Dragon Reign: Awakening :.

⤝ Vyrralynn looked over her belongings in her satchel, including journals, graphite, a compass, and various other items to help document her findings as well as anything she would need to stay overnight. Any food and water she could find as a dragon, so that was covered. Letting out a breath, she secured her key around her neck, pressing it to her feathers for a moment before she grabbed her belongings, walking out of her den and ascending quickly into the sky, maneuvering out of the Sanctuary with ease. She grabbed her compass, adjusting her flight, before beginning to fly towards the strange event Dark had told her about. She only hoped she could properly document it all and show Dark how much he had taught her over the last few years. ⤞

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--All you can see is miles and miles of pine forests, with scattered rocky hills and a discolored mountain range even further out. The sun blazes above you, and occasionally, you can feel cold spots from the cloudy skies overhead--

⤝ Vyrra hadn’t been out beyond the Sanctuary in a while, and was reminded of how much she missed the scenery. Landscapes always went through changes, and she never made time to go and see them, watch the seasons change. But the sun on her wings was her favorite, spreading them out wide to catch the air under her feathers and feel the warmth from above. She couldn’t complain about a warm flight. She occasionally dipped to touch the tree canopy, or high above to match the height of the mountains, but always came back to a more balanced flight, aimed on reaching her destination as soon as possible. She didn’t want to miss a single thing. ⤞

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--You feel the needles prickle on your talons when you touch the tree canopy, alerting some of the wildlife below. As you fly on, you glimpse a rippling golden field in the distance with what seems to be a small herd of Highland Elk, but from where you’re at, they only seem like distant specks. It seems they haven’t noticed you yet. --

⤝ The golden dragoness peered over the trees past the clouds to see a field opening into view, an untouched paradise she was approaching. It brought a smile to her face, and she lifted into the sky a touch to get a better view once she flew in - that, and to avoid disturbing what she was flying over. ⤞

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--From flying up higher, the Elk below remain oblivious and continue grazing without any indication of anything passing overhead. You pass them easily, catching several hinds and a few stags under your gaze as you continue forward.  --

⤝ It was a wonderful sight, the elk below her. The wildlife was untamed, free. Just as the dragons should be. She only hoped things would continue towards her goal, freeing all the dragons from their eternal human prison. It was the one thing she wished to do before her passing. Flying past the elk herds and prairies, she squinted as she flew into the clouds once more, catching the cool air and soaring ahead.
After a long hour of flying, she glanced at her compass and began to fly lower towards the ground, eyes peeled for the location Dark spoke of. It had to be somewhere nearby now, with her keeping the right direction. She kept her compass in her palm as she glided along, eyes whipping side to side to catch anything at all that would lead her in the right direction. ⤞

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--As you fly on, the air around you feels colder. Having traveled an hour out past the Sanctuary, you have left the mountain ranges far behind you and are now coming upon flatter lands. The trees below are more sparse this far North with bits of old metal glinting through the canopy -remnants of the ancient dragon war. You feel nothing aside from the air current, but as your eyes whip ahead, you can catch what appears to be a worn pillar of stone within a clearing. It is a little ways away, but it doesn’t look human made. --

⤝ Her dark brown eyes finally landed on the pillar, narrowing her sights on the object up ahead. Though not a human ruin, it was still within a place of the past, strewn rubble still popping up through the foliage that was overtaking the history. Her wings helped her glide smoothly down to where the pillar sat, landing gently to not disturb her surroundings and tucking her purple feathers to her sides as she approached it. Her eyes looked over the entirety of the stone, and to its surroundings, marking anything immediately obvious to remember before she would need to pull out her journals and beginning documentation. ⤞

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--As you land, you notice the pillar made of a smooth, white-grey material, though not stone as far as you’re aware. It is littered in lichen and moss, with cuts and scrapes all across it. As you look around to see what else can be found, you see more of these pillars, seeming to travel in a line across the clearing you’re in. Some pillars are smaller than the others, having been knocked down or worn by the elements, but it looks like they are leading up to something. You start to feel a strange tingly feeling in you. --

