Shadar vs Homunculus

[Abomination]

I'm using a previous post from an abandoned battle if you don't mind. All bunnying by both parties is approved.

Were Homun destined to have come here before, he would've found himself a different sort of anticipation. When he approached the monks, he was told that he was in luck. There was an opening for a Warrior spot, since the previous occupant of that rank had vanished with a challenge yet to be answered. The Homunculus remembered seeing a name as he was coming here, the news of a new Grandmaster in town named Teric Bloodrose. The name was familiar to him, and in the dull void of his mind any spark of interest became an immense source of anticipation.

"Not yet," said the monk, endangering his own life with those words. "To get to the Grandmaster, you must first go through the ranks."

Homun didn't understand. He glared at the monk, his hands twitching as if he could snap at the monk at any moment.

"What I mean is... the ranks are like doors. You have to go through one door to get to the other. The Grandmaster is behind the last door."

That made more sense. He was guided to the first arena. He was lead into a stone room, and once he was in the center of it the monk told him to wait and left. Two purple fluorescent lights clung to the ceiling above him, and the gray stone cracked when he stomped his foot onto it. It felt like any sufficient force would cause entire chunks of it to shatter. The only other source of light was through the thick, stone doorway, which was going to close once Homun's opponent entered. Once the door locks in place, the only way to open it was from the outside. Gas would start seeping into the room; poisonous gas with a myriad of harmful effects. Homun wasn't exactly aware of any of this, since he decided to come here before the monks were finished speaking. He wasn't aware that he could've picked some sort of other arena.

Waiting was now easy for him. He looked up at the lights, their deceptive glow told them they were weak. Not noticing the footsteps in the hallway, he continued staring upwards.

[Shadar]

"Hiya!" the small boy belted as he cast his line out over the water of Valeena Lake. An expectant moment later, the baited hook broke the surface and birthed bright ripples of noonday sun.

"Good luck, kiddo," his father chuckled as he reclined on the bank and tipped his hat over his eyes. "Wake me when you catch somethin' impressive." The ripples hadn't even settled when he began snoring.

The boy hummed one of mother's lullabies as he waited, his eager eyes wandering the mirror-smooth lake. There was not enough wind to even caress the surface. Though, unbeknownst to the boy, there should have been at least one distortion at the moment. Near the middle, directly below a spot where there was clearly not a bursting field of air bubbles, there were two bodies on the sandy bottom.

They sat back to back, one with his limbs splayed and his black coat falling open to show the bone white and very soaked sweater, and the other curled in on herself, her earthy-plumed wings wrapped about her like a shield.

"You okay?" Shadar asked. No air escaped him open mouth, as though he hadn't really spoken. The sound was real enough though, distorting its way through the water to reach his partner's ears. He leaned back, almost losing his short silver hair in the floating billow of the harpy's fiery red.

Stiffening her neck, Brigitte replied with the poise of a dedicated warrior, "Yes!" in the same airless speech.

Too bad it sounded more like a timid squawk than anything, especially coming from such a fiercely strong face; a face to put those fabled Amazons to shame. He couldn't fault her for it, though. Compared to the way she had capered about in a frenzy during the last rainstorm, she was enduring amazingly. Twisting his head, he watched the feathers on her shoulder sway in the current like golden kelp. It must have been far worse than the dampness of the rain, but she barely showed any sign of her fraying nerves, and they undoubtedly were.

"Are you sure this wasn't Jackal's idea?" she asked suspiciously. Her head twisted just enough for him to see the annoyed crinkle alongside her nose.

The frustration has to go somewhere, Shadar thought with a shrug before wiping the humor from his voice and responding.

Jackal beat him. "I wish! I'd make it better. We'd get rid of all your phobias at once, or watch as you go batshit crazy!" A wicked smile shone from the purple-muzzled face that suddenly appeared over them. Wrathful fire burned in those eyes, illuminating the disembodied jackal head like a nauseating pinata.

Brigitte hissed and jerked her wings upward to wave the mocking face away. But, with the sudden rush of sensation as feathers twisted in the languid resistance, she curled back in around herself dejectedly.

"Stop it," her half-elf guardian grumbled. He blinked the projection away, forcing the dream demon back into his home sweet home, Shadar's own skull. It wasn't an arrangement he had volunteered for, but life likes to plant burs in your ankles like that.


She's doing great. It's hard to believe that something with so much self-control could have been created by you of all people.

Jackal's response rang in his skull, though it was interesting to feel the sensation underwater, kind of dizzying too. It's just cause she's got you to cling to, lover boy. The bird fetish isn't normal, you know? Could be a sign of bigger problems.

You're the only problem, Shadar snapped.

Then, he pushed the demon farther into that scarred crevice of his brain. A taunting buzz still reached him, though, so he set his mind to the first distraction it could find. How can he say 'lover boy'? We haven't even... The musing crashed, and he realized he had leaned his head back upon Brigitte's shoulder. Was the water getting uncomfortably warm?

Unbothered, Brigitte did the same upon his shoulder, and he strained for a different train of thought to jump to. "Do you ever feel bitter about things?" he asked without thinking.

"Bitter? Like about water resistance training?" she quipped immediately. If she meant it, she still kept her cheek next to his anyway.

"No," Shadar said blandly, though he couldn't help but think, I guess she is picking up my sarcasm. Good girl. Smiling, he continued with the tangent that had been making its rounds in his head for ages. "Like bitter about stupid things in the past." Brigitte shrugged at the same time that she made an inquisitive noise in her throat.

The rant began, tempered by the pleasure at having someone to listen to it. "The Pagoda. I mucked around in that place looking for Yari. Imagine, him being alive again. Heh. It was stupid." He had a flash of his best friend's grave, untouched despite the rumors of the Bandit King returning. With a vicious, churning swipe of one gloved hand, he pushed the image away. "I hated that place, but I left it by losing to some annoying, snooty prick. I heard later that he's a chef. A chef! Those bastard monks are as bad as the Citadel ones, picking a chef over me."

Brigitte brushed her cheek against his as she shifted in the seething silence. "What are you going to do?" she asked, her tone clearly indicating that she would follow. Anywhere.

It's a stupid whim, the demon growled as he burst to the forefront of Shadar's mind again.

Before Shadar could respond, a shimmering light in front of his eyes caught his attention. A hook drifted by, inches from his nose, bearing a curled worm on the usual suicide voyage. With a mischievous smile, Shadar rose his right hand as the water began to swirl around the inky surface of the elbow-length glove. Twenty gold coins lurched out of the fabric at his palm, then melted into the shape of a small but intricate trout. Just before the hook was out of reach, he slammed the trophy down on the barb and watched it skitter along the lakebed with an infectious vigor.

I like whims.

"Dad! Dad! I found the golden fish from the fairy tale!"

The father grumbled awake. Then, he stared, speechless, at the ornament dangling from his son's line. "How...?"

The lake answered with a violent splash as something burst to the surface. The shape resolved for a moment in the spray, two bodies that were nothing but blurs of black and white and silver, dirty gold and fire. Then, they launched themselves toward the city like catapult fodder.

