"Hylltywyll." He said simply as she waited for his name. 

Hylltywyll was a bit offended. She seemed to just be dismissing him as some little weirdo, which was fair but still offensive. But he wasn't an idiot. He was a powerful magical being!

"Hmph. I haven't just heard of the Mage's Guild, I'm a member!" He announced smugly. The little gremlin had managed to be accepted into the Guild just like this lady. Of course, how could they not accept him? His magic was incredible and powerful. They'd be fools not to. They were also fools to accept him. He'd already torn apart several rooms of the guild hall that had to be cleaned up, and stolen a bunch of shiny magical things those dumb wizards just left lying around. Really, it was a lose-lose situation for the Guild as soon as the Fairy had set his eyes on joining, but that wasn't his problem. He was theirs.

He watched as she inspected the wriggling chandelier with his arms crossed. The audacity of this lady was unreal.

"Eldergrove Village? Never heard of it. You know where that is?"

SPOILER: Click to show

Quest Name: Rescue the Fine China
Chapter: Two
Description: The clues you have found have led you to a small hamlet deep in the woods, apparently a group of wizards have gained the power to transform things into other things, and have been kidnapping people to experiment on them. You have found one of many of their hideouts, however it seems the wizards responsible are no longer here, and have left two large gorillas made out of random material, like wood and metal, to guard the prisoners still here. Your job is to rescue the prisoners and lead them to safety. Unfortunately the wizards have gotten away this time but our mages will continue to search for them.

Requirements:
- Requires at least two people (you and one other, the other does not need to be interested in the guild)
- You must make at least 7 post with each post being 150 words to complete the mission.
- You must locate and free the prisoners
- You must protect them from the gorilla guards, either by fighting, sneaking or tricking
- Once you complete this mission you have finished this quest line

    A small “Heh” escaped her lips, before turning her head and raising a hand to cover her smile. This little forest creature…Hill te will? Was supposedly at least a two ring mage? To imagine…Though…The ice beam. And the bubble of water… She would check the ledger once she returned. It was know that the guild was full of interesting characters, but was this not a step too far. Or too short?



    “Right, ahem, excuse me. Humid air and all that. Eldergrove Village, I remember when I was researching the area that there were lost hamlets all over these woods. One was supposedly close to the search area, a little to the north. Maybe we can start there?” She said, inquisitively. Really it was a shot in the dark, literally, as to which way north was. But, the furniture had indeed all came from the same direction.



    Confidence propelled her forward as she strode out into the woods, expecting the creature to follow. Her Tree and Maul once more orbited her, the Censer giving off a faint glow in the midnight mist.



    “Tell me, Hill tee will, was it you speaking in my mind then?” If so, he may actually be a mage’s guild member, that would be two domains over which he would be versed in. If not, This wizard who was in control of the furniture had quite the range. She wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not still.

Hylltywyll narrowed his eyes suspiciously. He felt very disrespected by this lady. She was definitely looking down at him, and not just literally. She didn't even tell him her name. Humid air, yeah right. This lady was just downright about to laugh at him! She didn't believe he was in the Mage's Guild! He'd show her.

He growled slightly as she began to walk off and followed right behind her.

"You think you're better than me just because you're a little taller? Less hairy? Huh? I'm a powerful magical being! The most powerful magical being you'll probably ever meet! A Dark Fairy! Don't let my size fool you. I like being this size, you know! It makes it a lot easier to sneak around and hide!" He complained indignantly.

He smirked. "That's right, that was me speaking in your mind. But I wasn't just doing that. Your eyesight really sucks. And your veil smells awful." He chuckled to himself.

It was like the mewling of an indignant kitten that walked behind her, spouting off any argument it thought would get attention. Though to be honest, attention it had gotten. A dark fairy? From the Land of Wonder? Maybe…



Hardly breaking her stride from their walk, she spoke to him with no small amount of bravado. “I don’t just think I’m better than you, I am. I’m Lady Gwendolyn Mystwud of the Pale Concord, and if you are part of the guild then you surely have heard of me. It would be in your best interest to stay out of my mind, lest you pick up some manners. And what my veil smells of is of no business of yours, thank you very much. Hmmph” Her rant had betrayed a small amount of her indignation, showing the slightest pout as she finished.



