[No man's land]- Slaying two birds with the same sword.

[Immael Kha'Serith]

(OOC to the moderator:I'd have done this earlier but chronosynch came along. I'm here to train with my primary weapon and pay for my flight training at the same time.)

10th candlemark, 1st Solaria, The Month of Cryxatum Era XV Post Fractum

Immael had been walking since he'd woken this morning. He'd risen from his pallet at Citadel Uth Draconis before the sun had began to rise. A normal person would be tired, but he was no normal person. He was a dracon, out to prove his blade in battle, against the ultimate fear. A dracon who was trying not to shake himself to pieces because of his nerves. His father had been a necromancer, and Immael had grown around the undead, tamed, often amusing idiot corpses in a state of either preservation or early decay. They had been dumb, and harmless. These undead would not be quirky enough to scratch absently at interesting body parts, or wander aimlessly about the house, or play with his mother's tail. They'd eat him if they got the chance.

The sword he carried, a simple rapier with a sweapt hilt, had only been used to slay game during his recent walk to Archadoon, a trip that made him quiver with distaste every time he thought of it, but not in battle. Now it would serve him as a weapon should. To take life, or rather unlife.

He finally crossed the last markings of No man's land, into the remains of the western city. He looked around himself, a talon resting on his blade. He could smell decay everywhere, his nostrils sang with the stench of rotting flesh. He knew the undead were here, he welcomed them. But they didn't seem interested in greeting him. I shall take the liberty then.

His lungs expanded as he drew in a breath, then expelled a great deep voice, dropping the whispery, patronising, hiss he used to speak to softskins and strangers.

"I am Immael Kha'Serith, son of Ashmael Dra'Kalin, necromancer of Prateia. I bring battle and blade to the flesh of the undead who stalk this realm. I will take ten of your heads, and no less, to pay for my board and classes. I know your kind, I was raised in your presence. Let any of you foolish enough to appear before me be warned, you'll not have an easy meal of me."

He drew his rapier and flourished it at his side, his index claw pointing along the dull edge of the blade towards the ground, the sharp side towards his leg, the rest of his fingers holding the slightly curved handle in a firm, but not too firm, grip. His other hand hung openly at his side. He flared his wings, still aching somewhat from his training, and closed his eyes slightly, listening for the shuffle of feet.

"Let them come."

[Immael Kha'Serith]

The first corpse was unarmed, a half naked human, his skin sagging from his bones. One of the beast's legs was broken, and the remains of the male corpse shambled desperately towards Immael. He stood his ground, waiting for the creature to come close. With an alarming lurch, the beast reached for Immael.

He knew his blade was a sword built for slashing and stabbing, and while it had an edge, decapitation was not something it was built for. As the corpse toppled towards Immael, he stepped out of its way, turning the blade upwards so that the creature's neck fell on it. As the corpses weight bore it to the ground, most of it's neck was severed. Immael flourished the blade, shifted his weight, and stomped on the neck of the zombie, breaking its spine and popping its head from its shoulders like a cork from a bottle. The head rolled a couple feet, coming to rest against a pile of brick. Immael dubbed it his head stone, the humor causing a wicked grin to wrinkle his maw.

The next one that came for him was more or less functional, and it tried to bash his head in. Immael raised his blade, blocking the downwards stike, then kicked it in the knee. As the monster fell to its remaining knee, Immael stepped around behind it, grabbing its straggling hair with his sword hand, and its jaw with his free hand. With a tremendous yank, he switched the positions of his hands, effectively removing the things head. Another skull bounced towards the head stone as Immael gave it an ill natured kick.

There was a scrape behind him and something hammered against Immael's shoulder as he turned. The corpse that had hit him was dragging a heavy looking stick, and flailing it at Immael. It swung, twisting itself around almost double, and after ducking the second swipe, Immael swung his blade hard at the side of the creature's head. The wound didn't quite decapitate it, and Immael snarled as he hacked at it again and again, finally removing the appendage with a spray of gore. He grabbed the head and tossed it over his shoulder, grinning at the sickening crunch as it bounced. This was fun.

He flared his wings, looking around. There were no more of the undead in his immediate area. He hissed, mocking the air.

"Thhhree down, ssseven to go. Isssss that the bessst you have? HA!"

