Re: The Vivacious Deadlock: S3G6: Round One: Genreshift
07-24-2011, 10:33 PM
Originally posted on MSPA by Pharmacy.
As the effects of the bookmark crept across every corner of this particular setting, ripples across reality were almost immediate as the local environment began to shift to a more horrific atmosphere. The sky dimmed and flickered as ominous-looking cumulus, booming with thunder, rolled over the skies, already grim-grey thanks to Cascala's spell. As the cawing of crows echoed across the darkening atmosphere, mildew and spindly cracks rapidly enveloped the once semi-pristine walls of buildings. The banks, the suburbans, the alleyways, everything instantly became several centuries older; the artificial application of rapid saturation loss and aged neglect twisted the distinct architecture into something more menacing and demented.
However, the buildings were not the only existing things affected by the terrible majesty of the Horror bookmark, the denizens were also touched, to say the least. The once mundane pedestrians, humanoid, animal, or otherwise, were now monsters. Some were classic types like ferocious werewolves and seductive vampires; others were little more than indistinguishable creeping things, faceless doctors and spindly aliens. It was as if the Tome, with all its reality-warping, wanted the populace to blend in with the environment. After all, Horror was a merciless genre. One slight to innocence, to normality, thus that person was weak, a straggler, a victim. As seen from the slasher flicks and surreal thrillers, things always preyed on the weak.
There were many of these aforementioned things - creeping in the dark, in the corners, anywhere hidden from curious eyes. In fact there was a thing in an alleyway, right now, gliding silently across the pallid pavement like some sort of otherworldly predator. The flickering lights in the background obscured the blackened claws, the gear grinding painfully on his back, the shadowy ichor dribbling from this thing's nearly invisible mouth, and of course the inverse halo, a ring of faint black behind his head that seemed to absorbed the shadows. Like dust to cobwebs, puffs of inky darkness were surreptitiously siphoned into the prowling beast, enlarging him, empowering him in the alleyway hunting grounds. What was scarier than his noteworthy head decoration was his set of eyes. They were violently bright, an emotionless red that burned amidst the otherwise indistinguishable darkness of the thing. They were eyes that hungered, eyes that hunted, eyes that saw, and those eyes had seen something indeed. A slit of an insane smile slashed across the thing's face as Klendel leaped off to his destination at inhuman speed.
There was prey to mess with.
The whole place was warped with Horror, including the current contestants of this particular tournament. Despite the creepy atmosphere and the cosmetic changes that were implemented, the traveling party kept on going without a single notice of the effects (although Ivan kept making suspicious glances at his clothing, which had become bloodied and burnt somehow). With each advance in distance, the descent down the abyssal alleyway grew even more disconcerting. The crumbling walls, exposing softening bricks, grew more dingy and worn. The lamps, cracks of the oily glass filled with grime and fear, flickered above the daring bunch even more frequently, as if each step towards the inky blackness of their destination was screwing up the electronics of the light. If these had been normal people, the weakness withering at their hearts would have forced them to abscond the Lovecraftian streets. However, they were far from what anyone could call normal; a human hybrid, a cyborg gangster, an alien hydra, and a cat creature constituted the sneaking group. Normality didn't even come close to describing them.
Among the travelers, Nalzaki had the most noticeable changes. Bandages, spotty with dried extraterrestrial blood and grime, loosely covered the stitches decorating their exaggeratedly emaciated body. Three desiccated heads continually swerved around, looking for any suspicious activity. Razaran's horns had grown to look like vicious fangs and his canines had elongated to match, making the short-tempered head to look essentially like a bristling mace. Beside him, Nalyg had the unfortunate luck to have his visage twisted to resemble a grey skull, with sunken eyes that burned like orange coals. Kanpeki (whose stripes currently looked more like old scars on pallid skins than natural markings) had silently suggested this idea of alertness to the other heads via telepathy and unanimously they agreed. Cooperation was essential for the conjoined trio and they were leader-material, after all.
The alleyway was suitably creepy, but there was no sign of danger in these grimy corners of the street. Eventually, immeasurable time into the descent pulled long enough for Kanpeki to reconsider her idea to be just merely paranoia. Just when she was considering telling the others to call off their searching, Razaran's raspy voice broke the silence.
<span style="background-color:#848484;"><font color="#D30000">"Shh, I think I felt something!" He hissed, swinging his bristling head from side to side.
