The Osiris Open 2017: Round 2 (Revenant vs Warpath)

It was known as Ragnarok; a relic from thousands of years ago, before the age of man.

The celestial winds sent ripples across the surface of a thin layer of water that spanned the once dusty floor of this gladiatorial arena of the ancients. This magnificent building was roughly elliptical in shape, measuring by estimation a hundred and eighty metres wide and a hundred and fifty six in diameter.

One couldn't help but marvel at the architecture.The building stood on a base of two marble steps; above it there were three floors of arcades and even a fourth storey without arches but with small rectangular windows. There were eighty arches on every floor, divided by pillars with a half column of purest white.

The order of the ground floor half columns was one never seen before - divided by flat composite lesenes in place of the half-columns of the lower arcades, with a rectangular window every second panel. A series of bronze shields was affixed all around the attic on the panels between the windows.

All around the sandy arena floor there was a wall called podium, about ten feet high, whose scanty remains did not allow for a precise reconstruction. During fights, one can imagine the arena covered with yellow sand taken from the surrounding hills.

The structure known as Ragnarok jutted defiantly from the sands, ageless and proud. Standing just over four stories tall and made of smooth unblemished marble, William could believe that it had been built solely as a gesture of defiance against the withering sun which battered ineffectively against the structure from high overhead. By Haida, for all he knew the original creators had built it for just that reason. The few scholars that studied the place all agreed that it had been built before the age of men, though even the long lived elves of Raiaera knew nothing of its creators. But whatever its original purpose had been, Ragnarok had become known as a place where great fighters met to do battle, an arena of legend. That reputation was all that William cared about, and it was what had drawn him across the vast, empty wasteland.

Waves of heat rippled from the marble steps as William approached Ragnarok’s base, some caused by the intense glare of the bright sun, and some caused by the aura of heat surrounding the revenant. Comfortably safe from the sun’s searing rays in his war form, William had maintained the charred transformation throughout the entire three week journey to the monolith. He hadn’t seen another living soul in all that time, human or otherwise, but there was no denying that he was right to come here. Something had reached out to from Ragnarok, an indelible calling which dragged him to this place of strife.

The smooth marble clicked beneath the bone carapace on his feet as William mounted the dais and entered Ragnarok’s main floor. He gazed at the ancient podium wall in the center of the plaza and the water surrounding it, somehow unaffected by the dry desert weather. The air hung heavy with ancient magic, patient and waiting.

Ragnarok had called, and William had answered.

Flint’s mind drifted in a space between contemplation and dream, occupied with a fantastically vivid memory while simultaneously aware of his blustery surroundings.

Today he stood implacable and still on the upper deck of his airship, alone in meditation amidst the sweltering wind and the oppressive sun. Two days ago he sat in the company of a small child on the rooftop of a building in Ettermire, at chilliest sunset. Both moments existed for him at once, playing out in parallel, neither any more or less vivid than the other. The only thing that separated the present from recollection was the foreknowledge afforded to one experience and not to the other. He knew how the conversation would play out with the child. He didn’t know what awaited him in the desert.

The dusk air played over his exposed shoulders, teasing the hairs there to stand on end. He ignored it, but the child could not. She scooted closer to him, so that her shoulder pressed against his side. “We can go inside,” he told the little elf.

She shook her head stubbornly, staring out over the limitless expanse of city skyline arrayed before them. Steam and smoke mingled, billowing from the factories and the stacks in unending white-and-grey exhalations. The pair was high up enough that they could see over the clouds and the fumes, see the city lights rendered into a golden, hazy glow below, and at the same time see the brightest stars sparkling above. The sun, low on the horizon now, was behind them. He understood this about her: she did not want to see the city from the streets ever again. She wanted to be above it all - free from the oppressive smog and the cruelty it concealed from the eyes of gods.

Dark elves were not kind to their high elf cousins, and less so to their children...and doubly cruel to those children that display some aptitude for magic even here, hundreds of miles from Raiaera.

The pair sat in silence for a long moment. Flint’s forearms were rested across his knees. He dwarfed the child beside him, but thought that her potential power and value far outweighed his. His destructive capacity was as nothing to her unique abilities: foreknowledge, sight into the future. Her tiny fingertips could trace the myriad skeins of fate, and deftly.

