Solo Call of the Wild

[Caesarion]

83rd of Summer, 515 AV

I've never done this before, Noah whispered. He couldn't get last night out of his head - his new lover, his reactions, facial expressions or body movements or anything. The entirety of it was absolutely compelling. After so long, so long, Caesarion was deflowered and thoroughly pleased. The night was amazing in every way he could fathom. He had no idea what to make of it in the slightest, feeling a mixture of pride, elation, excitement and all sorts of other good emotions that wouldn't be eclipsed by anything. And of course, Noah, his lover was so beautiful. He felt a great joy, too, to know that someone so well tailored by the Gods was his and his alone. He didn't know how he was so confident that Noah was his, but there was something about this bizarre ethereal chain that ran between them that he placed as being permanent, infinite, and ultimately closed. He knew that his lover would always be faithful from the moment that chain connected, which it had. Noah was still fastly asleep in Caesarion's little tent, legs sprawled out and resting happily against the floor while Caesarion ventured out before dawn truly broke. He needed time to himself - time to think, to hunt, to take a moment of introspection due to everything that had happened.

And he didn't plan on doing it with the same sort of sanity that he'd expressed in recent events. No, he was going to go petchin' wild, bathe in the blood of the creatures around him and fulfill his most uncivilized desires. He was bonded to a Kelvic now. He was bonded to someone that was half-man, half-beast, just like him. There was no longer any reason to be ashamed of the compulsion he had for the wilds. Of that binding conviction he had for murdering violent forest animals and watching them burn in the clearing, the meadow, the prairie. Watching creatures that were proud and with predator's capabilities bend before him. It was bizarre as it was insane, but it was also something that he really liked to do. So, he ran through past the encampment, exercising his legs and focusing his breath as he built muscle in the lower half of his body. He looked to the forested areas around him as he ran, until he saw a small group of what looked to be squirrels sitting atop a tree that seemed to lead into a somewhat less densely forested area. Those were usually the areas that he went for.

Of course, first, he decided to be a total shykehead and he relaxed his muscles, focused his Djed, before releasing Res through his palms and then transmuting it into a powerful blast of air that would impact the arm of the tree and send several of the squirrels plummeting down from the height unto their death against the floor, bones smashing mere feet away from him. "Ah, classic," he said grinning. Caesarion had truly lost his ability to find empathy for animals, even despite being bonded to a Kelvic now. He should have felt closer to their needs, but instead, he only felt closer to the hunter he knew himself to be, as if that self-actualization came with truly aligning himself with the world that was the wild.

The Ravokian entered the forest, then, and stretched his legs and his arms to relax the strain of the muscles. He was going to go about this acrobatically, quickly, and with energy to him. He would dash through the trees, trying to dodge the ones that blockaded the forest instead of slicing off their branches with his longsword like he usually did. He ducked and avoided whatever he could, though he often found himself throwing his hands in front of his face and punching off branches so he didn't have to get whacked. He didn't care either way - he just sort of wanted to go crazy, after all. Even if he got injured, that'd only add to the strange sense of elation he'd surely gain while in this demented state of mind. Now, in order to try and uproot some creatures, Caesarion would begin to concentrate and tap into his Djed . . .

[Caesarion]

Centering himself and balancing the flow of his Djed, concentrating, before beginning to release Res, he would knock down a tree nearby with a large and blunt blast of wind. The tree would go tumbling down, Caesarion backing away slightly as it made impact. He watched as the tree would incite other trees - arms mashing against their bark, leaves going wild, endless reactions from tree to tree. As a result from one of the trees going down, there was a squirrel twitching on the ground after being knocked off. Caesarion unsheathed his longsword and drew near it, impaling it through the side and bringing it back to the pile of dead squirrels nearby to the entry of the forest. He yawned, then turned back and continued on in his tasks of increasing Reimancy and finding food for himself and Noah. He ducked back into the forest, the same tactics as before - running and jogging through trees, trying to avoid them and then using his arms to defend himself if he was to get hit by branches or larger chunks of the forestry. He didn't really know if this was so beneficial to him, but he did figure that testing his reaction time, using his legs and practicing running through difficult environments were all things he'd need for the trip to less-than-safe Cyphrus.

