the Rift

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otem
Trouble is as a trouble does, when it's on a troubled mind
Reasons come and reasons will go when the blind are followin' the blind


There were no shadows to greet her this time, as there had been seasons ago. Before she'd been hounded by illusory shades, bent on driving her mad. She'd surpassed them somehow, but that was to be her only victory. Face to face with the Magnus Metus (not magnamite mangoose as she had mistakenly once thought), she'd been battered around like a leaf in the wind, and had simply cried off from the challenge instead of facing the eye-less beast.

And then she'd simply done nothing. Otem had been in a mental hibernation since that fight, drowned in her own self pity. But then she'd found an itch beneath her skin, deep down where the glistening remnants of her soul lingered near some ever-burning fire. Perhaps it was her curiosity to know what it was Kisamoa had planned for them, perhaps it was her unconscious love of the spirit of the Rift that had given her so much, or perhaps it was mere boredom, but something inside of the girl blossomed and she found herself willing to try at least one more time. 

But this time would be different, because this time Otem knew what the creature was. 

"HEY." She shouted boldly into the stiffening and oppressive silence of the labyrinth. "HOW DID I TASTE LAST TIME?"

With a deep breath, Otem flew into the air. It was difficult because her body still felt oddly drawn towards the ground, as if there were rocks in her hooves, but she struggled against it. She wouldn't be caught unaware like last time. 

If the creature was drawn by her taunt, she would do her best to watch the bushes below to try and determine where it was. It would have an idea of where she was due to her flapping and smell (probably), but hopefully like last time it wouldn't know exactly where. If it appeared, she would conjure her tree spirits, hoping the additional sounds would confuse the creature. 






Image Credits
the Rift
She had fled from him before, but that didn’t mean that he hadn’t enjoyed the piece of her that was left for him. It was a small chunk of flesh, hardly anything of note, but he had won it from her, as though it were some sort of victory trophy – one that he had managed to keep before devouring it easily through that extended maw of his, lined with sharp daggers of teeth and a long tongue used to caress the kills he hunted.

But something was different this day, as he often reminisced about those that faced him and left. He hadn’t had eyes to peer at the creature that day she had walked into his home. But he did have a sense of smell and could tell with his translucent and thin skin when the small breeze in the caverns shifted. And so he was moving, as silently as he could, his large tail spiked with barbs dragging quietly across the ground as he positioned himself. His large snout peeking out from the shadows, those sharp teeth on a slow and menacing rotation.

How’d I taste last time?” If he had a mouth he would have told her that he craved her now, but all he could do was hide in the shadows and wait for her to fall into his trap. His large hands poised and ready to try and swipe her to where he could pin her and gorge himself on yet another piece of her flesh. He didn’t know exactly where she was coming from, but he had a direction in mind where he sat still and waited.


he remembers!!
otem
Trouble is as a trouble does, when it's on a troubled mind
Reasons come and reasons will go when the blind are followin' the blind


This was precisely how Otem knew that life wasn't just one big grand story. Or that if it was, she wasn't the main character. If she had been, the monster would have fallen into her trap. It would have pounced near one of the sprites she would have made, and then she could have attacked it and flew off with her victory.

But none of that happened, because as Taylor Swift once sang, I'm not a Princess and this ain't a fairly tale.

Otem was just going to have to do better.

If the creature wasn't going to come to her, then she should go to it. Sort of anyways. 

Wings still beating, Otem closed her eyes and focused on her magic. An earth sprite appeared before her, looking like somesort of anthropomorphic tree hung in mid air. Guiding it towards herself, Otem tried to rub against the creature to cover it in her scent. Otem didn't want to be anywhere near the ground when the creature came for her, but that didn't mean her scent couldn't be there. Lowering herself slightly to move her sprite onto the ground, Otem directed the summoned creature to begin to move through the bushes at will. Otem kept her mouth closed, assuming that if the creature sensed that her body odour and voice were coming from two different places, that something was likely amiss.  But in order for her trap to work, she had to be low enough to the ground to keep her sprite within magical range. Could the Magnus Metus jump this high? She had no idea, nor did she know if the beast would be lured in by her trap.

She would soon see.




Image Credits

SHARP TEETH ON A SLOW AND MENACING ROTATION. IS THERE ANYTHING MORE TERROFYING.
the Rift
Perhaps the creature was smarter than the Metus originally anticipated. As he lay in wait, an assassin in the dark ready to pounce on an unwilling target, he could smell her coming closer. There was a sound, and yet it didn’t seem to sound right, not like before. But his stomach growled, and he was so, so hungry, that he didn’t give it a second thought as the thing meandered its way into his claws – into his trap.

