[Round One] Through the Dark Streets (Puck, CourageWielder, Hippo Cloud)

[Zorolo]

OoC: And let the fun begin. ^_^

BiC: The streets of the nearly modern city were covered in grime and filth. Disease and darkness. Layers of garbage piled upon the rotting structures and food that scattered across the landscape. The smell of blood and decay drifted around darkly and seemed to have driven every person out of this town. Things here seemed to have stopped dead in whatever tracks had once existed. It truly was a sad sight to behold.

Water rushed through the sewers below as movement occurred. Rodents and other creature that made their homes in such places moved loudly about. From the way this town seemed, between the slowly dilapidate buildings and the state of ruin the streets were in, some great death had devastated this land not to long ago. The city had gotten to a point where even death itself seemed to keep away.

Thick black clouds lined the sky, but no rain fell. The city streets were damp, but not with any kind of sanitary liquid. The sidewalks were cracked and broken, but not by an earthquake or some other form of natural disaster. It was simple to judge that this was no act of God that had destroyed this once prosperous city and left little more then body parts and pools of blood; rather, this was something done by the hands of a living being.

It was for this reason that the company had sent in Monroe Vossler, the bounty hunter and mercenary. His orders were simple: to find out what had destroyed this city and deal with it. After all, the same company that hired him had a stake in the land where the city once stood. They simply made to pave the city into streets and then build it up a mall or something inane along those lines. A truly unkind thing to do to those who died here.

Actually, when other scouts had been sent in, that was the strange thing. One or two reports had returned to the company stating that all of the towns people had vanished, save for a few limbs or other body parts that lay scattered across the city; however, those were the only one or two reports they received. All other scouting crews had vanished without a trace. It was at that point the company sent a professional warrior in to go check it out.

The dark clad man stepped into a puddle of blood and lifted his boot up, stepping back in disgust. It had been weeks of scouting parties vanishing before he had been sent in, and even longer since this city was destroyed, so for there to be fresh blood meant that something, or someone, had wandered into this town and died. Still, that didn't answer what had happened to the city folk or why this town looked like the black plague had appeared and wiped everything out.

Not the black plague, Monroe thought silently as he turned off his Ipod and looked around. Whatever did this was worse. Something that isn't natural. Something... the modern fencer turned to look as he heard a screeching noise behind him, but found nothing. The enhanced human rested his hand on his revolver and continued to walk down the street, looking for anything out of place.

Something plopped on the ground and the dark clad man turned, drawing his revolver and pointing it at the ground. A body? The dark clad man's heart raced as he looked up towards the top of the rather large building. Had something thrown that body down here? Who in the world would be tossing corpses? These questions ran through the bounty hunter's head as he heard a moaning. Monroe's head turned slowly to see the body get up.

Z-z-z-z-z-z- "ZOMBIE!" Monroe yelled as he pulled the hammer of his Single Action Army back and fired off a bullet through the creature's head. The explosion from the bullet caused stirring around him. At least Monroe had one answer. Zombies were what had happened to the city goers. Now all he had to find out was what the hell had made these poor, stupid creatures. After that, killing the source would be easy.

Monroe couldn't help but smile at this kind of fortune. "This'll be fun," he noted as he holstered his gun and pulled two photon dagger hilts from his vest. "Time to dance!" he stated, spinning the handles in the palms of his hands before turning the blades on. This wouldn't be too hard.

[Puck]

The wind was nearly dead that day; the day the sun was blotted out by towering black clouds, and the air carried a stench of death with it. The world seemed dead, as if all life has be exterminated from existence, only leaving a stale sense of pain in the air. Huge, overpowering skyscrapers dominated the deserted landscape, yet without the sounds of feet and voices in the air, they seemed even more dead than the man made structures normally did. Stone was cracked and chipped, bridges burned into rivers, and roads were all but torn asunder. The world was not right that day. Not in that place.

The blond haired stranger to those shores looked more than out of place in that setting. A wielder of wind who thrived in forests and life not stepping slowly across a all but dead modern city. His gray eyes looked grayer than they did before, and his flashy clothes and cape seemed to have dulled in color, almost as if the world was slowly reverting back to black and white, like an old photograph. Sniffing the air, Kaze knew something was amiss. The stench of blood seemed to forever linger in this air. So potent, in fact, it engulfed the entire city.

Looking to his right, Kaze looked upon a old car, rusted and broken, with only a single wheel remaining. Inside was a man, no, that is to say he was a man. Now he lay only a headless corpse with dried blood caking on his rotting body. The gray eyed wanderer could only imagine the disgusting creatures that made that man's body its home. That's the way of the world. One mans death is another’s home, or something like that.

The pitter patter of rain suddenly washed over the mage, patting his hair to his head and soaking the street. It seemed the perfect occasion for something awful to happen. The mood was already set; the actors were all ready to go now, as Kaze figured, all that needed to be done was for the curtain to be lifted, revealing the truth behind the plague that haunted and killed this once thriving city.