He was her protector now, her guardian, but only because she had chosen it as the best eventuality for herself. For now. He, in turn, made himself good company and an eager audience for her, in case she deigned to guide him on his way as she sometimes did. He felt like he was on a tightrope: to be a parent but not a jailer, to value her as a person and not merely for her magical insights; to make use of her predictions without becoming dependent on her, to be present for those moments of clarity without pressuring her for them. He had many orphans and outcasts in his care, and many special ones, but none so integral to his success as Aetena.

“It’s not so ugly up here,” she told him. “It’s like when I see everything, instead of just what’s going on in the right-now.”


He nodded. She’d told him this before. “I know,” he said. And, not for the first time: “But the present matters. What you say and do, and when you say and do it.”

She didn’t say anything for another long moment. Then, she gave a big sigh.

“You have to go fight again,” she said at last. “He’s a scary human, but he’s not really human anymore. He’s full of fire.”

He looked down at her. She was making every effort not to look at him. He knew this meant that she was afraid he would ask questions, and that there were answers she could not give him, lest she change the outcome of what she had foreseen. He mulled this over.

“Is he far away?”

She nodded, and pointed. “That way, in the airship, for days. You have to leave tomorrow.”

Flint opened his eyes, and glared against the sudden flare of midday sun and heat. A desert stretched out below, broken only by a white marble structure rising ageless from the sand. Despite the unimaginable eons through which it had endured, the heat and wind and sand had not diminished the edifice, except perhaps to strip any colors that might have originally softened the glare off those unyielding pillars.

The airship was steadily descending toward the thing. Flint peeled his shirt off over his head and tossed it to the deck. He undid the laces on his boots and then kicked them away. He lifted a water skin and dumped a generous portion over his head, washing the sweat off of his naked scalp, and then he drank down whatever remained.

And then, with a running start, he leapt from the deck of the airship and fell with his limbs spread wide.

His head, chest, and back were dry by the time the battering wind relinquished him, and he landed heavily in the sand amidst a tremendous cloud tossed skyward by his impact. His body, enhanced beyond its apparent humanity, found his terminal velocity a simple thing to survive. The sand he trudged through wanted to scald the bottoms of his bare feet, but the pain was minimal. The marble steps, too, were not friendly to the touch. It was a relief from mild discomfort when he entered the building and stepped down into a thin layer of cool water. His toes were barely submerged in it.

The brute rolled his prodigiously muscled shoulders and strode into the arena. Fate awaited him within: hell all bottled up in a human shape, as foretold by a little girl who could - he knew - be sending him to an ignoble death.

The arrival of the airship drew William from a trance-like study of Ragnarok's cool marble interior. Since arriving, the revenant had spent his time memorizing every facet of the structure. His destructive enlightenment had shown William a dozen ways he could exploit the structure's minute flaws to bring the artifact tumbling down around him. It wasn't surprising to find that those flaws were few. Ragnarok had, after all, stood for countless years. Unmolested, it would stand for countless more.

One thing he had taken note of was that Ragnarok's builders had seen fit to not only weave an enchantment on the structure to ward off the ravages of time, but to also control the building's interior climate. The hot desert breeze that whipped across the sands outside were being magically stopped from crossing Ragnarok's threshold. In its place, a magically generated cool wind circulated which kept the arena pleasantly refreshing. It reminded William of the opulently high-end hotels in Radasanth that would have employees to churn giant fans behind massive blocks of ice in the summer to keep the hotel's common spaces and suites chilled.

It struck William as quirky that Ragnarok's builders would build an arena that would compel fighters to try to kill one another, but that it would also make sure that they weren't in any discomfort as they did so. Perhaps they'd figured that fighting in a sweatbox would cut down on the bloodshed? Perhaps the surrounding area had turned from a temperate forest into a blasted wasteland in the years since Ragnarok's construction? Or it could just have been that the builders had been so far removed from humanity that William was incapable of understanding them? Whatever the reason, William put the thoughts out of his mind as a bullish man leapt from the airship and dropped heavily into the sands.

William supposed that this man was the opponent that Ragnarok had chosen for him. Like the structure, William studied the man as he approached, letting his destructive enlightenment take the man's measure. From the look of him, William judged that the man was Salvaran, though he'd never met anyone from Salvar who was either as tanned or as thick as this man. Though he stood roughly the same height as William, his opponent had to have an extra hundred pounds lean muscle on him. Not that more muscle translated to more strength, necessarily. William's own enhanced strength was enough that his charred claws could tear through steel like it was soft cheese.

