NOVEMBER EVENT | THE HARBINGER ORACLE

[beleos]

HEDGING YOUR BETS

Bearers feel it. Similar to when the Scorching Isles was opened, there is the same tug, from somewhere in the distance. Those who are in springstar feel it from closer, like a blossom of warmth in your heart, you feel the Oracle spring to life. Those in Highstorm feel it too, but distant. Far away. You remember Cyrus’s words, that it would come to life in Springstar, and you know, just from the relative distance, from how far away it feels – He was probably right.

So bearers must make their way to the center of Springstar’s residential district. Finding one’s way to Springstar will be difficult, in fact. Preparations have been underway since Cyrus’s announcement, and Springstar leaps into action. The Legionnaires are already marching by the time the first bearers start moving throughout the city. In addition to any of Meridian’s own preparations, the Legionnaires establish choke points and start organizing evacuations. It will be difficult to make your way through Springstar, but the closer bearers make it to the hedge maze, and what seems to be the oracle at the center, the warmer their chests feel. Throughout the city, it feels warm, like small wicks of heat. The closer bearers become, the more it feels like a torrent. It is burning them to their center and igniting them to their cores. Like the fire of drive, is what it feels like. Like the hunger for something more than just food, or anything else, like the anticipation of victory.

The maze itself is where it is the most intense as bearers start to make their way through the hedge maze. Vines and brambles lie within a neat hedge, and it looks like it is safe to jump, or scale, but the moment a bearer tries to jump it, cut through it, or even go beneath it, roots, brambles, and vines lash out to entrap bearers, and start to drag them down and into the hedges. You will have to figure out a way out – lest you be stuck for seemingly the near future.

Of course, when Dimitri’s hand touches the stone statue in the middle, it all goes dark, and wherever you were, whoever you were fighting –

Every bearer collapses at the same time.

YOU'D BETTER BE A-MAZE-ING!

In the dark, there is that fiery impression of the Harbinger. Competition, drive, disdain for even those that best them. It is clear, in the dark, with your eyes closed, that the Harbinger does not see the Bearers as worthy to obtain it. You feel ghostly hands on your mind, into you, as if it is delving for more, trying to pluck and pull out the right memory. It looks for victories, triumphs, defeats, or betrayals. Something that shows the mettle of the bearer, what it is looking for. When it finds what it is looking for – or is this just a dream? – after the bearer experiences the dream, they will get the distinct impression that it is not enough. That the Harbinger wants more. It wants to see what this bearer can do. It wants to see you rise to the challenge, bearer! Will you do as it wishes, and show it the scope of your mettle, or will you capitulate and let the Harbinger know that it was right – you aren’t enough?

The Harbinger wants you to prove them wrong. Can you do that? Will you use spite to convince it that it is wrong? The Harbinger at the center of this labyrinth imparts to bearers, that it will not allow the weak to succeed, that nobody who cannot reach it, would ever be able to protect them. They look down on bearers, and it is up to you, to convince them that you are worth their attention.

When bearers wake, they will be stuck in a foyer. The walls seem blank, and there is a door, leading further into the maze. It is not… fully dark, everything here seems to be lit just enough to move around without trouble, but it is not bright. Bearers can look left, and right, and see others beside them. They are not alone, but nor are they with others of their faction. No, you can feel it, between all of you, gathered here in one space. The humming of your shared aspect fills the room, as if all of you together in one space feels right.

You will not be able to stay. The foyer lasts only until the last person leaves, and if any try to stay behind and stationary, they will find that eventually a door appears, and the room begins to shrink. You had better get moving!

You must move further into the maze. You will find that grouping up for long periods of time becomes impossible, and moving from one door to the next can find foes, allies, or even neutral parties. Every door you open within this maze, leads to new and unusual locations. You may both walk in, from opposite ends, only to find that the doors are gone when you turn your back. Do you end up on a precarious path over spikes, lava, or even water? Do you walk into a room with your greatest desire, a hunger that can now never be sated? Will you do anything to find your way through the corridors? Will bearers help each other, and resist the call of the Harbinger, or will you push over even your treasured ones to win?

