Mayngo had come to the Trial to help. To save. To pay back Vinnie's sacrifice.

Instead, he had led two to their deaths. Two had tried to save him, and had died for it.

He was on edge, guilt boiled in his chest. Even Vincinzo's talisman, resting heavy on his chest, did little to chase him away. So when the shadows lunged for Morganite, he moved without thinking.

The hybrid was twice his height, and easily much heavier, so how Mayngo managed to knock them out of the shadow was left to anyone's guess, but he struck them harshly with his head like a bull, pain blooming as the scarred flesh of his face broke, surely leaving blood behind - he'd never broken the habits he'd developed when he still had his skull - and then cold

it was so cold, and he couldn't breathe.

"Vin-!"

With eyes shut and hands over his ears, Fireheart was a bright splotch of red against the darkness of Puck's eyelids. Wide eyes focused on the form, disappearing into the dark. Fireheart was like a fireball, racing into the dark, roaring and screaming. The dark swallowed the void Fireheart left. And he didn't come back. Puck only heard the short cry of "Vin-" before the fossa-Mayngo-was gone, too.

The fear swallowed what embers of Puck's hate and anger remained. It was like a nightmare. No, worse than that. Worse than any nightmare or crystalsleep dream he'd had. Puck just wanted out of here. Compliant and quiet through sheer shock and terror, Puck nodded. Puck didn't want to throw that torch away, to be left out here in the dark. No light and no escape. Puck climbed down from Ifrit, the torch cradled gently in a hand.

Puck climbed the torch, feet finding handholds in the branches and the halberd. They settled on the halberd, and reached up with the torch. The flame flickered, briefly. A gust of wind rushed over Puck. Cold and unfriendly to the last wisp. The flame, already frail and spluttering, gave its death rattle. A thin plume of smoke snaked from the end. A single ember fell. It was gone.

"No!" Puck cried. "Puck dies here! All dies."

PUCK is rolling to light the torch

Puck curled in on himself, a tight fetal ball, waiting for the dark to claim them all.

Ru watched the torch go out, a sinking feeling in their gut. The monkey dropped the torch as they curled into a ball. Ru regarded it with disdain. It had attempted to hurt members of its group, and now it gave up so easily. If they did not finish the task, they'd be stuck out here. Ru edged closer to the small stick, picking it up with their teeth. The tip still glowed a faint red. Still salvageable.

"We cannot give up now. The Masters and Overseers will not come for us. They have no patience for failure. And they will especially not come for us whilst this creature is about." Ru exhaled, slow and heavy. The magicka within them concentrated, a pinpoint of pressure, and they focused on the torch in their teeth. They thought they had handled the trial well, without consequences physical. But now the stress caught up with themselves, and made itself known. The spell made their head heavy. The atmosphere too hard to move in. A misfire, Ru realized, and Ru cancelled it before more damage could be done. Ru gasped for air.

Yeah, they were screwed.

RU is rolling to light the torch

Morganite hadn't seen it coming. They'd felt the breath of death on their fur and whirled around to see a form lunging in front of them, sacrificing themselves for Morganite.

And all they could do was back away.

"I-I'm sorry!" they said, so utterly disturbed and terrified by the other's sacrifice that they didn't realize that their only hope for survival had blown out.

Their eyes turned and she saw... the torch. The torches. Neither of them lit. The halberd, the wood, her family.

Fireheart lunging into the shadows. Ifrit crawling out. The screams of their family. Kini would know what to do... what would he do? What... what could they do? They had no fire.

"... Keep the flame going," they breathed, eyes wide as she ran over to Puck, eyes wide and half-crazed, "B-blow on it."

Morganite wasn't really sure who they were talking to, themselves or the others? But they had to try... they had to, they couldn't die here. They had to make sure everyone else survived...

They blew on the embering torch, trying to light it, trying to press it to the bigger one to light it too... but it wasn't working. Tears welled up and their breathing quickened, panic making them start to shake and quiver.

"No- NO! WORK YOU STUPID-" she yelled, the first time she'd ever truly raised her voice above what anyone else would call a loud tone.

MORGANITE is rolling to light the torch.

A heavy pit settled in Sora's stomach. Simon -- no, whatever had him -- was still screaming but now Kini was there, too, and her head turned slightly and she saw it, saw the-- the oil, saw her brother's blood, saw Kini's blood, but most importantly her eyes zeroed in on the warm, gray piece of quartz laying at the edge of the light in its pool of oil.

That was her brother, in a way. If she took it, it wouldn't keep his mind, but... it would still be like keeping him, wouldn't it? She stared at the stone, her whole body still for a moment. Considering. At the border of the darkness, the border between life and death, was... Simon. And Kini, sure, but Simon was the one crying for her, the one begging her to help him. And she knew that, if Kini could choose, every single time they'd pick to have Simon live if it meant they died. Sora knew, because she'd have made the same choice in any other circumstances.

