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Wild Hunt

Nihka

By Nihka,
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Nihka

Nihka

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The girl did not know for how long she had been running, but she had begun when no light had filtered down through the heavy canopy above at all and her steps had been unsure and often painful as her bare limbs met the hidden dangers of fallen branches and caught in ruts in the ground that threatened to snap delicate ankles.  Now the cool of the dark had turned to the warmth of the dim, and though there was still nothing to see beyond the leaves and vines above every once in a while a stray beam of light snuck down to the ground for the flicker of an instant; a glimmer of something beyond the shrouded forest.

 

She was hot now, sweating and panting as the unmoving air between the trunks of the great trees became harder and harder to keep in her lungs.  She must rest.  Nothing can run forever, neither prey nor hunter.  One must give before the other.  This was the law of nature.

 

A sound hit her ears, the trickling familiarity of moving water.  The girl turned her desperate sprint towards it, and beyond the next heady oak she found the source.  A waterfall fed into a small pond created by a fallen tree across the width of a shallow stream.  The water was cold and clear, no higher than her thighs.  It was too small for fish, and she could see that it was empty, secluded behind the fallen tree.

 

Hesitantly, cautiously, timidly she came out from behind the tree, her breath still coming in raw heaves of her chest.  Her body demanded the cooling touch of the pond.  Her throat begged for the water.  She knew then that she could run no more and instead fell into the pond.  In an instant her skin erupted in goosebumps and icy cold stabbed through her flesh and into her bones.  She almost cried out but cupped her hands over her mouth to hide her voice from the woods.  After a few moments the cold was bearable.  She plunged her face into the water and took great bellowy gulps of the cold.

 

When she rose up again she was not alone.  A man stood at the edge of the water.  He wore furs over his shoulders and his bare arms were thick with muscle.  In one calloused hand he held a worn bow made of antler. His thick beard split open to show yellowing teeth as he spoke.  “Aren’t you a pretty little thing?”

 

The girl did not respond.  She stood, staring at the man, her arms clutched tightly to her chest, her eyes unblinking, afraid to lose sight of him for even a heartbeat.  The wood did not forgive carelessness such as that.  She knew it.  Careless.

 

The man stayed at the edge of the pond clutching a tree branch above him with one hand, his yellow teeth a wolf’s grin.  “A pretty pretty little thing.  What are you doing out here where even grown men fear to tread, hmm?”  He leaned towards her and the scent of fresh blood and tallow came with him.  “Anything at all could happen to you so far from home little miss.  Perhaps old Theron could keep an eye on you.  It’s not safe out here, oh no.  You need protection.”

 

The girl didn’t move, as still as a stone while the man spoke.  Her heart beat fast against her ribs, ribs that stuck out under her skin, gaunt and fragile.  The man took a step into the water, his eyes travelling across her body and behind him the forest began to move.

 

And then the screaming began.
 


Leve from the Donner family of The Central Shroud.  It reads as follows.
“Two nights past our daughter went in search of berries in the woods and has yet to return.  A neighbor said he spotted her heading into the Western Shroud.  Please find her whatever her fate and bring her back to us.”

 

Saturday, June 9th

8:30 CST

Six players.

 

1- Edda (alt)

2- Kiht

3- Virara

4- Artoria

5- Jana

6- Alera

Edited by Nihka
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  • 1 month later...
Nihka

Nihka

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Flurries of snow drifted down the cold cobbles of an Ishgardian plaza until the breeze reached an imposing stone building and pushed the ice up along the wall. From a single window, the faint light of an oil lamp tried to fight its way through the layers of frost and fog that extended from the corners of each pane of glass, slowly working towards the center. Inside was a small office; a young woman worked against an endless stack of papers.

 

Lyssa sighed, scrubbing her hand across her face. The day had ended, but the work had not. The flickering shadows of her inkwell and pens stretched out across the desk, and two stacks of papers made a hulking shadow across the far wall. The war was over, but old habits die hard: She imagined it as the shadow of a dragon flying overhead, a great beast that would devour her if she couldn’t escape.

 

Ishgard was no strange to the levemete. The Central Highlands had been home to Adventurers’ Guild outposts for years. When the Holy See opened its doors to adventurers, though, the sheer volume of requests had more than tripled. There was more business, more trade, and more jobs for clerks such as herself. Everyone wanted something done, from killing rats in a basement, to taming a skittish antelope, to finding the lost pages of some mysterious void tome.

