Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Carey Z W 10-19-06, 07:31 PM	Okay, Red parts were written by myself, the blue parts written by another character, and good friend on mine. We decided to mesh our stories together. Any comments or suggestions would be wonderful, although I am pretty sure this is our finished project. Any questions would be awesome, as I would then know what needs fixing... A small child plays in his yard, contented. He has always been this way, ever since he can remember. In the morning, he helps his Papa feed the cows, and his Mama feed the chickens. He likes working the earth. It’s simple, and keeps him busy. He enjoys working up a good sweat, and helping others. He knows he’s stronger the other boys his age, but he is kind and gentle, and not easily provoked. On this fated day, he’s at home, after his chores, outside his house, on the side lawn, waiting for his friend to come over to play. He’s drawing ideograms in the dirt, not knowing if they really mean anything. He’s waiting for his friend Billy. He comes over a lot to play, and the little boy loves playing. He can hear his father inside, talking in an odd language. Every so often, he sits outside this window and listens to his daddy talk the funny language. It sounds coarse, and not like his fathers normal deep baritone, and it makes the child happy. He doesn’t know why, but he’s drawing the ideograms wider and wider around himself, connecting pentagrams and circles, lines and curves, in a pattern he can’t comprehend. All he knows is that as his father talks the funny language, he draws the shapes better. He hears another voice talking to his father, a deeper voice, that sounds like it’s speaking the same language, but through a mouth of gravel. That voice doesn’t scare him though, he hears it a lot at night when his Mom is out, and his Dad is alone in his room. He doesn’t know what it is, but he hears his name mentioned a few times. His mind wanders, and he doesn’t notice all the ideograms and sigils beneath his feet glowing red, and he never knows why the voice his father is talking to suddenly yells in warning, or why his father looks out the window, then yells his name in fear. He doesn’t remember anything, until afterwards. The small boy is frightened. He’s in his fathers room, the one he’s not supposed to enter, and has never entered, but he is there now. He feels his clothes are soaked, and tacky, and he doesn’t know why. He is frightened, he doesn’t know how he got there, or what happened, or what the torn up clothing and red stained flesh in the corner. His attention is drawn to the fireplace, where a fearsome face of fire is in the flames. He panics, and tries to get up to run away, but the thing says in the language of Devils, the language his father has always spoke in secret, ‘ Do not fear little one. You have done a terrible deed, but all is not lost. You may be able to redeem yourself. I give you that chance, and one day, you shall repay me’. The boy hears it, and it takes him a moment to realize, he understood what the creature was saying, even in that other language. The words don’t strike him until moments later. He whimpers at the fireplace, ‘what deed? Wh-what did I do?’ but the fearsome visage is gone. The boy is terrified. He does not know what has happened, he does not know that his father was a key figure in the Blood Wars, the ancient feud between Demons and Devils. He does not know that he was possessed, and a demon controlled him, in order to kill his Father. He does not know that the Fiend in the fireplace saved him by exorcizing the demon, but in the process leaving a splinter of himself, that draws all the boys’ strong emotions to it and festers. It will protect him, but at what cost to himself? The boy doesn’t know what to do. He stands, and looks around him. His father’s study is in shambles, and a red tacky liquid is drying on the walls and floor. He reaches out to steady himself against a wall, and sees his hands are covered in the stuff. A coppery smell is in the air, with an underlying odour that reminds him of the butchers shop. He looks at the pile of rags in the corner, and recognizes the clothing as that of his father. He is too afraid to go look, and leaves the room, calling to his mother. He steps outside the room and staggers down the hall to the kitchen, where his mom is usually at the table, knitting or peeling food for supper. But not today; the kitchen is a mess, with upturned tables and broken apart chairs. The floors and walls are coated with sprays of blood, and his mother’s flayed body lays in the center of the floor, rent to pieces. He screams, and runs out of his house, into the arms of Billy, his babysitter, who had just arrived. The little boy screams and passes out into the taller boy’s arms. It was a good day. A quiet day. A well