~

Relieved, Shadar stepped through the arena's maw, leaving Brigitte with one of those infuriating monks. Would he take the warning that only Brigitte could heal Shadar wounds? Would he wipe that bloody annoying smile off his face? They had barely exchanged words, but the monk wore his thoughts like a flapping tavern sign. We knew you'd be back.

"Bastards," Shadar grumbled the instant the stone wall slid into place behind him. He only paid half a mind to the arena, because that was all it took. Plain grey stone spread out in all directions, making the room feel like a sealed mausoleum, though most mausoleums didn't have daggers all over the floor. And none would dare have the purple lighting, but that just made it worse. As Jackal's color, it could do nothing good for his mood, especially with the demon yapping again.

You really do hold a grudge.

Don't all immortals?

Only the pansy immortals. Don't know if you're really an immortal like me, but you're definitely a pansy.

Shadar locked his eyes on the pale skinned, blonde haired offering they had served him. Grinning wickedly, he spread his arms to the sides and crunched his fingers as iridescent prevalida veins rose to the surface of his gloves. You know just how to get me in the mood for a fight.

With a very pleasurable smirk, he barked to his opponent. "Hey, wanna help me find something I lost here?" He kept his arms wide, inviting the first attack upon his exposed chest.

[Abomination]

A bright, burning white light. A kind he hadn't seen in a long time. The being with arms outstretched before him looked normal enough, but he had the glow of power. Homun was drawn to this glow like a fly, feeling the urge to go up and touch it. His expression unchanged, he outstretched his right arm in response. While he hadn't noticed it at first, there were actually two glows coming from his opponent. Which one was enveloping the other was impossible to know. The Homunculus licked his lips slowly, his body aching with anticipation.

The door behind Shadar closed, and the clear gas began seeping into the room. The sleeve on Homun's right arm tore itself apart as several arms sprouted from the original, which split into two which split into four. The arms extended, creating their own space, floating in the air like there was a lack of gravity. There were ten of them now coming out of his shoulder, each with their own length, slowing growing longer and longer. The vision of the man before him shook a bit, but it did not deter him. He pulled his arm back, the rest of the grown arms following, and then thrust the tentacled mess forward, each hand turning into a fist.

As the arms flew and stretched through the air, the fists grew larger ever so slightly, so the opponent would see the enlargement as the arms simply coming closer, but the fists would actually double in size by the time they reached him. Due to how spread out they were, every part of Shadar's upper body was being targeted, including some of the space immediately around it. All Homun needed was a touch, a hair, one small bit of genetic data in order to assimilate. However, given Shadar's form and essence, the kind of assimilation that would occur could change Homun forever.

[Shadar]

"Oh fearsome warrior, what is it that you have lost?"

That's what his opponent was supposed to say. He had it planned quite clearly. Then, he'd follow with something cool like, "My pride, and I'm afraid the only place I'll find it is in your corpse." That would have been great. However, given the blonde man's lack of adherence to the script, Shadar had to do some adlibbing of his own.

"Oh sweet golden trout of Heaven," was the not-quite-as-cool line that came from his gapping mouth. The arms just kept coming, and he could do nothing but stare with a face like the aforementioned fish.

That is so cool! Jackal howled, pounding Shadar's head like a drum.

It was enough to break him out of his awed trance just as the deformed monster of a man reared his gargantuan limb back for the strike. Suddenly, the whole pride thing seemed rather petty. More important was Shadar's desire to not experience death by being pulverized and ripped apart by a tower of arms. Would Brigitte even be able to heal him if he were in that many pieces?

When the innumerable arms began their descent, his meager two were already out at his sides, palms to the air. Cool liquid metal leeched from the prevalida-laced fabric, lunging upward into thick, studded hoops that rose just over his head and back down into the stone floor. His circular barbed cage solidified into glistening steel an instant before the fists landed.

In a mighty blast of sound, the cavernous room came alive with echoes of grating steel and crumbling rock, and above that, so distinct that Shadar would carry that sound with him forever, was the horrible meaty explosion of flesh willingly tearing itself apart. Blood and bloody shrapnel splashed down between the bars, blinding him to the stripped bone lances of forearms that stabbed into the gaps.

Then, into him.

He had ducked in response to the crimson wave, but not far enough to avoid the pincushioning of his back. Most of the bones broke upon the chainmail vest under his clothing, but the mythril couldn't cover everything. His shoulder blades and the back of his hips took too many small punctures too fast for him to count. They release a cloud of his dark, misty blood as he flattened himself to the stone.

Blinded with red wreckage and deafened by the screaming of metal under so much weight, he could only guess that he was safe against the floor. His hands told him the opposite, though. The stone was cracking like an ice sheet.

Both of his gloves came up to his eyes and drank away the bloody mask, bringing back to him the sight of his cage. Every inch of the steel had turned crimson. Great globules of meat slid down between the barbs, and the nest of boney quills still reached for him from the top of it. Worse, the base of the cage had already sunken a handspan into the crumbling stone; stone that still groaned and spewed dust upward. In moments, Shadar's impromptu barrier would close on him like an Iron Maiden.

Through the bars, he could see the small humanoid base of the monstrous appendage. He grabbed those bars much as a pleading prisoner would. However, at his touch, the steel rippled and misted into near-transparency. He threw his body through the ghostly bars, gliding just above the ground like a blood soaked bird in panicked flight. Behind him, the cage sank into the stone like a nail, and the spiked head of the fleshy hammer grated out a final note of bone against brittle masonry.

In the sudden silence, Shadar howled with laughter. It was an attack he could never have seen coming. But, he had escaped it with only skin-deep punctures that made a faint cape of dark, gaseous blood behind him. Combined with the red clothing, it was quite the new look. He would have to thank the freak personally.

On his way to do just that, he glided under the trembling tree of limbs in a beeline for their host, and his right hand swept down to the ground and collected the strewn about daggers in a rapidly growing ribbon of metal. Then, as he passed directly under the midway point of the fleshy trunk, he snapped the ribbon up and over it. The steel hardened into a saw blade so thin it warbled audibly, so toothy with daggers it made the violet light dance, and so long that it was only taught against the tentacled mess when it encircled it and fell down the other side, connecting with his left hand.

Shadar twisted his flight path to the side as abruptly as a humming bird, drawing the toothy hoop deep into the arms. He rode the resistance in a wide circle around the trunk, creating a long fan of blood spray that would have soaked him if he wasn't already. With one rotation, the outer limbs had snapped away like stressed guitar strings, and with the second, the core too was shredded. The two halves separated in a gloriously gory eruption and slammed new pits into the floor.

The newly crowned Master of Amputation landed on top of the severed length sporting a delighted, blood-drenched grin. "Is that it?!" he shouted as he flung questioning arms outward. The momentum sent blood spraying from his gloves, droplets that seemed to waver in the air for a second and take on odd, humanoid shapes. But, when he blinked, they were once again normal drops splashing down into the wide crimson pool.

The adrenaline must be getting to me, he thought with more humor than concern.

[Abomination]

It was like a feeling of forced rigidity, his body seized with the pain but unable to react or stop his arms nor their mad rush. His slight grin never faded, but within him he was shocked and immovable. After the barbed wire incident, his arms started retracting but not before they most of his extra limbs were severed by his eccentric opponent. As the remains of his extra arms retracted into his original, he was left with a bloody stump that stopped just short of his shoulder. Huge gobs of flesh fell out of the stump for a few seconds before various flesh stopped it by blocking out the exit.

