The end of Antu'Rah

It is said that Cataclysm might be released as early as the 2nd of November, so I thought it best we start this rp so that it's finished in time.

For this rp, I will act as gm as well as rp Ryleen.

This will be the look of gm posts.

My posts as Ryleen will look normal.

The map of Antu'Rah will be updated with the location of players as well as changes that happen during the catastrophy.

The hut of the matriarch is calm and silent, everyone inside still asleep. Ryleen sleeps, wrapped in a blanket and leaned against the center pole of her hut. Having been forced out of bed a few too many times by the tiny baby, now sound asleep in his cradle, she finally fell asleep sitting beside him.

Despite her somewhat uncomfortable position, nearly sliding off the pole she's leaned against, she looks peaceful. The tangled curls of her unbraided hair frames her face, her soft fur taking on a greenish tint in the morning light that seeps in through the door.

The infant rests peacefully in his cradle. Having been born sooner than he should have, he's a tiny and fragile little thing. His fuzzy baby fur is a few shades lighter than the teal blue of his parents and a tuft of blood red hair on the top of his head easily identifies him as his father's son.

A little OOC time: explaination of usage of different fonts in my posts.

Bold - name of the character I actually write about.
Small underlined - background informations, such as the place my character went to or some informations unknown to the most and/or in some way important.
Small italic - character's thoughts.
- Italic with a pause - character's statements.

If any of these do not look right, please let me know.
OOC time over.
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Kaz'jo
One of the huts in Snick'watha.

Getting up early as usual, Kaz'jo placed a kiss on his wife's forehead. He doubted she'll wake up, he did it every morning. And she deserved sleep - after all, Chabat was carrying their children. Warrior smiled at the mere thought of it.

He stepped outside the hut and began morning excercises, to awaken his body and get it used to motion. Another daily activity, which he completely forgot why is he doing. Though he did it, as he felt it is important. His warrior training, received very long time before joining the Heritage and losing his personality, was rooted deeply in him. He knew what is it and was quite content with that - it meant he could defend his family properly in the time of need. His beautiful wife and two daughters, who were yet to be born.

Kaz'jo raises his head and looks at the sky, smiling at the view. "Another beautiful day in the valley" - he thought, before heading back to the hut. He have to prepare to work. His blacksmithing skills became quite popular in Azeroh, so their little shop in Booty Bay is prospering well.
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Zan'ziri
A small, simple hut on the hills near the waterfall.

Girl awakens in her little hut, built by Hadunka, the one who she eventually accepted as her "daddy". She is looking around, wondering where she is, before rather quickly realizing it. Yawning widely she stands up and begins to look for her tiger-skin cape. Girl quickly finds it and moves outside the hut. She takes a bowl with green dye that she prepared earlier - with only natural ingredients - and steps down to the water. Child stands by the shore in a little, hidden place, that she can observe a lot from while remaining unseen, and sits back by the water.

Ziri takes off the wrap on her hair that keeps not only her hairstyle, but also hides a lot of hair that growed up by all these years spent in jungle, and takes off a little, bone comb from the hair on the top of her head. Humming quietly the only song she remembers - the one which her "mommy" was always singing to her when the girl was sad - child begins to comb through her hair. She looks at rising sun with a wide smile.

"Another beautiful day. Yay! I'll have a lot of time to play with all my friends. I wonder if my bunny will try to escape again when I let him out to get some freedom?"
Ziri begins to dye her hair, which begins to show blue offshots by the ends of it. Blue is not a bad color for her, but is a lot harder to hide in the jungle than green, according to the girl herself.
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Thugha Ashenscar
A hut in north-eastern part of the valley.

Being rather frequent guest in the valley lately, Thugha spent another night in her hut, build not so long ago with the help inhabitants of this place - trolls, from a tribe that left the Horde, led by an exile. She was supposed to hate them, but past events completely changed her meaning of value. Now she treated those trolls - and one forsaken, of course - as friends, helping them in exchange for their help as well. Easy tasks for little favours, sometimes mercenary work in exchange for bigger ones. She was quite content with that outcome - plus, since losing the village she lived in as a child, the hut she helped to build was the first true home she ever had.

