the thing to swipe viciously with a heavy-handed paw of a hand that may do nothing but swipe through the smoke. He doesn't seem certain it will help, but his instinct is to attack what attacks his kine.
"Autumn is an.. An enemy.." Isaiah corrects Ash, the hand Kah places on his shoulder doing just enough to steady his mind that he can rise back to his feet with that knife in hand. "She is Orderite. Venice has us against each other this month." Then he waits, blue eyes searching the cemetery, waiting for the next round of harassment he'll receive from the spirits as Kah smashes through their smoky bodies.
As the dark mists roil in the cemetery, Isaiah and everyone with them are struck with a sudden fear. It's cold and awful, sinking into their heart to make the world seem impossible and alone.
Ash takes off their sandals, dripping with glowy flames, before starting their ritual. They start, as they often do, with careful gestures with fingers and hands, that draw in the air and leaves arcane sigils behind via trails of light. Rather than incanting with their mouth, they chant with their body. Fingers. Hands. Arms. Torso. Hips. Legs. Toes. They shift and sway, not unlike an air or waterbender, before they start to take their first steps.
"Spirits from Hell," Autumn calls out at the smoky figure, seemingly ignoring the words of others until she starts to step back. "You should all have been returned to circles," her voice starts to shake a bit while her magical glow creates a circle around her. "I know there is unfinished business, but I doubt this can be finished at this time."
Fear such as this may effect someone lesser, but Kah seems hardly effected in this case. After all, what is there for a being like him to be truly afraid of? He grimaces somewhat still, but he nods at the words that come from both Ash and Isaiah both before his eyes shift back at someone with a more acute sense of study. "I see." He remains in close proximity for the moment to Isaiah once more letting himself be used as a physical touchstone, or a mental one as the case may be. His eyes flash, blue turning to golden for just a moment, crescent moon pupils staring through the shadows at spirits and things unseen. As Autumn begins to chant, the mountainous bronzed man grimaces fresh as his skin quite literally ripples and crawls from the feel of the air around him.
Fear such as this may effect someone lesser, but Kah seems hardly effected in this case. After all, what is there for a being like him to be truly afraid of? He grimaces somewhat still, but he nods at the words that come from both Ash and Isaiah both before his eyes shift back at Autumn with a more acute sense of study. "I see." He remains in close proximity for the moment to Isaiah once more letting himself be used as a physical touchstone, or a mental one as the case may be. His eyes flash, blue turning to golden for just a moment, crescent moon pupils staring through the shadows at spirits and things unseen. As Autumn begins to chant, the mountainous bronzed man grimaces fresh as his skin quite literally ripples and crawls from the feel of the air around him.
Some figure forms in the smoke: tall, it has twisted horns and red eyes. It levels a gnarled finger at Isaiah, beginning to chant in an unknown language as the air begins to crackle with magic. Immediately, Isaiah can feel something like a vise closing on their heart.
As this figure shows up again, Kah tries to put himself in front of it but whatever attacks Isaiah can't so easily be blocked by such a physical act. So once more, all the ancient man can do is offer what support as he can as that breath comes shallow, heartbeats coming painfully. His eyes turn back to Autumn still watching them with slightly more caution.
Ash moves sensually, hauntingly, in careful, precise steps with their bare, brown feet on the cold graveyard dirt. They turn and twist, hands in constant motion making mudras, tracing runes, and building their grand circle of light, bit by bit. Their feet, too, marks and makes the circle, glowing toes leaving behind their own trails as they similarly draw in the dirt. Their only shown awareness of their surroundings is the careful way they keep distance from Kah as they cast the major magic circle to bind the spirits, for good.
Out of the smoke charges an armed and armored warrior, spun out of black mist. He is dressed head to toe in archaic plate armor, wielding some huge, two-handed sword as black as his armor. With a roar, he rushes at Isaiah, swinging the sword in some attempt to cut off their head.
"By flames under Prince Samael," Autumn chants, bracing herself for the dark mists. "I did not abandoned you as I could not complete alone." Her hazel eyes start to flash and her hands clench into fists, her circle growing more fiery. "But I will not let such rogue demonic spirits get loose from town. Begone."
The swing of a smoky sword comes and Kah just lifts an arm by instinct. The smoke may break against that trunk of an arm with hiss as whatever spirit fuels it lets that smoke burn and creep like poison into his arm. Black lines and veins creep along his skin and fade back as his regeneration works to counteract the necrosis that's happening. Each surge of magic causes more of the logic and sanity push away from those eyes that continue to blaze more golden with those crescent moon pupils than they do their natural blue. The look on the man's face struggles and looks more and more frenzied as the push of this experience continues to provoke his response to destroy what is not natural.
For a moment, the dark smoke is still around Isaiah ... but then a low, evil laughter begins to echo. It takes only a second to realize the laughter is echoing inside the heads of those who fight here, and with it comes a sudden urge to give into everyone's worst sin.
Ash moves more fantically now, frenetically, their skirt flying as their legs do the same. Acrobatic leaps, belly dancing twists, and ballet prancing works together to move them more frantically around the large circle, causing their chest to heave and pant with their movement. The trail of magic light flashes as it's empowered by their heated blood as well as the symbols they carve.
