[No magic guides the silent tread of Liem's booted feet as he slides through the woods, circling around to catch the creature in plain view; only decades' worth of practice keep his steps from making any noise, finding protruding roots and patches of bare ground amongst the twigs and leaf litter decorating the forest floor. He skirts a patch of dry bracken and pauses next to a thick tree trunk, observing the unnatural shape of the beast.
He does not dare get closer without risking its notice, so the paltry obstruction of a scantily leafed branch between them will have to be tolerated. He has shot through worse visibility than this — and if his bow retains even a scrap of its former luck, perhaps it will aid him. Dignity's Barb has long had a reputation for finding a mark even against the odds.
Liem waits until Akua springs her snare, chains of magic binding reality tight around the creature. When he spies the movement, sees the spell take effect, he steps just a bit clearer into view, aims his weapon at the beast — and shoots. One, two, three, four quarrels trailing ripples of magic, guided by his judgement as Abadar's weapon, by divine power and aberration's bane leap from his crossbow one after the other and slam into the creature's charred flesh: two more bolts into the spongy meat of chest and flank, one finding a dully glowing eye, and one piercing clean through its neck, each causing ruination upon impact, as though plunging into flesh already swollen with rot. The thing twists and gurgles in its prison with each strike, falling silent only upon the last, as greenish ichor weeps from its split, burnt skin.
Liem stands panting lightly, one last quarrel already half drawn from its quiver, regarding the snared creature for any remaining sign of life. But death seems finally to have claimed it; the only movement from that part of the forest is the drip of fluids onto the ground below.]
no subject
He does not dare get closer without risking its notice, so the paltry obstruction of a scantily leafed branch between them will have to be tolerated. He has shot through worse visibility than this — and if his bow retains even a scrap of its former luck, perhaps it will aid him. Dignity's Barb has long had a reputation for finding a mark even against the odds.
Liem waits until Akua springs her snare, chains of magic binding reality tight around the creature. When he spies the movement, sees the spell take effect, he steps just a bit clearer into view, aims his weapon at the beast — and shoots. One, two, three, four quarrels trailing ripples of magic, guided by his judgement as Abadar's weapon, by divine power and aberration's bane leap from his crossbow one after the other and slam into the creature's charred flesh: two more bolts into the spongy meat of chest and flank, one finding a dully glowing eye, and one piercing clean through its neck, each causing ruination upon impact, as though plunging into flesh already swollen with rot. The thing twists and gurgles in its prison with each strike, falling silent only upon the last, as greenish ichor weeps from its split, burnt skin.
Liem stands panting lightly, one last quarrel already half drawn from its quiver, regarding the snared creature for any remaining sign of life. But death seems finally to have claimed it; the only movement from that part of the forest is the drip of fluids onto the ground below.]