⤝ The tingling sensation was uncomfortable. It reminded Vyrra of something crawling under her skin, an itch she couldn’t scratch. But it didn’t deter her from the place she knew she was meant to be. Shifting to her human form only temporarily, she jotted down the appearance of the pillars, how they lead forward in a line, a formed line that wasn’t haphazardly placed. The stone wasn’t stone, but it was older, and damaged alongside the others. So intriguing, but typical it seemed from texts she had read of older ruins. Who it belonged to, however, she was unsure. Traversing forward, she followed the pillar line, noting any other changes in the environment or any indication of specific species that caused the damage she saw. But nothing was set in stone, as it were, and she could not place just about anything. ⤞

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--With each step you take, the sensation in your skin grows stronger and stronger. It feels less like an uncomfortable shiver and more of an overwhelming current now, and as you follow the pillars, you almost feel out of breath, like a force is physically pulling at you. As the line goes further, the pillars appear even more decayed than before. They lead directly into the forest again, but this time, the brambles and foliage is dense. It is too dense for you to walk through --

id like a strength check to break through the foliage

⤝ Vyrra brought in deep breaths as she pursued, hating the pressure in her chest that pulled her forward. She knew this was a sign, but even as she ventured forth, her hand trembled as she wrote, too distracted by the sensation. But what was even more confusing was the further decomposition happening with the pillars, the lack of strength they possessed that grew less and less as she passed each one. What had happened here, and what strange sensation was left behind? Her tracks were stopped by the foliage and brush, suddenly too thick to go through. Her first thought was using fire, but she didn’t want to destroy anything valuable within the forest. Writing down the last of her notes, she shifted again before pumping her wings up above the trees to get a better vantage point as to where to go next. ⤞

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--You feel a surge of air under your wings as you fly over the trees. They don’t appear like the trees back at the sanctuary. They are much more gnarled in appearance and it doesn’t seem like diving through would work, but at a second glance, a large gap in the trees suddenly appears, with flashes of yellow light trailing in the air before fading. It looks like more pillars are within, including several other structures, and broken arches. From where you are, it’s difficult to say what could be inside. What you do know is the gap wasn’t there before, but it looks like it would have room for you to descend into it. --

⤝ A curious discovery to find the gap in the gnarly, deformed trees. What intrigued her the most was the flashes of light, so different from the sunlight and certainly not originating from there either. What had caused them? Her first thought was a reflection, perhaps a mirror that had been hit by the sun. But it would be more than strange to have a mirror in a place of ruin. She descended down very carefully, avoiding harming any trees or plants as she swooped down and landed within the area seemingly made for her arrival. Her eyes tracked everything, that tension still heavy on her chest and making it difficult for her to breathe. But she sucked in breath regardless, gazing at the new pieces now revealed to her in the dense forest she arrived in. ⤞

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--As you make your descent, the sensation you feel within you becomes almost suffocating. The weight grows and grows, dizzying your mind completely, until you feel it may overpower you altogether, but as your claws meet the dusty, arid soil below, the feeling is removed entirely and at once. It feels like something has been released, but not just within you. A sudden rush of air blows over the clearing, followed by vibrant dashes of light. Then, stillness. You can hear the dry foliage rustle back into place. Something speaks within you... you have arrived.
When you look around, you see an ancient ruin made of the same material from before with moss decorating each structure. There are statues scattered in a half-moon shape on podiums, most of which with outstretched arms holding unrecognizable objects. They appear to have elven ears.
But aside from the objects, the most recognizable thing you see are large rune symbols in the ground. Only one is lit. The golden color within it ripples and waves, almost as though it’s alive. --

⤝ The stillness disturbed her, the sudden quiet after the storm of pressure that had built in her head. Whatever it was, she dreaded having to experience it again, whenever it came to her again. Blinking a few times and regaining her balance, she shifted once more and began to notetake again, finally at ease from the distraction earlier. The statues and their elven ears pointed to this being an elven ruin, which was different from her expectations. Dark would be interested in that bit of info at the very least. Her steps took her towards rubes in the ground, only one beaming with gold. Perhaps this was where the light exited from and how it summoned her through the gap in the trees. She bent down to it, observing the patterns it formed in its active state and sketched it quickly in her journal. So odd for only one to be lit - was this the one causing the disturbances? She looked for any cracks or leaks within the rune, unsure of how the thing worked regardless, as nothing seemed to activate with it. But Vyrra also wasn’t sure how to activate the other runes, which lay dormant around her. ⤞

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--The rune continues to pulsate and waver as you examine it, and upon closer inspection, it appears to be draining in power as well as emitting a low sizzle. The air has an almost static quality to it, which you are able to notice on your skin. A dry leaf drifts in from the forest, but it appears to hover over the mysterious force in the air. --

