The possibility that Kishan could be anywhere in the vast world of Charon meant that no, traversing into a hostile forest filled with dangerous varmints, oversized arachnids and whatever bloodsoaked fellows deciding to call this place home was unfortunately, not optional for Ambika. Keeping aware of every sight, sound, and scent was labourious and exhausting but would prove ultimately fruitful in keeping her safe as she made her way out of Shadewood Forest before nightfall descended upon the sky. Setting up a campfire a short distance away from the woods, she would consider her next options. Traversing the Shadewood Forest at night was tantamount to suicide, even if her vision would not fail her and she trusted herself enough to be ready for anything that might happen. She might feel just slightly more secure had she a companion, or two. Maybe not more than that. But sadly, her former travelling companions were either dead or retired. Times like these were where she especially wished Florentio was still around - that audacious fool would gladly beckon Sunlight upon these dark forests without a second thought because he wasn't about to limit himself to more mundane spells that barely pierced the shadowy veils. Then she remembered the amount of trouble in the form of enraged predators that wrought upon the party, and decided that perhaps it might be a better idea to go in alone after all.

It was then that Ambika sensed the presence of something having their eyes on her.

SPOILER: Click to show

Quest Name: Hunted
Participants: Two or more
Location: Anywhere
Post Requirements: 5 posts per person, 200 words per post
Reward: +1 Mystical Archive Ticket, +1 Mysterious Reward
Description: You find yourself as the main character in a Black Harvest story! Write out a spooky or scary story where you find yourself hunted, stalked or followed by a scary, creepy or frightening threat. The location, villains, and details of the story are completely up to you, as long as this year's theme is obvious and consistent throughout the topic.

Vonoros had just finished a contracted job in Moonglade and was trying to lay low in the Shadewood forest as things cooled off. It was far enough away from the city as he could make it plus the cover of trees would serve as a decent hiding place. He arrived and just kind of leaned against the base of a tree trying to just sleep and rest his tired head. However, after a while, he heard something nearby, the crackling of a campfire and the faint warmth nearby. He slowly and lazily awoke from his slumber stretching his back before heading towards the source of the campfire. He highly doubted it was someone after him considering he was a great deal from the town he had done the job but he still had his guard up. Peering through the darkness of the night Vonoros watched the human lady from behind some trees.

She didn’t seem all that threatening considering her age and just melancholic demeanor so he relaxed a bit. The triton continued watching though curious as to what brought someone to the forest so late at night, an adventurer possibly? Considering her gear and appearance that was his best guess.

“Ehhh might as well approach her, maybe she has some food on her? I am pretty hungry”, he thought before coming out of the trees and approaching the camp.

“Yoooo what’s up there lady? What brings you out here at this time of hour? Usually, only the shady type of folk are awake now. Got any food to share by the way? Let me tell ya it’s been a long day and I sure am hungry”, he said as he sat down across from her yawning lazily.

Ambika observed the Triton as he came out of the trees, his laidback words belying the trained movements his body took which might not suggest anything to a layman, but it spoke to her that this Triton was an assassin. She had to keep her guard up, not that it was anything new. And if he wasn't after her, then it would hopefully serve for her to extend kindness as a fellow adventurer.

"Thinking if I want to enter the Shadewood Forest at night. Personal business." Ambika kept her voice low, though she had no doubt the Triton would hear her just fine amidst the silence broken only by the sounds of crackling campfire and the occasionally rustling of leaves from the autumn winds.
"Shortbread, meat jerky and apples. Would that suffice?" She refrained from looking at him directly too much, focusing instead on his presence in general. Then she felt a hand touching hers. Not the Triton's, but a horribly familiar hand. It was devoid of true warmth, but the sensation was enough for her to kindle an imagined stimuli.

"Your day sounds interesting. Mind if I listen in as well?" A voice echoed in the air as the flow of magic manifested a tall, dark-skinned Elven figure over the surrounding darkness behind them.[1]

"Good evening, Mother." The living memory of Kishan would swing his swords at both his mother and the Triton's necks. Ambika, unable to process what was happening, remained frozen as the sword swung diagonally towards her.

---

[1] Unknown: Cyran's Manifest Memory, applied on Dark Elemental

“Gotcha I get it, I mean, I’m here too so you’re not the only one hiding amongst the moon’s gaze tonight. Don’t worry, by the way, I’m not some sort of wild crazy animal creep on the loose, there are a lot of weirdos out here at night. The woods aren’t exactly the most average place to lay your head at night especially not in Shadewood Forest”, he chuckled considering who he was and why he was here tonight.

