Welcome to Gaia! ::

"They're all old!" Ralir exclaimed, eyes widening as he observed the chaos befalling their group. "And - and - I think they're bucks."

He was a little less certain about that. The presence of coarse, greying hairs was an almost universal marker of age, but it wasn't like Ralir was some expert in dire rat biology. Noul bucks were a little larger, on average, than does, though, and the same was true for most of these rats. It was noticeable mostly because the range of sizes was much smaller than usual. He didn't know much about dire rat society, though - did they even have one? He'd thought they weren't very intelligent, up until now. Clearly there was some organization here, though. Why might so many older bucks charge out, when usually it was the youthful ones who had enough vigor to attempt to hurt a noulicorn? Why would they go for such a large group?

His hesitation and deliberation caused the dire rats to begin to catch up to him, though, and he felt himself hesitating as he watched their beady-eyed approach. Still, he couldn't help but hazard a guess: "Could they be in season?" Breeding season, anyway. It was his best guess: a pregnant rat was not very mobile, and perhaps younger bucks had something else to occupy their time with, like finding sustenance for their offspring. He didn't know.

He really did have to do something about the dire rats that were nearing them, though. He scowled at them, rearing up onto his hind hooves to help the gesture. "Back off! We're not here to for you," he called, though he was fairly certain they wouldn't understand him.

He was strong, for a young buck - but he was no experienced fighter or athlete. He had to come down eventually, and when he did, he wasn't quite better off, and he wasn't certain he'd done anything more than draw attention to the thinness of the cloth he'd been draped in. He stomped his hoof for emphasis, but then he wasn't quite sure what to do. He certainly didn't have Viltalta's easy confidence - he envied the smoothness of her movements right now, but could not possibly imitate them. But he wasn't going to run away, either, even if he wasn't very good at making an intimidating display.

Amoli was right, now it was time to fight!

As the dire rats turned to her Krima lowered her horn ready to face them. They were headed her way and soon she was fighting them using her horn to try and sweep them away if they tried to get too close to her head. Her hooves too were now in action, she brought her knees high up and then tried to smash them down onto the rats who were able to get past her horn. She didn’t know if she was hitting any since she was so concentrated in trying to take on the ones coming headfirst at her.

Her ears swivelled to listen to both Ralir and Aldwyn. She didn’t exactly have time to observe the rats but they did seem a bit old? At the least, the greying was showing on their coats. So maybe, but Krima didn’t really have time to look and observe as they did.

“Amoli can you see anything?” She called, maybe she could see something from her vantage point atop her back.

“I can’t see a thing with you bouncing and moving about like that!” Came the reply before Amoli was hissing a warning to a dire rat that was making its way around Krima. Though even if Krima wanted to stop to have a look, now was not the time.

Late. Again. Ysalone ran pell-mell across the Barrens, hot on the tail of the group that had set out from the Homewood in search of Wanderlust's party. This was par for the course, really. Ever since she had reached adulthood, Ysalone hadn't managed to be on time for... anything, really. Somehow the time just slipped away from her, and before she knew it, she was galloping blindly in pursuit of whatever it was she was meant to be at.

She was in such a full-out sprint that her breath had become ragged, puffing with each step even as she tried to force it into some semblance of regularity. At least all this running keeps me fit, she thought to herself, rather more brightly than perhaps a doe in her predicament should have. Still, not all was lost. The trail was quite clear and up in the near distance, there came the obvious sounds of a confrontation. She hadn't missed all the fun, after all.

"Oh boy, it's rats," she muttered to herself as she charged up to the fray. Well. It could be worse. She dashed forward and promptly threw herself at the action, rearing up as tall as she could and letting out a loud snort, pawing angrily at the ground when she came back to earth. With some concentration, she brought as bright a glow as she could to her horn and shoved it right into the face of the nearest attacking rat. "HOW DO YOU LIKE THAT?"

Intimidate
+1 for power use?
+2 for intimidation in the downpour

There was not much room for thought. The rats were not at all impressed by Ralir's maneuver - which shouldn't have surprised him, really. But what it meant was that they immediately headed for him, even as black stormclouds materialized from seemingly nothing over their skirmish, drowning out the high-pitched squeaks they were making in response to Ralir's words.

Ralir didn't need to think very hard to know what this was: it didn't rain in the Barrens, obviously, and none of the nouls on this journey had even an adept noul's bright splashes of color except for Viltalta. An ascended noul was truly powerful, and this storm was reminiscent of the one that'd ravaged Homewood in his own vision quest from the Grandfather tree.

