02-06-2017, 08:57 AM
After having crossed the overgrown gate that came closest to the one leading to Camelot Undyne was in for a pleasant surprise: they had come out into an enormous forest! For some odd reason crossing the gate turned their Tetsumas into living, breathing horses, but Undyne didn't bother trying to understand what was going on. There probably was some underlying magic rule that did not permit for mechanical mounts around here? Hell if she knew. But, she was digressing... the forest. It extended all around them, much like it did around the Snowdin region although it was a little more varied in terms of vegetation and there was no snow. Actually, quite the opposite: it was a little warm, the air was humid and there were occasional breezes. She found that she liked Snowdin better.
Jeremy perked his ears and listened to the sounds all around them. "This place is rather lively", he said. "I can hear animals and insects all around us."
"Well, you ARE a feline and your ears are half the size of your head, so no surprise there", Undyne remarked as she summoned a spear. "Hey, you know how to handle one of these?"
"No..."
"Well, that's too bad." She tossed it towards him and summoned a new one while Jeremy nearly fell out of the saddle as he tried to catch the thrown one and then hold onto it without cutting himself or the horse to shreds in the process. "I'm not your babysitter so you better get used to one. I'll summon a solid one so that yours doesn't break."
"I'll hurt myself more than anything that comes at me", the feline remarked while taking a few tentative stabs, adjusting to the spear in his hand to hold it properly. “I’d rather...” He blinked and stopped, his ears perking up and catching a sound that Undyne could not hear. “We may get company soon. There’s a pair of people coming our way.”
Undyne grinned broadly and patted his back. “See! I knew that you’d be able to make yourself useful. Now, just try to poke the spear at whatever gets too close to you. If they don’t jerk back, poke harder and yell for me to come help you.”
“And hope that I’m not dead by the time you are there”, he replied with a resigned sigh. “They’re coming that way... probably along this path. Three... no, four people, sounds like they are wearing metal armor. I hear clanking.”
“Armor, eh? Well then, see if I can’t match them. Just yell when they’re coming close.” She sat down and visualized her own suit, which wasn’t very hard. She had worn it for very long times after all, polished every surface, greased every joint and checked every leather piece. Jeremy meanwhile continued to listen, gripping the humming energy spear tighter and closely eyeing the footpath. But, whoever was coming that way, they were taking their sweet time. Undyne was able to conjure her armor and put everything on with time to spare. “Jeremy, withdraw for now”, she said as she fixated the helmet in place and took the horse’s reins to keep it close. “Don’t come out unless I tell you so.”
“What’s the matter?” he asked as he had his horse back up and turned to get off the path.
“My armor hides who I am but you’re exposed. We need to be careful.”
Shortly after a group of three men and a woman on foot came into view from behind a group of closely clumped-up trees, and followed the path towards her. When they noticed, they accelerated their steps. She noticed that they were wearing chainmail and leather armor, and maces. Good job, Jeremy, she thought to herself.
“Hoi, traveler!” the leader of the group spoke with a raised voice. “What’s someone like you doing this far from civilization?”
“Greetings, strangers, and I could be asking you the same thing”, Undyne replied. “I’ve actually just arrived through the Nexus Gate and am trying to get myself situated.”
“You’d best head the way we came from, then”, the man remarked. “Yggdrasil lies that way. Other’n that, there isn’t much to be found in this jungle.” While speaking he motioned to his comrades who started to move around Undyne. They tried to make it look like they were getting around her to continue their trek but she felt suspicious almost immediately. For now she just played along.
“Any path I should avoid?”
“You’d best not head south, that’s where the monsters have nested in.” He spat on the ground. “Ambrosians. At least all those freaks are clumped up in one place that way.”
Undyne snickered. “Monsters, you say? What sort of?”
“Freaks from Cinnabar, half-humans, bipedal animals... that sort of thing.”
“What about Boss monsters? White-furred and with goat-like horns and ears.”
“Hell if I know, stranger!” the other traveler said. “I’ve never set foot in there. You hunting one or something?”
“I might be. What’s it to you?”
“A traveling bounty-hunter then.” He grinned. “Your kind carry a lot of cash on you, don’t you?” Two of the travelers suddenly walked left and right of Undyne, seemingly casual as they did so, but she could also sense the fourth one directly behind her. They were trapping her. “And there I was unhappy that we’ll have to return to Scar saying that the elves found us out and we couldn’t snag any loot in the raid. At least we won’t come back empty-handed.” He reached for the sword hilt on his back.
“Don’t draw it. You’re making a big mistake.”
“The only mistake that can be made here is you not surrendering your armor and what’s in your pockets to us.”
