• Closed • The Fountain of Youth (Pt. 2)

[Pash Raj'oriq]

There hadn’t really been a single step in this Immortals forsaken jungle that hadn’t been a wrong one, and this all sunk further into Pash’s mind as the cold, dark water clawed through his clothes and skin, gnawing toward his very bones. The water was deep, that much he could tell, but he’d made a choice that was perhaps less helpful than it’d seemed just a few heartbeats ago: it was becoming increasingly difficult to swim and hold a torch.

The seafaring minstrel frowned, not for the first time that trial, and as he tread water for a few trills and made a decision, he realized something:

The water was moving.

While he had yet to feel anything move in the water (because, why should he … didn’t they all just have that discussion?), he did feel the water moving. He knew of currents, he understood how water moved from higher ground to lower ground on land and how warm and cold water flowed in various directions and to form different, permanent, predictable currents in the sea. He used those currents for navigation, too—they were like invisible streams in the Orm’Del that told a sailor which way to go. While he wasn’t at all confident on how water worked underground, let alone on land at all to be honest, the tall Biqaj at least knew that when water was flowing, it was going somewhere. Was that somewhere better than here?

He couldn’t swim with the torch, however, not really. He wouldn’t be able to be in control of himself against the tug.

Pash didn’t necessarily have the full length of time he would have liked to consider his options—he really hadn’t all trial for obvious reasons—and part of him couldn’t imagine how going further down, especially down under water was at all going to help them get out of this strange place. But water had to flow somewhere if it was, indeed, flowing, and the seafaring musician could only hope that wherever it was going was perhaps better than their current location. He also knew that he couldn’t fight against the current forever, that he would grow tired especially in the cold and eventually be forced to give into something on its strong terms instead of on his own.

So, if anything worse was really going to happen that trial, the Biqaj decided that water was at least an appropriate harbinger of his own inappropriately time and unfortunately rudely unannounced end. May U’Frek forgive his poor, rash decisions and may Kali’rial forgive him for being a heartless ass who didn’t loudly proclaim his feelings the very moment he knew he had them out of fear they were just some Empathy-induced ruse. By Chrien’s ire, he was sure that after the Immortal’s Tongue he couldn’t quiet despise himself more, but Faith had so kindly pointed out his ineptitude. This was a fate he deserved for attempting to prove otherwise, regardless of the faint good of his intentions. Truly, he begged in wordless prayer, may his Maker have some undeserved mercies on his ridiculous self in this cold, liquid darkness.

Twisting, he tossed the torch back toward the tunnel they’d left behind, though he wasn’t necessarily attempting to be accurate. Could Tio or Veyre swim? Probably not as well as he could, if at all. Even if they could, they wouldn’t be able to fight the current for long, either, and as much as he would have liked to speak up and discuss these details with them, he also couldn’t.

So, with a deep inhale and his desperate desire to get home his only light in the darkness, he let the current be his guide instead of his enemy.

His goal was a simple one: not to drown until that became the only option.

Off Topic

Just let me know if I've gotta retcon Saun and re-roll. <3

[Tio Silver]

The freezing cold water washed over Tio, sending a violent shudder running through his body as the inky black liquid enveloped him. With panicked, untrained strokes he kicked and clawed at the water, forcing his way up through the depths and back to the surface. Spirits this was cold! Why did water have to be so fricking dangerous?! If he survived this he was definitely going to learn to swim properly, because right now he couldn't help but feel that he looked like a drowning dog with the way he was thrashing about.

The second his head came up above water again Tio gasped in as much air as he could and floated on his back for a little bit whilst his mind got over the shock of the cold. Pash had made the choice to join him in the water by then, and as the Biqaj swam forward with a torch in hand Tio watched him and tried his best to copy his movements, kicking evenly with his feet and moving his arms in a paddling motion. It felt weird to do, but it was better than the impression of an underwater donkey he'd been doing earlier. Most importantly though he tried his hardest to keep his breathing even, forcing himself to make take long, deep breaths and keep his head above the waterline.