As he returned to the area, he found something exceptionally interesting. Without noticing it, he killed more animals than he thought, and he caught a few wolves feasting on what appeared to be another dead squirrel, or perhaps two judging by the number of wolves. There were a lot of squirrels in this forest. He wondered how often they actually got preyed upon, though? With quick reaction and an ability to scale up these massive trees, there was no way the wolves could actually pursue them. So how did the food chain work here? He had not the faintest clue. What he knew, though, was that he really wanted to kill some wolves. So, he steadily held his longsword and began to move closer to the beasts. The moment he was anything but super far away, the creatures grew anxious and they turned to him and began to growl. Warning him. But surely even if he did run away at this point they'd just charge him as a pack. He knew how wolves operated - they always wanted more food, because they always had more mouths to feed.

His Res began to move slightly downward, being concentrated by his open palm, the initiation scar visible. One of the creatures would then dash forward, with a few more wolves seeming to try and reinforce it and corner Caesarion. As he dashed forward and the others drew closer, Caesarion transmuted his Res which swept up the wolf as a blast of air going skyward and he impaled the canine with his sword as it went stunned through the air. Of course, not a single moment passed before the others started to charge in from different directions. Caesarion turned his position completely, throwing off the dead wolf from his sword at one of the other wolves, the impact making the creature pause if only for a moment. He was not safe right now, though. Another wolf came up to him and he swung at it, slicing through its jaw instinctively as it lunged. The wolf whimpered and fell down, while the other rose. Caesarion reacted with a Res transmutation, blasting the other creature away with a heavy-handed blast of wind, another Res core inside. As the creature made impact with the ground from the initial blast, the Res core would be transmuted and a massive compressed blast of wind would surely crush a large amount of his bones.

So that left one wolf . . . and a man fighting it that was rather impressed, actually, by their coordination.

[Caesarion]

The man relaxed himself and got into his battle-ready stance. The wolf was already damaged and would have a very difficult time biting him, considering its jaw was fairly split open and ripped. The man figured that he could kill it quickly while it tried to - most likely - figure a method of escape. He would channel Res once again, letting it extend from his palm, before unleashing a large fireball at the wolf. The creature was struck, its fur thoroughly charred as it began to light aflame. The man then quickly moved in and focused himself. He'd thought about his vacuum approach, something he performed in Sahova in the aftermath of the lightning bolt. Since then, he hadn't done anything so wild scale, as he nearly overgave the first time even though it was practically all he did the entire day. This wasn't so wild scale, though. Before the fire would spread to the ground, he would spread his Res out into a sphere before transmuting it into wind that would completely halt the progress of the fire, removing its basic mechanisms of spreading. The vacuum was ultimately successful yet again, with the fire being snuffed out and the dog still taking enough damage to die. That was three dead wolves. He began trying to haul them back to the entrance of the forest, sheathing his blade and lifting two of them - one over each shoulder, leaving the charred one dead on the ground.

He began to realize that lifting these dead things was decent exercise, but only if he exerted himself. He decided to instead put them underneath his shoulder, which would then tax all of the muscles in his arms and increase strength building. He tried to jog through the forest as he did this, though he kept keen to his surroundings to try and maintain some level of safety. Then - as he went out, he saw a creature feasting on the multitude of dead squirrels he'd left at the entrance of the forest. It was . . . a snake. Like the last one he fought - in fact, almost the same exact thing in terms of appearance and size. It was putting the squirrels through its ridiculously long tube of a body and as a result, expanding in grotesque ways. Of course, Caesarion wasn't a fan of gross, expanding snake monsters, so he set down the wolf corpses and unsheathed his blade yet again. He thought on his Djed consumption today. It was more than usual, but not enough for him to be so close to overgiving, especially not if he ate before exerting himself any more after this battle with the snake - which he was surely going to afford himself. He pointed his blade at the creature, the snake doing its typical bizarre tongue thing and hissing, and then the man began to intimidate him by flashing his blade forward.

