The Most Dangerous Game ~ [Tacheon Alexander Black]

[Λύσις]

Kartaikian Stormcloud stood next to his gray horse, Stormrider, looking to the Sun for the time. Only a couple hours to dusk, he figured. He'd best get on his way before it was too dark to see. As he mounted his horse, he wondered how it was he always ended up in these situations. Cursing his demon, he took one last look at his reflection in the dark waters he'd just filled his waterskins with, and then he prodded his horse to get it moving.

Kartaikian had a thing with warnings and revelations. In fact, he seemed to have a horrible tendency to ignore them, or at least not believe them until it was too late. Once again he was late to heed what was probably a pretty obvious warning, but this time he was determined not to be too late. He hadn't sorted through all the symbols yet, and he probably would never fully understand the meaning of them, but the here and now was what mattered.

The here and now was a matter of life or death. Kill or be killed. Hunt and be hunted. His enemy was out there somewhere, and his comrade...well, for all Kartaikian knew, that comrade was dead.

[TAB]

The trees whipped past Tacheon like, well, whips. As he sprinted across the terrain, the branches and vines left gashes and scrapes all along his torso, but not for long. Soon, as with all things, the wounds wove and stitched themselves as good as new, as though they were never there.

The thing from which Tacheon Alexander Black now fled was nameless, although it needed none. It wasn't some strange beast, some toxic vapor, or some natural disaster or any other sorts. It was shame. As if by running away from (and at the same time toward?) his problems he could just as easily solve them. Betrayal can be the bet option at the time, but it will scar you for eternity.

And then the trees grew thicker. And darker.

[Λύσις]

Betrayal was one thing that Kartaikian took very seriously. So here he was now, navigating though the forest with his sword drawn, mercilessly slashing at any vines or branches that got in his way. Behind him his horse made its way through the underbrush, carrying supplies. Kartaikian also carried supplies, in the instance he might get separated from his horse, but he also carried other burdens. The one that weighed most heavily on his shoulders was a grudge.

Kartaikian looked back up at the Sun. He would need to find suitable shelter by nightfall, which still looked to be a couple hours off. He kept on trailblazing though, looking, searching, and having no luck finding his target.

[TAB]

An old, abandoned watchtower sat on a hill, the only sign that the land Tacheon now stalked was once inhabited. He began to trek toward it. Inside the massive structure, riddled with millenia of overgrowth and decay, was a flight of stairs going up and, more strangely, going down. He decided to go up.

He was ascending the tower when he heard it: a horse's neighing. He had seen nothing moving nor breathing on his journey, so it wasn't likely that it was a wild breed. His curse had arrived.

He turned and fled to the stairs leading downward.

[Λύσις]

Night had now fallen, the sun long set and the moon now risen. However, in the distance Kartaikian, who was now riding upon his horse, could see something unusual silhouetted against the star spangled sky. It was a tall building, a tower of sorts. Stormrider neighed, sensing somebody nearby. Kartaikian shushed him, and guided him toward the tower, as quietly as possible.

The tower was quite large, and set up on top of a hill, where it could see a lot, maybe even all, of the forest. When Kartaikian got to the base of the hill, he dismounted his horse and walked up to the colossal tower. Before he entered, he drew his sword, which glimmered a gloomy green glow. He opened the door quickly and looked around.

No one yet... He saw stairs leading up to the top of the tower. And stairs leading down...to where? Kartaikian decided to find out...

[TAB]

The crashing of the subterranean river that the staircase led to was perfect for masking Tacheon's movements. Strange rock formations adorned the walls of the two-way cavern, and an eerie crystal glow both made it easier to see, and distorted vision. It was made to conceal something. As Tacheon entered one of the crevices in the walls, katana drawn, he heard something that even above the sound of the waterfall couldn't be mistaken. A curious grunt. Thousands of eyes glowered in the crystalline efflorescence, and Tacheon bolted. A long tongue followed him, and managed to wrap around his torso. He couldn't manage to pull himself backward.

He tried to analyze the elements around him, but something was blocking his readings of the environment... the crystals, he presumed. Sure that there was some sort of carbon in the soil beneath his feet, he tried sending a diamond spike to sever the beast's tongue, but everything went to hell at once.

One of the crystals on the wall overloaded and shattered, spreading dark purple haze over the area where it had shed its light. Atrion that was before so stable suddenly began to twist itself and deform into it's nasty twin, Delidium. Reality distorted itself.

"TACHEON!" came a voice barely audible above the rush of the water and the atoms collapsing around him.

"Kartaikian," Tacheon muttered, not sure whether to be relieved or even more terrified, "I..." and everything faded to black.

[Λύσις]

As Stormcloud descended the stairs the sound of rushing water came to his ears. Some kind of underground river or something, Kartaikian thought. When he got to the bottom of the stairs he shouted over the sound of the river, "TACHEON!"

The long cavernous corridor was lit with the dim glow of thousands of illumining crystals, but even in their glittery phosphorescence Kartaikian couldn't see anyone. He did see something though, a strange dark purple haze that seemed to be seriously disrupting the matter around it. Out of curiosity, Kartaikian fired an arrow into the haze, surprised by the fact that the arrow neither hit anything nor came out the other side of the cloud. The indigo smoke had consumed the arrow completely, as it would likely do to anything else it touched.

Rather than risk going through it, he went into a small crevice and hoped that it would make for a sufficient detour around the annihilative roadblock. The crevice indeed branched out and seemed to lead somewhere, and Kartaikian did the best he could to navigate the lowly fluorescing maze. Suddenly he heard a strange noise, that which could only be a growl from some subterranean predator.

He soon exited the maze to find himself back in the main corridor, on the other side of the purple smog. Very closely nearby he heard another growl, coming from a nearby crevice. Kartaikian chased after the sound, into a large chamber. The first thing he saw was thousands of glimmering eyes staring at him. The creature stood maybe sixty feet tall, towering over six foot Stormcloud. It's large head was filled with eyes, and a massively copious orifice filled with razor sharp teeth and a pitch black rope of a tongue.

It stood on four limbs, which each had seven webbed and clawed digits, suggesting that the creature was not just subterranean but also aquatic. It's skin appeared slick, and was a bluish black color. Hanging from its mouth was its tongue, hanging from which was a man. Tacheon Alexander Black, his katana dangling from his closed fist, even though he appeared to be unconscious.

The creature dropped Tacheon on the ground, leaping to attack Kartaikian...

[TAB]

OoC: Sorry that I've been inactive on this, I still can't really think of anything. I'm getting a picture of Tacheon today, so... that should be added to my post when I get it (courtesy of Monkey D. Luffy). I'll try to add more to this this evening, but no promises can be made at this point in time.

PEACE