Blood Battle

"Blood Battle" is a [SEASON NUMBER] thread written on [IRL DATE].
==Summary==
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==Full Text==
The Warden felt like the embodiment of the heat of war herself. Shaking, steaming, focused, hot, glowing if she were astrally present. The presence of Grey comforted her, but the appearance of Milae irritated her. At the same time, his abilities would be invaluable. 
Avoid any liquids or foods, she hissed to both of them. Touch nothing suspect. Don’t separate yourself. This, she targeted at Milae, and he twitched his ears silently. We take little risk, so we can fight another day. And with that, she began surveying the barn.
Mar 16, 2020
“Noted, Nala,” Grey said under her breath as she held her sword ready to fight. “The man I just encountered said that Rhenco did something to their well. Rhenco had to have put the Red Card in it to infect everyone.”
Shadow began to sniff the ground around her for any signs of Rhenco. 
Mar 16, 2020
As the barn doors were nudged open, they saw the man seated on the other side, a boar half breed held at knife point. Rhenco’s face was unmoving as they entered as he spoke evenly at them from across the room. “You’re all late…and I even know why…”
Mar 16, 2020
“I didn’t realize we had to be here at a certain time, Rhenco,” she said holding her sword in a defensive stance with Shadow crouching beside her growling at her. “Perhaps, you need to be more specific. Besides, your new friends kept us occupied. Oh, may I suggest you teach them how to treat a lady?”
Mar 16, 2020
“Specific…” Rhenco mused as he tapped the flat of the knife lightly against his hostages neck. “Okay…specifically have that fire mage explain to Sven that it’s her fault I’m going to take him away again after this.”
His gaze drifted towards Milae, and then around them as if looking for someone else. “I found someone you know Milae…I am so, glad, you’re here. And demon…welcome…find a way to physically manifest in the next five minutes and I’ll give the heir back wrists in tact once I’m done with him.”
Mar 16, 2020
The goat half-breed didn’t answer. He was staring with huge eyes at Rhenco’s hostage, who blearily looked up at Milae and then back down again. “Bhaem,” Milae breathed.
“You’re not real,” he mumbled, clearly tormented and lackluster over the danger he was in.
“Of course I’m real…”
“No, you’re dead.”
“Bhaem–”
The Warden was already arranging a lockdown of Haligan. Why should I comply with anything you want to request of me? she finally answered, trying to stay composed and commanding. This is as real as I will become for you. Let him go, and tell us where to find the nearest stash of Red Card.
Mar 16, 2020
The Night Fury growled at Rhenco’s threat to taking Sven again, and she wanted more than anything to blast him into oblivion. She readied a plasma blast.
“No, not yet, Shadow,” Grey quickly said holding a hand up to stop her dragon. Her hand that was holding the sword was shaking as she heard Rhenco threaten her son…her baby boy. She then turned to Rhenco. “Sven is no longer your little pet…or whatever he was to you, and if you even think of going near him…I’ll do more than punch you in the face. Now…release the half-breed, tell us where the Red Card is, and come with us quietly.”
Mar 16, 2020
“Every minute you stay invisible to is another day I keep Sven. Set whatever precautions you want. You haven’t stopped me from kidnapping anyone before, and you won’t be able to start now…”
He nodded his head towards the sunken floor, multiple head bobbing in the red bath. Milae could see his own head among them, and became acutely aware of a fuzzy feeling that settled over the barn like a haze. “Come on Milae…let’s do this all over again. And if you want red card draw some from the well. There’s plenty to go around…”
He held up a finger. “Now…I brought you here, because for one thing, I told Milae I would do this. And secondly, to play an old, old game…‘Can you get over to me, and save your friend…without me slashing his throat’?”
Mar 16, 2020
We need to leave, Nala silently urged Grey and Milae. We cannot engage. We need to go and protect Haligan.
Milae was jittering slightly in place. He lifted his arms, activated, and after the swell of dizziness in everyone’s heads had cleared, he was standing in the same place, with the same numb horror in his eyes, even though his face was still mostly obscured. His breathing grew strained and fast. “What do you want?” he said hoarsely.
Mar 16, 2020
Rhenco sensed the willingness to disengage, and hot irritation coiled through him. Their initial threats of violence and assumption that he planned some kind of invasion humors him. …but he didnt like this…
“I want you to come closer…all of you. Just not to fast.” His one eye narrowed ever so slightly. “None of you bail on me now…unless you want this boars head to hang by a thread.”
Mar 16, 2020
“What about my son?” Grey asked through gritted teeth. 
Shadow continued to growl behind her with the plasma blast ready in her mouth. 
Mar 16, 2020
“Nothing you can do about him, you already tried to interrupt what I was doing here and that…” the knife tip touched the side of Bhaem’s cheek. “So…are you really that scared to walk through a little blood…or am I killing him tonight?”
