It has appeared I have made a fatal error.

The sky opened and an ocean fell from on high. In the midnight hour rivers poured down the streets of Hargeon. Clouds so vast and depressing no light could hope to pass through them encased the world in their dark embrace. Worried mothers held their children inside to keep them safe from the whipping winds and cruel rain while their fathers struggled to hold the windows shut. No sane man would be about in the midst of such a storm.

No sane man with a choice.

An out cast from this world and the other a lone man ran through the fell downpour, undeterred by the heaven's fury. In one arm he carried a bundle of towels and blankets clutched closely to his chest, in the other he carried a katana that hung at his side as he ran. But that was not the only blade he carried for on his back he carried a large box-shaped sheathe that carried many similar weapons, but many of its slots were empty but this man had no shortage of blades on his person.

A dagger in his right thigh, one of his own katana had been run through his back where it remaiend still, a throwing needle caught in his teeth a moment too late stuck into the ceiling of his mouth, not one or two but three throwing knives were buried into the forearm that was holding the bundle of blankets and while not a blade an arrow in his left shoulder completed the collection of weapons that had taken residence in Myra's body.

Blood seeped from other wounds as the guardian desperately charged through the empty streets. Then through the darkness he saw it, stark white against the bleak surroundings. He came crashing through the front doors of the Lamia Scale Guild Hall just as his legs gave out and he fell to a knee. "I apologize my lord. I know you did not want to return here, but it is our last refuge." It had been several months since Myra and Mazza had last invaded the Lamia Scale guild hall and been repelled by the guild master and various residence. But now in a desperate hour he sought protection in the castle he had once tried to steal.

"What heroic nonsense." An arrow of darkness shot through Myra's torso from behind. Not even thinking of his own well being the loyal guardian extended his right arm holding the bundle away from his chest just barely moving it out of the arrows path as it passed.

Myra collapsed collapsed on his side as his strength failed. But even as his consciousness failed him he refused to allow the bundle to touch the ground. As it rested on Myra's arm some of the blankets in the bundle peeled away to reveal the tiny genie Mazza resting in the bloodied cloths. The young king's golden skin had turned a pale red and he rapidly breathed to fight off a burning fever.

An assassin clad in robes of black walked in the wide open doors of Lamia Scale. The warrior of darkness stood over his prey "You die hard Myra, but you deserved a harder death then this." He pointed an exposed index finger at Myra's leg and from his finger shot another arrow that buried itself in Myra's calf. "You deserve worse for what you did to my men. I fought along those men for years, and in one night you slaughtered them all. But don't you worry you will soon be apologizing to them in the after life." The magic archer then moved his finger to point at the defenseless djinn "Really all this trouble for that little golden pile of sentient dung. No pay check will out weigh my lost comrades, but it may just make me feel better when I kill you." Hidden by a cowl the assassin wore a smile so sinister you could feel it, even if it could not be seen. "Long live the king!"

"I invoke the World Serpent and the Great Wolf: Jormangand! Hati!"

Two silver magic circles appeared on the floor, one in front of the bloodied fellow and the other behind him, what looked like smoke converging on both. From the one behind, an enormous snake emerged, circling around both figures aside from Kateri. From the circle in front, a wolf about twice the size of the standard stepped out, teeth bared and eyes set on the intruder.

"You heard the kid, didn't you?" A voice asked from the shadows, a certain gray haired mage stepping out shortly after. "Your not welcome here, so beat feat pal." Dmitry Kazakov was certainly no fan of the bloodied man on the floor, not much appreciating the earlier attempt to take his guild's home. However, he new full well that Zuo Cii and Kihia would certainly be against throwing the man out on the street covered in wounds, let alone their current guildmaster. And as Dmitry found himself loyal to this guild and the two former masters mentioned earlier, he was obligated to protect this man who sought asylum here.


"Oh, come now. Don't listen to him." The wolf said, eager for a fight. "Let's make things interesting."

"Look, you can leave here with your head still attached to your shoulder..." The paused as he flipped his knife between his fingers and held it up as a guard, taking a low stance in case things got messy. 


"...or we can get started."

