Scene #4676: Crimson Cult Redux

Owner	Pose
Steve	Travelling at night in this world, the Flat Earth, was always a bit of a risk. Despite Steve laying claim to it, much of the surface still ultimately belongs to the wild creatures, especially at night. Yet, sometimes, it has its advantages, especially when you're trying to catch something unaware. It's a calculated gamble. To weight the dice more heavily in his and any assistants' favor, the summons for this task were to the stables, where several horses of various coat colorations wander around their roughly constructed, but sturdy, enclosures, pausing mainly to peer out from the fencing or chew on the hay bales piled within. Yes, going mounted would allow them to outrun most of the beasts of the night. Since they'll be sticking to the lowlands, this would work out decently, this time around. The miner-mage, himself, is working on the finishing touches of a new blade. Forged of a strange, purple-toned alloy, the metal appears to have little luster to it, and the ringing from the strikes of his hammer are distinctly different than iron or steel. The tome he had propped open adjacent to the anvil has its magical energy drawn from it and into the blade, which gains a subtle glow around it. The process of enchanting is complete. "Hmm, good enough." Also at the ready, nearby, various plate armors can be seen that look built to be worn by the horses, made of iron in some cases and gold in others. Don't use the gold ones, display models only.
Mihk Lihzeh	Mihk watches passively as the miner-mage does his work. She'd arrived a few minutes before, but didn't wish to interrupt the enchanting process. Delicate things those. As Steve pulls up from his work and inspects the weapon, the Arcanist lightly clears her throat. "I, am afraid I appear to be the only one responding to your request, Magus. I will endeavour to aid you as best I can." She erks softly, as her companion scrambles up her robe and perches on her shoulder, the teal-hued Emerald Carbuncle chirruping softly.
Steve	When did Mihk get there!? Must have also levelled up Ninja. Steve doesn't quite startle, but his concentration and preoccupation on his work is broken by the throat clearing. The sort to get lost in the fine details, it seems. "Ah, if it isn't Mihk," Steve turns his head and beams that broad grin that's seemingly always near the surface! His eyes do dance around to either side of her for a few moments, as though confirming her words for himself, but he doesn't seem bothered. "It's no matter. For this task, it might even be better if we don't march up with an army." The emergence of the Carbuncle does get a light chuckle from him, though, "We do have a third, though. Good, good." He hops to his feet and shifts his body, causing a series of light pops from his back, which he gives a satisfied grunt with. "Night is falling quickly, it'll probably be a good idea to go into details when we're on the road. How familiar are you with riding a mount?" He honestly never thought of riding a chicken, before. Only the baby zombies seem to get away with that one. Horses and pigs are about the limit. Reaching to get one of the iron armors, he nestles it onto the back of a (mostly) cooperative brown and white spotted horse in the stables. "We're going to have a bit of a wide area search, so we'll need the speed, plus outrunning the critters. You're good at detecting vis--err, aether signatures, right? That might come in handy." With this, he swings open the fence gate and steps into the stable, securing the saddle and climbing up, before trotting out. Seems he's ready to go, after a quick glance over his own personal equipment, and drawing his Thaumaturge robes more closely around him. The late evening air is a bit chilly, and there are already shapes beginning to emerge on the distant plains and rolling hills.
Mihk Lihzeh	"I can ride a Chocobo... these beasts should be similar enough that acclimatizing should be swift." replies Mihk with her usual analytical tone. "Aetheric signatures... yes, as long as I am using the correct Geometry I can pick out and localize signatures based on their affinity." She steps up, and looks at one of the horses, reaching out to offer a hand for it to sniff. "Easy. Easy." she coos softly, before going to get a saddle and armour for her chosen mount.... a blonde beast with a few patches of white here and there. "I am also possessed of acute vision in the dark. An artifact of my Keeper of the Moon blood."
