ORIGIN

The rumbling of the cave aroused some interest within the creature who lurked in the fringes; he felt the tremble as it began and then thought he heard a voice within the cacophony of the stone; but he could not be sure. It was far from him regardless - and likely a figment of his lonely mind, but Teyouma had seen many things during his cycles, some which defied logical thought and much which was now forgotten. His instinct was to retreat, of course.

Teyouma chose a direction at random and scrambled his way towards safety, so far as he was aware; having been drawn towards the dark spire which had so fascinated him the first time he'd spotted it; he did not get much closer in the time between the rumblings and the seeping of the oil, but he saw the iridescent sheen of something moving, and his pace increased. Taloned fingers scratched the dirt - his toes caught rock, his wings once tucked, now spread with an eager reach.

He would be witness to the stone coming alive, he thought. A serpentine form manifesting where the oil coalesced, creating a snout, and eyes, and -- it moved rapidly towards a cluster of beings, as if to devour them. It was in this moment Teyouma noticed the many others who had gathered. Were they here for the serpent? They had to be; it had awakened hungry, and they offered themselves! It was a noble cause, he thought.

There was chaos amassing among the creatures. Teyouma winced when he thought he saw a flash of light and even ducked, jerking down low against the dirt, as if he might be fast enough to avoid a shock of light to his system; thankfully the entity that channeled such energy had failed, and it was only the brief flourish of their magic that he saw. All the same, Teyouma's eyes were upon the beings now, not the serpent.

One by one, the individuals struck at the serpent. There were teeth ripping, the shimmer of magic, and further chaos that Teyouma could not entirely translate from where he watched. He did not understand! They were here but they refused to feed this glorious creature. What purpose did fighting serve? They angered it! They hurt it! The poor thing.

Scrambling closer now, watching as bodies flew purposefully towards the serpent to strike at it, to burn, to bite. Teyouma did not know what to do, but he could not sit and watch like he usually did - and so he channeled his own energies, focused the feelings in his heart that had been aroused by all that he had seen, and unleashed a wave of ill-feeling in an effort to turn these creatures back.

As it had been many cycles since Teyouma had tapped in to his gem as a source of power, this did not go as well as he had hoped. The energy coursed through his body and he felt immediately destabilized by it, and as he lost his focus the power waned and then outright died. He'd done little more than stare imploringly at the fighting gembound creatures - a failure. His silence was broken by a sudden dry gagging, as the spell's failure had resulted in his own gut bacteria growing and changing, rather than the intended targets further afield, and he was left to cough and sputter uselessly.