Vonoros shook his head, “I ain’t gonna pry into your privacy and personal biz I get it. All of us adventurer folk got our own stories and histories we’d rather keep to ourselves. I’m just kinda hungry and figured the campfire nearby could have food”.

He then greedily began eating Ambika’s food, “Yeah this is fine, I ain't’ complaining beggars can’t be choosers and all. Thank yo-”, the triton would stop chewing as a haunting shadowy figure appeared behind the oldy lady.

He dropped his food and hurriedly sprung to life, eyes wide awake as he took out his two weapons, a coral lance and his trusted quarterstaff Shu.

“Hey buddy just step away from the nice lady there, you’re not invited to our little campfire chat. Just buzz off before I gotta whack ya”, he called out as he walked closer to them.

Seeing the two swords fly towards them, the stitches on the triton’s right hand came apart and his right hand snapped right off (1) flying straight at Ambika and blocking the sword that almost hit her. He would hold his quarterstaff out and would clash against the sword blocking the attack with a deep annoyed scowl.

---

1. Suture Tattoo

The memory's swords wavered into billowing blacks for a short instant as both were deflected by the Triton assassin.
"Ah, how unfortunate. No matter. Mother will attest to my persistence." Kishan had a gentle smile in his face even as he deflected the bolt his dear mother had fired in his direction.
"What do you want, Kishan?" No other questions mattered right now.
"I missed you, Mother. Nothing more, nothing less." Kishan replied simply.
"Even though you will not come to me in person?" Ambika reloaded her crossbow and took aim once more.
"Oh, but I was here, Mother. I am glad that you have not lost your warmth," Kishan always had the weirdest way around his words at times, not that it stopped him from throwing his chained sword at the Triton while simultaneously firing a Chaos Bolt from his other sword at his mother, aiming for her torso.
Ambika swiftly activated Long Stride to gain distance while shooting another bolt with the opening she had been given. Of course, her son knew enough to redirect the injury to somewhere less critical and it just barely scraped the side of his torso, and it was barely meaningful since she was not dealing with flesh and blood. She ought to remember to invest in anti-arcane measures one of these days...

“Well I don’t care how persistent you are, I owe that lady for giving me her food after I was hungry. So how about you come over here and I beat the ever-loving crap out of you weird ghost darkness thing huh”, then triton would say as his right hand came back to him and reattached to his arm. He’d spin both polearms with great skill as he pointed them at this strange figure.

This sure was an awkward situation to be in, Vonoros had no idea who these people were. He thinks that the shadowy figure is the lady’s son from how they’re talking. But it looks like either he’s dead or using some kind of dark domain magic he’d guess. All he cared about was making sure this kind older woman was safe, he wasn’t the hero type but he felt a sense of obligation considering she gave him food.

A chain sword would come flying towards him, and the triton would easily run towards it and hit it out of the air with his quarterstaff. Vonoros didn’t stop there and sprinted towards Kishan intending to deal with this guy once and for all.

“Hey ghost dude, why don’t you just shut up and taste the end of my staff?”, he’d say as he tried slamming Shu into the side of its shadowy head.

"Apologies, but I will have to refuse," Kishan faded away[1] before the hit could connect, leaving the Triton's quarterstaff swinging at empty air.

Ambika closed her eyes, trying to intuit from where her son would come at them, finally recalling that her heightened senses were entirely useless against Kishan. She ought to have hammered that into her instincts since the day he successfully surprised her on one of her birthdays years ago, sneaking in a breakfast platter while making sure the smell would not reach her nose until he gently tapped her in the shoulder. He's made trying to sneak up on her in her sleep and trying to see how much he could get away with one of his favourite pastimes ever since. Not that he ever did anything harmful - Kishan always made sure he was helpful without fail - but waking up to her hair already done for her was simultaneously impressive and vexing when she considered how complicated her usual hairstyle was.

"There!" Ambika shouted for the benefit of the Triton as she threw a glass sphere[2] at her 4 o'clock, successfully landing a flashy explosion and eating a chunk out of whatever formed this new illusion. Now certain that he had no interest in coming at her in flesh-and-blood, she loaded her crossbow with a bolt fitted with explosive obsidian[3].

---

[1]Unknown: Banish

[2]Improvised Engineer: Glass Sphere + Crude Gunpowder + Flash Powder

[3]Obsidian Arrow

“Dammit I hate you spirits types, you guys are a real pain to fight normally”, the triton would call out annoyed as his quarterstaff hit nothing but the air in front of him.