Steve	"Heh. It's good to have reliable folks around," Steve muses, as he awaits Mihk performing her own preflight checks, as it were. "I tried to teach the Villagers that were native to this place, but...they're kinda slow. Now I've got pals like you that can cover my weak spots, and vicey versey." The horse, for its part, seems quite tame. It is a bit uncertain at first, about a humanoid cat, but it seems to warm up quickly, or as much as a horse obviously can. It won't be a problem to climb up, even if the handling of a four legged mount is slightly different than a two legged variety. They also tolerate armor well, though the miner won't make a fuss if she prefers to go without. He makes a quick mental note to experiment with mystical cloth dressings for horses, instead of only armor. Protection and style all in one. With that, he begins to ride out. It's a brisk but manageable pace, even for someone still learning how to handle a horse -- not different enough from a chocobo to be a burden. The monsters that do emerge, your standard Flat Earth fare, have no hope of keeping up even at that speed, save maybe the spiders which similarly fall behind due to their lesser fatigue, and the creepers that don't even dare approach even though they stare, for 'some' reason. Steve doesn't bother with reprisal against any pursuers. It seems he has something particular in mind. "Okay, I don't know how much you caught from my posting," he begins, "So I'll try to go over it quick. There are these unwelcome land squatters called the Crimson Cult, that seem to congregate around these obelisks. I don't know if they built them, or if they just find them, but they hang around them, guarding them, chanting at them...synchronizin' with their energy. We're going to find one of them, and we're going to take it from them, without damaging it." He withdraws his thaumometer, a hexagonal, golden-framed device set with multihued crystals, and begins to glance around every so often. Mihk would likely recognize the insets as being those aetheric-like crystal shards they had located, deep in the heart of the Flat Earth. For her part, vis nodes and the flow of it would probably be similar enough for Mihk to be able to sense them closeby. They are based around six elements, the traditional four, as well as order and chaos, matching up to those colorful crystals on the thaumometer. Compound ones, while rare, can also be felt. Deeper than that, though, while most of the nodes feel stable, some are...different. Weaker ones, some even slowly fading away. Strong and brilliant ones, that radiate mystical energy like unseen suns. Also, more sinister ones exist, connected to a darker space, as well as those that seek to devour rather than provide. It's like a galaxy out there.
Mihk Lihzeh	Mihk fits her mount with armour. It's not her own mount, so she'll make use of the protection provided. She mounts up, and falls in beside the miner-mage, her Carbuncle still perched on her shoulder. She opens her tome, and pours some Aether into the geometry on the page, causing it to lift up off the page and form into a non-physical thing very similar to Steve's own device. It points out concentrations of elemental Aether, or in this case, Vis. "That should be fairly easy... I can use a Miasma to drive them off, unless you would perfer them dead."
Steve	"Better off dead." Steve's brief appraisal of the course of action might startle some, but pragmatism tends to win the day in his view. "They'd just find their way back, and that'd get annoying." Besides, this is HIS world, and his alone, and he never invited these people to invade it. The obelisks clash with the scenery, too, no matter how useful they might end up becoming. "Hm. Kinda like a gas, then? That's a thought for later, might need to take some notes." The vis fields seem to follow no set pattern, or at least none that is clear without intense study. Just keeping watch is enough to notice a peculiar thing, however. There's a dark node just over a hill, which rather than being stable like most of the others, seems to be interacting with something close to it. It has the signatures of an intelligent manipulation. It's nestled in the middle of an even larger concentration of energy, and with astute night vision, it would be clear that even the grasses of the hills is subtly darkening in color toward the nexus of that activity. Steve's horse slows to a trot again, as he seems to feel it, as well, beginning to scan more intensely with his own device. "That's got to be it. It's pretty similar to last time," he remarks, though opposed to his usual enthusiastic voice he manages to crank down the volume. "Let's approach slow. They tend to be pretty fixated, but if it's like back then, they'll have sword guys patroling." With that, Steve slowly urges the horse forward to the crest of the hill, counting on the cover of darkness to help keep from being noticed. Sure enough, it's like the aetheric mapping would have shown. A bleak, obsidian altar is in the center of the grass, the node now practically visible to the naked eye thanks to the late hour, a faint mote of malevolent light fixed between the stepping stones and the focal point, a floating prism of the same stone. There's something even weirder about it, though. Within the four sides of the hovering object, the mirror-like surfaces reflect not the surrounding countryside, but a vast and dense starfield, similar to but not quite like the End's. There are also four figures in crimson (of course), armored robes and hoods, chanting in a hollow, reverberating tone, as they perform some ritual, their interactions with the node visible to the eye as tendrils of force between their billowing sleeves and the node, itself. And, yes, there are figures in crimson armor, three in all visible, with swords drawn, wandering around just outside the circle of glassy stone. "Even if we're gonna kill `em," Steve asides, "I want to see that miasma you were talking about. Divide and conquer, maybe?" To his wand, he's currently affixing a silvery-blue bauble, which seems to synchronize strongly with water, wind and order; a frost focus.