But this was the last torch, wasn't it? The last chance. And her whole family was standing there, waiting for her, hoping for her. Hadn't Kini's last words been don't go after us? Hadn't Simon said not to go after him? Her breath was shaky as she stared at the stone.

It would be easy, really. She could rush over and kick it back towards the group. She knew her own strength, knew how much force it would take, knew how to keep it from being shattered. But what if the wary edge of this darkness stuttered? What if the monsters lunged for her? What if she edged out just enough for the shadows to get their awful, awful claws into her? There was an alphabetical, itemized list of reasons why she should absolutely not.

What if she died, and left Morganite to take care of them alone, and betrayed her promise to Kini-yolotl, and betrayed Simon's last wishes, and lost everything? She'd promised her family at the beginning of this that they'd survive, somehow, but here she was willing to throw her life away?

Sora glanced back at the rest of the trial-goers. Something was wrong with the torch. The big dog was gone, the monkey's torch had gone out, the fish monster and Morganite were both freaking out -- but what could Sora do? Certainly not light it. Certainly not save it. She was one pig against the world, without an ounce of skill in fire or even magic. Her eyes returned to the stone. She swallowed hard. Conflicted. Confused.

If nobody lit the torch, they'd all die anyway, wouldn't they? Nothing she did would matter. Everyone would die. All her siblings. All her promises. Nothing would ever be the same. All their deaths would be for nothing -- nothing except the Merchant's sick little game, his little death march. All for nothing except whatever perverted desire he had, creating creatures just to die. He was more of a monster than this creature in the shadows, certainly.

The hog steeled herself and approached Morgan, where her sibling was freaking out over the torch. "Its okay, Morganite. I made you a promise, didn't I?" Gently, Sora breathed on it, making a strong attempt to revive the flame. If there were embers, it still had a shot, didn't it? Her chance to save Simon was gone now, but she was making a much more important choice. She was choosing to try and save everyone.

The smoke grew, briefly. The embers glowed brighter. And just like that, a tiny, meager but still-there flame (and wasn't that poetic? Just like her, really. Just like all her siblings -- one last shot, a light in the unfathomable darkness, and these other Gembound's last shot at survival) was gracing the darkness.


SORA is rolling to light the torch.

Carefully, mindful of her talons, Hera clambered onto @Ifrit with a shaky "Thank you," and huddled into herself, feathers still fluffed. If a bird could cry, she would have - 'I want to go home please, I don't want to die,' but she couldn't, so she shook and shook and shook until she was near falling apart. Voices were calling out, and she huddled down-down-down, laying near-flat on the massive creature's back, gulping down air as quickly as she could.

A wolf set himself on fire, and she clenched her eyes shut, though he'd already only been a blur, her eyes made for distance, painfully far-sighted, but even still his bellowing, his roaring, was so loud to her ears. Mercifully, she was spared the smell of charred fur.

"No! Puck dies here! All dies." and she screamed, flared her wings, but there was nothing she could do.

"Please... I don't want to die..."

Speech. Thought.

Hera is rolling to survive

All they have known is a darkness, one of loneliness for they only had each other and no one else, and now one of the a suffocating kind. It came for them, one by one. It was hungry and they were its snacks.

What were they to do in retaliation? Nothing but light a torch one by one and watch as that light, their life, was diminished until it could stretch no more.

In his hazy vision, with eyes still burning and lungs still refusing to take in great amounts of air, he noticed the shadows move. Coming to take another and he could not let that happen. He could not stand by and watch as their group became smaller and smaller and life became a novelty rather than a right. Orenstein lunged out, legs moving as quickly as he could, and barrelled all his weight into Anemoi and pushing her further into the light. He twisted as he did so, kicking his legs against her to give some more momentum and force to his push but in doing so he launched himself like a rocket out into the darkness.

It did not take long for him to feel the cold.

The loneliness.

The fear.

The claws.

He was no brave creature and his screams were testament to that, great, bellowing cries as he felt the darkness reach down his throat and tear at his heart.

He was gone now. The darkness won this round. There was only half whispered hopes for the others now.

CW for vomiting

From where he was perched on Ifrit, Charles could hear them. He could see them, running out of the darkness, just into the edge of the light, screaming for them. He dared to look closer until he saw Simon, scaled melting, and crying out - scared, terrified of the darkness that had consumed him and Charles wanted to throw up. His stomach flipped as he looked away, making a high-pitched moaning sound. They wouldn't stop. He wanted to fly to them and cry, tell them that he was sorry, that he wished he could save them, or even try to pull them into the light but he knew...they were gone. That wasn't them anymore, it was the darkness, gripping them tight, and when the darkness let them go, they were only shells. Shells that would soon become nothing.