MADE IN THE SHADE

And even further in, as you start to catch sight of them, patches of darkness seep into the corners, into everything. They may be hidden, at first. They may lurk underneath patches of leaves, or in shadowed corners. But the longer bearers are within this labyrinth, the longer the shadows seem. They start to reach out, to pull bearers into their shadowy depths. You may feel malaise, or an unwillingness to continue, once you first step within these patches. The longer you are there, the harder it is to get out. You will need help from your friends or dear ones, or sheer strength of will – but can you fight on, as you start to lose the things that motivate you?

And then there are the visions. People you know, love, or trust, they round corners, just ahead. They seem just out of range, and at first, it is difficult to tell if they are there or not. But they happen to reappear, and then disappear around a corner. Try and chase them, if you dare. When your fingers touch their arm, or grab their clothing, or heaven forbid, if you pull them into a hug – it seems impossible to pull away. They were treasured, weren’t they? There is a reason they appear here, to you. Why would you want to pull them away? Why would you –

They reach out, their fingers seem long, as they reach toward your shard – they will not be deterred by clothing or armor, their fingers seem to bend and twist around the junctions – before they find purchase on your shard. They rip it from you, and it feels like you are being separated from something. It’s painful, it hurts, but the last thing you see, as they hold your shard in your hand, is someone you care very deeply for, placing the shard in the same place on their own body, and your own face smiles back at you, and it all goes black. You are gone. Into… nothing.

NOTES

Here are some prompts to set the scene and foundation of the Exalt Oracle! Please refer to the ooc post for more details about what’s happening in the labyrinth! Feel free to direct questions here.

If your character gets killed by a shadow-copy, please let us know in the reporting post that goes up on November 20th if they touch the effigy. If they do not, please let us know on the deaths page! Don't forget to report any dissipations as a whole! Please also let us know if your character is saved by another bearer, or if your character’s shard is taken by the shadow copy for the entire duration of the event. This will not result in any permadeath, but you might get some cool lore! Teehee! If your character defeats a shadow creature, please let us know [HERE]

Comments

[wolof]

[ Akua's fingers stilled, for only a moment, the phantom hand twitched against her thigh, like fingers pressed against there, as her fingers pressed against the lace, brushing the fabric up against her clit like that, her mouth opened into a soft, pleasured gasp, and her body arched slightly, but with her permission, the reaction is short-lived, for one should never try to distract a Praesi from a prize.

Her mouth curled, and she leaned forward, to press a lingering kiss against the side of Hayame's mouth, warm, and chaste, were it not for what they were doing. ]

Your wish is my command, dear heart.

[ She says, before the phantom fingers trail closer before they find her, and brush first against the soft lips that cover her entrance, slipping along the inside, experimenting, and feeling it out. It's exploratory, at first — nearly clinical — but it is only a moment before Akua's invisible fingers twitch, and they brush against her swollen clit, and she leans down to plant her lips to her neck next, her other fingers still rubbing gently against her nipple, planting sensations, against her skin. She wanted to drive her wild. ]

[warmare]

[Just saying "yes" likely did not seem like much, coming from most people. But Hayame is not most people. Her tightly guarded, damaged hearts and her repressed, shame-filled upbringing were certainly not most people's. Just that amount of honesty, that amount of admitting aloud what she desired...

Her hearts pound, and both sets of lungs freeze in her chests as her face tips into the chaste kiss. Her lips part for soft pant of need... which becomes a whimper whine of pleasure as somehow, somehow, (magic) Akua touches her, her (her?) hand whispering over the velvet soft skin of her nethers and the sensitive swell of exposed nerve. Her own fingers splay and press as she arches into the touch, squirming as the light, teasing touch beneath her tail and over the taut tip of a flush breast make her feel deliciously trapped between. She should... Akua's lips are on her neck, they're too far, the words just fall out...]

I'm not... It's winter in Alenroux, I'm not supposed to be...

[Even now, she still provides excuses. She isn't this wanton by nature, she swears, she does... But she doesn't let the excuses actually stop her, not this time. Even as she sighs through the rest, the excuse for why she was so needy... She knows it doesn't cover her own actions. It doesn't explain away what she's doing. It doesn't stop her from doing it.]

Supposed to be in heat for... for at least three months...

