Request #1
“There’s been word about a bad omen that’s entered our territory,” Calcifer firmly states with caution and readiness. His crew was gathered around a table inside a tent, where each member were trying to keep awake. “Is that why you brought us out here for? Because of a superstition?” One of the members in the back groaned, cracking his arms with a grunt.
Isiah appeared slowly, pulling back the entrance of the tent and walked forward to get in with the rest. He had been the last one present, but his lack of presence didn’t interrupt anything due to a slow rise of tension within the group.
“I would agree with you, but the locals aren’t having it. They refuse to let up on their suspicions; in fact, some of them are causing a fuss about it actually affecting their health.”
“What about their health? It ain’t our fault these people scared themselves shitless.” “But it is our problem to solve for the sake of our people’s good conscious,” Calcifer interjects. He looks over at the team, whom have gone silent. Their eyes hesitantly looking around to avoid Calcifer’s gaze. They don’t add anything else to the conversation, for they know that once Calcifer gives the order, their words become of little importance.
Isiah peeks through the others and catches Calcifer’s eye. He acknowledges him with a head nod then continued on with the talk of the evening.
They planned to head out into the forest to investigate what sort of omen the locals were talking about. Isiah soaked up the information of a humanoid deer that eerily appeared out of nowhere. Calcifer explained that they were going to go out for a couple of days to make sure the conflict was resolved completely.
“This can easily be done in shorter time, but we’ll see,” he states, looking over at the layout of the forest. “Can’t believe we’re afraid of some deer,” one of the members yawned, clearly not taking this seriously. The other members hinted in their body language that they felt the same, but they didn’t bother to voice it.
“What do you think, Isiah?” Another member said, giving him a good pat on the back that nearly knocks him forward. Isiah rubs himself over the shoulder and looks up at him with a slight smile. “Shouldn’t be too bad, I would think.” His teammate laughed, walking out of the tent now. “That’s a good start,” he hollered as he left. Slowly everyone was walking out to get themselves situated for the mission.
Calcifer and Isiah were the last ones to exit out of the tent, though Isiah showed to be on the more uneasy side of things. He fixed himself up a bit, putting his hair in place and adjusting his pouch on the side of his hip neatly. On the other side, he adjusted his hunting knife and made sure it didn’t stick out to jab at anything.
“Is something troubling you?” Calcifer asks as he looks at him, to which Isiah shook his head in response. “No, I’m just,” he paused for a second before looking back at the leader. “well, it’s just a curious case, y’know? I’m used to hunting things for us to survive, not hunting witches or ghosts or whatever.”
Calcifer let out a small laugh. “Yes, it is pretty strange. But I’m sure it’s nothing we can’t handle.” And like that, it became the attitude everyone carried. They packed up their things and made way for their search.
The forest they ventured in started off slow. There were still people wandering around; some children playing nearby as well. They had place markers on them, suggesting they had quite a walk inside. The locals waved their hellos and went past, while the team just kept in their direction. Isiah looked around, feeling little brushes from branches as he walked. There were soft taps of the ferns along the ground that graced his exposed legs.
They hiked up logs and rocks, pulling themselves along, and hopped over rivers. It felt like a long time over just walking further inside. Everything looked the same as if they had walked in circles. The sounds of the forest rustled and felt like they were in a loop. One of the members lent over a granola bar over to Isiah, whom took a small bite from it. The flavor settled into his mouth, and he pondered about the aftertaste.
The crew looked bothered by something, as some were even becoming more attentive than before. They watched the area closely even at small traces of movement. Calcifer pulled out his watch and looked it over.
Isiah got distracted with his senses that he accidentally bumped into Calcifer, who looked down and back at him with slight question. The crew had stopped. Isiah looked around at them, confused. “What’s happening?” Calcifer made a gesture to be quiet then stepped forward. Looking up at Calcifer, it almost seemed like he was the leader of more than just the crew, but rather, he took charge of the forest. His presence astounded Isiah.
“We’ll probably need to split from here,” he states, looking over everyone else now. Everyone nodded silently as they held themselves defensively. Members had their arms crossed and others looked more withdrawn than usual. Isiah seemed confused by this and as he looked around at the others, it was apparent that he was the only one left out of the loop.
