World Tree MUSH

    Green Field is a small town with a population of about 500 people, bordered on all sides by rolling plains of lush green grass. Evidently this is how the town got its name. But Green Field has a problem lately.
    It's quiet right this second, but the town has been suffering from repeated raids by the local hobgoblin tribe.
    First they took food. But then they started taking people when the food ran low.
    Rydia of Mist is arriving into town right about now, walking alongside her trusty chocobo steed; having lent the saddle to a little guest for the time being, she simply guides the bird with one hand as the Summoner and her travel companion make it into town and...
    It looks like the local defenders are gearing up for a fight; the town guard and militia are arming themselves and preparing.
    "Huh. Looks like we showed up right on time." Rydia murmurs.

Itana didn't show up alongside her trusty Chocobo steed. She showed up /on/ it.

A little ways behind Rydia and her tiny friend, the traveler from Damcyan rides along with her hands crossed over the saddlebow and her hood up. A town of 500 people is hardly big enough to set her on edge, but there's always something of a wariness that comes over her when approaching settled places. They live in ways she's not used to and doesn't fit in well with.

The signs of trouble, at least, are hard to miss. The signs of tussling in the fields - the sight of villagers arming themselves. Taking her reins loosely, Itana sits up with a small frown and gives her chocobo a light coaxing forward, catching up to Rydia and her companion with a brisk trot.

"They're anticipating trouble any minute," she muses with a glance at the green caller. "Whatever has been troubling them is far from gone."

    Having heard on the grapevine about the town being attacked, a certain half-elf has entered the system and her ship hangs high overhead. On confirming that the town is in-fact their destination, a pair of robotic frames teleport down in a sudden flare of magical power. A stocky, heavy looking unit with magenta optics, and a much more slender, almost skeletal-looking one with white armour plate and a single red optic.

    The heavy unit reels off a rapid checklist that sounds like it's in elvish, the slender unit emits a bleepclicking sound as it rouses then settles over onto all four limbs before righting itself to two. "Do not be afraid, we are here to lend aid." comes a feminine voice from the slender unit. "I'll take a perimeter sweep, it seems we're not the only ones to come investigating." comes a more mature feminine voice, though it's clearly got a synthetic edge. The bulky unit turns to take a plodding route to investigate some of the signs of prior troubles, while the slender one turns to eye up the others as they arrive.

Popoi had been grateful for the lift, having had to rely on the kindness of those they had happened to meet while traveling. The sprite surveys the situation along with Rydia, noticing the collected group of combat ready people making preparations in what would have otherwise been a quiet town.

There's an air of tension that was plain as the looks on everyone's faces, once they were within the town borders itself, "At least we got a decent number of folks ready and willing to defend the place, so we'll not be completely overwhelmed by any hoards of raiders when the time comes." They comment towards Rydia and Itana.

    And that's a familiar face, to boot.
    "Ah, Itana." Rydia says as the archer trots up on her chocobo. "Yeah, it looks like our timing's perfect."
    The arriving dolls make some of the defenders jolt, but when they seem to be here to help more than to harm they're given a decent berth to do as they please.
    "Mmh." Rydia does muse as she ties her chocobo to a post and makes to help Popoi down from the big yellow bird steed as...
    "They're here! Everyone man your battle stations! They're raiding us again!" A guard on watch calls out.
    Yep, looks like this was the perfect timing.
    Unslinging her whip from where it loops at her belt, Rydia gives a sharp whistle and the mists that linger around her begin to gather.
    "I guess we're in for a fight already." She comments as the thundering sound of hooves in the distance as a cluster of hobgoblins mounted on horses begin charging the town.

Itana gives the mechanical arrivals a startled look, then a more wary one. As much as exploring a giant spaceship has helped expose her to weird future stuff, she still doesn't entirely trust stuff that clicks and whirrs and beeps and boops.

Popoi she barely knows, but cants her head towards the tiny sprite anyway with a nod, seemingly content to consider her part of the caller's extended posse. Itana nods back to the caller, lips pursed a moment before relaxing slightly. "It would seem that way, yes." She unshoulders her bow and gives the bowstring a quick check - nope, nothing wrong there - before looking off towards the horizon.

They are, indeed, right in time. The call goes out.

The thunder of hooves is hard to miss. Beneath her, Itana's chocobo warks tensely. Itana releases the reins and shifts in the saddle, her heels resting against the giant terror bird's flanks. "Let's go," she urges, spurring the chocobo forward with a light nudge.