It felt like they were making no significant progress towards their objective, only thoughts of things crawling around in her head as they walked through the forest. Cheeky bugger thought it could get in her head, it was probably the reason she felt paranoid earlier too. She was placing an awful lot of trust in somebody, something that had scurried up to her and insisted it was an ally.



Still, it had alot to prove before it qualified as the most powerful magical being she’d ever met. The reason she had lost the majority of her eyesight and needed the veil. Alvina the Archfey.

Hylltywyll was in disbelief. Shock. Anger. A little bit of respect. And even more anger, fury even, at the sheer audacity of this Lady Gwendolyn Mystwud of who cares. How. DARE she? She actually just said that she was better than him. Unbelievable. That should be a crime. She should be in jail. She should be executed. No, she should be sent to the shadow realm for such disrespect!

He focused for a moment, reconnecting to her mind again out of pure spite.

"Oh, you know you're better than me!? I could kick your ass! I'd destroy you! You wouldn't even know what hit you. I didn't need to show myself to you, I just felt like it! You would still be panicking and breaking random trees if I didn't decide to stop. You would've been killed by those weird furniture animal things without me! I saved your life and this is how you treat me? Maybe you're the one that needs to pick up some manners along with a pair of glasses!" He ranted angrily, directly into her mind as loud as he could.

While she heard his voice ranting in her head, Gwen could also hear a loud, shrill scream of anger from his actual mouth.

---

Mind Parasite
Howls of the Damned

    Doubling over with pain as the shrill screeches of the creature rippled through her mind, she clasped her ears to no avail.



    “Stop! Stop!” She shouted, hoping to calm the fairy, but after a moment, the screaming was gone. At least, the one outside of her head. The psychic tantrum could still be heard, but nothing else. No trees, no wind, no incense ashes falling in her censer. Shit, this was bad. She was running out of senses at this point. Another deep inhale of her veil brought her back to the hearing world with the rest of society (Filter Veil) and she stared daggers at the small fuzzy thing.



    “Listen Hill tee will, I dont care if you’re as magical as Solaria himself, if you don’t shut up whatever wizard made those chairs is going to turn you into a pillow.” She hissed angrily. In fact, listening closely revealed a scream from further ahead in return. An echo? Or perhaps a call to attack. Paranoia was part and parcel with the adventurer lifestyle, and an abundance of caution was always well rewarded. Dashing behind cover of a rotten tree, she lifted her veil and inhaled some salts. (Eagle Eye Potion)



    The world around her quickly snapped into focus as the sharp smelling salts permeated her senses. The normally enjoyable sensation was slightly ruined by the log she peeked over, but there were worse things to worry about. Looking ahead, maybe two hundred meters away was a semicircle of huts all oriented around the smoldering remains of a bonfire. In front of each hut was tied a person in rags, and what looked like two bulky animals of some kind angrily sniffed the air in their direction.

"Egh!" Hylltywyll stopped screaming and started rubbing his nose again as Gwen took another big whiff of her stinking veil. What was wrong with this lady's sense of smell that she could willingly subject herself to such torture?

Gwen looked down at him, staring daggers, and he looked right back up at her. He stood as tall as he could, all the way up to his full, mighty, horrifying height of two whole feet. He straightened his back and lifted his hands off the ground. While she spoke, hissing words at him, he literally hissed back like a feral cat.

"Ha! I'd like to see him try. No one can use me as a pillow!" He hissed back.

Suddenly, Gwen was glancing down the path and then hiding behind a tree. Ha! Coward. Guess he scared her off. He was quite intimidating, wasn't he? She must have finally learned her lesson. He looked smugly at her as she smelled some more gross stuff. Ugh! Why!? He cut the connection. Maybe she'd just trying to get back at him in some stupid way. Well, that wasn't going to be enough to-

Hylltywyll jumped when he suddenly heard a loud roar from down the path and darted into the shadows beneath some bushes.

---

One with the Shadows

    I’d like to seem him try as well she thought, as they hid from the beefy monstrosities. It seemed like the fight was unavoidable, she could care less about the hostages, but if that dastardly wizard was still hanging around she’d have to go through his gorilla guards. Making a head-tilting motion towards the camp, she addressed the little gremlin.



    “Alright Archmage of the Mage’s Guild” She hissed at him. “You wanna make me believe you? Now’s your chance shorty, I’ll go distract them. You do some of that magic stuff from earlier, ok?” It was a bit of a long shot, if these guys had brains to back up their brawn, it might be too much of a fight to do alone. But if anything, she was hard-headed enough to die in a random forest to prove some fairy wrong, so fuck it.