A corpse had stepped out of nowehere, one of its arms dangling by a thread of sinew, the other completely missing. Immael had been so startled he'd nearly dropped his sword, and as he stepped back, he tripped over a stone, landing painfully on his tail. The zombie tripped as well, and fell throat first onto Immael's upraised blade. It slid down the sword until it's chomping teeth were mere inches from Immael's hand. He made a disgusted sound and grabbed his sickle with his free hand. With a fumbling motion, he reached around the zombie's head with his left hand, placing the curved blade against its throat, and pulled his blades apart. The headless corpse fell onto Immael's chest, pouring half decayed blood over his torso. Immael was left with head in his lap that chomped fitfully at anything that came close, although with no real effect. Immael sheathed his sickle, a little shaken, and rose to his feet. His ass hurt, and his tail much more. It was fortunate he had managed to brace his fall with his left elbow, which dripped inky black blood onto the ground through a couple gashes. He wasn't worried about infection, his blood could kill anything that would pose a softskin a threat. He just hoped the scent of his blood would draw some attention. He reached his 'head stone' and placed this head on the top of the waist high pile. His eyes roved around, and he found what he was looking for. Some poor human soul had staggered out this way, and had been overcome. Immael kicked the mangled body over, eyeballing the softskin. It was freshly dead enough that it had probably passed the teeth of some of his heads recently. He dragged some wood together, formed a fire with his tinder, lopped the human's head from its shoulders, and used his sickle to secure a haunch. After a quick, vigilant for zombies the whole time of course, lunch of leg o' man, he bagged his five heads, for the softskin would have joined the undead shortly, and stood.

He slung the heads over his shoulder, their blood dripping through the black cloth, and burped. Humans had an aversion to eating each other, but Immael didn't have that problem. He saw them as cattle, the tasty kind, soft brains to match their pale skins, creatures harldy good enough to lug baggage, and yet they prosperred, to excess in this realm. He hoped to pssibly find a live one out here gathering... There wasn't much to gather but he hoped none the less. He set off, five down, five to go. His rapier dripping blood as he searched for more corpses to flay.

[Immael Kha'Serith]

Immael dropped the sack of heads he carried to the ground with a meaty thunk. He reached into his robe, retrieved a seared strip of flesh, and tossed it into his mouth. No convenient walking corpse made itself aparent so Immael looked around. His eyes fell upon a decent sized stone, ssemingly a loose cobble. He knealt, scooped it up, and then tossed it in the air, catching it with a thoughtful expression on his scales. There was nothing better for making noise then a good stone. With a gleeful grin, he threw the stone against a nearby pile of rubble, which collapsed with a delightful din.

As the dust settled, a corpse errupted from the runis of an old shack, and another burst from the ground a few meters away, clawing itself out of some old sinkhole.

Immael grinned, pulling his rapier from it's hilt and laying a claw along the blunted edge. He flourished the sword at his side, flicking the blood that hadn't coagulated to the ground. The two zombies lurched towards him. He stepped forwards with his right foot, and loosed a terrific bellow. It sounded more like a raptor like shriek then a yell, but any warrior would recognise a battle cry when he heard one. The air whooshed as he spread his wings behind him, and his tail lashed like a whip.

The corpses reached their goal at the same time. Immael folded his wings, stepped back, and looped the blade over their questing arms, placing it against the arm on his farthest left. His muscles flexed as he pushed the balde to his right, moving his left foot forwards. The zombie who's arm had recieved the gash was diverted to the side, crashing into its partner and sending it toppling. Immael used its momentum against it, reversing his blade and removing the corpses leg. The corpse toppled to the ground, its head splitting like a ripe watermellon and disgorging a reeking grey sludge. Immael stepped over top of it with his left, and dropped all of his weight onto his right knee, which landed on the back of the decomposing body's neck. The majority of the limb separated, and Immael turned his attention back to the other corpse which had risen and was advancing upon him at a rapid shuffle.

So lost in his battle fever was Immael, that he rose from his crouch, his knee coming off of the corpse's neck as he stepped towards his oncoming adversary, and shoved his rapier up under the beasts ribcage and into its heart. If it could laugh it would. Instead it advanced, its arms encircling Immael like a lover, and shoved him over. As he fell flat on his back, he remembered to keep his head raised, and his tail tucked. Pain tore through his back as he landed on his wings, and the hilt of his rapier dug into his stomach.