The whole party froze up at Razaran's warning, each for different reasons. Nalzaki froze up because their mutual telepathy was detecting something suspicious (perhaps, malignant?) in their psychic three-way radio. Merrifield stiffened because she could hear something, audibly faint, but there. It sounded like rusty claws, scraping lines in the concrete, sending shivers up her backbone in a fit of self-serving survival. Ivan and Abys both had a sudden creeping feeling that their previous plan was going to go off the rails in some manner. They did not know what sort of manner, but they had the strangest feeling that it was going to happen very soon. In fact they were pretty sure that it was going to happen -
Suddenly, a blur! Then, a commotion as some sort of powerful force knocked down Merrifield and it proceeded to make a fricassee out of the struggling alien hydra's back, their heads roaring in synchronized surprise. Fortunately for the trio, their shifting mass managed to minimize the damage from the rending monster to nothing. However, it was only a matter of time before the claws (or what resembled them, anyways) would pierce through their skin and make a tartare out of their innards. From the corner of Nalyg's eyes he could see a black fog engulfing their body at an alarming rate, spreading from their backs up to their serpentine necks, almost licking at their chins with shadowy tongues. Kanpeki wondered what would happen if the smoke entered their nostrils and their mouths. She figured whatever the result, it was going to be unpleasant and was to be avoided at all cost.
Receiving the telepathic signal from their tactical-leaning comrade, Razaran and Nalyg focused on prying the stubborn claws off themselves. They concentrated at their singular tail, which rapidly elongated and thickened to a lethal whip and grew some thorns on the surface. With this new weapon they proceeded to lash at the offending assaulter - again and again, and again. Despite the additions, the monster did not seemed to be physically hurt, but the buffet of the fleshy, spiny cord convinced (or annoyed) the attacker to withdraw his shadow and self into the darkness.
The Triach breathed a sigh of relief simultaneously. At least they had managed to drive away that meddling beast, though they had a nagging thought that they hadn't actually succeeded in damaging the creature much. Their back was torn to shreds, skin rubbed off and leaving their flesh annoyingly raw to the dirty air. Luckily, not much had been damaged beyond surface level; Kanpeki was just leaning in to examine the wound as the shadow suddenly returned for an unannounced Round Two.</font></span>
Merrifield sat there in shock as Nalzaki violently struggled with the empowered Klendel. The hydra-like alien's body sprouted all over the place as lethal weapons, some of them simple blades, others a little more indistinguishable, waving as far as they could reach attempting to damage the caliginous Cog. However, even the weapon finesse of Razaran was all for naught. The shadowy creature was either too slippery or too fast, somehow managing to glide past the flesh-knit weaponry. Whenever the weapons somehow managed to hit, they did not even seem to pierce even the skin of the maddened anarchist. Blades seemed to bounce off; projectiles phased through his shadowy flesh. To the ire of the trio, Klendel managed to slip back to the shadows and continued his unseen assault in rapid and stronger succession.
Eventually, the Kryesan got fed up with the Cog's hit-and-run ruse. As Klendel bounced from the inky shadows, red eyes full of determination and power, the reflexes of Nalzaki caught the annoying shadow in the vice grip of the thorny tail-whip. Teeth gritted in coordination, the trio took advantage of Klendel's short surprise and brought him in, kicking and screaming. The Triach extended four of their shared limbs, which glowed white-hot with searing light and attempted to choke the life force out of Klendel.
Merrifield should have been running away in a fit of self-preservation; yet for some reason she could not, unable to tear herself away from the complexity of the Kryesan's struggling. Shadow was an indomitable thing, yet simple light managed to conquer its malicious hold on the grip of reality. Darkness was merely an absence of light, as Triach had discovered, funneling that advantage into defeating that enemy. How could she not know? The genetic amalgamation only wished she could figure that out by herself, but alas, she was ignorant (not surprising since she spend a majority of her short life locked in a vat). Luckily, she had this marvelous ally to teach her the ways of this world.
Speaking of which, Nalzaki was quickly finding themselves in quite a conundrum. Their plan had been to burn the life out of Klendel, but they hadn't considered the endurance of this particular foe. Although the Cog was writhing around in agony, he still found the energy to begin sawing at their limbs, making astounding progress. Despite the rapid alien regeneration, it was clear that Klendel was clawing faster than Nalzaki could heal. You didn't have to be a powerful biokinetic to realize that the hydra had drawn themselves into a corner. They were pouring a good majority of their energy into gripping the Cog in white-hot hell, after all. Merrifield wanted to help, but how?
