Hey there, hope everyone had a happy holiday whether it was just a day off work or a full family affair with all the turkey and trimmings. If you're reading this, know that I'm thankful for you.
So let's just get into it -- I've got another Exalted write-up coming at ya.
(By the way, I've gone back and fixed a few mistakes I made on earlier posts. Among a few other edits, I've made sure Hǎifēng is identified with the correct pronouns, and adjusted the early posts so I consistently refer to Xương as such unless he's taken on his more monstrous form.)
It's been a couple of weeks since the Moonlight Maiden trio have gotten back from their visit with the Golden Lord. Hǎifēng's been working with/for Copper Orchid (like, Hǎifēng is an independent operator, but Copper Orchid gets sort of a 'manager's cut'), while Shango's been exploring the city and keeping up the handful of shipping industry contacts and investments he still has from his time in Zhaojūn. Xương has been doing some freelancing -- he's medically trained and sometimes makes medicines (and poisons) and also serves as something of a freelance negotiator on occasion, a professional 'neutral third party' in conflicts. But it's the freelance medical work that draws his attention one morning.
One of the local small 'street clinics' is overwhelmed -- a bunch of people, refugees really, have come in seeking help and they needed some extra pairs of hands. Mostly people dealing with exhaustion, sprains, that sort of thing. It becomes clear that these people have been traveling overland all night, and they're tired and scared. He spends some time trying to get out of them what's happened, until a guy in his early 20's gets fed up with the silence and tells him -- the Dragon-Blooded destroyed their village. Specifically, the Wyld Hunt. There's sort of a collective gasp from the other refugees in the room, as they've been afraid to say aloud what happened, for fear that Dynastic forces and sympathizers in Salt-Founded Glory will hear.
The brash young man explains -- the previous evening, a group of Dragon-Blooded and a bunch of troops descended upon the farming village of Hue Yên, accusing the people of harboring an Anathema.[0] The villagers didn't know what they were talking about, and so the Dragon-Bloods began threatening and torturing and menacing people until someone came forward and said they were looking for him. At that point, things get hazy but that's when the violence started and a bunch of people fled the area. They traveled overland rather than by the canals, trying to stay ahead of Wyld Hunt troops hunting them down to interrogate or execute on grounds that they'd been 'tainted' by the Anathema, which is why they were in the shape they were in.
He finds out where the village is and takes care of any immediate medical cases -- which, by this point, is pretty view, and things have calmed down enough he can duck out and find the others. He finds Hǎifēng lounging back at their apartment[1], and explains what's going on, and Hǎifēng is immediately on-board. They then start talking about tracking down Shango to inform him, and then at that moment Shango conveniently walks in the door. They get him up to speed, he grabs a few things, and they head out.
Hue Yên isn't far from Salt-Founded Glory, about 15 miles south. Yeah, that's a few hours on foot (the refugees having traveled slowly because they're mortals without Exalted constitutions and had to spend time hiding in ditches and stuff), and not too much faster via a canal boat... but then, everything's a little slower when you're bound to a humanoid form. Shango takes to the skies as an osprey while Hǎifēng assumes a bird of paradise form they acquired on the way back from the Pinnacle of Mercy. Xương dives into the canals in his goblin shark form, as the village is right on one of said canals.[2]
As Xương follows the route he's been given, the two bird-form Lunars fly over stretches of farmland and fruit orchards, roughly following the canal as a landmark. Following a pillar of smoke leads them to Hue Yên. The village isn't burning, but there is a massive bonfire which, they suspect, is full of bodies. They can see from the sky that about two dozen troops have taken over the village and turned it into a temporary military camp. There are no living civilians in sight.
There is, however, an individual in the middle who seems to be directing the rest. He's dressed in light robes appropriate to the region with a hauberk over them, and he carries a staff with what looks like a burning lantern or a torch on the end. Nearby, a giant wasp made out what looks like stained glass glitters in the sun, impossibly beautiful and inspiring a sense of wonder in all who see it -- which Hǎifēng recognizes as an agata, a first circle demon often used as a mount by sorcerers.
