[Event Job - Eoduun & Desmond] Horrifying Field Research ◑

While Eoduun wanted to get stronger, he knew that it would be a good idea to keep up with his scholarly side aswell. The lacrima that Eero had obtained a while back was still pending for a research session, but Eoduun felt like he would require help of his other guildmates for that task. However, an another piece of information reached his ears. A newfound small deposit of sorts of some strange lacrima crystals, wedged inside the Mysterious Canyon. It sounded both very intriguing and even more dangerous. Just the way he liked it. Along with that information, however, was an another one. That the skies were gradually becoming pitch black, like the darkest night. Eoduun couldn't fathom as to what possible reason there could be behind such phenomenon, but that wouldn't stop him from going out. The boy threw on some black clothing onto his person, nodded at Soho and left. Right after grabbing his travel bag with some essential supplies.

The travel north, up to the Canyon felt excruciatingly long. His motion sickness didn't help one bit and once he got to his last stop, he had to take a rather long breather. Soho caught up to him and looked him over, worryingly. Soon enough he understood that it was just the motion sickness, however, and took off to scout ahead. After Eoduun breathed through the sickness without throwing up or having any other similar accidents, it was time for him to finally set off, for real this time. He didn't notice it beforehand, as his mind was completely elsewhere, but Eoduun saw these tiny specs in the air. It almost looked like ash, or something else powdery like that. It didn't affect him, so he only shrugged his shoulders at that. But the atmosphere that dominated the area, however, was something else. The sky was very much pitch black, giving the Canyon a mysterious and eerie look. He would shrug again. He had come so far already, he wasn't going to just pack himself and go back to the Guild. The sickness was still not completely gone, anyway, so it would be a really bad idea to go straight back. Noticing that his humon companion was now almost fully funcional, Soho flew back to Eoduun, urging him to follow him. The boy would nod and follow his feathery friend.

The side, through which Eoduun was entering the Canyon made him descend its side a little bit and following a narrow piece of rock along it. With his right hand on the rocky wall next to him, Eoduun pushed forward. Soho was patient with him, knowing that Eoduun couldn't fly like him and had to deal with the ground obstacles, unlike him. After a few shaky moments of life flashing before Eoduun's eyes, he finally made it to a more open area, that was slowly going downward in the distance. To his right, however, Eoduun could see a faint shimmer, despite the darkness that enveloped him. He was drawn to it, like a moth to light. Soho confirmed his action by flying over to the shimmering spot. When Eoduun reached it, he kneeled in front of it. The boy's eyes scanned the faint shimmer, secretly wishing that he could call upon Eero's soul, that was inside of the artifact hanging on Eoduun's choker. Still, he reckoned that he would need help with it, regardless. The boy pondered for a minute, after reaching a conclusion. He took out his notebook and tore out a page out of it as Soho landed on the ground next to him. Eoduun then took out a pencil and scribbled a fast message on it:

Desmond. I am writing this message to you, asking for a bit of a help. I am currently investigating strange lacrima in the Mysterious Canyon. It seems that more hands are needed. Follow Soho if you wish to join me.

- Eero

For a moment he hesitated with the signature, unsure whether he wanted to reveal Eero's secret quite yet. Why was he writing to Desmond of all people, though? Eoduun saw in Eero's memories that he wasn't too big of a fan of him, his humour, at least. Desmond resided in the Rose Garden, other than the Guild itself, which was rather close to the Canyon. Even so, he was taking a bit of a chance there. The boy would fold the paper and give it to his blue companion who took it with his talons. "To Desmond in Rose Garden. If he will want to join me, he will follow your lead. If not, just come back on your own." Eoduun would give Soho instruction, who after a brief shriek took off with the message for Eoduun's guildmate.

Soho had set off for Rose Garden and Eoduun was left alone. The darkness was thick and overwhelming. The boy hummed to himself as he walked closer to the faint shimmer. He crouched down, to get a better look at it. There was definitely a lacrima crystal inside the canyon wall, but how it got there in the first place, Eoduun didn't know. He thought that lacrima crystals would be found in like quarries, deep underground. It only showed that he wasn't too much of a scholar without his other part. He dusted off the area around the shimmer, trying to uncover it better, but to no avail. He was hoping that Desmond would come by and possibly have a few answers with him, aswell. It would make the trip that much more worth it. It quite heavily depended on Desmond's decision to swing by, however.