Calcifer started directing small teams to go their own separate way. He starts going down a slope as he gives out orders, which prompted Isiah to rush down with him. He lost his footing and slipped down and bumped against Calcifer again. This time he acknowledges him. “Yes, Isiah?” “I’m sorry! I slipped.” “I can tell.” “Why are we splitting up? What am I doing?” “You’ll be going with Geoffery for now since it’s come to our realization that we’ve been walking in the same direction for awhile,” he pauses to recollect himself from walking, “and yet we’re not reaching the objective point we needed to get to.” “But how can that be?”
“Well, we had laid small trackers around in order for us to get back to,” he points off to a nearby tree, and there was a miniature yellow dot that was pressed into it. “and so far, it’s always the same points we can passing through.”
“You think this has something to do with the creature?” Isiah asked, cautiously looking off to the side and out into the distance. “It could very well be. I’m not entirely sure what it is, but that’s why I think it’d be best to cover more ground. We want to be out of here as soon as possible.”
Geoffery comes around and teams up with Isiah, whom they both shook hands on it. Geoffery was a good scout whereas Isiah was an excellent hunter. The pair worked out well. Like instructed, the both of them went in a different direction than all the rest. He looked back at Calcifer, whom slowly faded out into the distance.
“Really weird how everything is, innit?” Geoffery presses a pointer into a tree next to him as they walked. “Yeah, can’t wrap my head around it. What if we just end up seeing each other? Right, it’s like a loop?” “That’s what it seemed, at least to me. Who knows? If we do end up bumping into each other, we just gonna have to rework.” Isiah nodded to this and took a deep breath. “Yeah, we’ll be fine. I don’t mind seeing the same branches over and over again,” he laughs as he brushes off some from whacking against his arm. Geoffery chuckled to this. “It’s pretty close knitted in here, almost makes me feel like the forest wants to give me a hug or somethin’.”
They kept their walk with some urgency, quickly but not too much in a rush. “What do you suppose this thing really looks like?” “Oh, I dunno. I don’t think about things like that. Not the creative type.”
“Maybe it’s some kind of monster, but a short one. The kind that does an180 on what you expect scary omens to look like,” Isiah illustrates his story with his hands which causes Geoffery to laugh a bit more. “Don’t get me laughin’, Isiah. This is meant to be serious.” A few more trackers go by, and nothing out of the ordinary happens. They don’t loop around like they expected to with the others. In fact, the forest was starting to take on an entirely new design altogether. The two decided to take a break from the walk and go over where they could go off to next. Geoffery had a map on him, in which he observed the potential whereabouts of their location. To his dismay, they didn’t match the ones on the map.
“That’s strange.” Isiah was sitting up on a tree branch while Geoffery looked over the map, keeping an eye out. He looks down at him. “What’s strange?” “I have no idea where we are.” “What do you mean?” Isiah slid back down and rushed over to him, taking a glance at the map himself. “What I mean is that this area looks nothing like anything in the map. The direction we took should have taken us to Lake Eola.” They both looked up and around. “And as you can see, there is no lake.” “All right, all right, maybe we haven’t reached it yet? Or maybe we’re slightly off the path we thought we were on?” Geoffery scratched his head and gave a puzzled look at the map. “Could be, but I really doubt that. Think we should head back?”
Isiah gave it some thought and examined the area again to decide. He goes over to Geoffery and places two pointers on the tree he was on. “We should try to find the lake at least, but if not, we’ll settle in this spot for now.” “For the night? I don’t think that’s the plan Calcifer wanted to go by.” “If we leave now, who knows when that loop will happen again? We’re safer here and looking than going all the way back to an uncertainty. We’re not looping out here. Plus I call get grub tonight, so don’t worry about it.” Isiah pulled out a little bottle of water from his pouch and handed it over to Geoffery. He thanked him and took a sip.
They started their trek again with Geoffery now more focused on the map. He kept examining the area, searching for something to confirm some sort of backing of their whereabouts.
They placed their usual pointers around every couple of yards or so. To keep track, they marked them a bit better with a marker. Isiah was mostly in front and made sure to look after Geoffery's footing. There was no sign of the lake anywhere. Isiah's stomach began to growl and as if to respond, Geoffery's did the same.
