[PQ - in progress] Ultraviolence; Carnage

[Warlight]

Warlight

 

Her life had been short. After she had answered Carnage's call in Pangea she hadn't lasted long - only long enough to produce a child and loose one important battle. But she had not rested in the afterlife, even if she never thought she would see the land of the living again, she had not allowed herself to wallow.

She had fought that battle every day.
She had ripped him open in one hundred different ways.

And when crossed Nikkia's river of life and death, her body had been remade, and she had felt strength as she never had before.

Yet, it was not enough.

She was little more than prey still, like the creature whose antlers she wore. So she tells her mate she is going to the field, and leaves Tephra behind with a blink of her long-lashed eyes.

When she wakes, Warlight stands at the base of the mountain. She would not cheat the pilgrimage to teleport any further up. No, she begins the arduous climb with her head lowered, conserving energy for a journey she knows will last well into the night.

Hours pass, she falls, she stands, she climbs, and she forms the words she wants to say. The stars come out, and despite the howling of the wind, it is a brilliantly clear night. But finally, as she reaches a plateau that looks like it could be the edge of the world, she halts.

"Carnage!" Warlight calls to the Dark God in a voice that does not betray her exhaustion, as a sudden burst of adrenaline infuses life into her tired body. It was not the first time she had called on him, and it was not the first time she had been prepared to do his bidding.  "I am a warrior, but my strength is nothing in the field." There was little use for her antlers when magic ran rampant, and no matter how well she trained her body, her strength and speed were nearly useless when matched against the traits of others. "I'm asking for the power to level the field, to have the chance to fight a battle where the winner is decided by teeth, hooves anthers and claws."

— soul as sweet as blood red jam —

Warlight is asking for Trait Negation and would give up her emotional telepathy. She knows something is weird since she came back to life (winning the emotional telepathy in a quest) but doesn't really know she has the trait.

[Carnage]

lord, I fashion dark gods too;

He thinks sometimes, of Pangea – that land vomited forth from his ill magic. It had been created in spite, of course, as his magic sickened and malfunctioned, fighting against Beqanna’s drain of it.
He thinks even less of those who answered his call. They are blurred faces, more disappointments. For after he left, did they not let Pangea crumple into the sea, until he pulled it back? He was the one who had to fix it. As always.
(Never mind there had been others on that quest, too, who swam to the murky depths to spit the earth back into being.)

Many call for him. He ignores many of the requests, because he sees no value in them, no entertainment. Some he chooses at random, some because they manage to offer a kernel of interest to him.
He hears her call, and recognizes her voice. Faintly. He cannot place it, at first, and then it comes – she had been one of the ones who answered. Who added her feeble strength to Pangea’s defiant creation.
A kernel of interest, then.
And so it is that he appears. He chooses a flash of light this time, momentarily blinding her, and then he is before her, looking.
And she is pleading.
It would be simple, to honor her request. He reads her, knows what it is she wants. To negate. To muffle.
It is greedy, to ask without offering.
And so before he gives he takes, he pulls from her the strange trait she was given. He pulls more, too – pulls her health and vitality and other powers. Her antlers crumble to dust.
She will be nothing, for a time.
“Prove it,” he says, his voice low, warning, “go, in your weakness, and beg for the help of those powers you want to negate. And then, perhaps…”
He is gone before the sentence is finished.

c a r n a g e

Carnage has temporarily stripped her of her traits (feel free to say it was painful lol), and also weakened her greatly. Warlight must complete two threads in which she seeks the help of other traited horses (e.g. get healed by a healer) or otherwise benefits from their traits (e.g. a plant manipulator makes her some grass to eat). Once completed, she can return to have her powers restored and the trait swap made.

[Warlight]

Warlight

Her return to the Mountain is a march in slow-motion. She weaves between the kingdoms and territories on foot, a trek she had bypasses with her teleportation last time. She had lived the last half-year without such gifts, and the journey is nothing short of grueling.

But when she reaches her destination, the true trial begins.

She had told Raul she didn't know how long it would take, and on her fourth night, she sleeps at the base of the mountain.  She dreams of the comforts of home, of warmth and security, and she dreams of the afterlife. It's one of the later dreams that wake her, her chest still throbbing, pumping icy blood from an imagined death-wound.

She doesn't try to sleep again.

From this mid-night moment until the next day's dusk, she climbs. The leopard-skin warrior watches her feet as the hours fade in some mindless, disassociation. When the earth plateaus, she almost stumbles. Halting instead, Will regains her balance and looks around to see where her hooves have taken her. She recognizes the lands stretched out below, causing her stomach to churn from the height, and she decides that this place will do. Lifting her head and strengthening her shoulders, Warlight calls for the dark god.

— soul as sweet as blood red jam —

Ok! So she received help from two traited characters
The first one was the same day she met Carnage - she basically slid down the mountain and Aodhan found/helped her get home to Tephra using his Equus Mutatio to carry her. In the second thread Lilliana used her healing the day before today so she could have enough strength to make the return journey here! 

https://beqanna.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=27351
https://beqanna.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=27401