It was only a few feet later that things started to go wrong.

It began with a pull in the water, a disturbance in the otherwise steady but gentle pull downwards. At first Tio thought that it must have just been a water current, and considered that perhaps he'd been wrong in his assumption that this was an isolated cave lake. Now that he thought about it wasn't Scaltoth Jungle right next to the edge of the island? Perhaps they'd gone further in than he'd thought and this cave was connected to the sea?

He was cut off from his thoughts by a deafening screech, the kind loud enough to shake a man's very bones, and froze in horror as something tough, scaly and very very large brushed against his leg. He'd been wrong, dead wrong. There was something in the water after all, and judging by that screech it wasn't likely to be friendly.

Abruptly the noise ceased, and a deafening silence took hold of the place and seemed to freeze time itself. The creature's that'd been coming after them down the tunnel must have been scared away, leaving them the only beings around for the monster of the lake to snack on. Tio waited in tense silence for the inevitable shift in the water as the beast charged upwards to devour them, but as time past and nothing changed the thief found himself beginning to relax.

"What do you know, perhaps the monster isn't going to eat us after a-..."

With a jolt the waters suddenly shifted, spiraling around itself and pulling them down like a whirlpool with increasing force. If he had a future beyond this moment in which to tell tales of his deeds to others, Tio would tell them that at this moment he bravely faced the coming danger with his head held high and made not a sound. What he actually did however was scream like a little girl and instinctively start to swim away from the danger as best as he could. But Tio was no swimmer, nor was he especially strong or enduring, and so had no hope of fighting against the growing currents. Flailing like a fish out of water Tio was pulled into the dark depths.

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[Pegasus]

Really, this expedition into the jungle had been cursed from the beginning. Of course, that wasn't entirely true and, should our intrepid adventurers make their way out of this alive, they might realise the subtle but very important difference. It wasn't that it was cursed, it was that they'd not planned for it at all. Not with supplies, not with contingencies. As, in fact, the water seeped through all of their clothes and soaked their items, they might just get to the point of thinking that just wandering into a jungle was not the best of plans.

If they chose to come back and, this time, did their homework, they might even realise that this time, they'd gotten off lucky.

However, for any of that to happen, they had to survive. So, Pash prayed and Tio cussed and really, they did what was their only sensible option. At least, should they survive, they'd be able to argue that at least I didn't try and fight it when the water started pulling me!. That would probably not go a long way, but it might. It might.

So, a few things became apparent, very quickly. There were things down there and, in the last trill before allowing the water to take him, Pash might just recognise that they were trying to get to his torch. Like those strange sea-creatures who used lights to attract others, so too did these and they sensed and saw an interloper.

But, really, there was limited time and less opportunity to notice such things as the little orbs of light dangling from the many and numerous large creatures with lots of teeth who swam around them. Those creatures seemed entirely unconcerned by the swirling current they were caught in, yet no matter how much they fought (if they fought at all) they couldn't escape it.

And the swirling darkness took them.

All sense of direction was soon lost, the pull on them was enormous and physically painful. They were in a tumultuous vortex of water which dragged them down, into a narrow tunnel at the bottom of the water. In there, they continued to be pulled and tossed around, although they could gulp in desperate gulps of air every now and then. Had they not been able to, they would have inevitably died. It was the ultimate adrenaline rush as they bumped and slid their way, getting small cuts here and there, heavy bumps against walls and rocks and a swirling, desperate need to breathe, just to be able to breathe.

Then, suddenly, from the blackness they popped and the woefully unprepared travelers found themselves at the top of a waterfall. Not for long, of course, as they tumbled down and landed with a splash in the crystal blue lake below. It wasn't somewhere they knew, immediately, but they were in the open air. They were breathing. There were cuts and abrasions, bruises and scars. They each had swallowed water and the two males might notice that, somewhere along the lines, they seemed to have lost Veyre.