[But she was in something now, so... if Akua was right, if they could just take the edge off, if they could just "rest" and then get back to the Oracle-

Hayame's insides clench eagerly, another whine released as she leans into the other woman and resumes her touch, turning her wrist upwards to give her a better angle from which to thrust her fingers, a shudder racing down her long spine at the lewd, slick sound.]

[wolof]

[ Though it would be easy to say that Hayame shouldn't worry whether she was in heat or not, she understood what she was truly saying. This was unusual, and her passion was not and should not be this high. While as a human, she did not have such cycles, she understood them from a clinical sense, and she would have considered this, had her attentions not been so narrowly focused on the only person in front of her, the only thing that mattered right now.

She was hungry for it, in a way that defied logic, and perhaps that was what Hayame experienced whenever she was in a heat. It was a roaring inferno, a desperate hunger that left her squirming on Hayame's fingers, chasing a sensation that wasn't quite there yet, but that she wanted to find. Over and over, if she could. If Hayame would allow her the time. ]

Then we will sate it.

[ She promised, instead of telling her she was wrong. Instead of pointing out anything about it. Hayame knew her body best, after all, but Akua wanted her to feel the same as she did, her ghost-like fingers drifted, aiming to fill her in a way that would satisfy her. It wasn't her real fingers after all, merely controlled force, and if it felt solid, like something more pushing at her lips, spreading them apart, ghostly sensation coaxing her open as a phantom thumb brushed against her nerves, trying to make her feel as good as she felt. ]

[warmare]

[It was unusual. Her passions should not be this high. But they were, ever since she had come into this room. And maybe, if Akua felt the same as she did now... She would know what it was like, to be in heat. To burn with hunger that had no rational source, to find your brain drifting to lewd thoughts despite a need to focus elsewhere, to be sensitive to smells and touch, to ache and not be able to hide it, body responding as if to show anyone at all who might notice see? see how badly I want to... ?

She had always hated it. Only recently... only recently she had started to think something good could come of it, that maybe she wouldn't have to go through another frustrating, embarrassing heat ag-... for a while, but-

Hayame swallows some words that might have come out. Her excuses were in the air, she didn't need more. She had said "yes" and Akua had promised to sate them. She knew that Akua could. There wasn't any reason to doubt. So as the "fingers" became less defined and more simply pressure, friction, fill that slips inside of her, as an excited moan parts her lips and slides off her tongue... she lets out a ragged breath and then surges forward, dipping to find the other woman's mouth so that she might mask her sounds momentarily in a kiss, demanding and desperate.

It doesn't mask the other sounds, though. The slick way her nethers part but then clench around the intrusion of that invisible, magic force, how her hooves skitter along the ground as she lets out an aborted half kick, hips bucking up awkwardly into the electric rub of phantom touch that felt all the better each time her body "winked" and pressed her large, spade-shaped clit directly into the sensation of touch. It drives her further, too, anxious to not just receive, to show that she wouldn't be overwhelmed this time. Her fingers pull out of Akua's heat and splay over the half pulled-away undergarment, recalibrating just a moment, as she parts from their kiss with a gasp and a whimper, biting into her bottom lip, her tail shuddering high above her bay rump.

And then she's pressing back in with another finger, holding on to sense long enough to watch and feel for the angle from which Akua levers up her hips, striving to understand where felt best, what she wanted...]

Good-

[So that she can give it to her, curling her fingers and flicking her thumb over the line where lace has been pulled taut over sensitive flesh.]

Is it good... ?

[wolof]

[ Akua swallows a half-groan of frustration when Hayame's fingers slipped out of her, but it only sounds like need when she voiced it, a soft groan that escaped against Hayame's mouth, instead of frustration, bereft as she was of that touch that had been so good, exactly what she needed. She felt it, that heat that coiled in her belly, the way it sparked a fire between her legs, a surge of heat and warmth, and wet that made her want to squirm, and when Hayame's fingers returned, her sigh was pleasured, and pleased. ]

Yes, it's wonderful.

[ She admitted, her tone soft, and sated, even as her body moved against her fingers, not satisfied with only being given what she wanted, she was Praesi, she would take it, too.

