The first test

A usual day, for the little mage with the glasses. She'd often venture out on her own to test her abilities against bandit and yokai alike, when traveling from New Alteros to the Wychwood. The rhythm is familiar like family to her; to walk, to pause, to fight, to walk again. She'd even memorized some shortcuts amidst the more forested parts of her journey, even when it came to the Wychwood.

Or so she'd thought.

Verbena brushes aside a branch, squinting a bit as a house comes into view. She distinctly remembered heading toward a familiar path that led to that abandoned cave a few paces east of the pond, to fiddle around again with the rusted weapons that lay in carts there. Well, east? West? Weast?

She adjusts her glasses, blinking a few times as unfamiliar territory comes into focus. And with that unfamiliar territory came depravity, a kind that hung thick like smog in the air. This wasn't like New Alteros. New Alteros she'd gotten used to. This was... stronger.

Green eyes peer left and right, cautious.
(Verbena)

It was time to test the power of his modified Demicles. And he had the perfect test subject for it. Jinn Esther, one of his Nethradin. He'd been very... useless, even being less useful than the literally pile of goo that was another of his summons. And so he would make the perfect test subject. It was easy enough to command him towards the edge of Loranthis.

He couldn't exactly disobey of course but he had enough free will to make it... interesting.

The base of the staff clanked across the odd stone as positions were taken in an open area. The staff began to shudder and hum as the air began to split in a hot, white rift. Not too dissimilar to rift magic but with enough differences to be more... stable for someone who was untrained. The skull mounting the staff creaked and groaned with effort and before anything could be done, Gorandis became... distracted.

His head turned to the woman who had walked into the area and the rift snapped shut. Jinn was shoved off to the side as Gorandis approached. "What are you doing in Loranthis? Are you here to spy for the east? Here to claim the many bounties that go on around here? What is it?" The staff was raised again, the skulled tip pointing right at the newcomer.
(Gorandis)

A voice. One that niggles at her memory, tickles her synapses in a way that sends goosepimples down her spine. And that's before her head snaps in that voice's direction, to see-

Shit.

Verbena steps back without meaning to, temporarily stunned. That was the source of the mana she felt. The desert child - not a child anymore, since that fateful day - almost loses her cool. She coughs. Swallows though her mouth is dry. She tries to think of a suitable reply, and she adjusts her glasses while thinking, light reflecting off of those lenses in an opaque glimmer. It'd give her time to scramble for an answer.

"I took a wrong turn," she says with a calmer voice than she thought she could manage. "I wasn't heading for this... Loranthis, at all. I wanted to inspect the ruins of Frostvale."

Not a lie, though she crafted her words like it. Verbena's at a cross, a dilemma which she does her best not to show. Marek would have charged headfirst, especially considering his curse. Vasco would have ran. Or would he? She didn't know anymore. Logic tells her that staying here isn't good, and most of her agrees, and yet...

would a chance like this show up again? If she had this one shot, this one opportunity, would she capture it or just let it slip?

For the moment, at least, the little bronze mage can't decide just yet, lips pursed in ambivalent, turbulent thought.
(Verbena)

His eyes narrow. "Wait a minute... You... I know you. From... New Alteros... Yes. You were one of the children that harassed me when I was trying to speak with my daughter weren't you?" He takes a stride forwards and beckons Jinn to follow, closing the distance between him and her to be well within striking range if he wanted it.

The metal shaft of the modified demicles shuddered a little as red mana began to flow through it, pouring out of the eyes and mouth of the skull on top like a fine crimson mist. "And you want me to believe that you didn't come here on purpose, to harass me and annoy me once more? I find that very hard to believe. And if you're not careful, you're going to end up like Jinn here."

The nethradin was grabbed by the collar and lifted up with one hand. The same red mana began to pour off of Gorandis himself as the staff began to wail. The air split again and Jinn was thrown into it. Gorandis had hoped that the portal was a stable one to Helheim... but apparently it lacked the power. Which was rather unfortunate for the poor Nethradin.

Thankfully for Jinn, he didn't survive long. His body twisted and broke spraying blood to coat the thick white of the portal in thick sanguine fluids. For a brief moment the Nethradin's face was awash with a pained look of extreme betrayal before the portal snapped close. "So unless you tell me the real truth you will end up just like him."
(Gorandis)

If Verbena were capable of sweating, she probably would have. But the only thing that mirrors it is the thrumming of her Sarradian hearts, one that makes her very skin shake. She would have stuffed her hands in her pockets if she didn't need them to defend herself. The little one doesn't want to look directly at Gorandis, but she knew it'd be safer to look at him, to monitor his movements. She backpedals with his advancing, shoulders tensing until the backs of her knees hit the house's fence. And so, she's forced to watch.

