for sadistic violence towards cave rat

The grotesque dog eyed him with a mixture of distrust and caution. The peryton’s smile faded, lips twisted into a smirk. Distinct displeasure creeped down his spine and he glared at the thing even as she gave some directions. The peryton beat his wings and eyed her for a while more, then with an abrupt swoop flew away from the dog and headed towards the Western wall, the black and tan gembound promptly forgotten by him. Slowly, he caught onto a drift and then soared past the wall, head craning down to spy for a cave rat though he did not yet know what that was. Elk body cast an eerie shadow with talon for legs as the preyton remained mindful about potential prey down below.

He heard a distinct chatter and a shuffle of paws then. Rafael snorted and looked down. A rat was huddling by the corner of the wall, and it now started to dart forward ahead of his shadow. The peryton let out a shrill screech and began to pursue it. Wings supported his slender body as he veered towards the scampering target. With yet another screech, he threw his body weight back and lunged forward talon first and grabbed hold of the succulent body. Sharp claws dug into the squealing creature’s back as he hoisted it into the air with his right claw. Then, he hovered backwards and without warning, hurled the squealing, scratching rat against the wall.

Thud. The rat slammed into the wall, then slid down, injured. But Rafael wasn’t done yet. With another screech, he swooped up to a great height, then plunged down with wings thrown back to streamline his frame and kept one hoof forward, then brought it straight into the prey’s belly like a stabbing dagger. Hoof contacted flesh in a sickening crunch and the peryton snorted in delight as the scent of blood filled the air.Once was not enough – following his stabbing action, the peryton landed onto the ground and scooped the rat up within his horns, then flung it at the wall again. Then, before it could slide down, he darted forward and grabbed the wretched creature by the nape. It was either dead or just about to die – a straggly, wretched, creature hanging from his mouth. The peryton nickered with his mouth full of that thing, and then promptly trotted back towards the pile of bones and started to feast upon the flesh.

Giggle lay back down quietly, head on paws, utterly ignoring the strange stag-beast. It was broken, a malformation, a quirk, and she was simply hoping that soon it would be on its way.

It returned instead of leaving, though, and now it was crunching on a rat. Oh, well, at least it was eating.

Hopefully it will get bored, and leave.

The thought was sour, and her dark eyes followed the thing as it tore into the rat, but she didn't lift her head from her paws--or her paws from her boulder. She was staying right here, and she was hoping he went away, and that's all there was to it.

________________

Roll the bones.

The beast crunched into the rat, licking the meat and sinews off the bones. Blood ran down his chin and throat to his absolute delight. The cavern was a nice place too – dank, dark, shadowy, and if it held more of such easy prey, Rafael believed that this was to be his. The hyena was in the background watching him but he did not care. He was normal, and his mannerisms were perfectly normal and well-intentioned to him. Done then, the peryton groaned and pushed himself to his feet. Front elk feet hobbled a bit as he steadied himself while his hind talons supported his slender frame very well. He then used his hooves and kicked his set of bones into the pile that was at the pit – licked clean and sucked dry, they fit perfectly well into the pile apart from the fact that his saliva dipped in crimson blood stained the entrance of the bone marrows. Belly full, the peryton’s tummy had stopped rumbling and he felt the power of the lesser gembound seep into his bones, gush through his blood as his body digested the meal. Rafael then placed his hooves onto the pile of bones and hopped onto it, circled once or twice, and sat down upon it, hawk feet bent at an unnatural angle. The peryton scanned the world from the bone pile and saw that all was good.

Giggle spoke out with an almost bored tone, irritated by this stranger and, by now, resigned to the idea that she would likely have to fight what was, in essence, a child. A deranged, deformed child, but a child nonetheless.

"This pile, and this den, are mine," she explained from her position atop the boulder. "I gathered those bones and I take care of them, for my fortunes, so please get off of them." She kept a relatively civil tone, all things considered, still lying there with front paws crossed over the lip of the boulder, eyeing down at Rafael.

Think he'll listen? she wondered to herself idly. Think he's got a developed enough sense of social interaction to even understand the idea of territory? Of possession? She wasn't sure. Wasn't sure if he was a child, in his mind, or just a broken toy that would never be whole.

________________

Roll the bones.

The pile was spiny and bony against his rump. Rafael liked the creaking feel that they gave him. When he toed a bone occasionally and they clattered to the ground with that satisfying rattle, something right clicked inside of him. That was what he was meant to do – grace the world with more bones. Grotesque dog spoke. The peryton smirked and swivelled his head to face her, grey eyes latching onto her dark ones with an unnerving gaze. The corners of his lips twisted up into a smile, laughter tracing faint lines upon the creaks of his brows and cheeks. “Mine,” it had said to lay claim to what this den was. The beast got down and chewed at one of the bones like he was grazing lazily, then tilted his head back to assess the hyena. “Please get off them.” Immediately, the peryton spit out the bone from his mouth, causing it to clatter back towards the pile that was and drew himself upwards with a screech, grey eyes glimmering with an unreadable, hard expression. The peryton drew out his wings and brought himself to her height, then flapped himself backwards and attempted to concentrate dispel towards the general area that Giggle was at, to fling away not just the hyena but the fungi that surrounded her as well. By curving backwards and gusting his wings forward, the peryton would absorb the impact of his power if any.

Round: 1/5

Attempt: Dispel everything on the ledge Giggle is on (hyena, fungi?)