When he could sense it was close and the smell seemed to be of the being he remembered, he lunged. His large hands swiping out at it only to be met with bark. He stood for a moment, extending that long rope-like tongue of his to touch the creature as he was completely taken off guard. It was different than he remembered, and it enraged him. Was this a trick she had done to him, come to gloat about running away? He hissed a guttural sound from his mouth, his tongue returning to the dark cavern of his lips surrounded by sharp teeth as he leaned in to smell it.

It only somewhat smelt like the creature he had tasted and savored, and a deep roar left his lips in his anger. He slashed at the sprite, aiming to destroy the thing and find out just where the creature had tricked him dared to be. Those that tricked the Magnus Metus never lived again, and he would enjoy feasting on her when he got his clawed hands on her at last.


uh oh!!
otem
Trouble is as a trouble does, when it's on a troubled mind
Reasons come and reasons will go when the blind are followin' the blind


Through her magical tether, Otem could feel the claws of the Magnus sinking into the bark of her sprite even though its body was partially obscured by the bushes below.

This is it, she told herself, it's now or never. In a way, that was actually reassuring. Otem, rightly or wrongly, felt as though she had nothing to live for. Her family was gone, she was in a world that seemed hostile and strange, and she'd faced death more times here than ever she had in Helovia. If she died at the hands of this ... this thing, what of it?

Either she would live and find a reason to stay here, or she would perish. Both seemed fine.

While the Magnus was (hopefully) still distracted by her vegetarian entree, Otem dropped from the sky, hind hooves stretching to reach the place that its eyes should have been. She tried to be careful of the spikes lining its back, but of course there was more than just a little greenery around to obscure her aim.

"I - CAN LIVE HERE - TOO!" Otem grunted between her clenched teeth as she tried to fan her wings hard enough to bring her back out of the creature's range. But of course her lead-feet, the issue that started this quest in the first place - made her ascent slower than it otherwise might have been. 



Image Credits

SHARP TEETH ON A SLOW AND MENACING ROTATION. IS THERE ANYTHING MORE TERROFYING.
the Rift
He swiped again at the tree, a deep rumble growing through the center of his chest and seeping out from the open circular hole that was his mouth. It was only when hooves met the top of his head, on the part where his spikes that lined his head and back had just begun their small thorn-like growth, that he shrunk away from her with another earth shattering roar that seemed to echo the caverns and rustle the leaves of the bushes around them. There was a throbbing, blinding pain on the back of his head that he could barely make out what she said to him.

She was above him, slowly moving away, and he reached up with those massive claws, aiming a swipe at her foot. So she wouldn’t go down without a fight, he didn’t mind. He’d fight and he’d win, just as he usually did. Then he’d be able to enjoy the taste of her flesh once more. His tail behind him stretched across the ground, aiming itself to spring up much like a kangaroo to use for leverage as he angled himself up once again, swiping and angling those sharp pointed teeth at another part of her body – the once slow circular motion now growing faster and faster, a blur in the dark.

This creature could fly, and it made him want to devour her even more – if not for the fact that he remained here where the elements couldn’t hurt his body, but for the fact that she could leave and see the world while he lay in wait for unfortunate souls. He felt soft beneath his skin for the first time in years, a heaviness that grew and grew before the blinding rage shrunk it back into the small caverns of his dark heart. He would fight her, and he would win.


I left it open if you wanted him to hit or bite her, doesn't matter to me. I'll adjust accordingly in the next post ;D
otem
Trouble is as a trouble does, when it's on a troubled mind
Reasons come and reasons will go when the blind are followin' the blind


Unlike her mother Otem did not try to hide the victorious smile that pulled her lips apart, nor to dampen the cry of pure joy that left her lips as her hooves connected with the hard flesh and bone of Magnus' head. Further still from the steadfast Isopia was the way the blissful sound leaving Otem's lips turn into a peel of pain. Teeth or claws, she couldn't quite tell which, opened up a river of what felt like fire just above her hoof, revealing the snow-white bone beneath her skin to the hot air of Scorch. The blow sent Otem's lanky body reeling through the air like a fish through water, and as the Magnus' whirring teeth snapped upon her mane (where only moments ago her neck was), she said a silent prayer to the Rift.  Her bloody hoof was apparently the price of living a bit longer.

