BoZV - Arc 1

[Bloodbane]

Rion paused, hearing Aqua call out to him before she approached him. By this time, the other members of the group that saved Aldur were also retiring to their rooms. "Hm?" He looked over at her as she approached, before listening to her ask about his powers. He supposed that what he had done to that undead was indeed highly unusual... too bad even he couldn't quite explain what it was yet. All he really knew about the ability were three things; it had begun to act in this manner after a particularly nasty encounter with a blight mage, and that it manifested as a form of light-based crystallization in response to the presence of blight, almost to a degree of being natural based on a sense he feels when around higher concentrations of blight. Needless to say, the fact that it appeared eerily similar to the dark crystals that they had just witnessed protruding from the undead was not exactly something he had an answer for, and he had no real desire to try and explain away the similarity when he wasn't even entirely sure what it was, himself.

"I can't speak for Silver. I met her shortly before you and the others, so I'm not sure where she got this knowledge from, or how she managed to make use of it. What I do know is that she has done something previously unheard of, and if it means an opportunity to undo the destruction the blight has caused, then it is a risk I am willing to take. As for myself..." He said, before holding out both arms, once again channeling energy to reveal the markings on his bare arm, though it was clear that there was a glow from his protected arm to match. "I'm still learning what this is, myself. I've been as impressed as you are with how effective it is, but it isn't something I've been able to really delve into for long. I understand your suspicion, but I apologize if this does not satisfy your curiosity." He added, before walking away once more, this time going into his room and closing the door behind him.

Once inside his room, Rion removed his cloak, setting it aside as he sat down on the bed in the room, seeming to simply stare at the protected hand for a moment. However effective it is... it came at a great cost. But it is with this power that I will avenge them, and destroy those mages once and for all. He thought bitterly, before beginning to undo the bindings of the gauntlet as if preparing to examine what was underneath.

[Sorrum]

Rion's explanation left her with more questions than answers. He wearily retired to his room, leaving Aqua alone in the hallway.

Aqua retired to her room as well. There was nothing to do here but catch up on the rest she should have gotten hours ago. She removed her armor, which hadn't been damaged due to it's composition and wards. Her whole body was sore, however. She grabbed the visor out of her helmet and considered calling home, but she lost the strength to do even that. She left the visor on the helmet and laid herself down in bed. Thoughts ran around in her head for a short while about the events that occurred. That whole village who's name she never caught was destroyed, and all the people were made into monsters that attacked this town. That magic was truly a blight on existence, hence the name.

The other fighters were notable as well. They stuck out from what she'd expected, most of all those two. Powers able to combat the blight.. unthinkable. Her thoughts drifted to the people she saved. She was happy to see the little girl had made it out of this alive. Aqua closed her eyes finally and drifted off to sleep.

[Arashi]

After a couple of hours, Silver woke up, startled by her own dreams. She sat up quickly, and winced a bit. Her head hurt. Why?

She then looked over at the blight crystal placed on the bed stand beside her and remembered. She deactivated the crystal, it was here, and she was alive. She began to piece things back together now. Though she had just partially absorbed some of the blight within that crystal, she felt no different...how was that possible?

Wait. She was here, in a bed, and alive. The crystal was there. That means Rion managed to get her out, and get the crystal out as well. So he kept to the plan...that meant something significant to her. Not to mention, the others went in to the blight, knowing of its dangers still, and helped with the task. Impressive...she did not know what to think about this. She had never had good experiences with others besides dragons before; this was new. She had to thank them. That was polite, right?

Wait...again. If Rion got her out, what did he see? Did he see anything at all? He had to have, she had no idea what was going on for such a long period of time that someone had to see. Perhaps she was just being paranoid? But he still got her out of there, so maybe he didn't see it. There is no way he would have dragged her out if he saw that she is partially blighted, right?

"Gah, this is going to eat away at me...I can't handle it. I won't be able to sleep like this..." She said aloud to herself, quietly.

She slowly got up from the bed; all of her armor was off, so she was just wearing a short-sleeved shirt and plain pants. Her wounds were healed, so whoever did that must have removed her armor, too. Or something like that.

Her entire body felt a bit weak still, though. A side effect of using such powerful blight magic, she assumed. Oh well. She picked up the blight crystal and held it at her side, keeping it out of view of anyone.

She slowly put her armored boots on and slowly walked to the door of her room. She put her hand on the doorknob and froze for a few seconds.

Is this an okay thing to do? It was late. They were probably asleep, and they did need the rest...but she had to explain herself to Rion. Or at least figure out what he saw....if the party was even still here. This could potentially be bad.

She sighed and open her door, then shut it behind her, taking a mental note of which room was hers. She then walked to the front of the Inn and spoke to a rather bored-looking Innkeeper. She hoped she would get lucky with this and that it would be the same person that saw the group come in; and thankfully, since only a couple of hours had passed, it was.