But they were in a lake of crystal water at, should they explore even a little, what seemed to be the edge of the jungle (although not where they entered). There was no fountain of youth in sight. But then, continuing their exploration was always possible, if they so chose.

[Tio Silver]

Tio closed his eyes and grit his teeth as the massive weight of the water crashed around him, dragging him down into the depths. In an instant he was tossed, turned and spun around so fast that he couldn't tell up from down, and he had to clamp his hands down over his mouth to stop the air in his lungs escaping. So this was how it ended then; drowned in an underwater lake beneath an inhospitable jungle? It was doubtful that his corpse would be discovered in the next thousand arcs, so hopefully it wasn't true that burial rites were needed for someone to pass on to the afterlife or else he'd be stuck here for a long time.

Just as his lungs were about to give out his head broke above the surface of the water again, and Tio gasped in air greedily before the water could pull him back in again. As he did his eyes registered that they weren't in the the cavern from before anymore, now they were in some kind of tunnel. The water flowed down it like rapids, dragging him screaming along with it and dashing him against the floor and walls occasionally as it twisted and turned deeper and deeper into the earth, and for a second Tio wandered if perhaps this current was going to sweep him into the beneath.

But before he could be smashed to death upon the rocks a hole of daylight appeared before him, growing closer and closer with alarming speed, and as he went into it Tio suddenly felt as if he was completely weightless. For a split second time seemed to freeze, and Tio took in the sight of the sky up above him with an odd feeling of tranquility. Then he looked down, and panic welled up in his chest as he saw an incredibly high drop bellow him.

"AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!" He yelled as gravity caught him again, and like a stone the Yludih plummeted down into the pool bellow. The wind and water whipped past his face teasingly, laughing at him for his inability to fly, and with a hard smack Tio hit the water bellow.

The shock of the blow must have made him black out for a second, because the next this he could remember was coming to washed up at the corner of the pool. His body ached all over, his eyes were bleary and his breathing was heavy, but even so he was still alive. For a few seconds he thought of nothing at all and kept staring up at the sky, savoring the feeling of being alive, and then the memory of the rapids came rushing rushing back to him, bringing with them an uncontrollably urge to laugh. It stared off as a snicker, but as Tio turned over and crawled his way back up to dry land it grew louder and louder until he had to cover his sides with his hands because the laughter was making them hurt so much.

"We're alive! Haha! WE'RE ALIVE!" He yelled out to the world. "WE'RE ALIVE AND WE'RE OUT OF THE JUNGLE! HA! WHO WANTS TO DO THAT AGAIN!"

He shambled to his feet and tried to walk forwards, but his legs proved to weak to support him and buckled beneath him, making him fall to his knees. "I think- perhaps-... a tactical retreat might be in order." He gasped out between breaths. "But this- isn't over. I'll be back again- one day!"

But first he was having a good meal, a hot shower and a sleep on a nice comfy bed. Spirits knew he needed it.

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[Pash Raj'oriq]

Pash had sailed through most of his twenty-six arcs of life by the seat of his pants, recklessly following the enticing melodies of his insatiably curious heartstrings without much disciplined application of the steady rhythm of common sense. He had some, he did, but his aptitude at improvisation often chose to ignore the beat of that structured drum and follow his own whims. It was somewhat of a wonder he’d survived this long, to be honest, and to-trial was a dark reminder that his choices had consequences. Really cold, really terrifying consequences.

He’d made some terrible choices over the arcs, from his entanglement with Ari’nne in Rharne to leaving his family in Ne’haer one last time in 716. His regrets were heavy cargo, and as the rushing, swirling water yanked him roughly downward, the seafaring minstrel desperately attempted to focus on the positives that had grown from his mistakes. The swift current was violent in the narrow tunnel, and the opportunity to fill his burning lungs with air seemed woefully rare, but every breath was a hope, and Pash counted his way through them while struggling to stay conscious from the watery assault:

A gurgle for air—

The spark of Empathy wasn’t inherently bad, despite the circumstances of his Initiation.