The lights in the arena dimmed and turned gray, turning anything that moved into the arena as shadowy objects. Homun wanted to stare at his opponent, but he couldn't see him anymore. In fact, all he could see was a large white expanse. The claustrophobic arena had been replaced by a limitless field of light, and he could actually make out an amorphous blob of mythril floating around. A Homunculus usually doesn't dream, so being in such an unrealistic place did not trigger any sense of fantasy, just confusion. As he reached out to the silvery blob, it floated towards him and slowly enveloped his missing arm. When the blob retreated, it left a regenerated arm made entirely of mythril.

Ah, The Void. I have good memories of this place.

Homun looked around lazily, somewhat interested in the source of the voice. It was a fruitless action however, as the voice was coming from inside of him.

Anyway, luckily he can't hear me right now. What I want you to do is leave something here. Rip off an ear or something, I don't care.

The voice knew that after the assimilation, he'd be gone. He was, after all, a temporary manifestation of a dream being. Generally, Homun absorbs the memories and emotions of his targets, but since his target was a compound one, it separated his wills into two. The second will had a much greater grasp on Shadar's history. His abilities, however, were entirely up to Homun, who obliged the request by ripping off his ear and throwing it into the light. The ear grew back immediately, and flesh crept over his new mythril arm and gave it motion.

As soon as he was gone, he was back, still staring at his bloodied opponent. Had he been standing here the whole time or was he really gone? He never dreamed before, so he couldn't know. The figure of his opponent was blurry, and a white wind whistled in his ear the whole time. Oh, his vision wasn't that blurry, it was just that the ground and walls were moving. He looked down and saw little black blurs crawling about his feet. Without even thinking about it, he suddenly started lifting up into the air as if his body was oblivious to gravity.

Attack! Don't let him remove the object from the void!

The thought surged through Homun's head like a painful memory, sending him flying forward through the air. He flew above the bloody, severed hunks of flesh that used to be his extra arms. He took to the opportunity with glee, finally smiling and pulling his newly-formed right arm back. It looked like a normal, fleshy arm, but it was an entirely new weapon now. The second he would get in range of Shadar through flight, he would punch at him and the arm would grow several mythril spikes upon impact. Even if he dodged, it would still grow spikes in an attempt to get him during his dodging. The voice in his head figured that Shadar's greatest weapon was his access to the void, and restricting it would mean certain victory.

[Shadar]

Whoa whoa whoa! There's something else here, Jackal barked as if he had just been splashed. It's not human, or solid, but it's real. It... it just popped out of nowhere! The reverberations in Shadar skull calmed for a moment, then blasted stronger than ever. That guy's got it in his head!

He got a new arm, too, Shadar responded dryly. Whatever the dream demon sensed, it was unimportant. In the blink of an eye, the silent man's shrunken arm had reformed perfectly as it was before, though Shadar caught a faint glimpse of metallic shimmer at first.

However, that oddity was nothing compared to the changes overtaking the arena. Like a sea monster rising from the depths, the surface of the walls and ceiling suddenly split open and lunged outward in the form of thick stone tentacles. The lighting had changed also, now a dull grey where it could shine down at all from amid the writhing ceiling. With the room bathed in shadows, Shadar would barely make out the rippling carpet of bugs that had spawned from the floor.

Then, like a swooping hawk, the pale man fell on him from the darkness. His attack was readable enough, a single punch from one lonely fist. Shadar couldn't help but chuckle as he lifted one hand and caught the impact on freshly spawned buckler., with a surprising amount of concussive pain, on freshly spawned buckler.

Then, the mythril spikes reached around, growing from the newly formed arm as quickly as Shadar could have done from his own. Too surprised to counter, he made an indecent yelp and fell back until his seat and free hand were both against the fleshy stump. Still, the spikes came at him through the dark, dusty air.

However, in the instant that his hand struck the severed flesh, he realized something profound. Everyone he had ever met until now was a puzzle of emotional attachments; their possessions, their weapons, especially their own bodies. That attachment had always barred him from absorbing anything so personal. But, for the huge nest of arms, there was nothing. Their creator had discarded them with as little thought as discarding bodily waste.

All it took was a thought, and the flesh yielded. It opened below Shadar and welcomed his bloody form into its dark embrace, then closed just as quickly. The mythril spikes found nothing but a wall of muscle.

Inside the womb of dying flesh, Shadar's mind worked so frantically that his temples ached. That arm. I could feel the material hidden in it. It was a Void! His gloved hands clenched in the claustrophobic pitch darkness that the prevalida veins could give no light to. But, it couldn't have been mine, even if that mythril felt so much like... He shifted, feeling his mythril chainmail, a deathbed gift from Yari, rubbing against his torso. Good, he sighed with relief. His is so similar, though, even down to the lightweight enchantment. He must have... copied it.

That's it! That's what that second mind must be, a copy of me. Me! Can you believe it? He must have some fucking huge brass balls, or a dozen of 'em, to think he could copy me.

Well, I can be a scavenger, too, Shadar responded with a vengeful smirk. Like a bath drain blown open, the flesh all around him piled into the surface of his gloves, and a burst of grey light welcomed him back to the room of writhing shadows. Distract him, he commanded as he backpedaled through the crunching carpet of beetles and absorbed the remainder of the severed flesh.

From Jackal's portion of his brain, he felt the magic pouring out. It clung to him, rendering a fresh skin of shifting shadows that almost, but not perfectly, mimicked the light coming from amid the tentacles. Then, the energy traveled into the pool of blood, still visible despite the small, black swimmers. Suddenly, humanoid shapes burst up from it. Their skins of dry blood bubbled and spouted bursts of crimson as they, with agility beyond any human, leapt upon the scavenger.

Blood dolls, Jackal said smugly.

Before the immaterial nature of the illusions could be noticed, Shadar cleared the floor of abandoned flesh and jumped upon the ruins of his barbed cage. It was buried deep in the stone, but it still had some space inside despite the horrible deformation. As Shadar mentally sifted through the material that existed in his Void, he pushed his hands down through the bars. In seconds - seconds that sang with the splash of blood and the gristly pops of torn muscle - the interior of the cage was filled with arms. They reached out through the openings, grasping at the air with hideous intent, and at the very heart of their new nest was... a heart, or a crude mockery of one. It lacked the proper form, and barely functioned, but it would sustain the struggling limbs for a few minutes by Shadar's estimation.

The bloody fingers soon found his pant legs, and they began to pull hungrily. "Not me," he chided them as he kicked them away and jumped skyward with all the force that his resistance to gravity would allow him. His shadowed form shot straight up with a long chain tracing its path, one end of which was fastened securely to the cage, and the other fed out of his right palm.

When he reached the ceiling, it reached for him too. The bulky tentacles stretched through the shifting curtains of dull light, making them almost impossible to pinpoint visually. Shadar could feel them, though. Their simple desire to maim and shred everything within reach was like hot spear points of emotion, making his skin feel hot and itchy.

