It took a lot of finagling, but Zarius has finally made arrangements to head out to the Arid Mesa to assist with all the Nightcaller Troll nonsense. Monster hunting really was not his cup of tea. Hunting in general is more of a Cyran or Snow thing. He’d much rather be spending his time back home in Darkveil and getting the Rookery back into at least a semi functional state.

But since he’s joined the W.E.F. he’s received some pressure from the cranky old man who approved his membership to actually do something to the benefit of the guild, else he would revoke said membership. Deciding to relent rather than try to outstubborn someone who probably was used to digging his heels into the sand, he arrives in the Arid Mesa and has been assigned a partner to clear out any lesser threats from the area the guild expected to confront the worst of the trolls.

Zarius was pleasantly surprised to find that his partner was another familiar face. Mister Wolfe, the odd but friendly knight friend of Astrid Stormstone’s. It had been a while since they last interacted with one another and they had fought an equally dangerous creature. At least this time the fellblood would be more likely to actually do something useful during the fight.

As much as he is usually up for pleasantries and some chit chat, the rest of the guild shut that down pretty quick and sent them out as soon as possible to deal with the troll infestation.

It was...a sour experience to return to Giant's Avenue. This was where the temple was. This was where Scern had been confronted. This was where adventurers, including himself, faced down a god. The memories are hazy, but the pain, the unpleasantness, it all aches like a sore muscle.

Come to think of it, hadn't Mister Wolfe been there? Or was it someone else? Iryla certainly had been there...though she looked like a completely different person. Snow and Eirynor had been ripped from across Charon to engage in the fight. Who knows how many other people had shared that experience. There were many faces there, yet some seemed wildly different at the time or just hard to remember for one reason or another. He shakes his head to clear the fog. It felt like fragments of his memory were missing from that whole experience. 

The pair walk across the barren and cracked landscape of the Arid Mesa, the wind ripping across the land and battering them as they go. It was a bit of a jaunt to the location, and they would have to keep their guard up as they travel in case they get jumped by the trolls. Still, there was a bit of time to kill, and Zarius still had a LOT of unanswered questions about the knight.

“So, Mister Wolfe, how have you been since the whole orb ordeal?”

---

SPOILER: Click to show

Post Requirements: 6 post per person, 200 words per post
Description: With all your knowledge attained and preparations made it is time for you to start clearing the hunting grounds of the superfluous and smaller versions of the creature the Winged Expeditionary Force is about to take on. You need to combat and kill 3 smaller Nightcaller trolls, indicated by the Hunt Dossier, then study their corpse. By butchering the body you must study their organs and physical composition, this will help when preparing to face the major threat. Learn what you can from fighting these creatures, as everything you learn here will go a long way in keeping everyone alive during the final hunt.

For Blue Raspberry, returning to Arid Mesa didn't have as much of an effect on them as it did on Zarius. They'd been there during the fight with Ziev, had participated in it and heard the tale of Scern after it was all over, but it didn't hurt tham like it had some of the others who had been there, like Astrid.

Maybe they were too stupid to really understand the impact of everything that had happened, or maybe it just didn't matter to them all that much. Maybe both. They'd never followed any of the gods. Heck, they'd never even heard of most of them. The Ooze had never exactly been raised to believe in one god or another. They hadn't been raised at all, unless you counted Astrid and Cantio taking them in, but could that really be called "raising" them when they were already a fully grown person? At least as much of a fully grown person as an Ooze could be. Hearing the gods were dead hadn't affected them personally. It had saddened them to see Astrid so upset about it, but that was the extent of its effects on Blue.

Metal boots clanked as the Ooze knight walked alongside the much quieter Fellblood, moonlight reflecting off their shiny, polished armor. Astrid always made sure their armor was well polished every time they saw her.

"Oh, I've been doing good! Lots of stuff happened since then. Lots of weird stuff. The ground keeps shaking and lots of new people came to Sky Peak, Me and Astrid became nobles, we fought a couple of Arcuila and had to move their nest somewhere else cuz of all the ash in the sky from the volcano, I won a race, I ate a lot of crabs in Sol City... Oh! And I got eaten by a Baloth! But I was fine, and then we killed it and got into The Exposition!" Blue listed off some of their most notable adventures after the last time they'd seen Zarius, finishing proudly with their fight against the Baloth that had functioned as their initiation into the guild of which they were now on a mission for.

