[Exalted] Protectors of the River Province

[Marcao]

He heard Orduin's words but he had no immediate comment, it was a good question. He was uncertain how the magic worked. Was it akin to a trapdoor sending them to the Underworld once a certain distance had been breached? They were only fifty or so yards away that would be close enough. In the end, Orduin spoke sense and he agreed with it. Rather than keep pushing onwards and perhaps tripping the trap again, he brought the storm herald to a stop.

They were in creation now, and he was unwilling to risk going back to the underworld without accomplishing something first. It was time to see if Lookshy's toy was everything that he expected.

"Aim for the masts, I don't want that ship going anywhere!" He called out to the helots that scrambled around the weapon. If the masts were knocked down, he would then maneuver the storm herald towards the aft of the ship to knock its rudder. After that was done, the ship should be unable to go anywhere fast.

[rhoenix]

"Oh, so you guys are going to just snipe at them from here, huh? Okay, that works," Kolth said, dropping his overcoat onto the deck. "I'll wave when I'm done," he said, right before diving into the river with only the smallest of splashes, out of sight of the other ship.

Swimming strongly in the river, Kolth soon neared the bank nearest the Abyssal ship. After looking around carefully to ensure that it was clear, he pulled himself quietly out of the water, and melted into the night air. The crew of that ship was about to have a very, very bad evening.

[LadyTevar]

Teamhair backed to the opposite railing from the shore, and then exploded into a flat run across the short deck of the Storm Herald, leaping out and over the railing in a dancer's grande jete. Sailing across the river, she landed on the shore in a pirouette, orienting herself at the gangplank of the Black ship. Her robe snapped with the wind of her passing as she ran for the easy access aboard, her moonsilver tattoos seeming to leave streaks behind her as she ran. Any crew of the ship between her and the piper was about to have a very bad night.

[SirNitram]

Gunzosha armour, strictly speaking, was about the worst armor for a marine assault imaginable. Heavy, restrictive, and generally poorly designed for swimming, most would scoff at the idea of a Gunzosha Commando unit swimming to another vessel. They were accurate. No Commando ever swam to his target, and Orduin knew it as he dropped over the side.

Between vitality boosting subsystems, augmented optics capable of using even a sliver of light, adaptive camoflage, and a sealed structure, no Gunzosha had ever swam to the enemy's ships in the river. They took a walk, instead.

Underneath the dead vessel, cloaked in changing patterns that would obscure his form, Orduin clambered up the chain holding the anchor. It had been an operation he'd done before. The main difference was this time, he was glad he couldn't see what, precisely, the chain and anchor were made of.

[The Nomad]

As he walked the bottom of the river, Orduin was shocked to see that there were no anchors - he could make out, several yards above his head, that the landing stages clawed the river bank with multiple sets of huge skeletal hands, and maintained the ship during transfer. Fortunately, the banks were not very steep, and he could easily climb ashore despite his armor.
That's when he heard the echoes of a detonation from above the water, and a spear of sunlight turned the night into day for a split second.

Onboard the Storm Herald, Yevala had taken control of the implosion bow and, fuelling it with his own Essence, had aimed a shot at the ship's mast. Unfortunately, he lacked the familiarity with ranged weapons that would have assured success. The shot missed the mast, and nicked the stern's railing, going through several of the entranced passengers in the process.

As Teamhair closed in on the ship, she knew she would have a hard time crossing the landing stages with so many people on, but the implosion bow startled the deathknight, who stopped playing the pipes. The villagers just stopped their progress, still aghast and numb-witted, some falling from the stages into the river. Near the stages' end, onboard the vessel, several silhouettes drew weapons and some of them seemed to do something to the stages, which caused them to release their grip on the river bank.
Teamhair managed to climb aboard as all those around her fell into the river. The armed men, an icy-blue glow in their eyes, tried to run her through with swords, but her preternatural grace made it easy for her to dodge the blows.

Despite Kolth's insanely high skills at stealth, he knew it would be extremely difficult to climb onboard unnoticed. When Teamhair managed to get onboard, he had no other choice but to try leaping onboard or risk another bath and climb, and hope they wouldn't draw the ladders onboard - or worse, that the creepy things wouldn't just draw themselves.

[rhoenix]

There were times where taking the direct route was best - especially if it was unexpected. This would be taking a gamble, but what a payoff it would be, Kolth thought with a grin.

