07-11-2018, 11:10 AM
The scent of danger had made Graowr sharpen her attention and focus, turning quickly back around to face forward as soon as she'd confirmed with the Sage. "Something out there...somewhere," she said plainly. "What do you think it is?"
"Something dangerous, of that much I have no doubt." The old man slowly turned his head this way and that, scanning the area and horizon with a careful eye. "But what it might be I confess I have no idea."
The majin shifted in her seat and sprang up, standing in the saddle as she peered around intently. "Dangerous, huh..." That much was obvious, even to her simple mind. Out in a place like this, danger had a certain way of presenting itself that just made it impossible to miss. Especially when it was such a bloodthirsty feeling as was being put off by whatever had managed to sneak up on them now. Bad enough that it was really disturbing the horses, in the way that Graowr instinctively realized on some deep, hidden level of her mind, could only be done by a predator. Something that preyed on them, and just the mere presence of could raise up that deep-seated, primitive fear of 'you are going to be eaten' in the mind of any creature.
...well, almost any creature. Something like a majin just didn't have that ingrained reflex. Trying to eat them was a mostly futile effort to begin with, so that fear just wasn't there. Majin were the ones that did the eating, not the ones that got eaten, so they could still recognize that intrinsic, underlying sensation from a lifetime of unintentionally inflicting it on other things. A hungry majin was a terror and a half to behold, after all, even if you weren't directly in their warpath and potentially on the menu.
As her eyes scanned the night-cloaked dunes, though, none of this actually went through Graowr's mind. Nothing so complex, in nowhere near as many words; it was a much more simple understanding of 'bad things want to do bad things'. To them, possibly their horses, possibly both.
Under her, her horse veered off as it neared the ascent of a dune just ahead, ears flicking as the beast let out a snort and disturbed whine. She flailed, her balance thrown off at the sudden panicked movement, and for a moment she precariously teetered on the verge of falling face-first into the sand below before catching herself.
"I think that gives a clear enough idea of where the source of our horses' trepidation is," the Sage spoke rather flatly. "I think that means we should--"
He was interrupted by a sudden blast of wind and a stinging flash of blue and pink as the majin went from dumbly flailing and fighting with gravity to being airborne and streaking toward the dune at top speed. "Deal with it!" she shouted, voice loud and excited. "I got it, don't worry!"
The old man just lifted a hand to hold down his hood, scowling at the obnoxiously energetic demon as she disappeared over the crest of the dune. "Not at all what I had in mind..." he grumbled, moving to nudge his steed to skirt well around the dune in question. "But it should provide a decent enough distraction, all the same." He casually leaned aside and grasped for the reins of the abandoned horse, frightened more than slightly by the majin's abrupt ascension.
Atop the dune, Graowr crashed down to land, throwing up a heavy cloud of sand as she did and throwing aside her concealing cloak. It wouldn't do anything but get in the way now, and there wasn't even any real need for it without the heat of the day and fury of the sun to worry about. Or so she assumed, anyway.
Her aura blazed around her like a bright flame, washing the sands under her feet in a deep pink hue. She didn't even need to turn to her scouter to figure out what the source of the danger was here. It was right there in front of her, among a tumbled jumble of rocks, and staring at her with luminous red eyes. Lots, and lots, and lots of eyes.
It was such a bizarre sight that for a moment it left her dumbstruck, staring wide-eyed at it. "It's...it's a..."
Below, the Sage had only gotten halfway around the dune when there came a sharp, whistling whine in the air and the sandy ground in front of him exploded, a plume of sand filling the air with a cloud of grit and making both horses rear and scream in fright and protest at these working conditions. "G-Gah!" He abandoned his hold on the reins of his impromptu partner's steed, clutching at those of his own with both hands to try and maintain his seating.
As the sandy aftermath of the impact cleared and blew away, the source of the chaos could be seen, sitting at the end of a deep trough carved into the ground and ending embedded several feet below the surface, only her waist and below jutting out of the pile of sand and dirt.
"....are you enjoying yourself?" he called out in frustration. "This hardly seems like the time for games."