"What about you? Doing good after the orb ordeal? The orbdeal?"

Zarius listens to Wolfe as he explains all the things he had been up to since they last met. As the knight claimed, 'lots of weird stuff' was pretty accurate. The news of both Wolfe and Astrid had been given noble titles was not new news to the fellblood, he did try to keep tabs on them after all.

He assumes that the crabs Wolfe is referring to was during the clean up efforts, he's glad that the knight hadn't been in the same area where the crabs hopped up on drugs had been. Given how much food the knight had been proven to be able to consume, he could have easily died from cumulative toxicity.

He nods along until Wolfe asks him what he's been up to. He looks at the man with a bemused smile. 

"Orbdeal? Is that what we are calling it?"

Gods. 

"Things have been busy," he shrugs. "Never did find that Origin Matter again, which is concerning. The earthquakes destroyed my business so we had to temporarily relocate. And more recently Miss Astrid dropped by to get my assistance with the Force's whole troll issue."

There was more her could share, but he still wasn't particularly close to the knight. Wolfe was just still baffling to the fellblood, he really didn't understand what the knight's deal was or what he was capable of. Taking that into considerations, he didn't feel the need to mention much else or go into detail about things that were more specifically of interest to Wolfe. 

They continue to walk along before there are signs of destruction, specifically large claw marks gouged into boulders jutting out of the ground. Zarius pauses along their path and examines some of the gashes more closely. 

"I hope these things cannot swim or steer ships, if they got into one of the cities it would be absolute carnage." He looks back at Wolfe. "But I suppose we are out here to ensure they do not get further."

Blue was glad their face was hidden in their helmet so that Zarius couldn't see their concern at him mentioning his continued search for the Origin Matter. So he had kept on looking for it after the fight. Blue felt a bit guilty. Zarius didn't know his search was a complete waste of time since the Origin Matter had ended up somewhere he'd most likely never think to look- inside Blue Raspberry. But, they couldn't tell him they'd eaten the giant orb without also revealing that they were an ooze, and they didn't want to do that. Zarius was too smart. If he found out Blue was a living being of blue slime, he'd almost certainly put the pieces together and realize who actually covered him in slime while he was unconscious. He'd also probably realize why. Blue doubted Zarius would be very happy to learn he'd been swallowed by the ooze, even for a brief moment.

Nope, that was a secret they'd have to keep from him. Probably best to just not talk about that anymore.

"Oh, right! Astrid told me a little about that. That your bar fell down. My candle senses." Blue said sadly. They didn't understand how a bar could be a business, but it seemed important to Zarius. Maybe they hit things with it or something. In any case, it had been destroyed in the earthquakes, and Blue felt bad for him. It must be rough.

Blue looked at the gouge marks too, just trying to look like they knew what they were doing by copying Zarius. They didn't really manage to gleam any information from the markings other than 'something scratched these boulders'. They nodded in agreement with Zarius's statement.

"Yup, we're gonna stop them!" Blue agreed confidently, giving Zarius a thumbs up. "But, uh, why can't they swim or steer ships? I didn't get to read the thing about them, the dossy ey. Do they not like water?"

"My candle senses."

Zarius pauses at that. It takes him a second to figure out what Wolfe meant and he can't help but snort a laugh in response. "Thank you. Hopefully we will be able to rebuild soon."

He keeps Wolfe just in his periphery, watching him as he mimics the fellblood's movements. How this man had survived to adulthood is one of Charon's best held mysteries it would seem. 

"I do not know if they can or cannot swim or steer ships. I am saying that if they can then that puts all of Charon in danger," he explains. 

Just as he stands back up, there's movement between some boulders not that far away from them. Zarius frowns and signals to Wolfe to shush before he points in the direction that he saw the movement.

He quietly reaches back into one of his pouches and pulls out a purple swirling potion and hands it to Wolfe.^[1] There wasn't any time to explain to the knight that this was a potion to help him be silent as he moved, but he hoped he'd recognize it as the same thing he had given to Gerhart during their orbdeal.