"Um...excuse me. What are the rooms of the others I was with when we arrived? Need to speak with them. Also, can I borrow a pen and some paper, please?" She asked the Innkeeper quietly, her voice a bit strained still.

The Innkeeper, looking a bit confused by this sudden night time request, proceeded to tell her the rooms of her comrades; though he didn't know their names, he described what each of them looked like. He then handed her a scrap of paper and a pen.

"Thank you." She then walked off towards the rooms, but stopped for a moment and held the paper up against a wall. She scribbled a note on it.

It read:

Thank you, Aqua. You did an excellent job. I may not be able to answer all your questions right away, but if you continue to assist me, you will learn. I hope you will consider traveling with us.

Signed,
Silver


She read the note over a few times, her brain a bit fuzzy still, but she nodded and decided that was plenty good enough for now.

She then walked up to Aqua's door and slid the note under it, hoping that she would see it when she wakes up.

Silver then walked up to Rion's room and stared at the door for a few minutes. Should she really do this? It seems kind of weird...and rude, possibly.

Oh screw it. If he had questions, she had to answer them now. And the thought would eat away at her all night; she would get no sleep and be useless tomorrow. That simply would not do.
She quietly knocked on the door after hesitating for a moment. "Um...Rion?" She whispered quietly in to the door.

[Bloodbane]

By the time the sound of knocking came to Rion's door, he had already looked at what he needed to, though he couldn't help but be confused as to who was knocking at this hour. At hearing someone whisper into the door, he raised an eyebrow, before making his way over and opening it slightly to reveal Silver. "... Awake so soon?" He said in a somewhat joking manner, though it looked like she seemed somewhat troubled. "Looks like you're doing better, at least. Something wrong?" He asked curiously. What could she possibly be coming to him about at this point? Her mission was a success, she had to have seen the dormant crystal by now... and in all honesty he was indeed just about to finally head to sleep. Either way, this likely was something important, so he did keep his attention focused for the time being.

[Arashi]

Silver looked a bit surprised as he opened the door. He was being so nice to her; maybe he didn't see anything after all? Or maybe it was a cover-up. Or something. Her thoughts just would not stop until she talked to him about it, at least a little bit.

"U-uh, hey! Sorry...can I talk to you for a minute? In your room? It won't be long...I promise. I won't keep you from your sleep..." She smiled a bit as she finished, though it was a nervous smile. That was visible, because she forgot to put her mask on her face. Darn it.

"It's...something I can't afford having the others hear." She spoke quietly, while looking downwards.

Hopefully he wouldn't mind her intrusion; she was certain it was probably a little weird, but maybe he would understand.

[Bloodbane]

Rion raised an eyebrow as Silver made her request, though it was clear whatever she wanted to tell him was something she was not yet ready to reveal to others... But why him? She also seemed a bit more than nervous, which made him wonder if perhaps this was something else entirely.

"All right, come on in." He said, stepping back and holding the door for Silver to enter before closing it. As he looked back to her, a slight smirk came over his face as he attempted to lighten the somewhat tense atmosphere. "All right, I know what you're thinking... But I'm not really looking for that kind of relationship." He said, hoping for some kind of reaction but when Silver looked more confused than flustered he shook his head.

"It's a joke. Trying to lighten the mood here. You sure you're okay...?" He asked, before walking past her and towards one of the walls, leaning against it before crossing his arms. "But I think I really do know why you're here... This is about your... Uh... 'condition', isn't it."

The look Silver gave next said it all. "Okay, okay, calm down... You don't have to look so surprised; with light magic I have to look out for stuff like this. If you notice you shouldn't feel any worse now than you had before touching that thing." He explained, revealing that he had done what he could to prevent her actions from making her situation any worse. Needless to say, this conversation was going to be interesting.

[Arashi]

Silver walked in as he held the door for her, not saying much more than a "Thank you.." as she entered. She still wasn't so sure about this, but it had to be done.

She then blinked as he implied she was going to ask for a relationship of some sort. She tilted her head and looked at him in a confused manner, her face slightly reddened by the implication...but she was far more confused than anything. He was a nice guy, but she barely even knew him yet; that certainly wasn't on her mind right now! Plus, what kind of human would want to be with her anyway? A crazy one, that's what. She looked away from him a bit, clearly not understanding he was joking at all. Whoops.

"U-uhm...no...that's not...," She replied quietly, avoiding eye contact. Of course that's what it looked like she was trying to do. How embarrassing and weird.

Then as he must have noticed her reaction and said it was a joke, she sighed with relief and laughed a small bit, though it wasn't entirely a happy laugh. Too much to talk about for that.