⤝ Vyrralynn continued to observe the rune and its odd behavior. She had never seen an active runestone, and to see one flickering and sizzling was far different from what she expected it to behave like. If anything, she expected it to be doing great and magical things, changing the earth around it or hovering in the air or blasting fire from its rims. But here it sat. The staticy air was difficult to tell if it came from the rune or not, but it did bother her, almost as much as the prior sensation. All of these new feelings were making her uncomfortable to say the least. As she sat with the rune and sketched its changes, as well as noted the air and the space around her, she watched as a leaf floated in before halting and floating in midair, no wind keeping it in place. She blinked, and blinked again, unsure if the static had made her gone insane already. She reached out and touched it, seeing if it would move, if leaving the rune’s supposed force would cause it to leave or drop. ⤞

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--As you reach out to touch the leaf, it delicately drifts away from you by the force of your finger as though there is no gravity. It appears the entire ruin is creating this strange current. --

⤝ How fascinating. But also terrifying at the same time, to watch the leaf move with her touch. She didn’t know if she should be running away or not. But she knew she had to record this, record everything, for the sake of understanding their world better. She noted the change from the leaf and played around with it more, moving it to different places or seeing if it would drop or float, a variety of simple quick tests. It did not take long, and her eyes went back to the rune, and the ruins around her. She didn’t see any of the statues glowing, but perhaps the objects they held had some significance. She wanted to take the objects and place them on the runes, but wasn’t sure due to the lack of an item sitting with the golden rune before her. ⤞

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--Each time your finger taps against the leaf, it hovers in the air, only lifting with the force you give it first. No matter what you do, the outcome is the same. Eventually a breeze dips down into the clearing, sweeping the leaf off as though nothing had occurred. When you look around, you don’t seem to see much aside from the ruins, statues, and trees around you. But from the corner of your eye, you see old bones peering laying some ways behind you--

⤝ Vyrra was almost disappointed to watch her leaf blow away, vanishing as quickly as it had appeared to her. She finished her notes and set her graphite down before her gaze set on some bones that lay behind her. Bones? Were they remnants of whatever event happened here? She stood to her feet from her crouched position and stalked over, crouching down again to see the bones more clearly and note their location as well as appearance. She was afraid to touch any of them, as though they’d vanish to pure dust if she did. ⤞

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--When you look over the bones, they are as white as the pillars they created, indicating whomever had been here were dead for quite some time, more than several hundred years at a guess, but it was difficult to tell. Most of the bones were scattered by feral animals, but there was enough to wager a significant amount of people had died here. You can catch glints of armor peeking through the arid dirt that molded around them over the years, and arrows with broken tips. It looks like an old battle had taken place at these ruins.  --

⤝ A battle beyond her years. It was not immediately recognizable, as there were many fights that had taken place over the years and many wars raged. She pulled a book from her satchel and flipped through its contents, but quickly knew it did not contain what she wanted. After carefully returning it, she instead decided to note everything she could, in hopes she could connect these strange occurrences with a named battle in the past, or link a certain event to this place. She wrote everything she could, including the material of the armor and the number of bodies she could estimate, before she closed her eyes and settled her hand on the ground. She murmured prayers to those lost, and blessed the earth surrounding them, repeating words she used many times over in her past before removing her hand and opening her eyes, standing to her feet again. She almost felt to be a disturbance to this place of final rest, in this dilapidated ruin. Did she belong here, truly meant to be in this vicinity? She held her journal close to her as she took a few steps back, observing everything as a whole. Nothing connected as a whole, but she knew that knowledge would only come in time. ⤞

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--As you flip through the pages of your ancient texts, smelling the age from the pages, you gather nothing that connects this battle as you had expected. When you finish your notes and murmur prayers to the fallen and the soil, you feel a sense of peace resonate within you. It did not come from the ruin, but perhaps the act of it put you more at ease. As you stand with your hands around your journal, you suddenly hear the rune you left behind you humming louder, and louder. --

⤝ The humming was incessant. Enough to draw her attention away from her work and back towards the rune, which seemed to only get louder with each moment. What was up with this place and its affinity for making her uncomfortable? She grit her teeth but walked back over to the rune carefully, writing down the change before staring at the object. What had changed that made it suddenly start acting up? Certainly it wasn't her prayers. Otherwise she'd have bigger problems on her hands. ⤞