Once the knight takes the potion, he mimes that he would flank left and that Wolfe should go to the right. He then turns invisible and stalks off silently.^[2,3]

Zarius circles around to the left, pausing to listen for whatever might be over there. In theory, these trolls shouldn't be that hard to detect given their size. That said, the landscaped had plenty of jutting rocks to hide behind or break line of sight.

Wanting to get a better view, Zarius scales one of these jutting boulders.^[4] He scans the surroundings and just spots something large and bipedal creeping between the pillars of stone as the shadows lengthen from the setting sun. 

Night would fall soon, and that was a frightful thought given that the trolls were much more dangerous under the cover of darkness. If they could take out even one while the sun was still up, they would be extremely lucky. 

---

[1] Potion of Shadows
[2] Invisibility
[3] Silent Step
[4] Spider Silk Boots

Blue didn't question the potion being handed to them at all and just took it and shoved it up into their helmet, and into their mouth. This wasn't out of absolute trust in Zarius, or even remembering what the potion did from when he'd given it to Gerhart. No, it was just habit for them to eat whatever was handed to them.

Luckily, Blue did realize they were handed a glass bottle before swallowing the thing whole. That would have been very suspicious, and they didn't want to do anything too suspicious in front of Zarius. Trying to fake the motion being completely normal, Blue pulled the potion back out of their mouth just enough to bite into the cork with their teeth and pull it out of the bottle. They spit out the cork and then drank the potion, albeit a little strangely since they didn't show any sign of swallowing the liquid, no sounds of gulps or movement of their throat. It was like the bottle just drained into them. Hopefully their armor covered it up enough to keep Zarius from noticing.

After a few seconds, Blue suddenly noticed the difference. All of their movements were completely silent, the clanking of their armor gone. It was a sound they were very used to hearing, so for it to suddenly be muted like that was strange. Still, they couldn't help being excited about it.

Blue starting moving around, jogging in place, waving their arms, whatever they could think of that would normally cause a lot of metal clanking from their armor, but it was all completely silent! They were like a child giddily playing with a new toy.

They didn't even notice Zarius signaling them. They didn't even notice Zarius leaving. When they stopped messing around, they looked to see that the Fellblood was just gone. Blue looked around, trying to spot their suddenly missing companion.

Zarius doesn't notice that Wolfe hasn't followed him. After all, if the knight took the potion then he wouldn't hear him following anyway. But Wolfe was capable, so he should be able to keep up, right?

The fellblood watches for the thing he spotted creeping between the stone pillars for a bit. He then glances back to look for Wolfe aaaaaaand he's not in sight. Great. Hopefully the knight does not rush in recklessly against whatever this is. 

He decides to get closer for a better look then regroup with the knight immediately after. If it wasn't a troll then there was no need to get into a fight with it and waste their strength and resources. 

Silently moving from one stone pillar to another, Zarius closes in on the creature unseen. He stops in his tracks when he hears the grinding of stone against stone, like something heavy was putting pressure on some of the scattered gravel. 

Then he sees it, the giant lumbering form of a nightcaller troll. It's a hideous beast with greyish blue skin, large tusks and horns and a nasty looking scowl on its face. It's long fingers are caked in layers of dried blood from various kills it has made as of late. It surveys its surroundings slowly, blinking annoyed at the remaining sunlight in the sky. 

With his target confirmed, Zarius starts to back away to regroup with Wolfe when he stops again. His ear twitches at a sound off to the left. More grinding of gravel. And then to his right.

Shit. 

The dossier did say they travelled in ambush groups. 

It didn't seem like they noticed his presence. Yet. Who knows how good their sense of smell was though. 

Blue was still looking around for Zarius when they heard the sounds of someone walking on the gravel. Oh, was that Zarius?

Blue walked closer, their movements completely silent thanks to the potion, and looked to see if that was their friend. They were surprised to see instead the huge, pale grey figure of a Nightcaller Troll.

Oh shit.

