Trubbol vs. Virmir

[Shifting Sands]

The robe "stares" down at the two fighters below him and brings a sleeve up to where his chin would be. To make it even more disturbing, some darker lines show in the absence of his face and give the suggestion of fangs. His (you don't know how, but you know he's male) sleeve throws itself out, and tar falls from the sky, covering the arena and you and your opponent. "Begin."

[Virmir]

Lucile had the sort of mind which could never be idle under any circumstances, and, given the prospect of doing nothing for a period of time, would find ways to be constructive using any available resources, however limited, at hand.  Currently she was experimenting with the effects of fairy magic combined with centrifugal forces while sitting upon the lone stool provided in their cell-room.

"WHEEEEEEE~!" she said. It had only been a few hours, but for some reason it felt like exactly 46 days.

Arms folded and eyes closed while sitting on the bed, Virmir had taken the pose which mages of some power often took meditating in some serene landscape while leaning against a tree. It was also possible he was just trying to take a nap.  An eye opened and a Look was exchanged. The applied experiment in fairy magic ceased.

"Sorry," Lucile said. She touched her fingertips together and shifted her eyes.

Glowering, Virmir paced to the table, picked up the anhk in a sort of absentminded way, then noticed a slip of paper upon the table. Pocketing the trinket in his cape, he idly read.

There was a POOFing sound. Lucile turned around.

"Blast it!" She screamed. Her head darted this way and that, but could find no sign of the mage.  Sighing, she pulled the bubbling potion in its flask the size of her whole body out from behind her wings. "NEXT time I'm just going to have to slip this in his pocket, I guess..."

----

Virmir was about ready to fireball Kain's smug face when he noticed there was someone... or something different in his place high above the arena. The cloaked figure set him at unease, giving off the sort of vibe you get when you summon netherworldly creatures who eat children.  Before he could notice anything more, some sort of black goop rained from above.

"GAH!!!" he screamed, flailing at the icky blackness. "Some sort of... pitch?" He tried to shake the sticky stuff off. It was all in his fur and all over the ground. It was hard to even move!

[Trubbol]

Trubbol watches the scene puzzled, tilting his head with a look of baffled confusion. "I'm not... following this....wha-?!" The boy shakes his head as black tar covers him, trying to shake the stuff off. "These guys are crazy... I'm gonna die." He looks over to his opponent, pulling out his broken sword and holding it up defensively.

"Hey! Are you willing to talk before throwing those fireballs over here?" Trubbol was definitely not fond of fire.

[Virmir]

"Talk? Talk about what?!"  Virmir was livid. On top of this whole involuntary fight to the death nonsense, this robed fellow turns up out of nowhere and dumps some black goop all over him.  Blasted entertainment.

This was not  turning out to be a good day.

"This will take weeks to get out!" He flailed ineffectually at the sticky tar, only serving to get it deeper into his fur. His eyes twitched. He moved the robed fellow up above Kain on his hit-list, right below whoever brought him here.  But first this little furry... kid was in his way.

He was small and (underneath his own covering of black goop) brown and had big ears, holding a broken sword like it was some garden tool. He looked more like a rag doll than a fighter.

Virmir suddenly realized his chain of thought, folded his own oversized ears and shifted his eyes. Clenching his teeth, he held out his hand in a way that is terrifying to people who know anything about mages. "I'll talk only if you're willing to surrender! You've not affronted me yet, but I intend to win. Stand down, or die!"

With that, he conjured a burning orb within his hand. The tar covering his body, naturally being quite flammable, caught flame, which quickly traveled up his arm. "What?!"

Virmir began shaking his arm violently, only serving to spray more burning droplets around. "GAAAAAAAH!!!!!" he screamed, running around and failing his arms with all the professionalism of a cartoon character. Fire quickly spread from his body and engulfed the arena floor, which spread in a wide circle, burning out of control, racing towards the hapless brown-furred warrior...

[Trubbol]

Trubbol did not take this well, and starting trying to run in the other direction.
Oh my god oh my god..... he lit himself on fire! Who does that?! So much for talking!
It took a minute or so for Trubbol to realize he was not going anywhere fast, he was stuck! Immobilized by the sticky tar and merely running in place. Raising his weapon he begun to slash through the tar, sacrificing clumps of his fur coat in order to avoid the charging flaming carton fox.
Trubbol managed to cut himself free of the tar around his legs and dashed clumsily over to the side, only to get caught in the goo once again, but out of the way of the flaming fox. He stopped for a second to look at his own weapon, now it was covered in black goo and bits of brown hair.
Man... there better be something good by the end of this one!

[Virmir]

The inferno was raging now, rapidly spreading across the arena and igniting the few remaining tar patches that haven't ignited yet.  Virmir seemed to be lost in the blaze, until something stirred from within the bright heart of the inferno.

It was a small shape, laced with black against the backdrop of the flames, though still burning with it's own fiery aura. Four-legged, twin-tailed, the little feral fox stepped through the blaze. He was on fire.

To say Virmir was livid would be to say that the sun is a nightlight, or Canadian winters are mild. Members of the Committee of People Who Invent Words, who happened to be in attendance and seated high in the stands, immediately squabbled amongst themselves to describe the fiery hate reflected in his burning eyes (which were projected in high resolution upon the arena's large video screens). The general consensus was that it was some sort of lividocity squared.