paying day. I had been able to talk my sister into cooking dinner tonight. She was a much better cook than my old man. All I have to do was babbysit for a few hours, get my gold coin, and head home for a nice warm meal. I’m on the outskirts of town heading to my employers place. Like most of the farms it is quite a bit of a hike to get there from the village. For me though, a gold peice is damn well worth it. As I move my way up the steps towards the strangely silent house, I think nothing is amiss until I hear the frightened screaming of a child coming from inside. Calling out the little boy’s name I charge up the stairs, taking two at a time. As I reach the landing the door flies open and from it emerges the little boy, covered in blood. He latches his arms around my waist before going limp. In shock, I quickly catch the child before he falls and quickly lay him down. After seeing that the blood isn’t from any visible wounds, I pull out the knife I keep at my hip. As quietly as I can, I slowly step through the open door and into the kitchen. I nearly drop my knife at the sight of the boy’s mother horribly mutilated as if by some savage beast. Steeling my resolve and my stomach, I make my way, following the bloody trail into the father’s study. This time, I can no longer hold in my stomach and I fall to my knees, vomiting up the pie I had eaten for lunch. After retching for almost a whole minute, most of it nothing but dry heaves, I slowly pull myself to my feet, my dagger forgotten on the floor. Not being able to stand the grisly sight any longer, I flee in fear of whatever had laid waste to the once pristine looking room. As I step outside I kneel down and pick up the still unconscious boy and run. I run past the chicken coop, past the barn holding all the cattle and into the field of hay. I run and my legs burn. I fear and I run harder until finally, reaching the edge of the field and the forest, I can run no more and I drop to my knees, laying the boy down as he starts to stir. Placing a hand on the young boy’s shoulder I quietly whisper, urging the boy to wake up. It takes only a few seconds for the boy’s eyes to flutter open. ``Thank the Gods your alive!`` The young boys eyes flutter open after what feels like an eternity in darkness. He feels like his mind is full of cotton, and it takes him a while to focus. He senses a gentle hand on his shoulder, a voice whispering in his ear. He sees a blurred image over his head, and soon focuses on Billys concerned face. The litte boy is terrified. The memories all come crashing back in a flood, and he starts to cry out ‘I did it! It’s all my fault’, before curling up into the fetal position, and crying his soul out. He doesn’t know what to do, nothing in his life has ever come close to preparing him for this situation. He’s helpless, doesn’t know it, and would care less if he did. All he can feel is the terrible grief at knowing what he must have somehow done. He tears up again, and after repeated questions from Billy about what happened, his grief and guilt pops, and out spills the story. He whispers, constantly breaking down in tears, and having to stop to pull himself together, but in the end, the whole story comes out. There is no doubt that the small boy believes himself responsible for what happened, he doesn’t understand that there was nothing he could do. ‘‘Don’t worry… I won’t them take you…’’ I whisper soothingly before taking the distressed boy up onto my back and start walking into the forest. I can’t turn back now. I know the people in the village. They would burn the boy alive for being a demon. They would probably kill me as well. I feel tears well up in my eyes, but my stride never breaks. My resolve never falters. I will protect the small boy on my back, whom is still sobbing into my shoulder as we go deeper into the forest. It isn’t long before the kid has cried himself to sleep. As we reaches a stream heading through the forest, I enter it, walking with the flow of cold water as it licks my ankles. But still, I trudge forth. I’m getting hungry. My lunch was left back in the father’s study room, and as the thought enters my mind, I’m suddenly not hungry anymore. As the sun finally sets I place the boy down at the base of a tree, coving him up in fallen leaves to keep him warm. I force myself to stay awake for a few hours before I accidentally drift off into an uneasy sleep. I awoke several hours later in a daze. It was bright out. Way to bright to be healthy. I pulled myself into a sitting my position, my body protesting at the cool morning air. I turn to see the boy starting to stir. He looks fine. I don’t know how pale I look. I take the boy and place him on my back once more and start walking, my legs screaming in protest. The walk is good for me, and I start to warm up the further we travel. It’s only an hour until