"You ungraceful thing," Autumn narrows her eyes, gritting her teeth as she finds herself in the dark with only the glow of her bracelet as light. "You are as big mouth as that Novel guy." With both hand, she makes gestures and signs while keeping her focus and sending her energy out even in her condition. "Go back to Hell from where you came, or else."
Out of the smoke charges an armed and armored warrior, spun out of black mist. He is dressed head to toe in archaic plate armor, wielding some huge, two-handed sword as black as his armor. With a roar, he rushes at Isaiah, swinging the sword in some attempt to cut off their head.
The longer the magicka continues, the more that animal displays itself and less the man within Kah. Teeth are bared, and they gnash at the air as his eyes search for something anything he can levy his Wrath against before the finally begin to settle onto Autumn. A step toward them, and another as broad axe-handle shoulders shake and quiver from the desparate attempt not to shift into his True Self here in the middle of the street for all to see. He almost stalks the Orderite, this time he all but swats imperiously at that smoke-formed warrior as if to send it flying.
Ash laughs as they dance, singing loudly. "I'm only happy when it rains! I'm only happy when it's complicated! And though I think you can't appreciate it, I'm only happy when it rains"! They reach a crescendo as they dance, now upwind of Kah, as they dance feverishly, filling the air with the light of their body as the circle nears completion. "You know I love it when the news is baa-ad! Why it feels so good to feel so saa-ad? I'm only happy when it rains!" They wink to Kah and Isaiah as they drawl seductively, "Pour your misery down! Pour your misery down on me! Pooour your misery down! Poooour your misery down on me!" They cackle, as if high all of a sudden.
Ash finally brings the circle to completion, dancing to bring one end to the other, causing the circle to light up brightly before exploding to disperse the mist.
An eerie stillness settles over the graveyard, the fog thickening like an otherworldly veil. The ground trembles, and two ghostly armies surge forth, locked in a battle that defies time. One side, draped in ethereal armor, charges with spectral weapons, while the other hurls crackling bolts of elemental magic. The air is alight with haunting energy as the spirits, long dead, resume their eternal battle, heedless of the living who are caught in their spectral warpath.
Elora kneels in the overgrown grass, her vivid hair a burst of neeon green and blue against the dark night. All the darker for the stormclouds which are no longer dropping rain. She tucks a strand behind her ear, a thoughtful expression softening her features. As her fingers glide over the soil, she grips a slender wooden stick, drawing a perfect circle in the dirt with practiced ease.
The ground here is grassy and blanketed by an eerie hush. The fog is thickening, but she moves with purpose as she practices something she Knows - rituals are not new to her and neither are spirits.
Elora notes the rising of the eerie stillness that has settled over the graveyard. The thick fog. The trembling ground. ALready, she is drawing out runic protection for herself to help against the coming onslaught. She moves with quick precision, tracing out thorns coming off the circle and forming complex spiraling patterns with her at the center. The thorns face outward.
As a battalion of armored specters marches forth, a group of wraith-like sorcerers unleashes a storm of arcane missiles, shattering the ghostly shields; the resulting shockwave threatens to make ears bleed, if someone gets caught without cover.
Elora can see the battle taking place. Two spectral armies, clashing. She is ready when the batallion of armored specters marches forth, ready when the group of sorcerors launch arcane missiles that are blocked by ghostly shields. The shockwave of force from the ghostly memory of magic pierces the night like a gunshot or a siren's wail, but it deadens against the circle of thorns which now begin to glow faintly as energy flows through them. They glow with the same colors as the ghostly magic itself, pulsing as if alive.
Elora with her defense seen to now sets to work in banishing. There are more then a few ghosts amid the clashing batallaions. She sets her sights on the ghosts which caused the crashing against her protection.
She pauses, her teal eyes glowing faintly in the dim light. With a subtle motion of her wrist, she adds a line to the circle, then anothereach deliberate stroke shaping sharp, intricate thorn patterns around its edge.
The thorny circle is complete now, a barrier that might hold back even the most determined ghost or vengeful spirit. Theres a certain reverence in her expression as she draws back, sitting on her heels to inspect her work. The glowing runes throb gently, casting faint shadows that dance over her delicate hands and forearms. She glances up at the cloudy sky, the waxing gibbous moon veiled by the thick, dark storm clouds. Its dim, silvery light barely illuminates the cemetery, leaving much to be imagined in the long, dark stretches between the graves.
Faintly she murmurs under breath - words, words which have power. She isn't a ritualist alone, but someone who knows how to add power beyond symbols through her voice. The incantation speeds her casting as she banishes one of the spectral sorcerors.
Elora stands in the midst of it all, an oasis of calm amidst chaos. Her wild, vivid hair of neon green and deep blue swirls around her face like a storm's eye, the colors seeming almost alive as they catch the ambient glow of her magic. Beneath the shrouded night sky, flashes of silver light flicker over the open field, revealing the jagged lines of broken formations and bodies crumpled amidst shattered weapons and discarded armor.
A faint glow emanates from her hands, ethereal light coalescing into complex sigils that seem to dance on her fingertips. With each twist of her wrist, each subtle motion of her arm, the sigils grow brighter, their forms spinning and shifting, like serpents of light.