The orc awakens suddenly, reaching to her shoulders, where she usually carries two large swords. She curses loudly in a few languages of Azeroth and stands up. Gathering her armor and weapons, she leaves them by the entrance to the hut, so these items are close when she goes for her morning training soon. Thugha stretches herself, still bones are jumping back to ther usual spot with a few crackles heard. She doesn't react to it - with her rather active lifestyle, even a short rest makes whole body still.

Orcish woman stands by the wall of her home and looks at the sky, frowning. The dream she had - enormous shadowy shape, observing the orc everywhere she went in her dream - is still roaming in her not entirely awakened mind. Not first and obviously not the last time she has that dream. Cursing it in her thoughts, Thugha takes off every piece of equipment she had - including all her clothes - and places it all just behind her. She sits down on the ground after that, taking comfortable pose taught to her by Vypra, and begins to prepare for her daily meditation. Even if the rituals were already in advanced phase, the orc enjoyed these morning meditations a lot. Calm mind, coming as an outcome, was a great help in her mercenary work, plus it was a pleasant feeling.

"A nice morning... bringing hope for the day to be better than the last one. Or some in the past"
Thugha is slowly entering the meditation phase, clearing the mind from all the thoughts.

Vaali rolled over on the bed of soft furs, the morning light catching his face. His eyes opened gradually, the darkness beneath them showing the little sleep he had had. He was tired, but he was awake, letting his eyes adjust to the dawn light.

Slowly and quietly he pulled himself up and out of the bed whilst pulling on a loincloth. Crossing over to the cradle he looks down onto the tiny form of his Son. Smiling, he spent a few moments contemplating how lucky he was to have such a wonderful wife and Son. Eventually he turns and moves over to Ryleen. Crouching down, being very careful not to disturb her, he teases the blanket to cover her in a more comfortable manner, and gives her a soft kiss on the cheek.

Rising once more, he turned his attention to the insistent nagging murmur of the Spirit World, voices and feelings just outside of understandable perception, pulled at him to commence his morning devotional rituals, a combination of encouraging and agitated Spiritual flow beckoned him.

Sighing, he slipped out of the hut, and started the walk down to the waters edge at the bottom of the hill, wishing to pay his primary patron element devotions first. As he went, he cast his eyes around the village for any signs of other early risers.

Shadow were coming quick now and every thing darkened. It took Hadunka a few seconds to realise it was not shadows ... but daylight, every thing as different here in the realm of dusk, his patron Loas hunting grounds. Sitting covered in shadows close to his hut he could smell al the scents of the morning, the soothing smell of his beloved with the promise there in, the smell of the other tribe’s people awakening. He would also smell Ryleen’s and Vaali’s childe, that wonderful smell that meant survival for the flock. He was happy; it was a good home, and a good flock.

High above him is Sheil’ur sleeping on the wall, his primal’s wife.
She is expecting cubs, more guards to the valley. They were a large flock now … his animal family, and he was the patriarch … he was Bèt’wa.

He sighs and looks around, the morning is peaceful … not showing any sign of what he had felt stirring in is meditation.

His meditation had been a good one, but worrying … the animals are restless.

Some thing was a miss. With a grin he slips out of the shadows of the dusk and in to the awakening dawn, just as Vaali starts his walk. He looks at the shaman but smell no worry, so he assumes it is a strict animal problem. Quietly as a jungle cat hi slips in to his hut and the bed were he left his beloved Lahni just an hour earlier.
As always when he is in the village, is he going to let her awake in his arms.

Murmuring voices, and a defining silence. She was used to it now, and know what it was … the spirit world. Quietly she sits by the stream looking at the light show there in and just feels. It had bin a interesting time, and she was thankful to the shaman that had taken her in … teaching her. She had never known until now why she could hear thing others could not, se differently. She bends down to the stream and lets some water flow in to her hand and form a orb, it was a training exercise she had bin given … and it came easily now.

