Once upon a time, in a land not so far away...
You wake to the feeling of being watched. Of a set of unfamiliar eyes, of warm breath on the back of your neck. A jolt back to the land of the living, and it's gone. No matter how quick you are, how sneaky, the source of the disruption has long since disappeared, so you have no choice but to try and ignore it. To continue on with your day and try to set that moment of strangeness aside.
You eat, drink, speak with others. Perhaps you explore a little. Whatever it is you choose to do for the day, that feeling from the morning won't return. And by the time the sun sets and the moon glows brightly above, you've likely set those moments of strangeness aside. It's not like it's anything new, after all.
It's the same again for the next few days. No better, no worse. Something best ignored, right?
A speck of blood on the doorframe. That wasn't there before, was it?
A snap of twigs in the distance. A crunch of leaves.
Claw marks gouged deeply into the door.
Into the wall above your bed.
Scraps of red fabric, turned darker with blood. Pieces of fur. Of flesh.
Do you run and hide? Do you fight? Whatever you choose, it's definitely time to make sure your body parts aren't scattered next...
...what a horribly big mouth you have.
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Since first waking up on the island, characters have been stuck with that feeling of being watched. It isn't a constant. Isn't more than a few seconds at a time, dotted throughout the day. Investigation has never turned up much, and there's never been any sightings of the cause of it all.
Until now.
Throughout the first half of the week, characters will find themselves suffering from that feeling of being watched on a far more constant basis. Rather than it being a one-off, few seconds occurrence each day, that feeling will last for minutes at a time, and on multiple occasions.
However, it isn't until the fifth day that they'll start stumbling across physical signs of their monitoring. There are claw marks on doors. Spots of blood on the paths outside. A crack of twigs in the forests, or the imprint of bloodied paws in the snow.
Ten days in and those signs start finding their way indoors. Wet footprints, tinged with red. Claw marks in the walls, the floor. Torn sheets and the smell of wet...something. Whatever it is that's been watching you, its finally decided to come and say hello.
Two weeks in and characters will begin to have sightings of the creature, its fur dark and its eyes a glowing yellow. At times it looks like a wolf, prowling in the distance. At other times, it's walking on its hind legs, almost human were it not for the muzzle full of gleaming sharp teeth. Get too close, and it slips away like a shadow, gone between one blink and the next. It decides when to reach out to characters, not the other way round.
It's after characters finally get a good look at the creature that it starts leaving...gifts. Characters will start to find familiar items from their home worlds amidst the mess. The remains of a childhood pet, perhaps. Photographs of loved ones, faces torn almost beyond recognition. It's only once it delivers its final gift that the creature retreats to the trees again: a blood-splattered item of clothing that clearly belongs to the person the character misses the most at the time, alive or dead.
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no subject
Sorry, Mordred's in a pretty terrible mood. Anyone would be in a terrible mood with that thing leaving bloody presents for them. And it sounds like it's been happening to this guy too. Maybe he knows something she can use to get even with it, which is probably unlikely but that thought doesn't occur to Mordred at the moment.
“And yeah, it's been leaving a bunch of unwanted garbage at my place.”
She's definitely mad about it, that much is clear, but there's a hint of something else in her voice. There aren't very many people Mordred actually likes, so having it leave screwed up reminders of them makes it all the worse.
“Figured I'd teach it a lesson for messing with me, but I have to find the damn thing first.”
no subject
Howzer hadn't considered whether or not the wolf had been attacking other people. Even if his priority was to find a way back to the mainland, there was no way he could ignore someone else getting caught up in the beast's rampage. Howzer released his fist and began to pluck off his gauntlet, reaching into his armor for the pack he found when he woke up weeks before.
"Alright, so it's obvious it's not just any old wolf. If it's doing this to someone else, then it's got to be something much more intelligent."
He flipped open the satchel to pull out a little-salted jerky, taking a quick bite out of a piece. Unwittingly, he forgot the usual lesson he always had to be taught--not talking with a full mouth.
"So... It could be a spirit or a magic-caster who can shapeshift. Do you know much about either?"
no subject
“I've met mages before. Doesn't seem like any magecraft I've seen.”
She's definitely had her share of run ins with magic users. Both in Camelot and since being summoned into the Grail War, but nothing quite like that wolf. The closest that comes to mind is Frankenstein's Master's ability to summon animal familiars, but she's pretty sure that wolf and his ability are two completely different things with entirely different skill levels. Which is annoying, it'd be nice to have an easy answer for this one.