Mihk Lihzeh	Mihk points in the direction of the obelisk as soon as she's spotted it, which is about when Steve senses it as well. "It's intense, more a void to my magicks than anything solid... there seems to be no corresponding element in my world." she says, her voice, while still carrying far enough, is soft, like the purr of a cat. She brings her mount up beside Steve's, and nods in agreement. "I will attempt to divide their defenders away from the ones performing the ritual. If you then assault and kill them, we can then defeat the paladins without their thaumatuge support." She says in agreement, turning her almost entirely jet black eyes back onto the group. She melds into the night, her dark, charcoal skin reflecting precious little light itself, only the faint gleam of the dark teal face paint giving any depth to her form. She stands in the saddle, lifting her tome with her as she begins to softly incant, flipping to a new page and drawing aether and Geometric Seals up from the page. "Choking bile, noxious fume. Stinging gas and putrid gloom. I summon thee forth, heed my call, seal these wretches in your pall. Miasma!" Earth, Water and Fire all coalesce into the geometric pattern that's appeared beneath her mount, then transfers out to several points between the magi at the obelisk, and the armoured figures that are meant to protect them, engulfing the latter in a thick, noxious cloud that seems to cling and slow like being stuck in a swampy mire, while also inflicting minor poisoning with each breath.
Steve	Though they may appear almost ghostly at a glance, the Crimson Cult are still very much beings of flesh. As the toxic mists emerge and settle over the area they're occupying, it is, at first, ignored. Strange effects like these can be expected when one taps directly into the forces of the Warp, but they typically dissipate quickly. Not so much in this case, however, and the knightly looking warriors eventually grow restless, sensing that this is different, perhaps directly controlled by someone. Somewhat disturbingly, perhaps, they appear to be making the motions of coughing and struggling to breathe, even though no actual sound can be heard from within their helmets, as they quickly try to leave the area and abandon their posts. Maybe to be expected, the robed figures are a bit more resistant to the effects, or at least they put up a defiant posture against it. For a moment, their chants quiet, perhaps taking stock of the situation, before they resume, the droning growing louder and more purposeful, as though attempting to expedite whatever otherworldly deeds they're attempting. The vis/aether attuned would note the robes they're wearing ripple with a resistive energy, but it's apparently coming at a cost, draining their very essence in the process. People inflicted with that kind of imbalance in their aether would probably be driven mad, noramlly. These guys must be serious about their job. "That's what I figured," Steve mutters. "They're wearing those Warp-woven robes, just like before." However, in his next breath, his composure shifts back to his normal mirth, a grin coming to his face, "Yep, this'll work out nicely for us." Rolling up a sleeve of his own robes, he gives a light kick inward, and his horse is charging down into the fog. In the midst of the mixture of confusion, and the unerring focus of the robed figures, he charges in, swinging that blade he had enchanted earlier deep into one's back. As the figure's life thread is severed, so are the tendrils snaking between their outstretched gloves and the node. The energy springing back is like a magical rubber band just got snapped. That leaves the other three, which are doing their best to retain their concentration. The knights from before, still shaken from the miasma, begin to recover enough of their faculties to triangulate the source of the trouble, or at least one of them. As best they can, though winded and still silently rasping, they begin to make their way up the hill, steel blades drawn, though Mihk still has the high ground in this situation.
Mihk Lihzeh	Looks like they've gone loud, as the soldiers of the Empire would say. Mihk remains stood in the saddle, holding her mount to bay atop the hill. "Fools and braggarts. You know not what powers you deal with. Come with thy steel and flesh, and I shall rend them both asunder!" She flips to a new page, and with a burst of unaspected Aether, flings a bolt of energy out at the knight approaching her. Designed to disorient and blind, like a flash-bang grenade, it's the first in a two prong strike. "Carbuncle. Backblast!" she commands, pointing at the intended target. The knight approaching her which she just blasted in the face. The little blue fox-like creature chirps, then leaps off the Arcanist's shoulder, running a bit closer to the Knight, before it arches its back, drawing in Wind-aspect energy... then unleashing it in a concentrated burst of kinetic force, much akin to a compressed air cannon. It's designed not to damage, but knock a melee fighter away, giving the ranged summon, and its master more room to breathe and cast spells with.