Merrifield gazed at the bleeding wounds - scrabbling cuts that oozed out blood, dripping onto the cracked concrete. She began to think harder. Although she had the intelligence on par with an average human, it was often hard for her to collect her thoughts, given her loose physical structure. However, that intelligence was sufficient enough. She could plan, she could be wily, and she had ideas. The two combatants were so engrossed in battle that they could not see the slight smile played on her lips. That was one of the reasons why both Klendel and Nalzaki yelped as the gripping limbs suddenly burst into flames. The combination of the energized limbs and the Merrifield's control over metabolic processes rapidly engulfed the surrounding area in the acrid smell of burning flesh.
As Nalzaki retreated (glaring all the while at Merrifield, but she did not care, she had a PLAN), Klendel merely flailed in place. The combination of searing light and the surprise metabolic fire was too much for the Cog to effortlessly slip away into the shadows. Through the red cloud of pain, Klendel was looking for revenge. Although the seer immensity of his empowered status had lead to irrational overconfidence, the cogs in the Cog's head creaked towards revenge. His shining eyes swerved towards Merrifield. So this was the little twerp that did that thing, huh? The only reward for her was death.
The battle between the two degenerated into a game of keep-away. The two contestants made swipes at each other and snapped back to safety. Although Klendel had inhuman speed and reflexes, Merrifield managed to keep up with the dancing shadow, although she suffered more than a few very narrow misses. She'd realized that the Tome made an effective shield against the Cog's vicious claws. Unfortunately for her, the anarchist managed to trip her up with a false feint and his hands, bristling with dark spikes, nearly went through her chest. She managed to bring up the magic book in time, but the force of the attack was so strong and her grip was so weak that the heavy literature surprisingly sailed across the air. For the first time in this battle, Merrifield found herself completely defenseless.
The Tome could wait for later. The slack-jawed pause of the genetic amalgamation was too much of an opportunity for Klendel to pass up, so he lunged at the seemly defenseless creature. He engulfed Merrifield, seeping every shadow into every pore of her cells and crushed them with all the strength he could muster in this state. Wet, smattering squeals of pained surprise echoed within. With a vicious twist, he rendered the monstrous twerp into primordial soup, gloating over his easy victory. He was so engrossed in his domination he was not aware of an impressive weight taking hold of his leg.
The attack had been a surprise for Merrifield. In fact, it was such a surprise that she lost hold over her form, essentially collapsing into a fleshy lump. Usually, that was incredibly annoying for her, but in this situation, that was a pleasant serendipity as she managed to salvage a good portion of her cells. The mottled goo managed to slither over the back of Klendel, leaving disgusting trails of purplish flesh over his skin, especially his Gear. The feeling of something heavy and wet convinced the Cog to swerve his head to the side, where he met the reformed visage of Merrifield. She wasn't fully-formed, but Klendel saw her small mouth, one of its corners raised up oh-so-slightly. Was she mocking him? Before he could react, Merrifield giggled and set herself on fire.
Klendel never felt so agonized during the duration on the battle as a massive living torch stubbornly clung his back. In a fit of anger and pain, the Cog managed to throw the fleshy mass easily into the distance. Merrifield had a weak grip after all, but that was not the end of his woes. Engulfing his sensitive part in a brilliant white flame, residual burning flesh stubbornly stuck to his Gear like biological napalm. In a futile effort, Klendel attempted to rip off the pieces, but there were too much, and they were too bright. In a red mist, the Cog found his mind wandering off to the sea of unconsciousness….
Phere sat in impatient glee as her Hollow gaze caught the arrival of the Tome into Abys and Ivan's hands. Although she had not seen the brunt of the battle, she was pretty confident that Klendel had done a magnificent job at keeping the three-headed hydra and that disgusting cat-thing at bay. Now, all she needed was for the Tome to be in her physical hands. After that, she would be in control, delicious control. All the reality-warping in her fingertips and oh, she had plans, plenty -
A startled gasp escaped her throat as a flaming something slammed forcefully into the backs of Ivan and Abys. She could only watch helplessly as the Tome sailed across the air, the Horror Bookmark silently flitting out of the magic book. Phere did not even notice the rippling of the surrounding reality as the Tome hit the building wall, knocked besides the lamps, and gracefully fell into the open hole of the sewer. Phere was proper royalty and was not given into the conniptions of tantrum. However, seething anger boiled within her very soul as she could only watch the last corner of the Tome slip away into the sewer grate.