Like all plots, this one was revealed just when you expected it. This time, it came with an ear shattering screech. Turning on the heel of his boot, Kaze was met with a sight that even understating could only be described as disgusting beyond measure. How many: one, two, three, four... to many to count, Kaze decided jumping back. They looked like something out of a cheap horror movie: skinny and decaying as they trudged forward with a slight limp, a glint of madness in their half eaten eyeballs, with the always popular trail of blood spurting from their mouths.

“So this isn't where the beauty contest is being held?” Kaze kidded with himself, “I guess I should get going than.” Kaze took another step back causing the one in front, presumably the leader, to screech and run forward towards Kaze. Of course, running for a zombie is like walking for a normal person so Kaze had plenty of time before it reached him.

“Or we could stay and play.” A small smile formed at the corner of Kaze's mouth as he spoke, “One thousand frozen lakes see thee rise into this frozen heaven of endless dreams, Water- Frozen Touch!” This was not his usual spell. Normally he used hydrogen and oxygen molecules in the air, formed them together, and extracted energy from them, allowing them to freeze into ice. This time however, he had some raw materials to work with that made the process a lot less draining.

At once, it seemed the pitter patter of heavy rained ceased. The clouds stopped for a second, like they had changed their angles and now were all pointed towards the blonde haired stranger’s out stretched arm. Every rain drop within three square miles shot towards Kaze's right arm, pushing them closer, and closer together, as tight as was possible according to physics, which is really close, as a thick blue mist formed around his hand. With a slight snicker, Kaze grabbed his left wrist creating his usual sized ice blade to form on it. Just in time, mind you.

Cross step. Kaze dodged the beast’s initial lunge and with a clean sweep took its arm off at the elbow, causing it to slosh into one of the puddles that were now forming along the street. Back step. The creature used its other hand to try again, but the cocky Kaze carefully contended the attack taking this arm off at the shoulder, leading it to the same fate as it's brother. It's a good thing the undead don't bleed, for the blond haired stranger did not want blood stains on his clothes.

Third time is a charm, or so would be the logic of that of a brainless freak of nature, as the beast lunged forward, it's over sized maw gaping, allowing yellow puss to spew out of it. Stop. All it took was one finger to stop the beast. One finger of Kaze's right, mist, covered hand directly on the beast moved forward. Pushing the lanky monster back caused it to start to fall. A spark of blue energy could be seen leaving the hand and connecting to the beasts head as it fell. That was all it took, as the rest of the horde was already close enough to attack.

Snap.

With a sound like resounding thunder, the entire hoard found itself incased inside a block of ice that burst from Kaze's hand. All the molecules he had collected from the rain had formed itself into one concentrated attack, completely freezing a street and all within it. Kaze breathed heavily as the rain started falling normally again, cooling him off. Something like that was always draining, and the Archmage of Wind was feeling the effects. Looking around through the heavy deluge, Kaze looked for other poor souls that must have seen and been attracted to that spectacle. The more the merrier, or something like that.

[Hippo Cloud]

OoC: Sorry that took so long.

IC: Daniel swung his sword at the undead abomination that was attempting to kill him. He heard the sick, wet thud that accompanied the strike and watched the zombie’s head fall to the ground and roll towards him. There were still more zombies to kill, and possibly thousands more elsewhere in the city. Daniel lifted his blade into the air and brought it down on the mindless beast next to him. A pained groan burst from the undead’s mouth; feeding the demon within the ex-monk’s body and making him stronger. Within seconds another group of zombies attacked the young man; their decaying bodies creating an awful stench that made him vomit his last meal onto the decapitated head of one of the fallen zombies.

The darkened sky above his head began to boom and flash as rain poured down on him; washing away the blood and bile from the rooftop battleground. Daniel lunged toward the nearest zombie and ran Kratos through its chest and brought the blade up through the beast’s head. The young man was breathing heavily at this point and was not expecting to feel the cold clammy hand of death on the back of his head.

“Help me, demon!” Daniel cried as he was lifted several feet off of the ground by his head.

Only if you promise to eviscerate the freak that is doing this to you.

“Yes I will! Just help me!” Daniel cried before his skull was crushed and blood filled his eyes.

Seconds passed, and the young man could feel blood begin to pool in his skull and his eyes roll to the back of his head. After what seemed like an eternity he began to notice his injuries were healing themselves and that the blood was beginning to flow back into his body. Daniel grabbed his sword and stabbed the monster’s wrist; causing thick black blood to spurt into the air. The beast released his grip and sent the young man to the ground.

Now kill him.

Daniel jumped onto the zombie’s chest in a blind fury and stabbed the entire blade of his sword into its chest. He used all of his weight to bring his sword down to the middle of the creature’s stomach, then pulled it out and ripped the wound open, exposing the rotting intestines of the undead beast.

The demon laughed, it rang out from Daniel’s body and alerted the hordes of zombies in the buildings next to them of his presence.

Do you see how the beasts fear me? It is my power that they fear; they know that I could kill them with a single thought if I wanted to. Now kill them, let me feed off of their pain.

Daniel looked to his right and threw his sword at the human figure that he saw. He didn’t care if his attacker was a zombie or not anymore, he wanted pain and he would get it, one way or another.