Her gaze, cool and assessing, sweeps over the remnants of the armies clashing before her. Soldiers press forward, blades gleaming and shields raised,
The air thickens with an unnatural fog as ghostly archers let loose a volley of arrows. The projectiles are swept away by a whirlwind conjured by spectral windcallers, and the gust of wind sends everyone alive flying against tombstones with bone-jarring force.
The wind hits like a hammer. Elora hair, already a wild tangle of deep blue and neon green, flares out around her head in a radiant storm of color. The gust shoves her back, feet lifting off the ground for a heartbeat. She gasps as shes thrown off balance, the breath stolen from her lungs. The world tilts, a blur of grey headstones and glowing sigils as the wind carries her through the air.
Her body slams against a tombstone with bone-jarring force. Pain lances up her spine, but she bites back the cry, gritting her teeth. Her shoulders crash against the weathered stone, her back arching as the impact sends shockwaves through her frame. The stone cracks under the force, ancient inscriptions splintering beneath her weight.
For a moment, everything is a dizzy haze. Her vision swims, and she blinks, struggling to focus as the wind continues to howl around her, shrieking through the cemetery like a maddened beast. She forces herself to sit up, fingers digging into the rough stone behind her for support. The cold surface bites into her palms, grounding her in reality.
Face set in determination she rises, as the wind fades and limps her way back to her protective circle.
Slowly, Elora draws in another breath, centering herself, and her fingers trace the air in front of her. Glowing runes materialize, flickering like embers caught in a storm, swirling around her in a protective barrier. She murmurs under her breath once more, sending another banishing out. This time she targets a group of spectral windcallers. The banishing catches them and whisks them away.
Elora stumbles slightly, leaning against the fractured tombstone for support. Her chest heaves with effort, sweat trickling down her brow despite the cold. The clashing armies at war are at least somewhat repelled but she now moves again to add more details to her circle drawn within the ground. Partly, to fix it, in places where the wind tore at it, and broke its power. Partly to add lines of force to help soften such blows in the future.
As a battalion of armored specters marches forth, a group of wraith-like sorcerers unleashes a storm of arcane missiles, shattering the ghostly shields; the resulting shockwave threatens to make ears bleed, if someone gets caught without cover.
Elora lips are in constant motion, murmuring an unbroken stream of incantations. The sound is soft, almost a whisper, each word half-lost to the thick, swirling fog that blankets the battlefield. What little reaches the ear has a lyrical, almost hypnotic quality, like an ancient song hummed beneath one's breath. She breathes out fragments of magicwords shaped by purpose, each syllable weighted with power.
"aether's weave and shadow's thread bind and break, sever and shatter"
Her voice dips low, a rhythmic chant that resonates with the faint glow of the sigils spiraling from her fingertips. The words are elusive, slipping away like the mist itself. "fade to dream and dust to air unravel ties, release despair"
Elora once again finds that her protections are enough - the wail comes - crashing against her fortress of thorn covered spirals and somehow the wail get trapped as if an animal caught in bramble. Panting, cringing, she realizes that her protection held. Suddenly she is baring her teeth. Glaring out at the spirits as if to feign that she had not been afraid and was not afraid.
Elora resumes her use of Incantation paired with Ritualism. Her voice dips low, a rhythmic chant that resonates with the faint glow of the sigils spiraling from her fingertips. The words are elusive, slipping away like the mist itself. "seek no solace, hold no claim begone, forgotten, without name"
Elora continued to draw shapes on the ground. "Is anyone else coming? An army by myself is not easily banished!" Her complaint hangs in the air. Unheard. Unnoticed. Uncared for. The spectral bettle swallows it.
Elora says "I'll just have to do it on my own."
The air thickens with an unnatural fog as ghostly archers let loose a volley of arrows. The projectiles are swept away by a whirlwind conjured by spectral windcallers, and the gust of wind sends everyone alive flying against tombstones with bone-jarring force.
Elora refocuses on her efforts. With her work done at defense in the spiraling thorns around her she now focuses more on banishing spirit after spirit with the banishing ritual. But then, again, the volley of arrows comes. She is thrown this time with great force. She lets out a cry of pain as she once more cracks into a tombstone. She stands, blood trickling from her arm where it was rubbed raw by the tombstone. "Gone... forgotten... without name," she hisses out. Power, not just from the runes, thrums out of her. Her necklace vibrates against her as illusions of runes break out around her. The completion of the spell comes more quickly and she banishes another group of windcallers.
Elora pants lightly, going to one knee, getting her body lower as she looks among the specters that are clashing for signs of other groups of windcallers. One of her hands grips into the grass as if to anchor herself while the other sketches more twisting, sharp, and curved sigils. "Gone," she pants. "Forgotten," she mutters. "Without name," she insists.
Elora looks around at the chaos of the spectral armies clashing adidst the fog of the graveyard. One spirit, she could banish. Another, she could banish. Yet it was not just one spectre. It was hosts. A re-enactment of ancient battle and she was there on her own. Struggling on her own. A little nexus of blue and green amid a world of gray. A bit of nature amid the desolation of death.