With a sigh and a shake of his head, the boy would stand back up and stretch his legs. Eoduun would walk out a few steps into the wider area, to make it easier for Soho to spot him, once he came back. The boy waited, patiently, until he heard a familiar pair of wings. And soon enough its source appeared aswell - his blue feathered companion, but he wasn't alone. Desmond did come by as per Eoduun's note that he sent by Soho. He felt sort of relieved. /"Now to not screw up."/ The boy thought to himself as his guildmate made his way over to him. Desmond questioned the need for more hands, upon his full arrival. Eoduun was taken by surprise for a moment, since Desmond called him Eero, but he quickly recovered. He couldn't forget that at this point, Leona was the only one who knew of his circumstance within the Guild. He would have to get used to being called Eero for just a little bit.

The boy would nod at his guildmate. "Thanks for coming." He would thank the other man, in his slightly deeper voice than Eero's. "But yes, it is presumably a lacrima. What is strange, is that it seems that it appeared after this darkness fell upon the land." Eoduun would explain the reason why he was out in the Mysterious Canyon in such a rather strange time and motion with his hand for Desmond to follow him. The boy would nod towards the faint shimmer encased within the wall. For some reason it suddenly had this eerie pale green light to it. Eoduun didn't like it one bit. "Here is the lacrima, presumably. It is honestly the only thing I can see somewhat properly in this damn dark." He would say with a little shake of his head. "I asked for more hands, since, as you can see, it is somehow wedged inside of this rocky wall. I figured that two heads and two pairs of hands would be better than one." The boy would finish his rather lengthy explanation of the current situation and why he wanted Desmond to join him. "What do you reckon?" The boy would his guildmate with genuine interest apparent in his voice.

Eoduun was glad to hear that Desmond was fine with the idea of helping with this strange occurence. Though he was sort of surprised that his guildmate caught his slight shift in his voice, that was one of the things that distinguished Eoduun from Eero. "Yeah, not harmful, alright..." He murmured to himself as he winced at Desmond's remarks. His guildmate then proceeded to scan the surrounding area, saying that the lacrima seemed to have been quite packed with power and that they had rather plentiful company aswell. While Eoduun was always up for a fight, he also realised how different and difficult thing would be in this darkness. Desmond went on to set up a few protective traps and Eoduun only nodded back. At least one of them was prone to thinking ahead, even if he was slightly tougher to understand with a voice changer on.

Desmond carved out the trapped lacrima and after he was done, his suit disappeared and he was visibly exhausted. /"Probably the traps took some toll on him."/ The boy would get closer to the free'd lacrima and attempt to take hold of it. Eoduun's guildmate noted that the lacrima could be a trap itself and he believed that he was absolutely right. But Desmond already exhausted himself trying to get it out, so the boy felt like a lot of work had been done to just simply turn away. "We've come so far. I don't see a reason to turn back. I'll cover you if anything happens." Eoduun would say and pry out the lacrima out of the wall. It took a bit of an effort and a few cuts on his hands because of the lacrima's sharp edges, but Eoduun got it out. It made a bit of a thud when it met with the rocky ground, but thankfully didn't shatter. The lacrima seemed to have been a bit sturdier than it looked. The crystal had an eerie, pale green glow to it, that almost made Eoduun feel sick just by looking at it.

"It definitely looks.. strange enough." Was the best statement that a rather bad scholar could come up with on a moment's notice. "Don't touch it, though. My blood will make you feel nauseous." The boy would extend a bit of advice to Desmond. He didn't think that his guildmate was aware of his magic, so he wanted to make sure he would not get affected by his mishaps. However, before Eoduun could inspect the lacrima closer, a bunch of shrieks would pierce the silence of the darkness. From within it, a couple of small, grotesque-looking pumpkin monsters that were floating appeared behind Desmond. Eoduun could feel something behind himself aswell, but he didn't know what it was. It was not too surprising, though. The trap was something that he honestly counted with at some point. The boy would assume a fighting stance, slightly regretting not bringing his staff with him. "Careful." Eoduun would say quietly, prepared to dash forward, regardless of what was behind his own back.