Blue took a fighting stance their arms and legs morphing into wolfen claws, ready to take on the approaching enemy who could certainly see them right in front of it, out in the open. But it didn't charge at them. It just kept walking. Did it.. not see them? But they're right in front of it! How could it not see them? Blue tilted their helmeted head in confusion. Did it really not notice them? Sure, it was sunset so it would be dark pretty soon, but it was still plenty light out right now. What's going on?

When it came close enough, the troll lifted its head and started sniffing the air, turning their head in different direction. Blue could hear their sniffing even from a dozen feet away. Was the troll smelling something? Blue didn't smell anything. The ooze didn't really have a nose though, so they usually didn't smell much at all.

The troll definitely did smell something though: fruit. The smell of raspberries filled its nostrils as it came closer and closer to the raspberry-flavored, and more importantly in this situation, raspberry-scented ooze. Blue took a few steps back and suddenly the troll looked enraged, its senses picking up the movement of the knight and finally realizing there was a person in front of it! It had been confused by the fruity small and lack of heartbeat, but now it could finally pick up the tremors in the ground and tell what it was in front of it.

The troll let out a call to the others who all turned in its direction and started running.

The war cry from the troll makes Zarius flinch.

Dammit!

They missed their chance to get the jump on even a single troll. Now all three were on the warpath. This was going to go poorly. 

As the trolls react to the call and charge to the aid of the one confronting Wolfe, Zarius keeps out of their way, moving quickly to circle around so they can at least flank the group rather than be surrounded themselves. At least, that was the plan. 

The trolls do not need to see an enemy to know it is there, their other senses are keen enough to overcome their blindness. There was no hiding once they were clued into the pair's presence. Two of the trolls focus on Wolfe, but the third catches a whiff of a different smell. A smoky, acrid smell like the brimstone of Mount Drakolt. 

Zarius glances back while circling around the group of trolls only to see that one was hot on his trail. 

Yeah. This is definitely going poorly.

The troll swipes forward with its elongated reach and gnarly hooked nails and Zarius is forced to springs backwards. The dossier warned about getting hit with their claws due to the poisonous nature of the troll's blood. Though it was unlikely that they would be able to avoid getting hit given the circumstances. 

"Mister Wolfe! We need to put them down before the sun sets!" Zarius calls out as he scrambles up another rock pillar to try and stay out of the reach of the troll, hoping that his voice reaches the knight over the sounds of the raging trolls.^[1]

He staggers as the stone pillar under his feet shifts. Looking down, the troll slams its fists against the pillar, chipping away the stone. 

"Oh please," the fellblood breathes. 

The troll then opens its maw and lets out a terrible screech. Zarius is struck with the soundwaves which rippled through the air with enough intensity to knock him clean off his feet and send him falling back off the pillar. He winces, his ears ringing as he flips back and just manages to land on his feet.^[2]

He doesn't have much time to recover before the troll towers over him, ready to tear into him. 

Meanwhile, the two other trolls converge on Wolfe, equally eager to tear into the strange smelling knight with no pulse. 

---

[1] Spider silk boots
[2] Cats Grace

"Uh-oh."

Blue readied themself again to fight the suddenly aggressive troll, lifting their clawed hands into a fighting stance and starting to spark with electricity. The troll was quickly baring down on the knight right in front of it, swinging its own clawed hand down at Blue with a snarl.

Blue wasn't aware of the poison on the monster's claws, but that didn't matter much. Even without knowing that, they didn't want to be slashed with those fearsome things anyways. Blue jumped back out of the way of the heavy swing, the claw passing in front of their armor with a woosh.

They counterattacked immediately, stepping forward again to slash at the Nigtcaller troll's extended arm. With a hiss of acid and a crackle of electricity, four gashes were left in the troll's forearm. The troll growled in pain, but Blue felt like something was wrong. The hand they'd slashed the troll with felt strange, the ooze that was exposed to some of the troll's blood burning with pain. They felt a flash of heat and it was as if the world around them was spinning for a second.

Blue stumbled backward, confused. It lasted only a short moment before all of the strange sensations stopped, but it was enough to make Blue not want it to happen again. Slashing the troll with claws was a bad idea.

At the same time as Blue was being affected by the troll's blood, the troll was reeling from the acidic burn and electric shock it had received from the electric ooze's slash. Both fighters took a second to adjust to the new information and change their strategy.