we hit civilization. A small hamlet, a place where everyone knows everyone and they are wary of outsiders. A farming community. We stayed at the edge of the forest for half an hour until I saw our chance. A single carriage was leaving to the north. I follow it at a distance, the jogging killing my legs. I push them harder. When out of sight of the small village I sprint towards the carriage and toss the boy rather roughly into the back. I jump in right after him. The carriage itself had a sort of bench out front and a canvas arching over the top. The inside is full of supplies, mostly food. An armed man sits sleeping in the corner. Without hesitation I run at the man and grab his short sword. Ripping the blade from its sheath, I slam it into his neck before he can get a word out, his lifeblood splashing up onto my arms and shirt. He dies. His eyes flare open and a gurgling comes from his mouth followed quickly by blood that runs down his chin. I am amazed. I can’t stop staring. His eyes stare forth into mine; asking ‘why’ and I truly had no answer. As the light fades from the man’s eyes I remove the bloodied sword. I let it fall to the floor. The child is staring at me in shock. He can’t believe I had just done that. I can’t either. As the boy starts to cry once more, a voice comes from the bench up front. The driver. I move tiredly forth and whip open the twin curtains. A man is sitting precariously on the little bench, staring up in confusion and fear at the bloodied warrior who has come to take his life. Without hesitation I plant my heel awkwardly into his face. It has the desired effect and he stumbles off and under the cart. The cart itself doesn’t jolt so I can only assume we didn’t run him over. I take hold of the reigns and guide the carriage down the road before stopping the horses after a fifteen-minute ride. I then head inside to see how the boy is doing. Not good, apparently. He is curled up in the corner farthest away from the corpse. My corpse. My kill. I go over and heave the man’s body out of the carriage and throw a nearby blanket over the bloodstain. The blanket follows the man out, leaving a pinkish tint to the wooden floor. I find some fresh clothing and change into it. Within minutes I am up front driving away. We travel on for days. Thankfully, there is water and feedbags in the cart. Luckily, we are not attacked. Days turn to weeks, and still we head farther North. During this time I have been able to just sit and talk to the little guy. He still blames himself for his parent’s death, and I try to tell him that it wasn’t him, but that… Demon. I think he is starting to listen, but the seeds of doubt have already been planted. And here I am. Kidnapper, murderer, thief, highway robbery, assault, cart jacking… Not bad for the span of two days. And so, we continue to head farther North. We take the long way around South Valley city and try to stay out of towns as much as possible. The bloodstain starts to have a bit of a smell so I toss some garlic over the pinkish boards to mask the scent. As he sleeps, I find myself sitting awake and simply watching him. The disturbed little boy that turned my world upside down. I have killed for this boy. ‘Why,’ I ask myself time after time as his chest raises and lowers with the breath of sleep. Why have I strayed so far from the path of light and fallen so far into darkness? For this child? The boy rolls over, and now I can see his face. Yes, for this child, I realize. I have taken a man’s life to protect this life. There was no other way I could have commandeered the cart. I had to do it. I had to kill him in his sleep. He was a warrior. I couldn’t have fought him and won. I had to. I had to. I have committed grievous sins in order to keep this boy alive. But was it worth it? Will my soul burn in hell for my sins, or will Pelor bring me to heaven for my deeds? I don’t know. My thoughts kept this train of thought until I fall asleep. And when I wake up, I still have no answers. The small boy drifts in and out of dreams. He remembers being carried around, on the back of Billy, who tirelessly carries him an unknown distance. Billy is taking care of him now, the boy understands this, and it soothes him. His childish mind is already beginning to suppress his memories of his parent’s deaths. The memories are too much for him to handle, but they are fading fast. He doesn’t realize it’s the devil shard in his soul, gathering all things that cause strong reactions, drawing them in to itself, and becoming more potent. Billy eventually stops, and sets the small child down outside a small city. The boy watches as Billy looks for something, he doesn’t know what. Apparently, whatever Billy wanted to see he saw, as he picked up the boy and sprints towards a road leading away from the city. Billy throws the child into a bumpy landing on