Like a scene of reacquainted lovers, he reached his chain-spawning hand forward just as the nearest tentacle stretched its twitching tip in his direction. Contact. Immediately, Shadar pulled back, leaving the end of the chain affixed to the stone tip, and the tentacle reared back too, trying to destroy whatever was putting pressure on it.

The chain went screamingly taught beside Shadar. Then, he heard the brittle explosion of stone as the steel cage and its grasping passengers were ripped from the floor. In the tentacle’s frantic struggle to grip its own end, the gargantuan flail was set dancing haphazardly around the room. It smashed against the writhing floor, leaving some arms nothing but ruined stumps studded with twitching beetles. Then, it hiked skyward again. Over and over, the fleshy pendulum bashed about, spanning the entire expanse of the room in its wild trajectory.

Shadar, taking care to dodge the snapping chain, drifted farther out of the tentacles' reach and looked to where he had last seen the scavenger. If Jackal's knack for making the unreal seem real was up to par today, the silent abomination would, hopefully, still be occupied and vulnerable to the random assault of the tentacle's new toy.

[Abomination]

The talkative entity in Homun's mind was silent after the attack had failed. The Homunculus stood around, somewhat curious as to why the dismembered components of his body had turned against him. He never really considered the implications of his disregard for his body, but this was an odd sensation. Shadar was correct in assuming that Homun's body held no bonds for him, losing an arm was like losing a hair. He slammed his right, mythril fist into the flesh, and it pulled the fist in for a moment before rejecting it forcefully. Blunt force was doing nothing to it.

Back down... the voice spoke up, sending Homun backwards towards the wall, just barely out of reach of the vicious stone tentacles.

He twitched, his skin tingling with the sensation of something crawling underneath. He had a shit-eating grin permanently plastered to his face, but usually he didn't care so much. Assimilation felt like sustenance to him, so afterwards he shouldn't be acting so strong and aggressive, but he felt different-- perhaps from the assimilation. He felt superior to Shadar, like the one he assimilated didn't deserve to walk on the same ground as him. It was somewhat of a complex; was It Shadar's?

Several bloody little men came after Homun, and his first instinct was to swat them away like flies. This cause some to split, it caused some to explode in a bloody mess, but ultimately they seemed unaffected by Homun's response. He stomped one, punched through another, and even cut through some of them by shooting one of his swords out of his left arm, but they kept multiplying and coming. Heeding the advice of the voice once more-- almost instinctively-- he backed down again, but this time the stone tentacles wrapped themselves around his body. One around his neck, many around his torso, as well as his arms and legs. Homun couldn't move as the blood dolls moved in closer and jumped upon Homun at once. They exploded in a bloody mess upon contact, but The Homunculus did not feel harmed. For a moment, he even forgot about the tentacles that were trying to choke the life out of him. They... were harmless.

He was out of one mess and into another, however. There was a steel cage with animated former body parts flying around the room, crashing into the walls and clearing entire sections of the wall of those tentacles. Homun struggled to break free, but he was missing something.

Wait... I know! That's why! Of course!

Homun focused on the voice, somewhat hesitant of it. It was him, his thoughts, yet it wasn't. They were thoughts inside his head that he thought were his, and that's the mistake he made. Being absent of the ability to contemplate his own thoughts, he simply assumed these thoughts were his, but now something was starting to dawn on him: They weren't.

The ear! Those fleshy messes! It all makes sense!

Apparently, the Jackal copy was thinking about why his plan didn't work. Foreign objects that held a bond with someone other than Shadar had the potential of causing great pain in Shadar's head until they were removed. Yet, not only did it not do that but he didn't even notice it. It was because the ear held no bond. Shadar accesses the materials of the void through feel, through his bonds with the objects inside, so something that is bound to no one is immaterial and invisible to him.

There was also another thing, and it was the synergy between Jackal and Shadar. Maybe in a previous time the two entities would hinder each other, but now Shadar appears to have absorbed elements of Jackal and made it his own. He was a true hybrid of wills, even though their thoughts remained separate. Homun lacked this synergy, making his grasp on Shadar's abilities virtually non-existent. He could fly around, but any sort of mind tracks seemed lost on him. The Jackal copy realized that he could not win using conventional means, he had to do something that neither Shadar nor Jackal would expect. Something only a Homunculus could do.

The steel caged bounced around, collecting more debris for the grasping arms to latch onto, and Homun's little spot was in its next trajectory. The Jackal copy decided to take matters into his own hands. He actually had some control over Homun, so he caused parts of Homun's body to suddenly expand and break the hold of the tentacles, allowing him to jump to avoid the crashing steel cage. Looking back at Shadar, Homun tripled his arms for a total of six, ready to attempt to break his opponent once more.

Before you do that, I want you to form a bond with that ear.

The Jackal copy knew something that even pre-assimilation Homun did not. Namely, that his lost body parts were not entirely lost to him. He still had some modicum of control over them, if he so willed.

Reach into that void, and desire it. Grasp it in your mind.

Homun did not. He was sick of this voice and decided to ignore it.

Dammit! Wait...

The voice realized that he was part of Homun too, and as such could form his own bonds. So, he waited until Homun charged at Shadar again. During his charge, Homun's arms doubled again, with now twelve ready to pulverize Shadar into a pulp. He jumped into the air, flying on a collision course with his opponent. He could see his opponent because of the blood doll illusion. He felt a sort of familiarity after the blood dolls were found to be harmless, and he felt it in Shadar's direction. As if the source of the illusion was visible to him. There was only one of these sources in the room, and it was in the man-shaped distortion up above the ground. It would be an easy task for Shadar to avoid, but...

Now! I desire you, ear in the void! Return to me! Become one with your original body!

The voice had no capacity to access the void like Homun did, but he could desire, and that was enough to form a bond.

[Shadar]

"The most disgusting monsters are always the easiest to play," Shadar said aloud, though too quiet to be heard over the bashing of the grasping wrecking ball. The same thought swelled from Jackal's den, and the two shared a rare companionable moment as they watched the blood dolls corral their target against a wall.

Suddenly, the moment ended.

What the hell are you doing?! Shadar shouted internally. His skin was crawling, writhing, rippling, or so it felt. More strangely, he shouldn't have been able to feel anything so strong. As soon as the bone shards had pierced his shoulder blades earlier, instinct had prompted him to close down the affected nerves. He still bled out those thin streams of mist, but they didn't register at all to his brain.

This... crawling... though. It was everywhere. He tried to swat the unseen invaders off his body. But, he only sent the clinging blood down to the ground.

Stop it! Do you want to test if Brigitte can put my skull back together?

It's not me! the demon growled in offence. Your nerves aren't even acting up. It's all in your head, so stop going all schitzo and pay attention!

But Shadar was pampered. For too long, he'd been able to simply shut off any offending touch. To just ignore the wriggling seemed so... unevolved, so simple that it was almost beyond his capabilities. Only when he realized that his opponent was rushing up at him did he find the will to push past the sensation. With no smirk, only a clenched, twitching jaw, he lifted his arms defensively and spawned a bed of steel quills from wrists to elbows as the twelve arms closed on him like tidal waves crashing together.

The limbs would have been punctured on the thin spines... if not for the fire. He felt it flare in his skull, a sensation far worse than the crawling and just as piercing. He knew exactly what it was, though the thought was a mere flicker amidst the migraine that threatened to cripple him.