The zombie ontop of him tried to bite, and Immael placed the palm of his hand on its forehead to stop it from reaching him. The skin was clammy, loose, and riddles with worms and roots. This was the one that had come out of the ground. It happened to have a weight advantage and Immael was seriously beginning to consider life without his throat, when his thumb talon rested against the monster's neck. He placed his other hand over the creature's nose, shifted his hands sto that his thumb talons were against the shelf of its jaw. He thrust his claws up into the things mouth, then through the roof of its mouth. He distinctly saw one of his claws appear in its eye. He bent the head upwards and way from his neck, then shoved his finger talons through its cheeks. The corpses teeth closed on his talons, and the pain as his nails began to break was all he needed. He tore the lower jaw off of the moster, tucked his head, and slammed his forehead into its nose. The jerk exposed the mosters throat, and Immael grabbed it with both hands, then shoved it to the side. The momentum rolled them over, and Immael wound up straddling the zombie, his knees on its arms. The weight shift caused Immael sword to shoot out of the things chest, and the pommel smashed into his chin, then the blade fell over. The zombie struggled in vain to dislodge Immael, and he took a moment to massage his jaw and stretch the pain out of his wings. He had a sneaking suspicion that smaller thumb like bone on his left one had broken, and he stretched his wings to their full extent.

The reddish grey membranes creaked slightly, and he turned his head to examine them both with a cocked eyeball. There were a few scratches here and there, and a small rip in the skin of one of the limbs up towards the joint where the 'fingers' originated, but nothing serious. The little thumb like bone, that was really just so much extra body mass, was acctually completely missing. Immael spotted it laying near his current mounts dislodged jaw. He flapped his wings experimentally. Everything seemed in order.

His eyes narrowed as he looked down at the flailing head of the zombie.

"You my little friend, are going to sssssssuffer greatly. I don't care if you don't feel pain, I'm going to shhhred you."

He ensured he was alone. Not a single corpse for many miles around, at least that he could see. He set to work with his claws, tearing all the skin out of its throat and throwing it aside. He used a talon to scalp it, pulled all the teeth out of its upper jaw, ripped the nose off, and finally twisted the head clean off the neck. He rose, holding it thoughtfully, and lifted it into the air, staring at its sightless eyes.

"To throw or not to throw, that is the question. Whether 'tis more satisfying to crush this skull against the broken cobbles of a ruined city, to kick it across the street and smash it until its naught but red jelly, or to place it in my bag with all the rest. Ah hell I'll just take its jaw and make a neclace from it."

He turned, scooped the partially removed head of his other victim from its shoulders, and shoved them rudely into its bag. He gave it a good kick for good measure, then turned. He could see his sword glinting in the noonday sun, and it was the first thing he retrieved, wiping the blade on the body of one of his foes. He sheathed it, scooped up the jawbone, which he promptly stripped the flesh from and placed in a pocket in on his sword belt. He snared the little thumb bone thingy, which was essentially just a phalange with a vestigial claw sprouting from it, and threw it after a brief moment of consideration. He grabbed his bag, which contained seven heads, and slung it over his shoulder. He stank of decay and death, and he revelled in it. Wherever his father was, Aetheria or Aeternia, Immael imagined he was smiling. He looked up to the sky, chocked with circling pockets of vultures, and snarled. Time to move on. Three more heads to go, then maybe one more just for fun. He started walking, his tail swishing as he used it to balance.

[Immael Kha'Serith]

The sun was beginning to lower, and Immael was trudging wearily back towards the Citadel. He'd found no more undead between his near death experience with a hungry zombie and his current trek, and the adrenaline had faded. His wings and tail ached, and he still had more flight training ahead of him. Not to mention another three heads to collect. And by Jalat, he wasn't walking around the ruined city at night. He could see the stones that marked the beginnings of No Mans Land, and on the other side, the lights of Archadoon were beginning to be lit.

Immael's attention shifted as something moved to his right. There. Four of them. Almost as if they'd been waiting for him. Three came at him simultaneously, and Immael became worried very quickly. He stepped back, his sword flashing through the air.

"Alright, put your eyeball back in your head you, because you're going to witness something not oft seen on Telath."

Immael turned and ran. The zombies shambled after him. One tripped gracelessly over a chunk of stone, and fell behind. As he turned around a corner of a ruined shack, an idea came to him. He stopped, turned, and raised his blade, grasping it with both hands and holding it like a baseball bat. As one of the undead came around the corner, he swung, hitting it in the side of the head. The wound was not enough to sever its head, but it shoved it into the wall. Immael wrenched the blade from its spine and kicked it hard in the face, removing the rest of the bone structure. As the other one came to play, Immael met its shin with his sword, tripping it. It put its hands out infront of it, bracing its fall.

Immael grabbed it by the remains of its clothing, shoved it against the wall, and kneed it in the throat until its head separated.

After that bit of savagery was completed, he bagged the heads. As he exited the alley, the other zombie barreled into him shoving him off balance. He barely held his feet, and he found himself at an akward angle, with a heavy bag of body parts, an ill suited sword, and one-possibly-two undead coming for him. Immael grinned.

"If I have to meet my maker at the likes of you, so be it. But lets just see if that head of yours sits on your shoulders a solidly as it looks."

