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| Unforeseen Consequences; [P] Nomad | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Wed Jul 25, 2012 6:35 pm (921 Views) | |
| Emilie Joubert | Fri Aug 24, 2012 4:33 pm Post #16 |
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She explained that her concerns came from the ease at which people died. Nomad stared, listening with total fascination at what she observed about life and death. Vivianne ended her explanation by promising that she'll be fine, which was good since the elemental wasn't sure if stomach-calming herbs grew around here after all. She paused before responding. "Humans are not inherently special. They live and screw and die like animals. You make yourself special and meaningful by what you do, how long you keep yourself alive, and what you leave behind when you die." Feeling that answer was sufficient, Nomad walked past the Forest Guardian, deeper into the forest yet at an angle away from where the bodies were being carried. The elemental looked up at the sky. The dimming sunlight was orange between the leaves. "Are you diurnal?" she asked, a sideways way of asking whether they needed to find shelter for the night. |
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| Vivianne | Sat Aug 25, 2012 2:57 pm Post #17 |
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Vivianne shrugged awkwardly when the sniper gently chastised her for her doubts. She knew better than most people that humans weren't as special as they thought. Animals were just as intelligent as most sentient creatures; they simply lacked the aspects of civilization that most people considered pivotal to human's superiority. Why, then, would the death of a human be something special or unique? She supposed that, in the end, Nomad was correct. It was far more important to accomplish as much as possible in your life so that when you died, you would be remembered. She was trying to forge such a legacy here in the forest, creating an environment where no one would dare to harm a creature unnecessarily. If she was lucky, the legend of the 'Witch of Norwood' would remain even after she was dead. When asked if she needed sleep, the skinsharer shook her head. "I c-can see at night. I w-won't need to sleep for a while yet." After the adrenaline rush following her escape from Norwood Village, she wasn't sure if she would be able to drift into slumber. She would be far too paranoid to rest for at least a few more hours. "There... w-will just be more p-people hunting me, won't there? Until I'm d-dead." She balled her fingers into tight fists, her eyes narrowing. "T-they'll find me eventually. Is... is t-there a way to stop them?" She paused for a few seconds, swallowing with a trace of nervousness. "P-permanently?" |
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| Emilie Joubert | Sat Aug 25, 2012 6:19 pm Post #18 |
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Nomad, satisfied with Vivianne's answer, kept leading their way away from the road and the site of the murder. They'd do well staying away from the Green Road for a while, even if search parties were fairly unlikely to stray far from it in their search for the witch of Norwood. This brought the agent's train of thought momentarily to a few special cases that they'd need to be wary of. Elven trackers and rangers wouldn't be as limited by the roadways, and they'd be better at traversing the dense forest anyway. Thankfully they'd be looking for Nomad, not the Forest Guardian, and Nomad made no tracks nor left any scent of her passing. Vivianne chimed in with a question about how to end a perceived 'cycle of revenge,' of sorts, and end it permanently. "Simple: you make it not worth it. Scare them into never bothering you." Nomad abruptly stopped and turned to look back at Vivianne. "Along with ambush and hunting tactics, would you like me to teach you attrition? Guerrilla warfare will help your problems. Then again, you might already know it." She shrugged and kept walking before listening to the girl's response, taking a high step over a gnarled tree root covered in bright green moss. Nomad swooped her hand down and plucked a little purple flower from the ground, tucking it into her hair and behind her triangle-shaped ear. Her mind briefly went to missing Lumi, who loved wildflowers, but soon enough it refocused on the path ahead of them and the forest around them. |
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| Vivianne | Tue Aug 28, 2012 2:21 am Post #19 |
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Vivianne frowned slightly. The sniper's answer wasn't what she had expected. From her past experiences with Nomad, she knew that the woman usually preferred a direct approach that usually ended with an arrow spearing a victim through the art. She had some experience with scaring the residents of the forest into leaving her alone, but she suspected that her mentor was referring to a much different approach. She wasn't completely sure about the meaning of the word 'attrition,' and when the sniper continued and mentioned something about gorillas she got really confused. "Er... gorilla warfare? I... um..." She looked around the woodlands, as if she thought the shadowy warrior had somehow managed to hide several of the hulking primates in the forest. She should have been able to see or smell any unnatural creatures in the surroundings. "I'm s-s-sorry... I don't k-know how that will h-help." She frowned, looking at Nomad curiously. From what she understood about gorillas, they were relatively peaceful creatures that preferred a life of seclusion in the deep jungles of a foreign land. "What... w-what is gorilla w-warfare? And a-attrition?" She continued to follow after the sniper. Although she did not seem to pay any attention to the underbrush as she moved, it only took an iota of effort for her to control the sound of her footsteps and keep them as silent as a whisper. |