Just as suddenly, the pain spread to his gloves. He couldn't see with his head tilted back and mouth gapping in agony. But, he could feel the burning that turned the prevalida laced black a brilliant ember red. In a splash of liquidizing metal, the quills retreated into the Void.

Beating a tempo to the internal pain was another sensation. It wrapped about him in a multi-armed grip, and it pounded away at his sides, his arms, and his skull. Assaulted from both inside and out, he could do nothing but loll about in the battering embrace, lose himself in the anguished sea. Jackal's voice shouted at him, but it couldn't hear it over the brutal percussion.

Salvation came in the wrecking ball's chain. Humming with tension, it cut through the air toward them and impacted from the side, separating Shadar and his tormentor as efficiently as a scalpel. The burning within felt almost comforting in the absence of fists, a warm arm that drew him from danger.

By his own will to escape, he fell faster that gravity would have demanded, and it was with a visceral thump and the crackling of stone that he pounded himself into a nest in the floor. Instantly, the bugs washed over him, erasing his presence and finally rationalizing the creepy crawly sensation his brain was insisting upon.

Bruised and broken, he lay in the bed of bugs and blood mist and pulled himself deeper into his mind. He did it to escape, yes, but also to plot. Whatever he had come here for, that inconsequential whim long forgotten, still compelled him at his core.

[Abomination]

Pressure. He felt the sting of his fists hitting his opponent, sending shock waves throughout his entire body. He ignored the damage he was inevitably causing to himself as well as his enemy, as his sense of pain has been all but dulled to nothingness. He could only smile as punch after punch made Shadar further tenderized. He wouldn't stop until there was nothing left. However, that plan wouldn't unfold the way he thought it would.

CRASH! The metallic cage crashed into the two, splitting them up. Of course, with Homun's luck, the cage actually hit him and sent him crashing into the wall, sending severed stone tentacles to the ground below, their stumpy remains jamming themselves into Homun's back. The arms of the vicious pendulum grabbed hold of Homun, squeezed him, pulled him towards the device. He could not comprehend how his own flesh had turned against him in such a way. He had never before experienced this, but in a way he sought a solution. He felt like he was the master of his flesh, like the way Shadar felt he was the master of his own devices. Sharp spikes from the formerly-barbed metal pierced into his body as the rotting hands drew him close. His body held the pendulum in place now, the chain hanging loosely as the stone tentacle thrashed about on the ceiling.

Not only that, but the voice in his head was silent. What was he left to do now? Trying to move his arms seemed futile. Then, he noticed that his extra arms, albeit detached, were not moving as the ones in the cage were. They were attached to the spikes of the cage from the impact. He looked at his recently severed arms, at least the ones that were attached to the pendulum and not the ones that had been ripped off and had fallen to the floor. He stared, expecting something, and then it happened. It twitched! The arms he threw away... he could form bonds with them! So, the arms that were grabbing him now were still his, and so... He willed.

The arms that were grabbing him let go slightly, as if they were contemplating something. Then, it happened. They started to extend out of the cage and absorb into Homun's flesh. The cage's grip on Homun loosened, but before he fell, he extended his now free left arm and grabbed the raging tentacle up on the ceiling, coiling his arm around it like a snake and then snapping it in half. After pulling back his arm, his the barbed spikes of the cage slipped out of his body and the cage fell into the swarm of insects below, displacing them everywhere. Homun was still somewhat attached to the ceiling, but then he slid out of the stony emplacements in his back and fell into the dark mess as well, followed by several large pieces of stone that smothered him.

Buried under the avalanche, his consciousness was slowly giving way. He felt tired, itchy, with burning sensations running all over his body. Yet, it wasn't pain. Then, he remembered his opponent and tried to move his broken body. Struggling with every fiber of his being, he burst from the rubble, and he found that the damage to his body was indeed extensive. One of his legs had so little flesh it was down to the bone, a large part of his neck was messing, he had craters all over his body, all of his excess arms had fallen off and his remaining two arms were messing flesh and fingers. He looked more like a zombie now, especially with half his left cheek missing to reveal two rows of sharp, carnivorous teeth. He took a step forward and his left leg nearly collapsed from the pressure, but the regeneration process was already underway. Fallen flesh from within the rubble crept towards the leg and wrapped around it like a makeshift graft, and other pieces of flesh followed suit. He ignored this process however, taking another step forward and squishing many bugs underneath. He was looking for Shadar; He wanted to finish the job.

However, Shadar had hidden himself among the creepy crawlies beneath. Homun's eyes darted around, drool seeping out of the missing section of his face, pus leaking out of his neck, deep red rings around his eyes. Suddenly, he punched the air, nearly tripping over himself. He thought he saw him! Was it another one of his illusions? Behind! No, not there either. He felt like his opponent was everywhere, but in every direction his eyes looked there was no one. It wasn't just the bugs, but his skin felt like it was crawling as well, his body twitching and reacting to unseen forces that were touching him.

An undeniably gruesome roar came from The Homunculus, shaking the entire arena and making the dim lights flicker. He extended his arms, elongated them quite a bit, and then spun them around, destroying hundreds of the remaining stone tentacles and sending the debris flying to the floor of the arena. He wanted his opponent, and he didn't care if he was going to bury himself in with him to do it.

[Shadar]

Where is it? Shadar intoned bitterly into the Void. His thoughts, like much of his body, were bruised and shakey. He tried to feel the internal space as best he could, but the only handholds for his mental feelers were his own possessions. Clearly, each one he touched was still his and his alone. Even the stolen arms, having been abandoned and now separated from the material world, were as much his as the steel he had been gathering for years. But, then, where was the sabotage? It had to be that. Something... planted.

Hey meatbag- The demon's words pounded so fiercely in his tormented skull that they seemed staggered into broken, condescending outbursts. If your brain isn't too scrambled.... That bastard copy of me... Find the connection... It's bloody there somewhere. Disgusting scavenger!

Oh shut up, Shadar responded in a perfect hangover voice. He understood, though, as much as he could over the sensation of embers between his ears and acid under his gloves. While he couldn't feel the mental bonds from the scavenger, he knew Jackal's the way one knows the intricacies of a bitterly earned scar. The copy of the dream demon, by default, would feel the same, and if Jackal felt it nearby-

There!

Without wasting a second to examine the foreign object, he ejected it into his clenched palm. Instantly, the fire was snuffed out, leaving him feeling scoured and charred throughout. With a mix of relief and anger, he crushed the fleshy invader in his fist. Mangled, the ear fell from his grasp and floated away in the shallow sea of insects.

I'm fighting me, Shadar droned, oddly calm, as if he was having trouble holding the thought. He can even sneak things into the Void. Sneak sneaky bastard... How would you kill me?

Jackal responded as if he'd spent way too much time thinking about it. You're nothing but a smartass. So, someone should go in hard and fast and beat that ass before you have time to come up with something smart.

Shadar burst out in manic laughter as he creakily righted himself and emerged into the near-pitch air. The echo of a horrible scream was just fading, though it still made his battered ears burn. With eyes half closed in a wince, he took a blind step forward and felt, rather than saw, the room begin to break around him.

