From being an Abandoned who had rarely left the Hollowed Grounds, to embracing the call of adventure, to dying and being reborn first as an Ascended and then as an Ancient, Maea has gone through quite the amount of changes in her life. One thing remains common, though, in her attempts to find out just where she belongs; she’s always had a craving for knowledge which has brought her to so many places and to meet so many people here in Caido. We can’t wait to see what else is in store for her!
Congratulations, Maea!
Credits
Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
Skinning and hosting by the epically talented Kaons, and functionality fanciness by the coding magic of Neowulf. If you ever see either of them around, make sure to show them some love!
The lack of light had started to get to everyone by this point.
Oliver himself wasn't feeling all that great. A lot of overwhelming things had happened, mostly bad ones, but a couple of small good things also happened. Still, he had discovered that chugging alcohol to forget about his worries wasn't exactly helping. In fact, it had made him feel about 100 times worse. What he did discover, though, was that letting out all his energy did somewhat help.
It allowed him to have a way to let out all his emotions and energy he would've been spending if it weren't pitch black and dangerous. As well, Oliver figured that it may help him to feel better about all the bad things going on.
Quite unfortunately, Oliver didn't really have access to too many things. It wasn't like he had sprawling hills, his own set of knives, or really anything more than a stick...and he knew how far that got him. He wanted something else, something that didn't make him rely on others to get. Nobody here was close enough to him for Oliver to feel comfortable to ask to borrow and tools. He needed a skill that wouldn't make him feel like a burden.
After a bit of scrounging around for supplies, Oliver managed to find a massive sack of flour as well as a rope. It didn't take too much longer to find a very empty alcove with a strong looking beam not too far from the ground. It took a bit of trying, but Oliver soon rigged the flour sack to be hanging down from the beam, using the rope to attach it. With that, he started attempting to punch...which he absolutely had no idea how to throw a proper punch.
10-26-2019, 06:57 PM (This post was last modified: 10-26-2019, 07:00 PM by Loren.)
The white sheep of the family
Loren had been patrolling, looking for anything untoward. Now that they were a decent amount of the way through LongNight, he was worried about people going stir crazy. Also, he himself was feeling restless, so he welcomed any chance to stretch his legs. It didn’t take long for him to stumble upon a strange dull thumping sound. Further investigation revealed it was Oliver punching a sack. The other man’s technique was terrible, and the summoner leaned against a nearby wall. ”Make sure to keep your thump on the outside of your fist, your feet pointed towards the target, and to use the momentum from your hips to give your punches enough force.” While the Launceleyn was primarily a magician, he’d had combat training of all sorts.
”I’ve always found that a moving target provides a bit more of a challenge. I’d be happy to provide one.” He was feeling too lazy to actually throw a punch himself, but he had other skills. He cycled through the creatures he could summon before settling on a golem. Which...failed to manifest.
Frowning, he tried a luxere. Again, nothing. Ogre, pegasus, still nothing showed up. A bear flickered into being briefly, followed by two wolves that appeared and disappeared, which were replaced by three rabbits. Finally, dismissing the rabbits, he called upon a unicorn. Thankfully, that appeared, and he breathed a sigh of relief. However, try as he might to keep the panic from his face, surely some of it shone through. Whatever was going on with his magic—parts staying behind, summons now failing to show up—he’d figure it out after LongNight.
For now, Oliver had a unicorn to contend with. While it was a healer, it was also a huge fucking horse with a horn on one end. At Loren’s unspoken command, it trotted forward, aiming to shoulder the other man to the ground.
The blonde was just about to try and punch the sack again when a sudden voice appeared. He immediately looked over at Loren, but just as quickly, he looked back down at every single thing that Loren would point out to him. He'd try his best to correct them soon after he was told that they were incorrect. It was extremely embarrassing, but then again, it was better to only have one person see him like this than multiple. Loren wouldn't judge him, hopefully.
"Like this?" Hopefully he had listened correctly.
At first, Oliver thought Loren was offering to fight him. Or well, stand in to be punched. Oliver really, really didn't like that idea. Punching could seriously hurt someone and Loren had been so kind to him. However, once a couple of animals briefly appeared, he started to understand what Loren was doing. He didn't like the idea of fighting an animal, not at all. "Wait. What if I hurt them?" There wasn't enough time for waits as a unicorn now appeared before them and boy was it ready to fight.
The gigantic fucking animal ran right towards him. Once it was barely a foot away he tried to move off to the side and give a punch to the neck of the beast, praying to god that he wasn't about to be skewered by the horn. He wanted to keep every appendage, thank you very much.
”Better.” It wasn’t perfect—far from it, really—but it was a marked improvement, and Loren’s voice came out encouragingly. Training took time and effort, and no one expected anyone to be perfect on their first try. Then the subject of hurting the animals came up and the summoner sighed. ”Don’t worry. They’re not real and they can’t feel pain.” At least that was true as far as the Launceleyn knew.