As the effects of the bookmark crept across every corner of this particular setting, ripples across reality were almost immediate as the local environment began to shift to a more horrific atmosphere. The sky dimmed and flickered as ominous-looking cumulus, booming with thunder, rolled over the skies, already grim-grey thanks to Cascala's spell. As the cawing of crows echoed across the darkening atmosphere, mildew and spindly cracks rapidly enveloped the once semi-pristine walls of buildings. The banks, the suburbans, the alleyways, everything instantly became several centuries older; the artificial application of rapid saturation loss and aged neglect twisted the distinct architecture into something more menacing and demented.
However, the buildings were not the only existing things affected by the terrible majesty of the Horror bookmark, the denizens were also touched, to say the least. The once mundane pedestrians, humanoid, animal, or otherwise, were now monsters. Some were classic types like ferocious werewolves and seductive vampires; others were little more than indistinguishable creeping things, faceless doctors and spindly aliens. It was as if the Tome, with all its reality-warping, wanted the populace to blend in with the environment. After all, Horror was a merciless genre. One slight to innocence, to normality, thus that person was weak, a straggler, a victim. As seen from the slasher flicks and surreal thrillers, things always preyed on the weak.
There were many of these aforementioned things - creeping in the dark, in the corners, anywhere hidden from curious eyes. In fact there was a thing in an alleyway, right now, gliding silently across the pallid pavement like some sort of otherworldly predator. The flickering lights in the background obscured the blackened claws, the gear grinding painfully on his back, the shadowy ichor dribbling from this thing's nearly invisible mouth, and of course the inverse halo, a ring of faint black behind his head that seemed to absorbed the shadows. Like dust to cobwebs, puffs of inky darkness were surreptitiously siphoned into the prowling beast, enlarging him, empowering him in the alleyway hunting grounds. What was scarier than his noteworthy head decoration was his set of eyes. They were violently bright, an emotionless red that burned amidst the otherwise indistinguishable darkness of the thing. They were eyes that hungered, eyes that hunted, eyes that saw, and those eyes had seen something indeed. A slit of an insane smile slashed across the thing's face as Klendel leaped off to his destination at inhuman speed.
There was prey to mess with.
***
The whole place was warped with Horror, including the current contestants of this particular tournament. Despite the creepy atmosphere and the cosmetic changes that were implemented, the traveling party kept on going without a single notice of the effects (although Ivan kept making suspicious glances at his clothing, which had become bloodied and burnt somehow). With each advance in distance, the descent down the abyssal alleyway grew even more disconcerting. The crumbling walls, exposing softening bricks, grew more dingy and worn. The lamps, cracks of the oily glass filled with grime and fear, flickered above the daring bunch even more frequently, as if each step towards the inky blackness of their destination was screwing up the electronics of the light. If these had been normal people, the weakness withering at their hearts would have forced them to abscond the Lovecraftian streets. However, they were far from what anyone could call normal; a human hybrid, a cyborg gangster, an alien hydra, and a cat creature constituted the sneaking group. Normality didn't even come close to describing them.
Among the travelers, Nalzaki had the most noticeable changes. Bandages, spotty with dried extraterrestrial blood and grime, loosely covered the stitches decorating their exaggeratedly emaciated body. Three desiccated heads continually swerved around, looking for any suspicious activity. Razaran's horns had grown to look like vicious fangs and his canines had elongated to match, making the short-tempered head to look essentially like a bristling mace. Beside him, Nalyg had the unfortunate luck to have his visage twisted to resemble a grey skull, with sunken eyes that burned like orange coals. Kanpeki (whose stripes currently looked more like old scars on pallid skins than natural markings) had silently suggested this idea of alertness to the other heads via telepathy and unanimously they agreed. Cooperation was essential for the conjoined trio and they were leader-material, after all.
The alleyway was suitably creepy, but there was no sign of danger in these grimy corners of the street. Eventually, immeasurable time into the descent pulled long enough for Kanpeki to reconsider her idea to be just merely paranoia. Just when she was considering telling the others to call off their searching, Razaran's raspy voice broke the silence.
<span style="background-color:#848484;"><font color="#D30000">"Shh, I think I felt something!" He hissed, swinging his bristling head from side to side.