Mar 16, 2020
Nala prepared to stop Milae at any cost, for she could see that he had no intention of leaving with Grey, and then something tickled the edge of her awareness, and she turned away in horror, her essence becoming visible around Grey and Milae like a nebulous red cloud. No–!!
An arrow whizzed past the Chief and the half-breed, its trajectory trailing both a banner of light and a streak of shadow, and buried itself in Rhenco’s right shoulder. It sputtered for a moment, and then a thundering BANG echoed through the barn and the arrow exploded outwards in a thin arc, cutting a splashing wave of force through the bloody pool in front of Rhenco. It released a white-gold flash bright enough to blind everyone with physical eyes, and then directly afterwards, an explosion of black fog filled the barn, further obscuring the area.
Milae took the opportunity by the throat; he immediately dashed forward to where he last saw Rhenco, drawing his blade. The Warden solidified and engaged as well, the tense moment snapped into chaos as she reached for Rhenco’s mind and tried to disable anything and everything she could find.
Mar 16, 2020
Rhenco hit and slid on the hardwood floor, leaving a smear in his wake. His arm and shoulder dangled from his torso from where it had been nearly ripped away. For a moment Nala felt her mind strike against the shield that prevented her from reaching the deeper parts of his mind. His hand reached out to grab at her, and then he gasped as he felt Milae’s blade slid into him once more. 
He coughed blood as he looked down at his chest, and then up at his own bloodied hand grasping at Nala’s form. 
Blood…
A blood stained hand…
A demon standing over him…
He blinked a few times. “This was it…” he gurgled as blood welled from his mouth. “This is what it was…I think…I think I can…” 
His eyes widened as he leaned back against the ground, his gaze rolling to Milaie’s. “We…barely…talked…”
Mar 16, 2020
As soon as Grey and Shadow were able to collect themselves, she and Shadow ran over to Rhenco until they were standing over him. This was it. It was finally over, and as she realized this, she glared at the madman wishing that Brandt was here to see this as well. Ever since his threat came over the rebellion…their family, they wanted this more than anything. 
The Chief knelt down. “It’s over for you,” she said. “You will no longer be a threat to my Rebellion or my family, especially my son and daughters.” She grabbed a bottle from her pocket…Monstrous Nightmare gel and poured it over the sword. Shadow fired a little plasma blast igniting it. 
“Last chance, where’s the nearest stash of Red Card?” she asked. 
Mar 16, 2020
Nalaagura leaned everything she had into prying apart the walls of Rhenco’s mind, trying to find something about his secrets, his motivations, anything. It was like a red-hot iron pike being driven into stone itself, cracking and melting and spitting sparks, and at the same time, she pushed a hand out backwards and stopped two figures, one short and cloaked and one lanky and tall, from entering the barn. Stay back. 
Milae’s face twisted up in a hidden scowl as he twisted the naginata a few times deeper into Rhenco’s body before releasing it and hurrying over to Bhaem, who had been tossed sideways by the arrow’s explosion. He was covered in gore and several burns, but he hadn’t taken the brunt of the blow, as Rhenco had. “Shit, you did it,” he mumbled, sluggishly gripping Milae’s scarred arms as a new light of hope glimmered in his eyes. “You didn’t die that time.”
“I’m harder to kill than you think.” He squeezed Bhaem’s hand and started to help him up.
Mar 16, 2020
The heads had returned to their true image, the faces of the afflicted villagers…
Rhenco had gone so still only his eyes and lips could move lazily. Nala’s probe failed to pry away the stubborn wall, a brilliant alchemist pattern flaring in her mind across the shield. At the center of the protective circle was a familiar shape, a familiar feeling, and a familiar smell. The alchemic recipe flares hotter, and repelled her away.
Rhenco blinked once sluggishly. “When I come back…” he murmured to Grey. “You’ll hand me Sven willingly…and I’ll tear him in half in front of you…” They flicked over to Nala. “I never wanted to hurt the rebellion…just a few in it…”
Finally they turned towards Milae. “I wish…you’d…come…back…”
His eyes glazed over, and his skin blackened as the smell of burned hair and flesh touched their noses, and a chill swept through the room…
Mar 16, 2020
Fury burned inside of her. Her hands shook as she held her sword...tightly before she grabbed his hair forcing him to look at her and placing the flaming sword dangerously close to his throat. “My son is going nowhere with you,” Grey said, “and you will no longer be threat to us. I will find a way to get rid of you...once...and for all.” 
Nala turned completely aside, staring down the two young adults in the open front door of the barn. The girl stepped slightly behind the boy as he locked eyes with the demon, twisting up his nose a little at her expression. 
You both are in an incredible amount of trouble.