"Oh...sorry...my mistake," She smiled a bit and looked at him, though she was very clearly troubled and this smile was fake; she didn't want to be mean, he was just trying to lighten things up a little. This was just too big of a matter for her to joke right now. Then he mentioned something about her 'condition', and that's when her expression changed to that of shock. So she was right, he did see it after all. Argh. Why was he still even talking to her at this point, if he saw? She took a deep breath; she had to stay calm about this.

"...So you saw, didn't you?" She paused for a moment. "I wanted to hide it, but I guess that wasn't going to happen..."

She then looked up at him as he said that she shouldn't feel any worse after what she had done, looking a bit confused again. He was right, she didn't...he must have done something with his light magic to help her. She vaguely remembered feeling something; feeling like the new blight within her was being...removed. That must have been him. So he had definitely seen a lot more than she thought. She wanted to ask how he did it; she had never witnessed something quite like that before with light magic, but her mind was very-one track for the time being. This had to be fixed...or something.

"You saw nearly all of it then. So you must know...I can use blight magic, then. Why didn't you kill me?" She walked up closer to him, looking down, avoiding eye contact. Her expression was that of emptiness "It's dangerous. Unstable, even...and I'm dumb enough to use it. As you saw, clearly." Her words were calm, surprisingly. As if she had had this conversation before, and as if she expected the same results; as if she had been nearly critical of him for not just killing her.

She went quiet for several moments. It would probably be best if she left them; it was foolish to think that anybody would accept a blight magic user as a good guy. She failed at hiding it, and now she would likely pay the consequence. She could only hope the others in their little group didn't see...who knows what the townsfolk would do to her if they found out there was a blight mage among them?

[Bloodbane]

When Silver noted that he saw nearly everything, and how she wanted to hide it Rion simply nodded. "Somewhat, I can only really guess at what let you do what you did I suppose, but it's clear that you had basically drained the crystal of its energy." He replied, though when she asked the rather unusual question of why he didn't kill her, he scoffed lightly. "Would it make you feel better if I told you the thought crossed my mind when I realized that I couldn't stop it completely? Don't answer that." He said, mostly joking once more, although even he couldn't deny what his first instinct had been after the backlash stopped him from purifying Silver's own energy further. He noticed she was now avoiding him, remaining quiet as if expecting him to react harshly. It only made sense, really; it would be easy to assume her to be part of the problem... except for what he had clearly seen. Her intentions were as clear as his own, she was simply going the route of fighting fire with fire, and if she could keep doing that without becoming some crazy undead monster-maker, then he honestly did not see too much of a problem.

"Now don't get me wrong... You're right, it's not something you should be messing with, and clearly what you did was a pretty big risk. But if you're crazy enough to take that energy into yourself as a means of getting rid of those crystals..." He said, a smirk coming over his face once more as she looked back up at him. "Well, you're going to need someone crazy enough to make sure whatever happened to you doesn't get worse. I've already said it once, you and I want the same thing, and at this point it's pretty clear neither one of us can do this alone. I guess I really only have one question right now..." He said, before putting a hand to the back of his neck as the one thing that did not make a whole lot of sense to him came to mind.

"Why come to just me with this? If you were going to tell me, why not the others that may be helping us along the way?"

[Arashi]

Silver simply listened as Rion spoke, not looking at him, afraid of whatever he was about to say. How could he have not seen her? She felt silly; it was impossible to hide from everyone. Especially in a situation such as this, where she had to use a lot of her power.

She smiled a bit at his reply to her question, though, and looked at him for a few moments. His attempt at humor made her feel a little better for some reason; though it was difficult for her to tell he was joking by his words, his tone was readable enough for her. Instead of yelling at her, or calling her a heathen or something, he made light of the situation. It was certainly not a reaction she was expecting...in a good way, of course.

Though, she couldn't shake the feeling that something was off here; he couldn't just be okay with it. That's not how it works; everyone that knows about the blight wants nothing to do with it. And it makes sense; it's horrible. She looked away once more.

And then he spoke again, explaining that he was essentially okay with her condition. What? This is new. He called her crazy, but...he accepts it? She looked at him again, a stunned expression on her face. She stared at him for a few moments, trying to process what he just said. He was still willing to travel with her and help with this? She sighed with relief, then smiled.

"...So...you're okay with it? I...greatly appreciate you still being willing to help me. This is not the reaction I expected...well, I guess we're a team still, then," She continued smiling as she spoke, a much less dark tone to her voice now. This was not at all what she was expecting to hear; how was this even possible? A human, a light mage no less, not afraid of her blight magic? And he wants to...help her?

"So long as you know what you signed up for. I am pretty crazy, y'know." She laughed a bit. Maybe not all humans are so bad after all...

She tilted her head at his mention of having another question. At this rate, she wouldn't mind what he asked, if it was about her blight magic. Apparently, he didn't care. Weird...