It only gets a short distance before Itana calls something sharply in a language other than the common tongue. The chocobo rears with a loud wark, turning to run back towards the town, evidently in retreat. Is she giving up already?

Not at all: Itana just turns in the saddle to face backwards, notches an arrow and aims to fire it into the chest of the lead hobgoblin-on-horseback. The Parthian shot evidently crosses any universe where archers ride steeds and gain immense skill in both.

    "Multiple entities approaching at high speed." comes Minerva's call at about the same time as the watchman shouts. The bulky Doll moves into the path of the oncoming horse-mounted hobgoblins, its forearms morphing into long, slightly curved blades. A pair of casements on the shoulders of the bulky humanoid robot unfold into repeating crossbows also, the combat frame unfurling its entire profile.

    "It does appear so. I will attempt to intercept any that try to flank to the far side of town." says Justina before the slender doll goes to all fours, and skitters off rapidly through town to the far side.

    Minerva's crossbows open up to support Itana's bowshots, the rhythmic TWOK, TWOK, TWOK as each one fires in sequence sending steel-tipped bolts lancing outward at the riders of the horses.

Popoi was wondering how they were going to get down from this strange yellow bird, but Rydia is easily able to pick them up and set them down due to their light frame, which might have not been apparent at first under those green robes that seem to conceal the shape of their frame. The strange mechanical golems briefly get the Sprite's attention, but it is broken just as quickly when turning towards the sound of shouts of warning and the rumble of hooves that soon follow in the wake of the call to arms.

Popoi pulls out their staff, figuring the first order of business is to make things a bit more difficult for those mounted raiders. They concentrate for a moment, summoning Gnome, and Earth Elemental of Mana, "Gnome! We need some uneven ground to stop those raiders over there from reaching us too quickly!" The squat, bearded humanoid nods, "On it!" The Elemental disappears into the ground, then a localized vibration starts, causing the soil to loosen in some areas and begin thrusting upwards slightly in others.

Old, dead roots buried deep in the soil come to life, and start spreading upwards and outwards, creating obstacles near the direction of the Raiders, they'll either have to waste time going around the snarled landscape, or risk getting thrown off their mounts should they attempt to traverse the unsteady ground.

    Just like that the raid starts so fast.
    The hobgoblins, armed and armored, come bull-rushing on their mounts at breakneck speed. They're brazen that's for sure, expecting an easy raid like usual.
    What they most certainly were not expecting was to have their leader suddenly slump off his horse with an arrow embedded in his chest.
    But one loss doesn't stop them, even as several more go down in a blaze of steel-tipped crossbow bolts, flung from their horses as-- the GROUND itself turns against them when the Sprite child calls upon Gnome- an act that makes Rydia cock her brow curiously.
    The first wave is dealt with, but in their wake come the hobgoblins on foot, armed with bows and arrows of actually decent quality, they unleash a hail of arrows upon the town and its defenders. Causing Rydia to skid into cover behind a recently overturned cart, arrows pelting into it as she hunkers down.

Itana lets the robots do their thing. She has no idea how they work, but at least they're on her side this time.

The sight of roots springing from the earth surprises her, but her own chocobo's fortunately well ahead of the tangle of weaponized foliage - and it'll do a great job tying up the horses, or so she hopes.

Her arrow strikes true; as the lead hobgoblin falls, Itana shifts her weight and moves a hand to her reins, the chocobo beneath her rearing with a loud kree and a spreading of wings. The big terrorbird wheels, talons digging into the turf a moment before beginning to dart back around.

Arrows shower down around the group of defenders. Itana pushes her hood back in a spray of silver hair, the chocobo dashing off to one side to keep ahead of the volley. An arrow snaps past her, tearing a hole through her cloak but passing through without hitting flesh. Another shot buries in the turf just behind her chocobo. Things are getting entirely too close.

"Rydia, look away," she calls out, remembering the things the girl fears.

She snaps an arrow to her bowstring. "Angarag," she whispers before snapping it into the air on a high arc aimed to land it in the midst of the main cluster of hobgoblin archers. As it descends, fire wicks to life around the arrowhead - and at the bottom of the arch, the fire expands, suddenly blooming into an explosion intended to catch several hobgoblins and break up the thicket of archers.

    CLANG CLANG CLANG.

    Minerva's frame takes arrows, shrugging them away with the curved plating. Nasty scoring shows their impact points, but they don't pierce through the armour. At least not yet. "Captain, requesting authorization for specialized ammunition." calls the AI as her crossbows shift to 'reload' position, their internal magazines running dry after taking out the horse-riders.