Like the bowels of a monster, the floor jolted under him, and great chunks of tentacle stone crashed down in the few lighted patches that he could make out. From the thundering impact of stone on insects, though, he knew it was happening all over the room.

Something else was happening, too. Something that trumped any oddity he had witnessed since the stone wall slammed shut behind him. Where the heavy rain crashed down into grey-lit pools, and even where it was completely black, he could see the silvery puffs that were carapaces exploding upward. They didn't return to the earth. The stones kept falling, even grazing his bloody shoulders and forcing him to his knees, but the beetles stayed aloft, and their airborne numbers grew with each brittle crash.

They began to shift about in the air, shiny swimmers in a sea of their own making, forming schools that rippled about in unison like windblown sheets. Shadar reached one hand out as they surrounded him, blinding him to everything beyond a few inches. He couldn't tell if they reacted to his hand at all. But, real or imaginary, they were beautiful. The sand falling from a gravediggers shovel could not have been so pretty, nor tickled so much.

What happened to the 'smart' part of smartass? Jackal asked, almost aghast at the lunatic display.

Suddenly, the swimmers parted in the wake of a long appendage swooping overhead. Distraught at the intrusion upon his shimmering world, Shadar slashed at the pale flesh with claws that had suddenly spawned on his left hand. The instant they bit in, he threw himself into the wall of shimmering bugs and falling stone from which the arm seemed to grow.

The rain pulverized his back further, shattering on impact and nearly pushing him back to the ground. But, he continued to glide, given that he could certainly no longer run, by ripping handhold after handhold in the snake-like limb. He felt as if he were fighting his way down an endless, crawling tunnel, until he was assaulted with the sudden realization that he had arrived. The peeled, spitting face of his opponent burst from the sea ahead of him, and he reared back his right arm as the metal grew from it.

As weak as he was, as blown about by the current of the collapsing arena, he felt assured and strong in a single piece of knowledge. If he could make a blade sharp enough, sharper than he had ever made one before, it wouldn't matter how weakly he struck. The beast's facade of a human skull would leave its body for good.

[Abomination]

To know that you are a character in another man's dream is true self-awareness. What have I to say about my other self? He has formed a bond with his captor, and I can feel it too- even from my incomplete and fragmented memory. I used to detest the boy... My hatred was the cornucopia of my soul, and in my bitterness I sought to corrupt and destroy my prison: Shadar. Then, something happened. I gained a new perspective, I grew content, I became satiated with my new home. It was like I awoke from a long slumber, and in my new life I had infinite possibilities. Yet, away from my home, living in a half-cracked shell of my former self, I do not feel nostalgic. My hatred is stronger than before, and my desire to destroy the one who sought to tame me is greater than ever. I wish I could remember my true goals, my true dreams, so at least I knew that my real self had some semblance of an existence... but I feel like a dream character. I feel like my spirit has been dulled, my drive diminished, my future bleak. Yet, here I am, fighting against him... perhaps for the first time? All the desires of hitting Shadar, of physically harming him before giving up and attempting mental sabotage... Oh yes, I'm going to make this count.

The loss of feeling was the first sign of trouble. Not knowing pain anymore, Homun merely knew that he was being attacked. His grin was wide, his skin cracking and peeling off from the strain. He pulled back his right arm, since his left one was hacked into pieces. Although, what he was saying didn't match what he thought he saw. He was no longer in the arena, but in a banquet room, with people drinking and having fun. It wasn't a normal party though, it appeared to be entirely composed of criminals; especially bandits. At the front of the table was a young man holding up a long, shining spear. What was Homun witnessing?

"Another good hunt, gentlemen!" the man at the front announced. "I have a feeling The Bandit Brotherhood is going to last forever! Here here!"

The announcement was met with cheers, and Homun felt like he knew some of the people there. Then, he saw him. A reserved man in a cloak, enjoying himself for perhaps the first time. Under the dark hat, the man extended a weapon from his sleeve and punctured a chicken, bringing it back to his plate and pulling the weapon back. Homun did not recognize the man at first, but then the man lifted up his head and he saw the face. It was his opponent. Behind him, he saw a man half-transparently floating with a jackal's face. It looked like some sort of spirit.

The scene vanished, and the voice returned to his head. This time, he would listen.

The place you were before. The bright light, remember it. I want you to know... not think, not wonder, but absolutely know that everything in there can be out here. Now, here is the important part: Imagine that everything in there is out here.

Homun pulled his right arm back, and he saw the face of his opponent closing in. Bright colors were flashing about the room, his vision was blurry, and the fatigue was almost forcing his eyes to close. However, he was ready.

The next moment, he felt himself coming out of somewhere. He was growing out of a small tear in time and space, and he was behind his opponent. His upper body burst out of Shadar's hand, and with an absolutely insane-looking grin Homun pushed his remaining right arm forward. The sword that was in it came out forcefully through the middle of his palm, on a decapitating course with the back of Shadar's neck.

[Shadar]

Sharper, sharper, till the edge shone in a wide arc toward the monster's throat, a strike of grey lightning in the night. More than honor or pride, Shadar wanted to see the filth that filled the miserable sack of a scavenger, to prove that the similarities between him and it were only skin deep.

Then, the tattered face vanished, and his blade exploded in a sudden rupture of liquid metal. "Bloody hell," he whispered in shock, his voice cracking as if he could not have imagined such a violation of the Void, as if it had punched a hole clean through him. In the splash of metal, at the very corner of his vision, the grotesque beast's upper body appeared from such a narrow space that it bent like the figure of an hourglass. Then, he felt the sword bite in as the weight of the man growing upon him drove him to the ground. There was a horrible grating of metal gainst bone, then against the stone floor, and a high pitched snap.

Can the harpy bitch put your damn head back on? I'm not going to live in a fucking trophy!

Something broke. He felt lute strings snapping all within his body, and then nothing but reverberation. Panicked adrenaline filled his mind, forcing from him an animalistic scream of nothing but dumb self-preservation; a scream that would not have sounded from a breathing creature, for the blade's tip stuck messily from the front of his neck. Every fiber that he could still feel in his body willed him to be elsewhere, and so it was with one wild mental push that he threw himself away. He couldn't feel the air rushing past him, nor the crunching cushion that received his body, or even the broken length of metal that remained in his neck, its cracked stump sticking a few inches out the back and its tip waving before him with earthy, brittle flecks still clinging. He could feel the bugs, though, crawling in his body as if it had been hollowed out to make a hive.

And he could see. He saw the sides of his vision fill with red mist, that ethereal blood that this monster could never steal, the proof that some part of himself was beyond the physical world no matter how crippled the shell. It framed his killer, a gristly and mangled silhouette that wavered, upsidedown, amid the world that fell apart in darkness.

Then, he was looking at himself against the pink sky of Concordia. The image wore his clothing of old, the pitch-black hat and cloak that he had shed when Jackal turned him into something not quite mortal. It bore his old weapons, too, one wristblade extended from a bracer and a ruby-capped dagger in the same hand. Slim fingers twirled the blade, skipping it against the erect wristblade as regularly as a metronome, and each rotation drew a circle of flame from the small blade as the magical ruby sparkled at the pommel.

"I could heal you, but you'll never walk again," his old self, the bloodied yet victorious warrior, said down grimly unto his broken corpse of the present.

