Fight Type: TOURNAMENT BATTLE Prize: Progression to round 2 of the tournament Contact Made: I personally haven't but it was announced by Syn
Character #1:@Dune Bonded: No Magic: Dream Walking Armor: No Weapons: No Current Health: 8 Current Attack: 12 Current Experience: 10
Character #2: @Amaunet Bonded: No Magic: Chaos Armor: No Weapons: No Current Health: 8 Current Attack: 12 Current Experience: 16
I dreamed of you in colors beyond seeing,
braided your name into the earth
When Dune read who he would be fighting, he choked on his own saliva.
Amaunet
He had never seen her name written before. He had only ever heard it; chanted like a lusty prayer for deliverance, the scent of sweat and blood heavy in the air, ground trembling as the audience stomped their bloodlust into the earth. He bet against her only once– never again.
Yes, Dune knew his opponent well, and he knew this would likely be his only advantage in their match. He had fought in the pit only a handful of times, with varying success. If by some chance she had watched him, it would not have been memorable. Dune was not a particularly strong fighter, especially in the pit. The streets favored him more, where he could use the environment to his advantage. In his pit fights the bay came, put his head down, and fought his hardest until the end. He could take a kick– no, that’s understating it– he could take a beating. But he couldn’t always give one. Worse, he had no magic to fight with, and working the crowd was above his head.
There simply was not much money to be made in the pits when you lacked both prowess and showmanship, and as a result he spent most of his time in more lucrative endeavors... Like betting on other fighters. Amaunet was a damn force of nature, and she had actually won him a pretty penny. The thought of fighting her deeply unnerved him. But he had been promised a reward just for participating– imagine that! a handout in Solterra?!– and he was not one to turn down free money. Anyway he had once been ambushed by three older boys and beaten to within an inch of his life, just for the fun of it. There was no way this could be worse than that... right?
The day of their match was just another day in Solterra: hot, dry, and dusty. The midday sun was so fat and heavy, Dune’s shadow was almost nonexistent as he stepped into the ring. Sweat was already darkening his skin. Someone immediately started booing, and in response his ears pinned in distaste. Across the ring his opponent stepped forward, supple and hungry. Keeping light on his feet, Dune braced himself for the whirlwind that was sure to follow.
@Amaunet I hope it's okay he knows her, let me know if there's anything I need to change <33
Summary: Dune gets scared, thinks about his history and capabilities of a fighter (or lack thereof) and steps forward, keeping light on his feet and waiting for Amaunet to make the first move.
Glory hums in her veins like an angelic trumpet as she waits beneath the arches of the Colosseum. She lets it sink into her marrow, and sinew, and into each black space between her feathers. It fills her as much as it settles something cracked and tremulous underneath her skin. And when she takes her first step onto the blood-soaked sands her magic rises higher and coats her skin in a flush of golden dew-light.
The roar of the crowd echoes louder than the steady drum of her own heart in her ears. Today the crowd seems full of lions instead of horses, each snarling with their jagged teeth and their empty bellies. Amaunet imagines herself as queen of them all.
Here there are no nobles or street-rats. There is only blood (on the sand, on their skin, and between their teeth like seeds instead of iron). There is only dominance and submission.
Furious instinct settles deep into her muscle when she spots the bay waiting in the center of the sands. A memory races across her mind like spider lighting, there and gone faster than she can hold it. She does not bother to try to find it again, not with the trumpet bellowing in her blood and the gluttony for violence reminding her that her stomach is empty (painfully so). All she gives him is a smile on the side of feral and full of teeth. It is the only warning he will get from her.
With a snap of her wings, loud enough to leave the crowd choking on their inhales, Amaunet explodes into the madness of her wrath.
Only her magic can hear the roar of the crowd and the harsh beat of their hooves on the stone as they chant and bellow for blood, and blood, and blood. It devours their urgency and lights embers beneath each inch of muscle and between every hollow bone in her wings. Her skin glows softly as a dawn sun as she races towards him in a strange mix and flight and charge. The shine of her magic on her skin is barely visible in the hot furious sun. Perhaps it is both a blessing and a curse for the bay stallion to see only a mare racing at him instead of something golden and holy.
Dust billows up from the tips of her hooves as she races across the sand. Her lips pull back from her teeth as she snarls in a sound that is more predator than horse (more monster than mortal). The curl of his neck, where it begins from the point of his withers, becomes her sole focus as every drop of her violence narrows onto that point of his form. She throws every ounce of her weight into the contact as she tries to bury her teeth into the hard bone and sinew there. The sound her wings make is more growl than birdsong as she pushes herself forward with them.
