Dare So. Come Here Often?

[Xenovia]

Fry it, cut it, survive. Xen's to-do list was getting longer by the second. Swinging her blade, the Deva scythed through tentacles and lashing limbs, seeking the heart of the monstrosity currently garnering her attention. Without potions, without a means to combat the malignant magic coating it, her odds of getting close enough to land the killing blow were looking quite scant.

But that was okay. She didn't need to be the one to kill it. Unlike Vincent.

The man was brave, she would give him that. Nimble, too. Fast because being slow meant being dead. Mercy was different, bigger, nigh as monstrous as the entity he was fighting. He did not Shift the way she did. Where hers was instantaneous, his took time. Precious seconds, when dancing the knife's edge between life and death.

Whirling her greatsword, Xen struck out at the black mass. Ichor splashed and sprayed. Pustulant skin oozed and shivered, contorting, so as to escape the kiss of her heated blade. A sac of something foul burst as the flame ate its way through the burbling body.

Turning, twisting, Xen threw herself clear as a half-decomposed leg shot out like an arrow to shatter against the wall.

 

[Vincent Brezat]

Where the blade struck, the thicker outer layer sizzled and charred, the cuts releasing the liquified slimy rot. Less lifesblood from a wound, or sap from a tree - it seeped like steam from a crack, fading in volume as it contacted the pustulent air, then thickened with a backdrop of susurrous squelches and bubbles in the slashed crevices of that horrendous primordial soup.

A moment came, a realization that the ooze was no uniform. And while it digested fast - it did so within thickening nodes of different composition, one of which Xenovia had just burst, moving its volume around to pull the consumed parts toward them.
The acid did not only spray outward - it rooted through the creature, branched into its liquid form in a splotchy pattern of dissolution.

It was moving slower, now. The arrows raining from above were staggering it, charred the outer layer that hindered the giant's maneuvers. But it was them, here, that were figuring it out - that could reach its globulous stomachs and rip them open. End it from within.

Mercy's transformation was, indeed, delayed. Delayed at the middling stage, where he was still bipedal, with opposing thumbs, but bulkier, with a layer of thick, coarse fur covering the skin and thick fat layered beneath it to soften the blows.

A glass vial crashed on the floor just before the black mold, and a bright yellow liquid snaked up into the cut left by a glass shard, as if magnetized to the necrotic energies. The monstrous oogloy attained an underlayer of color, murky greenish as the liquid spread all over it in swaths. But it seemed to not react with acid, the globule burst by Xen and other similar ones becoming much more visible.

There wasn't time to talk. The leader mercenary's sword pierced into the other of about three stomachs, ripped out the wound.

And then, though it was the worst time for talk, a voice came from far above.
"Captain! Incoming from street!"
"Mer'cee, fetch!" Vincent barked, seemingly without missing a beat.

He wagered the man's hands, even with cutting edge outlines of weave that made them more like katars, would do much better punching through living flesh.

 

[Xenovia]

The accent was beginning to grate on her nearly as much as the stench. Putrescent, the oggloy at least had an excuse. Black ichor wept from openings in the creature's form as the blades and bolts took their toll. Xenovia had to remind herself that they were winning, even as the entity reacted to hers and Vincent's swordwork.

Of course, all it would take was a glancing blow for the tables to turn. The thing Xen feared most was making a mistake.

A shout came down from above. Trouble attracting trouble, as it had been with the four of them. Guards or goons, it mattered little to Xen, whose attention was locked fully on the oggloy.

'Why won't this thing die?' A cruel crosscut lopped off a tentacle. The devahni followed through with a thrust, backing up hastily as the boil she had targeted burst, spewing filth, and a foul liquid as yet unidentified, though not by the likes of the Dogs. It was one of their toys, after all. Still. Whatever worked.

'Hey, Mercy!' Xen called out to her fellow Deva, half-goading. 'Stop standing around with a thumb up your arse and do some work!' Her greatsword found another bloated sac, ran it through.

 

[Vincent Brezat]

'Fetch' seemed to have sufficed - the stance shifted, and Mercy repositioned to the severely precarious, floorboard and bodypart-littered tamp where the stairs to the basement must have been.
The captain called out, in a rustic Altalusian, between swings, and Omar responded with cover fire for the horned man to leap out and crash into the men backing from the entrance. Screams and the violent rending of flesh spilled out onto the street, though not for long, as the deva dove into cover again.

"Ze nodes! It's ze..." He slashed, turned away from the heavy blow that only grazed the shoulder, tattering the armor with a corrosive trail. "It's 'ow eet moves!"
Was too long to explain that the thing has absorbed and crushed what it could eat inside, metabolized it very quickly to move and attack and get more food, and this could spill out of control very easily, very fast if it kept eating. More nodes, harder to reach, harder to carve...

But it was coming down. On its oily hide, dry craters spouted flaking ash from Omar's explosive bolts, charred embers of Xenovia's carves, slashes and stabs died down and scarred sections that could no longer extend into pedipalds or spikes, nor contract and roll its body toward the assailants. Liquid was escaping from the oggloy, too, less acidic than the concentration of what could pass as it's 'stomach' juices. Its volume diminished, and while it seemed to try and pull its stomachs closer to the center, the two swords found them, one by one, by threads of luminescent yellow that effectively outlined them.

