#3
Post
by Trickster-kun » Mon Nov 17, 2008 11:01 pm
Let's do this, then, chief~
-Battleground-
Eldranul's Swamp, a vile expanse of rotten land where the earth's water often meets hot geyser streams from the ground and creates an evil rain that sizzles and burns vegetation and life alike. The poor souls that have either gathered the courage -or had the necessity- to cross this swamp have all been greeted with large alligators with rock-hard skins and maws as large as their bodies themselves, secret pockets of water able to trap and drown up to 10 feet of man or woman, and worst of all, the projectile geyser water that super heats the liquid to boiling point and then revolts the surface and the area of the swamp as a whole, creating a blazing rain of green-brownish fluid that perpetually melts off tender skin and nullifies all possible hope of life in the place, save for the hardest of shells able to withstand the immense heat generate at that explosive moment. Dead trees, large rock formations and soaked overgrown roots bear silent testament to the swamp's danger, and within the warm mist that envelops the area, the smell of death permeates the air.
----------------------
-"Hey, Katzbalger, tell me again... where do we have to go now?"
-'Jeez... you're really helpless, aren't you? We're going for training, t-r-a-i-n-i-n-g. That easy enough for you? Huh?'
-"Oh, yeah... things aren't the same as they were before, though, now that I have you by my side, right?"
-'Hrrrh...'
-"Fine, fine, no need to get grumpy with me, Katz... please."
-'Would you stop calling me that?!'
The mental dialogue was held by a square-spectacled young man of some 20-so young years of age, with hair as black as his jeans and eyes as brown as the simple sneakers he was wearing at the time. As the hair and the facial features were constantly whipped and batted by the winds that blew past him, he held close to him the bullet-torn azure cloak he wore at the moment, a richly detailed garment embroidered with small lightning shapes all around the borders of the cloth. The young man was of rather thin build, with a semi-tanned skin and built muscles on arms and legs-- a physique that showed the invisible scars of intense training, and yet bore none of actual-combat ones. He was an average fellow that rode in a cloud at high speed some little distance from the ground, was all.
Yes, for Arkimeth Seizen was a simple man in physical terms- there wasn't anything that was particularly eye-catching within the frame of this fellow, other than the squared glasses and the long cloak that he seemed to wear everywhere he went, bullet-torn and somewhat dirty as it was. Beneath the robe, Ark was wearing a simple and nondescript short-sleeved blue shirt, the best option in the face of the sun's flaring heat of day. Riding atop a smoothly-curved purplish cloud some good ten feet or so from the ground, he currently flew across what looked like a rice field of sorts, then as he made his way up a small hill...
Land. Barren land, as far as could be seen, and in the varied distances, trees and vegetation. A dirtied old road greeted Arkimeth in silence as it stared towards the nothingness of the plain, never moving, never talking or expressing itself, but merely observing. Observing how the world moved and went on, and how people carried and brought their dreams, hopes and despairs with them, all within this single, abandoned road. And at the end of the road itself, just as the horizon seemed to offer a strange comfort amidst the traveling:
-"Ah, a forest!" exclaimed Arkimeth as his eyes went far above the plains and straight towards the mass of greens. "Good, see if we can catch a--"
But there was a small disturbance in the atmosphere as Ark had already hit the midway spot in his travel, and this disturbance caused the young battlemage to flip the cloud slightly to the right as if avoiding some sort of long-range projectile that was directly aimed at his position.
But there was no such projectile.
-"... something's there. I can just tell." Arkimeth muttered as he resumed his flight, not before a small comment from his sentient armor:
-'Oh really... pigs fly, Arkimeth.'
-"Huh? What'd you say, Katz?"
-'*sigh* Nothing. Just keep going... and be careful.'
-"Of course. After all..." The cloud began to rise. "As long as you're here, you're all I need." he smiled.
-'...that's sad, Arkimeth, trying to hit on your own weapon.' Instant reaction.
-"Hey, it's not like that! Jeez... what are you thinking of me, anyway?"
-'Nothing. That was just too corny.'
-"Oh really... Pigs fly, Katzbalger."
-'Eh? Babbling nonsense at a time like this? I can't believe you.'
-"Oh, nothing~"
The cloud rose higher into the sky, but only for a few more feet until most of the forest's expanse was on view, and Arkimeth's thought caught up for a second as he realized that the vegetation was not, in fact, a simple forest as was the impression that he had gotten from the outside, but was rather a well-enveloped and expansive piece of pure swamp, complete with dispersed clouds of mist and decaying trees. Tall rocks, chipped and damaged by some source, were randomly arranged in places where they blocked the flow of the darkened water puddles here and there, giving the whole setting an eerie atmosphere fitting of some videogame or fantasy tale. Regardless of the sudden 'change' of pace, Arkimeth prepared for the strike: using the same motion as he had done once before, he flipped backwards into the cloud, propelling the thing forward and allowing Ark to levitate into the air with the momentum of the maneuver. Just as he completed the flip, *CRACK!!* The purple cloud was now split into more than 15 different spear-shaped fragments, and were now scattering and falling one by one on the swamp area, creating a circular perimeter around the zone more than a hundred feet all over. Meanwhile, focusing electrical sparks in his hands, he launched forward and exclaimed:
-"ELECTROMORPH!"
In an instant, the battlemage had already become lightning itself, and in the next second, the single bolt was fast to arrive on top of a platform-like rock smack in the middle of the whole thing, where it materialized back into the Platinum Trickster. Standing and removing the torn cloak with his left hand in one fluid motion, he waved his right hand forward, and called forth his main support on times before: "Tornado Burst!" With speed, hundreds -perhaps thousands- of tiny wisps of concentrated cutting air gathered around Ark's immediate 5-feet reach area, ready to deflect and/or block whatever long-range assault might come his way. Then, raising his left hand into the air, he released the cloak into the murky waters below, and channeled a single crackling bolt that linked both his left and right hands together as he screamed to the swamp:
-"COME ON OUT!!"
The scream echoed among the dead trees as his eyes scanned the entirety of the place as far as the mist would allow, and a small bubble of air erupted in front of him.