A ghostly battlemage hurls a ball of fire, deflected mid-air by a phantom knight's shield, causing an explosion that sends searing heat and blinding light across the battlefield.
Elora raises her hand against the sudden flare of light and shies away from the burning heat which lights the world of dark and mist within the graveyard. Unconciously, she steps back. The explosion doesn't leave her stunned. Instead if has her baring her teeth toward the mage.
"Gone, forgotten, without name," she incants along, fueling her spell casting with words attuned to it.
Neon and turquoise light flicks about running through various runes and sigils, spiraling around them, and spiraling around the girl with hair of such a similar color. Her teal eyes are full of worry rather than confidence, but her bared teeth have a fierceness to them as she tries to feign a vicious smile. Perhaps, if the ghosts were paying her any mind, rather than fighting each other, it would have been worth something. As it was, the feigned confidence was for an empty graveyard - at least, empty of the living. Elora, she needed that desperate confidence, and so she snarled and smiled all the same.
Elora was starting to look tired after the nearly thirty minutes of continuous chanting and casting. A vanishing didn't take much in the way of life force, but being thrown about did. Still, there were signs of progress. In some places the spectral forces had thinned. Certaintly she had made progress on the ghosts which had been so painfully hurling her about. There were much fewer of those now.
Her dress was dirty after the flinging. Filthy with the mud of the graveyard. The diminuitive girl didn't seem to notice.
Two spectral generals lock eyes from across the battlefield as their armies collide in a chaotic whirlwind of steel and spell. One of them has a blade wreathed in fire; the other conjures a vertex of ice-cold magic around him - their collision sends a shockwave rippling through the graveyard that knocks everyone off their feet and cracks all nearby gravestones right in half.
Elora amid her protections skids and falters back, breaking through her own circle in the process as magic overwhelms her defenses. The clash of the two generals suddenly upon each other and the resulting shockwave which cracks a tombstone in half has Elora's eyes widening in alarm. Thick stone, broken, too easy to imagine that being her own body.
Elora begins once more to sketch out runes of banishing. More exhausted now, but also more focused, she takes aim not at the troops but at the leaders. The two generals and their clash have made them stand out from the rabble. Green and blue light whisks around her, casting ambience over the specters which fight nearby. "Seek no solace, hold no claim... Begone, forgotten, without name." The chanting speeds the flow of energy through the runes and sends power lancing out to strike and rip at the two generals locked in combat.
Elora looks about as she tries to sense whether there is any difference for having targeted the generals. The clash of silvery bodies in battle is chaos all about her. Her eyes flit this way and that. She was no warrior to read battlefields like a book and so she was uncertain.
Elora set back to drawing rune after rune, more the time. And then still more. Each small so she could fit another beside it as she prepared for a more massive working now that the ghosts had thinned somewhat.
Elora trembled faintly as she drew, skin clammy and slick with sweat despite the cold. The chill of death all around her was sapping. The cold of the grve setting her to shiver. Her teeth clattered and hot tears spilled from her as she struggled to draw yet more ruins.
As the battle against the supernatural forces intensifies, the ancient struggle between magic and might is laid bare. Ash's attempt to cast a binding circle is accompanied by the protective measures of Kah and the ambivalent position of Autumn, who is neither friend nor foe. The air is filled with the pastel flames of Ash's casting and the violence of spectral combat, creating a volatile atmosphere that tests the resolve of each participant. Isaiah, grappling with the physical manifestation of the demonic curse, leans on Kah for support, revealing a complex web of alliances and enmities that complicates the conflict. In a climactic moment, the concerted efforts of the group culminate in the expulsion of the demonic forces, but not without leaving its mark on both the physical and metaphysical landscape of the cemetery. The struggle underscores the pressing necessity for unity against common threats, despite underlying tensions, and illuminates the unpredictable nature of engaging with the spirit world.
(Isaiah's ghost banishing)
[Thu Oct 10 2024]
On the Sprawling Hillside of Arkwright Cemetery
It is night, about 56F(13C) degrees, and the sky is covered by dark grey stormclouds. There is a waxing gibbous moon.
There is the sudden smell of brimstone that fills the area, and along with a rising, black mist: smoke, coiling along the surface of the graveyard. It seems to form strange whorls and shapes, and as they draw close to %n they begin to look more and more like creatures -- horned creatures, with red eyes full of menace.
Ash says "Oh, thank *gods* I picked this up in time."
Ash says "You bustin' or bindin', Izzy?"
Long strides carry Kah into the area with a silent, looming presence. His face briefly breaks into a small smile at the sight of Ash and Isaiah before tundral blue eyes turn with a more neutral expression toward someone. His head tilts aside with a slow blink, before the coalescing smoke draws his more immediate attention. His lip curls up at the corner of his mouth, revealing one pristinely white canine in a silent look of disdain.
Long strides carry Kah into the area with a silent, looming presence. His face briefly breaks into a small smile at the sight of Ash and Isaiah before tundral blue eyes turn with a more neutral expression toward Autumn. His head tilts aside with a slow blink, before the coalescing smoke draws his more immediate attention. His lip curls up at the corner of his mouth, revealing one pristinely white canine in a silent look of disdain.