No part of her knows how to relent or go gently. Not now, not with the hunger coiling snake like in her belly. And every line of her form as she tries to devour him seems to sing: submit until your knees start to bleed.
The crowd starts to rise as they descend into a feverish fury (encouraged perhaps by the pure savageness of her brutality). Amaunet pushes harder against him, her magic eating the blood lust and turning it to rage.
Summary: Amaunet thinks that maybe Dune looks a little familiar. She then she realizes it doesn't really matter and she stops trying to figure out who he is. All she gives him is a smile before she half flies and half charges towards him. Her intent is to latch on this withers and push him to his knees (using her magic which is charged by the crowd's brutal energy) to make her attack a bit more powerful.
When Amaunet smiles, cruel and beautiful, a distant part of Dune recognizes that he should be afraid. But he isn’t afraid. To his surprise he also isn’t excited, or nervous, or anything at all. He is simply here. He is now. And in the here and now there is a gorgeous, terrifying, nightmare of a woman charging at him like a lion with blood already on its tongue.
It doesn’t take a genius, or even a coward, to realize it would be in Dune’s favor to make this fight a quick one. His opponent is considerably taller and more experienced than himself, winged, and most likely wielding some kind of unseen magic-- although this last point is pure speculation on his part. So, forcefully ignoring every instinct that tells him to run, Dune moves into the charge. He takes two strong strides forward and lunges up to meet Amaunet, catching her attack low and forward on his left shoulder instead of the withers. He grunts through gritted teeth as her teeth sink into meaty flesh and pain floods his senses.
Around the two fighters, and so very far away, the crowd convulses with delight as Dune’s red blood drips upon the dusty colosseum floor. Amaunet uses her size and weight to push Dune to the ground, and his knees are on the brink of buckling when her magic suddenly rips through him like a tidal wave. The blood is pounding in his ears, ringing in time with the stomp of hooves in the stadium and the throb of his shoulder. It sounds like music. It’s-- It’s beautiful, so very beautiful.
“Oh,” realization dawns, “I understand now.”
And what a beautiful understanding it is!
Dune understands, and he does not submit. He lashes up and out with his teeth in an attack similar to her own, except he’s got a large, beautiful wing to sink his teeth into. Now, he really doesn’t know much about anatomy at all... but it seems to him that for all the limb’s size and strength, the place where it emerges from the body is a terrific weak point. So he aims for the joint where the wing meets the shoulder, and if his bite finds purchase he will tug back and forth like a dog on a bone. And then, working with her downward force instead of against it, he will pull sharply downward. If he’s going down, he’ll take her with him.
… Later, still high on the adrenaline, Dune will remember every precise detail of the fight except for one. He will learn it at the tavern, four drinks in, when a stranger tells him that not long after the first blow, his face erupted into a savage grin that lasted the remainder of the fight.
Summary: Dune lunges forward and Amaunet's blow lands painfully on his left shoulder. He attempts to bite her wing where it sprouts from the shoulder. If his bite lands, he will shake back and forth to tear the limb and then pull down to possibly bring both of them to the ground.
She falls into the heady thrill of blood-lust like a stone rolling down a hill. It washes over her in waves as she tastes the fermented copper of his blood. It drags her into the belly of it when she feels his muscles tremble beneath the furious weight of hers.
Amaunet wants more, and more, and more. She descends fully into that black belly of the beast, and the bottom of her violence, when she feels him rise (like a lion, like a stag, like a thing knowing it's going to die) against her attack. Her bones quiver under the weight of him, and her wings snap and curl like claws instead of feathers as she seeks any purchase at all against him. The glow on her skin turns to a flush, all dewdrop gold instead of sun-golden.
The crowd feels like something dense, and deep, and more shadow than form, around them. Their roar turns dull in her ears as he lunges for her wing joint. Every inch of her focus narrows again. This time she is all prey animal, all sparrow in the air, when she rears back out of his reach. Her wings thrust forwards to help her lunge backward. The movement is still a chaotic tangle of feathers, legs, and muscles screaming abuse (they are too close for it to be more graceful than desperate).
But the intent behind it, one she knows from years of fighting in the pits, infuriates her. Wrath rises instead of caution.
And even as she feels his teeth latch on to the muscle just below her wing joint, and feels his push and drag against her like a noose, she hardly feels anything but the battle-cry echoing on her lips when she screams. Her brassy cry rings in the now almost-silent crowd. Most of them know enough of her, and enough of the pits, to know that it's a death-knell of a song.