As it lurched for him, Immael, stepped in, bracing his weight and placing his rapier horizontally between its teeth. It bit down on the flat of the blade as it pushed towards him. Immael braced his hand against the blunt edge, and shoved with all his weight. The result not only toppled the zombie, but split its mouth open, making it look like a clown. As it tried to roll over to stand back up, Immael jumped on it. His weight bore it to the ground, and crushed most of its torso. Several stomps on its neck were enough to remove its head. He knealt, lifted the limb, and smiled.

"Thats ten."

There was a low moan at the end of the alley. The fourth one had caught up. Immael cursed, it was carrying a sword. It shuffled towards him, the point of the blade dragging over the rough cobbles. Immael looked with distaste upon that. A weapon should not be mishandled. It was a tool. But then the beast weilding it was just a shell. It didn't know that. Immael would show it how a weapon should be treated. The thing swung in a wide, sweeping flail. As strong as Immael was he knew he wouldn't be able to block that. He leapt back, then dashed forwards, bringing his blade down on one of the creatures arms, severing it at the wrist. He stepped around behind it, and shoved his foot into the back of its knee. It fell, and Immael didn't let it stand back up. He placed his left tallon on its head, stepped on its remaing hand with his right foot, trapping the blade on the ground, and drove his sword through its temples. As the blade emerged from the other side of its head, Immael garbbed a piece of leather, which he usually used to wipe his sword, from his belt, wrapped it around the blade, and held it like a handle.

"And now you shuffle from your immortal coil."

He began to walk around the zombie, holding the handle and leather wrapped blade at the same time, until its head popped off. The body crumpled to the ground and he spat on it. One look at the sword told him it was useless, blunted, chipped, dull. He'd feel soiled were he to take it with him.

"Well, I guess that wraps things up."

He removed the square of leather from his sword, polished the blade where it wasn't imbedded in the head, and after ensuring all his personal effects were still on his person, which they were, he walked towards Citadel Uth Draconis.

The first person he met in the street recoiled from him. He reeked of blood and decay, and was covered in filth. To top it off he walked with his sword slung over his shoulder, the head still skewered on it.

He wistled as he walked.

He was sore, tired- hell call a spade a spade, he was exhausted- and disgustingly dirty enough that the people he passed were nearly fainting from his odor, his blade needed sharpening, and his armor was dented in a few places from his falls and scrapes, not to mention he was covered in blood. But he'd just paid off his flight training, and learned a few things about fighting with a rapier he hadn't before.

Things had gone well.

[Immael Kha'Serith]

When Immael arrived back at his quarters, a small spartan affair, he promptly got himself cleaned up. A hot bath, a quick laundering of his cloak and trousers, as well as scrubbing down his shirt. He went down to the armories, borrowed a whet stone, and took care of his blades, sharpening them back to their usual edge, and polishing the blood off of them. He also polished his armor as best as he could, removing the dents with a hammer to the best of his ability, which wasn't much. He looked more presentable at least.

The bag of heads had been deposited, after a wrinkled maw of golden scales from the pretty receptionist, where he had been told to leave it, and the extra Immael had cleaned of its skin, leaving an empty skull, which hung from his belt now by a cord passed through its temples.

He rested a few candle marks, and woke near sunrise the next day. It was one of the two consecutive days where he didn't need to train his wings, but he did so anywyas, flapping hard and exercising the muscles with weights for nearly a full hour before the strain exhausted him.

After breakfast, he moved down to the training field, his rapier on his belt. When he arrived, he found himself a space near the walls, so he wouldnt interfere with his kind as they practiced flight, and began following a pattern his father had once practiced with a scimitar. It was long and flowing, and Immael moved through it like water, all the strikes perfectly controlled, all the stances balanced. His motions spoke of practice. He did this routine every morning, usually more then once. After he finished the pattern, he did it again, twice, then moved off to find one of the many sword dummies that littered the fields. They were over stuffed scarecrows, and they didn't offer much in fighting back, but Immael was here to practice offensive strikes at the moment. Maybe he'd provoke a fight later on for some more practice.

His blade sang through the air, biting into the dummy. Immael trust, slashed, turned, slashed again, backhanded his imaginary adversary across the face and skewered it, his wings flaring as he did so. He was so lost in an imaginary battle that he ceased to pay attention to the world around him. He was out for blood. Or in this case, stuffing.

[Immael Kha'Serith]

Immael attacked the training dummy with all the hatred he could muster. He hacked, slashed, stabbed, chopped, all the time hurling curses and insults in draconi. Some students stopped and stared openly at him as he threw his entire weight behind a strike. With a splintering of wood, he removed the arm of the thing, and kicked it flat over. He stood over the battered and broken scarecrow, his chest and shoulders heaving as he panted.