There was a muffled mumble in response, as the majin regained her senses and the brilliant pink aura returned as she forced herself free of her sandy prison. "BWAH!" She flopped back, seating herself in the ground and spitting out a mouthful of sand, hastily wiping and swatting more of it from her face and hair. "Not playing!" she managed after a minute. "Giant scorpion!" She looked up at him, and then past him, her eyes going even wider than usual against all odds. "Lot of them!"
"Giant...scorpions?" the old sage repeated in puzzlement, slowly turning around in his saddle to get a clearer look at what she was on about. He was just in time to see them, swarming down from the crest of the dune among a wall of dust and sand. Scorpions, the smallest of them the size of dogs and the largest one easily eclipsing the size of the horse he rode. "....ah, yes. I see. We should--"
"Knock 'em all out!" the majin cut in again, leaping back up to her feet and readying to spring into the fray.
She didn't get far, before a surprisingly taut grip on her scarf elicited a sharp choking sound from her as it arrested her momentum, plopping her back down into the sand. "No! We don't have time to fight them!" The muscles in his arm went taut and his voice strained as he hauled the diminutive demon up out of the sand and hurled her overhand at her horse. "We run! Fight them if you have to, but only to get them out of our way."
She flipped and flopped through the air, landing on her back in the saddle and nearly sliding right off before catching herself with a grip on the reins and flipping around to plant her seat in...the seat, as it were. "That's no fun!" she huffed indignantly at the retreating form of the Sage as he spurred his increasingly frightened horse into moving. "We could totally handle these things!" she wailed, angrily spurring her own horse to get moving, just in time to avoid the thunderbolt of a stinger that a scorpion had been trying to introduce her to.
"It isn't about fighting!" the old scholar hollered back. "Lest you forget, we should be in a hurry. There's no telling how long it will take Dupree to start mounting a pursuit, or how quickly he will move when he does!"
"....oh. Right." That took just a little of the wind out of Graowr's sails, so to speak. She had completely forgotten about that. Now that she'd been reminded, though, she leaned forward in the saddle, her expression twisting into a determined one as she spurred her horse more intently forward. "Then we should hurry!" she announced as she caught up to the old scholar and passed him entirely, prompting him to just scowl and spur his steed onward to a full gallop across the sands to keep pace.
If they both survived this absurd quest it would be a miracle.
"Something dangerous, of that much I have no doubt." The old man slowly turned his head this way and that, scanning the area and horizon with a careful eye. "But what it might be I confess I have no idea."
The majin shifted in her seat and sprang up, standing in the saddle as she peered around intently. "Dangerous, huh..." That much was obvious, even to her simple mind. Out in a place like this, danger had a certain way of presenting itself that just made it impossible to miss. Especially when it was such a bloodthirsty feeling as was being put off by whatever had managed to sneak up on them now. Bad enough that it was really disturbing the horses, in the way that Graowr instinctively realized on some deep, hidden level of her mind, could only be done by a predator. Something that preyed on them, and just the mere presence of could raise up that deep-seated, primitive fear of 'you are going to be eaten' in the mind of any creature.
...well, almost any creature. Something like a majin just didn't have that ingrained reflex. Trying to eat them was a mostly futile effort to begin with, so that fear just wasn't there. Majin were the ones that did the eating, not the ones that got eaten, so they could still recognize that intrinsic, underlying sensation from a lifetime of unintentionally inflicting it on other things. A hungry majin was a terror and a half to behold, after all, even if you weren't directly in their warpath and potentially on the menu.
As her eyes scanned the night-cloaked dunes, though, none of this actually went through Graowr's mind. Nothing so complex, in nowhere near as many words; it was a much more simple understanding of 'bad things want to do bad things'. To them, possibly their horses, possibly both.
Under her, her horse veered off as it neared the ascent of a dune just ahead, ears flicking as the beast let out a snort and disturbed whine. She flailed, her balance thrown off at the sudden panicked movement, and for a moment she precariously teetered on the verge of falling face-first into the sand below before catching herself.
"I think that gives a clear enough idea of where the source of our horses' trepidation is," the Sage spoke rather flatly. "I think that means we should--"
He was interrupted by a sudden blast of wind and a stinging flash of blue and pink as the majin went from dumbly flailing and fighting with gravity to being airborne and streaking toward the dune at top speed. "Deal with it!" she shouted, voice loud and excited. "I got it, don't worry!"