Eoduun dashed past his guildmate, straight into the fray. In his way were three wolves, which seemed to have been stunned, presumably thanks to Desmond's prior trap laying. The floating pumpking things were making their way towards the mages, but they were still a bit away. That created a great opportunity for Eoduun. The boy skid to a halt, promptly summoning his Deathgarden, launching an arrow of acid above and past the wolves, burying into one of the squashy things. The acid was working its way through it, creating a hole in its body that hissed under the acid's violent reaction. Eoduun didn't unsummon his Deathgarden and launched an another arrow at a second squashy, disintegrating a part of it just like on the first one. The boy noticed that the wolves in front of him were starting to get their bearings together, so he knew that he would have to work fast, if he didn't want a bunch of fangs sunk into his flesh.

The squashies that were hit by Deathgarden were slightly lagging behind the uninjured ones. The rest of them were just behind the wolves, that were just shaking themselves from the very shocking experience they just had. The wolves let out a small howl in unison, as if they were glad to be free from their affliction. "Howl all you want." Eoduun would growl at them and gathered a special kind of poison in his body. He then released it in a tainted roar. The wolves and squashies were covered in lingering poison, damaged, but the fight was still far from over. The squashies that Eoduun had damaged with Deathgarden were barely hanging on, from what Eoduun could see, but he the rapidly approaching wolves gave him the need to move. The three wolves jumped one by one, intent on making the fight quite physical. Eoduun's first instict told him to dash to his right side and his body made the thought happen. He managed to dodge two sets of jaws, but the last wolf scratched him on his shoulder, resulting in rather sizeable gashes. The boy dashed even further from the group, taking a brief look at his shoulder. It was bleeding and his jacket was in shambles. "You'll pay for the jacket." The boy would growl again. That jacket was one of his favourites and such and offense wouldn't go unpunished.

The wolves and two squashies were closing in on Eoduun. He knew that he couldn't back away again, as he was getting dangerously close to the edge of the part of the Canyon they were fighting on. The boy let them get closer, as he covered his hand in corrosive acid. The idea was to toss out a few punches around and then Miasma them into oblivion. But would it pan out that way? Probably not. The wolves were ready to pounce on Eoduun again and this time he retaliated properly, by punching the closest wolf to him. The acid that covered his hand hissed at the contact and the wolf took a few jumped backwards in surprise. The other two wolves pounced onto Eoduun, scratching and biting. It hurt quite a bit, but he was still more than able to fight back. He punched the wolves off of him, only to have the squashies getting close to him, reaching his legs. "Ah, so you want some of this, aswell?" The boy would ask rhetorically as he punched the two uninjured ones. They wobbled in response, but they seemed adamant about munching on Eoduun's legs. His shoulder was still bleeding and he wasn't even really counting the scratches he received after that.

The acid on his hand dissolved, leaving Eoduun free to work his magic. The magic of death. The only problem was Desmond. Eoduun's acid and poison didn't discriminate and would affect his allies in their full force. That meant that he would have to get sufficiently away from his guildmate, to ensure that he doesn't burn him with his acid. Thankfully, he could kill two birds with one stone. The nightly monsters were about to attack him again and Eoduun knew that he couldn't take those hits forever. With that in mind, the boy dashed to his side, along the edge of the area they were fighting in. One wrong move and he would fall down to his death a possibly leave Desmond to get torn apart by the grotesque pumpkins and the wolves. Eoduun would make sure that it would not come to that. Using his Regenerative Molt, the boy dashed forward, leaving behind an aciding molt. The monsters that were pursuing him took the temporary bait, the wolves sinking their teeth into the acid. After the dash the boy could feel his scratches slightly mending, along with the larger gashes in his shoulder. They were still bleeding, but not as much as they were before.

With the monsters slowed down by his decoy, Eoduun was free to use Miasma. And he did just that. It was high time he ended the fight. The boy built up acid in his body and let it out in the immediate area around him. Soon after he could hear howls and weird squelching noises and the hissing of acid. The boy started walking back, his chest heaving from the adrenaline. He stopped, once he reached the disintegrating monsters. "So much for your ambush." He would say, as he watched the monsters turn into a gross goop of acid and whatever they were made of. The boy sighed and walked back to where he and Desmond interacted with the lacrima. Upon getting back, he noticed three wolf corpses with numerous slashes across them. The boy assumed that it was Desmond's handiwork, but he couldn't see the man in question. /"Oh. Right."/ He kind of forgot about Desmond's previous antics, so he was probably just hiding, somewhere. Hopefully. Eoduun wasn't in the mood for shenanigans or had too much strength left to fight if the issue was real. "The monsters on my side have been dealt with. I hope you're done with yours, aswell." The boy would say, to no one in particular, hoping that Desmond could hear him. As he said that, he took a quick glance at the lacrima that he pulled out earlier. The eerie glow that it had before was nearly gone. Were the monsters tied to it, somehow?