So his normal martial attacks weren’t going to do anything to this fella whatsoever, he needed to think outside the box for someone like him. With the old lady seeming shaken up by this Kishan dude, Vonoros couldn’t count on her being focused. Ghosts were unpredictable and unrelenting, no matter what you did or tried they’d always find a way to mess with you.

His senses immediately went into professional assassin mode as he heard Ambika’s voice ring out with some sort of object coming right at him. Vonoros quickly jumped out of the way and rolled forward, avoiding becoming fried fish as a loud boom went off where the shadowy figure stood by.

The triton chuckled, “Nice one old lady, glad to see you’re awake and concentrated ‘cause I don’t know how long we can last against this guy. I don’t have anything that can hit him, why don't we just try running away?”, before ducking down and dodging a flying sword that nearly took off his head.

"No. His time will be up soon. Isn't that right, Kishan?" Ambika pulled out the hair accessory gifted to her by him from the back of her hair, now with haphazard streaks of glowing magic concentrated at the bottom of the stick, gradually reducing in length.
"Indeed. How unfortunate that my time with you is almost at an end, Mother." Kishan's smile remained unperturbed, though his eyes now carried a sense of melancholy.
"I need not look for you. That is what you mean, correct?" Ambika cocked her crossbow, her visible expression that of resigned annoyance. Why couldn't their son be normal, was a regular question both she and Florentio asked, before they remembered that 'normal' could mean his personality would remain entirely unchanged and he would just be less competent and everyone would be infinitely worse for it. Kishan simply remained silent, shutting his eyes happily for a moment.

"I don't suppose you would be willing to indulge me on your choice of approach?" Ambika fired her bolt without waiting for a response. It was a formality at this point. "Jump!" She'd shout at the Triton as she activated Long Stride to jump backwards, leaving herself completely defenceless in the process. Knowing her son, there was no point in trying to resist anyway.

And so Ambika would find herself in her's son embrace as he would spin her around and made sure none of the obsidian shards even came close to scraping her.
"Mother, when did you become so reckless?" Kishan's eyes glistened, curving downwards, and guilt, however slight it was, would show in his demeanour, imperceptible to anyone but her.
"Need you ask that question?" The answer was right in front of her, after all. Kishan would set his mother down gently as he began fading away into nothing, the magics reaching its end.
"Until we meet again, Mother." The echoes would haunt her for the rest of the long night.

“Alright, alright”, Vonoros would say, putting his hands up jokingly, “Looks like Mister ghost dude here is getting tired of causing chaos here”.

The triton would lower his quarterstaff feeling as if this whole thing would come to an end soon. It was strange for sure and he didn’t quite understand what was going on here, so this old lady’s son was the ghost and was haunting her? He seemed like a decent guy, his voice charming but he was still sending out swords and chaos blasts towards his mother. Vonoros was pretty confused, so did this guy want to kill her or talk to her? Sheesh, and he thought his family situation was complicated, it seemed like folks had even more going on than he did.

Vonoros jumped out of the way avoiding another flying blade, man this guy was relentless. Panic set in as he saw Amika jump back and be spun around by Kishan but that was calmed as the spirit seemingly shielded her from his attack. Placed by his quarterstaff into its sling he would approach Ambika with a very confused look on his face.

“Uhhh yo, old lady what in the hell just happened? Was any of that real? Who was that?”.

"I apologise for the sheer insanity that is my son. What I would give for all of this to be a dream, but neither you and I possess such luxuries now, do we?" Ambika started as she walked back to the campfire to take a seat and have a breather, all the while wondering how to even describe the inscrutable anomaly that is Kishan.
"Before anything else, though, I owe you my name. Ambika Shanti Phairot." It was a courtesy now that, for better or for worse, the Triton assassin was involved with her.
"I wish I could say Kishan used to be a sweet child, but that would be woefully inaccurate." Ambika continued. "He has always been, and continues to be, simultaneously endearing and terrifying, as nonsensical as I might sound right now." For all her intellect and wisdom earned from experience, that child's train of thought forever eluded her grasp.
"Even now, I know not what he desires from me." Ambika ended with a resigned sigh as she clutched Kishan's present in her hand and stared wistfully at it, wondering how he could have even pulled off this stunt when she had checked for enchantments when she first received- Oh. But of course. She put her hand over her right eye as her brain yelled at her to forget common sense when it came to her son. Sneaking up to her while she was asleep and casting a spell over it was a feat he was entirely capable of performing, after all, and he had done similar acts for so many years prior.

