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 Posted: Sat Apr 21, 2007 3:23 pm
This was what he'd come here for - why wouldn't he accept it when it was offered so plainly?
The Reaper brought his hands up between them when the Salamander charged; but not to defend, or to attack. He wanted to see what this creature was really capable of after all of that. It wasn't just about beating it into submission, it wouldn't even be worth his time unless the Salamander stopped hiding the brunt of his real power.
He took the impact of her head against his chest without hesitation; the force of that alone was easily enough to lift him clear of the ground and carry him along with the Salamander's own momentum. But he wasn't planning on going anywhere just yet...
"Now, wethead," was his answer as he grappled around the back of her neck and gripped firmly on the tops of her shoulders; keeping the two close until his hindquarters had dropped back low enough so that his heels could dig into the earth and provide resistance to the Salamander's advance, "but we're going to get a lot more-"
His right knee exploded upwards to the center of the creature's abdomen.
"-intimate!"
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Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 8:57 am
A freeze, a pause in the advance that could have had to do with the knee now embedded against the heavily scaled mid-drift. There was a sigh of fire as she took the shock and a slumping feeling under his grip.
She tipped the balance, and fell forward against him, tail lashing against his grounded leg, feet bending and digging in.
The object would be to lift Joshua off his other foot and onto his back with the most of her ribcage/upper body slammed into him.
A rock and a hardplace.
The knives dug in as she used it and her feet to start pushing him along the rough ground.
The turf exploded upwards as she heaved him along the ground, if the grip around her shoulders was maintained she'd push and dig til she built up speed.
Finally her whole being would lift and crash him between herself and a solid wall of rock, instantly sending it into an explosion of fire and cracking stone.
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Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 9:52 am
Now this was the kind of fun that just couldn't be found anywhere else. Like arm wrestling with a Brahma bull... a bull that's on fire.
His hands dug into the armored scales on the Salamander's shoulders and pulled hard at them; putting pressure on the creature's neck and head - but it wasn't enough to keep it down. The air around the fire lizard was like an oven, and the bladed embrace with the creature was cutting into his sides; it began to smell a little like seared flesh and boiling blood...
And then it began to drive him back again into the earth. A rock and a hard place... and the rock was softer.
Dirt and loose rocks tore out of the way as the two cut a rut into the mountainside. To those looking up at the mountain what they saw would look almost like a volcanic eruption as smoke and flame enveloped the surrounding area and a billowing cloud of dust and ash began to rise.
"...wethead."
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Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 10:02 am
A three toed foot rose up and pressed almost gently against Joshua's middle before slow pressure began to build as the salamander yanked backwards on the grip. It practically started to rip it's own scales off to shed the stickey reaper, boiling blood dripping softly over the obsidian, making grooves in it's own armour.
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Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 10:31 am
The Reaper facilitated; not by releasing the Salamander, but by rolling back, bringing his own leg to bare against the creature's midsection, and shoving off with a violent thrust. If his grip didn't slip because of the blood, the Salamander would find itself free and stumbling back, minus a pound of flesh. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a wound for a wound.
"Come on!" he shouted back at the lizard as he shook the dirt and dust from his hair and stood again. "There's no one coming to save you this time! No hero!"
The back of his hand smeared a stain of ash and a trickle of blood from the side of his chin.
"Or are you just a lamb in sheep's clothing?"
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Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 11:11 am
A chuckle, her head cocked sideways from behind the crossed blades as she rolled her hips to work the kinks his kick had placed there.
She accepted his declaration by closing the gap once again, flat of the blade making a head height sweep in a kind of firey metallic backhand.
He is the lamb,
CRUNCH!!
I am simply the victem of circumstance.
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Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 2:24 pm
CRUNCH!!
The sound of gravel grinding under foot drowned out the echo that finally came from the explosion. Though the broken stones and dirt of the mountainside that had made that gravel were a much more concrete form of proof that the explosion had really happened; even if it hadn't seem to have slowed down either of the two that had been a part of it.
The Salamander's 'firey metallic backhand' was intercepted by one of the Reaper's own metallic backhands... and a fist. Sparks flew as the blade impacted against a plated arm guard; slowed, but not stopped. Joshua's fist slammed into his own arm immediately after with a violent thrust to knock back the bladed limb.
"You've got strength-"
The fist pulled back only a few inches and snatched at the hilt of a sword sheathed over his shoulder.
"-but so does an ox!"
A metallic ring pierced the air as the sword was freed from the sheath and swung crashing down onto the Salamander's shoulder.
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Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 2:38 pm
Ka-chunk!
She threw herself back from Joshua when his fist shoved at her blade, it was the only thing keeping the fast man from taking off her shoulder, leaving a gash in bright molten orange down the supposed armour. The wound hissed and smoked. The good part of being a fire planer was that cauterizing wounds came as easily as spilt blood, the bad part was that a wound is a wound is a...etc.
Once again hefting the blades she reacted in a more cautious light.
You own a blade and the knowledge to use it...and here I thought you were a complete loss.... The tail lashed lightly before she feinted to her good side and then dove in from the wounded, one bladearm to guard, the other to strike, not at Joshua himself, but at his sword, trying to throw a balance, open up a weak point.
Were you but taller...I'd say mating might be possible...