Was not long now before it reached a critical state.
And then, with a last sputter of movement, start liquefying in a steaming mess that threatened to drench the basement level ankle-deep.

 

[Xenovia]

'Not for long!' Xen shouted back, working the sword's edge back and forth, through blubber and boil and liquidised biomass. Smoke coiled about her wrists and arms as she dragged the greatsword up and out, severing yet another node in the process. Within the oggloy, the wildfire continued to spread, intertwining and igniting the oils trapped inside the creature's body.

A last-ditch attempt ended in failure as Xen drove aside a spike aimed at her chest. Answering with her blade, she matched Vincent blow for blow, until no more were required. Only then did she retreat, chest heaving, towards the stairs.

An inky pool spread about the basement as she mounted the bottom steps. Tortured wood groaned beneath her weight, and as she clambered up to the ground floor, she felt a few bow and give way. Shooting a glance over her shoulder, Xen grimaced, the pervasive stench filling her sinuses like that of a mass grave. Worse, given the nature of the thing they had just fought. Triumphed over.

Had they?

Shouts and screams drew her attention towards the tavern entrance. Unabsorbed bodies littered the space there. Blood stained the lintel, drip-drip-dripping as shadows danced in the street outside. Xen knew a death curtsy when she saw one.

'Goddamn it, Mercy! What the fuck're we doing here?' Down in the basement, the ground had turned to mush and mess. Fires blazed amongst the ruin left behind by the oggloy. Even diminished, it still posed a threat. To them, and any fool dumb enough or unlucky enough to stumble across its path.

Driving the point of her blade through the boards at her feet, Xen closed her eyes, hands tightening about the hilt and pommel of her sword. Slowly, as if manifesting her will upon the world around her, the runes etched into her steel began to grow brighter, warming in unison with the flames below. The faded scars marking her palms throbbed as the Shroud surged around them, growing taut as a bowstring. A heartbeat. Two.

The basement exploded in one huge fireball, shaking the building to its bones. Planting her feet, Xen rode the wave, lips parted slightly to keep the overpressure from bursting her eardrums. It was only then she realised she hadn't warned the Dogs of her intent.

Fuck 'em. They were no friends of hers.

 

[Vincent Brezat]

Mercy was not much for words mid-action. Leave that to the Captain, as it were. By the time the shout reached him, he was going upstairs even if there were no proper stairs left. Had to clear out the mob for the exit. If they wanted front door view, they were going to get some. He'd leapt upward, massive height helping the ineffective jump, and pulled himself back up onto what used to be ground floor, now mostly viewing platform to the basement.

He'd caught a brief glimpse of the unfamiliar kin's silhouette. He would remember her, perhaps, with a modicum of respect - as a good fighter, even if her fire had gone to the nervous sparks of urgency.

No idea where the Captain relocated, he realized suddenly.
Wasn't near her, or the oggloy anymore.

When the fireball erupted, Mercy was outside and on a rampage, with no time to think of that air he read about his kin. The sort of tired that made Dogs scary because one didn't join the Dogs if one felt it creeping.

*

Thu-k. Thu-shhk. Thu-k.

A body dropping to the ground.
A bolt hitting the side of an eyeslit and ricocheting, clearing a heavier armored brute outside. Mercy used the body as a throwing weight right then.
Another body dropping to the ground.

Omar's teeth were visible, not quite a snarl and nor quite a grin, something still with the absolute focus but also - the utter ice-cold joy.

Moments before the fireball, he glanced down to where the deva and the boss were rolling about with the oggloy, and sighed, dreamily. His hands kept moving, and made a second-floor mezzanine - into a second floor balcony with a smart toss of something completely.

What a woman. He'd write a poem to her furious reluctance, in his spare time.
Couldn't see the boss though. Mildly concerning. Not unusual. He'd give it five more seconds.

Like an eel slithering out of its hidey hole, Faces maneuvered his ass out of the new roof hole proper.
Mercy could use help with the outside, too.

Sigils turned gold with practiced efficiency. Shield.

*

So, here's the thing.
In the fucking marshes, there lived a special sort of toad, with a special sort of venom that reacted with manticore bile.
Long story short, the unholy combination of that, no-heat treatment and a particular yellow jelly mold cultivated in, specifically, a bovine horn, created a complex unstable amalgam that reacted to heat with extreme cold, and crystallizing expansion. Made these pale-yellow stick-pillars that stuck together and held against the flames great, and crumbled in coarse spongy sand as soon as the heat was gone.

He'd need more than a bucket of it against this thing, and he didn't have that particular vial on him.

So, Vincent did the next best thing.

He felt the surge of the Shroud rising swiftly, preparing to become flames.
Doubted she'd warn them, they weren't friends, assessed the dead spell area around her, behind her, and seemed to just... find himself standing in it.
Right behind her. Back to back. And he stood straight and still, for the deafening eruption, mouth slightly parted in order to keep his eardrums - and deeply aggrieved at the fact that there was no witnessing the explosion itself. Just feeling the immense pressure, the heat roll over, the stench fading into the uniform reek of burnt alchemicals.