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| Emilie Joubert | Tue Sep 4, 2012 12:09 am Post #20 |
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"Not gorilla. Guerrilla. Spelled differently. A Balefiric word," Nomad quickly explained, noticing her ally pronouncing the word a little more like the animal -- and probably having more experience with the animal itself, knowing the often exotic nature of her pack. "You have a lot to learn. I'll teach you." The elemental beckoned Vivianne to walk alongside her so they could speak and walk relatively comfortably through the forest. However, despite the definitive sound of her words, Nomad didn't speak again for several minutes as she collected herself and the two of them continued their trek. They crossed rolling hills, stands of scrub, and reached a section of the forest that was one of the oldest and healthiest natural places in Imythess. The trees were even more humongous here, going hundreds of feet in the air and filling out the canopy so thickly that the ground was sparse of plants save for mosses clinging to tangles of roots. It was a bit dark by then, which Nomad only noticed in a detached way. Night or day, she could see perfectly fine. Staring up in the trees with an expression that looked vaguely like wonder, Nomad picked off where she had left off in her speech as though no time had passed at all. "Warfare. Most people see it as two armies." The shadows between Nomad and Vivianne peeled from the ground, thickening to the consistency of mist. As if timed with the elemental's words, these shadows twisted into the shape of an animated scene: two armies of silhouette warriors charging each other, weapons clashing, a brutal soundless scene. "But not all sides are equal. One side can be small and weak, facing a side that is large and strong. To win, the small side uses guerrilla warfare." Nomad turned around to face Vivianne, but she was barely visible through the thick shadows. One side of the two clashing shadow-armies disappeared, and the remaining silhouette-soldiers continued "marching" as though nothing had happened. Then a shadow-arrow pierced one through the mouth. And another went down. One took a step toward Vivianne and its leg slid into a fake punji pit lined with shadow-spikes. A silhouette crept up behind one of the shadow-soldiers and slit their throat. Little by little, the fake army fell to chaos: men running away into the darkness, triggering traps, getting picked off by arrows. The scene unfolded in a semicircle around Vivianne, almost completely filling her line of vision. "When you are the small side, you have mobility. You can run and hide. And tire your enemies while they search. You can get your supplies from the land and sabotage theirs. Putting on constant pressure. You can do this for a very long time. This is called attrition," Nomad added. A section of shadows parted around her as she stepped through, hands folded behind her back. "You can use these skills to great effect on the number of enemies that trouble you." |
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| Vivianne | Tue Sep 11, 2012 8:01 pm Post #21 |
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Vivi flushed slightly when her vocabulary's shortcomings were pointed out, but Nomad did not seem to hold the lack of knowledge against her, simply explaining her mistake and moving on. They traveled at a comfortable pace through the woods, and the skinsharer was surprised with how effortlessly the sniper navigated the forest. She was used to traversing through the underbrush and was incredibly familiar with the area, but Nomad's path through the area was just as instinctive and assured. She must live in Norwood too... but how have I only run into her once in all these years? She mulled over that puzzle as they left the frequently-traveled section of the forest, delving deeper into the heart of the woods. The trees grew taller and wider as they continued, massive plants that had never been touched by a woodsman's axe. The lowest branches were too far off of the ground to reach, and their upper boughs were so thick and covered in leaves that they completely blocked the view of the sky. The undergrowth had dwindled due to the lack of sunlight, which made it much easier to traverse. No roads or paths crossed through this area. The forest here was primal and untamed, unchanged for centuries. Nomad didn't continue talking until they were well within the monolithic trees and the hidden sun was starting to dip towards the horizon. She spoke of war, and how a smaller force must behave if they wished to be victorious. Vivi gasped when the shadows in front of her writhed and contorted, forming unnatural shapes that had nothing to do with the impending dusk. Her eyes widened as the darkness began to form recognizable shapes, two miniature armies engaged in fierce combat. As the sniper continued to speak, one side in the battle started to lose soldiers rapidly in various ways that seemed incongruous with the open combat. Some died from unseen archers, others fell into deadly traps, and more were eliminated by stealthy assassins. Everywhere she looked shadowy enemies were taken out by stealth and deception, dying in droves. Eventually the archer emerged from the grisly demonstration, the shadows breaking apart so that Vivianne could see her. The girl frowned slightly, nodding at one nearby scene. "But t-this way of f-fighting couldn't possible kill them a-all, could it? Or is t-the goal different?" She watched as one dark figure had its foot caught in a wire snare and got drawn into the air, helpless to stop a foe from sending an arrow through its throat. It might be brutal and bloody, but this style of warfare seemed lethally efficient... and perfectly suited for her. |