Still, the rippling of corded muscle under the man's skin told William that this contest wouldn't be a stroll in the park. Furthermore, his enlightenment saw that the man's muscles had a coating of some form of organic armor. Tough yet flexible, the man's own body was its own protection, and one that wouldn't hinder him like a suit of armor would. Coupled with the inhuman grace that the man displayed as he moved and William knew that the man he faced was no simple bruiser.

William took up his obsidian warscythe and marched down to the water to meet his opponent. The pool's cool stillness shattered as his aura of heat caused the thin layer of water to sizzle and hiss where it touched him. As is in reply, William felt a surge of excitement well up within him. Regeneration could rid his body of the strain caused by marching across burning desert sands for days on end, but nothing had been able to rid him of the tedium that came with it. This man, however, seemed to have some promise. Hopefully his death wouldn't be too quick.

Knowing how far his burning aura extended, William stopped a dozen feet away from the bulky Salvaran. The old urge to simply leap at the man surfaced briefly within him but he clamped it down. Why end this quickly when he could take his time and enjoy it?

"My name is William Arcus and it looks like I'm supposed to kill you." It surprised William to hear just how well his voice carried around the open structure, even as dry and raspy as it was with disuse. "Will you give me your name before we start, or do you just want to get straight to it?"

Aetena’s description of the creature had been simple, but apt. It was a walking lava flow, char-cracked skin hinting at the smoldering inferno within. And it spoke.

Flint’s eyes flicked from the creature’s face to the water complaining at its feet, and then back to its face again. This was not the first time he’d been asked his name before something tried to kill him, but the question was no less confounding. Did it wish to humanize him before it tortured and killed him? Did it consider its killer instinct a burden, a mental parasite it had to feed, and itself noble in its own suffering? Would knowing his name make the killing tragic and the killer nobler?

Flint sucked on his teeth so that he made a sharp clicking sound, and then he spoke. “I am called Flint.”

He turned at the hips, and then took a cautious step off to one side. When the creature didn’t attack, he took another, curling his bare toes into the sediment beneath the water, eyeing the structures beyond the charred man's shoulder. His eyes never stopped searching the creature’s face. He abandoned the attempt to find recognizable humanity in its molten eyes. He hoped his knowledge of human physiology still applied - that he would recognize the tell-tale shift of weight that preceded attack. Did it need muscle to move, or did it operate on magical principles he could not guess at? Did it have bones? Could he break them?

And what happened to it? Magic, obviously. But did it do this to itself? Was it an Ignus; another pyromaniac with magical talent that embraced the flame too tight, heedless of self preservation?

Flint risked another glance over its body. It didn’t seem to be in the agony such a state suggested. Safest to assume, Flint decided, that its nerves were burnt away and that pain was no useful avenue to him.

At last, the underking stopped his pacing and sighed. “I find that I am difficult to kill, William Arcus,” he said. “I do not think I will dissuade you from trying, however. Let us find out, together, if you hold the means to do what many others could not.”

And then Flint rocked back on his heels, stretching his back and shoulders outward, and then flung himself forward in a thundering, breakneck charge, each footfall kicking up towers of murky water in his wake.

"Flint," the word whispered through William's cracked lips. The name made him smile further, jagged teeth gleaming in the dazzling light. It was ironic that Ragnarok was using a fire starting tool to draw living fire into a conflict. Cosmic irony had always been funny to the revenant.

He watched Flint slowly circle, taking William's measure. He was wary, William saw it in his movements, but he was not skittish. It would have been easy for either of them to simply jump to the part where they fought, or for one of them to wait for an ambush in one of the soaring arcades. But that wasn't the way of true warriors, the warriors that Ragnarok craved. Now that both men had introduced themselves and sized one another up, the real contest could begin.

When it came, it came fast. From the moment he'd first seen Flint leap from the airship William knew that how it would be. This was a brash man who faced his problems head on. Problems would be met with stubborn, forceful resistance and if they remained after, another solution could be found. William felt a certain kinship with the man. No wonder Ragnarok had drawn them together.

The instant Flint surged forward, spraying water high behind him, William made his own move. Supernatural power flooded William's veins, infusing him with a speed that no normal human could hope to match. And yet Flint's massive frame not only matched William's speed, he surpassed it. The big man's speed wasn't too much greater than William, but the difference was definitely clear.