Undyne chuckled and removed her helmet, revealing her fish features to the group leader, whose face reflected big surprise. “I’m not going to do any such thing. Now move along.”
“It’s a freak!” one of the other men yelled, the woman chiming in with a disgusted shriek and pulling a club from where it was attached to her waist. In the meantime, the group leader drew his sword and stepped forward to deliver a brutal slash at her unprotected head with a battlecry.
Her helmet, thrown with gusto, hit him straight in the face and sent him tumbling back, his broken nose sputtering blood over his clothes. The others cursed and attacked her simultaneously from three sides. It was too bad that they were dealing with an experienced combatant. Undyne blocked the axe hit from one side using the toughened steel of her left glove while summoning a spear into her right hand. The woman on her right side got in a hit with her club but she had aimed too low and instead of striking Undyne’s head hit the back of her torso-protecting armor, causing a loud clank and a dent. The third was preparing their bow and wasn’t a concern to her... yet.
“Humans are more pitiful than I thought. Even Frisk was more skilled than you!” Granted, Frisk had blocked her attacks and run away from her at the first chance instead of actually attacking her, but had she actually attacked the fight would have taken a very interesting turn. While toppling over the man whose strike she had blocked she blocked a second hit from the woman with the bottom of her spear, then grabbed the man before her by the shoulder just as he was regaining his balance and skewered him with the spear. The energy tip penetrated the crude chainmail, went straight through his body and broke through the back, covered in blood. His eyes widened and he spattered blood as Undyne tossed him back and snatched the axe from his hand before it could fall to the ground. One down, three to go.
“You monster! You killed Frank!” the woman yelled as she swung the club only to have it deflected by the axe, her momentum carrying her past the armored fish. She barely dodged a blow that would have split her in half.
“Shut up, Sapphire! You know you’re not supposed to use our real names!” yelled the man with the bow while hastily putting an arrow on the string and taking aim. “Keep her busy! I’ll kill this freak!”
With a rage-filled scream, the woman launched herself at Undyne once more. She kept her eyes on the axe when readying to swing her club and in the process missed her opponent shifting her weight until it was too late. Undyne’s armored boot hit her arm from below, forcing her to drop her club to move along to the motion if she didn’t want to break it. She cursed as she stumbled back, but her task had been accomplished: the fish-woman had stood still for long enough.
The bowman let go of the string of his bow and the arrow darted through the air. Only luck kept Undyne from having her head pierced, instead the arrow grazed her cheek, leaving a deep cut. But no blood poured out as she was still a monster... monsters don’t bleed. The woman’s eyes widened a bit as she realized that their plan had failed, before Undyne brought the axe down on her head, splitting her skull with the sickeningly sound of bones breaking and metal digging into brain mass. She left the weapon lodged in there and turned to the bowman who was drawing his dagger with shaky hands. “You’d better look behind you”, she said.
“Do you think I’m stupid or wha-” was all that he could respond before her summoned spear pierced his neck from behind. He could only sputter an incoherent word along with a splatter of blood before toppling forward and dying with his face on the ground.
The only one left was the group leader. Undyne summoned a new spear as she stepped towards him, knocking aside the sword that he stabbed at her. “I thought humans were stronger than that. All the monsters of the underground make up for one of you guys in soul power? How pathetic.”
“Wait! We have hostages! If you... if we don’t return to our lair, the boss will kill one for each of us that doesn’t-”
Undyne cut his plea short by stabbing him between the eyes, piercing his skull. He was dead instantly. Disgusted, she let the spear vanish again. “At least they will die knowing that you’re not walking this earth anymore. JEREMY!”
“I’m right here”, the feline replied with a wide-eyed smile that couldn’t hide his terror.
“I’ll extract their souls. You stand guard.” She gathered the bloodied bodies and laid them next to each other, then closed her eyes and focused. She had never extracted a human soul before, but she imagined that it had to be something like visualizing their essence and sucking it out. Unbeknownst to herself, what she actually did was Omnilium extraction instead, taking slightly over five minutes for each body. They vanished entirely. When she was finished with the first, she barely felt any stronger... not in the same way as had been told by the plaques in Waterfall. “These humans are exceptionally weak compared to what the legend has us believe. They didn’t even use magic.”
“And extracting a soul would leave the physical body unharmed”, noted Jeremy. “Does that mean that this is something else?”
“I’ve no idea, but in this Ambrosia place we may find more answers.” She finished the extracction, leaving only discarded weapons and a few splatters of blood on the path, then mounted back onto her horse. “Let’s get going. The human said southwards...”
“And what’s south?”