Clamping her lips down on her continued scream of pain, Otem pulled her limbs upwards and beat her wings unsteadily to put as much distance between herself and the beast below. She could see him now, and unless she was going to use her sprite-magic again, there was no reason to remain where he could so easily strike out at her.

"What, is that all?" Her voice was full of false confidence that began to turn real as a plan formed in her mind.

Although she had no container within which to bottle once of her hallucinogenic potions, perhaps she didn't need one...

Closing her eyes, Otem focused. She couldn't control what the hallucinogenic liquid would do, but maybe she'd get lucky. A purpleish liquid appeared suspended next to the flying woman-girl, who unsteadily tried to position herself above the Magnus. "OPEN UP." She called, shaking her bloodied hoof to encourage the newly-clotting skin to bleed down onto the creature. As the droplets began to fall, hopefully enticing the creature to ingest them, Otem allowed the magic liquid to fall down too.





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the Rift
He smelled the blood long before he felt it. He heard her voice as well, a challenge asking for him to try harder. If he could have smiled, he would, for he wouldn’t go down without a fight. She would be regretting the decision to return, though perhaps she wasn’t quite as smart as he originally gave her credit for. For once she knew who was in the caverns among the bushes and heart of the green labyrinth, she had returned – but for what?

The rumble of anger continued to grow in his throat, his eyeless form using his large snout to be his eyes to smell her in any way that he could. His snout was angled straight at her, as the blood began to drop toward him, his long tongue snaking out to try and taste the creature once more. Yet, aside from the blood that touched his large serpentine tongue, there was something else. Something horrible and he cringed away from it – from her – as the purplish liquid touched his sensitive tongue and burned.

Another roar shook the caverns, he stumbled backward, using his tail to keep him upright as he moved away from the creature. A hissing sound left his circular mouth, his tongue lashing out in an attempt to remove the poison from his tongue. And he simply stood there, staring, breathing heavily as he looked without seeing in her general direction. What did she want? It was obvious to the Metus that she put up too much of a fight for him to want to continue – and so he waited, waited to see what she would do.


So i believe the trial was to challenge him, which you've now done! He's sitting and waiting and can answer basic questions if she has them, but he's surrendered to her, deeming her to be too much effort for food ;)
otem
Trouble is as a trouble does, when it's on a troubled mind
Reasons come and reasons will go when the blind are followin' the blind




Had she ... was this ... was this the thing she was supposed to do? Suspiciously Otem eyed the creature below, waiting for it to lunge back up at her, or otherwise engage her in some way. But it... it just wasn't. Eyeless it seemed to peer up at her; expectant. Waiting.

Had she won some sort of ... parlay with him? A temporary truce? Swallowing hard, Otem felt the necklace around her neck and wished for it to speak with her mother's voice. Isopia would know what to say, but of course Isopia had gone away, back into whatever shadowy realm Kisamoa had pulled her up from. Even if the necklace did speak, it wouldn't really be her mother.  Just as this place wasn't really her home.

Or was it?

"W-will-" Otem began, her youthful heart betraying her as the words stuttered from her lips. Swallowing and steeling her resolve, the autumn child continued. "The portal Kaos opened which brought us here ... will it ever open again? Can we ever go back?"




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ty!!!
the Rift
He hissed as the girl stood before him, lowering his head in acknowledgement that she had won. For now at least, his mind thrashed, hoping to gain more power to hopefully grab her should she return one day. So he stood, his sharp teeth slowing their circular rotation until they stopped – waiting for her words. He still couldn’t see her, but he could sense the fact that she hadn’t left just yet. And as if his mind was beginning to deceive him in thinking she had, she spoke at last.

She began to ask him, stuttering like a small child. He huffed slightly, a dark laugh of some sort that this was who had beaten him today – a stuttering child. Still, he stayed silent as she finished her question. She asked him if they could ever go back, to leave the portal that had opened and brought them here. He hadn’t known she was from Helovia, he hadn’t known exactly what she spoke of other than the fact that in the recent years, darkness had descended upon them. Back before the darkness, he didn’t have to lie and wait for unsuspecting souls, he had a steady amount of food supply that kept him humble, only challenging those that dared to enter his home.

So he stood with his eyeless face, offering a small shrug of his shoulders before attempting to speak in raspy sounds – much of which of having no use in the many years past. “I do not know.” He answered in his hissing-like voice, unable to move his mouth enough to form perfectly coherent words. “Things were better here before the darkness.” He offered her, tilting his head with a predators sharpness. “Maybe it will open again.” He offered her, waiting to see if she indeed had more questions or if he could continue the hunt for something more easily caught.


:D
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