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| Emilie Joubert | Sat Sep 22, 2012 10:40 pm Post #22 |
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Almost as if responding to her question, the silhouettes of dying warriors thinned out. The ones that remained seemed to stagger through the forest, visibly ragged. Shadowy blood dripped from their bodies. A few collapsed and 'died' in the meantime. "You want them to leave you alone. You control their environment. You c-control where they are, if they live or die, how they die." The final collapsing body of a shadow dissipated, punctuating the elemental's sentence. Nomad remained unmoving. "If enemies try to attack you, and every single time you take control of their whole lives away from them, you will be so feared that no one will come for you anymore." Even if they did, the implication was that Vivianne would be able to summarily destroy them without incurring a scratch or maybe even being detected. Unlike the armies depicted in Nomad's shadow scene, the Forest Guardian's enemies would operate in much smaller yet no less organized parties. She still had the advantage regardless. Nomad led Vivianne even deeper into the forest. Something got the elemental talking at length on the subject of traps. They weren't something the agent used very frequently, so her knowledge was mostly applied to identifying or disarming them in her day-to-day work life. She still knew enough about the basic ones to teach Vivianne how to make and arm them, and where to strategically place them. For example, Nomad talked a bit about punji pits. How deep to dig them, making sure to put the stakes facing downward so the caught leg would embed in a barbed pattern around the limb and do more damage. Placing them where enemies were likely to dive for cover; meant to maim and slow down, not kill. Of course, traps were only the beginning. There were also aspects of misdirection, battlefield control, and other tactics that Nomad spoke with Vivianne about, often quizzing the girl on what she would do if placed in certain dangerous situations. "It is the middle of winter. You are surrounded by a dozen approaching soldiers who are at medium range and closing. The area is like where we are now. What do you do?" Edited by Emilie Joubert, Sat Sep 22, 2012 10:41 pm.
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| Vivianne | Mon Sep 24, 2012 7:51 pm Post #23 |
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Nomad revealed that killing your enemies wasn't necessarily the most important part of combat. It was instilling a fear in them so deep that they believed you could kill them, no matter what. That sort of predeterministic attitude is what would defeat them in the end. They would be so convinced of her impervious nature and lethality that they wouldn't even attempt to engage her, and even if they brought enough comrades to actually defeat her the cost would be heavy. It was very similar to the defense mechanism of some animals, although much more complex. Beasts such as toads and porcupines were easy to kill, but any predator that took their life would likely die itself. She would have to learn how to teach the bandits and poachers and sheriffs in Norwood to treat her with that same magnitude of respect to keep them from interfering in her life. The sniper continued her lesson in guerilla warfare, teaching Vivianne about not only tactics, but methods of designing and setting traps. This was an area in which the skinsharer already had some knowledge. Hunters used a variety of pits, tripwires, snares, and foothold traps in order to catch prey. She already knew how to defuse some of these devices, but for the first time she thought about them in the opposite way: how to place them in a region so it would give her the largest advantage and how to lure oblivious enemies into their grasp. Vivi had never seen a punji pit before, but Nomad described the lethal contraption to her and how to design it so that someone who was caught would be unable to move but would rarely die from their injuries. When she was asked about how to respond to a hypothetical scenario, Vivi bit her lower lip and looked around. There was still no underbrush to hide in, nor could she climb up the smooth trunks of the monolithic trees that stretched above them. "Er... s-snow means I'll leave tracks. L-leave them a trail to f-follow in... t-that direction." She pointed randomly, knowing that it wasn't actually very important to her strategy. "If I h-have time, leave t-traps hidden under u-unbroken snow to whittle down t-their numbers... Footholds and s-snares. No d-direct engagement." She walked on the course she had indicated, eying the ground. "No t-time for a pit... So just b-bury more t-traps in this area surrounding m-me... Then change s-shape and fly away. Leave them f-following trail that ends in the middle o-of a clearing. They'll be s-scared and confused and not thinking s-straight..." She glanced at Nomad to see if the woman approved of her plan. It was heavily dependent on having traps available to her, but even without them she could make it seem as if she had simply disappeared and lead the soldiers on a wild goose chase to an area where she had more of an advantage. |