“Hang on, I remember that human history – I mean anime... they said that the sun rises east and descends west. So south has to be...” She checked the sun’s current position then pointed in a direction. “That way. Let’s get going.”
Jeremy shuddered as he lit a joint. He’d heard the stories of Undyne. But seeing the carnage was a whole different thing.
Jeremy perked his ears and listened to the sounds all around them. "This place is rather lively", he said. "I can hear animals and insects all around us."
"Well, you ARE a feline and your ears are half the size of your head, so no surprise there", Undyne remarked as she summoned a spear. "Hey, you know how to handle one of these?"
"No..."
"Well, that's too bad." She tossed it towards him and summoned a new one while Jeremy nearly fell out of the saddle as he tried to catch the thrown one and then hold onto it without cutting himself or the horse to shreds in the process. "I'm not your babysitter so you better get used to one. I'll summon a solid one so that yours doesn't break."
"I'll hurt myself more than anything that comes at me", the feline remarked while taking a few tentative stabs, adjusting to the spear in his hand to hold it properly. “I’d rather...” He blinked and stopped, his ears perking up and catching a sound that Undyne could not hear. “We may get company soon. There’s a pair of people coming our way.”
Undyne grinned broadly and patted his back. “See! I knew that you’d be able to make yourself useful. Now, just try to poke the spear at whatever gets too close to you. If they don’t jerk back, poke harder and yell for me to come help you.”
“And hope that I’m not dead by the time you are there”, he replied with a resigned sigh. “They’re coming that way... probably along this path. Three... no, four people, sounds like they are wearing metal armor. I hear clanking.”
“Armor, eh? Well then, see if I can’t match them. Just yell when they’re coming close.” She sat down and visualized her own suit, which wasn’t very hard. She had worn it for very long times after all, polished every surface, greased every joint and checked every leather piece. Jeremy meanwhile continued to listen, gripping the humming energy spear tighter and closely eyeing the footpath. But, whoever was coming that way, they were taking their sweet time. Undyne was able to conjure her armor and put everything on with time to spare. “Jeremy, withdraw for now”, she said as she fixated the helmet in place and took the horse’s reins to keep it close. “Don’t come out unless I tell you so.”
“What’s the matter?” he asked as he had his horse back up and turned to get off the path.
“My armor hides who I am but you’re exposed. We need to be careful.”
Shortly after a group of three men and a woman on foot came into view from behind a group of closely clumped-up trees, and followed the path towards her. When they noticed, they accelerated their steps. She noticed that they were wearing chainmail and leather armor, and maces. Good job, Jeremy, she thought to herself.
“Hoi, traveler!” the leader of the group spoke with a raised voice. “What’s someone like you doing this far from civilization?”
“Greetings, strangers, and I could be asking you the same thing”, Undyne replied. “I’ve actually just arrived through the Nexus Gate and am trying to get myself situated.”
“You’d best head the way we came from, then”, the man remarked. “Yggdrasil lies that way. Other’n that, there isn’t much to be found in this jungle.” While speaking he motioned to his comrades who started to move around Undyne. They tried to make it look like they were getting around her to continue their trek but she felt suspicious almost immediately. For now she just played along.
“Any path I should avoid?”
“You’d best not head south, that’s where the monsters have nested in.” He spat on the ground. “Ambrosians. At least all those freaks are clumped up in one place that way.”
Undyne snickered. “Monsters, you say? What sort of?”
“Freaks from Cinnabar, half-humans, bipedal animals... that sort of thing.”
“What about Boss monsters? White-furred and with goat-like horns and ears.”
“Hell if I know, stranger!” the other traveler said. “I’ve never set foot in there. You hunting one or something?”
“I might be. What’s it to you?”
“A traveling bounty-hunter then.” He grinned. “Your kind carry a lot of cash on you, don’t you?” Two of the travelers suddenly walked left and right of Undyne, seemingly casual as they did so, but she could also sense the fourth one directly behind her. They were trapping her. “And there I was unhappy that we’ll have to return to Scar saying that the elves found us out and we couldn’t snag any loot in the raid. At least we won’t come back empty-handed.” He reached for the sword hilt on his back.
“Don’t draw it. You’re making a big mistake.”
“The only mistake that can be made here is you not surrendering your armor and what’s in your pockets to us.”
Undyne chuckled and removed her helmet, revealing her fish features to the group leader, whose face reflected big surprise. “I’m not going to do any such thing. Now move along.”
“It’s a freak!” one of the other men yelled, the woman chiming in with a disgusted shriek and pulling a club from where it was attached to her waist. In the meantime, the group leader drew his sword and stepped forward to deliver a brutal slash at her unprotected head with a battlecry.
