⇨ INTERLUDE: A Continuation

[ringleaders]

Who: The Ringmaster, all Supervisors, and any rule-breaker onlookers.
When: Twilight on D40
Where: The woods surrounding the grounds.
What: The Ringmaster found something threatening and has decided to share it with her supervisors.
Warnings: Wannabe satanism.

CATCH A FALLING STAR↴ The Ringmaster waits for all of the Supervisors to arrive before continuing onward. She doesn't say much about what they are doing as they wait for everyone to arrive, simply explaining that she has found something concerning that she needs to show them. Once everyone is together, she will lead the pack into the woods - with or without any snoops who may be trying to follow after, against her wishes. The forest is far more accommodating to her than it is to anyone else who tries to navigate it. Instead of getting wound in circles by its path, and running into dead ends, it's as if the trees have moved themselves to intentionally create an easy path for her to follow. It's stretching into the twilight hours as they travel, and various phosphorescent flowers and pods have begun glowing among the leaves with the shift to night, faintly illuminating the way. The sun is low in the sky when they arrive at the spot, still present but swiftly fading as its light cuts through the trees in beams. They reach an area that is not so much a clearing as it is a small space, tucked away between trunks and branches. In the center of that space lies a large, black mark, cut into the earth like a ritual sigil. The dirt and rock is blackened along its lines, and all plant-life within a few feet of its presence has died out completely. As the dark approaches, the black of the lines will seem to paradoxically glow, as if the void within it somehow creates a light of its own. The Ringmaster kicks a few last leaves off of the mark - it seems that she's been clearing away mess from this spot already today, and indicates the digit with a snarl of disgust. "I told you I was cursed!" she insists, putting her hands on her hips.

Comments

[dorkypantsuit]

"Are you shitting me?" Psi exclaims loudly in irritated disbelief. Of all the things to find. He is also staying away from the mark. Well away. He doesn't know much about curses, but he can see how the plants are dead and that makes this very real and very concerning. Even worse, it was apparently from those vampires.

"This has been here this whole time?"

[cuckooed]

"...That's..." The blood freezes in Koel as she realizes what the Ringmaster is saying. This isn't just a question of luck, with something like that, if the Ringmaster's words are true. "Those damn things might have left it for one of their own to track and sabotage us when we pushed them back!"

Which probably sounds hypocritical coming from her, but she doesn't attack kids and innocents.

[pipers_son]

Well, that is the quickest way to get Joker's expression to darken, his mouth twisting and brow furrowing together. All the usual ease that's in his expression gets banished in a heartbeat, replaced by something cold as he stops around the other side of the mark.

"How do we get rid of it?" he asks simply, not dallying about anymore.

[periphrasing]

"I could blow it up," Peridot offers, totally deadpan. Seriously. Get a little C4 and just. Literally blast it out of the ground. Poof.

[cuckooed]

"That is not going to work." Koel's response was quiet but flat. "Those beasts would have likely enchanted it to prevent something so simple from being effective. The best way to erase it is to figure out exactly what the mark says. What the symbol exactly means."

Its a principle of alchemy which...she knows basic symbols like fire and water and alcohol. A similar principle to fae magic, though this kind of complicated sign is more out of her league, which she's more than aware of.

[lordofthering]

"Bingo," the Ringmaster says, pointing at Koel. Tracking and sabotaging is more or less exactly the uses she's determined herself, having looked into it briefly.

"I'm not sure if they'd be capable of actually bending the strands of Fate, but at the very least it has created a flaw in my wards. Imagine it like a chain, stretched through an open door - of course, it prevents the door from closing entirely, creating a crack for something small to seep in."

Peridot says they could blow it up, and the Ringmaster just about scoffs at that idea before suddenly pausing to contemplate it more deeply.

"Blow it up? Hah, Koel's right, that would be-" She hesitates. "It would... Hm."

She considers that for a few moments longer.

"...Actually, nevermind. Peridot. Blast this thing out of the ground. Immediately. Use as little magic as possible!"

[pipers_son]

And that's when Joker just straight up flies to the trees.

HE'S AROUND, HE'S JUST. HE'S NOT GOING TO BE THAT CLOSE AROUND.

[cuckooed]

Koel blinks at the Ringmaster, then very quietly steps aside, wings fluttering. Hey, any port in a storm. The worst that can happen is that it doesn't work, right?

[periphrasing]

She's on the verge of saying something kind of snarky and just backing out of the conversation when the Ringmaster addresses her directly. Oh. Someone's actually? Listening to her? WHAT A CHANGE OF PACE. She's literally shocked.