Then it was time to put that to the test: Oliver punched the unicorns neck and...pretty much nothing happened. The other man wasn’t that strong, the unicorn was pretty study, and he hadn’t punch anyway too vital. As the newcomer side-stepped the creature, Loren had it do something no normal horse (or unicorn, probably) would do. Instead of whirling around to face the other man, the unicorn kept its momentum but turned, its back legs coming around as it pivoted as its side sped towards Oliver. Again, it wasn’t moving fast enough to do real damage, just enough to knock the other man off balance or maybe knock him to the ground if he did something dumb.
The word of encouragement brought a bit of confidence to the young man. It was always good to hear that he was already improving, though, even Oliver knew he had far more room to improve. It'd be nice to hear what he could do to be perfect, but it was hard to be perfect when he was so new to fighting. No matter how much verbal instructions he received, he'd always have room to improve.
And thank the gods, the animals wouldn't feel pain. It still felt super weird to be tasked with punching an animal, especially when so many of the people he knew could apparently turn into animals.
Luckily, when his punch landed on the creature, there was no sign of pain or resistance. Rather, the beast kept on its merry way. Could it be merry if it couldn't feel anything? Oliver didn't see the next thing coming, especially when it wasn't a thing any horse he'd seen could do. The horse's lower body rammed into him.
He was knocked to the side and did flail around a bit. Oliver would attempt to give a punch to the back leg and try to take a few steps back. It was hard to get his footing and his legs shook slightly as he tried to step back.
Oliver soon became distracted, turning to look over at Loren briefly. He called out to him, obviously very confused. "What am I supposed to do? Get it on its back?"
Oliver’s punches were wild, but horses’ legs were fragile, prone to injury despite the great bulk they carried. Apparently, unicorns were much the same, if the way this one’s knee buckled when the other man’s fist hit it. However, the muscle wasn’t torn, just bruised at worst and again pain was no obstacle to summoned creatures.
So without missing a beat, the unicorn whirled to face the newcomer and kicked with one of its front legs. Loren’s target was the newcomer’s shin; the summoner didn’t want to seriously injure Oliver, so the kick had very little force behind it. There was enough to bruise and sting, but not enough to break bones. ”Your opponents won't give you the luxury of telling you what to do.” And right now, the Launceleyn was Oliver’s opponent. ”Figure something out.”
The young man let out a yelp as the unicorn made contact with his snin. Buckling ever so slightly, he tried to give a swift punch to the side of the Unicorn's head, trying to aim more for the jaw and far less for the horn.
Once he had made that attempt, if his hand wasn't impaled, he'd try and take a few staggering steps back. He seemed to be able to put some weight down on the foot that was kicked, but damn did it still hurt.
Stepped a few feet away he took a glance down at his shin, clearly allowing the unicorn to stab him at his moment of blindness. After making sure that it wasn't broken, he turned to look back up at the unicorn, waiting for it to charge for him once more. Oliver wasn't sure what Loren expected him to do. He was a tiny dude with no muscles and the unicorn was a massive ass tank. Hopefully his shin would be the only thing damaged after this.
"I'm really trying to figure something out right now. It's not exactly going great in Oliverland." And yes, he was still in pain. His voice reflected this as he seemed a bit agitated, but not quite angry. He had to think of something: fast.
Loren frankly didn’t give a shit about how it was going in Oliverland. The summoner came from a military family and had been trained since birth to be ruthless in combat. Mostly, he managed to hold back those instincts, which the other man should be grateful for; if the Launceleyn had really been trying to make this into a fight, then the newcomer would be dealing with far worse than a bruised shin.
Oliver’s fist connected with the unicorn’s jaw—it didn’t really matter if the other man hurt the creature, since again, it wasn’t real—because Loren wasn’t even attempting to keep the summons intact. However, the other man’s comments were getting on the summoner’s nerves. Time to show the newcomer just how little he really knew about combat. Ordering the unicorn to pivot, Loren basically told to bowl the newcomer over (still, though, without enough force to do more than bruise) and then sit on Oliver.
Well Loren would still have to deal with the fact that Oliver was very clearly not from a military background. His memory wouldn't help him at all, but in no way was Oliver trained for fighting in the slightest. While he had worked somewhat based on his body, he also clearly didn't have any experience with the same sort of training as maybe Loren. Truly though, Oliver was lucky. Loren could have made this a terrible fight by choosing to actually stab him with the horn or to face him head on himself. Oliver wasn't sure if he could even dare to punch Loren in the face, even if it was just training.