Taking a good running start, Kolth made a mighty leap from the shore toward the ship. As he began to fall from the highest point of his jump, he unwound the long chain attached to the curved blade he always carried, and flung the bladed end as hard as he could toward the cross-mast of the dark ship. As the imbued orichalcum blade pierced the cross-mast, he held onto the other end of the chain, using the momentum to swing mightily directly at the Deathknight standing on the ship, in a hard flying kick to the jaw.

[SirNitram]

No anchor, the landing ramps pulling up, and no time. Orduin hated moments like this.

** Exomuscular Fibers online, boosting.. **
** Motion Accelerator In Use. **
** Stealth system switching to beacon. **

Strictly speaking, Gunzosha armor could change colours rapidly to blend in. If you loaded, say, the brightest and showiest sequence in, however, it turned you into a big, noticable thing drawing attention.

Orduin leapt, boosted by magitech, sword out. He was aiming to get onboard, and already the tempo of battle was pushing him. It was time to cleave through some enemies.

[The Nomad]

The deathknight was busy barking orders, and did not see Kolth approach. Yet, at the last moment, Kolth's legs spasmed as a great fear gripped his heart. He flew past the deathknight and arced back onto the deck, in the middle of the entranced villagers. What could have done that to him? As he laid eyes upon the deathknight again, he felt a shiver down his spine. The leather-and-skulls aficionado did not look so damn scary from a distance. He noted that a black circle was spilling blood on the man's forehead. The deathknight looked surprised to see the Night caste dangling from his mast, with a murderous 'what did you do to the paint?" glance.

As Orduin climbed on board, several of the crew members who were attacking Teamhair diverted their attention towards him. From the corner of his eye, he could see the deathknight - and even the Gunzosha had to admit that there was something very scary about him.

[rhoenix]

Shaking himself as the fear momentarily gripped him, Kolth mustered within himself for the cold resolve he needed, feeling the effects of the fear drain away as he regarded this formerly-frightening figure. Now, it looked more than a little ridiculous.

Yanking the chain down from the mast, Kolth held the blunt end of the chain in his left hand, and the handle of the blade in his right, as he smirked contemptuously at the Deathknight. "Hi cupcake. You should try bathing in something that doesn't come from your own ass, since we could smell you a mile away. Stinky goth bitchboy, you can't even be evil correctly."

With little warning, he took a short running leap, somersaulting in mid-air for extra momentum to leap out of the surrounding circle of entranced villagers, and toward the Deathknight. The bladed end of his Chain Daiklaive suddenly lanced toward the Abyssal's neck.

(EDIT: Dice rolls removed)

[SirNitram]

The spine-icing terror of the man before him did hit Orduin hard. Even Gunzosha training didn't make you fearless; there had been a specific lesson on knowing when to bug out. However, the mission objective was not complete. Others were no doubt working their own way. He would have to focus himself on his own. A quick glance confirmed that he had a few seconds to follow the 'Neutralization' part of his mission before he'd be distracted by men with swords.

A moment of focus led to a flurry of sword blows down onto the ship itself, the golden-flashing blade seeking weak points and stress points on the hull itself. The goal was simple: Cause enough damage to strand the ship or at least force some kind of sorcerous intervention that would eat up the target's attention.

[ Iron Whirlwind, targetting the ship itself. And poor little coastals really have no chance of not being turned to splinters in short order by a magical-flurrying Gunzosha. ]

[Marcao]

A part of him had to wonder why Lookshy had provided them with a weapon system that apparently no one had been adequately trained in their usage. It was an impressive device and he felt compelled to attempt its usage as the helots scampered about and seemed unwilling or unable to touch the thing. He brought the weapon to power with remarkable ease, the weapon brought to alignment with his target.

How hard could this be?

He fired and his first shot missed his intended target by a significant amount. He winced as the shot plowed through the railing and impacted with several entranced passengers. He almost stepped away from the weapon at that instant but something held him firm. If they allowed their adversary to carry out his task, many more would be lost. He grit his teeth and tried something else.

He was not willing to try an attempt at marksmanship, it was clear that he was not up to the task. However, hitting the ship itself should prove to be no obstacle itself. He aimed for just above the water line and attempted to once more fire.

[LadyTevar]

"Prey, you are in my WAY!" Teamhair snarled, as she danced amongst the blue-eyed men, their blows sliding harmlessly by her or parried by the moonsilver fans she wielded. As some broke off to deal with Orduin, the Lunar decided to clear her path.