Looking in to the orb and seeing the elemtals dancing happily in her hand she begins to sing. Unlike her empty tone when she speaks is her singing a flowing harmony … like a reflection of the joyful, powerful and beautiful rivers, seas and lakes.

EDIT BY RY (to not disturb the thread with ooc posts): Mind telling us who it is? Or, if we're not supposed to know, at least describe her.
((answer: She is Chaj'nka my troll shaman I am bringing in to the heritage. But it have yet to happen. I will bring her in before the cataclysm though. That is before this threads events takes place. And I will describe her futher on. The problem is I do not know how she is part of the heratige. I am hoping a shaman will help her as she is a completely untrained on IC atm. Will remove this OOC later.))

The first rays of sunlight reach over the treetops, bathing the valley in bright golden sunlight. The air is perfectly still, the only movements the water of the rivers and the butterflies fluttering around the colourful jungle flowers.

((Map is updated, tell me if I did it wrong. I'll keep things calm for a little longer, to let people have a chance to get into the game.))

((My second post were Chajnka and I noised the location was not described. She is sitting by the river were nr 5 is ... as I understand it were Vaali is heading. Also if Ziri is next to her hut will it be (what I know) close to the south of were nr 5 is on the map.
I will remove this when it is not needed))

((Yes, it's the rp we've discussed before. We play through what happens the day cataclysm strikes, so that we have that done the day cataclysm (the expansion) is released. ))

Raz

The resident walking dead stands by the make shift window of hs hut gazing out across the Valley and the temple, for him the temple carried many bad memories and thus he tried his utmost to avoid it. As the first rays of sun raised over the horizon they beamed into his hut picking out the fine details of his armor and giving his one remaining eye a gentle glow. The night before had been uneventful, as per usual his nightly patrols had gone off without event. Outside his hut stood his loyal steed Serenity, she had been with him in both his life and his death and still her loyalty never faultered, she had stood against both the Burning Legion and the Scourge and had stood by Razeals side as they were taken by death. A more nobel and loyal steed he could never ask for, he considered her more of a friend than just a simple mount.

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Zor

As had become familliar recently, she lay in Gul'juns hut staring up at the ceiling. She had struggled to sleep lately, her normal upbeat and happy persona had been shakey lately due to her lack of sleep. For reasons unbeknownst to her she was struggling to commune with the elements of water, she had pinned it down souly to her lack of sleep as tiredness would often effect her judgement and her control over the elements, her healing had become slightly weaker due to this. She rolled over and pushed herself up from the mat she had been sleeping on, from the other side of the room pounced a small tiger cub that happily joined her side, scooping it up in her arms she left the hut smiling up at the clear sky...Yet another beautiful day!

A while later Ryleen stirred and awoke, a thin beam of sunlight peeking in through an opening in the wall and hitting her eyes. She grimaced and stretched her arms above her head, feeling how stiff she was from sleeping awkwardly sitting up for half the night. Still half awake she checked on the sleeping child, got dressed and wandered out of the hut.

Around the back stood a big wooden bowl, and with a gesture she filled it with clear, conjured water. She started work on washing and combing her hair, gradually waking up enough to actually register some of her surroundings. Once she was done she walked over to the big log by the fireplace and sat down. Humming a melody to herself she started to braid her hair, tying off each end with a piece of grey ribbon.

Standing up again she finally started to feel alive again, although still tired from the restless night. She went into the hut to fetch her cooking things and set to work with making breakfast, hoping to have it done by the time Vaali returned home.

Euphrati --Undercity--
An dark armored guard on an undead horse comes in from the rain. Nothing happens at the Undercity banks. It has been an good night none has bothered her. Not even the distrusted Korkron have bothered her tonight. As she sigh an thought of Antu´rah appears. "Oh, the silent and peaceful place. Perhaps try to take some extra days off and travel there"