From Blue's hand, a new weapon formed. A long, sharp glaive made of slime that crystalized and hardened into a sturdy weapon. If direct contact was a bad idea, they'd use this and more ranged attacks instead. Lightning conducted itself down the glaive's shaft just as well as it did across the claws. They wouldn't be able to use their acid, but that was a downside they had to accept if they didn't want to be poisoned again.

Meanwhile, the troll similarly formed a weapon for itself, blood trickling from their wound and coalescing into a large club.

"Before sunset, sure!" Blue shouted back to Zarius as they held their glaive at the ready. The troll also held his club, taking a fighting stance again. Now both armed and a little more aware of their opponent's skills, they resumed their battle.

---

Eldritch Claws
Lightning Armor
Desert Blessing

The fellblood's ears ring from the concussive force of the troll's battle cry. Dammit, his balance was all thrown off. As the troll rages towards him, it takes a heavy swipe downwards at him with its gnarly claws. 

Zarius ducks under the swipe, feeling the air ripple from the sheer strength and speed of the troll as it narrowly misses taking the fellblood's head clean off his shoulders. For lumbering giants, they sure were agile. Handspringing backwards, the fellblood reaches into one of his pouches and pulls the cork on a bottle before throwing it at the creature. Spilling forth from the bottle is dozens of little ash balls that move on their own and swarm over the giant in an attempt to distract it.^[1]

The troll brushes off the sootlings in mild annoyance. Its nostrils flare as it takes in the scent of its prey, locking onto his location despite its blindness. The creature's skin flushes red as its veins swell with the toxic blood pumping through its system, making its appearance much more hellish than before.

Moving forward aggressively, the troll tries to corner Zarius, but luckily for the fellblood, he's pretty slippery. While he can't give manage to get the troll to lose his trail, he does manage to keep just out of reach of the creature which only makes it more and more frustrated and angry. It starts recklessly swinging its arms, slamming its fists into the stone columns and breaking off large pieces of stone. 

Zarius has to not only focus on avoiding the claws of the troll, but also all the airborne debris. He hopes that Wolfe is able to hold his own considering how challenging it is to fight something with a much larger range of motion than himself. Thankfully he only had to worry about the one-

The hairs on the back of his neck stand up as he feels something strike out at his back from around a pillar.^[2] His options for evasion are limited with the debris shooting out at him from the flailing troll directly ahead of him and this ambush attack from behind. He twists and takes a few blunt hits from the flying stones in favor of catching the hooked claws swiping at his back.^[3]

The powerful swipe launches him into the air and the world goes spinning. The fellblood tries to reorient himself to land safely but he slams into the side of a pillar before falling back to the ground. Something internal cracks and the pain shoots through his body, locking him up for a moment before he just manages to orient himself well enough to land on his feet. The landing sends another spike of pain shooting through his torso and he grips his ribs. 

Fuck!

One of his ribs was definitely fractured. Grimacing, he looks up to see the silhouettes of the two looming trolls circling around to flank him.

Dammit.

He thought the third troll had gone after Wolfe with the first one, but it looks like it turned back when it noticed its other ally lagging behind. 

The dwindling daylight casts long shadows across the field of stone pillars. They were running out of time quickly and the fight had only just begun. He needed to come up with a plan, and fast. 

---

[1] Bottle of Sootlings
[2] Fighter's Sense
[3] Steel Catch

As Blue and the Nightcaller troll exchanged blows, the sounds of a battle that didn't match up with the club swings and glaive slashes of their own echoed across the Mesa. Zarius was fighting his own battle, and it didn't sound good. They could hear the snarls and roars of what had to be at least two trolls fighting against him. That wasn't good at all. Just facing the one, Blue could tell these weren't weak opponents. They needed to finish this fight and go help him!

Blue was also out of their element. They were much more used to fighting with their acid and lightning laced claws than a glaive. A heavy swing of the troll's bloody club hit Blue in the side and sent them flying, the plates on that side of their armor crumpled and broken. The troll charged in as Blue rolled across the ground, club raised above its head to smash down on the knight.