Her soft gasps were loud, even as their breaths were louder, and the slick sounds of both hers and Hayame's arousal was almost vulgar in how loud it was. Or perhaps the room was simply silent, otherwise. Her fingers arched, like a weaver, plucking at strings, one to play with Hayame's nipple still, gentle teases now that she knew what she liked, and her other artfully strummed her magic. She could make Hayame feel pleasantly full — or more if she liked — and the gentle swipes up against her clit whenever it was free for her to press and brush against. She swiped at it, and pressed it, and pinched gently, rubbed it when she could, with her magic, the sensations were... unique like this, but her sorcery was adapt enough to allow her this.

Against her mouth, she murmured — ]

Do you like this?

[ She assumed so, but well. It is good to make certain. ]

[warmare]

[If ever confronted on the subject, Hayame would find it extremely distasteful for anyone to even begin to imply that a warrior such as herself, in such an intimate setting, would ever be the sort to respond so directly and wantonly to simple praise. Yet how is she supposed to explain it, then, how she whines and clenches around Akua's magic when told her touch was wonderful, how her body arches eagerly into a taut bow, quivering with pleasure as dark fingers tease and flick at a taut nipple, the slick swell of her clit. But does she like it... ?]

Mmmm...

[Another moan she cannot hide in a kiss when she needs to pant for breath, striving to give as good as she receives, to provide the sense of fill with her fingers and the friction with lace and thumb.]

Can...

[Doing was one thing, but saying... She had managed "yes", but. An expression beyond the shades of cultural shame and inexperience flickers over her face, something... was that guilt? It was. Guilt, as if afraid that more than just being with someone else, that asking for that, for something that person couldn't give her would be the true betrayal. Would it? But she wants it so badly, and Akua could-]

D- Deeper, can you...

[Her sharp teeth bite into her lip again to half swallow her moan, hiding her guilty request in a sloppy kiss, in nips to lips far softer and crimson than her own. She had only had it once, when Set had taken a stallion's form to sate her Discord-mixed heat, and it had been... She had felt pleasure since, and it was good, it was enough- it was more than enough because it came with trust, with something that made her hearts ache sweetly, so it was, it was, but-]

Fill me more...

[But there was some primitive part of her that craved it still. And in this room where hunger ruled...]

[wolof]

[ Akua cannot help the soft laugh, swallowed by Hayame's kiss, and it's not mocking, but indulgent. Can she? Her conductor's fingers spread, as if she is nudging something larger, and her hand moves, as if to press it further into something. She's happy to oblige Hayame's needs, especially when they are voiced, and there is a part of Akua — the prideful part — that greatly enjoys that she can offer this as well as anyone else can.

Of course she can, actually. She can do anything, she is a Sahelian, but being recognized as able to do so for Hayame, a woman who was so truly prickly, and truly set in her ways... That she allows her to do this, not once, but twice now, encourages her to take this further, to truly satisfy her.

After all, what other person can stimulate so much? Who else is perfect? (Akua's pride, of course, is eternally too much.)

Her other hand gently pinched at her nipple, and her tongue ran against the length of Hayame's sharpened teeth, her body arched against her fingers, the pressure distinctly pleasant, and when she arched, she pulled back from her mouth, exposing the length of her neck, the laced dress across her body hugged every curve, the sensation of lace against her body enough to make her squirm, as hungry and turned on as she was. It made it better. ]

[warmare]

[Hayame had once been the type never to ask for anything, because she would not receive it. What was the point? Even now... Even now after over a year in an entirely different world she finds it in her to be both amazed and distrustful of receiving what she requests. But Akua gives it to her without cost or demand, and Hayame releases a mewling sound of pleasure the moment she feels it, somehow, the magic-aided sensation of pleasure thrusting deeper into her aching body where no one else has managed to reach . It all blends together- the fill, the pinch, the slide of tongue over her sharp teeth, and now...

Now she finds herself lost in it. Even though she knows... She knows they must pursue the Oracle, she knows they must leave this room... her desires are twisted, and she thinks... Then we must do this first. If they can only advance once sated, then they should sate-

And the last of her guilty reticence crumbles. Akua's head tips back to bare her throat and the fangs she had flirted with nip and prick along the warm length of her neck as Hayame squirms and her back hooves splay, desperately leveling up her croup to invite the sorceress' friction faster, further, into the head-like slick of her arousal, her own fingers seeking to do the same. Just a bit more... they could- They could claim the Oracle if they tried just a bit more-]

[wolof]

[ Ever stalwart, Hayame's focus is on the Oracle, but Akua's mind lingers on this alone. he is not a woman of great hunger, but for now, it is all that can fill her mind. Maybe it is the concentration, to maintain the hold on her gift, and use it for this purpose, or perhaps it is that wild thing blossoming inside of her, a raucous, wild hunger. It lives only for release in this moment, and Akua wants it just as much as she wants to hear those same cries escape Hayame's throat.