The whole party froze up at Razaran's warning, each for different reasons. Nalzaki froze up because their mutual telepathy was detecting something suspicious (perhaps, malignant?) in their psychic three-way radio. Merrifield stiffened because she could hear something, audibly faint, but there. It sounded like rusty claws, scraping lines in the concrete, sending shivers up her backbone in a fit of self-serving survival. Ivan and Abys both had a sudden creeping feeling that their previous plan was going to go off the rails in some manner. They did not know what sort of manner, but they had the strangest feeling that it was going to happen very soon. In fact they were pretty sure that it was going to happen -
Suddenly, a blur! Then, a commotion as some sort of powerful force knocked down Merrifield and it proceeded to make a fricassee out of the struggling alien hydra's back, their heads roaring in synchronized surprise. Fortunately for the trio, their shifting mass managed to minimize the damage from the rending monster to nothing. However, it was only a matter of time before the claws (or what resembled them, anyways) would pierce through their skin and make a tartare out of their innards. From the corner of Nalyg's eyes he could see a black fog engulfing their body at an alarming rate, spreading from their backs up to their serpentine necks, almost licking at their chins with shadowy tongues. Kanpeki wondered what would happen if the smoke entered their nostrils and their mouths. She figured whatever the result, it was going to be unpleasant and was to be avoided at all cost.
Receiving the telepathic signal from their tactical-leaning comrade, Razaran and Nalyg focused on prying the stubborn claws off themselves. They concentrated at their singular tail, which rapidly elongated and thickened to a lethal whip and grew some thorns on the surface. With this new weapon they proceeded to lash at the offending assaulter - again and again, and again. Despite the additions, the monster did not seemed to be physically hurt, but the buffet of the fleshy, spiny cord convinced (or annoyed) the attacker to withdraw his shadow and self into the darkness.
The Triach breathed a sigh of relief simultaneously. At least they had managed to drive away that meddling beast, though they had a nagging thought that they hadn't actually succeeded in damaging the creature much. Their back was torn to shreds, skin rubbed off and leaving their flesh annoyingly raw to the dirty air. Luckily, not much had been damaged beyond surface level; Kanpeki was just leaning in to examine the wound as the shadow suddenly returned for an unannounced Round Two.</font></span>
***
Merrifield sat there in shock as Nalzaki violently struggled with the empowered Klendel. The hydra-like alien's body sprouted all over the place as lethal weapons, some of them simple blades, others a little more indistinguishable, waving as far as they could reach attempting to damage the caliginous Cog. However, even the weapon finesse of Razaran was all for naught. The shadowy creature was either too slippery or too fast, somehow managing to glide past the flesh-knit weaponry. Whenever the weapons somehow managed to hit, they did not even seem to pierce even the skin of the maddened anarchist. Blades seemed to bounce off; projectiles phased through his shadowy flesh. To the ire of the trio, Klendel managed to slip back to the shadows and continued his unseen assault in rapid and stronger succession.
Eventually, the Kryesan got fed up with the Cog's hit-and-run ruse. As Klendel bounced from the inky shadows, red eyes full of determination and power, the reflexes of Nalzaki caught the annoying shadow in the vice grip of the thorny tail-whip. Teeth gritted in coordination, the trio took advantage of Klendel's short surprise and brought him in, kicking and screaming. The Triach extended four of their shared limbs, which glowed white-hot with searing light and attempted to choke the life force out of Klendel.
Merrifield should have been running away in a fit of self-preservation; yet for some reason she could not, unable to tear herself away from the complexity of the Kryesan's struggling. Shadow was an indomitable thing, yet simple light managed to conquer its malicious hold on the grip of reality. Darkness was merely an absence of light, as Triach had discovered, funneling that advantage into defeating that enemy. How could she not know? The genetic amalgamation only wished she could figure that out by herself, but alas, she was ignorant (not surprising since she spend a majority of her short life locked in a vat). Luckily, she had this marvelous ally to teach her the ways of this world.
Speaking of which, Nalzaki was quickly finding themselves in quite a conundrum. Their plan had been to burn the life out of Klendel, but they hadn't considered the endurance of this particular foe. Although the Cog was writhing around in agony, he still found the energy to begin sawing at their limbs, making astounding progress. Despite the rapid alien regeneration, it was clear that Klendel was clawing faster than Nalzaki could heal. You didn't have to be a powerful biokinetic to realize that the hydra had drawn themselves into a corner. They were pouring a good majority of their energy into gripping the Cog in white-hot hell, after all. Merrifield wanted to help, but how?