“What about you? You brought it up, so I'm guessing you have some experience too.”
no subject
One final chew and swallow later, Howzer wore his heart on his sleeve. Utterly incapable of dealing with most enemies who relied on subterfuge and deception, he felt woefully inadequate having a question tossed back at him with any sort of expectation of expertise. There was a clear flinch in him as he was forced to really think about it.
"Well, yes," He began slipping his gauntlet back on, clipping it to the mail beneath with little effort. "I guess I've fought a lot of magic casters and worked with just as many before but I couldn't say I have experience with what's causing--"
A sudden relapse of memory caught him mid-sentence and he held up an armored mitt, interrupting himself.
"Gowther--the Goat's Sin of Lust! He has magic that could alter memories and make you forget you've ever seen him and it was all done without any visible trace. I doubt it's exactly the same but... Given how evasive whatever this thing is, maybe it's similar."
Almost pleading, he turned a worrisome smile in Mordred's direction before barking out a little bit of a nervous laugh, "I can't say I know how to trap someone that can cover their tracks like Gowther's, though! Haha!"
no subject
“You can't say....”
She's at a loss here. She really is. What does she even do with this? Give up and storm off? Threaten him for wasting her time? There's a moment of silence before she starts laughing, planting her sword in the ground to keep her balance.
“You can't say you know how to trap something like that, and I can't seem to track it or land a blow. We're screwed, aren't we?”
It's not that she's happy about it, it's the exact opposite. But these last two weeks have been such a mess, she can't help but laugh about it.
no subject
"Heh. Maybe," He planted his hands on his hips, looking aside from Mordred to the woods. There was a momentary glance towards her sword--something he couldn't help but notice. His father, a renowned blacksmith, couldn't have possibly crafted something that ornate. Even the presence of it was a little scary but it was worth admiration. Maybe if he saw it swung in battle, he'd take the time to praise it and the knight wielding it but--
"But... I can't help but get a little pissed off thinking that I may not be able to do anything," He reached behind his back, drawing up his lance and tapping the butt of it against the soft, cold dirt beneath his feet. Mordred's mood was infectious.
"Whether or not we're in a bad way doesn't matter, does it? Either way, I've got a score to settle with that thing and I don't care about outsmarting it or unraveling its tricks. All I want to do is make sure it doesn't hurt anybody else! As a knight, I can't possibly let it get away!"
no subject
She gets it. She gets along better with people like this. It's not that she shirked her duty or anything back in Camelot. Okay, rebelling against the king probably counts as that, but before that she carried out her duties when ordered! It's just that she can't really be one of those super strict super formal knights. It's just not her.
“So let's get going already then. Either we come back with its pelt, or it gets away again, but at least we tried.”
She'll start walking towards the woods, but stops and looks back at him.
“Besides, I saw you eyeing Clarent, it'd be a shame if I didn't get to show off a little.”
She won't show off too much, just because the king apparently leveled forests while hunting doesn't mean she's going to do it too. Mostly because she's not sure how that all works without a Master here, but look, if they find the wolf, she swears it's going down.
no subject
Still, if he got a chance to put down the monster wolf, he'd probably jump at the chance to take it down. Even if he had suppressed it, he was still shaken up by the sight of his mother's bloody apron.
Following after, Howzer adjusted his belt and pack so it was more secure at his hip--better so that it wouldn't get in the way once he had to move or draw his lance. When Mordred turned back, he paused and watched her, curious.
Crap, she saw--
"Oh, well--don't worry if my eyes wandered a bit! My old man's one of the kingdom's best blacksmiths, so I can't help but recognize when something's professionally made," He added, giving Mordred an excited grin. "My lance is one of his pieces! I'm not sure my old man can compete with something that powerful but I'd love a chance to show his work isn't anything to scoff at, Sir Knight."
no subject
“Call me Saber.”
That works well enough for now. Not Saber of Red, that doesn't apply here, so there's no need to specify factions unless the other one shows up. And if he does, that's a whole other mess she's not going to think about unless she has to.
“And your dad made that?”
That's kind of awkward for her since she's wielding a sword she stole from her dad, but she'll try not to dwell on that anymore than she already is.
“All right, if we find it, I'll give you a chance to show it off too.”