(This guy, if the telegraphing isn't obvious. is a Dragon-Blood. I'm just going to tell you now that while the group never learns his name in-character, it's Raden Vesque.[3] I'm just pointing this out so I can just refer to him by name in the narrative from here on out.)
From the canal, Xương bursts out of the water in his hybrid sharkman form in his 'aspect' as the Bonetaker, enhanced by Deadly Beastman Transformation, a silver glow around him as his anima is already flaring. He emerges from the water into an environment where he's surrounded by armored troops and the air is filled with what he definitely recognizes as burning human flesh. And, as per the plan, he begins to tear into the troops while the other two descend upon the leader now that Xương has given the 'signal.'
Hǎifēng drops down in front of Vesque in their own hybrid form, also glowing, and taunts him with "I think you're looking for us?" as they assume Laughing Monster Form. As they take on the constantly-moving martial arts stance, illusory afterimages trail behind their arms, making it look like they have a dozen arms or more as they deliver a powerful palm strike to Vesque. (The effect is very much like Doctor Strange when he's getting ready to break bad on someone.) Behind Vesque, Shango shifts into a hybrid form, also glowing[4], and comes down at him boot-first, calling out "Death from above!" As he does so, the flame leaps off of Vesque's torch, revealing itself to be a Virtuous Guardian of Flame. It takes on the shape of a flaming sword to try and deflect the kick, but it's unable to fully stop the blow from staggering Vesque (Crashing him) and sending him to the ground.
The soldiers ineffectually attack the Lunars with their spears while the demon wasp surges forward to swipe at Shango and Hǎifēng with unnatural speed -- still fast enough to get a hit on Shango, though. Vesque tries to get back up, but the other two Lunars are basically right on top of him and he can't get his feet under him. So instead of unleashing the Death of Obsidian Butterflies as he would have normally done, he channels mystical energies in his hands to turn them into Wood Dragon Claws.
Hǎifēng channels energy into one of their fans, the glow increasing as they toss it into the air.[5] The area around them takes on a twilight level of lighting, flashes of colorful cloths moving around at the edges of vision as if people wearing flowing, vibrantly-colored outfits are dancing just out of sight. As they catch the fan with their tail and bring it down on Vesque like a bladed whip, music can be heard -- albeit muffled, as if hearing it when drunk. But despite the power into the blow, the flaming sword is able to deflect the fan. However, because it's blocking the fan, the sword can't move fast enough to deflect Shango's axe kick, which knocks Vesque out.
Nearby, Xương has unleashed his fury on the troops enough to drastically reduce their numbers, enough that a lesser-trained squad of combatants would have scattered and fled by now, but their morale holds fast. The agata swipes at Shango and Hǎifēng again but they're fast enough to keep ahead of it. The mortal soldiers, though, driven by adrenaline, desperation, and dedication, lunge at the trio with spears. Shango and Hǎifēng are staggered fending off the coordinated attack while Xương just shrugs off spear-tips seeking purchase in his rough shark hide.
Xương then gathers his own Essence as he charges into the remaining troops like a ship running ground, surrounded by a void like the lightless depths of the sea, with glints of teeth and eyes around him as if surrounded by predators.[6] Backed by his raw power, he devastates the rest of the troops, either killing the rest or leaving them too wounded to escape.
At this point, the group finds that the agata is inconsolable at the state of Raden Vesque, letting out an almost-musical, weirdly-beautiful wail of despair.[7] It's basically lost interest in continuing the fight, so they turn their attention towards the unconscious Dragon-Blood. They slap him a bit and dunk his head in the canal to wake him up to try and interrogate him.
Of course, once he's awake, Xương asks him where the rest are and what they're after, and he says they're hunting the group's 'ilk' and spits on them. Xương informs him, as sincerely as he can, that while he's not a wicked man he will hurt the Dragon-Blood over and over until he tells him what he wants to know. He says to "call it a prophecy."
