Deep within the heart of the Haunted House, in a room doused in shadows that stretched long and spindly fingers across a splintered wood floor, a horseman stood in the middle, hands tucked into his sleeves, his robes trailing on the dusty, dirty ground.
He was not moving, nor was he speaking. Instead he started out across the dilapidated room as though somehow it might say something to him, as though it could tell him why he was here, what he was doing in such a place - why he even existed.
But there was only silence.
Mengyao absently stroked a finger over the black thorn bracelet, feeling the pulsing warmth against his skin and it felt somehow soothing, despite his shattered nerves. He was on edge, annoyed, unsteady on his own feet; and at first he had tried to delude himself into thinking that he was perfectly all right, that everything was perfectly fine.
But it wasn't. There was nothing fine whatsoever; nothing at all, nothing, no reason for him to be here, and what he was looking for was lost, gone, disappearing into nothingness until all that surrounded him was an impenetrable blackness that threatened to suffocate him.
It was like the Insanity all over again.
The grey had grown over time. It now stretched out over his face, settling over half of the left side of his face, spindles of grey stretching down across his left eye, which burned a bright, brilliant gold in contrast to the more subtle blue of his right. He could not stop it; it would continue to grow, continue to consume him until all was lost.
He had thought fighting it would be the way to go, but now Mengyao had given up. He did not belong here anymore, after all - why was he here?
Why did he exist?
[ Just so you know, this will be a FAST PACED BATTLE, so don't hesitate to post or to just go at it! No more than two people attacking another, though! ]
Syusaki
TK
Keiifuu
Makoto
Kanth
Etzer
Meegane
AJ
Nerpin
Lifen
Ice Queen
Fai
Ol-j-man
Shikoba
Posted: Tue Jan 08, 2013 8:11 pm
She had found her way in to this building because she hadn't seen her close friend for a few days now and she was starting to worry. One day is fine, two days is he's bored out of his mind and exploring/getting lost. A few days is just unnatural and bothered the horsewoman immensely.
Slowly walking through the rooms, she lightly rubbed a shoulder, bow already in her hand, just in case something would jump up at her - it had happened before enough times that she was not going to be taken by surprise again. Why she even came was beyond her. He owed her so much.
It wasn't until a few moments later that she caught the sight of a larger horseman in this new room, just standing there, the grey obvious and a little unnerving. It wasn't a first that she had met him in here, and not a first that something had overcome him.
Sighing a little, she took the chance and lowered her bow from it's slightly readied position, giving him a dry, yet caring look. "Mengyao, what have you gotten yourself in to this time. . .?" She asked very quietly, hoping for an answer. It would settle her inner worry.
Fai was not there to question life, he was not there to search for friends, no, Fai was wandering around Amity--simply because he had stopped running into mirrors in the lair, and while finding a new project in the experimentation room sounded fun to the Famine Alchemist, he had not yet stopped being fascinated with the distortion mirrors. It was one of his phases, as much as he hated to use the term--and would run its course sooner or later--
Until then, this delightfully twisted little haunted house would have to do as substitute for the mirrors. The horseman looked around, his excellent night vision picking up the two figures with something akin to happiness.
Ah, how wonderful. He had playmates! "Greetings, fellow clansmen," he said politely. "Am I interrupting something?"
Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2013 10:20 am
After a meal, AJ visited the Haunted House to see if he can see the hunter boil he met before, however, that was no sign of him. So he decided to go back, but there came the problem - he forgot the way out. As a result, he ran into the house to see if anybody was there for help. Well, he really needed a campus tour, he kept getting lost in Amityville.
The house was so big that he went through rooms from rooms, but there was no one. He stopped and rested a bit before he continued. The searching was not smooth at all. Out of boredom, he started talked to his tail head. "Hey Bro. Why do you think there's such a house within the campus?" The head answered, "Adventure?" The reply was short as the head had no interests on topics unrelated to foods. It yawned to show its lacking of interest. Response from the amphisbaena boil was a shrug and a mock. "You don't like this topic, do you?" His brother never failed to delight him.
"Bro, do you hear something?"
His good hearing noted some noises from the room ahead, AJ walked forward and the sounds became louder and more obvious. It was someone chatting, oh yeah. He ran into the room without hesitation and found there were three strangers.