Nimnir --On the opposite side of the stream, waterfall of where Ziris hut is--
He opens his eyes, awakes from his meditation. Looks around where he is and smiles. It sure is warm here.
He thinks and look at all the sweatpearls on his skin. His wolves seem to think so too as they lie on the other side of the stream. He knows he have several times been dreaming of having fur as them, especially on the darkest, coldest weeks of the winter. But now feel little sorry for them. Wonder why jungle trolls have fur but we dont?
He takes off the chain he have around his neck and hangs it on his small sword and takes some steps on forward to the shore of the small river and put his whole head into the water, cooloing himself.
The chain has in the end an collar in the shape of an owl. He gives it an kiss before putting it on again.
Suddenly he react at an small sound, and sits up on his four listening and searching where the sound came from, like an wolf.
There!
He calmens, and simply look out towards the other side of the stream. He see someone clearly, someone he like. And start smiling.
Her, this feeling... I feel good, just seeing her.

((it was zulros that followed us that night and raz doesn't remember much of what happened anyway!))

Chabat

In the hut she shares with Kaz'jo

The soft morning light seeping through into the hut finally wakened the little mage. Not so little anymore, her belly swollen with the twins growing inside her, she smiled. he snuck out without disturbing me again.

Her days seemed to be endless rounds of sleeping, eating and going to relive herself...which was, of course the reason she was now awake. Sighing, 'Bats slowly pulled in some clothes.

I hope you come soon little ones she murmured.

Lahni

Lying in Hadunka's hut.

Birdsong. Warmth. Hadunka near. Lying down. It's Morning. Lahni wakes up slowly, her hand reaching for the usual position her goggles hang from now.

The hut. The sky outside. Hadunka next to her. A flourish of vision. She cuddled up to Hadunka, not quite wanting to fully get up yet. Things were just fine here. All of here.

She smiles, waiting for Hadunka to awake.

Kaz'jo
The workshop
After taking a short walk to raptor pens, Kaz'jo brought his raptor and stuff to the workshop built in old meeting place. It was more for engineers than him - after all there were at least four engineers in the valley, which of three were rather active - but forge is a forge and anvil is an anvil. Even if the place is filled with sprockets, gizmos and all the stuff that Kaz did not recognized from eachother. He goes to the rack standing rather aside and takes a huge sword from it.
It was his old sword, made of some sort of crystal and recently reforged. Warrior broke the sword during a duel with an old combatant in Dalaran, though it only did good - he lost it during a sparing and not during real combat, which might be fatal, and now the sword was strenghtened by rare mineral called Khorium, which made it very durable. There was still much to be done, though, to keep the sword in proper shape.
Kaz'jo adds more coal to the forge and begins to raise heat. He needs to finish this sword as soon as possible. He still has the axes, but this blade is far superior towards them.

Zan'ziri
Hills over the lake, near the waterfall
After she finished to dye the hair, Ziri waited a while, humming to herself and waiting for the dye to dry up - which went fast due to it's natural properties and the jungle warmth. After that, she goes up towards her hut again.
Girl leaves the bowl that contained dye in the hut and goes outside again. Smiling happily, she quickly takes her clothes off and places them on tiger-skin cape found before, then runs towards the edge of hills and does a long jump down to the lake, letting out a happy laugh while flying down, silenced by contact with the water. Believing in the huge privacy of this place, she has no idea she's being observed.

Thugha Ashenscar
A hut in north-eastern part of the valley.
After spending some time meditating, orc slowly left the state and regained her consciousness. She stands up and puts her clothes, as well as heavy plate armor on. She takes her sword and lets ou a sharp whistle. Waiting a while, she picks up a small book and opens it, then takes ink and quill and begins to write.
"I didn't managed to finish my work yet. I hope my machine will work soon enough... I'm working on it for a long time for now. Will be over a month.
I managed to take it off the ground once, but nearly crashed just a second later. It still needs a lot of work.

I had another of my nightmares. They're tiring me off completely. I need to get another mug of that "coffee" thing I've got. It helps me a lot... though I hope I won't addict to it. I have enough hard time trying to drop chewing tobacco. That crap is overadvertised.