Torn between defending his brothers-in-arms but also wanting to steer the Anathema towards them to face justice, he says that they're hunting a beast that walks like a man and ensnares the minds of the weak, tainting them and turning them against the Dragon-Blooded. Which sounds like an Exalt with social Charms (or mind control, though the line between them is a little thin), and it's possible if whomever is doing this is is new to their power, they might be doing it without full control of their powers.
(Or it's a raksha that's managed to get pretty deep into Creation. Less likely, but not impossible.)
Vesque says that the Anathema fled south, possibly to the City of Dead Flowers, a shadowland in that area, and the others are chasing it. Xương asks the others if they trust him to make an executive decision, and they agree. The Dragon-Blood begins to insist that the others have the Dragons on their side, but they can only speculate on how the sentence was going to end because Xương cuts him off by turning his head around 180 degrees. A few moments later, while none of them are looking at it, the agata goes silent in an instant as it vanishes back to Hell now that it's summoner is gone. The effect is like an old TV special effect where they simply paused the camera, had the actor leave the show, and restarted it.
The group gets ready to head south, their anima banners still blazing for the moment. Xương goes after one of the Wyld Hunt's horses to claim its heart's blood and now, while not as fast as Shango and Hǎifēng's bird forms, he can definitely pick up the pace as they get on the Wyld Hunt's trail.
And we left off there.
[0]-- I've probably explained this elsewhere, but just as a refresher, 'Anathema' is a word that followers of the Immaculate Philosophy use for a variety of threats. While it can mean a raksha or a rogue god/elemental or some sort of monster, it usually means one of the Celestial Exalted. Most commonly that's meant Lunars, but the return of the Solars (and the emergence of Abyssals and Infernals) have muddied those particular waters a bit. On rare occasions it means a troublesome Exigent or a Dragon-Blood that's really become a problem (often by allying with one of the aforementioned Celestials).
[1]-- So something I've been screwing up because we haven't had as direct of a conversation as we should have had about it, but Hǎifēng's non-binary, and it was only recently it clicked that their player (Zac) was using they/them pronouns for the character. So that's going to be a note in my 'things to do next time I have a session 0' list. But I mention it here because at some point after this goes up I'm gonna go back through and update prior posts to match. So on the exceedingly unlikely chance someone notices the change, this is the explanation why. (Edit: Chris from the future popping in, barring one or two instances I may have missed, I've completed the update.)
[2]-- This isn't some random coincidence. An-Teng, especially in the third of the country closest to the shore, is a network of canals and waterways. It's a surviving bit of First Age infrastructure. So most settlements in the western half of the country are directly on the canals, or close to them.
[3]-- 'Raden' may be an unfamiliar family name to those of you who follow Exalted. House Raden is a Cadet House, a smaller group of Dragon-Bloods based in the Threshold (areas outside the Blessed Isle), very much like Legend of the Five Rings' Minor Clans.
[4]-- Look, this is the Wyld Hunt they're dealing with. There is literally no reason to hold back -- nor is there any reason to leave survivors. Whether mortal or Dragon-Blood, these are people who've signed up to hunt the Exalted by any means necessary, even if that means torturing and killing innocent civilians to slay someone who was probably blessed by the Unconquered Sun for doing something amazing and heroic and is still getting a handle on what they are.
[5]-- At this point, Hǎifēng's reached the highest tier of their anima banner, producing an 'iconic' display of power specific to their nature.
[6]-- And now we have Xương's iconic anima.
[7]-- Agata are notoriously strange, prone to weird emotional outbursts and mood swings. They might kill someone they love just to weep over the beauty of the corpse, for instance. From a Storytelling perspective, I included the agata to add a little something to the enemies knowing full well that if it wound up being the last thing standing I could handwave it into withdrawing from combat depending on if we were running low on time and/or if it would just seem a chore to finish off.
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