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--When you make your way to the rune, you see the vibrant gold light shining within the elven symbol, flicking as you come closer. But something seems very wrong with it now...it’s becoming empty like the other runes you glimpsed before. You see the color beginning to pull out of the rune -like the magic is fading- but from your studies, you know that isn’t possible. Runes cannot lose their magic without intervention, or so you’ve been told. --

⤝ This wasn’t right. Whatever this area contained, it was rejecting the laws of nature and magic, or so she had always known them to be. What could she do? She jotted it down, so confused that her words were scribbles, meshed together in an almost unreadable state. But Vyrra could hardly draw her eyes away from the phenomenon. Only intervention could pull the magic...but she didn’t feel any intervention, see any. What could possibly be happening for the rune to be acting this way? Was it a warning, a sign to run away? As much as she could believe it, she could not move her feet on the ground, her heart firm on staying here and seeing what the results of her and Dark’s curiosity were. ⤞

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--A crackle breaks the air, sizzling past your ear as the last of the magic fades. The rune remains desolate, empty now as you look down at it and only a tile of clay remains in its place with the static still in the air. The static rolls around your scales and feathers…and then the air begins to whirr.
Louder, and louder, the air roars and spins, doubling down to get more power. Droplets of colored magic form in the air around you. Colors of all sorts. The droplets stay hovering in the air before pooling into  streams toward the center of the ruin, weaving into a pressurized ball of light. You lose some of your energy and feel weaker…you feel a burning in your chest as the air roars around you--

⤝ Vyrra’s heart jolted when a crackle seized through the air, yet her eyes on the rune saw it was still empty, without power. Was that the last of its power draining? That’s what she thought…at least until the air kicked up around her. She began to panic without her wings, but was unable to shift, not with how delicate this area was, the magic it possessed. It roared in her ears, deafening her to the world around her as she was whipped around in place, her hair wrapping itself around her face as she held on tightly to her journal. The gods forbid if she lost any of the valuable papers at hand. She had shut her eyes to avoid the wind getting in her eyes, but she suddenly felt wetness on her cheek, like water sliding across her face. When her eyes opened, sure enough, droplets danced in the air in an array of colors, but only momentarily before they rushed to the platform before her, becoming light that was blinding. It hurt to watch, but she squinted, stepping back once before the wind kept her in place, her chest beginning to hurt as the air pounded in her ears, everything overwhelming her at once. ⤞

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--You notice some of the streams of color are originating from you, slipping off your skin to merge with the power before you and you feel weaker with each passing second. It doesn’t take long before you can’t help but shift into your dragon form, almost by instinct.
The ball of light contracts, pivoting to consume the streams of magic, knotting them to fasten a prism around the light as its power expands. Daggers of blinding light cut through the droplets and streams of color until suddenly, the blinding light implodes inward and then lurches out in a bang.
Your ears ring. All you see is light and dark, prioretting shadows. It feels as though you have died, your body not quite feeling there…you can’t feel anything in yourself, yet you can feel the land in ways you hadn’t imagined possible. Every particle, everything in this ruin, you can feel it as if it was an extension of yourself but the lightness around you remain.  --

⤝ The air kept pressing in on her, unable to move Vyrralynn was forced to shift, letting out a breathless roar as she did so, panic rising through her chest. What was happening, what was this place doing to her?! She could hardly breathe, watching the light come together in its colors before a bang went through the area, blasting through her eardrums. Everything went dark in her vision, her body weaker and weaker until…it didn’t feel anything anymore. She was no longer touching the ground, yet…the world around her - she felt every bit of it. The trees surrounding the ruins, the stones laying on the ground, the wind still brushing in the air. She must have died, must have entered the afterlife. All this time to be the beta she wished to be, to impress Dark, all of it was done, was in the hands of Dark and Xol and all those she cared about. She was afraid to open her eyes, accept her new fate watching over her dragon family. But when she peeked open her dark eyes, she only found the same area as before, yet light illuminated every inch of it around her. She was not gone from it, but she was not grounded within it either. It was watching through an exterior view, of not feeling herself but knowing the world around her. Of knowing it was real. Her eyes scanned everything around her, understand where she was, try to get a grip of the ground under her. But she only went back to the platform, to the rune before her. What was this all leading to? Would this ruin take her life too? Would she simply become another one of the skeletal remains, for the next curious historian to find? ⤞