“We actually just saved his life,” Liam said, signing as he spoke and pointing at the boar that Milae was trying to help limp out of the barn. “So, you’re welcome.”
You could have gotten infected, and then where would we be? Nala argued, still surrounding the large group protectively. Come along. We have no time for this. We must return to Haligan. Call your dragons.
We need Red Card, Kendra interrupted, pointing back to the center of town. We need to cure everyone.
Liam grabbed her wrist. “Later. That is a terrible plan right now.” She pulled her hand away and made a face at him. 
We can’t just leave them! They’ll tear each other apart!
Mar 16, 2020
The Chief seethed as Rhenco crumbled to dust in her hand. Her fury built up more and more, and yet she closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths. 
“What is your sister saying, Liam?” Grey said trying to keep her anger in check with her back to the Arnason children. 
Mar 16, 2020
“She wants to stay and fix the town,” he said angrily, and she balled up her fists behind him and shoved past him, walking quickly towards Grey. Nala fed Grey a stream of Kendra’s translated words as she made sure the surrounding area was secure. 
We have to do something, Grey, they’re people just like us! They’re sick! We can cure them!
“We’re not gonna have time,” Liam spat. “And it’s too dangerous.”
Everyone go back to Haligan, Nala spoke up, turning around in the middle of the group and raising her hands to waist level. The air around her hands shimmered with heat. I can fix this, but the rest of you need to go, immediately. The dragon Liam and Kendra had borrowed hit the ground behind the siblings, called by the Warden’s mind. Liam looked disgruntled and Kendra looked indignant, but they looked at each other and conceded. 
“That guy need a ride or does he zap all over the place, too?” Liam asked, jerking his chin at the boar half-breed they had rescued. Milae shook his head and started helping him towards the dragon.
Bhaem grunted. “Zap all over the…?”
“I can explain later.”
Mar 16, 2020
“I agree with Nala and Kendra,” she said before placing a hand on Kendra’s shoulder with a small smile trying to push down her anger toward Rhenco. “Nala will be the one to adminster the Red Card since she is unaffected. Everyone else, we return to Haligan Island. Rhenco promised to come after my son again, and we have to protect the Rebellion.”
Mar 16, 2020
Everyone quickly mounted, and as the dragons lifted their wings, Milae, in tandem, raised his arms to his chest, and disappeared with a blinking flash. 
The Warden turned her blank face to the center of town and began moving down the street, not running, but neither meandering. She walked at a brisk, purposeful pace, and as she passed the feral, screaming, bleeding residents of the town, they sensed her presence, heavy and thick and hot, and they began following, and she brought them in tow to the shanty courtyard that had been constructed at the heart of Temple Gate. She took in the crowd that was gathering from all directions, and pity and sorrow coursed through her being, as she turned away and stepped up on top of the wall of the well, straddling it with her two heeled porcelain feet. The diseased people began to close in.
Rest easy. Her body began shining, a rainbow of scarlet and amber and ultraviolet and cobalt, and she lifted her hands again, two beacons of radiant light that shone in the night like a new sun. Everything will be alright, little ones.
The water beneath her, deep down in the well, began to boil and steam. It started to rise slowly, but as it reached a certain point, it became hot enough that all it turned into was superheated steam, the temperature and glow of a dragon’s maw, and it began to roll forth from the well, like a thick white smoke signal. She let it billow and cool into a low cloud, hovering above Temple Gate, and then she surged with energy again, pulling the steam inwards towards her, and it began to tumble through the dirt paths and homes of the disease-stricken town, simmering red with both demonic energy and the poison and cure that it carried. 
The people began to sag in place as their lungs filled with the humid air, and the cries of bloodlust and derangement turned into shock, fear and horror as they started to realize what they had become, and seeing the demon work her magic at the apex of their small settlement. Nala grimly let the cure pass through the entire town and a mile or so into its edges before pulling it back in and letting it condensate in the well, turning her attention to the mental well-being of the people around her. It was going to be a long night yet.
Mar 17, 2020
The Chief furrowed her eyebrows together as her Night Fury flapped her wings away from the village. She didn’t even bother to look behind her at Temple Gate. She knew that Nala could be trusted with curing the village, and she had other things to worry about: like how Rhenco threatened to take her son again...and how he was potentially going to come to Haligan Island. The mere thought of the madman coming to her island...hurting her family made her grit her teeth and grip Shadow’s reigns tightly. She wanted to scream, but she couldn’t...not in front of Liam and Kendra. 
She took a deep breath and turned to her comrades’ kids. “Let’s pick up speed, Liam,” she said. “The sooner we get back the better.”
Category:BOTGD 2
Category:Events
Category:Act I
Category:The Warden
Category:Grey Bergman
Category:Liam Arnason
Category:Kendra Arnason
Category:Rhenco
Category:Bhaem
Category:Yun Milae
Category:Shadow