Another painful gasp—

His travels had been full of beautiful experiences, even if his family had often needed him more than he knew.

Oh, thank U’Frek for one more breath—

Had he been home an arc ago, would he have lived? Or would his life had ended beside his brother’s? Would he have been able to keep his father from being injured, crippled? Would he really have been capable of running a business, of rebuilding?

That rock hurt—

Had he not sailed away, he wouldn’t have met Kali’rial, who had perhaps changed more things than he was capable of understanding in this moment, if at all.

A quick gulp in the darkness—

One more chance to change things, to make things matter.

Did he really need to reach the ends of the world to see so clearly? It felt like it. In the raging, watery darkness, he felt illuminated.

Or was this just what it felt like to stare mortality in the face when drowning? Of oxygen deprivation and pain?

For a heartbeat or two, the rush through the dark tunnel may had been thrilling, but the seafaring minstrel was far too busy throwing things overboard in his own mind to enjoy anything other than when he managed to take a fiery breath.

A faint glow filled the liquid doom and then the light of day was all but blinding, filling his mind with its vibrant brightness while a loud roaring of falling water snarled in his ears over the rush of his own panicked heartbeat. He may have let a shout of fear escape his lips had he somehow possessed the air in his lungs to spare, but the sound hardly left the hull of his chest as the tall Biqaj was unceremoniously tossed over the waterfall and down into the pool below. He heard Tio’s voice on the way down, which was a bit encouraging, though he had no time to be glad for it, the painful sting of hitting the surface of the pool exploding across every inch of his awkwardly positioned body.

Chunta! That hurt, and Pash let himself sink beneath the surface for a moment, no matter how desperate for more breath his lungs wanted him to know he was.

Weightless, only the sound of water filling his senses, the seafaring minstrel grasped at the threads of enlightenment and change for a heartbeat or two, seeing far too many things at once with a painful clarity. When he finally shifted and forced himself to break the surface with a kick or two, inhaling the warm air and treading water with sore limbs, Tio was laughing.

Laughing.

The cheeky, trouble-making bastard was laughing.

To be fair, the seafaring musician had agreed to everything. All of it. Every trill of the trial. He had wanted to prove something ... but from his current position, he couldn't even remember what that was. It hadn't been worth it. It hadn't been worth it at all. He'd still failed. Whatever it had been, it didn't matter.

Adrenaline taking its course through his veins as well, Pash may have finally smiled a little despite having spent so much of the trial frowning. Thank the Immortals, they were alive indeed,

"Again? Havakda! No thanks." The tall Biqaj managed a humorless sort of chuckle and made his own way to shore with a groan, sitting and taking stock of bumps, bruises, and blood. He knew most of the things in his rucksack were ruined, but here wasn’t the place to sort that out. Calloused fingers reached up to curl into dripping hair, dragging the sea-bleached mess out of his face, "Retreatin’ sounds like th’ first good idea all trial at this point, but we should look for Veyre a bit first, eh?"

Pash was doubtful, afraid, worried, and yet he’d already learned his limitations in the jungle that day. Perhaps she was just as lost as they, but through a different exit. Tidepool gaze swept up to judge the sun’s position in the sky, trying to determine the break to know how much daylight they had left, not wanting to be anywhere near the jungle after dark. He’d want to make at least a small effort to search for their lost companion, but knew he didn’t have much in him to make it an extended one. This hurt, inside, as much as his body ached and itched.

He was eager to get back to The Muse, to Kali’rial who wouldn’t even know why he had been missing, his secretive escape most likely festering into anger and hurt as the trial wore on. His selfish decisions had been stupid, and he’d be paying a high price for it. Perhaps too high, but he hoped not.

Still, he was alive.