Blue managed to recover from the fall more quickly than it had expected though. Plates opened up on the knights lower back and a gooey tail of blue slime emerged and hit the ground, stopping the rolling and helping to give them a boost back onto their feet. Blue slipped under the club as it crashed down and past the Troll to jump onto its back, climbing up it to reach the troll's head.

It shook, trying to throw them off, but their slimy hands and feet stuck firmly to its skin. Blue climbed up and reached their arms around its head to shove a hand into its mouth. The troll gagged in surprise and confusion, but its eyes suddenly went wide as it continued to choke and gag. A deluge of slime started to flow from the hand and down any pipe it could find. The troll's throat bulged as slime flowed down into its lungs and stomach, its throat and lungs burning from the acidity and its whole body twitching and spasming from the light electrical shocks it was now receiving from within.

Blue didn't stop until they could feel no more slime would go down the monster's throat, its chest and stomach swollen from how much was already inside them. It tried to choke and cough, to get some of the slime out of it so it could breathe again, but it refused to be spit out, solidifying into crystal just like Blue's glaive had, but in the shape of the troll's insides.

The troll teetered back and Blue jumped off to avoid being crushed beneath it. It twitched on the ground, suffocating to death while Blue ran off toward the sounds of battle, to go help Zarius.

"I'm on my way, Mister Zarius!" Blue called out reassuringly.

As they ran, the damaged armor plates on their side sank into them and were replaced with fresh, undamaged ones. These trolls were tough. They'd better be prepared. They didn't want to go into this fight with their armor already damaged. Oh, they also didn't want to go see Zarius with a tail of slime on their back! The tail changed to look like a lizard's tail, the slime shifting to take on the appearance of blue scales.

---

Torso Hit Reduction -1
Prehensile Tail
Slimy Hands
Breathe In, Breathe Out
Blacksmith's Wishbone

Wolfe didn't need to worry too much about Zarius seeing his oozey form as the fellblood currently was having some difficulties seeing anything at all. 

Moments before Wolfe defeated the troll he was battling against, Zarius was still struggling to fend off the two other nightcallers long enough for assistance to arrive. While ducking and dodging multiple foes was usually not much of a problem for the lithe fellblood, many of his tricks involved going unseen or obscuring vision. He could go invisible, tread silently, or create a smoke screen as a distraction.

But none of those tricks worked here. These creatures already did not rely on their sight, and worst of all, they didn't need to rely on their hearing either. Zarius could do nothing against their sense of smell, ability to bounce soundwaves off objects, or detect the slightest bit of movement through the ground. All the fellblood had left in his arsenal to keep from getting cornered was his speed^[1], ability to run up walls^[2], and honed reflexes.^[3] 

It bought him time at the most, but he was burning through his energy quickly and the trolls were only getting more agitated with chasing him down. The one that was busting up rocks breaks the surface of its skin, splattering its own blood across the stone before the droplets shudder and retract into a serrated blade. 

Wanting to stay the hell away from that nasty looking weapon, Zarius makes one misstep too many. He dodges back only for the other troll to take a wide swipe at him. The giant palm of the troll impacts his chest hard and the fingers are quick to curl around his shoulders and neck like a spring loaded trap snapping shut. 

"SHIT!"

He grabs onto the troll's hand as he's lifted off his feet. He tries to pry its fingers off to no avail and the curved nails dig into his back making it painful to struggle. Zarius at least jams the tips of his knuckle knives into the troll's hand, but it does little to make the creature's grip loosen.^[4] Quite the opposite actually, and he winces as the broken rib pops from the increasingly crushing pressure. Pain shoots through him along with the effects of the poisoned claws which have pierced through the back of his coat, and his vision starts to go in and out of focus.  

Wolfe's voice does ring out, and the trolls do turn their attention his way for only a moment. But the fellblood does not respond. He does not hear the call of an ally coming to his aid. All he hears is those whispers crawling out from the darkest recesses of his mind and deafening him to even the sound of his own racing heartbeat or the ragged breaths of the trolls. 

Shit.

Not now.

NOT.

NOW.

---

[1] Dashing (enchantment)
[2] Spider Silk boots
[3] Fighter's Senses
[4] Knuckle Knives

It only took Blue a couple minutes to get to Zarius, but in that short time Blue saw everything going terribly wrong. Zarius was being held in the air like a doll, blood trailing down his back and soaking his clothing as the troll's nails dug into his flesh and imparted their terrible poison.