The creature responded by balling itself up and staring at the mage, its attention completely consumed by the man wielding the blade. Caesarion let out a roar before picking up a large rock and throwing it at the creature. It didn't even seem to flinch, really, but he knew he felt a sense of irritation from it. Caesarion decided to not move forward at all. This thing was slow. It may have been fast in the water, he didn't know, but on land its body was a complete mess with so many folds and adjustments it needed to make before it could slither on. So he made his distance, then focused his Res, channeled through his fingertips before unleashing a jagged bolt of lightning to impact the creature. The result was . . . boring enough, a very dead snake. "Well, at least now I know how to kill the buggers without starting a forest fire," he nodded. It was always nice to make advancements. But . . . now, it was time to pick his wolves back up, trek back home, running and building up his legs. He was going to take a quick food break before practicing his Reimancy on the go.

[Caesarion]

Back at the encampment, he cooked and munched on a fairly large piece of dead wolf he'd gotten just a few days ago in the forest. Nearly half of what Caesarion ate was animals that he killed, and all of that meat was put towards building his muscle. He was becoming exceptionally buff at this point, and his strength and stamina were increasing very much, as proven by the rambunctious night before that he'd spent with his lover. Of course, there was always room for improvement, and Caesarion didn't plan on normalizing his body building - he was going to keep going until he was one of the strongest men he knew, even stronger than those brutish Akalak he'd been given the luxury of traveling with. So, as he took bites and chewed on his protein, whenever he would swallow a bit of it he'd get back down on the ground and do more sit-ups. From the moment he woke up to the moment he went to sleep, he was constantly looking for moments to train Reimancy and Bodybuilding, his two primary focuses right now while trying to perfect the self. This was a good opportunity, and he took it, making the time spent as efficient as possible.

After he was done eating, he did feel even more tired despite the food, but it was because his muscles hurt from all the movements he'd been making. This wasn't djed exhaustion though, it was physical, and he knew that he was far away from overgiving, especially after eating. He decided that he would set back out and climb up on one of the hills overlooking encampment - one of the hills where he'd met Noah, actually. He looked to the sky above him and he saw a few birds soaring. He wondered if he could apply his theory and pull them out of the sky. But, they all moved very quickly and they were so high up that he'd lose too much Djed in the attempt. He needed a much larger bird, and a slower one, or one that just took flight so that he could grasp it before it was moving all too quickly. Instead of testing this ridiculously risky theory, he decided to see if he could find some more food for Noah than just dead squirrels and some wolves. He wanted to make sure he had all the food he could possibly eat, considering Caesarion was going to ask him if he would stay with him on the whole journey.

He looked down the rabbit holes that were buried into the hills. They were very peculiar looking. He hadn't actually seen a place with real authentic rabbit holes. Maybe they weren't even rabbit holes, but were instead just random holes in the ground made by something else. He wondered if he could lift up whatever was inside. Technically speaking, if he pushed Res to the bottom then transmuted it to blast upward, he could catch them if he quickly reacted and grabbed the creatures before they fell back down. That sounded weird, though. He decided he would try gaseous Res for this so that it didn't smash the rabbits against the bottom, thus halt his attempt. He let his Res flow into the abode, gas pressing downward until he felt like it might possibly have reached the bottom. Then, as he said he would, he transmuted it as an upward flow that would fling any rabbits inside upward. Unfortunately, he didn't end up getting any. "Is this even a rabbit hole?" He asked, frustrated. Caesarion didn't know much when it came to wildlife, despite all of the killing that he'd done, acting as if some great invasive species.

He decided to fill the hole with gaseous Res again, but this time he transmuted it to fire to see if he heard anything... like dying wails. Nope, nothing. "Petch."