Amaunet rides the adrenaline wave, as she leans into this new point of contact between them. The tug of his teeth makes pushing that wing against him painful. Instinctively she leans away from the tug of pain (later it will be near crippling). But even as she tries to pull the soft point of her shoulder out of his hold, she swings her teeth towards the fleshy curl of his crest (or if he pulls way as she hope it'll be an eye that she aims for). Her hooves slid into to the sand as she seeks purchase for her attack and she tries not to blink hard against the sting of the sand rising up around them in furious clouds.
Belatedly she wonders if her blood tasted of fermented copper and iron as his did. Or did she taste like war, and fury, and all the things that will leave him stained in the wake of her?
Summary: Amaunet is surprised a bit at the fury of his counter-attack and it makes her half-rear, half-scrabble backwards less than graceful. She's pissed that he was aiming for a wing so she screams just in case he didn't notice. His teeth land just below the joint, on the softer skin and muscle. It hurts and she quickly bleeds from the grinding of his teeth (later once adrenaline settles she won't really be able to move that shoulder and wing easily if at all). In return she twists her head around and tries to sink her teeth into his crest, or his face if he pulls away). At this point she's worried less about grace and more about suffering.
Later, with her blood still on his tongue, smeared wine-red at the edge of his lips, he will wonder at the vicious instinct that filled him during the fight. Despite the pain in his shoulder as the medic stitches it up, pressing fragrant leaves into the raw flesh, he will yearn for another brawl. Amaunet will have awakened something in him that will only ever be at peace in the ring, with the chaos of the crowd pressing in on all sides.
In the moment, Dune is pure focus on the fight at hand. His teeth scrabble against Amaunet’s flesh, missing the target he had aimed for but finding firm purchase in the shoulder beneath. He hardly hears her terrifying scream over the hammer of his heartbeat, and surely that’s for the best-- there’s no room for fear now. If he were to let in just a little of it, he would falter; if he faltered here and now, he could very well die.
Quick as a viper, fluid as water, she pulls her body back and lashes forward with her teeth in one smooth motion. Instinctively he’s on the defensive, releasing his clamped teeth and swinging his head away. Her teeth graze the side of his neck, almost breaking the skin. A near miss, well worth the cost of losing his grip on her flesh-- despite the analgesia of adrenaline, his shoulder is already aching from her first attack.
Not wasting a moment, Dune swings his head back to face her, rears up, and strikes out with his hooves. It is not a very elegant attack (remember: his only strategy was to finish the fight as quickly as possible) and as such he is not concerned with precision. Aligned as they are, his hooves are poised to land on her chest or left shoulder. Regardless of which way she moves, he’s likely to land a blow somewhere, and at this point that’s good enough for him. He is careful to lean to the right as his legs return to the ground, in an attempt to keep some weight off his wounded side. This won’t make a huge difference, but it’s all he can do at the moment to prevent further pain and damage to his shoulder.
Summary: More brief commentary on how Dune is having way more fun that he thought he would. When Amaunet attacks he lets go of her shoulder to swing his head away. Her teeth scrape his neck to his great relief-- he'd rather avoid pain, thank you very much. Taking advantage of their closeness, he then rears up and strikes out with his front hooves. It's a bit clumsy and not very targeted, he'll be happy to land a hit anywhere. He's starting to really feel her first attack and just wants to end the fight.
There is a moment, before the gong, where she fluctuates between something civilized and something monstrous, grotesque and hungry (so, so hungry). There is a memory of dust and iron hanging on the back of her teeth when she scrapes her tongue against the ivory. Every drop of her blood hums like a tuning fork struck against a bell-chime. The gold of her gaze turns molten, and furious, and more like a solar flare than a look.
She snarls with teeth, and a spit, and blood dotted on her lips like embedded rubies.
I could devour you, that look of teeth, rubies, and spit says, and you would beg me for the blackness of my touch.
Her wings rise, rise, rise at her sides as he pulls away. Her shadow stretches long, and low, and of a black as thick and dark as oil. That looks waivers between language, fury, and a wrath deep as the sea. The bone of her jaw aches as her teeth drag arcane lines down the muscles of his neck. And the look in his eyes, that hint of darkness calling her home, sends her careening over the cliff side of memory.
By the time he turns to rear she is already curling her wings forward like twin scythes. Her body curls backward with the movement. Dust billows around them, turning her glow to sunset instead of solar flare. His hooves find only feathers instead of flesh. Feathers flutter down around their hooves and land in a pattern that will haunt her dreams. The wounds on her shoulder ache with the force of her movement and she welcomes the sting and burn. It settles her from the cliff side and bleats lamb-like against her hunger.
Whatever is left of the monster she's almost become, blinks and retreats as the gong vibrates deep into her aching bones.