Peridot blinks rapidly at their illustrious leader, taken aback. "Wha-- right now??" She looks around at the rest of the group, like, is she serious? "I. Um. I mean, I didn't exactly bring any tools out here with me--"

KINDA PUTTING HER ON THE SPOT HERE, RM.

[lordofthering]

The Ringmaster turns to look at Peridot with moderate edge of impatience, crossing her arms and tapping her foot. She waves a hand, dismissing her.

"Well, hurry up and go get them, then! Sans." She gestures at the skeleton pointedly. "Take her back quickly so that she can collect her explosives, and bring them here post-haste. We haven't got time to waste."

[osteothropy]

Sans is very displeased with being singled out to help, and casts Peridot a sideways glance of annoyed commiseration, before sighing loudly and waving goodbye to everyone in the area.

"Welp, gunna get some snacks and a lawn chair while I'm at it. If Peridot is going to blow up a ritual circle and kill everyone here, we may as well enjoy the show while we're at it."

[pipers_son]

"Bring a case of soda! The creamy ones!" Joker yells helpfully from where he's balanced himself on a sturdy enough tree branch. "Got thirsty walkin' all the way here!"

Listen. If he's going to do it anyway...

[periphrasing]

The gem shoots Sans a dirty look. As if she'd be so careless.

"Alright. Fine, she sighs. "I'll be back soon."

[zebrarhyme_everytime]

"Perhaps we need a shield," Zecora finally said, from her almost-invisibility in the nearby shadows. Healing had taken a great deal out of her after the attack, leaving her form even more oddly tenuous, or tenebrous, than normal.
"One that will not yield."

[osteothropy]

Sans clicks his teeth, giving Joker a finger gun.

"You got it, pal."

And then him and Peridot will disappear.

[lordofthering]

The Ringmaster relaxes a little, that plan on its way, but then perks up again to give Zecora a confused look.

"A shield for the explosives, or for the curse mark? Because I can tell you, simply shielding this... disease will have little effect."

[dorkypantsuit]

Psi isn't usually one to question the Ringmaster's orders, but this time he can't help being a bit confused.

"Yeah, but is blowing it up really a good idea?"

She'd already said Koel was right about thinking this wouldn't work.

[cuckooed]

"Madam, if this doesn't work." Koel looked up at the Ringmaster. "What will out contingency be? Is there a library or archive you know of that might have information about this symbol?"

Surely there's a library world somewhere, right?

[lordofthering]

"It will be fine," she insists to Psi, waving a hand. "If it doesn't work, then we'll try something else.

The looks to Koel.

"And no, but that won't be necessary, at any rate. Leaving this mark here has given me a perfect opportunity to find the source - as much as this mark is chaining my realm to their power, that chain can be followed back to the source. And then... I will show them what a terrible mistake they've made."

[cuckooed]

"...I see."

Koel understands what that means. She can almost smell the blood and venom dripping from the Ringmaster's words, from the intent. Whatever happens, it will not be clean.

"Then, we will need to be prepared for that, I assume?"

[zebrarhyme_everytime]

"Warding the blast?
I could do that, fast."

Zecora lifted her head slightly, looking from the mark up to the Ringmaster. Her words held no censure, only caution.

"But haste
Might waste
The opportunity
That we now see."

[dorkypantsuit]

"Wait wait wait. So, what you're saying is that instead of just 'breaking the chain,' you're going to follow it back towards danger?" He holds his hands out in front of him, looking to the other supervisors present (the ones that haven't flown into the trees). He knows someone here besides him has to have a problem with this. This is most definitely not what Signless would do.

[lordofthering]

"No, right now I'm planning on blowing the chain out of the ground!" the Ringmaster asserts, a bit haughtily at that. "However, if this doesn't work, I have my own ways of sending a message back to the spellcaster... no need to go there ourselves."

It's called magic, Psi, look it up.

[dorkypantsuit]

Okay, so he really doesn't know anything about magic, but he does no quite a bit about hideous revenge cycles. He knows the ringmaster isn't a human, but when she acts like a troll it still surprises him.

"As long as this is here we are in danger, right? So wouldn't pissing off the people that put it there seem like a really bad idea?"

[lordofthering]

She looks at Psi, frowning as if she's taken offense. It's not really about the concept that starting a fight might be a bad idea, but that she wouldn't be able to come out on top.

"What do you take me for?" she asks, her words sharp but not yet angry. "A prey animal? A rabbit forced to flee from the jaws of a fox? Hardly! I am more powerful than this specter could ever dream of!"