Those bright jade eyes twitch, and she wants to close her eyes at Gorandis's minion is crumpled into an unrecognizeable, fleshy mess before the portal closes, but that would be a bad idea, and so she doesn't. She does however have to swallow back bile, and her face moves less from "calm visage" to "blank, wide-eyed terror."

"I'm not lying," Verbena replies, upper lip curling in half of a snarl, partially due to fear and partially due to primal, defensive anger. "If I'd known you were here, do you think I'd come alone? I'm not stupid."

Perhaps not the best tone to use, but it was a fair point. She didn't look very imposing or accomplished on her own - a tiny slip of a mage, 4'3'' on a good day, so small even the staff that hung on her back threatened to trip her with every step. She'd learned how to not do that with the last five staves, of course, so she only tripped sometimes now.

"The only sentient things I've seen here are the lesser demons and the dragons north. I'd had no idea there was a city here in the first place."

This looks like it's going to be bad. Verbena shudders out a breath through her nose, calls her mana half-way up in case she needs to react fast. It didn't hold a pale candle to the stink of depraved magic that clung to her like soot, but she wasn't about to go down without a fight if that was what Gorandis had a whim to do.
(Verbena)

For a moment Gorandis turned to look at his own staff, it hadn't worked properly... which was annoying him more than Verbena's presence. A hand came up to fiddle the bleeding skull before a soft sigh escaped his lips. It needed more work and this girl was nothing more than a distraction at this point. Which, admittedly, was all he thought she was in the first place.

His own emerald eyes looked at her wearily for a long moment as the red mana continued to flare. "How did you have no idea there was a city here? It is rather... public knowledge I would say. To not know about it is to be a complete idiot. Which I wouldn't put past you. So don't take that tone with me. Being an idiot is not a valid excuse..."

Still, his eyes continued to wander to the staff. He couldn't have it so... useless. His hands roamed to his bag and withdrew three crystals, each about as large as his fist. "Do you know what these are? These are people. People I have killed and turned into nothing more than simple energy. A crystallisation of their lives and wants and needs."

"And they are... alive in a way. Eternally tortured until I deem it fit to release them. And I think now it's time I put them to good use." Purple streams of thick, depraved mana snaked out from beneath the sleeves of his coat, worming their way around the crystals and lifting them into the air. One silver, one orange and one as red as has own mana.

They began to think out and lengthen into something more akin to groups of spikes. The sounds of wailing filled the air, human wailing. And as the tortured spirit continued to morph and change, the staff began to reach out to them. The pink crystal the tied the skull to the tip of the staff reshaped and changed to draw in the other three crystals, securing them on as additional... clusters.

And once the gems seemed to settle into their place, the staff shuddered once more. For a moment, Verbena would have sworn the skull looked at her. Before it seemed to settle down, thrumming violently in the air and leaking a very real amount of wrathful energy. Enough to perhaps sway the minds of those around.

But not Gorandis' own. His own Wrathful madness was already too far gone.

"Ah... Much better, the staff should now perform at... peak." He waved it and the air ruptured again. but instead of the brilliant white of before, something else was shown. A dark, cold land under a strange sky. Towers of billowing energy clouds stormed through the area. But, just like the first, the portal wavered and faltered before collapsing once more.

Leaving an angered frown on Gorandis face. His eyes slowly shifted towards Verbena. "Perhaps it needs more power... Perhaps one more crystal would do the trick..." It was very obviously a threat and it was up to the little Sarradian girl to respond.
(Gorandis)

Well, it wasn't quite that she'd had no idea a city was here. She knew vaguely of Loranthis, and knew vaguely it was near Wychwood. She just had no idea it was so damn close. It did make an inkling of sense; why would so many yokai linger near such an idyllic scene if it weren't for the thick aura of depravity that was only a small division of trees away? But Verbena doesn't quite have time for pondering, as she's still in the middle of, well... a situation.

The mana comes first, and it tightens her chest and incites a raw, red sort of panic in her. And then the wailing. Oh random abstract deity, the wailing.

It wasn't that Verbena didn't believe him, when Gorandis fetched those crystals. She'd just had no idea about how true the sin mage was to his word. The screaming was enough to make her eyes go fuzzy, and complete with the heavy hang of sin-tainted mana, the short one can't stop herself from trembling violently (heh). She was quite sure, dead certain in fact, that she never had and never will hear something so thoroughly unsettling. Being purged in the whole of Owen's holy beam was a tickle compared to this.

Even when it stops, Verbena's head is still rattled, ears ringing from the deafening, terrible cacophany that doesn't seem to go away even when it's not there. She's so dazed that she almost doesn't notice when Gorandis wheels on her, when he brandishes that damned skull staff.