The old man just lifted a hand to hold down his hood, scowling at the obnoxiously energetic demon as she disappeared over the crest of the dune. "Not at all what I had in mind..." he grumbled, moving to nudge his steed to skirt well around the dune in question. "But it should provide a decent enough distraction, all the same." He casually leaned aside and grasped for the reins of the abandoned horse, frightened more than slightly by the majin's abrupt ascension.
Atop the dune, Graowr crashed down to land, throwing up a heavy cloud of sand as she did and throwing aside her concealing cloak. It wouldn't do anything but get in the way now, and there wasn't even any real need for it without the heat of the day and fury of the sun to worry about. Or so she assumed, anyway.
Her aura blazed around her like a bright flame, washing the sands under her feet in a deep pink hue. She didn't even need to turn to her scouter to figure out what the source of the danger was here. It was right there in front of her, among a tumbled jumble of rocks, and staring at her with luminous red eyes. Lots, and lots, and lots of eyes.
It was such a bizarre sight that for a moment it left her dumbstruck, staring wide-eyed at it. "It's...it's a..."
Below, the Sage had only gotten halfway around the dune when there came a sharp, whistling whine in the air and the sandy ground in front of him exploded, a plume of sand filling the air with a cloud of grit and making both horses rear and scream in fright and protest at these working conditions. "G-Gah!" He abandoned his hold on the reins of his impromptu partner's steed, clutching at those of his own with both hands to try and maintain his seating.
As the sandy aftermath of the impact cleared and blew away, the source of the chaos could be seen, sitting at the end of a deep trough carved into the ground and ending embedded several feet below the surface, only her waist and below jutting out of the pile of sand and dirt.
"....are you enjoying yourself?" he called out in frustration. "This hardly seems like the time for games."
There was a muffled mumble in response, as the majin regained her senses and the brilliant pink aura returned as she forced herself free of her sandy prison. "BWAH!" She flopped back, seating herself in the ground and spitting out a mouthful of sand, hastily wiping and swatting more of it from her face and hair. "Not playing!" she managed after a minute. "Giant scorpion!" She looked up at him, and then past him, her eyes going even wider than usual against all odds. "Lot of them!"
"Giant...scorpions?" the old sage repeated in puzzlement, slowly turning around in his saddle to get a clearer look at what she was on about. He was just in time to see them, swarming down from the crest of the dune among a wall of dust and sand. Scorpions, the smallest of them the size of dogs and the largest one easily eclipsing the size of the horse he rode. "....ah, yes. I see. We should--"
"Knock 'em all out!" the majin cut in again, leaping back up to her feet and readying to spring into the fray.
She didn't get far, before a surprisingly taut grip on her scarf elicited a sharp choking sound from her as it arrested her momentum, plopping her back down into the sand. "No! We don't have time to fight them!" The muscles in his arm went taut and his voice strained as he hauled the diminutive demon up out of the sand and hurled her overhand at her horse. "We run! Fight them if you have to, but only to get them out of our way."
She flipped and flopped through the air, landing on her back in the saddle and nearly sliding right off before catching herself with a grip on the reins and flipping around to plant her seat in...the seat, as it were. "That's no fun!" she huffed indignantly at the retreating form of the Sage as he spurred his increasingly frightened horse into moving. "We could totally handle these things!" she wailed, angrily spurring her own horse to get moving, just in time to avoid the thunderbolt of a stinger that a scorpion had been trying to introduce her to.
"It isn't about fighting!" the old scholar hollered back. "Lest you forget, we should be in a hurry. There's no telling how long it will take Dupree to start mounting a pursuit, or how quickly he will move when he does!"
"....oh. Right." That took just a little of the wind out of Graowr's sails, so to speak. She had completely forgotten about that. Now that she'd been reminded, though, she leaned forward in the saddle, her expression twisting into a determined one as she spurred her horse more intently forward. "Then we should hurry!" she announced as she caught up to the old scholar and passed him entirely, prompting him to just scowl and spur his steed onward to a full gallop across the sands to keep pace.
If they both survived this absurd quest it would be a miracle.
Quote:Word Count -- This Post: 1,388 // Word Count (Graowr): 7,466 // Quest Word Count: 14,871
Character Count -- This Post: 7,588 // Character Count (Graowr): 49,537
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