With the cloak on his body, Howler feels good. He grins when Rosary says it suits him. She seems to have found something herself - a nice comb, he thinks it suits her too.

"Of course I can help." he hums, picking up the comb and placing it within Rosary's mane.

Quickly making sure it stays, Howler also notices the group continuing on.

catch up post
@Rosary

Howler scrambles to catch footing to help the others. As Rosary said there is danger. Howler has never faced something like this before. The pillars are crumbling - but the statue is damaged. A falling rock hits Howler, sending pain shooting up from a shoulder - Howler's skin is not strong - but he must continue.

If Rosary can help the others, so can he. Howler has no damaging spells - the claws would be useful against flesh but not... Pure stone such as the statue.

He tries one of the few things he can use. Can the statue even hear?

She scrambled back slightly as she watched the creature, her eyes wide as she panted softly. This... wasn't good. Her weapon wasn't doing anything, which she figured, but it was really all she had.

So, she backed up and placed her scythe down, picking up a large rock, or anything big enough to chuck at it, aiming to hit it as close to its head as possible. She was still very small, so she really was just aiming at its mid to lower body, but it was a bit too heavy for her, and it just crashed at her feet the moment she tried to throw it.

Welp....

For those that knew him, they might have been surprised to see him so rattled. For Attikias, he's too lost in it, though he did jolt in place while Plover goes for the kill.

He needed to be doing something too. Pulling himself higher, Attikias clutched his shield defensively, fingers tense around the edge. Others were continuing to attack. He was cowering, and something lit in him, some sort of adrenaline-enduced rage that only served to drive his panic in even deeper.

Abruptly, Attikias surged up to strike back, only to be faced with a backhand thoughtlessly swinging his way. The shield was his only defense; stone struck it with enough force to split it in the middle, but it saved Attikias well enough, though it did send him stumbling back and away from the golem.

Too many people were on it. He couldn't attack it. And so, he stayed out of the way, throwing the shield back into the piles of broken things and focusing on keeping himself safe first.

The crumbling pillar, shuffling ground, and chaos of stone ricocheting off metal has their ear feathers pin flat while their crest flares up, making them look quite goofy from the front, I would imagine.

Though they can’t help their cackle at Plover’s guts, and finally open their wings to take to the air and get in the statue’s face. Hoping to distract the swings of the statue like a magpie, that start swooping and kicking at the broken pieces of its head to keep it from squishing the nervy other being.

There were shouts to go 'GO FOR THE EYES,' and most of the others were attempting to slay the rampaging statue, but Connie was not among them. Maybe if he was a little bigger, and a little braver, he would've attempted to fly up and yank the statue's eye out himself.

But instead he would continue scrambling around, looking for somewhere to hide until everything calmed down. The falling rubble had made a multitude of new crevices for little rodents to hide in, and Conleth eagerly bee-lined for the closest one.

Rosary was momentarily gone. In the moment, chaos caught up to her. It had always been a cloud above her head, it had always been there, but in this moment it was not the wandering oil-dripping horse that cried softly and moaned for a release from the nightmare of existence, no, now it was a valkhound pressing forward to fight, destroy, consumed by corruption and intent on bringing this stone statue down with the raw force of Chaos.

It made Rosary reckless. It charged forward, shrieking, oil-spittle flecking the ground where it passed, only to run straight into one of the stone statue's blows, which caught it right on the side, fully lifted it off the ground, and flung the horse away where it slammed against the dungeon walls and collapsed to the ground, stunned.

He started forward, but others were already going for the eyes. And to get past Plover risked hitting the other Gembound.

So Sergei turned, quickly assessing--Flower. Flower was in danger, falling stones and-

Sergei lunged, trying to slap the flail outward in an attempt to deflect the rocks falling toward her. So focused was he on making it to the smaller druid that he missed the other rocks falling toward him. A falling brick, a flail of the statue, and Sergei was stumbling back--bruised and blinking.

Plover was the next to grab onto the statue's face. If it could have spoken, it might have expressed some confusion as to what Plover was shouting, however; it had never been sitting down. But... it was a statue. It could not speak. It also could not hear, judging by the way it had no real reaction to Howler's magic. It simply stomped forward, staggering on its damaged limbs.

Some of the Gembounds--Flower, Howler, and Sergei--were struck by falling bricks; the least lucky, Rosary, was hit a direct strike by the statue. But--the damaged head, held tight by Plover, suffered additional damage when kicked brutally by Renasci.

The kick was enough to break Renasci's foot. It was also enough to fully dislodge the second ruby, which came loose in Plover's hand. The power of the strike was enough to ensure the statue's final throes were now truly final.

But throes they were nevertheless. It flailed and thrashed, its movements now stuttering. Rather than a devastating, unstoppable stone rampage, this statue had been obliterated from the start. All it could do was... die, albeit violently.

Stone fists swung blindly around it as it staggered, slowing...

---

DEATH THROWS (heh)!

The Stone Statue is in its death throes. It is flailing wildly as it begins a collapse. Characters may roll to finish it off. Both failures and critical failures will merely be hit glancing blows by the dying stone statue.

---

The next post will take place on July 15th in the afternoon/evening GMT.

Characters who were not posted last round (Naskarra, Khavur, Hunter) should be posted as a catch-up post before being posted for this round.

@Howler @Flower @Rosary @Relic @Sergei @Naskarra @Plover @Khavur @Conleth @Hunter @Renasci @Attikias

She grunted softly as she was hit by a falling brick, making her fall to the ground as she held her shoulder. That would certainly bruise, and it hurt like a bitch right now, but she had bigger issues.

Like the fact that the creature was frantically swing its crumbling arms around and last thing she needed was to get hit again or god forbit Fern did.

She placed a hand on Fernie's back to keep them safe on her shoulder before aiming to leap out of the way, wanting to get as far away from the rampage as possible until it finally died.