Her helmet, thrown with gusto, hit him straight in the face and sent him tumbling back, his broken nose sputtering blood over his clothes. The others cursed and attacked her simultaneously from three sides. It was too bad that they were dealing with an experienced combatant. Undyne blocked the axe hit from one side using the toughened steel of her left glove while summoning a spear into her right hand. The woman on her right side got in a hit with her club but she had aimed too low and instead of striking Undyne’s head hit the back of her torso-protecting armor, causing a loud clank and a dent. The third was preparing their bow and wasn’t a concern to her... yet.
“Humans are more pitiful than I thought. Even Frisk was more skilled than you!” Granted, Frisk had blocked her attacks and run away from her at the first chance instead of actually attacking her, but had she actually attacked the fight would have taken a very interesting turn. While toppling over the man whose strike she had blocked she blocked a second hit from the woman with the bottom of her spear, then grabbed the man before her by the shoulder just as he was regaining his balance and skewered him with the spear. The energy tip penetrated the crude chainmail, went straight through his body and broke through the back, covered in blood. His eyes widened and he spattered blood as Undyne tossed him back and snatched the axe from his hand before it could fall to the ground. One down, three to go.
“You monster! You killed Frank!” the woman yelled as she swung the club only to have it deflected by the axe, her momentum carrying her past the armored fish. She barely dodged a blow that would have split her in half.
“Shut up, Sapphire! You know you’re not supposed to use our real names!” yelled the man with the bow while hastily putting an arrow on the string and taking aim. “Keep her busy! I’ll kill this freak!”
With a rage-filled scream, the woman launched herself at Undyne once more. She kept her eyes on the axe when readying to swing her club and in the process missed her opponent shifting her weight until it was too late. Undyne’s armored boot hit her arm from below, forcing her to drop her club to move along to the motion if she didn’t want to break it. She cursed as she stumbled back, but her task had been accomplished: the fish-woman had stood still for long enough.
The bowman let go of the string of his bow and the arrow darted through the air. Only luck kept Undyne from having her head pierced, instead the arrow grazed her cheek, leaving a deep cut. But no blood poured out as she was still a monster... monsters don’t bleed. The woman’s eyes widened a bit as she realized that their plan had failed, before Undyne brought the axe down on her head, splitting her skull with the sickeningly sound of bones breaking and metal digging into brain mass. She left the weapon lodged in there and turned to the bowman who was drawing his dagger with shaky hands. “You’d better look behind you”, she said.
“Do you think I’m stupid or wha-” was all that he could respond before her summoned spear pierced his neck from behind. He could only sputter an incoherent word along with a splatter of blood before toppling forward and dying with his face on the ground.
The only one left was the group leader. Undyne summoned a new spear as she stepped towards him, knocking aside the sword that he stabbed at her. “I thought humans were stronger than that. All the monsters of the underground make up for one of you guys in soul power? How pathetic.”
“Wait! We have hostages! If you... if we don’t return to our lair, the boss will kill one for each of us that doesn’t-”
Undyne cut his plea short by stabbing him between the eyes, piercing his skull. He was dead instantly. Disgusted, she let the spear vanish again. “At least they will die knowing that you’re not walking this earth anymore. JEREMY!”
“I’m right here”, the feline replied with a wide-eyed smile that couldn’t hide his terror.
“I’ll extract their souls. You stand guard.” She gathered the bloodied bodies and laid them next to each other, then closed her eyes and focused. She had never extracted a human soul before, but she imagined that it had to be something like visualizing their essence and sucking it out. Unbeknownst to herself, what she actually did was Omnilium extraction instead, taking slightly over five minutes for each body. They vanished entirely. When she was finished with the first, she barely felt any stronger... not in the same way as had been told by the plaques in Waterfall. “These humans are exceptionally weak compared to what the legend has us believe. They didn’t even use magic.”
“And extracting a soul would leave the physical body unharmed”, noted Jeremy. “Does that mean that this is something else?”
“I’ve no idea, but in this Ambrosia place we may find more answers.” She finished the extracction, leaving only discarded weapons and a few splatters of blood on the path, then mounted back onto her horse. “Let’s get going. The human said southwards...”
“And what’s south?”
“Hang on, I remember that human history – I mean anime... they said that the sun rises east and descends west. So south has to be...” She checked the sun’s current position then pointed in a direction. “That way. Let’s get going.”
Jeremy shuddered as he lit a joint. He’d heard the stories of Undyne. But seeing the carnage was a whole different thing.
"(Note to self: insert quote & picture once I find stuff)"
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