Merrifield gazed at the bleeding wounds - scrabbling cuts that oozed out blood, dripping onto the cracked concrete. She began to think harder. Although she had the intelligence on par with an average human, it was often hard for her to collect her thoughts, given her loose physical structure. However, that intelligence was sufficient enough. She could plan, she could be wily, and she had ideas. The two combatants were so engrossed in battle that they could not see the slight smile played on her lips. That was one of the reasons why both Klendel and Nalzaki yelped as the gripping limbs suddenly burst into flames. The combination of the energized limbs and the Merrifield's control over metabolic processes rapidly engulfed the surrounding area in the acrid smell of burning flesh.
As Nalzaki retreated (glaring all the while at Merrifield, but she did not care, she had a PLAN), Klendel merely flailed in place. The combination of searing light and the surprise metabolic fire was too much for the Cog to effortlessly slip away into the shadows. Through the red cloud of pain, Klendel was looking for revenge. Although the seer immensity of his empowered status had lead to irrational overconfidence, the cogs in the Cog's head creaked towards revenge. His shining eyes swerved towards Merrifield. So this was the little twerp that did that thing, huh? The only reward for her was death.
The battle between the two degenerated into a game of keep-away. The two contestants made swipes at each other and snapped back to safety. Although Klendel had inhuman speed and reflexes, Merrifield managed to keep up with the dancing shadow, although she suffered more than a few very narrow misses. She'd realized that the Tome made an effective shield against the Cog's vicious claws. Unfortunately for her, the anarchist managed to trip her up with a false feint and his hands, bristling with dark spikes, nearly went through her chest. She managed to bring up the magic book in time, but the force of the attack was so strong and her grip was so weak that the heavy literature surprisingly sailed across the air. For the first time in this battle, Merrifield found herself completely defenseless.
The Tome could wait for later. The slack-jawed pause of the genetic amalgamation was too much of an opportunity for Klendel to pass up, so he lunged at the seemly defenseless creature. He engulfed Merrifield, seeping every shadow into every pore of her cells and crushed them with all the strength he could muster in this state. Wet, smattering squeals of pained surprise echoed within. With a vicious twist, he rendered the monstrous twerp into primordial soup, gloating over his easy victory. He was so engrossed in his domination he was not aware of an impressive weight taking hold of his leg.
The attack had been a surprise for Merrifield. In fact, it was such a surprise that she lost hold over her form, essentially collapsing into a fleshy lump. Usually, that was incredibly annoying for her, but in this situation, that was a pleasant serendipity as she managed to salvage a good portion of her cells. The mottled goo managed to slither over the back of Klendel, leaving disgusting trails of purplish flesh over his skin, especially his Gear. The feeling of something heavy and wet convinced the Cog to swerve his head to the side, where he met the reformed visage of Merrifield. She wasn't fully-formed, but Klendel saw her small mouth, one of its corners raised up oh-so-slightly. Was she mocking him? Before he could react, Merrifield giggled and set herself on fire.
***
Klendel never felt so agonized during the duration on the battle as a massive living torch stubbornly clung his back. In a fit of anger and pain, the Cog managed to throw the fleshy mass easily into the distance. Merrifield had a weak grip after all, but that was not the end of his woes. Engulfing his sensitive part in a brilliant white flame, residual burning flesh stubbornly stuck to his Gear like biological napalm. In a futile effort, Klendel attempted to rip off the pieces, but there were too much, and they were too bright. In a red mist, the Cog found his mind wandering off to the sea of unconsciousness….
***
Phere sat in impatient glee as her Hollow gaze caught the arrival of the Tome into Abys and Ivan's hands. Although she had not seen the brunt of the battle, she was pretty confident that Klendel had done a magnificent job at keeping the three-headed hydra and that disgusting cat-thing at bay. Now, all she needed was for the Tome to be in her physical hands. After that, she would be in control, delicious control. All the reality-warping in her fingertips and oh, she had plans, plenty -
A startled gasp escaped her throat as a flaming something slammed forcefully into the backs of Ivan and Abys. She could only watch helplessly as the Tome sailed across the air, the Horror Bookmark silently flitting out of the magic book. Phere did not even notice the rippling of the surrounding reality as the Tome hit the building wall, knocked besides the lamps, and gracefully fell into the open hole of the sewer. Phere was proper royalty and was not given into the conniptions of tantrum. However, seething anger boiled within her very soul as she could only watch the last corner of the Tome slip away into the sewer grate.