Desmond stayed hidden as he said that he detected one more presence. A presence that had shown itself after they defeated the previous monsters. Eoduun didn't like the sound of that. He wasn't sure how much fight exactly he had left in him. Sadly, he had no time to ponder on those finer questions of life, as suddenly a towering mass of vines slithered out from the ground, taking in the corpses of the sliced wolves, aiming ever upwards. Along its viny body were ten pumpkins heads in total, with the tenth one being on the top of the mass. The thing let out a loud screech that made Eoduun cover his ears in a feeble attempt to dampen the horrific sound. The boy would let out a sigh, just before a few vines swiped at him, giving him little to no time to react. He dashed to his right, hoping that he wouldn't bump into invisible Desmond by mistake, though he still got hit on his already injured shoulder. That hit recreated the full injury he had before, making Eoduun wince, as a puff of poison appeared nearby, withering away some of the vines. It most likely Desmond's doing and it made Eoduun want to take a good old whiff of the poison to recharge himself, but decided that it would be probably better if he left it alone to let it do its thing.

A pumpkin started to get slashed as Eoduun was forced to dance and slide around the vines that were trying to grab him. The monstrosity briefly winded up and Eoduun took a chance to fire an acid arrow from his Deathgarden on the run, hoping to hit the vine, as it seemed that it could be aiming for a specific spot. He hit it, but it was far from stopping it and a loud thud and then a crack could be heard. Sounded like Desmond. The mage hoped that his suit kept him safe, as he fired an another arrow from Deathgarden, this time aimed at one of the pumpkin heads. Upon contact with plant material the acid hissed and left acid marks after where it ate away at the head. Soon after, an another pumpkin got slashed, showing Eoduun that Dosmond was alive and well. Well was probably not the right term when facing this towering monstrosity, but it would have to do.

Eoduun used one of his truly non-offensive techniques to create hardened acidic scales on his body, to make sure that if he got by a vine again, it wouldn't hurt as bad or reopen any other wounds. An another get got slashed, but this time it got tossed to the side. Eoduun assumed that Desmond wished to keep a souvenir out of this endeavour. It didn't sound like a bad idea, but the boy's magic thought otherwise, as Eoduun slammed his fist into the ground, making a spear of accid appear out of the ground, impaling the damaged head, obliterating it. It felt good, but the spell did take a bit of magic power out of him. With an another dash out of the vines' grasp he concluded that he would probably stick to Deathgarden and spice things up with his acidic whip. The pumpkin heads were getting slashed away and the boy knew that he was lagging behind with his kill count. Within next few shaky shots from Deathgarden next two heads fell. Eoduun was getting pretty tired from dodging the vines, though. They would have to get rid of this thing and do it fast. After five punpkin heads were slashed away and only two remained, Eoduun figured that it was up to him to finish things up. He fired a few shots from the Deathgarden and the vines just swiped around them in rage, letting Eoduun build up the acid and poison and release it in a loud roar, that took down last two heads in one fell swoop, not leaving the monster any space to retaliate. With an another screech it started to dissipate.

Eoduun felt.. spent. And exhausted. Very much exhausted. The boy looked over the mess that was left behind - withered, burnt and slashed into oblivion pumpkin heads. Soon enough Desmond revealed himself, back in his regular outfit, this time. And just as he said, the light within the crystal that Eoduun pulled out was now completely gone. The boy was kind of sad that there was nothing more to the tale, other than some monsters trying to ambush the two mages. He felt kind of bad for calling out Desmond this far out for something like this. In the end, Desmond departed for his home, saying something about kids going from door to door. Eoduun was not entirely sure what that meant, but the boy waved the man a goodbye. After Desmond left, Soho flew back down. The boy pat his feathery friend, before he took a good stomp on the empty lacrima, smashing it into pieces.