So she takes her cues, her eyes at half-mast as she looked over the shoulder of the Jinba, Hayame's fangs offer pricks of pain and Akua feels heightened by it. Good. She breathes in and out, and she arched, her eyes struggled to stay open as she wanted to lean back, and offer the whole of herself to Hayame's ministrations.

But so did Hayame, didn't she? Akua watched the Jinba's haunches rise slightly, and she obliged the unspoken request, filling her more, fucking her harder, letting her feel just how satisfying it can be. She observes to make sure that Hayame never complains, backs off when needed, learning what her body likes just as well as any male lover could. Her breaths started to escalate, the flush across her skin darkened it, and Akua knew that she could only hold back so long, her hunger was so great, and her body ached, for how much it throbbed, chasing Hayame's fingers, taking them.

She needed more, her breaths said, even as through her own lips escaped a needy, hungry little sound. ]

[warmare]

[With that person... Hayame always tried to be gentle. She tried so hard not to bite him, even when she felt the urge, because... because she didn't think he would like it, what if he thought it was too animalistic, what if... She didn't know. She just tried. But here in this room, the hunger building, the urges rising with the pleasure... the minute Akua seems to invite it further, arching into it, her breathing shallow...

Hayame bites, her sharp teeth pinching skin and lightly breaking it, her tongue laving over the marks left behind. It half muffles the strangled whines that travel up her own throat as Akua's magic thrusts obligingly deeper, harder, like she hasn't experienced since Set, and the instinct-driven part of her brain, the part that in heat craved that sort of all-consuming mount... it was on fire. Hayame's thumb rubs desperately quick over Akua's clit and the slick-damp lace, her fingers thrust...

And she bites again, further up the column of the other woman's throat, the abject moan of peaking pleasure splashing against honey dark flesh as her body tightens up around the invisible shape of the sorceress' magic, a slick surge of arousal messily squirting out around "nothing" that felt like so, so much.]

[wolof]

[ Akua enjoys it, the pain. Her softly hissed groan fills the spaces between them, because while it hurt, she likedit all the same. How could she not? Her tastes had always been eclectic, and pain in lovemaking was... truly something else, either given or received. She felt her entire body flood with heat on the second bite, the thrust of her fingers, and the way she rubbed at her —

She swallowed, and breathed, her arm gently moved to rest against Hayame's shoulder, her entire body starting to stiffen, like movement was hard, like everything in her —

Even still, her fingers moved, she still thrust into her with steady patience at Hayame's direction, filling her, thrusting with increasing speed, the press of her magic "thumb" against her clit while she thrust, determined to satisfy the Jinba if she possibly could, show her that there was no shame in wanting, show her that she could satisfy herself and it was welcome. All she had to do was ask, after all. Akua would give this to her, if only she asked.

Her breath came ragged, and she rubbed her hips against her again, her head swimming, like it was floating high and above the two of them. ]

I'm —

[ She breathed, but it was already too late, and Hayame would feel the tightening of her around her fingers, as she started to come. ]

[warmare]

[Hayame does not need the warning. She had watched, enraptured and dazed with heat and Discord as Set had worshiped between Akua's thighs, as his tongue and fingers had slipped inside of her and drunk of her pleasure while her own lips pressed distractedly along the flexing line of his shoulder and neck. Even distracted and desperate with her own needs she had watched, and once the god-turned-stallion had sated those needs the same way Akua was now through magic, addressing the primal, instinctive wants of her heat for deep, hot, full... She had tried, herself.