the back, and then hops on himself. The child starts to pout, having banged his head on the floor, but what Billy does next is enough to silence him. Billy had walked over to a sleeping man in the corner, and with no warning at all, drew the mans short sword, and stabbed the man in the throat. The child was shocked. The abruptness, the violence, it brought back memories he was still trying to suppress, and he sunk down onto the floor, and rolled as far as he get away from the scene and closed his eyes. It didn’t matter. The smell of the blood alone was enough to bring back the memories. He broke down; crying, new memories brought back, his father trying to kill him, and his mother screaming in terror. The boy passes out. He spends almost all of the rest of the trip in a stupor in the corner, getting up only to relieve or feed himself. Two weeks. Two weeks of travel, and three close calls with bandits later and we find ourselves on a mountain pass, heading to the country of Barbados to the North. It’s cold and windy, but we keep going on. We are almost out of food. A cliff to our right and a mountain to our left. I’m on edge. One slipup here and we plummet down the cliff to our deaths. I slipup. We plummet. We however, don’t die. I would fantasize later on about that Pass. The Yellow Trout Pass. I would fantasize briefly about death. To this day I still believe it should have killed us. I awoke. A smile graces my lips. My sister coming to wake me up. I can already smell breakfast. Strange, she usually makes porridge, not bacon and eggs. As my eyes flutter open the blurry figure above me shifts and my vision clears. What I thought was my sister turns out to be a chandelier. Man, she would be ******. It’s an ugly chandelier too. I falter briefly. An unfamiliar ceiling. I bolt upright, looking around. A small bed with an ornate looking dresser to the side, a plate of food sitting upon it. The room isn’t that big, about seven feet across and ten feet long. I push off the bed as I notice an old man sitting next to the door, his wizened eyes staring at me beneath bushy white eyebrows. The small child awoke when he felt the wagon tipping over. He didn’t know what happened, but he heard Billy curse, then a lurch, a terrified whinny from the horses, and the wagon went over on its side, and started falling. Minutes later, the boy came too, lying on his side amidst a large amount of wreckage and debris. He stands up slowly, a little dizzy, and looks up. He’s amazed, he’s fallen almost 100 feet, and he’s fine. He doesn’t know what really protected him, that the Devil had taken over, and cushioned the fall, before leaving. He’s sudden remembers Billy, and rushes over to find Billy unconscious and, and bleeding badly from the head. He starts to panic, but his concern takes over, and he does his best to stop the blood flow from Billy’s head. He hears voices behind him, and turns around to see two old men rushing towards him. They call out, obviously offering help, and the child gladly accepts, letting them carry Billy, with the boy following closely behind. The skinnier of the two elderly men drops back, letting the other carry Billy. He asks the boy questions about himself, whether he’s all right, and the boy shyly answers, as his Father had taught him. The memory this brings back causes tears to come to his eyes, and the older man wisely leaves the boy, to solve his own inner problems. They lead him to a large stone structure, they call it their monastery. The man carrying Billy goes off to one room, and the other man, the tall and skinny man, takes the small boy to another room. He sits the boy down, and quietly examines him for injury. The boy puts up with this, and afterwards the man examines him carefully, almost weighing the boy with his eyes. The boy nervously looks away after a moment, and the man speaks softly. “You are strong in body boy. You have potential beyond your imagination. Inside you is steel enough to forge a thousand swords, with the right teacher to unleash it. I am that teacher.” He carefully watches the boy’s reactions, and notes the child’s eyes. They seem to take on a look, like cold flint, calculating. It disappears after a moment, but it unnerves the older man. He stands, and looks to the boy. “Your training begins tomorrow. I will come for you. Until then, wait here for me.” The old man leaves, and locks the door behind him.” It’s about here I realize it wasn’t a dream. I then mentally chide myself; there is no way that could be a dream. So vivid. The blood. The pain. No way my imagination could do that. I walk towards the door. I’m naked, but I don’t care. I need to find the boy. I ask the old man for answers but he answers my questions with a stare. Frustrated I start yelling. As he does nothing, I head for the door. Locked. After a few more minutes I cave in and