Defense: Curved around the shoulder with wings flapping to absorb any impact that may hurl him backwards

Injuries: None

She hated fighting, she really did, and she was pondering ways to avoid it--to avoid a repeat of Kerberos--when the thing lifted up and hovered before her. She was standing when the magic blasted her back, and some of the fungus she'd grown along the ledge, too. Damn--that was now entirely useless, and not only would she have to regrow it from scratch later, but for now, she was defenseless.

At least, in terms of fungus.

She did not speak and she gave utterly no sign that she was going to attack--no hackles raised, no bared teeth, no growl. She wasn't out to threaten, she was out to take this creature down, to show him whose pile this was and why, exactly, it had been a terrible idea to attack her in her own home.

She staggered up from the attack and simply charged, launching herself straight out into the air, hoping to slam into the stranger and take him down--his back downward, with her weight on top--right into the bone pile, snapping at his face and neck as she did so.

The problem was--he wasn't there. She missed--or maybe he'd moved--and she sailed gracefully past facefirst into her own bone pile.

There was a crunch of bones--hers, or --well, hers? She couldn't tell. She was dazed, though, and grunted as she struggled to stand again.

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Roll the bones.

Round: 1/5
Attempt: Leaping straight for the Peryton to try and take him down.
Defense: Coating of various fungus just in case.
Injuries: None.

The hyena took the blast silently to which the peryton was unusually alert. He liked – no, loved it when his prey thrashed about so why wasn’t she thrashing and squirming and crying out with brokenness? Maybe he had not spoiled this gembound bad enough. Sharp grey eyes latched onto the grotesque hyena – yes, that was what she was…though dog she was to him nonetheless, and then without warning she lunged forward, snapping towards him. However, Rafael’s defences were already up, swings scooped in a balloon-like fashion on either side of him and he continued to veer backwards, talons lashing out to further propel him away from her vicious grip. Alas he dodged fast enough and she fell from the height magnificently, head-first into the pile of bones. Rafael was positively tickled – he screeched in giddy delight and then remained hovering where he was and with the sheer joy he took in shattering the flesh of those he dug his talons into, cast forth dispel, intending to wreck the hyena’s body against her very own pile of bones.

Post-roll edit:
Alas, no energy came forth and so he remained in the air, wings beating carefully, ready to dodge incoming attacks.

Round: 2/5

Attempt: Dispel energy blast aimed at Giggle, intention to cause her to crush herself against her own bones

Defense: Airborne, ready to dodge

Injuries: None

Ugh... everything hurt. Her face was battered, her wrist was twisted, and both her head and her mind had some sort of weird haze. Was it the strange creature's magic, or had it been from the few meters' fall? As she staggered up, adrenaline fuelling her, she could feel that there were cuts and gashes over various parts of her body. None were too deep--she hoped--but it all hurt.

She heard the beating of wings through the bleary daze of her mind and lifted her head, growling very, very quietly deep in her throat.

Theeere he is.

But... how could she reach him? She glanced around her bone pile for a weapon, and instead her mind registered patterns, impossibly intricate for so brief a time, hissing into her mind of lessons that should not be repeated.

Kerberos.

She looked up, and drew on the fungus she'd gathered on her coat and on the area all around, focusing on her magic, on her fungus. On what she knew. He'd been lying in her bone pile, which she'd sewn with hallucinogenic fungus before. All she had to do was find it, and grow it...

But she couldn't, not from here, and not in this daze. She growled again, frustrated, pacing and waiting for the coward to actually come down and fight.

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Roll the bones.

Round: 2/5
Attempt: Trying to grow hallucinogenic spores from her bone pile onto Rafael (from when he was lying in them earlier).
Defense: Various fungi growing in coat just in case.
Injuries: Dazed, slightly concussed, twisted left wrist, bruised face, cuts

She got up slowly, somewhat disoriented and attention now upon him. The peryton screeched and smirked, feral sounds echoing through the tunnel walls. "You don’t lead, you serve," its voice boomed through the walls surrounding the fortress, hawklike vocalizations mixed with the melodious bleat of an innocent fawn. The peryton continued to flap and then attempted to repeat the similar manoeuvre – to oppress the other and crush her back into her rightful place. He nickered a soft lullaby, hushed syllables falling from between his lips and then he attempted the same manoeuvre, though this time he kept his wingspan closer towards his body and hunched up his shoulders in greater preparation to take any impact if it so came to that.

Round: 3/5

Attempt: Dispel energy blast aimed at Giggle, intention to cause her to crush herself against her own bones

Defense: Airborne, ready to dodge

Injuries: None

Giggle found herself tumbling back into her own bones with another strange shockwave of magical pressure, as if the air itself had concussed around her. She staggered and fell and rolled, and then stood, shaking her head and growling once more. The bones were scattered, now, tossed haphazardly back and around her, some fully clear of the bone pile and rolling away over the rock beyond.

This time she kept moving backwards, now ducking back behind the boulder so the thing couldn't reach her with its bizarre magics, not from the air. He'd have to come down there to hit her. And as she went she focused again, harder this time, shuddering and gritting her teeth with the effort.

If I can just... get this one thing to--grow... he'll crash, by the bones he will crash... Let him crash...

As she slipped back behind the boulder, battered and already weary, she could feel the magics finally take hold. Triumph gripped her and she let out a broken, hoarse cackle as she felt the spores fill the air around the strange being.

________________

Roll the bones.

Round: 3/5
Attempt: Trying to grow hallucinogenic spores from her bone pile onto Rafael (from when he was lying in them earlier).
Defense: Various fungi growing in coat just in case, hiding behind boulder to protect from air attacks.
Injuries: Dazed, slightly concussed, twisted left wrist, bruised face, cuts