But she does. And she can hear that sentence loud and clear.

The Sin Mage's little "display" of horror tipped the scales in terms of Verbena's conflict. Her mana swells, expands, bursts to the surface of her skin through her clay pores, and just like that, the mage vanishes into a puff of smoke with a little "pop."

Or at least, it looks like it. The mist is blown away in the breeze, taking Verbena with it, and hopefully Gorandis didn't care enough to track that innocuous distraction.
(Verbena)

The mist was almost instantly dismissed with a gust of foul winds. And left Verbena right in the open as it were. Gorandis' eye narrowed again and he let out a sigh. "I do hate it when they run like this. It makes it far too much effort on my end. And, quickly, the gap was closed with the staff being used to sweep out Verbena's legs from under her.

The jagged crystals would poke and tear clothing as they connected but they wouldn't pierce the skin. "You know. Perhaps you aren't worth the effort. But, you are here from New Alteros and you did come wandering into Loranthis apparently by 'accident'... I very much hope that you aren't really that dumb. But... I have seen worse."

"But, before we get to the unpleasantries. I'll give you a few minutes to say your piece. I wouldn't like to be called unfair now would I? So go on, explain why you should be let go free after you've gone and run into Loranthis like this. After you've sneered at me and annoyed me to no end. Go right ahead, let's see if there is a brain in that head of yours after all."
(Gorandis)

Shit.

The mist dispels, and before Verbena could lunge for something, maybe propel herself up into a tree, the jagged claw of a staff hooks her ankle, and she's sent tumbling into the ground, her own emerald-jewled staff thumping painfully into her body. Verbena scrambles onto her back, digs her fingers into the soil, and there's that's inkling again - fleeing had failed. Was fighting the only thing left? The raging mana seemed to tell her so; it made her heart pound, her teeth clinch together in ways she'd never known. Rage infects her like a virus, and it only takes an equal measure of panic to stave off lunging at Gorandis with everything she had. And it wasn't like his taunting made it any easier.

The deep, screaming buzz in her brain makes it hard to think. Hard to do anything. Her jaw clenches so tight that her teeth squeak painfully. The pain brings a little clarity. Enough for her to at least try and form an argument. She didn't want to die, and she wanted to end up in one of those hellish crystals even less. Her eyes dart around wildly, glasses having slipped off and dangling on one solitary ear. Think. Think. THINK!

"Because.it would be a waste of materials," Verbena blurts out eventually. "You're having trouble powering that portal. The crystals you have are too weak. If you use weak souls, children's souls to power them, can you really reach... wherever it is you're reaching? There are stronger targets. People with more vigor, strength. Even if the torment is what powers the portals in the end, someone with more fight in them than a student would be able to last longer, fight longer before breaking. I-it's like a battery. Finding small cells will only yield small charges."

Marek would have said that Gorandis was afraid of him, afraid of his latent potential. Vasco would have been able to run in the first place. Verbena was neither as courageous or fast as her friends. She'd have to rely on her logic, on her booksmarts. She vaguely remembered reading about such magicks in the Grand Library. Not to this extent - she'd never seen anything like this before - but reading so much about all veins of arcane, even the occult arts, could perhaps give her a bit of latent common sense on how magic and mana worked. And even if she had no idea what she was talking about, Gorandis's special brand of terrible, horrible magic completely foreign to what she'd studied...

Maybe the promise of a challenge to slate his hunger, to use a more reputable champion as a mere thrall, a power source for whatever foul deeds he was cooking up, would work.
(Verbena)

Another sigh rattled out as he lent on his staff just a little. "You know, your argument might have some merit. if it actually cost me anything to convert you in the first place. There is no waste. A large amount of small charges is exactly the same as one big charge. And you seem to have volunteered yourself as something to help bolster, yes?"

"And, besides, the spirits I am using are by no means weak." He brandished the head of the staff. "Do you see the silver one? That is the Spirit of Nerebia's Archbishop, her strongest disciple. And I killed him and now he is mine. He is by no means weak. The problem... The problem with the staff is that I just need to calibrate it better."

"And you made a poor decision to point out any of my flaws by the way... So, I am afraid you have squandered your chance... Such a shame, you almost had potential but you kids seem to all be the same. Like that other one, the one whose legs I broke. I suppose he's got some crusade against me right now doesn't he?"