    A hand placed on the edge of the rotten tree she hid behind gripped it enough to crumple the wood. She used the leverage to thrust herself forward into a dash with her weapons trailing close behind her. Spiney twigs and needle thin leaves shot out from the tree that floated above her, drawing the attention of the gorilla guards. Her Censer Maul shot forward, steel head aimed straight for the chest of the one on the left.



    Just before impact, the monstrosity stuck it’s meaty hand out, catching the burning maul, and tossed it to the side. The crash demolished one of the ramshackle huts, and sent all of the prisoners into throes of screaming.

Hylltywyll was a powerful, independent, capable spellcaster. He could tell what a spell did just by being near it when it was cast. He could do all sorts of things, from hiding his presence so thoroughly almost no one could detect him to suspending spells in the air or even changing them to his will. He was full of magical energy and abilities!

But, uh, fighting wasn't really his strong suit. He only really had a couple of spells that would do any damage to someone and one of them was extremely draining and could even leave him unable to move if he used it for too long while the other took some time to cast and could only be used once and on a single target. He didn't want to be so vulnerable in front of this lady that clearly wasn't a fan of his, so there was no way he was using that spell again. He'd already used it earlier and was only still walking around because he'd stopped casting it so quickly thanks to Gwen's spell.

He'd just have to bullshit his way out of this.

"Oh? You finally realized that I'm an Archmage? What's wrong? Can't handle them on your own? Too tired? I don't really have to prove anything to you, I already showed you how powerful I am, but I guess I can prove it just a little more if I have to." He said smugly, raising a hand toward one of the gorillas.

Suddenly, tendrils of black shadow shot up from the ground and wrapped around all of its limbs, binding it in place. It struggled against them, trying to pull and break them, but they held fast. As they wrapped around it, dark purple flames started to burn all over the tendrils and scorch the gorilla.

There, that was one less enemy to deal with. Now, hopefully she could deal with the other one herself.

---

Scern's Godkiller

    *Damn, that wasn't bad* She admitted to herself as the dark tendrils reached up and arrested the monstrosity. It’s howls pierced the night air as they burned into its wooden skin. Wait a minute… more furniture creatures? What was with these wizards, did they own a second hand store that had too much inventory? It was that momentary distraction that was her downfall though, as before she knew it she was within melee range of the other monster she had been charging towards.



    A big meaty paw swung out with the force of a galleon at full sail, slamming into her and sending her flying into a hut opposite the one her maul had been sent into. The wind in her lungs took a moment to fully refill, but it was a moment too late. The free beast leapt from his position and brought two huge steel fists down onto where she had landed. Gwendolyn lifted her legs and vaulted backwards as the impact sent wooden splinters and dust high enough into the air that it was apparent the blow would have been fatal.



    She landed on her feet after a short somersault, clicking the quick release on her damaged armour so it fell off, unburdening the lithe warrior. Enlightened Redolence summoned itself in her grasp, and a bloodied smile was all the warning she gave that she was back in the fight. The monster snorted heavily as she charged forward once more, reaching backwards for another massive punch.



    This time, however, Gwendolyn slid under the attack, using the momentum to swing her own maul with traumatic force directly at the beasts head. The crack of metal on metal reverberated the handle, but the blow was impactful nonetheless.

Hylltywyll stayed hidden beneath the shadows of a moderately sized shrub while he watched Gwen get thrown around by the wooden gorilla like a metal-clad hurcal ball. This was at least as exciting to watch as a game of hurcal, probably more. Not only the pure excitement of watching a thrilling battle, but also the joy of watching the snooty, rude woman get a bit beat up. Ah, this was great! He could kick back and enjoy the show as she took care of things. This plan was going perfectly.

While Gwen fought the other one, the gorilla trapped in Hylltywyll's spell was slowly being burned, the wooden facsimile of fur turning black and cracking like charcoal. It roared and struggled against its bonds, but the spell was a powerful one. It couldn't break the shadowy tendrils off of it so easily. The Fairy just needed to keep this one contained a little longer. Hopefully Gwen would finish off the other one soon and then she could bash this one while it was still trapped. Hopefully. He really couldn't actually hold it for that much longer.