Today's meditation brought me a light vision. There was an odd rumble heard around, I think I've seen rocks shaking. I wonder if this does have any meaning?"
She raises her head as she hears hoof sound. Her ram is riding towards her, stopping not so far from trampling Thugha. She chuckles and shakes her head.
This animal is still to be trained, though Hadunka did a great job there. He's not even half as stubborn as he was before...
The orc closes the book and attaches it to her belt, then mounts the ram. Putting her goggles from the forehead on her eyes, she yells "Forward!" and the animal begins to dash ahead, guided by the reins. Thugha manages a wave to Razeal - her forsaken "neighbour" - as she passes by his hut.

Everything looks like the beginning of a wonderful new day.

But the peace is abruptly torn apart by a rumble as the ground begins to move. The motion is violent, the very earth groaning as it heaves, tossing heavy objects like they were weightless. Huts collapse, the sturdy poles holding them up breaking or getting torn up from the ground.

The old temple on the hill, already ruined once by the last earthquake, shivers and cracks, raining huge stone blocks on the ground beneath it, and the newly built town hall, ripping its thatched roof to pieces and breaking its sturdy walls like matches.

Parts of the steep cliff walls break off and tumble down into the lake below, splashing and disappearing down into the deep waters.

((map updated, as with every GM post))

With a moments notice from the Spirits, Vaali snaps out of his meditations a split second before the ground buckled beneath him, casting him off the edge of the cliff, towards the water below.

With the swift, agile grace spawned from his combat training, he snapped out his hand to grab the totem planted firmly into the shifting earth, small enough to roll with the ground rather than snapping. His grip now firmly around the Earth bound spar of wood anchoring him in place, he swings chest first into the jagged and disintegrating cliff side, cutting a ragged slash across his side and knocking the air from his lungs.

Forcing himself up and away from the edge, he spends a few moments dragging air back inside him to appease his screaming muscles. Dazed he stands, and surveys they continuing destruction around him, with a wheezing whisper tinged with horror,

"Ry ..."

Turning, he sprints back up the path towards the village, ignoring his protesting limbs.

Raz

As the world begins to crumble Serenity unleashes an ear splitting screaming as she bucks and rears onto her hind legs. Before she reaches the ground again Razeal has already joined her side clutching at her reins trying to calm her down. Passing it off and simply a badly timed earthquake he focuses on trying to calm her nerves as she continues to rear up and scream, her howls no doubt muffled in the thunders of the collapsing earth. Unlike him, she knew something was wrong and that this was more than just a simple earthquake.

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Zor

It had seemed like a potentialy beautiful day moments ago, but now her world was literally coming crashing around her as she fells to her knees covering her head, she knew not what to do and thus knelt there and screamed while trying to cover herself. She prayed someone would protect her from this apparent devastation! It dawned on her suddenly...She had help...She was help! Still cowering in her own recoiled fear she held out her arms and muttered a few words as a totem appeared, looming behind it stood a huge golem made entirely of stone. The golem roared and thundered as the earth tore itself asunder around them.

"Golemor!" Screamed Zorah as she moved closer to it attempting to hide under it.

The golem was not its normal gentle composure as it twisted and roared seemingly unstable...Within moments the golem shattered into a thousand shards and rained around her...It was here that it finally hit her that something was wrong...Very wrong!

Kaz'jo
The workshop
Hearing the rumble, warrior quickly takes the blade from the forge and begins to search for the source. Seeing that part of the cliff is falling apart, he lets out a curse in Zandali and rapidly dashes to his raptor. He jumps on raptor's back and loosens the reins - which he did only once before. Raptor screeches and begins to run, led by Kaz'jo towards Snick'watha.
"- Chabat! People! Watch out!" - he yells through the link.
Snick'watha
Kaz'jo guides the raptor to his and Chabat's hut and leaps down, stumbling slightly but proceeds to the hut itself, hoping to see his wife safe and healthy inside.