Wardrums pounded a rhythm inside her mind, and she danced to its deadly beat. Step and slide and pivot and SLICE as she pirouetted her way between the blue-eyed warriors, the outspread edge of the moonsilver fan razor-sharp as it whistled across the neck of the man to her right. The fan in her left-hand sliced downwards across another's chest a beat later as Teamhair continued her dance, both fans snapping shut on the next beat for a doubled-thrust to the chest of a third.

"Prey... you are In My Way."

[The Nomad]

The implosion bow rocked on its mount as Yevala fired towards the ship. Despite the mist, he was able to score a hit near the stern, running the wooden hull through without causing much more damage. Somehow, he thought an armored hull would have suffered more from the stream of piercing Essence.

Teamhair's fans arced in deadly swings as she scythed through what she had realized were animated corpses - not the shambling undead the Deathlords' armies were famous for, but agile, skilled creatures called nemissaries. According to her limited knowledge, they were a rare breed of ghosts, specialized in possessing living or recently dead human shells. All the same, she cut their tendons and limbs, the sheer ferocity of her blows causing blood to spurt despite the absence of pulse, while the nemissaries could only graze her tough fur.
She felled a couple of them easily, but from the corner of her eyes, she could see that the bodies of villagers killed by the implosion bow - those mostly intact, that is - were starting to rise. It also occured to her that they seemed skilled enough at tactics that if given time they could surround her and press their advantage past even her defenses.

The deathknight paid Kolth no mind, his hateful gaze fixated first on the corpses of the villagers killed by the implosion shot, then on Orduin, whose impending Essence-fueled blows were about to tear his ship apart. The dire chain seemed to pierce through the deathknight's neck - before Kolth realized that it was only an afterimage. He then took notice of the thunderous sound that signified that Orduin had taken a terrible hit - unable to parry or dodge the ungodly fast strike of the deathknight who had just appeared behind him, he could only groan as the soulsteel daiklave cleaved through a torso joint in his Gunzosha armor, inflicting tremendous pain as his vision clouded, his mind drifting into unconsciousness, as well as a feeling of his life being sucked out of the wound into the soulsteel blade. Then a flash of golden and crimson light erupted from his armor as his anima prevented the blade from sinking any deeper into vital organs. It had been so brutal an attack that Orduin had been projected five yards from the deathknight into the railing, his ears still ringing. But he was still in battle condition. For now.

The detonation finally seemed to steer the villagers out of their stupor. Slowly, it seemed they regained their wits and took in the surrounding chaos.

[LadyTevar]

At first, more undead was Teamhair's only concern, until she saw the DeathKnight appear behind Orduin and stab him through.

Her heart stopped inside her chest, but it did not stop her from moving. With a slight bunching of her leg muscles, she leapt up and over, clearing the head of the nemissary between herself and the DeathKnight. Landing momentarily on her hands, clenched into fists holding the closed fans. She balanced for the barest second before her arms flexed and sent her into the air again. Landing on one foot as agilely as a cat, she was now directly behind the DeathKnight, who had yet to withdraw his sword from Orduin's back.

The warsong in Teamhair's head was shrill and screaming, demanding she protect her love, her life, her Solar. Balanced as only a dancer could, she spun like a top, the fans outspread -- a deadly pirouette of moonsilver meant to slice the DeathKnight for ribbons for harming Her Man.

[SirNitram]

Dragging himself back up to standing, Orduin faced the deathknight. There was, admittably, not so much blood as there should have been, as the armor's regenerative systems struggled to contain the damage. He closed the distance, moving defensively, re-engaging if only to give the others a chance at a blow.

[HGD will be thrown at any incoming attacks]

[Marcao]

"Not exactly what I had in mind." He growled as the effects of his attack made themselves visible on the hull of his target. He knew that he was not very familiar with the weapon system before him, but a part of him understood that more could be done with it. The others were risking life and limb in the struggle and here he was, nice and safe struggling with a weapon system that was not cooperating!

He was not certain how he did it or why, but he fed more essence into the machine what had once been a trickle of essence became a stream and the weapon reacted. He understood that he lacked skill in its operation, so he did not even bother to do anything more than attempt to put a larger hole into the side of the vessel. He was desperate now, he wanted to immobile the ship and ideally start to sink her. The weapon fired once more, as he sought to channel his guilt into a true shot.

(He is trying to harness his "valor" and use it to boost his dice, aware that his allies are in a mortal situation while he remains nice and safe aboard the Storm Herald. He also fed two motes of essence into the light implosion bow instead of one.)

[rhoenix]

Though Kolth had now missed his quarry - twice even, he was determined that there be no third time.