"Mister Zarius!" Blue yelled as they ran toward him from the direction Zarius's back was to. They could see the blood darkening the back of his black coat.

There was no time to be holding back if they wanted to save Zarius's life. With the sound of metal scraping against metal, the plates of Blue's armor detached and separated to make room for the rapidly expanding form within. The gaps between the plates filled with blue scales as the knight shapeshifted into a monstrous, lizard-like being to disguise their ooze nature. Their wolf-like claws shifted to scaled reptilian claws and their helmet broke into multiple pieces to make way for a reptilian face. Their footsteps thudded louder and louder as they ran, their weight increasing as they grew to have a twelve feet tall and six feet wide frame with a long tail and a second pair of arms.

The trolls took notice of the large enemy that was suddenly thundering towards them. But, as fast as the kaiju had suddenly appeared, it vanished. That is, until the troll holding Zarius felt three massive fists smash down into its skull and both of its shoulders from directly above it, Blue having teleported using the magic of their greaves crafted from Displacer Beast hide.

Following the fist, the entirety of the massive ooze's weight fell down onto the troll as Zarius was thrown from its grasp. The second troll hesitated for just a moment, caught off guard by the teleportation and crushing of its fellow troll, an act that cost it dearly as Blue's tail swiped out and took its legs out from beneath it, sending it slamming to the ground. Its legs felt numb as electricity coursed through them, making it struggle to try and stand back up, but before it could do so it felt something stab into its stomach.

A blue, crystal-like glaive stuck from its stomach, the other end in Blue Raspberry's hand. With a crack, the glaive broke and then suddenly liquified into a pool of bright blue liquid that soaked into the sand.

---

Red Rogue's Coat (1/2 posts)
Prehensile Tail
Extra Arms
Bare Hands
Bull's Strength
Blink Tabard
Lightning Armor
Desert Blessing (ended)

The fellblood is thrown to the side, slamming against the ground before tumbling out of the way of the fight. 

He's disoriented and can't really tell what is going on, but at least he was free for the time being. He has enough wits about himself to know that he is pretty badly hurt and he desperately needs to do something about before he takes another heavy hit. His options are limited, but he does keep one major source of healing on him at all times. A necklace tucked into the collar of his shirt has a delicate glass vial with a potent healing solution inside it.

Zarius grips his ribs with one arm and pushes himself onto his knees. He pulls the vial out of his shirt with his free hand and tugs at the cork off the small glass vial with is teeth before downing the crystal clear liquid inside it.^[1] The potion works quickly, knitting together the fracture and healing any other internal damage.

It does little to make the voices shut up, but at least he could focus on silencing them rather than being distracted by the pain.

His vision starts to clear just in time to roll out of the way of one of the trolls as it comes tumbling down from Wolfe's onslaught of powerful attacks. But he wasn't quite able to join the fray again just yet. 

His body shakes as his muscles contract and spasm. Something was trying to force its will over him but he was able to resist for the most part. Unfortunately, it had been growing increasingly bold these last few months. Or perhaps, impatient. He cringes and grips his head as the whispers try to overwhelm his mind.  

"N-not again. I will not...let you."

It's been happening often enough for him to start to get smart to it. He can hold it off now, at least a little. He just has to avoid getting knocked out. 

He pushes himself back up onto his feet, his eyes flickering between their usual gold and an eerie illuminous blue. 

As he regains his senses, it looks like Wolfe had more than dealt with the two remaining trolls. Damn. Fat load of help he was. But then he notices the downed one twitch, the damage from the glaive attack slowly being repaired. Regeneration. The dossier did mention something about that. What a pain. 

Only fire would stop them from getting back up again. 

Zarius focuses for a moment and channels the heat from his body into his fists. They ignite in blue flames which the fellblood then gathers into a small burst of fire before releasing it at the downed troll. The flames scorch the troll's flesh and spread hungrily across its body.^[2]

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[1] Essence of the North
[2] Art of the Burning Fist (1 out of 3 post duration; 1 out of 2 fire blasts)