Nothing could have prepared for what was going to come next. The punch did little to stop the unicorn, but what even would? The unicorn basically started to come straight for him, this time holding back nothing. Panicking, Oliver looked around for anything that he could use to defend himself since clearly, his punches were shit and kicking wasn't going to help him. Only things near him were a couple of bricks and his belongings: none of which he could easily reach. Looks like he was going to have to try not to die the hard way.
Right as the unicorn made contact with him, from three feet away a nice, four pound rock shot up at the unicorns face aiming to hit it right in between the eyes. Of course, Oliver was too busy falling to the ground to ask Loren why the fuck he chose to almost decapitate him with a brick. The blonde landed on his side, letting out a groan as he felt some of the bruises from a couple previous events.
There was a sickening crunch as the brick smashed the unicorn in between the eyes; the creature’s skull was probably fractured, if not broken. So Loren didn’t bother having it sit on Oliver, since even though it was a fake, the force from the blow still staggered the creature. Instead the summoner just dismissed it, then crossed his arms and frowned at the other man. ”Why didn’t you use your magic earlier?” It certainly hadn’t been the Launceleyn’s telekinesis that had lifted the brick. And it certainly would’ve made the fight fairer, not that it would’ve been fair. The Launceleyn was one of the more powerful Abandoned in the Hollowed Grounds, second only to Remi and maybe Deimos.
10-29-2019, 06:55 PM (This post was last modified: 10-29-2019, 06:56 PM by Oliver.)
OLIVER
Rolling over to his back, Oliver looked up, expecting to see a horse ass right next to him, but instead there was nothing. The blonde sat up and looked at Loren who didn't look too pleased. Now, Oliver expected the man to be mad at him for having to interfere by throwing the rock, for being mad that he fell to the ground.
However, that wasn't the case. Instead, he started accusing Oliver, of all people, of hiding away magic! "What the fuck Loren?" He sounded far more confused than aggressive, like he didn't understand why Loren was so furious with him.
It took a bit, but Oliver soon stood up and walked over to him, his fists balling a bit. His eyebrows scrunched down and he mad a bit of a frustrated face as he looked at the other.
"You and I both know that-" Then it dawned on him. His face soon relaxed and his eyebrows raised back to normal. It took a few seconds for Oliver to speak once more, drifting off and looking just beyond Loren. "I...I...didn't" He didn't what? Oliver wasn't sure what happened. How it happened.
"All I did was look at the stones...I was going to use it as a weapon but it wasn't where I could grab it. Even if I want to reach for it, the unicorn knocked me over-" He tried to explain to Loren. It was clearly overwhelming because he was switching from denial to trying to figure out if he actually had done magic. Never had he actually showed signs of it and long had he accepted that he was boring, basic, useless.
This changed everything and Loren looking at him like he was a dog who just pissed on the carpet wasn't helping him to reconcile with this.
Ah. Oliver was either an idiot or hadn’t known he had magic. Loren wasn’t particularly interested in discovering which one it was, so he decided to see if the could cut through the other man’s babbling. The summoner drew himself up to his full height—which meant he practically towered over the other man—and pointed at the brick that the newcomer had already picked up. ”Pick it up in your mind and pour all of your willpower into it.” The words came out as a barked command; if startling the newcomer into using him magic was how they had to do it to begin with, so be it. The Launceleyn could be patient later.
Nothing was making sense- or more like Oliver was refusing to accept any of it as logical. He was normal. He was an Accepted. If he had magic, someone should have known by now, right? No way was he an Abandoned-
The barking of order's made him shoot up practically, standing upright and frowning slightly. He looked over at the brick hurriedly, not wanting to anger Loren anymore. He didn't have magic. He couldn't lift it up. But he had to follow orders. He had to do what Loren wanted him to.
In a split second he did what he was told. He focused intensely on the rock and that rock alone, nothing else mattered in that moment. Oliver imagined his hand somehow lifting it from the ground and holding it at eye level. And before him, the rock lifted off of the ground, seeming to levitate in air.
As the object was held in the air, Oliver's body trembled and he looked like was either about to cry, scream, or vomit.
”You can let it drop now.” It would probably drop anyway, given how weak the other mage must be, what with being new to Caido and all that. This time, Loren’s voice came out gently and soothing. Indeed, his whole demeanor had softened: now that they’d gotten past the initial hurdle of Oliver not knowing about his magic (if that was indeed the case), the summoner didn’t need to do the whole nasty drilling thing anymore. Now what was needed was patience and understanding.
The Launceleyn hadn’t had the problem of not knowing the extent of his abilities (though he did now), but he got the sense that, for whatever reason, the initial group from Northaven had been given a little bit extra when they were portalled in. Most newcomers were like Oliver. They were incredibly unsure of their new abilities and of Caido as a whole. ”You didn’t know you were an Abandoned?” It was a question, but it came out sounding more like a statement. Still, Loren’s tone was kind.