Seeing that the deathknight was now after Orduin, more importantly, the deathknight had his back to Kolth. This caused him to grin wickedly before he swiftly and silently erupted into action.

Running at full speed, though with rolling his weight around on each step so as to make each step far less obvious, Kolth leapt again at the deathknight, this time sailing through the air toward his back, with his blade aimed at the back of his skull. Once this hit, it would undoubtedly put something on the deathknight's mind other than his current mission - something like three feet of imbued, sharpened orichalcum.

[The Nomad]

Kolth's preternaturally light steps did not alert the deathknight, though he felt that the ship's deck was making more noises that it should have - a feeble warning to its master, perhaps?

As Kolth jumped and sent the chain daiklave's blade flashing towards the deathknight's back, the latter circled around Orduin, and swung his daiklave at the incoming Lunar, the blade flashing under the moonlight, and it took Teamhair's Essence-fueled inspiration to prevent the blade from sinking in her belly as she scarcely parried the attack. At the same time, Kolth's chain hit the deathknight under the armpit where his night-dark lamellar armor did not protect him, causing him to howl in pain and surprise. Clenching his teeth, he let Teamhair's fans past his guard, but the weapons could but cause white, lifeless sparkles as they met the soulsteel bands, propelling the deathknight backwards as his feet scraped the deck for purchase and he halted his recoil by gripping the mast with an audible 'oof'.

The nemissaries kept up with Teamhair though, and three of them managed to organize an attack on her, charging her with their wicked chopping swords drawn. Teamhair's Essence flowed in her arms as she let herself feel the right way to parry one especially vicious strike.

It was then that Yevela fired the implosion bow once more, an area-of-effect shot that punched a three-yards wide hole in the hull, eviscerating the ship which rocked and almost immediately started to capsize. The Abyssal Exalt steadied himself with the mast, but Teamhair's elaborate motions did not allow her to retain balance. Orduin was actually thrown over the railing, plunging into the cold water below.

Kolth was swept off his feet, but his natural agility and acrobatic training allowed him to turn his fall into a gracious sommersault, landing lithely on his feet.

Many villagers shook out of their trance with the deafening detonation, and started shouting and falling overboard, and one of the three nemissaries was unable to remain standing.

The ship would sink completely in under a minute.

[LadyTevar]

Flat on her back was something Teamhair was used to; more than one traditional dance had floor movements. Rising gracefully from a supine position was a skill she'd learned early on, and knew many ways of doing so, some faster than others. With the nemessaries off balance and the DeathKnight holding the mast in a deathgrip, Teamhair exploded into a flurry of action.

She rolled onto her side, pulling one knee under her as she pushed herself off the deck, her free leg rotating to extend out in front of her. Then it was a simple roll of her body off the bent knee onto the forward leg to rise .. and it took only a breath to do so.

The rise to her feet continued into a short running lunge at the DeathKnight, using both her natural dexterity and her dexterity charm to balance on the tilting deck. As she charged, her Anima flared around her; a glowing fox of light and shadow that twisted about her, vanishing and appearing in a strobe-like effect that make Teamhair's movements seem to stutter and skip like a drawing on a child's flipbook.

The Anima effect was meant to confuse the eye and dazzle the mind, and Teamhair used it to complete her flurry of attacks upon the motionless DeathKnight, slicing one fan across his lower back as she passed, pirouetting to stab his side with the closed fan in her other hand, and completing the circle with a deadly slice towards the DeathKnight's neck.

She was going to kill him. He had hurt Orduin, her lover. He had harmed the villagers of many villages. He had cruelly killed one of the gentle dryads. He was -not- going to get away.

[rhoenix]

Looking upon the Deathknight with a cold, almost blank look, Kolth forced some of the night-time air around him into a rote, forcing his anima to flare. Though a slim aura around him lit up with subtle golds, purples, blues, and some red, more surprising was a dark brown ferret appearing, staring at the Deathknight, and growling as only a ferret can.

This seemed to echo Kolth's feelings on the matter, as he suddenly erupted into motion, stealth forgotten, concentrating on pure speed and agility. Running directly at one of the nemissaries still on its dead feet, Kolth used it as an unwilling ramp, planting one foot on its hip, the next on its shoulder, and leaping mightily back onto the sinking ship, landing with a somersault that almost instantly became a run, directly at the Deathknight.