She knew how Akua's body looked before it came, felt before it came. But this time, she's not fumbling and new and ashamed. Maybe she will still be a little ashamed, maybe she will feel as if she betrayed that person, only time would tell. But that one night had given her the power to be less of it, and so- So-

Hayame thrusts her fingers in as fully as she can, angling upwards in rhythmic pulses as her thumb presses hard against the damp lace and the sorceress' clit, determined to see her over the edge and further for what she has done for her. Even as she... Gods, it's so good. In a way, she hates that she loves it, because she- She had chosen a human man as her lover, and so she had told herself she would be content never having that specific type of pleasure ever again. She had others, he sated her despite that "lack", but-

As Akua falls silent in her dedication to orgasm, Hayame cries out for it, releasing the Praesi's neck. Her back legs splay out and her tail whips, and without a mounting stallion's weight to keep her hips pressed down she finds herself bucking, welcoming the somehow-there thrusts and the electric pressure over where her own swell of nerves winks in and out of sight with each clench of desire. Akua was... Akua was there for her now in her need, and even if she-

Even if they had to get back to the Oracle, right now-

She is a mare, not a stallion. It is the stallions who are driven to bite the back of their mares' necks to keep them still as they pump into them, heavy and selfish. But Hayame isn't being selfish now. And she is biting, digging her sharp teeth back into the honey dark junction of neck and shoulder as she cums, tongue laving up against a hint of blood and flesh as she muffles her breathy moans in Akua's shoulder.]

[wolof]

[ She clenched around Hayame's fingers, the pulses of her release thudded against Hayame's fingers inside of her, her body taught, her head back, she very nearly didn't feel Hayame's teeth on her neck until she started to descend from the heights Hayame had sent her to. Her entire body was like a strung bow, just about to snap, and with one hand on Hayame's shoulder, her nails gripped into her shoulder in turn, and her hands continued to try and push into her, a little harder, as if she couldn't tell that the Jinba was coming.

She could, of course, the way her rump moved, her tail lashed, the way she sunk her teeth into her, and she wondered if she would have to cauterize the wound when all was said and done — and wasn't that a deeply pleasant thought that left her body heated and thrumming through the last pulses of her orgasm, her eyes closed until she finally felt the last shudder of it leave her, and her hand relaxed, her body feeling sated, though only momentarily.

It's almost shameful, how much she wants to keep riding on her fingers, even now. Her body rocked against Hayame's fingers as she rode the rest of her own orgasm, her fingers still drawing the sensation in and out, her eyes half-opened, she looked at Hayame with a hazy sort of hunger, not quite sated, and she gasped, as the pain finally, finally filtered through the haze of her pleasure, a spike of it that forced her head back, and a curl of her lips spread across her face.

After all, what Praesi could resist such a divine (or damned?) mix of pain and pleasure? ]

[warmare]

[The sounds of her pleasure may be muffled, but they crash and hum against Akua's honey dark flesh and where her canines have punctured it, the iron taste of crimson blood staining her teeth and blossoming on her tongue. Not enough to scar, not enough to endanger, but enough to notice, enough to hurt. Hayame's jaw spasms and tightens her bite as Akua's magic-formed sensation of fill and pressure keeps thrusting, keeps her orgasm spiraling higher, tighter, longer, her cries reduced to whines and whimpers on the edge of overstimulation-

Until it all comes crashing down when Akua's fingers at least slow, just enough for her to start crashing half-down. Belatedly, as if she has just realized what she's done, Hayame's jaw suddenly releases and frees the other woman's throat, panting wildly over the damaged skin as she struggles for sense and for words, her forelegs trembling in attempt to keep herself balanced in her strange arch between a Praesi's legs, her own hindquarters grinding up into nothing seemingly but air, the back of her dun thighs damp and her tail flagging up obscenely high. It was still so full, so good, but no, she had to-

She had to focus, there was something... Something important-]

Akua, I'm sorry...

[Right, she had to. She had to apologize, she hadn't-]

I didn't mean to-... to bite you-

[Surely it wasn't welcome, could have even ruined the pleasure she'd been so intent on providing? She can still feel Akua clenching on her fingers, though she manages to pull the digits free with a slick sound, pressing her hand over the other woman's mound to provide a bit of pressure, half an attempt at modesty, rubbing just a bit with the heel of her palm to try and soothe the remaining sparks, try and be sorry for losing control.

Try to focus, so she doesn't lose control and try to coax that phantom sensation further inside her again. There was something else. Something...]