Some figure forms in the smoke: tall, it has twisted horns and red eyes. It levels a gnarled finger at Isaiah, beginning to chant in an unknown language as the air begins to crackle with magic. Immediately, Isaiah can feel something like a vise closing on their heart.
"You do the magic- I'll keep them off of your ass," Isaiah tells Ash, leaning his large, tattooed form in against Kah comfortably as the larger male approaches. It's a reassuring sort of touch, and then he slips his knife from his pocket, twirling it between his fingers a few times. "Use me as the conduit- they'll come for me, but I know how to fucking defend mys- Hurhck..." Except against that, and Isaiah immediately drops to his knees, clutching at his chest as that smoky demon points in his direction. "Fuh-huck..."
Walking slowly towards the grave, Autumn peers around with a tired look before she sees the rising black smoke. "Let's hope no Disruptors around," the woman speaks, keeping her gaze on the formed figure as she holds her left hand out. The runes on her bracelet starts to glow red-orange as her mouth moves in silence.
Kah growls reflexively, the white hair atop his head coming into focus as his head dips low enough to look at Isaiah with that sound that comes from inside the depth of his mountainous chest. He places a hand on the man's shoulder, and murmured words come close to their ear. When he rises, his eyes cut back to Autumn. "Who is this?" He asks of Ash, since Isaiah is having trouble talking.
Ash fills the air with ghostly little pastel flames, will o' wisps that float and move like jellyfish in the night air. Ash holds their quartz aloft, and the little flames lift it up. Looking over Kah, they step away, making the circle larger, before hissing, "You protect him, I'll bind, sorry if this isn't enough space for you." At least, it's bigger and free-er than the Cauldron basement. They growl as the demons attack, but focus on their ritual, instead. They let go of the prism, before reaching up and clenching their fingers into fists. The flames pop like water balloons, dowsing the african american schoolgirl in glowling liquid. "Autumn. She is neither enemy or ally," they add to Kah.
Kah nods at Ash, turning his attention back to the thing chanting at Isaiah. Made of smoke, the man will still try to disrupt it, disappearing and reappearing before the thing to swipe viciously with a heavy-handed paw of a hand that may do nothing but swipe through the smoke. He doesn't seem certain it will help, but his instinct is to attack what attacks his kine.
"Autumn is an.. An enemy.." Isaiah corrects Ash, the hand Kah places on his shoulder doing just enough to steady his mind that he can rise back to his feet with that knife in hand. "She is Orderite. Venice has us against each other this month." Then he waits, blue eyes searching the cemetery, waiting for the next round of harassment he'll receive from the spirits as Kah smashes through their smoky bodies.
As the dark mists roil in the cemetery, Isaiah and everyone with them are struck with a sudden fear. It's cold and awful, sinking into their heart to make the world seem impossible and alone.
Ash takes off their sandals, dripping with glowy flames, before starting their ritual. They start, as they often do, with careful gestures with fingers and hands, that draw in the air and leaves arcane sigils behind via trails of light. Rather than incanting with their mouth, they chant with their body. Fingers. Hands. Arms. Torso. Hips. Legs. Toes. They shift and sway, not unlike an air or waterbender, before they start to take their first steps.
"Spirits from Hell," Autumn calls out at the smoky figure, seemingly ignoring the words of others until she starts to step back. "You should all have been returned to circles," her voice starts to shake a bit while her magical glow creates a circle around her. "I know there is unfinished business, but I doubt this can be finished at this time."
Fear such as this may effect someone lesser, but Kah seems hardly effected in this case. After all, what is there for a being like him to be truly afraid of? He grimaces somewhat still, but he nods at the words that come from both Ash and Isaiah both before his eyes shift back at someone with a more acute sense of study. "I see." He remains in close proximity for the moment to Isaiah once more letting himself be used as a physical touchstone, or a mental one as the case may be. His eyes flash, blue turning to golden for just a moment, crescent moon pupils staring through the shadows at spirits and things unseen. As Autumn begins to chant, the mountainous bronzed man grimaces fresh as his skin quite literally ripples and crawls from the feel of the air around him.
Fear such as this may effect someone lesser, but Kah seems hardly effected in this case. After all, what is there for a being like him to be truly afraid of? He grimaces somewhat still, but he nods at the words that come from both Ash and Isaiah both before his eyes shift back at Autumn with a more acute sense of study. "I see." He remains in close proximity for the moment to Isaiah once more letting himself be used as a physical touchstone, or a mental one as the case may be. His eyes flash, blue turning to golden for just a moment, crescent moon pupils staring through the shadows at spirits and things unseen. As Autumn begins to chant, the mountainous bronzed man grimaces fresh as his skin quite literally ripples and crawls from the feel of the air around him.
Some figure forms in the smoke: tall, it has twisted horns and red eyes. It levels a gnarled finger at Isaiah, beginning to chant in an unknown language as the air begins to crackle with magic. Immediately, Isaiah can feel something like a vise closing on their heart.
As this figure shows up again, Kah tries to put himself in front of it but whatever attacks Isaiah can't so easily be blocked by such a physical act. So once more, all the ancient man can do is offer what support as he can as that breath comes shallow, heartbeats coming painfully. His eyes turn back to Autumn still watching them with slightly more caution.