"Hello, hope I didn't disturb something. Anyone knows the way back to the campus?" AJ asked with a friendly tone.
Accidentally trodding into a tear in the air was making Shik want to tear something a new on in return. He'd had enough of the place to last a lifetime and had been lucky to avoid being sucked in for quite some time now. The only reason the executioner wasn't paying attention this time was because of an argument he and his newly returned sister.
There had been joy at her return, yes, but with it came old wounds as well.
The horseman cursed as he wandered the house for a way out, only pausing to change his course when he heard voices closeby. Several horsemen and a wayward student. "What are you doing standing there?" he snapped at the lot, though his gaze was most pointed at the horned snake boil. "This isn't a playhouse. If there aren't hunters about, why not try and find an exit." Shik had lost all pretense of politeness when it came to Amityville after being attacked by several students in the last battle - worse, watched one heal a Hunter.
Really he was waiting for a chance to strike at something at this point.
Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2013 8:51 pm
Makoto ambled in sometime after the strange gathering occurred, sidestepping a suspicious looking pile and smiling benignly at the group. It wasn't as though he always meant to end up in the wrong place at the wrong time, it just somehow happened. And here he was, and here these horsemen were, and well. That was odd. "I should have brought TK." He mused mildly under his breath, sweeping past a particularly tall looking War horseman with little more than a flick of his ears and tail in mild curiosity and an infuriatingly condescending sideways glance.
He stopped near the edge of what might have been considered the center of the room, toeing it with scrutiny before glancing up at his wayward companions. "Are you all here for some particular reason apart from looking lost?" He inclined his head to the side with a maddening calm. "Or are you just playing dress-up in this decrepit place?" He'd obviously either not bothered to pay attention to Shikoba's words, or he'd simply missed them all together. His tail cracked to the side, and he tilted his head just far enough that it nearly popped off as though just some elaborate part of a doll.
The inugami tucked his hands into his sleeves mildly, and smiled at the group with something close to polite craziness. He was just asking to be eviscerated all over the floor.
keiifuu
Offline
Syusaki
Offline
Posted: Wed Jan 09, 2013 9:22 pm
TK had heard of the Haunted House, but he had yet to be tempted to step inside. Until now, that is. He had been told it was a mysterious place that appeared in random places at random times and pulled in students and horsemen alike, even hunters. With such a wide variety of victims, he could only assume chaos constantly erupted inside the house. While the undead had never been the type to step into conflict, just one trip to the Haunted House couldn’t hurt, right? Perhaps if he was lucky, he wouldn’t meet anyone and he could spend a few minutes wandering around the house to content, and that was exactly how the first part of his trip went.
Golden eyes glowed dimly as he calmly treaded through the abandoned hallways and occasionally chose to peek his head into a room, which was always often and in complete disarray. He hummed quietly, but peacefully continued walking around until he happened upon a room that was clearly occupied.
The boil must have been extremely lucky today because there were already seven other occupants within the area. His eyes flicked toward a certain dog. Immediately, his gaze narrowed and lips curled into a frown, but he remained standing by the door and kept quiet. Rather, TK observed the horsemen with polite curiosity. “Hmm.”
If he heard Lifen the first time she spoke, he made no indication of it. The fingers of his left hand curled upwards into a fist, then slowly uncurled, as though Mengyao were grasping at something unseen, reaching nothing. He lifted his chin, eyes leveling with the splintered, black picture frame that hung on the wall opposite of where he stood. It was empty - perhaps it had never even been filled - the space behind it grey and dusty, like the walls that stretched out on either side of the room.
More footsteps echoed closer. Mengyao closed his eyes briefly and let the feel of the bracelet against his skin soothe and calm him, though unlike the last time, it did little. He still needed to find what he was looking for, and the irateness seemed unable to settle, as though he were stretched too thin, his heart refusing to relax.
Slowly he turned, his eyes flickering towards Lifen.
"I," he said. "am fine."
A bow fizzled into being in the palm of his hand, and without another word, Mengyao drew back the string, feeling the wire tighten, snapping into place, the feathers of the arrow brushing against his fingers.