"I have, after all, been informed about his goings on. Metztli does have her uses... But, I digress." He spoke eerily calm, unbefitting of the rage that filtered into the air around him. It was a cold, quiet and calculated kind of anger. "Now then. What to do with you properly. I could just kill you and turn you into a crystal... but you wont have time to learn your lesson that way..."
(Gorandis)

Verbena shudders against the wall, ice cold fear wrapping around her throat. But, something loosens its grip. Gorandis seemed lethargic, in a way she could parse beneath the weight and volume of sin making her woozy. He seemed to be toying with her. The thought alone twitches her shoulders, and she has to clamp her teeth down on her lower lip to the extent that the clay skin pops, crystal clear blood trickling down her chin. Her mana burbles beneath the surface, reacting as strongly to the taint as her brain does. Stay calm. Breathe. There could be a way out of this, still, otherwise she'd be dead by now.

"... Y-your minion cursed him," she says through gritted teeth. He probably already knew as much. "He can't... feel anything anymore. I-it's like he's empty now."

A little bait. A little suffering. She claws up fistfulls of earth with shaking fingers, but it keeps her grounded enough to not try and dig those blunt nails into Gorandis's flesh. Verbena continues to shiver and shake, warding off the gnawing need to rent and maim quickening in her thoughts, slithering like black eels into her mind. Stay calm. Breathe. Stay calm.
(Verbena)

"Oh, she cursed him did she? Not surprising really. Well, how would you like to be cursed? though I don't go for the 'emptiness' kind of curse. Oh no. No, my kind of curse will be a bit more... brutal. Though I could just take an arm or leg too. That might suffice." He shrugs lightly, pressing the base of the staff a little further into the earth.

"Though at this point it's just entirely me toying with you. You could fight me and lose and go down painfully. you can quietly accept it and be forced to forever wonder if you could have fought back at all. It's a bad spot for you I must say. Not very nice at all." The staff is twisted in the ground and more white flashes begin to start up around the area.

"Of course I can also send you through one of these portals just like I did to poor Jinn back there." The world split once more and the dark realm spread out beyond the gateway. It was like a doorway into the abyss. "I'd say pick your poison but... Well it's never going to be your choice really." And this time, the red mana began to pour off of him and into the staff.

And the portal stayed open.
(Gorandis)

Verbena has to continue to maul her own lips, the soft tissue a shredded mess by now. It only looks relatively clean because her blood is clear and clean and not a traditional, gory red. A more disciplined mage would perhaps attempt to look unphased at the portal opens. A more disciplined mage would be able to maintain a poker face, able to reason further with the idle Gorandis, who seemed to be amusing himself by tossing her life around like a rubber ball in a waiting room. She was not a more disciplined mage.

Verbena only darts her eyes between the looming void of a portal and the mage that casted it, trying to figure out something, anything to do. Her brain comes up blank aside from the echoes of tortured screams and the grate of depravity like syncopated nails on a chalkboard. Her breath comes in wet, rapid huffs, spattering her blood on her meticulously pressed and cleaned suit. There's a dead lock for now; a high tension that squeals amidst the miasma of dark magic that threatens to break at any moment.
(Verbena)

Gorandis stares at her form for a short while, taking in her despair in deep, shuddering breaths. Before, finally, he let out a content sigh. "Ahh... That will do." The portal snapped shut and the red mist seemed to scatter. "You know, watching somebody break down like this is almost worth all the bother they cause in the first place."

The staff was pulled from the ground and strapped to his back casually. The portal was nothing more than slightly ozone smelling air. And Gorandis gave Verbena a questioning look. "Well? Are you going to run off then? No doubt you're going to run off and tell everyone about me and what I was doing. It's in your nature I suppose to run to someone you think can stop me."

"But there probably isn't anyone you can get. Not ones that would step foot within this city anyway. And even if they do, they'll have to deal with the others that live within the city. Ones that do indeed answer to my call as much as others.So go on then, rush off into the wilds or whatever. You said you were going up to Frostvale, yes?"

"Hopefully you wont be able to annoy anyone there."
(Gorandis)

A crushing weight. A thread fraying at the seams, ready to snap in two. And then... nothing?

Verbena can almost hear the sound of a glass window shattering in her mind, when the portal bloops closed. For a second, her consciousness flatlines, and she only stares unblinking at where it previously yawned open. Now, considering her temper already flared hot when her pride was insulted, the addition of wrath-rooted depravity only flares it hotter. It burns to such an extent that her fingertips smoke with a magic that practically begs her to be leashed. Were she stupider, she'd have spit in the face of Gorandis's condescending free pass and tried to burn him to cinders where she died or not.

She really wishes she were stupider right now.

Instead, bloody-mouthed Verbena raises her hands, and thrusts them toward the ground. Embers change to wind, and she doesn't bother with the pleasantries or grace of turning to mist; she straight propels herself up and far, far away from Wychwood, likely launching herself hard enough that she'd crash into one of the poor farmer's crops just outside of this damned forest. So, either by a lucky streak or by a wound to her pride (a little of both), Verbena gets out of this bout with Gorandis unscathed. There would probably be more.
(Verbena)