Chuckling and sitting down near the campfire Vonoros shakes his head, “Nah don’t worry about it it’s all good here dude, I’m not hurt, you’re not hurt and that’s what matters most. I’m sorry your family situation is so rough I get that especially from someone who also has a complicated family situation. I mean your own kid coming to haunt you when you’re trying to chill is a total bummer. You’re right though it seems pretty real to me and I don’t have a reason to doubt any of this”.

Vonoros would then hold out his closed knuckle to Ambika offering her a friendly fist bump, “Cool nice to meet ya Ambika, my name’s Vonoros Jedath, you can just call me Vonoros or Vono though”.

The triton would sit back and simply listen to the human as she spoke telling her tragic tale about her son Kishan. It seemed like a pretty bad deal overall him just stalking her and being pretty weird. Vonoros didn’t know whether the dude wanted to kill her or simply talk to her and from what she was saying it looked like she had no clue either.

Speaking back up he tried being as careful as he could, “Eh sounds pretty rough if I’m being honest with you. Have you ever just tried asking this dude what he wants? What happened to him? Is he like alive, a spirit, or just straight-up dead? If so, how'd he die?”.

Ambika was not much of a people person, but she would return Vonoros' fist bump.

"I... do not know." Ambika answered as honestly as she could. "I had not seen him in 9 years before..." The events that transpired in the Black Spire flashed in her mind once more as she stared at the hair stick bearing symbols of his likeness. Her brain would outright refuse to allow her to make the necessary connections for her to theorise a different reality from what she believed as of this time. "Regardless, he is alive enough to be keeping an eye on me. That answer will have to suffice for now."

"Trying to ask Kishan a question that he has no desire to answer is like trying to grasp and keep water on your hands without magic. You heard him yourself." Kishan had, for better or for worse, inherited both Ambika and her partner's stubbornness, which meant that he was near impossible to dissuade or break if he absolutely insisted on something. Even if that meant his family got caught in the crossfire. This incident seemed to be, to the detriment of Ambika, shaping up to be one of those instances.

"You may sleep if you wish. I shall keep watch. There will be no rest for me tonight." Ambika offered, knowing full well there was much to ponder and even more to reminisce.

The triton shrugged, “Damn nine years you say? Yeah that’s plenty of time for people to change and to be totally different people. You say he used to be a fun charming kid but the guy I saw seemed like a total crazy psycho. Who tries to kill their own mom for Solaris’s sake. Well whatever’s going on you have my sympathies for whatever that’s worth”.

Vonoros would laugh, “Whatever he is, living or undead he sure is a pain in the neck huh, I’d be pretty irritated if I was being stalked and approached like that all the time. He sounds like a very complicated and mysterious guy from the way you’re speaking about him. Throwing swords and chaos bolts sure is a way to sell huh?”, trying to lighten the mood.

Vonoros would nod and turn his head, taking Ambika’s offer of lookout seriously, quickly falling asleep for the night. He’d wake in the morning and bid his new friend farewell, “Well it was nice meeting ya Ambika sorry it was under such stressful personal stuff. If you ever need any help or need some muscle just reach out and I’ll be right here. Until then Seeya”, waving goodbye and heading to his next job.

Changed? Kishan? Ambika could scarcely imagine those two words within the same sentence. She would sooner believe Kishan wanted her dead for her own sake rather than for some self-serving motive. The extremes that child would employ for his own goals was horrifying, certainly, but that applied in equal measure, if not more, for what he considered was to the family's benefit.

"Kishan is scarily easy to be with when he wants for nothing," Ambika remarked, as she recalled the exponential increase in tedium in regards to practically everything after he had left the household without a word with his animal partner. "Sneaking up and starting a fight with me and my partner was one of his favourite pastimes. Him actually winning against both of us at once was what led to him leaving the following day without a word." She knew deep down the two losing was an inevitability at some point, but it did not make the fact less painful.

Ambika nodded at Vonoros and watched as he soon asleep, her ears tuning out the crackling sounds of the campfire and her mind rewinding back to when tonight's incident began, trying to recall every little detail and make sense of what exactly Kishan wanted from her. Alas, all her efforts would be fruitless and dawn would break while she was lost in her labyrinth of thoughts, only breaking away when Vonoros greeted her farewell.

"Safe travels, Vonoros. May we meet again in less pressing situations." Ambika returned his greeting with a raise of a hand, and carried herself up from the ground to extinguish the campfire.