AJ turned to the horseman who was talking to him and smiled even the tone of the boil wasn't friendly at all. "Didn't you hear I. am. finding. my way. out. because I was lost?" He gave another smile when he finished what he said. Soon, another student showed up and asked a question. He turned to the Inugami and smiled. "Maybe they are but not me. I am asking the way back to campus since I was lost." Then, another boil came into the room. AJ started to think if there was another secret meeting, he got a bit excited.
"So....anyone knows the way back to campus?" The serpent dragon boil asked again politely when he felt a pain on his face. He touched his face and found there was a graze mark. Blood. The wall behind him got an arrow stuck into it. Apparently, he was not welcomed.
He smiled, pulled the arrow from the wall and threw it towards the direction where it was from. "Here you are."
HP: 27/ 30 Action: Throwing back the arrow Target: Mengyao Damage: 2 Fear: Y1 Battle Cry [1/1]
kurotomato
Gives Mengyao his arrow back OwO
Posted: Fri Jan 11, 2013 11:51 am
"Perhaps what my friend with the bow is saying, is that we should have a sparring match, since we are here, anyway?" Fai offered. To be honest, though, he glanced at Mengyao closely, looking for traces of gray on his skin. It could possibly be insanity, he thought. Or perhaps something else...
Either way. You had to cover to another horseman. That was the nature of things.
He found himself in the Haunted House, his head tilting curiously at his surroundings. He was about to say something until he saw others of his kind, and a smile slid across his face, twitching at the ends of his lips.
"Greetings," The frost demon murmured smoothly, a hand raising. "I seem to have gotten myself lost. Perhaps one of you knows the way back to Amityville?"
Posted: Fri Jan 11, 2013 8:07 pm
The first attack hardly surprised him. He had surmised someone would attack someone, but he could only quirk a curious brow at the horseman. “Your particular emphasis makes me wonder if that is actually false reassurance,” he murmured, more-so to himself for fear he would face the conquest horseman’s wrath next.
Instead, he chose to focus on the attacked. “You pose an interesting question. As tempted as I am to go out and investigate this problem myself, this also an interesting circumstance I have fallen into.” TK raised his eyebrows and shrugged. A thoughtful gaze settled on Fai. He opened his mouth to speak, but hesitated so he could give the horseman’s hair a longer look. “…I suppose I could take you up on that offer, as inexperienced as I may be.” He held out an arm as a gesture for the famine horseman to attack first. “Your move.”
"I will be happy to spar with you, scareling," Fai said, nodding and smiling ever so slightly. Since it seemed this was as good a place to test new students for their abilities as any! He didn't move, though. Instead, one of the heads on his hair shot out, taking a small bite out of TK's FEAR shield.
"Ah, Precious, you are always so quick to strike," Fai said, patting the largest head fondly.
A slow tilt of his head towards the skeletal one, the feel of his returned arrow ignored. It cut a neat line down one hand and then dissipated, fizzling into nothingness.
"I was not," said Mengyao. "talking to you, you lowly cretin of an existence."
The black thorn bracelet dug deep into his wrist, sinking against his skin, warmth spreading first through his fingers, then across his wrist, and then up his arm, and Mengyao could practically feel it running through his veins. He only vaguely heard the famine horseman speak, dual colored eyes flicking towards him just briefly before returning to the matter at hand.
Namely getting rid of the irritations in the room so he could return to searching for what he had lost.
Admittedly this wasn't the first time Mengyao acted unruly - it was always an obvious sign when something was wrong with him. Mismatched eyes glared up at him lightly, eyebrows furrowed as she listened to the words spill out, a volley of arrows let go from his bow. Sure, this was the haunted house - battles and spars were definitively not out of the question, but his tone of voice was off. He was too . . angry.
"Oh Mengyao, what have you gotten yourself in to, again." She said very lightly to him, eyebrows raising lightly.
Hearing an odd sound, she turned just in time to see an arrow volley back at him, his own feathers singing through the air and scraping the horseman beside her. Gut reaction told her to send another arrow the way it came - he was her clansman and best friend, she would follow him through battle. She had before, and she would again.
Quote:
HP: 40/40 Damage: She hits the wall. Attacking: AJ, but she doesn't hate, okay.