    "Granted. Ice Knife bolts authorized." replies Justina as her frame skids around a building, and starts loping like a large, mono-eyed animal into the front of the swordsman line. The talon-like claws on the limbs slash and stab, as metallic plates form around limbs and over the white plates as an ablative additional layer.

    Minerva's crossbows drop into the casements, then emerge a moment later with gleaming blue-white runes on the ammunition boxes. She takes aim and after Itana's arrow lands, Minerva follows up with a volley of bolts. Their heads are bulbous but shaped for flight, and are inscribed with runic symbols. On impact these runes break and the spell sealed inside activates, spraying shards of ice in all directions like an elemental fragmentation grenade.

Popoi laughed a bit in amusement as the initial wave of riders seemed to fall to pieces like a house of cards, "If this is the worst they got, we'll be sending these wart faced back where they came from before the sun sets." Though that grin was soon wiped off their face as several arrows go flying in their direction, a few getting lodged in that mass of red hair, though missing their actual body. Popoi soon follows suit and takes cover with Rydia, quickly considering their next course of action.

"Now they're using arrows, time to send that plan scattered to the winds."

They begin calling upon a different elemental this time. A spirit of the wind, one that looks similar to such creatures known as Djinn, "Sylph, send a blast of wind across the battlefield to take the punch out of those archer's shots!" The elemental nods in a solemn manner, "As you desire." Before dissipating into the atmosphere. The wind begins to pick up, coming from several directions as vortices begin to form and shape into large dust devils that whirl about the area.

Small stones and jagged shards of wood and root are carried into the air, pelting the ranged combatants and generally disrupting their aim.

    'Rydia look away'.
    God, people say to look away, it's almost invariably going to make someone want to look. But Rydia... Rydia knows what's coming and for a moment longer she remains hidden behind the upturned cart as fire blossoms explosively from Itana's arrow amid the archers, followed subsequently by fragments and shards of deadly ice courtesy of Minerva and Justina, cutting down more, and then Popoi summons Sylph...
    The whirling winds and flying debris is more than enough when combined with the chilly doom and blazing conflagration to make the few remaining archers that do survive break ranks and flee.
    But one last wave comes-- swooping in a flanking maneuver, they rush from the opposite end of town, longswords in hand to meet the defenders and--
    "WHITE WOLFOS!"
    Rydia calls out, her voice booming with power as she summons *something* from elsewhere. A white wolf the size of a car comes bounding from around a building corner, ice and frost wafting off its body as it rushes the sword wielding hobgoblins, snarling as it tears one in twain with its jaws and starts mauling more.
    That. That's enough to make the assault break off, earning a ragged cheer from the local militia as things start to quiet down.
    Rydia picks herself up from her hiding space, placing a hand on her Wolfos to ruffle its ice-flecked fur as it rumbles.
    "I'm going to guess that's not the last of them. We should probably find their camp and see where they're coming from and deal with this a little more... Permanently. But we can do that later."

It's not the first time Itana has thrown Angarag around in front of Rydia. She remembers the green-haired caller's reaction all too well. The least she can do is warn her.

The white wolfos comes bounding out, and Itana brings her chocobo to a halt to look on with eyebrows raised at the ensuing carnage. The hobgoblins, at least, seem to think enough is enough too.

With a light coaxing of the reins, Itana brings the chocobo back around towards Rydia and her friend. She rests her bow on her saddlebow and folds her hands atop it, nodding back to the girl in green. "That seems like a wise idea."

She nods towards those villagers still in view. "For now, we should tend to these people. No doubt there are those who could use assistance."

    Justina is set to chase after the fleeing swordsgoblins, but breaks off after a few paces. "Minerva, track them." she commands, standing to bipedal height and glancing with the one optic at Rydia and the others. Without a further word the slender Doll teleports away.

    "Already tracking them." replies the AI. "Don't mind the Captain. She doesn't do well with people. We'll be in contact." the AI's voice is cheery at least. And then she too vanishes in a burst of magical power and a flare of blue-white.

Popoi heard there was yet another wave of attackers, one that was approaching from a less defended direction. Though before they could head out in order to meet the rest of the raiders, Rydia had yet another friend to call upon, "Wow, seems like those grunts were the ones who were overwhelmed. Though Rydia has the right of it, we can't just think they're not gonna try to regroup, or that they don't have a much bigger force waiting somewhere."

Though now that the immediate threat was over, trying to assess the damage here and try to lend aid seemed to be the next order of business, and since it had been a while before aid had arrived, there's probably quite a clean-up situation involved.