Steve	The Crimson Knights have a slight advantage, in that their helmets allow a bit less light than normal in. When combined with it being night and their accomodation to low ambient light, however, it still does enough to dazzle them, even though their continue their charge, even with their ears ringing and vision thoroughly clouded. As one hefts (presumably, based on body bulk) his sword to attempt a swing, the second salvo of the one-two punch is unleashed. They're kind of not used to magical animals being beholden to humanoid masters, you see, so they hadn't even been paying attention to the Emerald Carbuncle. That turns out to be a terrible mistake, as the one in the lead is sent tumbling back down the hill. Directly damaging, perhaps not, but there's a slight crunch at the landing, where the hill was a bit steeper. Heavy armor has its downsides if you land wrong. With them that close, though, one would normally be able to see their eyes though the slits on the helmets. But, there wasn't anything there, it seemed like. Perhaps the helmets are fitted with dark lenses on the interior for intimidation factor? The rest of them seems human enough, if densely muscled. Somewhat similar in build to Steve, in fact. Steve, meanwhile, digs his sword deeply into yet another of the more magically inclined cultists. They seem like predictably softer targets than the templars, even moreso because of the enchantment Steve had placed on his sword before the expedition, which makes it highly damaging against fellow humanoids. But with one of their flock down, and another downed and struggling, it seems like the remaining two have finally had enough. They all but break their chanting to fully turn on Steve, instinctively using the last of their sanity remaining to focus their energies and draw upon the powers of the Warp. While the lingering mists choke off some of the oxygen that fires would need to spread, they still manage to begin hurling fireballs at him, almost knocking him off his horse as one pummels against his robes. "Eesh, hot," he yelps, but thankfully the enchanted cloth of the robes dampens the flames quickly. "Cheeky, ain't ya! It's too bad, though. We're taking this obelisk, and there's nothing you can do about it." He begins to withdraw from the ensuing firestorm, fighting fire with frost, as it were, and within the settled gas, alternating flashes of orangey-red and cyan-blue light can be seen. Though, both Steve and the cultists seem to be showing restraint, sharing value in this obelisk. He also spares a quick glance back to make sure Mihk's holding down the fort, though can't afford to look too long, as several of the errant fireballs impact the turf, smashing up dirt and grass and setting flame to the latter.
Mihk Lihzeh	Tch... she was hoping to domino them all. No matter. The Carbuncle screetches and hurls a more directly damaging razor wind at one of the remaining paladins, aiming to strike him in the back and knock off his aim for that big swinging sword. Mihk, unused to mounted combat, tries to get the horse to back up or turn... anything, but just confuses the poor animal and gets thrown from the saddle for her trouble as it rears up. Thankfully it chooses not to trample the Miqo'te, and instead slams its forehooves down into the other knight's chestplate with a wicked whinney. The Arcanist hauls herself back to her feet, adjusting her spectacles with a grumble. "Dullard beast."
Steve	Cultists, perhaps, but still trained soldiers. Trained where and by who? No one knows. They had fanned out slightly at the base of the hill upon approach, wary of just that sort of retaliation. The other two close the distance, but as they were lagging slightly behind, being slower to recover, Mihk still has the time she needs before they have closed into range. Having seen what became of his counterpart, one foolishly focuses on the Carbuncle, moving in with a supernaturally sharp blade to strike the mystical beast down, only to be outmaneuvered by the smaller, and not-gas-strangled familiar. The blade flies out of his gauntleted hand, and though helmeted, one can only imagine a confused expression as his empty, gauntleted hand swings at -- nothing. As for the other, unintentional, perhaps, but the Crimson Knight wasn't expecting Mihk's mishap to lead to his own misfortune. Closing in as he was, he moves to strike with his slowly recovering vision seeming to sense a chance. From within the helmet as he readies, he finally speaks, but it's a gruffer, still slightly gasped mirror of what the robed ones had been chanting earlier. Not playing around, he shifts his sword for a killing stroke, when the horse finally steadies itself in time to throw him backward. So, the horse might have bucked Mihk off, but at least made up for it. He staggers back, the armor's crimson-painted steel crumpled slightly, as the others once again attempt to regroup from their own misfortunes. Steve senses opportunity in this, however, once he's clear of the miasma and is drawing the more wizardly presences out of it. Quickly taking stock of the situation, he slows his own horse down, instead making a wide fan around where the air blasted Crimson Knight was beginning to gather himself. Sure enough, fireballs come flying in, trying to track the miner's movements, and instead impact against their own guardian in a literal friendly fire situation. As he's pulling around to ride back the other way, he also blasts two silvery-blue shots from his wand at the two still directly menacing Mihk and her Carbuncle. It doesn't seem to do much to them directly, but their armor quickly gains a coating of frost, and their lower legs are encased in heavy ice. "You good to finish `em off," he wonders, riding by the slow roasting Templar? "There's two of the hooded ones left!" Right on cue, those finally escape the veil of mists, and resume alteranting fireballs and some sort of shadowy sphere at Steve. Who knows what the effect of the shadow balls would be, but it's probably nothing good.