As if by instinct, Ralir's flailing limbs kicked out at the rats which were now making their way toward him. As he made contact with one, his heart jumped in his chest - and he found magic lighting through his veins quickly and familiarly. He was still new to using his powers, but surely the sudden warmth flooding the area immediately around Ralir, so very different from the ambient temperature, and uncomfortable, too, given the storm raging around them, would prove ample dissuasion from continuing their assault.

It wasn't a real attack. Ralir could deal with one or two rats, perhaps, but there were so very many here, and there was no way to even simulate this in the safety of Homewood. There was no real way for him to defend his limbs from this many rats, but if they were going to make their way toward him and not anyone else, at least Ralir could make that as unpleasant as possible. "You don't want to tangle with nouls like us!" he called out, though his own combat abilities so far had not really supported this idea.

But, hey - Viltalta and that one grumpy buck who'd never introduced himself seemed to be doing just fine, even if everyone else was beginning to falter now.

"There's more where this comes from," he added grimly, stabilizing himself even if it let more rats at him: it wasn't like they could tell how much pain he was in right now if he pretended he was still strong, right?

Draven paused for a moment as his sides heaved. The crack of thunder over head after the ascended reared up and cried out and the magic that was released up into the skies. With the clouds that crowded in and the drenching rain that followed, this didn't really add to the mood. Shaking his head, his mane already sticking to him from the sweat of moving around. As he stood there looking around in the darkness, his ears flicking to the sides, listening. Most the rats had fled back to where they had come from. Only thing was, they were replaced with others.

"Some are fleeing, still many left." Draven muttered as he glanced around.

Others were using their gifts to try and scare off the rats. He had not an ounce of magic at his disposal, but using the rain and flicking shadows to his advantage. Draven reared up in an attempt to frightened off more of the rats. He wanted to clear the path so that they could move on. But this trip seems to have just been one case of bad luck after another...



Roll 5+2=7(Partial success)

Several of the rats were focused on him now, but Aldwyn could see that their numbers were divided from trying to drive off so many larger targets. Around him, the other noulicorns of the group were stamping their hooves to attack or rearing back to frighten the rats away. Even Viltalta had deemed the fight dangerous enough to call forward her own powerful magic. It burst forth in a flurry of thunder, pelting them all with rain and whipping up a deterring gust.

Aldwyn squinted his eyes in the darkness, taking his own wary step away from the fight in the encroaching darkness. He didn't want to be caught blindsided by a dangerous bite and unable to move forward...

But so many of their group had already taken damage. He could smell the tinge of blood in the air, mingling with the dusty scent of sand as it was whipped up by the wind. Surely the others knew what they were encroaching on, now? The dire rats were desperately trying to defend their home, and here their group was punishing them for it... Aldwyn's body tensed as the pack advanced again. Everyone else had made their choices. No one fled. No one wondered if it was right for them to travel through this territory.

The other noulicorns only persisted in what they'd come to do.

And perhaps that was just how it was supposed to be. It saddened Aldwyn to know that they had to choose between persevering in their mission or allowing the rats their security. If it wasn't another noulicorn in potential danger, the choice might not have been so easy.

But they must traverse this obstacle.

With a high whinny of his own, Aldwyn reared back, hooves pawing at the air and horn glowing faintly with a pulse of his magic as he smashed down. In the same breath, he pushed his magic outward, exhaling a plume of pollen to further subdue and disorient the nearby rats.

Much to Adahy's relief, the dire rats run away from the groups attempts to intimated them away. With one of the biggest signs Adahy had ever made he said aloud. "Thank you the Great Tree that worked." He really had no idea what he would have done if it had not worked. Looked around at the group, Adahy could see that they all need some rest and time to heal. Everyone was drentched form the rain that Viltalta had brought to help and they would all soon be cold due to it being night. But they were still on the land or area that had started this whole mess. Adahy needed answers.

"Furry Tail how you doing buddy?" Adahy checked on the young hop. "Ok...Now at least." Furry said but his voice was still laced with fear and worry. "Ok well lets just take a look around and see if we can find out what is going on here before settling in and resting." Wincing form the pain of the bits the rats had given him, Adahy put his injuries out of his mind and started looking around. They needed to know what had caused such an attack if for no other reason then to be able to avoid the same fate again.



wc total:1878