It was horrifying just to think about - they had been alive not long before. They'd been happy just a few hours back, a small family at last seeing beyond the reach of their little cave. They were going to see the world - survive together for a little while before at last touching the light they were so desperate to reach. But now, they wouldn't see it. Simon, Kini, Owlface, and now...no, Orenstein was gone, too. They were all gone, their family broken so violently.

He let out a small sob from atop Ifrit, anger vanished from his body. The dog's screaming is what did it - he turned to the side, stomach heaving and emptied what little remained over the side of the giraffe's head. "I can't do this," he murmured, sounding exhausted. "Why are we here?" He breathed heavily, just trying to hold onto Ifrit. Instincts just trying to keep him alive.

CHARLES is rolling to survive.

Anemoi

A yowl rips it way out of her chest as she first lunges to save Ifrit, but instead slips into the shadows -

-those cold reaching shadows -

before she's suddenly kicked, bodily shoved back into the light by some very familiar feet.

No longer a shriek of desperation, and personal terror, it instead becomes a screeching bellow... or whatever you'd imagine the heartbroken cry of a walrus cat to be as she shrieked into the shadows, after her family... oh caves why did he have to save her?

Orenstein...

"ORENSTEIN! No, Orenstein! I'm sorry- come back! Please, come back!" she sobs, forcing herself to her flippers and curling close to her remaining family, tears blurring her vision, eyes wild as she watches the chaos- listens to others get torn apart... and..

Given that she watches her family collapse near her, the bodies of those he'd already begun to mourn crumpling around her, dissolve into oil and sand, some twisted part of her is glad she didn't beg for Orenstein back... she didn't ever want to see them like this... any of them...


ANEMOI is rolling to survive.

TRIAL OF HYDRA - DARKNESS

ROUND 9 - IT HAS FED

"No! Puck dies here! All dies..."

As if in answer to Puck's cries, the darkness closed in: consuming, oppressive, snuffing out all light. But there was no crushing wounding, now, no slashes; only cold, only tendrils that slipped suffocatingly, almost gently, over the small creature's body...

...and then receded.

Sora's breath ignited the final flame, a small piece to be lifted, touched to the pitch-soaked Third Torch, to boil into fire. This last beacon blazed bright, and the shadows again receded, without protest, without harm.

The shadows had fed enough, this night: whatever lurked in this unnatural darkness was at last sated with all the life that it had taken from them. It drew away from Sora's light, from all their light.

The cold stillness, that muffling, gnawing hunger, receded from Hydra. The darkness began to fade, like a sudden, swift dawn: cool and pale, the horizon gradually becoming visible again, the cave walls at last sighted through the haze formed of pure distance.

Those who had fallen closer by were visible, melting away into the water and wet sands, their bodies and many of their stones consumed by the marsh. Warrior would find himself--perhaps too large, or too submerged to destroy--left half-drowned on the shore of the pit he'd nearly died in, skin left to badly scar at the wounds inflicted by the dark.

The survivors were now free to return to the exit of Hydra to claim their rewards. But behind them, many had not been so lucky. Those who had fought to save the rest; those who had sacrificed themselves, or simply been too slow, or in the wrong place, at the wrong time... Many of those who survived would have to live with the knowledge that they had fought only for themselves, that they had left allies, friends, and strangers behind to die. And many would live on with the memories of those who had died in the nightmarish dark; those they would never see again.

Survival was its own reward: but for some, would the cost be too high? Those who had tried to save the rest, and lived--and the courageous and selfless who had fallen--had, at least, secured their legacy as heroes. But those survivors who had fended only for themselves--were they cowards? Or were they cunning? Would they be plagued by nightmares of those they'd left behind, Hydra's dark crowding back in nightly? Or would they sleep soundly, confident that their choices had been right?

It was a matter of perspective, and certainly only the living were left to have one.

_____________

Gembound may react to the lights returning, to the presence of bodies, and may return to Hydra's entrance to claim rewards. Rewards may be OOCly claimed at the end of the final round (next round). Though the stones, for now, are gone, the following stones are available for retrieval attempts later on in separate Hydra threads: Orenstein, Simon, Styx, Nassir, Black, Fireheart. The rest--the stones of Owlface, Kini-yolotl, Mayngo, and Elyon--are lost to Hydra, and the murky depths of the Dead Marsh.

@Pumpkin @Rainstorm @Howl @Puck (Ru) @Morganite @Sora @Hera @Charles @Anemoi @Ifrit @Warrior