She then looked a bit startled by his question, unsure how to answer that, or if she should answer with the truth or not. She didn't want to freak him out. But, he did just say he was okay with her being a blight mage, so...nothing could be worse than that. Besides; he just proved to her that she could trust him a bit more. After a short pause, she replied.

"Well, I'll be honest with you this time. You left quite an impression on me when you stood up for me back where we met...I felt just maybe you would be the most understanding of my differences. First impressions matter a lot in dragon culture, and you left a good one on me. The others are strong, but I have no way to determine their character, yet...and telling just anybody I am a blight mage is...well...a bad idea." She looked away before continuing, confidence in her voice. "Now you have proved my impression right, though. I can trust you."

She looked at him and nodded with a smile. Being honest was much better...and hopefully made him trust her more as well.

[Bloodbane]

When it seemed that what he had said had finally gotten through to Silver, Rion smiled and simply nodded. "Beats wandering around hoping I'll figure out some other way." He said in response to Silver's own humor. To him, it was not so much that he was all right with what she was doing, but that he could vividly recall the sacrifices that were made for him to keep going; deciding to go on this journey was not only a means for him to possibly avenge those he lost, but to pay their efforts forward in the hopes that perhaps he could completely help Silver once he had a better grasp of his abilities. He watched as she spoke again, explaining how his actions earlier had left some kind of impression on her, and that it would take time before she could really feel comfortable revealing her secret to others. At that, he simply nodded after she did.

"I suppose I can't blame you for that. After all..." He said, before briefly placing his armored hand on Silver's shoulder. At this close proximity, she would be able to see that while it appeared to be contained to the area about just past his wrist and up to his fingertips, there was now a faint but definite radiance from underneath his sleeve, which appeared to be some sort of reaction to being close to someone who had some semblance of a dark aura. "... We all have things that raise more questions than answers." He added, revealing to some extent that there was more to his "knack for finding trouble" than he had mentioned earlier, before walking with Silver back to the door of his room, opening it in front of her.

"But that'll be a story for another time. Get some rest; assuming nobody has a better idea I think we'll head toward Agrova in the morning." He stated, explaining that the best place to head next would have to be one of the major cities in the region. After all, they had not found the source of the crystal, meaning whoever had wiped out the smaller village with it was still at large.

[Arashi]

"I guess so. Well, you found a way now. Probably not what you expected, but hey...it's something!" She smiled a bit. The fact that she could inspire some sort of hope in someone made her happy.

She simply watched as Rion touched her shoulder, confused...until she noticed the odd glowing coming from his hand. There was no way that was normal light magic; she had seen nothing like that before. Just...what was it? Oh well, she didn't need to ask any questions for now. She blinked a few times, unsure what to think, and curious...but perhaps one day on their journey he would trust her enough to tell her what that was. It could wait until then. She wasn't sure what to say, so she simply just looked at him in a curious manner, then smirked. Perhaps...he understood her need to keep this hidden for a reason.

She quietly walked with him to the door, and went outside after he opened it.

"You'll have to tell me that story some day, perhaps..." She looked at him, her worried expressions now gone. "But I agree with your plan. Though I'm not much used to human affairs, so you guys will have to do the talking."

She then looked away once more. She was obviously not used to really revealing much of her true nature; it was odd. But good.

"...Thank you, by the way. For understanding." She looked towards the crystal in her hand. "...Please don't tell the others, for now."

And with that, she waved at Rion, then went back to her room to get some much needed rest. They would likely regroup in the morning, and she needed to be ready to somehow answer some questions.

[Bloodbane]

Rion simply nodded at Silver mentioning how he and the others would have to handle reporting their findings. "Not a problem." He replied, before giving another light chuckle as Silver asked him not to say anything. "I'm leaving that one up to you... but I'd at least say something about the book, maybe?" He advised, knowing that if nothing else Aqua wanted to ask some questions about what happened. It should be simple enough to defer to the book as being the reason for having an idea what to do, he figured. He smiled once again as she waved at him. "Good night, Silver." He said to her, before closing the door as she headed back to her room.

What a day... He thought, sighing at how things had unfolded. Needless to say, he was not expecting to run into just what he did... but it meant that there was hope. Not only that, but he believed that Silver did have some means of controlling what was inside of her thanks to the book; if that was the case, perhaps there was a way to use that to figure out just what happened to his own powers. He went back to his bed, once again undoing the clips that bound his gauntlet to him before removing it and setting it down nearby before staring briefly at his left hand, which appeared to be covered in the same light-based crystal he had formed when slaying the giant before, though it no longer had the same glow it did when Silver was close by.

And to think... this is only the beginning...

[Arashi]

((This is the end of Arc 1. Arc 2 will start Monday the 29th, later in the evening. I don't have time to summarize this arc atm, but should be able to do so next week!))