The dark clad assassin jumped out of the way of the impeding wyvern, putting his back to the guild's door frame. He pointed both of his index fingers at Shadow and prepared to fire a pair of fell projectiles at the beast, that was until the area quickly became swarmed with equally large creatures and the two Lamia Scale mages made their presence known. Under his cowl he grimaced and clenched his teeth. "I'd step down if I were you. The worst you can do is kill me but the little red animate shit you are hiding can do so much worse." The hood had no intention of running, but he wasn't liking his odds so far.

Keeping his voice steady he continued "I am the Black Archer, Dorubalt. That man on the floor there is trouble. He is tasked with guarding the spawn of a dangerous monster. It is a young Djinn, a dangerous magic creature with no regard for the sanctity of human life." Dorubalt looked between the Dmitry and Kateri and lowered his hands to his sides before he continued speaking, "You have taken the wrong side. That creature is one of deceit and it has trained its servant equally well in the art. If you shelter them, allow the Djinn to grow, the world will bare the consequences and I promise your names will find themselves in infamy and your consciousnesses will be tormented by this mistake."

For added effect the assassin lowered his hood revealing his face, it was rather plain and the dark of the night hide what few noteworthy features it may have had, "Trust me. Enough human blood has been spilt today. Allow me to end this evil before it can grow to hurt anyone else. I implore you, I beg you, please stand down. You will not regret it."

Meanwhile Myrra and Mazza continued to get familiar with the marble floor.

Dmitry lowered his guard for a moment, knowing full well what Kateri was planning. He approached the assassin, gripping his knife tightly in case he needed to fight.

"Watch yourself, boy..." Hati said, wary of what his pupil was doing. Dmitry, of course, ignored his mentor, getting close to the invader. He made sure to be ready to teleport out of the way of the spell he knew Kateri would use, looking the potential opponents square in the eye.

"Come one, pal, you know you're not gonna win a fight here." He said, a certain edge to his voice. "You can't possibly think you'll survive if you start somethin'. I know you didn't come here on your own time; your here on orders. If you want to be any use to the folks who gave you those orders, you'll turn around right now and head out those door. You can't do nothin' if your dead and I'm sure your boss has other uses for you." 

Dmitry didn't much care if the fool complied or not, but he was professionally obligated to give him a chance. At the same time, if he decided to push things, the medium knew that he and Kateri could take him.

Dorubalt scowled as his appeal to their humanity almost instantly fell apart. He took a quick inventory of his options and chances of success before doing anything. Either of the mages before him would not have been a great barrier in one on one combat as for an assassin that was his ideal battle format; for in one on one he could easily turn a fight into an assassination. Once a battle became an assassination his victory was assured. But when put against two foes of considerably ability turning a direct confrontation into an assassination would become very difficult. But it wasn't impossible.

However that wasn't the situation; he was trying to assassinate three high level individuals(Even if one was incapacitated), three giant monsters and a demon all at once. An effort that Dorubalt had no interest in attempting.

His employer could certainly make Dorubalt regret ever being born, but he was willing to take that chance to live and kill another day.

Dorubalt accepted Katerii's handshake and said "You had best know what you are getting into. Which you can't know because it is complicated beyond even my knowledge. I insist you save yourselves some trouble and kill him while he is down." With that he yanked his hand away from Katerii and fled the building to vanish into the night.

But the assassin had not left without making an attempt to leave a mark. For by touching Katerii he was able to place his curse spell "Hunter Arrow." If at any point in the next forty eight hours she made contact with Myra or Mazza a shadow arrow would shoot from the point of contact impaling the one touched. If it was noticed was up to her own magic detection ability.


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OOC: It occurs to me that "Hunter Arrow," comes close to auto-hit territory. But I hope it will be fine with you since the only person I'm really damaging is myself, and its more of a plot point then an actual mid-battle attack.

If this is cool, then I guess continue as usual. If not? Shoot me a PM and I'll fix up my post.

Dmitry watched the invader as he left, wondering what in the world he was doing here. 