Audience members within the lower reaches of the stands tended to panic. This was partially due to being much closer to the giant high-resolution eyes, and partially because some of the banner displays had caught flame and the blaze was rapidly ascending up towards the lowermost spectator ring.  Probably everyone was going to die.

Probably.

[Trubbol]

Trubbol could only stare at the flaming creature in front of him, and do his best to avoid the flames. How did it all get so crazy so fast? The boy readied his weapon, And got ready to take whatever was coming at him.

There was no anger in the young boys eyes, no hatred or rage. There was just a determination to survive, to win, even as the heat moved through his body and sapped his strength, he readied himself for any attack.

[Virmir]

Virmir regarded the brown-furred fellow for a moment.  He was not the target of his extreme irritation... but he had no other choice but to take him down first. He had to rip apart that robed fellow, and the only way to do that was to win!

Virmir knew he did not have much time left... Fire could kill him just as easily as anyone else. The exception was if it was his own flame.  So he had to burn his own magic constantly, lest the tar still covering his body kill him.  And he was expelling energy by the bucketful. Sure, since he had gained the second tail he found he had more reserves, but he had never fully expelled himself since he tried to rip out his grandfather's throat, and he wasn't keen on trying that trick again any time soon... expelling himself down to the point of unconsciousness was no way to win a tournament.

The flaming feral fox Virmir sprinted at Trubbol and leapt, tiny fangs baring for his opponent's throat, arm, leg-- anything!  Just a nip would set him ablaze!

[Trubbol]

Trubbol watched Virmir charge at him, and aligned his weapon with the foxes chest. He took a step back and grounded himself in the tar covered ground, and held his weapon in both paws. He waited for Virmir to leap, and then thrusted at his chest when he was in the air.

[Virmir]

Setting your opponent on fire by a graceful flying magical bite attack sounded great on paper, but in practice this approach had two things wrong with it. Firstly, Virmir was a mage and had about as much close-handed fighting experience as a scenery photographer. Secondly, while Virmir was very much a fox to the core, he did not spend a whole lot of time as a feral animal, and thus was just a bit behind in the dynamics of flying leaps.

Granted, these sorts of things could in no way come easily to mind for someone enraged beyond mortal comprehension, and currently on fire, but hindsight does wonders in connecting the dots after the fact.

Virmir collided with the blade, possibly with enough force to knock it out of the youth's hand, then arched over his body and landed with a THUD.

Frazz.

His flame went out. He noted that spending some moments inside an inferno fortunately removed the tar from his body.  The second thing he noticed was the lancing pain in his chest. He pushed on all four paws to stand, trembling. Blood dripped underneath him.* That was stupid.  Luckily he landed on a patch of tar-less ground.

He realized he was in real danger now... Not only was he mostly spent, he had what could be a very serious wound and he had no way of knowing unless he just fell over...  Deciding against shifting back to anthro form to clutch his chest, he instead conjured a fireball which floated above his head. What he should have done the first time!

Immediately the burning ball zipped towards his rival!


* This Virmir comes from a universe where people do in fact bleed. Especially when described in written narrative (as opposed to drawn).

[Trubbol]

Trubbol gasped as his blade flew away from him started to run, narrowly dodging the fireball. The fireball exploded against the wall and showered the floor of the arena in sparks, the sword clattered against the floor and rolled, disappearing into the tar. Trubbol blinked and watched it, imitating the weapon and covering himself in tar as camouflage.

He reached into his bag slowly and then gripped what was left of the potion, deciding to fight fire with fire.

[Virmir]

Virmir used the time his opponent was on the run to shift back to anthro form.  Blast, did that make his wound sting! Clothes-less (BUT), he tentatively ran his left hand over his chest. Apparently the wound wasn't as terrible as he initially thought. Perhaps the magic flame surrounding his body at the time absorbed the blow? He stumbled a bit and winced. He was starting to feel dizzy...

Regardless, his opponent was even more prone than before, covered in tar like that! Fanning his twin tails to either side, he extended his free hand and called forth a ferocious flame. Virmir was not much for words or taunts, otherwise he would have shouted something like "Surrender or die!" Or perhaps at his level of irritation, just "Die!" Instead, he let loose the burning orb straight at the little fighter!

[Trubbol]

Well, so much for that idea... Trubbol fell backwards engulfed in flame, thinking about how greedy he had been how he had been willing to kill another just for a single wish. More and more he lost the willl to fight for the wish...

The will to survive however, kicked in as he pulled the potion from his burning bag, which for some reason smelled like burnt toast. He pulled the bottle to his face and drank up as much as he can, trying to ignore the smell of his own flesh burning the sting. What was left of his fur and clothes was near gone do to the fire, and he was falling over backwards as the changes began.

[Virmir]

"Tch!" Virmir said as he folded his arms and turned away from his burning opponent. Smoke hung in the air, enough to turn the blaze into a soupy glow. "It is done, " He addressed the robed figure, who was probably too far away to hear. "Now hurry up and get on with whatever idiocy you have next!"

[Virmir]

Meanwhile, Lucile was drawing foxes.  She had fully explored the capabilities of fairy magic and had documented the capabilities in tidy notes for use later (notes on strange magic tended to come in handy-- especially when mixing things).  She had then proceeded to pull a tablet PC out of her wings and spent some time wishing she were a bit bigger while struggling with the over-sized pen. (Sadly the capabilities of fairy magic did not include self-growth.)  It was around fox number 327 that she noticed Virmir was gone for quite a long time. Really, it had only been a few hours, but for some reason it felt like 70 days.