start eating. After I’m finished my meal I head for the door, only to receive a blow to my ribs. I topple like a stack of cards, but I am back up on me feet. The old man is sitting there, as he was as if he didn’t move at all. Glaring at him I move forward to kick the man out of the way. Without much effort on his part he sends me flying across the room and into the dresser. I black out. When I next awaken I am in the same room. The old man is gone, and the door is ajar. I head out. The place is large, but it has that old deserted feeling. As I enter the largest room in what feels like a small castle, I find the walls alit with torches and the old man standing in the center of the sparse room looking at me expectantly. “I am a keeper of the Nine. My brother and I guard this monastery and its teachings. But we grow old and weary, and we feel out time shall come to pass soon. When we found you and your brother under the pile of rubble, we knew you would be the ones to take on our legacy. Please, child… Become this old man’s heir, and become one of the greatest warriors to ever grace the world.” I feel relieved at his words. The boy was alive. It didn’t take long until another old man, this one as skinny as a rail and hair that looks wild and peppered. Alongside him was the boy, looking quite nervous. Then came the reading. “This one’s Ki roars like the lion. An untamed beast. Savage, ferocious and wild. The art of the Tiger’s Claw is for this one. A master of this art will he be.” The old man I had dubbed ‘The old Rail’ spoke as we all sat in a circle of incense. The smell is… Pleasant. The other man spoke. “A fiery feline I sense in this one. Already blooded is his aura. A blazing temper, a cool head, balance, grace, stealth and ferocity. A burning desire to defend. The Cat Fist this one I will teach, and protectors of the Nine they shall be.” Speaks Baldy. “The Cat Fist? But he is too old…” “I shall not teach him the forbidden Cat Fist. How stupid do you think I am, brother? The training is crazy and it would kill him anyway. I shall train him in the True Cat Fist, not that abomination that the Goddess Bast had created for her savage warriors. No child should be put through such travesty.” Silence reigns, and I can almost feel the tension between the old geezers. “I accept the youngling as my pupil.” Says Old Rail. “And I accept the elder as mine.” And with these words, our training begins. It is long, hard, and arduous. My master himself does not know the Cat Fist and has to teach me from ancient scrolls. I find myself soaking up the information like a sponge, and everyday I went to bed with a sore body, battered and bruised. Master never allows me to see the scrolls, and I am forced to fight Baldy on a constant basis. The old Rail and the boy have a much easier relationship. I’m older, and apparently that means I get to be beaten around a lot more. They were quite soft on the child. After the reading by the skinny elder, the boy feels a little nervous. He doesn’t like what was said about him, although the tone in which it was said was likable enough. He likes the older man, he’s gentle, and seems kindly enough. Afterwards, the other old man and Billy went off to one place, and the skinny elder, who almost immediately told the boy to call him Fang. From that point on, Fang was the boys master. He taught him basic self-defense, and how to defend himself in combat. After the boy had mastered the basics, which took less time then Fang thought it would, Fang started to teach him parts of his specific specialty, Tiger Claw. The boy loved to practice with the Fang. He was a very adept teacher, but had high moral standard, and wouldn’t stand the boy lying, or laziness. He punished these severely, and the boy learned. Fang taught him many small tricks from the Tiger Claw fighting style, and the boy excelled at these with natural grace, and a seeming innate skill for them. His training passed rapidly. They have taken to calling him Caleb Tael. He doesn’t know the meaning of the words. One night, almost a year into training I sneak into the main Dojo and steal one of the ‘forbidden’ scrolls. When I sneak it back into my room, I can easily see why it’s forbidden. The training method is insane. Despite the insanity of the method the next morning I find myself throwing my arms into a firepit to grab at small chestnuts as they cook. I drop a searing pan of bacon grease while cooking breakfast a few hours later and explain away my burns that way. My secret training continues on like this for a long time and I keep my arms bandaged at all times. Four years pass. The boy has grown up and I am in my prime. I am well into Cat Fist training and even my master is impressed by my speed at times. I have yet to show him my full speed. The boy on the other hand… Can get quite scary. During our stay he has