Mihk Lihzeh	Mihk looks between the two approaching knight-cultists. As Steve freezes them in place, she smirks. "Indeed." is her simple reply, as she flips her tome to another page. She takes her time with this, now she has plenty of it. Using Aether to draw two Geometries, one beneath each knight from where she stands. A flick of her wrist has a quill in her right hand, scrawling something in glowing 'ink' across the page. "Begone." she simply says, as the Geometries suck in energy from the area, then explode upwards in a much more concentrated and directed assault like the first bolt she launched... those these are tuned to cause more damage than disorientation. That dealt with, she turns her focus onto the remaining magic-users. A flick of the page, and shift of her Aetheric energies, and those shadow bolts and fireballs are returned with bolts of unaspected Aether, and a sudden welling of poison from within the cultists own bodies as she inflicts them with Bio, the noxious green bolt of magic splashing them and causing their own bodies to begin poisoning themselves.
Steve	Almost as if she were a native, the local vis energies respond much as aether fields would. It's quite something to hear, feel and think -- that vast constellation of apparently disconnected nodes in the surrounding area briefly linking to feed into her workings, even the dark node that is part of the centerpiece of the obelisk. What other effects this might have is hard to say, though it certain works to the detriment of the knights. The one that had been on fire has his life mercifully ended by the sudden, driven impulse of raw power. The other two do not still quite as abruptly or dramatically, though their silent, anguished screams can nonetheless be seen, before they breathe their last gasps, in the form of that same chanting. While their Warp-infused armor does provide some resistance, it isn't fit for withstanding such an assault. Perhaps if the spell casters had fulfilled their ritual and connected with the Eldritch, they could have become one with the Warp and not had to worry about physical bodies anymore. Having overcome decay and other side effects of having a mortal body, they would escape even the common definition of death. Sadly, they hadn't quite made it that far when they were so rudely interrupted tonight, and while they are initially so hell-bent on burning Steve alive, or corrupting his mind with clouding shadow, that they are not seemingly fazed at first, eventually the combination of the Warp they have endured and the poison coursing through their already compromised bodies catches up with them. Their chanting grows more halted and interrupted, the fireballs less frequent, and they remain motionless, all but hunkered down while fighting for survival. This gives Steve the opening he needs to charge in once again, and end them directly with the blade of the sword that had already claimed half their number. This was part of the plan all along; to draw them out and minimize the chance of damage using a melee assault, but Mihk's support certainly made it leagues easier to execute. With the last run through, Steve finally feels confident enough to dismount. "Troublesome folks, aren't they? But we got the job done." Callously standing above the last dying Cultist, Steve awaits Mihk joining him, and assuming the mists part once again, the obelisk is right there in front of them. "Now for the fun part," the miner grins, rubbing his hands together, almost stereotypically eager. "If you like, you're welcome to join me on research. The Obelisk looks intact, at least, as much as was possible. Should be some clues."
Mihk Lihzeh	Mihk looks dubiously at her mount... who looks right back almost as dubiously, until she reaches out and pets the beast on the nose. "Good... thing." she says intelligently, before leading it down the slope. Now she doesn't need it, the miasma clouds quickly dissipate, their Aetheric anchor severed which eventually leaves the whole valley area clear as if the mists weren't there. "It would be my pleasure, Magus. Perhaps we can find meaning to all this." she offers in reply, smiling her curt, little smile back at the local miner-mage.