[Caesarion]

This whole 'providing' thing really wasn't sitting well with him at the moment. He was trying to provide his beloved Kelvic with an assortment of many fine foods, but instead all he got was petch and shyke. Squirrels? Wolves? The man seemed to like bunnies so much, he wanted a bunny! He was practically willing to overgive for a bunny at this point! The Ravokian peaked through what must've been every rabbit hole, rabbit domain, rabbit abide, rabbit home, sprinting from hilltop to hilltop, gripping and climbing up the more rugged ones. He knelt down and peaked, and peaked, and peaked, but he never ended up encountering sight of a single bunny. Was yesterday some blessed bunny day? Why did he find one so easily yesterday but not a single one today? Maybe they were all hiding thanks to the encampment? He continued to look anyway, though he kept his distance so he didn't have one jump out and munch on his eye or something. The mage was fairly irritated at this point, but he didn't let that irritation make him forget his caution when there was so much danger in the wilds, even from stupid bunnies.

Then, without his immediate notice, one of the holes he'd just looked through had something unexpected begin to crawl out of it. It was a snake, slithering upwards and trying to see if it could wrap around the mage without his notice. The man seemed so content, after all, to look through the rabbit holes - how could he possibly shift his focus so easily? Of course, the moment Caesarion felt something touch his leg and begin to wrap around his boot, he immediately freaked out and started to kick his leg, turning around to see the snake fidgeting on him and trying to strengthen its grasp. "Holy shyke!" He yelled, though those words were only initiation into absolute survival mode from him now. He grabbed his sword from its sheath, and started trying to poke at the snake. He didn't really have the ability to stab at it, considering he didn't want to accidentally stab through and have to get an amputation or something. The creature then lunged forward to try and bite him, and he grabbed its neck and struggled with it while its body started to move upward to try and constrict more of him. He knew that surely if it wrapped around him completely he would die, but during his freakout he dropped his sword. Again.

The mage tried to focus himself. One arm gripped the neck of the snake and one started to punch it. It wasn't enough, though, considering how fast he was being gripped. He was going to be dying soon. He was going to . . . die -

And then, he brought his second hand - which was curled into a fist - against the mouth of the snake and began to extend Res forward through his mouth and into its throat, while the creature desperately tried to bite at his hand, Caesarion having to apply all of his strength to keep its head back. More and more res went down its throat, gaseous in nature. The Res even had an untransmuted Res core inside of it. All of that Res being unleashed was enough to push him to the brink of that tired warning stage where he might soon overgive, but he knew that he would simply force himself to relax today and he would not take risks like this again without thought. He transmuted the Res inside of the snake, beginning to burn its insides, before releasing the Res within the core and transmuting more of it - flames filled its bowels, and it quickly lost the muscle strength to wrap around Caesarion, though the man already felt extreme strain in all of his body. He was unbelievably scared - unbelievably shocked by what just happened, an event that very nearly almost killed him, if not for his quick thinking and pressing Res through the throat of the animal.

He was not going to forget his mistake.

[Devi]

Your Grades have arrived! Caesarion Skills: Reimancy: 4 Bodybuilding: 3 Acrobatics: 1 Running: 2 Weapon Skills – Longsword: 1 Hunting: 2 Wilderness Survival: 1 Endurance: 3 Tactics: 2 Intimidation: 1 Observation: 1 Lores: Noah: Mine and Mine Alone Squirrels: Fun to Squish Wolves: Coordinated Pack Hunters Bodybuilding: Importance of Diet Reimancy: Burning a subject from the inside. Comments: Caesarion will need to eat well and rest for the rest of the day to recover from his use of Reimancy (yes I know the Kelvic is pretty but you need to REST *glarey face*). Let me know if you have any questions or feedback. Don't forget to edit your post in the Grade Request Thread to say it's graded and leave a link in there for the Storytellers. Happy Writing!