been able to pull out his ‘beast’ and takes the form of this… Demon. He never hurts me, but I can see the feral glint in his eye. He has gotten quite good and is well on the road to mastering his art. His art is much more focused and he is able to pull off his techniques much more than I can pull off mine, but I have much more than he does, so I guess it balances out. His defense could use some real work, however. His offensive, however, can be quite scary while we spar. One day, after training, when Billy and Caleb are out practicing on their own. Caleb is older now, and surer of himself. After a moment, he looks around to make sure the masters aren’t watching. “Billy,” he whispers, “Watch this.” When Billy turns and looks, Caleb focuses on the power he has always felt inside him self, and with an angry cry, he turns into a monstrosity of his normal self. Huge fangs rip out of his mouth, and razor like machete claws push from his fingers. A pair of demonic looking horns sprouts from his head, and tattered wings, much like a large bat, unfurl behind him. After a moment of this, the creature seems to almost fold in on itself, and its just Caleb again, hunched over, and holding his head. Billy is speechless, and when Caleb looks up he says a chilling thing, “This is what’s in me. I can barely control it. It’s so hard to keep it from coming out during sparring.... It scares me.” Speaking of sparring, the dreaded day finally arrives. The day we leave the monastery. I wish it could have gone down better. The masters want to test our strength. and decide to do some heavy full contact sparring. Caleb seems a bit nervous, but it’s to be expected. The monks have started to call him “Beast” because of his ferocity and me “Blitz Faust” because of my natural speed. I don’t know what language it is in, but it at least sounds cool. I am up first. Our match is quite uneventful, but Baldy eventually beat me down. He is just so good against a single opponent it’s kind of scary. It is so hard to hit him. I get a few good shots in, but my jaw stings from the kick he lands. He seems proud of our fight, as his heir is getting better. And then, Beast is up. The fight starts like any other, with probing of defenses and testing attacks. Soon however, they lock in savage combat that is they key to Tiger Claw. And then, I start to see it. Caleb is starting to move faster. His attacks become more and more savage. And then I see it in his eyes after the Old Rail gets in a brutal rake to the throat; the feral ferocity of a killer. The boys form shifts and lets loose a massive roar of anger and slashes at the surprised old man, ripping open the man’s belly. I am instantly on my feet and so is my Master. “Demon!” Old Rail says as he stumbles backwards, holding his stomach. My master moves forward, killing intent coming off of him in waves as he moves towards Caleb. I couldn’t let him. I had to stop him. I dash forward and drop into a combat stance. “Red Fury of the Cat fist!” The words roll off my tongue as if they belonged there. I push my Ki directly in his path towards Caleb. The Ki grows instantly into a fiery being. With the old man’s attention elsewhere, I strike. One, two, six times. My master is old, and like most people, when caught by surprise has little to no defenses. All six strikes hit their mark true and he drops as he finally sees the true speed of the Cat Fist. The fiery apparition dissipates, leaving a scorch mark on the ground. I look over to see a claw erupt out of the back of the Old Rail. Silence ensues. Fang entered Caelebs room, and told him he was going to be tested today. To see how far he had come. Fang took him outside to where Billy and his master waited. They were already sparring, and Caeleb was impressed by how fast Billy was getting. Even though he had amazing speed, the old man had skill and knowledge to back him up, and it wasn’t long before he had beaten Billy. Then it was Caelebs turn, and he did the normal bow and preparation. They started off exchanging light blows to get warmed up, then Fang let loose with a wolf claw, and Caeleb blocked swiftly, and the fight began in earnest. They exchanged the brutal attacks normal to Tiger Claw techniques, leaving huge openings to cause maximum damage with little concern. Caeleb was really getting into the fight, trying his best to win. He was getting angry at his futile attempts to hit the old man, always coming just short, or being parried away. After a particularly powerful swipe, he left himself open, and Fang took advantage of it, and struck Caeleb a strong blow to the throat. Caeleb was already feeling the battlerage, and after that stroke, he felt his inner beast coming out. He tried as much as he could to hold it in, but it came through anyway, and he could feel the murderous talons on his hands tear through Fangs midsection