Pash had been granted this opportunity to fix things, for the past handful of trials felt like some kind of heated crucible, crushing him with the weight of change.

Once no signs of their friend had been confirmed, the tall Biqaj was willing to stagger back towards town with Tio without too much reluctance, willing to admit defeat for a second time in less than ten trials. The end of the world was a tough place to adventure, that was for damn sure.

[Pegasus]

Veyre

Overview

Such a shame that you didn't get to see the end of this thread! I really like Veyre as a pc and I hope most sincerely that school pressures let up enough that you're able to come back and write with us again soon.

Points

XP:15

Fame:+5

Loot

Thank you for keeping your ledger updated!

Knowledge

Acrobatics: The art of falling
Detection: How the jungle looks
Detection: Reading others' emotions
Detection: The sound of scalvuffys
Endurance: Physical battering by water
Fieldcraft:Making marks to find your way home
Fieldcraft: Cloaks to protect from insect bites.
Hunting: Spotting tracks
Tactics: Be prepared
Tactics: Hiding in water to protect yourself.

Tio

Overview

There are no words to express how much I love Tio! He is determinedly optimistic, resoundingly cheerful and just always, always chipper! Your writing is truly excellent, great fun to read and I laughed aloud more than once during this thread. Technically, your writing is excellent and I'm always impressed with how you manage dialogue with Tio. Fantastic fun, a pleasure to write with. PM me with any questions

Points

XP:20 (may not be used for Domain magic. Moderated event)

Fame: +10

Loot

Your spelunking kit is soggy and you lost your torches.

Knowledge

Acrobatics: The art of falling
Detection: Low buzzing sounds
Detection: The sound of insects
Detection: Use what light is available to you
Detection: The moment the ground moves beneath you.
Discipline: Remaining determinedly cheerful
Endurance: The battering of standing under a waterfall
Endurance: Icy water
Endurance: Breath control (enforced)
Fieldcraft: Basic paths
Fieldcraft: Keep branches etc away
Hunting: Identifying tracks
Logistics: Be prepared for any eventuality
Logistics: Equipmnt is vital
Persuasion: Explaining how much you've achieved already!
Persuasion: Appeal to their ego.
Psychology: Grumpy people are grumpy
Swimming: Icy water is hard to swim in
Swimming: Treading water
Swimming: Kicking with your feet
Swimming: Paddling movements with your hands
Tactics:Improvisation is sometimes necessary
Tactics: Relying on improvisation is not a good plan
Tactics: Hide in water from insects

Pash

Overview

Oh, poor Pash. Regretful Pash is so sweet and funny. You wrote him with a real sense of "what on Idalos am I doing here?" and this feels like a turning point for him. He tried so hard to be the voice of reason and really was for a lot of it; it was interesting also to see him snap at Tio. That was really well written, I felt Pash's frustration there. Lots of fun to write and, it felt like, lots of character development. If I've missed anything, drop me a pm.

Points

XP: 20 (may not be used for Domain Magic. Moderated event)

Fame:+10

Loot

Damp sandals.

Knowledge

Acrobatics: The art of falling
Deception: Putting on a cheerful face
Detection: Noting who is armed in a group
Detection: The sounds of the jungle
Detection: Checking your environment
Detection: Finding someone by the sound of their voice in the dark
Discipline: Not losing your temper
Discipline: Putting aside your emotions to decision make.
Endurance: Bugs bite. Lots of Bug Bites
Endurance: The battering of a waterfall
Endurance: Bruised and battered against the rapids
Persuasion: Being clear why something is a really stupid idea
Persuasion: Stating what you are doing in the hope others follow
Psychology: Secrets can be dangerous
Swimming: Lowering yourself into ice water
Swimming: Swimming one-handed
Swimming: Holding a torch whilst swimming
Tactics: It's good to be prepared

All: I have awarded you skills knowledge. If you wish any non-skills knowledge about locations and each other, then please send me a list in pm and I will add it to your review here. Thanks!