Welcome to Gaia! ::

By the end of it the Headmistress looked rabid with a terrible, manic energy. It took a few moments for her to gather her composure. "...in short. Go in. Fight things. Come back with what is found here," she tapped the building marked Goal, "...and bring it back to me." With that, her form warped, wobbled, and flattened, growing ever darker until everyone realized that it had been her shadow all along. A gnome cleared his throat, and began explaining. His voice was wonderfully flat, and completely lacking in song. Several students sigh in relief.

"Through yonder tree is another world. It's called Christmas, and I find it entirely unpleasant. You will start in the festive forest, and from there you will find three paths. Do not take this path!" A gesture to the striped center route, "CandyCane Lane is a deathtrap for our kind and only the truly strong may take it. Both the Northern and Southern routes are longer, but safer. You may seem some faces there that look like family members or sommat, but attack them all the same. Even if a creature seems friendly, their friendship tends to be pretty painful. You see, Christmas is made up of JOY. Which make FEAR go all wonky-like, you follow? Alright then. Anyways, in the end, all three paths meet up at ChristmasTown. It's full of elves," and here the gnome turned and spat in disgust, "and other such things. The big goal is Sandy Claws' workshop, here at the end. That's the payload we're after."

The smoke cleared, taking with it the last traces of darkness. The sky above had steadily been growing brighter with every passing moment. Now the comforts of night had vanished, replaced with the dour gloom of daylight. And with it their colossal visitor was revealed.



The sun has risen.


The twenty to thirty foot tall creature half-stood, half-knelt on the battlefield as it stared with unblinking eyes that held the same glow as the weapon; the weapon that was kicked off the same ledge mere minutes ago.

But the scent the creature had belonged to only one person: Red. Red was back. Red was back.

The massive skeletal face slowly turned and focused on Caelius. A deep rumble grew in the creature's throat as it spread its wings, blocking out the morning sun. "You," it, no, Red growled.

Red did not say anything more. She opened her skeletal mouth and roared, a jet of blue-fire shooting out towards the Death Hunter. The beam-like stream of fire expanded as it left her mouth, increasing drastically in size. While the core of it was directed at Caelius, the attack had the drawback of having a radius that affected the entire battlefield, affecting everyone on it.