That was the second dummy he had broken since he had come here.

He moved over to the next one, and went after it. He only stopped once he had torn a sufficient amount of the thing to shreds that a sizeable portion of the wooden frame was visible. With a malcontented hiss, he sheathed his sword. Beating up on zombies and training dummies was good fun and all, but he needed something that fought back.

After he stalked down to the armory and sharpened his blade, as well as borrowing a training sword of the same make, he returned to the training field. His eyes roved until he found a human who looked sufficiently weak enough, yet still silly enough to rise at a challenge, to beat into next week.

"Hey, ssssoftssskin. Up for a little tussssssle?"

"Hoo, me?"

Immael made an exasperated face.

"No, the other idiot behind you. Yessss you fool!"

The human chuckled, evidently not all there, and picked up a rather large practice claymore. Immael looked at it once.

And grinned.

"Sssize isssn't anything human. It'sss how long you can ussse it for that countsssss."

Most would take this as an inuendo, Immael found such baser humors dull and uncouth. He and the human, a midsized fellow of sufficient build to pull a mule but not much else, advanced to a sparring pitch, where Immael brandished his rapier.

"Allright cattle, letsssss sssee what color you bleed in."

[Soldier]

OOC: The heads would have had to go to the Clan Chieftain of the Fianna. The Academies wouldn’t be handling the bounties. And softskins won’t be found in the Draconi Academy. It’ll be fine this time, but just remember in future. Other than that, it’s fine.

IC: The Human chuckled and stripped off his shirt to the waist, dressed in nothing but a loincloth. Powerful muscles rippled under tanned skin, and the sounds of muscles popping sounded clearly in the air as he flexed his shoulders and back. Finally, he was ready and stepped into the middle of the sandy ring where the tussle would begin. Grinning widely, he yawned lazily and thrust his weapon into the sand, spitting on his fingers. “So how you wanna do this? Slow or quick? Either way, it’ll be fun to get my poor little softskin butt out of the building to do some light work for a change.”

[Immael Kha'Serith]

(OOC: Noted. For the future I'll remember that.)

Immael twirled his rapier and took a step towards his opponent, raising the blade between them.

"Assss long asss it takessss to turn you into ssssoup."

He stepped again, his left hand raising up behind and above his head like a scorpion's sting, his blade flourishing in the air. He grinned savagely, his teeth flashing in the sun.

[Soldier]

The Human lowered his sword and leaned on it, blinking lazily as he watched his opponent. “You gonna jabber or we gonna fight? I don’t got all day.” As Immael brought his rapier up, the Human brought his own massive blade up quickly, amazingly agile for one with such a huge weapon. He sidestepped gracefully as his eyes stayed on his opponent, his weapon held at the ready as he smiled widely. Oh, this was gonna be jolly fun. “If I win, do I get to keep you?” he asked lewdly, trying to see what his opponent’s reaction would be.

[Immael Kha'Serith]

He struck like a snake, the edge of his blade hurtling for the brute's skull. His feet stayed light, ready to move at a moments notice. He kept his wings tucked against his back, but his tail lashed angrily as he struck, the better to help his balance.

"The only thing you'll keep are the sssscarssss."

His other hand remained floating behind his head, his claws wiggling slightly as he contemplated his foe.

[Soldier]

The Dracon noticed his opponent was more than he seemed, holding the weapon as if he had been born with it. And he didn’t carry himself like a kitchen worker. In fact, with a swing that caused the large sword to sing, the claymore came across at the Dracon’s knees, the Human’s eyes focussed on his opponent, ready to dodge at a moment’s notice. “I’m disappointed,” he said cheerfully. “I was looking forward to stuffing you and tucking you into the corner with the rest of my collection.”

[Immael Kha'Serith]

Though the weapon was long, and required immense amounts of strength to swing like that, Immael did not falter once. He stepped backwards, his strike to the head of his opponent forgotten, planning on evading the strike by out distancing it with his long stride. With a few quick steps, he worked his way in the opposite direction of his opponents swing, hoping against hope he would wind up behind him.

[Soldier]

The Human was enjoying himself, as evidenced by the huge smile on his face as he brought the weapon across in a lazy arc, missing his target by scant inches. The massive blade made the air curl against the scales of Immael’s legs, it was so close. But then, he was behind him, and the Human had to turn. Holding his blade ready, he turned to face his opponent. The cocky grin was still on his face. “Bring it, Lizard,” he said cheerfully.