Though his physical condition shouldn't have allowed him to do so, he lifted his head and looked down at his legs. Perforated and raw, there was almost nothing left of them, and above those ruined limbs was the body of the Bandit King. Shadar felt tears well up, though he didn't know if they were his. He looked to the side - the motion seemed to be another's will - to see the dead body of Emma, and behind her the defeated ranks of the Mindless army, their blood still wet on the spear embedded and forgotten in the nearest of them.

He knew what Yari was thinking not because he was Yari, but because he had been Yari's friend far more than his subordinate.

Nothing is left for me, he thought in two voices, his eyes blinking away the tears of a broken heart to see Emma so still.

And so, Shadar, the confidant of the Bandit King, had let a hero and a friend die.

But... I still have something.

The delusion turned to dust and wafted out into the red-tinged darkness that weighed so heavily on him. She was beyond the black, the only one who still willed him to exist, just as he willed her to. No healing technique of man or gods could restore them without that shared acknowledgement of each other's barely mortal lives.

Abandonment was death. Shadar would not put her to death.

A demonic roar burst through the haze of his cooling mind, and he felt oddly akin to it with his physical body seemingly so far away. If the skull's still on and you can think, you can be a smartass! So, do something before I lose to a fuckin' copy!

Shadar delved into the Void, the only realm that still provided any sense of substance. All the trappings of his mortal existence brushed against his brain, reassuring him in a miserly way, but he could feel the stain now. It hide away in an unremarkable cranny of the Void, a tattered opening that became glaringly clear for the fact that his energy was nowhere near it. With a thought, he pushed all the metal in his possession toward the opening, packing the breach closed and forcing it still further.

A manifestation of his voice boomed in the room that he could no longer perceive. "You're better than me. I can only touch it through my gloves, but you passed through it. Your very flesh is a doorway to the Void." A ruby surfaced on the back of his left hand, and it sparkled with the same shimmer that it had while fighting alongside the Bandit Brotherhood.

“I’m closing it.”

[Abomination]

The feeling of the blade piercing through Shadar's neck was exhilarating. The sound of bones crushing and veins snapping, of muscles tearing and wounds forming made Homun lost in the moment. It ended very suddenly as the tip of the blade hit the ground before anything else, causing a chain reaction that sent Homun flying out of the void and snapping the blade protruding from his hand. Homun landed on the ground several meters in front of Shadar, a cracked sword coming out of his hand that he merely pulled back into his flesh. He turned around to observe his handiwork, and it was glorious.

Shadar was on the ground face-up, blood streaming out of his neck and the color of his eyes was dull. He didn't notice the splotches of metallic gray spreading all over his body. The voice in the Homunculus' head was silent, perhaps also reveling in the moment. There was only one thing left to do: Finish it. Apparently, Shadar couldn't agree more.

SHOOM! Homun's body lit up like a candle and sent him thrashing about, head in his arms and roaring violently. Shadar had a satisfied grin on his face, watching as his opponent roasted like a pig. The smell of burning flesh filled the room, and Homun's features were degenerating even further. Yet, it was not so easy. He lifted his head up and dropped his arms, standing perfectly still as he burned. He no longer felt pain.

Mwahahahahaha!! Maybe you need to figure out what it is you're actually fighting, boy! I knew I was right. The shattered pride of the real me is no longer fit to exist. As I depart from this mortal realm, so shall you! No longer will I have to stomach this embarrassment you call a 'living arrangement'! Now, Homun, finish them!

Homun's burning right arm reached down into the bugs and expanded, caressing the ground and then picking the arm back up. There were multitudes of daggers sticking into the arm, and they were absorbing into it as the arm fattened and fattened. He held his palm at Shadar, the tips of many daggers piercing through the surface of his skin. With his opponent unable to move, this was going to be sadistic.

Up to this point, Homun heard screams and other sorts of sounds. The tentacles seemed to be screeching, the bugs had yelps of agony as they were being burned and crushed, and the entire room was wavy as if it was filtered through the tide of an ocean. Back and forth, the waves of the room became more and more erratic. The lights were flickering, Homun being the brightest source of light in the room.

Suddenly, the sounds became very dull. Like Homun was underwater and the sounds came from above the water, they were a faint echo of their former selves. Even his inner voice that was repeatedly cursing Shadar seemed like a distant memory to him. Something was happening to him, something familiar.

...No! Not now! It can't be time yet! Homun, do it! Finish them NOW!!

It was too late. It was not the gas, but the assimilation's end that did him in. The cumulative damage that he's gained up to this point had been magnified and sent his body into shock, immediately making him pass out. The lights on the ceiling went off, and still holding his expression, Homun fell backwards and hit the ground hard, displacing the bugs and sending them crawling all over him. The flames that were engulfing him went out as the metal splotches disappeared. After all, without the assimilation Homun's connection to the void was gone.

The room was dark and quiet for a moment, and then the purple lights came back on. The walls and floor had holes in them, but there were no more tentacles or bugs. It looked like a normal stone room again, with both the competitors lying on their backs. Homun was a charred version of his former self, but in time he would heal and be back.

Back for more.

Requested Spoils--
Just the 20 or so daggers that Homun absorbed into his body at the end there. The mythril can be dissolved with the end of the assimilation or kept, whatever.

[Shadar]

Shadar floated in nothing, a void more barren than the Void. Even his mind was swept clean, save one memory, the deliciously vicious scene that had pushed his broken body to smile.

The monster hadn't noticed the metal patches growing from him like a second skin, nor the ruby that sparkled at the surface of Shadar's glove. He was just a cheap facade after all, to not know what was to come. So, it was with both relief and smug vengeance that Shadar had smiled as the scavenger's new skin became an incinerator.

There, the scene repeated. Over and over, the torn body burned with a light that could signal ships at sea, and in each repetition, the flames cloaked their host more thickly. The images spiraled tighter and closer, ever downward in the suffocating way of a dream without end. Soon, the image of the body was lost under the flames. All that could be seen were the eyes, but they did not belong to the scavenger. Those narrow orbs burned with an internal fire even stronger than Shadar's inferno, and he could almost see the sickeningly violet outline of another beast that he knew all too well.

In those eyes was more hate than he had felt in years, and it scared him. He felt that same hate within him, locked away only by a sense of mutually assured destruction. The nightmare spiraled to a precipice, teasing him on the edge; no way to escape, no way to speed the fall.

Shadar heard birdsong, not twittered, but hummed deeply in the throat. Slowly, he came back to life.

Brigitte's vibrant emerald eyes met his, her stern face flushed with softness as she used her wings to cradle his head against her breast. She didn't say a word, only continued to hum her quiet song.

With a faint smile, Shadar closed his eyes again. The room had returned to its benign state, though the purple lights now shone down from a ceiling as pockmarked as a plague victim. He kept his eyes closed for a long time, even as he spoke. The light was turning Brigitte's brilliantly red hair a disturbing, indefinable color that he didn't want to see on her.

"The pride, honor, whatever I was looking for... it wasn't here," he droned sleepily.

Brigitte stopped her song long enough to ask softly, "Are we leaving, then?" She sounded almost hopeful.