 

She slid over the next sheet of paper and squinted her eyes to read the shaky, unpracticed script.

 

“I’m worried about my grandfather. A sennight past, he set out to our old home in Western Coerthas. Our family lived there before the Calamity, and now that the war has ended he hoped to bring home what we left behind. The trip was only supposed to take four suns, but we are well past that now. I can’t sleep, for imagining him trapped in a cave while horrible wolves prowl about. Please find us some strong adventurers to bring him home to meet his new great-grandaughter.

- Addie”

 

Lyssa scowled. Leave it to a Brumie to go running off in foul weather chasing ghosts of the past.

 

Saturday, July 28th, 3 PM Central, four players

1 S'imba

2 Zelmanov

3 Anstarra

4 R'shesha

 

 

 

Sadly, no child was ever found in the search for the missing Donner girl. Now, it is presumed to be a search for her body, or perhaps an attempt to identify the strange creature they encountered before.

 

Saturday, July 21st, 8 PM Central, four players

1 Renaea

2 Edda

3 Lan

4 Jana

 

Reserve: Vincent

 

Reserve, either event: Kiht

 

Edited by Nihka
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Anstarra

Anstarra

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Sign me up for the July 21st event~ This being said, I'm flexible! If that one fills up and other players can only make it and not the 28th one, they can message me, I'll probably be able to swap ^^

 

EDIT: Switching to the 28th, giving my spot on the 21st to Zetchryn since she asked in the Discord at 1:48 pm EST

Edited by Anstarra
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  • 2 months later...
Nihka

Nihka

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For all of his life Gagaroda Yayaroda had believed that the desert was his home.  He was dunesfolk, born and bred for the blowing sands and the burning sun, but he was now realizing that he was mistaken.  Somehow he had gotten lost and was now farther south in the Sagolii than he had ever been before.  His world was split evenly at the horizon between the coarse brown sand below and the azure blue cloudless sky above.  A man could see forever out here, but there was no sign of any life whatsoever, much less the mining camp he was supposed to be delivering supplies to.

 

His chocobo was wilting in the head, its head hanging low and its tread heavy under the packed bags on its back.  Gagaroda tugged the lead again, drawing the bird ever forward, forcing it to keep up.  It was time to turn back.  Hopefully he could retrace his steps back to Forgotten Springs and refill his supplies before the head drove him to the ground, never to stand again.

 

Under his feet he felt a tremor and froze, pulling the chocobo up short.  A sandworm was stalking the area.  The first sign of life he’d noticed in over a day.  What was it doing out here with nothing to eat?  Well, nothing to eat save a lost Lalafel and a chocobo too tired to run.  Gagaroda cursed his luck.  This trip was proving to be entirely unprofitable.  Perhaps his wife was right and he should have set up shop in Silver Bazaar instead of insisting on being a travelling merchant.

 

After a few tense minutes the tremors grew faint, and then stopped, so gagaroda began moving again, heading back towards civilization, or at least where he thought civilization might be.  But then something caught his eye, barely visible at the edge of the horizon.  It shimmered in the heat coming up from the sand, and for a moment gagaroda thought it was a trick of the eye, but no, there it was.  A gleaming city of purest white standing out brightly against the sky.  It was far, ten malms, maybe more.

 

For a moment he considered heading there, perhaps finding some water and continuing his journey, but he thought better of it quickly.  A lost city this far out in the desert?  It must be ruins, perhaps recently uncovered by the shifting wind blown dunes.  There’d be no water there, and at the moment he needed that more than he needed the risks and rewards of exploring a lost ruin.  So he pulled out his map and marked down where he thought the city was, though he had to admit he wasn’t even entirely sure where he was.

 

If he could keep this a secret and then return, better supplied and prepared…  Well, more than one man had made his fortune on lost relics from forgotten ruins.  Perhaps it was time for Gagaroda to join them.

 

Leve:

Gagaroda Yayaroda would like a brave troupe of adventurers to explore the ruins of a recently discovered lost city in the far southern Sagolii desert.  Gagaroda will split the profits of the expedition 50/50 with the adventurers with the adventurer’s share to be split amongst themselves by their own means.  Please bring adequate supplies and preparations for a long trip into the desert.

 

Saturday, Sept 29

8:00 PM Central time

Five player slots

1. Nheu'a

2. Kiht

3. S'imba (effin' Tia)

4. Anstarra

5. Wauren

 


 

Edited by Nihka
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