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--With nothing but light around, you come to the platform and the empty rune. The ball is continuing to wind and fasten, shards of darkness lashing inside like lightning. You feel something important is going to happen, you can feel it resonate inside you like an afterthought behind the other questions going through your mind.
The light begins to pull matter around it, shaping it in toward itself -dirt, dry foliage, and bits of rubble to form a mass that continues to grow. It piled on, smoothing out then juttering back into disarray before smoothing out again while light circled its shape, nestling in the fragments of matter. A body was forming, or so it appears.
The rest of your energy depletes and it all fades to black as your body physically gives in. It’s too much.--

⤝ She was certain this was the end, that she was watching her own demise through the ruins around her. Her sacrifice would bring forth…whatever was being done. Her magic would be taken. Would it enter the rune before her? Was this magic here just consuming her as it had done to the last person being here? Was the last time someone was here was the skeletons behind her, the ones she would join? Vyrra hated all the uncertainty, the unknowing if she would live or die, what was beyond all of this. The sphere brought more than just water, but earth and stone, merging together into a solid form. It was trying to create something…something more than just a circle, but bringing in material to make some kind of body. Was she the sacrifice to bring forth this abomination? Before she could find out, her eyes flickered to darkness and she felt her body collapse to the ground, unable to do anything but watch in exhausted horror as the lights flashed and her vision went dark, the ruins consuming her. ⤞

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--Your vision fades to darkness, the view around your blurring before capsizing into an empty void.
Fade to black.

When you finally regain consciousness, your senses slowly drift back to your body and every inch of you feels frozen, but you are able to see the ruins just as they were before. There is no static in the air, no magic streaming by your field of view, and you appear to be alive and breathing. The runes still remain vacant and where the ball of light once was, a creature now stands. Its body is formed of the earth, smoothed into a shell with divots and pockets where raw magic emanates from. Its knelt on its knees, pools of emerald green light revolving inside its new body and appears not to be stirring aside from the magic trapped within. -

⤝ Vyrra could feel her surroundings before she even opened her eyes. The hard ground had made her muscles stiff and uncomfortable, and her ears still rang, but her feathers were not staticy as they were prior to her fainting, nor was there blinding light. Her eyes flickered open, her vision blurry temporarily as she blinked a few times and sat up on her front legs, still in dragon form. She still felt too weak to shift, but if she stayed still, perhaps she could avoid anything happening again to her. Her focus however went straight to where the ball of light had been before. In its place was a strange, motionless figure, almost humanoid with magic coiling through its inner core. Her eyes were wide as she gazed at it, unsure if it was enemy or friend, or something in between, an otherworldly force awakened from her presence. Had she caused this new being to come forth by her investigations? Why was it here? What did it all mean? She tried to control her now panicked breathing as she kept her sights on the figure, wishing to gain enough energy back to shift and write down everything before quickly going home and getting away from everything that had happened. She wasn’t sure of anything and didn’t want to stick around and find out if she would legitimately die. ⤞

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--The creature begins shifting its weight as you gaze in its direction. Emerald light beams through the empty cavities where its eyes would be located and it crackles and creaks as it breaks from the foundation and raises to a stand. When it stands, you can see a core of white and green light coiling in a hallowed area at the center of its chest. A life force of some kind. It looks at its hand, to the tips of its slender, pointed fingers. Then it looks at you, or so it appears. No inkling of what it plans to do next, but you slowly begin to get strength back into your limbs, no hint of whether this thing is friend or foe. You have enough energy to move, despite the tingles of numbness coursing through your scales. –

⤝ Vyrralynn was petrified by this new being, that now suddenly began to move and observe itself before its eyes, its voice eyes, landed on her. She could feel her heart pound in her ears and adrenaline coursing through her, her body telling her to run, run, run. The tingling in her limbs didn’t help as she hoisted herself to her feet, eyes still on the being as she tried to gain a foothold on the ground and know where she was, and where she needed to go to get out. Backward and up, it seemed, from the light she could see in her peripheral vision. She didn’t want to stay a second longer and find out what magic this thing had, why she couldn’t shift back into her human form - what it was keeping from her. Dreading the consequences, she grabbed her meager belongings and spread her wings, finding her exit before lifting off and bolting from the area, her body still aching from the fall and all it had endured. Her panic kept her flying fast, to get back to Dark and away from whatever horrors she had just unleashed upon the world. ⤞