"You'd better, if you don't want your bloody head cut off," spat Jackal's full-body illusion. The regal crimson robes seemed to brush the dust and rubble along the cracked floor, a convincing bit of showmanship for a creature that tried so hard to be something more than a delusion.

Shadar, with a sudden spike of anxiety, looked from the projection's fiery eyes to see the blackened body of his opponent being borne away by the monks. The facade of a dream demon was gone from the shell, he assumed, but he still shivered. How absurd, a presence that could make Jackal seem soft. Discarding the nightmare, Shadar looked back at Jackal's illusion, and he felt Brigitte tense under him (in both body and song) at the carnivorous smirk that played across his face. "Think about what else we could find." In the Void, he toyed with the stolen limbs of the scavenger.

Jackal's muzzle curled with pleasure. "Put his head back on good and tight. He'll need it," he growled at Brigitte, who pointedly ignored him as she lay a wing over Shadar's face and willed her song and her soul to mend him. He yielded, drifting off into his own mind again.

I bet you do all this just because you like being healed, she thought privately, flexing that odd muscle called sarcasm.

Spoils requested:
About a dozen arms worth of Homunculus matter. They like to grab things (violently) but can't be programmed to do more at this time.

If Homunculus is allowed to keep some malleable mythril (which is a copy of Shadar's, not taken directly from him) it can also carry the enchantment that makes it lightweight to its user.

[Taskmienster]

JUDGING!
Shadar vs Homunculus
Characters Involved:
~Shadar~
~Homunculus~

I would like to make a note here saying that throughout this battle I was almost always lost. I’ve tried to read it multiple times to gain a better feel for what exactly was going on, as well as how everything related, and have failed to despite my best efforts. I apologize for it taking so long; on top of reading it over three times the hurricanes cut my power a good number of times and destroyed two previous incarnations of this judgment since I could not save them. I am not going to add as much detail in every area, though I will point out which areas you both needed help with the most.


STORY (16/30)(14/30)


~ Continuity ~ 6~4
~Homunculus~ Your opening post was your weakest post in the entire thread. You did not explain who he was, why he was there, or anything of that nature. Try to explain what he is, why he is in the Pagoda, as well as anything else pertaining to the conflict. Remember, to the reader (and in turn to the moderator judging the thread) your opening post sets the stage for everything later on as well.

~Shadar~ The post that you used for the opening was well executed. The underwater training, the dialogue used, it was all well done. I got a feel for Shadar, as well as his fun little group of demons. The bit about Yari and the Pagoda was good, but could have been better if you had thrown in even just one more post about why Yari would be at the Pagoda. Also a little bit about the Pagoda’s relationship with current Shadar and such…

~ Setting ~ 3~3
Alright, this is the part that caught me off guard COMPLETELY. The setting seemed to shift and change depending on what the person posting needed in order to do… whatever. It was inconsistent, unclear, and generally nonsense. The void, the ear thing, fighting in the void, bugs, and metal daggers? Wow, too much to switch back and forth in without writing MUCH more in order to let the reader understand it. I give you both props for intricate and detailed setting descriptions, but the transition between all of it was incredibly lacking and extremely confusing.

((My decision on the setting stands. I was given a link to the description of the area, but it is not the reader's responsibility to go outside the thread present to find all the information about an arena. It is the writers responsibility, firstly the opening poster and when they do not do the job the following writer(s) should pick up the slack more.))

~ Pacing ~ 7~7
The pacing was quick, sudden, and unfortunately like a lot of the portions of this judgment, was completely offset by the setting and the arena you both fought in. You both did well to keep it up and the battle exciting. From beginning to end it was well done, slow where it needed to be (at the end) and not abrupt.



CHARACTER (19/30)(14/30)


~ Dialogue ~ 7~5
~Shadar had the most interesting and involving dialogue. There were a few points when I felt it was somewhat out of place. Then again, I figured you were in a battle and wasn’t sure if you were actually in the physical fighting area or in the void you kept mentioning… that made it difficult to gauge. Also, the opening to the 11th post was WAY too much dialogue.

~Homunculus had very little dialogue except when he ‘assimilated’ part of Shadar and the voice that spoke in bold letters began to tell him what to do. It was alright, but not that great. Nothing outstanding of note.

~ Action~ 5~5
Both of you kept the action heavy and thick, which suited the pacing. Again it was completely confusing due to the setting and the story line that wasn’t exactly expounded upon though…

~ Persona ~ 7~4
~Shadar~ Your character is intricate and detailed, with a long history to boot. The only thing I had of note was that thing about Yari in the beginning to better understand what exactly was his relationship with the Pagoda. Other than that you capitalized on it well in the end with the flashback.

~Homunculus~ Your persona was undeveloped, if even present at all. I don’t know what to make of it, honestly. Do you purposely display no attempt at a developed character in order to show that he is nothing more than what he absorbs? Or did you skip an expression of a developed character in order to focus more on the stolen personality of Shadar? What little I got was he was somewhat naïve of the world, and that was it besides the stolen portion… I personally think that your persona was ignored due to the different type of battle, and using and manipulating someone else’s character isn’t really an amazing way of writing out your own character.

((My decision on Homunculus stands. It is not my (as the moderator) nor the reader's responsibility to look outside the thread to understand the characters involved. It is the writer's interest to explain their character(s) personality.))


WRITING STYLE (23/30)(20/30)


~ Technique ~ 8~6
Shadar took the cake with this, so many wonderful and beautiful uses of the language that I wanted to copy and paste examples all the time. The previous and lost version of this that I started with had a lot of them posted here.

Homunculus had a few here and there, but for the most part it was more storyline and setting you seemed to focus on. Don’t be afraid to put in a few literary devices, it adds to the story and the way you write, makes it more interesting.

~ Mechanics ~ 8~8
Nothing major of note, a few things here and there. You both did well though.

~ Clarity ~ 7~6
The very first line of the very first post was so utterly confusing that I had to read it multiple times every time I tried to read the thread… Other than that the clarity of the writing was fine, despite the unclear use of the setting and the strange storyline both of you seemed to be following.


WILD CARD!!! 7~7
((The powergaming note was taken into consideration, and this is the only score I will change due to any issues brought to my attention.))



TOTAL
(65/100)
(55/100)



GAINS/REWARDS!

Experience doubled due to the completion of this thread within the time period of 'pagoda month'.

~Shadar~ You gain 12 arms as requested; 4330 exp; 200 gold.

~Homunculus~ You do not gain the weapons; 1200 exp; 100 gold.


((Shadar, the mistake was fixed, you have been granted the 12 arms as requested, I only ask that you use them carefully. Arms have no assimilation properties of the charactre they come from. If you want them to then I would request you drop the number to 2 arms.

Homunculus, I still do not reward you with the 20 daggers, as a spoil. Your passive aggressive approach to explaining your issues with the judgment is not a good way to conduct yourself, please remember that in the near future. Also, I have the liberty of not granting rewards, and as such use that liberty here. Not because of your PM, but because of your performance in this thread.

EXP and GP rewards have not been changed. The wild card score was fixed to represent what I have been given to me via PM from both contestants. No other score was changed, and my reasoning for not changing them have been added in in BOLD text.))

[Witchblade]

EXP and GP added!