It was hard to say whether or not she actually considered this a possibility, she wasn't human after all, but hell, she might have been having her own private joke just at his expence.
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Posted: Mon Apr 23, 2007 3:03 pm
"Don't disappoint me now."
He attempted a stab towards the wounded shoulder but it was knocked aside by the Salamander's arm. Joshua circled to the left and took a few steps backwards with the sword held down at his side.
"I came a long way to see what's inside of you."
With a lunge he advanced again; swinging the sword straight vertically towards the creature's center. It was almost like a repeat of the Salamander's explosion, only there was no smoke or fire, just dust and stone as the ground split open and blasted the creature with a spray of debris.
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Posted: Tue Apr 24, 2007 4:41 am
Metal screeched and the sounds of multiple thuds as the debris hit her body.
She'd met his incomming sword with her own blade, forcing it away from her mid-drift and straight up her chest and shoulder, opening another rent that exploded hot blood along the blade and lodged it somewhere along her collar bone, dangerously close to her neck. The vibrations of her heart would echo with strong thuds along his sword. A kind of music all it's own.
And still she dragged herself down it, cutting the wound deeper angling the sword with her own body for best room to manuver into his personal space, her head impacting with the space in between Joshua's eyes with a staggering crack and a ear shattering scream from behind the grillwork of her face.
Enjoy the view then, reaper.
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Posted: Tue Apr 24, 2007 11:47 am
There was no way that a sword like that would cut so deeply against the Salamander; her weapons were thick and heavy, her body was charged with unnatural strength. The guard that she had raised would have had no problem stopping the light blade dead in its tracks.
However, it had never really been the blade that she would need to stop. Things were already set into motion by the time the Reaper's blade struck against the hot metal of the Salamander's weapons. The ground beneath her was split and the dust and stones and debris from all around peppered harmlessly against that armored carapace... but things were already set into motion.
A wall of hard air slammed into her midsection despite her guard, as fierce as if she'd been staring down the mouth of a cannon. It was, after all, a master sword of the wind.
It looked like it was going to be a rather blustery day.
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Posted: Wed Apr 25, 2007 3:22 am
Strong as Sali might be, she hadn't been expecting that, in the kind of way a small tornado would surprise someone. It launched her right off the edge of the road and down the incline.
She tumbled tail over head before managing to find a semi kind of purchace through the use of one of her weapons. They were getting uncomfortably close to the city below now and the obvious crowd was gathering. She snarled up the hillside debating how to get passed this now obviously magical contraption.
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Posted: Wed Apr 25, 2007 12:39 pm
'Don't run...'
When the dust began to settle the two were much further apart now. The Salamander had rolled down the mountainside after being blasted back, but the Reaper stood his ground just where he had been with the sword still raised between them. At his feet was an intersection of two parallel scars in the earth; the one to his left from the Salamander's charge, the one ahead from his retaliation.
'Don't you dare think I'll let you run...'
He spat to his right; a mouth full of mountain dust and blood mingling to leave just a wad of black sludge.
"Come on, then!" was the shout that came down the mountain after the fire lizard. He walked to the edge of the road and looked down after her; tossing the sword between his hands thrice before it ended up raised out to his left side.
"I don't believe for a second that you were actually hurt by this-!" His hand snapped down sharply and the roadside to his left burst up into a cloud of dust as another heavy blast of air tore up the topsoil and sandblasted another rut into the ground.
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Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 9:22 am
She tensed like a cat when he appeared over the edge, whole body sinking in that quick movement of utter focus and then a freeze as if the world began to slow down, the sword caught the light and reflected the city as he pulled it up again. themightyjello "I don't believe for a second that you were actually hurt by this-!" His hand snapped down sharply and the roadside to his left burst up into a cloud of dust as another heavy blast of air tore up the topsoil and sandblasted another rut into the ground. She angled a little to the left to compensate and lept from the crouch. Fire exploded from the tip of her tail and all the way up her spine as she ran, or was shot up the wicked path. Any air that was compressed enough to carve a gouge in the ground would be enough to stand on, so long as the blast was the same height as the sword at it's peak above Joshua's head. Not only that, but every step became a firey explosion as the air suddenly found itself rushing to fill the empty space that her path lead. A leap and the reaper had a fire encased three toed foot wrapped around his head, plus the backdraft of her trail rushing in with the same wind that had been powered by his sword. It would be a big boom when sound actually caught up to the explosion.
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Posted: Thu Apr 26, 2007 11:44 am
Maybe he hadn't given the creature enough credit.
Maybe he'd let the weakness of the man allow him to forget about the reality of the monster.
Or maybe he'd actually believed for a second that with all that power it wouldn't be able to move like that.
The reality of the situation was that he'd been waiting for the time when the Salamander would show it's real colors. Strength, speed, power, when something appears with any one of these traits, it simply can't stay alive without the others. After all, survival of the fittest is the only true law in the world.
Still... to know something is coming and to be prepared for it are two entirely different things.
'I never thought it would be like-'
He had time enough to guard; but a guard alone would be a worthless thing without a chance to strike back. Bracing for a collision he readied the sword in front of him to receive the Salamander's charge: held across at shoulder height with the blade pressed against the back of his right arm guard, not to defend with the flat of the blade, but with the edge.
He'd see how fast the lizard was without his feet.
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