"We'll take a break for now, ya?" He asks Isiah, who nodded as a reply. It was beginning to get dark again as they went back towards their camp ground. While Geoffery went to grip onto a branch, he lost his step and tumbled down a slope. He hollered as he rolled all the way down into a ditch. Isiah quickly rushed after him, sliding down the slope and immediately jumping to his side.
"Hey, you all right?" - End edit.
Enter: Isiah felt through the walls, feeling along the vines that kept him going as he ventured further down the tunnel. A soft glow was at the end, slowly inching closer to him, until finally he popped through. There he was met with a light glowing lake surrounded by forest all around. There was a river out on the far end that extended far out of sight. He looked around at his surroundings and cautiously stepped forward. The lake was so wide; it felt like there could be eyes everywhere.
He stepped up to the lake and noticed some fish swimming around, poking at the surface in search for little pellets of food that may float above them. It calmed him to hear the forest; the tone from nature was so fragile that breaking it would cause hostile tension. Isiah poked along the water and felt its comfortable coldness. It felt refreshing after walking for awhile, so he decided to dip his hands in then took a sip. The coolness tickled his throat. As he withdrew his head back to straighten up, he saw something in the corner of his eye. There were a couple of thickets near him, but that wasn’t exactly that caught his attention. One particular thicket moved subtly; it was the kind of movement of withdrawal, like something was pulling themselves inside. There were unnatural colors peeking through, poking at Isiah’s eyesight with curiosity.
He braced himself as he got up to go look. Some kind of animal living in there? It looked a bit too big to be a small critter. He didn’t think too much about it; maybe it could be something he could hunt to bring back to the group for food.
As he drew closer he pulled back the thicket from the side and slowly up to the top, parting it until he got to a center. Looking down into the thicket, he could finally see what was inside. From below was actually a person, sleeping soundly in a curled up position. The realization caused Isiah to jerk the whole thicket, which alarmed the sleeping individual. Her eyes fluttered open, and she quickly peeked her head up. It happened so quick that if Isiah hadn’t flown himself back as fast as he did, she would’ve headbutted him.
The interaction was misunderstood but Isiah couldn’t wrap his mind around it. Her head protruded forward with hostility; her antlers were intimidating. Her ears flickered, eyes focused intently on him and slowly she emerged from the thicket. Out of panic, Isiah scurried up and onto his feet. His shoe slipping and causing him to trip as he got up to stand before making a run for the entrance of the tunnel.
She watched Isiah flee while Isiah never looked back. Once he reached the tunnel, he took cover at the wall and heaved. It wasn’t like him to be so freaked out, but he had never seen anyone quite like her. He didn’t know how to react. As his heart slowed, and his thoughts gained a rhythm to process, he turned his head to look back over at the thicket.
There she was sitting by the lake. Her fingers dipped in the water just like he did before, though she looked a bit more lonesome now. When she perked her head up, the water casted a glow onto his face that made her look softer.
Isiah let out a soft sigh, which registered into the girl’s ears as they flickered immediately. She snapped her head toward the direction of the sound and quickly rushed away, going farther than the thicket now. Isiah came to the conclusion that she was whom they were after, but as he watched her flee, he couldn’t bring himself to hunt her.
It wasn’t that he terrified her. Her presence didn’t disturb his peace, but rather it unnerved him to realize this was their threat. Yet how could it be so? When she completely vanished he turned away into the tunnel, telling himself that he won’t speak of what just happened.
Later that night, Isiah couldn’t shake what he had saw. There was a lump in Isiah’s throat that wanted to say something, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that it would escalate into conflict. What was the point in not saying anything when that was the whole reason they were out in the first place? Has he lost his mind?
He found his way to the others, whom showed their concern and patted his back with compassion. They were glad that he had returned but scorned, disapproving that he went against protocol. He agreed with them that he shouldn’t have strayed so far from the group, and that was that. It was noticeable that his thoughts were reaching the surface of his actions. He was becoming a bit more hesitant, and his rambles were like word vomit.
“Is everything okay?” One of the teammates asked him with genuine curiosity. “Huh? Yeah, me? Everything’s good. Fine. Everything’s fine.” At first, no one seemed to notice anything of it. Odd but it could very easily be explained by nerves. The leader of the group, Calcifer, didn’t buy it. One brow was arched with uncertainty, a hand fixed at the knee as he poked at the fire during the night, and his eyes shifted attention constantly but always mindful of Isiah.