Ash moves sensually, hauntingly, in careful, precise steps with their bare, brown feet on the cold graveyard dirt. They turn and twist, hands in constant motion making mudras, tracing runes, and building their grand circle of light, bit by bit. Their feet, too, marks and makes the circle, glowing toes leaving behind their own trails as they similarly draw in the dirt. Their only shown awareness of their surroundings is the careful way they keep distance from Kah as they cast the major magic circle to bind the spirits, for good.
Out of the smoke charges an armed and armored warrior, spun out of black mist. He is dressed head to toe in archaic plate armor, wielding some huge, two-handed sword as black as his armor. With a roar, he rushes at Isaiah, swinging the sword in some attempt to cut off their head.
"By flames under Prince Samael," Autumn chants, bracing herself for the dark mists. "I did not abandoned you as I could not complete alone." Her hazel eyes start to flash and her hands clench into fists, her circle growing more fiery. "But I will not let such rogue demonic spirits get loose from town. Begone."
The swing of a smoky sword comes and Kah just lifts an arm by instinct. The smoke may break against that trunk of an arm with hiss as whatever spirit fuels it lets that smoke burn and creep like poison into his arm. Black lines and veins creep along his skin and fade back as his regeneration works to counteract the necrosis that's happening. Each surge of magic causes more of the logic and sanity push away from those eyes that continue to blaze more golden with those crescent moon pupils than they do their natural blue. The look on the man's face struggles and looks more and more frenzied as the push of this experience continues to provoke his response to destroy what is not natural.
For a moment, the dark smoke is still around Isaiah ... but then a low, evil laughter begins to echo. It takes only a second to realize the laughter is echoing inside the heads of those who fight here, and with it comes a sudden urge to give into everyone's worst sin.
Ash moves more fantically now, frenetically, their skirt flying as their legs do the same. Acrobatic leaps, belly dancing twists, and ballet prancing works together to move them more frantically around the large circle, causing their chest to heave and pant with their movement. The trail of magic light flashes as it's empowered by their heated blood as well as the symbols they carve.
"You ungraceful thing," Autumn narrows her eyes, gritting her teeth as she finds herself in the dark with only the glow of her bracelet as light. "You are as big mouth as that Novel guy." With both hand, she makes gestures and signs while keeping her focus and sending her energy out even in her condition. "Go back to Hell from where you came, or else."
Out of the smoke charges an armed and armored warrior, spun out of black mist. He is dressed head to toe in archaic plate armor, wielding some huge, two-handed sword as black as his armor. With a roar, he rushes at Isaiah, swinging the sword in some attempt to cut off their head.
The longer the magicka continues, the more that animal displays itself and less the man within Kah. Teeth are bared, and they gnash at the air as his eyes search for something anything he can levy his Wrath against before the finally begin to settle onto Autumn. A step toward them, and another as broad axe-handle shoulders shake and quiver from the desparate attempt not to shift into his True Self here in the middle of the street for all to see. He almost stalks the Orderite, this time he all but swats imperiously at that smoke-formed warrior as if to send it flying.
Ash laughs as they dance, singing loudly. "I'm only happy when it rains! I'm only happy when it's complicated! And though I think you can't appreciate it, I'm only happy when it rains"! They reach a crescendo as they dance, now upwind of Kah, as they dance feverishly, filling the air with the light of their body as the circle nears completion. "You know I love it when the news is baa-ad! Why it feels so good to feel so saa-ad? I'm only happy when it rains!" They wink to Kah and Isaiah as they drawl seductively, "Pour your misery down! Pour your misery down on me! Pooour your misery down! Poooour your misery down on me!" They cackle, as if high all of a sudden.
Ash finally brings the circle to completion, dancing to bring one end to the other, causing the circle to light up brightly before exploding to disperse the mist.
An eerie stillness settles over the graveyard, the fog thickening like an otherworldly veil. The ground trembles, and two ghostly armies surge forth, locked in a battle that defies time. One side, draped in ethereal armor, charges with spectral weapons, while the other hurls crackling bolts of elemental magic. The air is alight with haunting energy as the spirits, long dead, resume their eternal battle, heedless of the living who are caught in their spectral warpath.
Elora kneels in the overgrown grass, her vivid hair a burst of neeon green and blue against the dark night. All the darker for the stormclouds which are no longer dropping rain. She tucks a strand behind her ear, a thoughtful expression softening her features. As her fingers glide over the soil, she grips a slender wooden stick, drawing a perfect circle in the dirt with practiced ease.
The ground here is grassy and blanketed by an eerie hush. The fog is thickening, but she moves with purpose as she practices something she Knows - rituals are not new to her and neither are spirits.
Elora notes the rising of the eerie stillness that has settled over the graveyard. The thick fog. The trembling ground. ALready, she is drawing out runic protection for herself to help against the coming onslaught. She moves with quick precision, tracing out thorns coming off the circle and forming complex spiraling patterns with her at the center. The thorns face outward.