"Yeah, yeah...and stop calling me that damnit!" He said after about thirty seconds late, finally noticing what she said. With that, he dismissed Hati and Jormangand, there presence no longer needed, before heading to the room where Myra was resting. When he arrived, he pulled up a chair close to the bed and sat down, waiting for Kazimir to finish his treatment. When he was done, Dmitry looked long and hard at the person in the bed.

"Listen close," he said to the swordsman. "Your welcome to hide here, but first your gonna tell me everything I wanna know. We clear?" Dmitry didn't bother waiting for him to answer before asking his first question.

"Who was that and why is trying to kill you two?"

Myra awkwardly came to his senses as he found himself the operating subject of what looked like a demon butler. That's fine. The guardian had found himself being worked on by stranger doctors. He took the pain of having the weapons removed from his body in stride, and just kind of laid there in the face of Katerii's warnings and/or threats. Fortunately by the time she finished Kazmir had removed the arrow in Myra's mouth allowing him to say, "I can promise you I shall cause no trouble of my own will. However my master is a king. He takes what he wants when he wants and I must serve him without question. When he comes around he is the one you should be talking to. I have no control of him." Myra's eyes fell on Mazza "Speaking of. Stop my treatment at once and focus all efforts on his care. He has developed a dangerous fever and it must be seen to immediately. His life outweighs mine twenty fold."

While Myra would have liked to stop talking as it was most uncomfortable he was irritated to find there were more questions to be answered. Now this black clad summoner insisted he knew 'everything,' and well that would make for a lot of talking. Myra grumbled "'Tell me everything,' is a stretch and you know it. But I will tell you what you need to know. That assassin was named Dorubalt the Black Archer. He is just a two-bit assassin motivated only by the coins in his purse. Who sent him is of little consequence, past that he will send more." He paused and took inventory of everything he was going to say, it was important he not let any secret information slip, "I am sworn to keep many factors of this secret so pardon my inability to explain in full. But what I can tell you is that you find yourself in the midst of a complicated political game. The rules are complex beyond human reason; but the gist is that lots of people are trying to kill my master and I will kill them first." It was not said like a goal, or an idle threat to any spy who might be listening, but rather it was deceleration of fact. As far as Myra was concerned it was an absolute that he would succeed. "If you have further questions, wait until my master is healed and ask him. He has freedom to say what he wishes."

Dmitry wanted to demand more information than he was given, but he knew this stubborn fool wouldn't budge. Digging his personal needle and stitching thread out of his pocket, he continued to rummage around until he pulled out a tiny vial of calendula oil. 


"Put this in the wounds before you stitch them up and again before you wrap them." He said as he handed the oil, needle and thread, before reaching back into his pockets for another vial containing a cocktail of herbs that he found useful in dealing with infections. "Get him to take this, if you can." With that, he headed out the door to help Kateri with the paperwork. They wouldn't be able to give him the guild's emblem until Ni Ju Hachi approved him, but they could get him through the fine details until then. On his way out, he turned to the wounded man. "I expect you pay me back for that stuff..." He wasn't kidding. The medicine he provided was homemade and wasn't something Dmitry had much of on hand. When he got to where Kateri was, he began sifting through the appropriate paper work, having done this once or twice.

"So, what do you think?" 

Myra all but roared in frustration when all but told to put the life of his master in the hands of fate. "To hell with that!" He pushed himself up from lying down with his hands "The natural order can screw itself for all I care. He is Mazza future king of the Djinn; the rules of nature bow their heads at his feet and I his servant Myra am sworn to protect him from all harm." He resisted any attempt by Kazimir to continue his care and continued to shout "If it is not in your ability to heal him then find someone who can! He must live! He must-" Having pretty much been begging for it to happen, Myra's wounds opened and he was gripped by a wave of pain. He collapsed again, apparently unable to move; just staring with a crazed fixation at Mazza. Either he could not speak or he chose not to; but he had said every word he would that night.

In time both Master and Servant would recover; but what they had said was all Katerii or Dmitry would get out of them this night. Perhaps another day would serve to shine more light on the strange creature and the outrageous man who called him master.


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OOC:

Congratulations you've done the impossible, you completed an intro thread! Feel free to continue posting if you so desire; but this is the last one from me.