The dozen feet between the two combatants vanished in the blink of an eye. Since he was faster than William, the revenant made the split-second decision that he needed to test Flint's abilities further before simply clashing their strength together. William dodged toward the center of the pool, where the high podium wall stood. He twisted as he did so, transferring his warscythe to his left hand and brining the long-hafted polearm around in an arc that snapped through the air so fast that the air whistled across its razor edge. The blade dropped as it shot towards Flint, angling towards the brawler's legs. The man had a powerful reach and an armored hide, but how much good would that do if William cut him off at the knees?

This thread is now closed for judging.

Osiris Open 2017 Round 2:
Revenant Vs Warpth: Raganrok

Combat:

Revenant: 21/30

Strategy:
Heading into the arena straight in Revanant's war form certain helps. It gives a good example of using your best strengths to your advantage. He takes time to ask the name of his enemy, and reacts well when the first hit comes. There is cleverness in his brain, and this showed in the tactical comments you have William make about the raw strength and energy of Flint. The only real criticism is that it did not have as much of an impact as Warpath's writing in this particular section.

Resourcefulness:
I did not see much resource using in combat itself, unlike Flint falling from the airship, though William does take in clear consideration of the structure of Ragnarok and how that can be used to his advantage. This definitely here could be a hint of what would lead into a very powerful thread, wherein setting would be used brilliantly by your writing.

Execution:
With the focus on fire you have comments such as about William's aura, and how that would effect others. You have a calm consideration of Flint and assessment of the situation – before the fight truly begins which is a wise move on your character's part. Flint's actions speak of his personality a little more rawly though, and I felt you could do some things to reflect the war-like prowess of William, but perhaps this would have been seen later on in the thread.

Warpath: 22/30

Strategy:
You begun the story beautifully, with the vision of Flint and Aetena showing what was to happen. It gave him a form of reason join the battle, because he is quite literally told it will occur. From this he goes to the battlefield (post 5) and throws himself right at William. It shows a brutish manner of simple 'charge in and get it done' which can work, and gave focus. The questions also that make up part of post 5 from Flint about what William is shows strategy on Flint's own side. For what it was, it was good, it was only a shame there was not time to finish.

Resourcefulness:
There was a great set of scenes of Flint falling dramatically into the battle field, and then getting up. This really was your moment of resourcefulness for this battle, in getting out of the airship. For your character it fits well. You also have Flint using Atena's ability to some extent in knowing what William was going to be like, although more details of this perhaps could have been added slightly, as you have an excellent opportunity there with her.

Execution:
With your character's primary abilities focused on raw strength, endurance and general survivability, you show a good natural way of fighting and reacting, by simply having him running in that makes entire sense. With the inability to make much comment on the exchange of blows there is not much this judge can say in terms of the battle overall, but you did have Flint react to William's first cries and questions. In terms of execution this marks it out as a powerful start.

Character:

Revenant: 22/30

Communication:
Though there is very little communication from William directly you make a point of this in post 4 with: “dry and raspy as it was with disuse”. When William does speak it is to the point and focused, with only a few words. This seems to suit his personality well. It would have been good perhaps to see some internal monologue, or thought which can be seen more with Flint's own questioning, that may have given more picture to William, but this is something that has a great foundation.

Action:
There is confidence in the way that William moves, with his “march” towards Flint on them meeting at the battlefield. You have some good basic actions, but tend to focus a lot more on persona than anything in terms of character. Some things could be described as action, such as William's look at various items, but overall there is the feeling that there was something missing in this thread. Even though it picks up in post 6, with the eerie smile at the start, and you have some good focused actions, and we did not see the rest of the thread this reader did feel that more direct actions could have helped.

Persona:
In post 4 you remark, “his destructive enlightenment had shown William a dozen ways he could exploit the structure's minute flaws,” which shows to the reader not only William's power but also his intelligence. It shows part of his personality and his way of thinking, done with strong language use. This is one example of excellent persona use, for which you have a great skill, and though it would have been good to see more of a balance with communication with action this is very much one of your strongest abilities.