He knew Orduin could halt a bombardment with what he could do in that armor, but it was being severely tested by the corpse-fucking Deathknight at the moment. Those odds were about to be severely trimmed, as the heavy blunt end of the chain whipped toward the Deathknight's ankles to trip him and make him fall towards Kolth with a well-timed yank of the chain, the blade in his hand ready to decapitate the Abyssal as he fell from being tripped.

(OOC: Activated First Martial Arts Excellency - this bitch is going to go down)

[SirNitram]

"Oh..." And then the ship swung violently, knocking Orduin off his feet and into the drink. The rest of the invective was lost as the airtight seal on the armor was gone, the pierced damage causing it to flood. Heavy armor, wounds, and no air supply of use. Time to get out of it.

A moment of concentration.. But so long, too long, thinking of his allies still aboard.. Sent the Gunzosha armor and it's integrated blade back into Elsewhere. Swimming to the surface, he could see he'd be little help as he was now. The cries of the formerly-entranced called, though, and he began to swim for all he was worth to help them to the shore.

[Channelling Compassion to rescue folks.]

[The Nomad]

Teamhair's and Kolth's attacks were deadly, but they did not account for the ship's listing, and the strange aura that seemed to tug at their movements when they were onboard the ship. The deathknight, obviously used to fighting onboard a naval vessel, had the time to see Teamhair rising from her position and use the mast as cover while stepping aside Kolth's chain. With a baleful smile, he raised his daiklave to retaliate in a sweeping arc of death, but aborted his attack and jumped above him.

With a glance in the direction of the Storm Herald, he barked a word in a strange tongue that neither Exalt recognized. They heard a splash from the starboard side - the one facing the river bank - and the deathknight darted to port: the impact of the implosion bow had tilted the ship so that he was invisible from the Storm Herald.

"We will meet again on my terms, runts," he shouted, standing on the railing, before leaping overboard.

Teamhair and Kolth could see that the deathknight was standing on what looked like the skeletal landing stages, their huge hands sporting some sort of leathery flippers. With powerful swimming strokes, the stage carried itself away from the vessel, out of their reach. Dark sparkes danced around the Abyssal as he was making strange gestures and intoning a guttural incantation that sounded more like a retch, and a dark inky cloud erupted from the deathknight's mouth.

Yevela saw the deathknight on his strange raft, coming from behind the Black Ship and drifting into the mist at great speed. Before Yevela could aim the implosion bow, he noticed some kind of dark cloud coming in very vast from the deathknight - coming at him.

Orduin reached the riverbank, exhausted, as the villagers had finally come fully to their senses; some flew terrorized in the forest, while a few braver ones offered assistance to the wounded or those still in the river.

Teamhair and Kolth were left in precarious balance on a ship on the verge of capsizing.

[LadyTevar]

Several curses flew from Teamhair's mouth, most little more than animalistic growls. Yet she could feel the ship lurching and knew she was about to be dropped into the water. "Dammit! Kolth, time to leave."

Forced to focus on her balance on the sinking ship, she hurried to the open side where the gangplank had rested, hoping to repeat her earlier leap that had taken her from the Storm Herald onto the shore.

[rhoenix]

The aura around Kolth was fading, though the ferret sat at his feet, growling and making threatening paw gestures alongside Kolth himself, as he yelled out at the departing deathknight.

"Yeah, you'd better run, I bet you're hurt, you fucking pansy! You won't even try to fight like an honorable swordsman, since you can't tell the sword handle from your cock, and you love jerking both, don't you? Don't you, you piece of shit necro-bestial spank tart? You love that shit, don't you? You'd better run home and go cry in the corner about that lump I gave you, you little bitch, because that was the placeholder for a lot fucking more where that came from, you useless corpse-fucking whore!"

Sensing the foothold beneath him was almost sunk, he leapt mightily backwards, making a slow cartwheel, landing on an unlucky nemissary that had the misfortune of standing near the shore, leaping from its shoulders onto shore, giving a strong backwards kick at it as he did to knock it into the water.

Putting his chain and dagger wound around him as subtly as usual, he put back on his coat as he shook his head with a disgusted look, looking off into the distance. "Man. That's akin to begging for an ass-beating in the future. Running away, and trying to make a witty getaway line and failing miserably? It's like he wants that skeleton-boat he's riding on stuffed up his ass."

[SirNitram]

Orduin watched the raft retreat, shaking his head. On the one hand, you couldn't really call the mission an outstanding success, but on the other, they had neutralized the Black Ship and it's current mission. The Deathknight would be back, but more important to inform people that it was a Deathknight. He waited for the others to gather, and to return to the Storm Herald.