Ring of Fire [Dmitry/Exam]

Dmitry sighed heavily at the petite mage in his path, not feeling like talking her out of it and unable to teleport again so soon.

"Alright, you can come," he said, intent on getting back to the matter at hand. "But try not to bother me, alright? I'm gonna need my focus when we get up there." And on that note, the gray-hair continued onward and up the volcano.

"What we've got here is a nature spirit," he said as he walked, deciding to explain the situation on the way. "And not just any spirit either; this one's an elemental, one of the most powerful. There's only four in the world and they got a much stronger influence." Still, it was strange..

'I know, it doesn't make sense, does it boy?' Hati said, deciding to jump in. 'That it would affect the physical world so directly...'

'Yeah, somethin' ain't right.' As unique as they were, this kind of behaviour was unlike anything he had come across. 'Somethin'...maybe someone did this, didn't they old man?'

'Seems that way.'

Eventually the two mages of different guilds were approaching the summit of the volcanic mountain.

"Now would be a good time to turn around..."

She swore one of her eyes twitched but she followed along nonetheless. His explanation was rather vague but she could follow along somewhat. In a world full of magic it wasn't the most shocking thing but it was intriguing to say the least. "An elemental spirit?" She hummed in thought as she walked after him. The rest of their journey towards the mountain was one spent in a pondering sort of silence. Venir was still trying to wrap her head about the whole elemental spirit thing, and figure out just what sort of elemental spirit would shake the earth or create smoke. It wasn't until the pair had gotten close to the summit of the mountain that Venir realized just how out of her league she was. Even though there was some distance between them and the very top of the mountain Venir could still feel heat from it. The smoke in the air stung at her eyes, and there was a certain feeling that made Venir frown.


Her nose crinkled and she laughed almost nervously, "Perhaps I accompanied you for nothing." She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, "Well, I guess I'm not a fire mage and I might actually be out of my league here." It was almost a comedic really, "You got this buddy! I'm just gonna take your jacket back down to the town. Uh and you know what if you can actually do whatever is going on here." She made a vague gesture to everything in the vicinity, "You got my respect. Heck I'd say you're more powerful than me..."

NOTE:

Among the smoke and soot, Dmitry looked back at the white haired woman, his gray hair blowing in the hot air.

"Hmph, powerful?" He asked with a huff. "Powerful's got nothin' to do with it." That said, the mage walked forward, ignoring the intense heat permeating the place. Naturally, the center of the spirit's presence was most likely within the mountain itself, making the task ahead of Dmitry that much trickier and even more dangerous. Despite the sweat forming on his brow, the former tribal walked onward to where the spirit waited.

'Hmm, I'm not all that sure about this, boy...' Hati said, showing an unusual amount of caution. Still, it wasn't all that surprising to Dmitry, considering that elementals were a tier above animal spirits in terms of influence. It only made sense that the wolf spirit would be wary of a being that embodied one of the primal forces of nature, being one who simply embodied the aspects of a single animal. While he had formed bonds with two other elementals, the conditions were very differant from what he was dealing with now.

'What's the matter, old man?' Dmitry asked, deciding to mock his mentor a bit before they got to their destination. 'Worried about runnin' into one-o-the big guys?'

It was but a few minutes longer until Dmitry made the summit, the heat becoming extreme. After finding a nice flat ledge that was ideal for his purposes, he stood at the very edge of the precipice that led to the magma filled depths below. After kicking a rock into the pit on a whim, he looked downward at what awaited him if he should screw this up.

"Well, no time like the present..."

Dmitry held his hand out over the fiery abyss and closed his eyes, focusing on the world at large around him. Every ounce of concentration was poured into reading the flow of nature. It wasn't long until he pinpointed the very core of the most wrathful of the elementals.

"There you are..." Dmitry said as he opened his eyes, the 'whites' now entirely black and both his irises and pupils swallowed up in a silver glow. Soon, the earth began to shake again, much harder than it did before. Smoke began to pour out from the volcano even faster than it did before, to the point that the plumes created by it rivaled the clouds. However, none of this seemed to affect the mage. He stood among the chaos unflinching and unmoving, barely even breathing. Much like a ghost, he appeared untouched by everything around him, his hair and clothes remaining perfectly still, the smoke avoiding him completely on it's journey to the sky. The magma below began to shift and writhe, almost as if it were angry. Soon, all five physical senses were drowned out within the sage-like figure. Sight, sound, smell, taste, even touch all faded and gave way to the sense that had allowed him his most effective means of defending himself, the sixth sense that allowed him to perceive spirit, a sense he had from the very day he was born.

And then, as soon as it had began, everything ceased. The ground shook no longer, sky allowed to clear after some time. Dmitry's arm slowly moved back down to his side, it's owner in a daze from his earlier task. His eyes half open, the young man began to slowly lean, almost to the point of losing his balance. Just as he was soon to enter the molten slag, a single burst of hot air hit him as the elemental let out one last defiant breath before accepting it's new bond, bringing the mage back to his senses in time to stumble back from the edge.

'Welcome back, boy.' Hati quipped, glad to see his pupil hadn't gone to all that trouble just to roast inside of this glorified hill.

'Well, that was...something, eh old man?' With this response, Dmitry turned around and headed back to town, a new and powerful spirit at his disposal.