Warpath: 23

Communication:
The communication given in this, though un-ended battle, was constant in tone and in presence in terms of a character, with moments of silence and wise words. With communication you develop the relationship between Artena and Flint well, showing what the dynamics of it are. Overall there is not enough communication in this thread to truly be able to see the extent of true skill, but what you give is raw. Subtler communication techniques such as shrugs and so on are also ones to consider besides silences, going on from this.

Action:
There is a genuine remark of the power and confidence that Flint has, when he falls from the airship and gets up again in a “simple” movement in post 3 that shows off your character's personality well. This is continued with mentions of “glances” over his body (post 5) that your character does, which shows the effect of more subtle actions and what use they can be. This confidence is shown further in running at William directly, and although it would have been good to see your actions written with stronger technique, they certainly made an impact.

Persona:
Directly from the start of the thread you have the reader be introduced to the inner workings of Flint. Him as a person, with his thought processes and an indication of what is important to him is done very well and introduces him wonderfully into the thread. There is a excellent continuation of this also, as there are open questions with: “Did it have bones? Could he break them?” that Flint asks the general audience, or himself. There is view of a kind, gentle, father-like figure, but also a warrior. In two small threads you deftly construct a very good persona.

Prose:

Revenant: 23

Mechanics:
Mechanics is strong and with no noticeable spelling mistakes. There were lots of correct use of comma and periods. One thing that might be good to look at from here is going into the use of more prolific punctuation (elipses etc) but what you had was technically correct and well-structured.

Clarity:
Affecting Clarity to some extent, I would have liked to see William's war form described a little more than just “charred”. Though it was a passing comment, it was rather unclear as to how it was different from his 'normal' body. This is not an issue, however, when it gets to the main body of text and the understanding of the action sequences and the general plot. You write in a smooth, harmonious manner that gives no need for confusion.

Technique:
Technique is one of your greatets assets. You open well, with a powerful, impactful first post, ending with, “Ragnarok had called, and William had answered.” This has real strength within it and displays a good hold on the introductory side of the battle, which is always very important in making a first good impression. Although, as a general note, it would have been good to see more linguistic techniques (similie, alliteration etc) you have a powerful word choice and structure to bring your scenery to life (see setting). One focus to see good examples of this is post 4, where I was impressed by your use of phrases such as, “rippling of corded muscle.”

Warpath: 21

Mechanics:
Very similarly to Revanant, there were no major, recognisable issues with spelling or sentence structure. Paragraphing was gone correctly, with only a couple of places that could have had commas in, but it was not necessary. Use was made of hyphenation (post 5) which was strong, and more of this type of technique will only make your writing stronger.

Clarity:
There are some clarity issues in your first post, in moving from the scene back in time to the “current”. At the start it is clear but when you have Flint come to Ragnarok itself. It is punctuated by “Flint opened his eyes” (post 1) however the tenses are the same, (past perfect) for both. Aside from this your writing goes on to continue with a well written, understandable plot and pace.

Technique:
Technique was done well overall, although did feel a little lacking in places. In post one you write, “... toward the thing” where a better word could have been chosen for “thing”. That being said it is proceeded by a glorious description of, “Despite the unimaginable eons through which it had endured, the heat and wind and sand had not diminished the edifice,” using an excellent example of run on sentence to illustrate Ragnarok well. You have a good sense of imagery, with a continuation of fire-like words (“inferno” etc) for talking about William that is continued through the thread. Overall there was chance to make use of other techniques such as simile and metaphor, but in the short space of time you made good use of this section.


Wildcard:

Revenant: 7

Warpath: 6

In terms of setting the scene, Revanant you won there. The setting was described so beautifully (see technique) that I felt there definitely was scope to add extra points. Use of the intial description given, and then expanding upon it worked very well for you.

For sheer base story telling, Warpath you did remarkably well here. I was very impressed how you wove together a really impactful introduction even in just the two posts that you had, and really would like to know more of what happens.

Final Comment:
This was a very hard battle to find a winner for, you both wrote so well here. Genuinely I struggled in comments, in overall sheer genius of some of the writing here. Thank you for a really good read!

Final Score:

Revenant: 73

Warpath: 72

Revenant wins and goes through to Round 3.

Rewards:

As per with the rules of the Osiris Open, all rewards are based on a score of 65.

Revanant receives:
600 EXP
40 GP

Warpath receives:
315 EXP
30 GP

Warpath forfeits his GP win as per rules of the Osiris Open.

Rewards have been added.