Zan'ziri
Smaller lake
Ziri feels the rumble rather than hears, as she is under water. She swims above to see what's happening, to witness a cliff falling to the lake. She screams loudly.
Girl quickly swims to her little bay and gets out of the water, running up the hill to collect her things. She quickly dresses up and attempts to go to her hut. In the same moment, large part of the cliff breaks off her hill and opens a large chasm under her feet. She falls down, screaming loudly both by voice and the link, crying for help.
She falls on a small ledge, contact with ground knocks the breath out of her lungs. Ziri, dazed by the fall, witnesses the hill falling apart and collapsing, with her hut and every belongings. By the moment she sees her bunny, proceeding to inevitable death below.

Thugha Ashenscar
Road to training grounds
Thugha swears loudly when large rock falls before her. Hearing the rumble she turned away, to see her hut collapsing to the lake. She curses in dwarven language and jumps from her ram's back. Startled mount dashes away.
Orc runs back rapidly, proceeding towards a cave shown her by Ziri about a month ago.
I can't let my work to waste. Not after that much time and effort spent on it!
- Watch out! Valley is collapsing! - she yells while passing Razeal on her way. - Find my dumb ram and save it, all my belongings are within saddle bags!
Not waiting for response, she dashes towards the cave, praying in thoughts for it to be untouched yet.

((When you said lake, I thought you meant she jumped down to the lake, not into the river =P I'll correct the map next update. ))

Crouching by the cooking fire, Ryleen very nearly tumbles into the flames as the ground starts shaking. The cooking pot falls over, splashing boiling water over her legs, but she hardly even notices. Having avoided the flames, all she can do is try to crawl towards her hut, as the ground shakes too badly for her to keep her balance.

Tam.

She could see other huts collapsing from the corner of her eye, and as she saw the main pole holding her own upright start to lean dangerously much she felt her heart freeze.

Tam!

She didn't know how, but suddenly she was on her feet, lunging towards the hut. One hand ablaze in the blink of an eye, she tore through the hide that made up the wall of the hut. The opening on the other side was too far away.

She threw herself into the hut, aided by the ground heaving and launching her forward. She wrapped her arms around the cradle, shielding and covering it with her body. Staring down at the terrified child below her, she gained enough focus to try to raise a magical barrier around them, all while she felt and heard the hut collapse around her, engulfing them in darkness.

Lahni

Hadunka's hut

Lahni scrambles to her feet, she sends a light kick at Hadunka, before rushing outside. She calls across the spirit link "What the vekk is going on!?"

Lahni immediatly looks over as Ryleen's hut collapses, she swears and rushes back into her hut, arming herself. She then sprints over to Ryleen's hut.

She calls with her voice. "Ryleen!"

Nimnir --At start sitting next to the hut on the opposite side of the river of Eups hut, overlooking Ziri. At end on the cliff about Ziris hut, abowe where she is. --

See the girl jump in the water, and follow her with his eyes. The blurred image of her deep in the clear water. He knows he shouldnt look but cant take his eyes off her, but slow and silent takes some steps away from the shore.
Suddenly the ground start shaking. It shakes so hard that the hut next to Nimnir is destroyed. He halfly falls and halfly dodge away, luckily hes unharmed. Nimnir looks to where the girl stood, Ziri! shes gone!
She cant be... was it she who screamed? she may need help.
He look at the stream, it looks to have become more violent. Part of him want to flee, other part cant let go of the though to help. The latter is stronger and Nimnir cast himself out in the river trying to best it, to swim across.
He get dragged underneath, suddenly he feels a couple of paws at his back, trying to get him above the surface. His stronger friends, Growler and Howler, succed and drags him to the otherside of the stream. The youngest of his pack is not strong enough in the stream and are pulled away. Falls over the waterfall disappearing. Woof! NO!
He rushes towards the stream but the other wolves stands in his way keeping him off, knowing he have more important matters to care for. Nimnir howls and sheds a couple of tears while running towards Ziri... or where she was. Looks down in the dark chasm. There something, someone is. Ziri? he calls down, one of the few words he has learned.*
Over the link he calls: need help... ziri... rope. *
(* according to if hes been in guild long enough to speak somewhat and if hes on the link by then)


Euphrati --Undercity--

Feels suddenly chaos and pain in her mind, coming from the link. People screaming for help.
She force her undead horse down by pure willpower. And start weeping of the pain.