But when the dust settles, and they pull away from each other, their shadows still stretch long and low to meet each other. Her golden gaze still flickers and flashes like a solar flare reaching for a star-dream. And her smile still speaks of teeth, and rubies, and spit.
Summary: For a moment she forgets that this fight is supposed to be a civilized match between the two of them, testing courage and mettle instead of blood lust. It is only warning gong that settles her fury (and hunger). Amaunet is already pulling away and curling her wings towards him (and in front of her like a shield) as he rears. His strike finds feathers instead of flesh, and while her wings is damaged it's the ache and blood loss from her previous wounds that really effects her. She pulls away as the gong signaling the end of their fight rings, but her smile is nothing sweet, or gentle. It's a promise.
When the gong rings, Dune’s body is flooded with relief.
He did not particularly like this place. Feathers and dust, sweat and blood. Consequences. Pain. Pain that would linger day after day, so unlike the pain and the death in dreams, which vanished behind the open eyes as shadows to the drawn curtains. “I don’t belong here,” the boy thinks to himself as his shoulder throbs. But Amaunet smiles with blood in her teeth-- his blood-- and her shadow reaches for his with the hunger of a jealous lover.
And he knows with a certainty that scares him that whether this match was won or lost, he’ll be back again.
Dune does not smile back at the great Amaunet. He’ll kick and punch and bite the mysterious woman, but he is not so bold as to smile. Wary as a stray cat, careful not to make eye contact with the frothing crowd, he turns and exits the ring to await the results-- and to claim his coin for participation.
@Amaunet a quick closer! this was fun (ish?) and I love her <3
The gong is still echoing in her ears like a roaring sea of steel. The sounds makes it almost easy to forget the ache of her wounds and the patterns of her feathers strewn around her like leaves in autumn. She wonders if they could consider it a forfeit if she lunged forward again to pick off pieces of his flesh. Would they stop her? Would they only bellow again for more blood, more violence, more gluttony as Solterrans are oft to?
Surely one bit of him for each feather of hers in the dirt is a fair price to pay.
When she turns it is by halves-- one wing curling towards him like a claw and the others towards the crowd like a banner of furious flight. Between the two she seems a thing strained between civility and wildness. The blood curling a half moon below her eyes and the lines of it painted on her from the battle shines the color of fire. She smiles below the fire-shine and each of her teeth are just bones, mortal and fragile beneath the feral glow of her chaos.
When he goes, as hounds do into the silence and the dark, Amaunet laughs and takes to the skies.
Only those who know her well will notice the wavering weakness of her mighty wings. Only they might notice way her glow seems duller, and duller, and duller as her blood drops on the crowd like holy rain.
Amaunet does not make it far before she has to land. But it is enough to know that to the crowd she seemed more god than girl in the wake of battle.
Creativity: originality, imagination, and attention to detail.
Realism: mechanics and whether you accurately reflect your health and attack
Overall writing: creativity, realism, and writing mechanics (spelling, grammar, punctuation, run-on sentences, etc.)
FIRST POST (intro)
Honestly my first thought was “poor Dune”. I like this as an intro post, his reaction to the matched fight (and his reasoning for being there in the first place.) A good post to set the stage, and it read pretty clearly. No standouts.
SECOND POST
Defensive: Considering she’s taller than him and stronger than him and more experienced than him, I think this is a pretty realistic move for him. Since it’s not a true block I’m not spending much time on it (but having dealt with fistulous withers in real life I think him protecting that area was an A+ decision).
Offensive: I always like when dodges and attacks are sort of played into the same move, like you did here; again since Dune isn’t much of a fighter (and you’ve already described as being able to take beatings better than he can give them), this seems like a solid move for him to make. It may not be the most creative or extravagant move but your writing is what gives it that extra oomf to draw the reader into it and keep things moving.
Mechanics: A couple of repetitive words like beautiful and downward used multiple times in the same sentences; but overall it reads pretty well! I like that he’s thinking ahead instead of acting on brutality alone like Amaunet; considering he’s outmatched in terms of experience (both literal EXP and IC experience as a fighter), I think he’s doing a good job of making this fight a little more even rather than just a beating.
Notes: “as her teeth sink into meaty flesh” quote of the season material
THIRD POST
Defensive: I really, really appreciate the realism in this block, I know it can be tempting to just write your character dancing lithely away or transforming into some acrobat, but I think this played very well to Dune’s character. I also loved the instinctive play into it.
Offensive: Ahh there was substance to this attack! Very easy to imagine what he’s trying to do (and also why he would be trying it). There’s a couple of nods back to his intro post which I appreciated, and the consistency between his analysis of the fight/thinking ahead has been nice to see.