---

One With the Shadows
Scern's Godkiller

    The reverberating bong to the head left a large dent in the constructs head as she let go of the maul for it to return to it’s orbit. It paused for a second, only before turning it’s massive head fully around to stare at her. Were her bladder full, it would have emptied itself in that moment. The massive arms reached around her with incredible quickness as it pulled her in for a gorilla hug. Splinters of wood and hot metal singed her undercoat, the monster staring daggers into her eyes.



    It leapt up, easily thirty feet before turning upside down and crashing back into the earth near it’s ensnared partner. The prisoners each winced as gwendolyn was pile-driven straight into the earth. Now unconscious, her weapons each fell to the earth with her, no magic keeping them aloft.



    The Furnitrilla stood tall, beating it’s chest in victory over her crumpled body, and went to go beat on the chains that held it’s brethren in place. Behind him, however, something interesting stirred in the dirt. Small movements at first, almost in sync with the pounding of the machination on the chains. At least, until the weapons began to move on their own beat. Like something out of a story, each second jerked them more and more upright with the beat of the gorilla until they had all but stood tall like statues in a grand hall.



    The maul and the tree began swaying with the devilish rhythm, each dancing forward a small step unnoticed by the monstrosities. As soon as they were fully upon them, by their own will they attacked. A vicious mauling ensued, the Censer maul beating the chained one to splinters and ash, and the Tree breaking apart all that made up the gorilla until it’s own branches had all but disintegrated. The beasts were no more, and the weapons danced back to their owner. Laid beside her, their essence visibly leaking out of themselves and into the defeated woman with an ethereal mist that entered through her nose and mouth.



Living Weapon
Sacrificial Bond

Hylltywyll watched with wide eyes as Gwen and the furnirilla went high up into the air and then crashed back down, piledriving her into the ground. Oh shit. That was awesome, but also totally not good. Now there was no one to deal with the two wooden monsters. The one bound by his magic was on the verge of being free, the spell starting to fade. He was glad he was already hiding at least. It would make his hasty retreat much more stealthy.

But retreat ended up being unnecessary. The maul and tree began to float into the air to some strange beat. Before the gorilla could even attempt to free the trapped one, the weapons descended on the both of them and smashed them to bits! So, the annoying lady wasn't dead. Good for her.

He walked over to watch the mist flowing out of the two weapons and into Gwen. Interesting. He was curious what was happening. He was tempted to try linking his mind to her again to see if he could learn anything, but decided against it. He would feel what she felt if he did, and she looked super fucked up right now. It would probably hurt like a bitch if he linked to her right now. His mischievous nature wouldn't be satisfied with doing nothing, however.

He walked around to the maul, reaching out a hand to see if he could scoop up a little of the mist flowing out of it.

    The cool night breeze stirred her from her slumber. She remembered little after swinging at the beast, she didn’t feel bad. Had the little gremlin knocked her out and betrayed her? Her eyes opened with a start to that thought, only to be met with Hylltywyll fruitlessly scooping the residual smoke from her disembered maul.



    “What are you doing?” She asked, eyebrow arched in a quizzical fashion. She couldn’t speak to the odd habits of forest creatures, but surely he knew mist was intangible. “Where are the creatures?”



    Reaching out with her mind to reignite her weapons, she found them unresponsive. “Did you do something to my gear? What exactly happened here?” Looking around even further, it was apparent that the prisoners bindings had been loosened in her unconsciousness, escaping into the forest by the looks of it. This was all so weird, had he defeated the monsters by himself? Maybe he was a powerful archmagus…

Stupid mist, being all intangible and slipping through his fingers. This wasn't working. He tried keeping the spaces between his fingers as small as possible, but even that didn't work. It spilled right out of the bowl he made with his hands as if it had a mind of its own. He let out a slight growl of frustration before jumping as Gwen was suddenly awake and asking him questions.

"Huh?" He muttered in confusion.

Did she not remember what happened? So she hadn't been the one to make the weapons attack the gorillas? Or did she just immediately forget? How strange. Well, there was only one thing to do at a time like this.

Take advantage of the situation.

"I didn't do anything to your gear. The one gorilla broke your weapons and knocked you out, so I just finished them myself. No problem. It was easy. I don't know how you had so much trouble with a single dumb animal when I handled two of them on my own. I thought you were supposed to be tough, with all that armor and fancy floating weapons. How disappointing." He said with a smug grin.

He leaned down to try to just inhale some of the last bits of mist coming out of the maul just to see if he could.