As a battalion of armored specters marches forth, a group of wraith-like sorcerers unleashes a storm of arcane missiles, shattering the ghostly shields; the resulting shockwave threatens to make ears bleed, if someone gets caught without cover.
Elora can see the battle taking place. Two spectral armies, clashing. She is ready when the batallion of armored specters marches forth, ready when the group of sorcerors launch arcane missiles that are blocked by ghostly shields. The shockwave of force from the ghostly memory of magic pierces the night like a gunshot or a siren's wail, but it deadens against the circle of thorns which now begin to glow faintly as energy flows through them. They glow with the same colors as the ghostly magic itself, pulsing as if alive.
Elora with her defense seen to now sets to work in banishing. There are more then a few ghosts amid the clashing batallaions. She sets her sights on the ghosts which caused the crashing against her protection.
She pauses, her teal eyes glowing faintly in the dim light. With a subtle motion of her wrist, she adds a line to the circle, then anothereach deliberate stroke shaping sharp, intricate thorn patterns around its edge.
The thorny circle is complete now, a barrier that might hold back even the most determined ghost or vengeful spirit. Theres a certain reverence in her expression as she draws back, sitting on her heels to inspect her work. The glowing runes throb gently, casting faint shadows that dance over her delicate hands and forearms. She glances up at the cloudy sky, the waxing gibbous moon veiled by the thick, dark storm clouds. Its dim, silvery light barely illuminates the cemetery, leaving much to be imagined in the long, dark stretches between the graves.
Faintly she murmurs under breath - words, words which have power. She isn't a ritualist alone, but someone who knows how to add power beyond symbols through her voice. The incantation speeds her casting as she banishes one of the spectral sorcerors.
Elora stands in the midst of it all, an oasis of calm amidst chaos. Her wild, vivid hair of neon green and deep blue swirls around her face like a storm's eye, the colors seeming almost alive as they catch the ambient glow of her magic. Beneath the shrouded night sky, flashes of silver light flicker over the open field, revealing the jagged lines of broken formations and bodies crumpled amidst shattered weapons and discarded armor.
A faint glow emanates from her hands, ethereal light coalescing into complex sigils that seem to dance on her fingertips. With each twist of her wrist, each subtle motion of her arm, the sigils grow brighter, their forms spinning and shifting, like serpents of light.
Her gaze, cool and assessing, sweeps over the remnants of the armies clashing before her. Soldiers press forward, blades gleaming and shields raised,
The air thickens with an unnatural fog as ghostly archers let loose a volley of arrows. The projectiles are swept away by a whirlwind conjured by spectral windcallers, and the gust of wind sends everyone alive flying against tombstones with bone-jarring force.
The wind hits like a hammer. Elora hair, already a wild tangle of deep blue and neon green, flares out around her head in a radiant storm of color. The gust shoves her back, feet lifting off the ground for a heartbeat. She gasps as shes thrown off balance, the breath stolen from her lungs. The world tilts, a blur of grey headstones and glowing sigils as the wind carries her through the air.
Her body slams against a tombstone with bone-jarring force. Pain lances up her spine, but she bites back the cry, gritting her teeth. Her shoulders crash against the weathered stone, her back arching as the impact sends shockwaves through her frame. The stone cracks under the force, ancient inscriptions splintering beneath her weight.
For a moment, everything is a dizzy haze. Her vision swims, and she blinks, struggling to focus as the wind continues to howl around her, shrieking through the cemetery like a maddened beast. She forces herself to sit up, fingers digging into the rough stone behind her for support. The cold surface bites into her palms, grounding her in reality.
Face set in determination she rises, as the wind fades and limps her way back to her protective circle.
Slowly, Elora draws in another breath, centering herself, and her fingers trace the air in front of her. Glowing runes materialize, flickering like embers caught in a storm, swirling around her in a protective barrier. She murmurs under her breath once more, sending another banishing out. This time she targets a group of spectral windcallers. The banishing catches them and whisks them away.
Elora stumbles slightly, leaning against the fractured tombstone for support. Her chest heaves with effort, sweat trickling down her brow despite the cold. The clashing armies at war are at least somewhat repelled but she now moves again to add more details to her circle drawn within the ground. Partly, to fix it, in places where the wind tore at it, and broke its power. Partly to add lines of force to help soften such blows in the future.
As a battalion of armored specters marches forth, a group of wraith-like sorcerers unleashes a storm of arcane missiles, shattering the ghostly shields; the resulting shockwave threatens to make ears bleed, if someone gets caught without cover.
Elora lips are in constant motion, murmuring an unbroken stream of incantations. The sound is soft, almost a whisper, each word half-lost to the thick, swirling fog that blankets the battlefield. What little reaches the ear has a lyrical, almost hypnotic quality, like an ancient song hummed beneath one's breath. She breathes out fragments of magicwords shaped by purpose, each syllable weighted with power.
"aether's weave and shadow's thread bind and break, sever and shatter"
Her voice dips low, a rhythmic chant that resonates with the faint glow of the sigils spiraling from her fingertips. The words are elusive, slipping away like the mist itself. "fade to dream and dust to air unravel ties, release despair"
Elora once again finds that her protections are enough - the wail comes - crashing against her fortress of thorn covered spirals and somehow the wail get trapped as if an animal caught in bramble. Panting, cringing, she realizes that her protection held. Suddenly she is baring her teeth. Glaring out at the spirits as if to feign that she had not been afraid and was not afraid.