before he lost total control. It terrified Caeleb, it was like he was looking through two glass eyes, and watching as someone else controlled his body. He didn’t realize that’s exactly what was happening. He cried when he saw his hands tear apart Fang, and managed to take over right before attacking Billy. The beast got weaker, and lost a little control after he had killed. Today, everyone is bested by a child. Even me. He defeats his master in hand-to-hand combat, while I resort to attacking an old man from behind. Once again I have killed for this boy and once more I wonder if it’s worth it. We both shed our tears and we surround the monks with scrolls of ancient wisdom and techniques long forgotten. After saying a prayer, we left, alone once again. The lonely monastery burns behind us, the flames cutting a hole in the sky as a streak of black smoke trails up and out of sight. It must be visible for miles. I look back once more and bow to the growing flames in thanks. Their bodies have died. Their memories will live on. A thought crosses my mind as we walk. Is this what they wanted? What Rail and Baldy had in store? Neither died with fear on their face. As I look back, I can distinctly remember a knowing smile as each man breathed his last breath. I expel the thought and we leave, heading down the mountain for the first time in years. I have to wonder what had happened in the years we have been gone. Dead is Billy and an innocent child, and all that is left in their wake is the rebirth of Caleb Tael and Blitz Faust. It would be interesting to see what I had missed. Armed with some armor and items taken from the monastery we choose a random direction and walk our destinies thrown to the wind. The boy looks back on the burning remains of the Monastery. He is devastated that he lost control, and caused their masters to die, but he remembers an odd look that Fang gave him after crying “Demon”! It was almost as if he understood, and wanted it to happen…
Fithero 10-20-06, 08:17 AM	Awsome story guys, ive got no problems with it what so ever. As far as a back stories go, that has to be one of the best ive seen. One question though, what are these two characters? Im going to assume they are both monks, but what is Caleb Tael able to turn into? Great work Peace
Carey Z W 10-20-06, 03:09 PM	Heh, it's gestalt, and on one side, he's full warblade. On the other he's monk, going tigerclaw master. He's a shifter, and I took two flaws and every concievable way possible to make him better when he shifts. He gets sick bonuses, but I call it when the devil side of him comes out, and he has little control over what happens, I'm going to love playing him.
Cherubaddon 10-20-06, 10:38 PM	Simply awesome! Great work!
Carey Z W 10-20-06, 11:03 PM	Thank you, it's good to know our work was appreciated.
Sang-Drax 10-22-06, 11:28 AM	Excellent!
Omnirahk, half-Rahkshi 10-22-06, 04:13 PM	Heh, it's gestalt, and on one side, he's full warblade. On the other he's monk, going tigerclaw master. He's a shifter, and I took two flaws and every concievable way possible to make him better when he shifts. He gets sick bonuses, but I call it when the devil side of him comes out, and he has little control over what happens, I'm going to love playing him. And it seems like Faust Blitz will factor into the story somehow as well. What's his two classes? I could recommend something from Classes and Prestige Classes: the Soul Bound, a class all about having a demon bound to you and being able to release it to get bonuses. DM approval is of course needed. Overall, I LOVE the story. I gotta know how this all turns out. And I am correct in assuming Faust Blitz is also appearing, right?
Carey Z W 10-22-06, 04:26 PM	Yes, you are most definitely correct. Because Caelebs strong emotions are all drawn to the shard in his soul, he is very shy and timid, and requires Blitz to keep him alive. Blitz is going with a ToB build. Swordsage 20 one one side, and swash3/monk(something)/The shadow PrC class from ToB I forgot... Something like moon and sun ninja. I'll have to check that soul bound thing, any place I can do it?
Omnirahk, half-Rahkshi 10-22-06, 06:52 PM	It's on the Classes and Prestige Classes forum. Ought to be near the front (probably not first page). Title of the thread is Soul Bound. If you don't find it, I'll have a link soon.
Carey Z W 10-22-06, 06:56 PM	Found it, my DM shot it down, and I agreed with him... The concept was good, but I think some of that class is a little wonky, and that charismatic will is just stacked....
Omnirahk, half-Rahkshi 10-22-06, 11:20 PM	Found it, my DM shot it down, and I agreed with him... The concept was good, but I think some of that class is a little wonky, and that charismatic will is just stacked.... Ok. You may want to post on the topic then, letting him (or her) know how the class is imbalanced.