Howling in the night (Open to LS members)

“IEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!”

The wild howl could be heard from the confines of the Lamia Scale guild hall. The clang of metal blades upon metal bars could also be heard. It was a loud night for everyone. Nobody would sleep until someone calmed the beast within. Did it need to eat? Did it need water? Did it need to poop? Nobody would ever know. Until someone figured it out though. But even then, until someone figured it out, nobody in the town of Hargeon would sleep this unpleasant night.

Within the cage lie a pillow and a blanket, probably left there while the beast was unconscious. It was rather rude of the beast to return this kindness with loud, obnoxious, violent screaming and violent sword arm swings against the magically reinforced bars of his cage. If these bars were normal it would have only taken a few swings to get through but these weren’t letting him cut through anything. So in a panic he continued to do the only thing he knew how, the only thing he was trained to do.

Destroy.

He made every possible effort to destroy the bars of the cage but to no avail. No matter what he did, not even a chip or a scratch would form on the metal. His blades also never chipped or cracked. Eventually the beast started to tire and had to stop for a moment, heaving his breaths in exhaustion. He didn’t know where he was. At one moment he was battling trespassers in his territory, the next he had awoken in a cage.

After a moment of panting the beast let out another frenzied roar to the sky before continuing the slash away at the bars that confined him. His only thoughts were of escape. Last time he was in a cage it was not a pleasant experience and he wasn’t going to experience that again.

Maya sat on her bed in her dorm room, hands over her ears as she desperately tried to mute the screaming noises coming from elsewhere in the hall. Truth be told, the beast's shouting was only part of the reason Maya was still awake. Sleeping in general had become much more difficult for her ever since her experience in the warehouse a while back. Every time she closed her eyes, she could feel her body thrumming with excess energy, and her new ability to see mana seemed to be effective even when her eyes were closed, the combination of which made sleeping a monumental task. The screaming savage man was just the cherry on top. It wasn't like she truly needed the sleep anymore, either, but it would still have been nice to be comatose for a few hours to keep her mind from wandering to darker things.

After several more minutes of futile attempts at slumber, Maya decided against trying altogether tonight. That being said, she needed something else to keep her mind from wandering if she wasn't going to sleep. Anybody still up would probably be overwhelmingly grumpy from all the noise that was being caused and wouldn't be up for conversation, so that was probably out. Most of the shops outside was probably closed as well with the exception of a few bars, but she was too young for that (could she even get drunk with this body? She wasn't sure). She could always go back to reading more about Lacrimas and other magic to try and decipher what exactly happened to her, but she had done that since they had returned from the hunting excursion and she was a little burnt out on it. So what could she do?

With a slight start, Maya realized that there was at least one person up who wasn't probably dead tired. Of course, that was the man whose screams were currently echoing through the entire guild hall. He probably wasn't much for conversation, but interacting with him would give her something to do at least. She swiftly got dressed in a casual outfit of a T-Shirt, jeans, and her trademark hoodie, made her way through the guild hall towards the room where he was being held, and gently pushed the door open, stepping into the room where the beast-man was held. "Hey there, guy," Maya said gently, walking over cautiously and taking a seat a safe distance away from the cage. "Hope you don't mind a bit of company for a while." She didn't really expect him to respond, but hey, it was worth a shot.

It was amidst the first month of autumn, a couple months after the war of Navrick. I stayed over at the guild hall, being too tired to fly back. Nearing the midnight hour, I was startled out of my trance-like slumber, by a humanly inhuman roar, screaming throughout the guild. I became so irritated by this noise, that I followed this noise down to a cellar-like room with a man...beast... ughh Person i guess, was trying to break out of a solid metal cage. His screams at this range were almost deafening, before realizing that Meletzo, someone I fought with on the battlefield, and not as an ally. I slowly approached the cage, quietly assuming a stance next to the cage. I motioned over to Meletzo, and said softly: "I'll handle this. Don't worry, it won't hurt him... If he doesn't resist." I trailed off into near silence, before throwing my mind out of my body, and pushing my consciousness into him. I could easily tell that this, I don't know a good word for him, but he doesn't know any form of communication out of the base animalistic instincts imbibed into his core. So, I worked around that, piquing emotions inside him, calm, friendliness, basic communal emotions that make it possible for him to be in a room with people. I had to do this slowly, however, since I didn't want to probe him into more negative emotions, and more violent reactions...