Elora resumes her use of Incantation paired with Ritualism. Her voice dips low, a rhythmic chant that resonates with the faint glow of the sigils spiraling from her fingertips. The words are elusive, slipping away like the mist itself. "seek no solace, hold no claim begone, forgotten, without name"
Elora continued to draw shapes on the ground. "Is anyone else coming? An army by myself is not easily banished!" Her complaint hangs in the air. Unheard. Unnoticed. Uncared for. The spectral bettle swallows it.
Elora says "I'll just have to do it on my own."
The air thickens with an unnatural fog as ghostly archers let loose a volley of arrows. The projectiles are swept away by a whirlwind conjured by spectral windcallers, and the gust of wind sends everyone alive flying against tombstones with bone-jarring force.
Elora refocuses on her efforts. With her work done at defense in the spiraling thorns around her she now focuses more on banishing spirit after spirit with the banishing ritual. But then, again, the volley of arrows comes. She is thrown this time with great force. She lets out a cry of pain as she once more cracks into a tombstone. She stands, blood trickling from her arm where it was rubbed raw by the tombstone. "Gone... forgotten... without name," she hisses out. Power, not just from the runes, thrums out of her. Her necklace vibrates against her as illusions of runes break out around her. The completion of the spell comes more quickly and she banishes another group of windcallers.
Elora pants lightly, going to one knee, getting her body lower as she looks among the specters that are clashing for signs of other groups of windcallers. One of her hands grips into the grass as if to anchor herself while the other sketches more twisting, sharp, and curved sigils. "Gone," she pants. "Forgotten," she mutters. "Without name," she insists.
Elora looks around at the chaos of the spectral armies clashing adidst the fog of the graveyard. One spirit, she could banish. Another, she could banish. Yet it was not just one spectre. It was hosts. A re-enactment of ancient battle and she was there on her own. Struggling on her own. A little nexus of blue and green amid a world of gray. A bit of nature amid the desolation of death.
A ghostly battlemage hurls a ball of fire, deflected mid-air by a phantom knight's shield, causing an explosion that sends searing heat and blinding light across the battlefield.
Elora raises her hand against the sudden flare of light and shies away from the burning heat which lights the world of dark and mist within the graveyard. Unconciously, she steps back. The explosion doesn't leave her stunned. Instead if has her baring her teeth toward the mage.
"Gone, forgotten, without name," she incants along, fueling her spell casting with words attuned to it.
Neon and turquoise light flicks about running through various runes and sigils, spiraling around them, and spiraling around the girl with hair of such a similar color. Her teal eyes are full of worry rather than confidence, but her bared teeth have a fierceness to them as she tries to feign a vicious smile. Perhaps, if the ghosts were paying her any mind, rather than fighting each other, it would have been worth something. As it was, the feigned confidence was for an empty graveyard - at least, empty of the living. Elora, she needed that desperate confidence, and so she snarled and smiled all the same.
Elora was starting to look tired after the nearly thirty minutes of continuous chanting and casting. A vanishing didn't take much in the way of life force, but being thrown about did. Still, there were signs of progress. In some places the spectral forces had thinned. Certaintly she had made progress on the ghosts which had been so painfully hurling her about. There were much fewer of those now.
Her dress was dirty after the flinging. Filthy with the mud of the graveyard. The diminuitive girl didn't seem to notice.
Two spectral generals lock eyes from across the battlefield as their armies collide in a chaotic whirlwind of steel and spell. One of them has a blade wreathed in fire; the other conjures a vertex of ice-cold magic around him - their collision sends a shockwave rippling through the graveyard that knocks everyone off their feet and cracks all nearby gravestones right in half.
Elora amid her protections skids and falters back, breaking through her own circle in the process as magic overwhelms her defenses. The clash of the two generals suddenly upon each other and the resulting shockwave which cracks a tombstone in half has Elora's eyes widening in alarm. Thick stone, broken, too easy to imagine that being her own body.
Elora begins once more to sketch out runes of banishing. More exhausted now, but also more focused, she takes aim not at the troops but at the leaders. The two generals and their clash have made them stand out from the rabble. Green and blue light whisks around her, casting ambience over the specters which fight nearby. "Seek no solace, hold no claim... Begone, forgotten, without name." The chanting speeds the flow of energy through the runes and sends power lancing out to strike and rip at the two generals locked in combat.
Elora looks about as she tries to sense whether there is any difference for having targeted the generals. The clash of silvery bodies in battle is chaos all about her. Her eyes flit this way and that. She was no warrior to read battlefields like a book and so she was uncertain.
Elora set back to drawing rune after rune, more the time. And then still more. Each small so she could fit another beside it as she prepared for a more massive working now that the ghosts had thinned somewhat.
Elora trembled faintly as she drew, skin clammy and slick with sweat despite the cold. The chill of death all around her was sapping. The cold of the grve setting her to shiver. Her teeth clattered and hot tears spilled from her as she struggled to draw yet more ruins.