Mechanics: A couple of awkwardly worded statements (“Dune is pure focus on the fight at hand” being the main one), but overall there isn’t much for me to pick apart!
Notes: I felt like this post was lacking a little bit of the flare and fluidity from your first two posts; it was more focused on his actions than his internal processing of the fight. That being said it was nice to see him slipping into a sort of battle-lust, not something I was expecting him to discover in this fight but really nice to see him working through it.
FOURTH POST (closer)
I feel like this post was a bit at odds with his previous one to be honest, it leaves me questioning whether he wants to be back or not since you’ve stated that he both found a new part of himself here but disliked it. But overall it was a really nice, short and sweet closer that completed the story for him.
Creativity: originality, imagination, and attention to detail.
Realism: mechanics and whether you accurately reflect your health and attack
Overall writing: creativity, realism, and writing mechanics (spelling, grammar, punctuation, run-on sentences, etc.)
FIRST POST
Defensive: N/A.
Offensive: At first I was thinking that I expected a little more flare from her with her reputation as a prized fighter - but honestly it’s how you write the attack/her fury/her ferocity that makes it stand out. The idea of her shoving him to his knees feels more like wrestling to me, which seems odd for horses? But also we write them drinking from wine glasses and stuff haha. So her forcing him to submit seems like a very in-character thing for someone used to winning to do.
Mechanics: A couple small typos (“she races towards him in a strange mix and flight and charge”) and awkward wordings that made me do a double take. But overall the writing is fast-paced and reads quickly, which helps set the mood of the post.
Notes: I do like that you’ve both included the crowd/setting into your posts (usually that’s forgotten in battles), and how you’ve capitalized on their character differences.
SECOND POST
Defensive: I thought this part played true to her character, being surprised that he didn’t immediately submit to her like others may have; again since this isn’t a true block I won’t spend much time on it, but I thought it was worthy of note still.
Offensive: I had to read the summary to understand what her attack was; then I had to reread that bit in the post to make sense of it. I wish there had just been a little more description (it being a single line made it easier to glance over and not register as being an “attack”; that being said, since it was a pretty straight forward attack I can see why it’d be hard to focus much writing on.) Same notes as your first attack, your writing is what gives it the extravagance it needs to keep the reader’s interest.
Mechanics: A couple of inconsistencies (“dewdrop gold instead of sun-golden”, slid instead of slide, or awkward punctuation places) but honestly I don’t think I would notice them much if I wasn’t looking out for them. It breaks the flow up a little bit but again the fast-paced writing carries through that and sets the rhythm for the post.
Notes: I kind of feel like your writing is playing off of Rae’s, like you’re both matching each other’s general prose. Dune describes the crowd’s reaction to him, then Amaunet describes the crowd’s reaction to her; Dune describes how he’ll remember the fight later, then Amaunet describes how she’ll think back on the fight. It makes it read more like a story and brings another level of intrigue, which I appreciated. Also, this last line in your summary “At this point she's worried less about grace and more about suffering” was really good, and I kind of wish there was more of a nod to that in the post itself, since I’m not sure I really got that point at all from the writing.
THIRD POST
Defensive: Every part of this nods to her experience as a pit fighter, and how much more agile she is over him (which normally might have made me second guess it since EXP wise they’re pretty similar, but every post leading up to this has highlighted their differences in experience).
Offensive: Again I wasn’t entirely sure what her move was meant to be here haha, but I like that her attack and dodge were written into the same move. Using her wings was a really good move that I liked to see.
Mechanics: The first paragraph might have been a little choppy, but I couldn’t pick apart the rest if I tried.
Notes: Honestly this was my favorite of your posts in this thread; for the most part it was an easy read through and nothing made me pause or lose focus.
FOURTH POST (closer)
I love that this post continues the story from before; it provides a fitting end to the battle.
Closing Remarks: I have to laugh when i think back on the irony of these two being matched; but I really like that neither of you shied away from their differences, but embraced it and made that the point of the battle. Good job!
Proof of dice rolls can be found in the #contests channel on Novus' discord (07/10/2020 @ 1:48 PM PST)
@amaunet wins.
All damage taken in the thread is still applicable and cannot be retconned!
Participate in a Battle or Challenge: +1 EXP to dune, +1 EXP to Amaunet
Win a Battle: +1 additional EXP to Amaunet
Total: +2 EXP to Amaunet, +1 EXP to Dune
Both characters' official experience has been updated to reflect these changes, so there's no need to post in the Experience Updates thread!