The heatwave begun to ease, and though he didn't dare breathe and taste more of the charred oggloy, Vincent did have the audacity to tap her shoulder once he'd cleared the collapsed part of the stairs.
"'Alf-expected you to fr'y your'self viz it. Need an 'and up, cherie?"
He leaned over the breach, offered the gloved and braced hand, noise wrinkling with the sneer.
"Or' goeeng to stay zer'e and look for' a vine cellar', too?"

 

[Xenovia]

The inferno tore through the cellar, flash-frying the oogloy, and consuming every bit of organic material it sought for itself in a last ditch effort to survive. If it was ever truly alive to begin with, mused Xenovia, riding the waves of power until they settled once more around her.

The runes etched into the metal of her greatsword dimmed as she relaxed her grip; blood-bound, the blade understood her intent, cooling in the time it took her to look over her shoulder at Vin.

'There's still time yet,' the devahni grinned up at the mercenary, shaking her head as she stood, uprooting sword from board in the process. 'Ze vine is gone, alas, and now it's our turn.' Immolated timbers cracked, releasing a long death groan as they collapsed, taking parts of what had once been the groundfloor with it. A patch of embers still clung to life where Xen had driven her sword in. The scars marring her palms throbbed in sympathy as she stomped them out with a boot.

Outside, Mercy was busy living up to his namesake, whilst above their heads Omar could be glimpsed raining down death on the unsuspecting with bolt and bomb. Xen just hoped the poor bastards he slew deserved it.

If not...

Golden eyes regarded the Captain. 'Call your Dogs to heel,' she said, shouldering her blade, the metal warming at her touch. 'It's time we were on our way. If you wish to dance with me, I'd prefer it not be to the hangman's tune.'

Holding Vin's gaze a moment, the Deva smiled, before making her way carefully towards the only exit left to them.

As much as she hated the violence, there was a more primal part of her that could not help but revel in it.

 

[Vincent Brezat]

"Don't you say," the mercenary drawled, facetious, "I vaz sinkeeng about leeving zem zer'e until ze 'hole str'eet sought it vaz under' ze new management."

He shrugged, straightened with his hand lowering, and pulled a thin whistle from behind his belt, almost fully concealed in the fist. The noise it made was particularly thin, in the way that made the skin crawl, and Vincent blew into it a few times, short-short-long, before putting it back. The ruckus outside didn't stop immediately, but certainly took pause as the Captain marched out the door and took stock.

Omar was still on the roof, letting the remnants of the gang take their wounded and instead occupying himself with weaving whatever stray flames were there into a large red glass phial in haze orange ribbons. Mercy simply got to the front door, the limp in his step evident.

Vincent nodded, and blew a stray strand of hair out of his face. His forehead was covered in sweat, beading with admissions he was not going to make about all that ailed him now that the adrenaline was lowering. He smeared it with a leather gauntlet, good side.

"Vher'e 'ave you fought, befor'e?" He called out to Xenovia. He didn't ask where they were going, or if she was going to offer any ideas on the subject. Simply fell into step beside, and his men fell in behind him, keeping an eye out. Something told the deva that if he decided to part ways, he would just as casually stride in another direction.

"Mar'ginallee mor'e impr'essive zan village milisha, zat." A nod to the sword, a toothy grin.

 

[Xenovia]

The street was hotter than what remained of the taverna, but not for the same reasons. Thugs lay scattered across the cobblestones like ragdolls, limbs broken or missing, eyes wide as buttons, seeing nothing. Blood filled the gutters, a veritable stream of crimson and black. No bright, though. Xenovia was relieved to see none of her kin sharing the stones alongside Mister Big's knifehands.

Shrill whistling echoed up the street from either side. The guard, calling their fellows to arms, too late to break up the fight, but not too late to arrest the victors. Though, once word of the oogloy got out, they would sure to paint themselves as heroes.

Vin and his cronies made for convincing villains - that they were outlanders would make the lies go down easier.

"Where have you fought before?" He asked her as she strode away, laying it on thick with the accent. Ass. 'Oh, here and there,' she answered, cultivating an air of mystique, so as to appease their more theatrical selves. 'Much like you, I imagine. Someone somewhere shows you the basics. The rest, you pick up along the way.' Or you didn't, in which case the adventure ended before it had a chance to begin. Tragically. Stupidly. Oftimes, meaninglessly.

Khurun's full of dreamers, she thought to herself, pressing herself up against a storefront as a mechanical carriage trundled by, the rough cobblestones jarring the firemen straddling the beast's back. The whistles still sounded. The guard weren't far behind.

'Marginally,' she agreed with a grin, sharp fangs bared to the throuple dogging her steps. 'Where'd you cut your teeth, Vincent? In the poor fucking infantry with these two reprobates?' She hooked a right, disappearing into the half-light between buildings, faded plasterwork peeling like sun-burnt skin from the walls. Red and orange. Yellow and blue.

A squad of scalies trampled past the mouth of the alley. The last paused long enough to give their backs a good scouring before running on.