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| Emilie Joubert | Tue Oct 2, 2012 5:25 pm Post #24 |
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Nomad considered Vivianne's response. "Good." The girl was thinking like a guerrilla now. She would live for a while yet, and her enemy's fear would spread quickly. The elemental continued to teach everything she knew about whatever came to mind. She lost track of the time, only remembering that they should make camp and sleep about an hour later. It was the middle of the night, and they found a nice overhang of crossed fallen logs which they used as the base for a simple lean-to shelter. Nomad wandered off to search for dead leaves and other bedding material, which brought her a considerable distance away from their campsite and Vivianne herself. They knew it was an excellent opening they couldn't pass up. A dispatch from Norwood Village consisting of a two-man team of elven covert operatives had been stalking the druid and sniper for a small portion of the night, apparently right under Nomad's nose. Based on their silent communications they had originally planned to strike when both were asleep; however, they agreed that attacking the vigilante Witch of Norwood while she was unguarded was more important than attacking while she was asleep. The pointman, formerly in the shape of an opossum, climbed to his vantage point and transformed back into a heavily camouflaged wood elf. He gave the signal to his partner, who was similarly hidden at a different angle up in the trees. When Nomad was far enough away, the first sniper released his shot, aiming straight for the kill. Trained professionals, they were experts of stealth and properly magicked so that their natural scent blended perfectly with their surroundings in a similar way that Nomad's did. |
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| Vivianne | Thu Oct 4, 2012 5:39 pm Post #25 |
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It wasn't long before Nomad declared that they should set up camp for the night. The two woman scouted their surroundings and quickly found a perfect place to settle in: some tree trunks had fallen so they were propped up against a still-standing one, making a natural overhang that would protect them from the elements. They quickly set about plugging up any holes in the ceiling to make a passable lean-to that would probably keep them dry even if it started pouring. Nomad soon wandered away to search for dead leaves or moss that could serve as bedding while Vivi started to make a tipi out of dead branches so they could start a fire. This region of the forest was virtually deserted, and the fallen logs would hide most of the light from the flames. She quickly sent out most of her predatory animals to hunt for food, which left her alone at the campsite with Hephaestus. The dreadsnout settled down outside of the lean-to, closing his eyes and starting to pant heavily as if he had just run for miles. Vivi's mouth quirked up at the corners in a slight smile. Although she might be able to function in the dark, she would have to remember that not all of her companions could do the same. The boar was obviously exhausted from wandering around the woods for half the night. "Oh, you stop it. You're just being lazy." If she hadn't bent down to pat the boar on the top of his head she probably would have died in the next moment Instead of taking her in the heart the arrow zipped over her left shoulder, slicing through her clothes and leaving an angry red cut across her skin. Vivi let out a soft shriek and dropped to the ground, rolling away from Heffy. She hadn't detected any unnatural scents in the area, which meant that whoever had launched the arrow could hide traces of their presence. For a moment she thought that Nomad might be testing her, but when another missile thudded into the loam less than an inch from her throat she guessed that the sniper wasn't responsible. These attacks didn't feel like they had been aimed to scare her; only luck had kept them from killing her already. Her body contracted so quickly that there was a soft rushing noise as air filled the space she had inhabited an instant before. A small bat flew out of the overhang, leathering wings pumping to launch her up into the canopy. She hadn't seen anyone as a human, which meant that these enemies were experts at hiding themselves from sight as well. She had chosen the form of a bat not only because it would be difficult to strike the small, furry body with a projectile, but it also had extra senses that could assist her greatly. She release an echolocation call that sounded like a slight chirp to any observers, but provided the skinsharer with a wealth of sensory information. The sound waves that returned to her overlarge ears painted a picture of the surroundings, revealing every tree and leaf in astounding detail... and nothing she could perceive as humanoid. Who are these people? |
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