Homestead Members:

@Matthew Campbell | @Ruth Fairchild | @Akerrah Koné | @Alphonse Toussaint | @Siobhan McCarty | @Damien Dragonclaw | @Taliesin Annwyn

The traveller wagons were not just a vibrant burst of colour in the thick green forestry but a symbol of power for those that had left behind their lives in search of peace and training. The history of the Isle was not without its skeletons, war and occupation had devastated communities both magical and not across the world and the Isle served as a sanctuary away from that. It gave the magical world in Asia and Oceania a hope that there was a better choice than the simple survival of hiding.

These were places of reverence to the early sacrifices of the Isle's founders. Magically enhanced to keep their colour so that they would always be a light in the jungle they did not expect the intrusion of darkness to soil them. Wells of tentacle like vines began to slink around their wheels, damaging artifacts beloved by the locals. Paint scraped away as holes were burrowed through the vines desperately seeking what lay within, who lay within. As it broke in splintering wood in its wake it pierced the enchantments of the structures and lurked its way into the magically enhanced interiors to find its prey. Slithering within as the sun began to dawn on the new day it moved with haste eager to fester in the darker edges of the wagons were it could thrive. Where it could feed.

And feed it would. This particular vein of the entity had not only managed to carve its way into the wagon as silent as sleep itself but had already claimed a victim. Roll: 1 The group would awake to the harrowing screams of Matthew Campbell a boy seemingly always prone to misfortunate. With the terrifying screams the group collectively woke and all but one saw as Matthew's tangled corpse was dragged from the wagons entrance by snake-like vines that sealed the entrance preventing them from following. Though such options would not have even been a possibility for as the students began attempting to move, to follow they would find their own bodies near half covered by the writhing black mass binding them in and attempting to suffocate them. Whatever danger Matthew was in, the group would first have to help themselves.

Moderation Note: Matthew has been taken by the entity and will not be present in this stage. The rest of you are considered restrained on your lower halves, unable to move your legs. You may make a strength save to escape or attempt another solution.

Screaming.

With a blink, she thought she was imagining it the same way she imagined all the lost time, all the strange fragments that scattered her existence. But with a beat, that was definitely, definitely screaming.

Running from her bed and grabbing her wand, she made her way into the main room, where it was very obvious fairly quickly where the screaming was coming from: a boy in their wagon was entrenched in vines and being pulled away from them with every second that passed. She'd never seen anything like it, but she'd never been here before, never examined plant-life like this. The panic that set into the lines on her face were all too easy to read.

It only got worse as the vines began to wrap around her ankles like a sickly snake. She tried to move but couldn't. She was so unsteady, in fact, that she fell over, ripping the elbow of her pajamas against the floor. The grip of the plants was so strong, she knew she didn't have a fighting chance. She was agile, not strong.

So, struggling, she racked her brain for an idea. The only time she'd seen anything close to this kind of a vine was at that strange fall event at the English school. She'd used one spell and it hadn't done very much. Maybe this time would be different. "Lu-lumos Solem!" she attempted towards the vines at her legs. If she could get free, she could run. She could get him, this boy she didn't know.

She didn't know any of them actually.

But she knew wouldn't want to be alone wrapped in vines.

Open to interactions
Action: Casting Lumos Solem

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Stats: sta 6 ⊹ eva 8 ⊹ str 7 ⊹ wis 7 ⊹ arc 7 ⊹ acc 7 | Time: An Underhanded Night Attack| CC:#2E8B57
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Siobhan's anxiety had blocked out much of what had been happening in the last five minutes after her homestead's collective of limbs had found themselves gobbled up by a heavy and ever tightening grip of vines. How they had arrived in the wagon had been beyond her but one moment Siobhan had been peacefully asleep under the woven cover of a borrowed blanket while the next involved Matthew's desperate screaming as the sounds died off his voice and subsequently his body disappeared from her perception.

Siobhan's arms where still free but when the Devil's Snare had snatched up her lower half, she'd been snatched from her own bed and fallen hard on the wooden floor of the wagon, slamming her chin on the rough hewn wood. Her wand had been perched on her nightstand but the force of her body slamming into the wagon base had been enough force to knock it off and when her face hit the floor it rattled off out of her reach. Her face stung and her ears where ringing with the sounds of Matthew's screams receeding into the distance. The slithering sounds of the vines stretching and growing out of the eerily quiet jungle where dousing the sound of her own heartbeat in her ears as she struggled and tried to crawl towards where she hoped her wand had rolled off to.

Siobhan groaned from the pain radiating up her chin, a static and metallic taste dripping onto her tongue as she pulled herself along in a desperate crawl, the snaked vines around her legs and feet gripping tighter with any movement she made. Siobhan wasn't stupid- she knew Devil's Snare continued to strangulate the more somebody struggled against its hold. But she, a blind and defenseless student, had no choice. She could not see who was still there, her mouth was far too pained to cry out for help, and she would not become the second claimed victim of the night. Her only hope was to keep moving, slowly but surely, in a hopeful direction of her wand.

Siobhan's hands began to fumble as she coughed out a glob of spit and blood in front of her. Disgusting but necessary. It was safer than consuming it and it tasted bad anyway. Something must have graced her with a shred of luck though as she managed to brush her fingers against her ash wood wand. With a mighty heave of her otherwise deadweight body, she slammed her body down against the floor once again and grasped the wand with her hand as she flung her arm back and wheezed out a dangerous but necessary- "Incendio Duo!"

She heard the sound of running footsteps and a shaky declaration of a "Lumos Solem" which prompted her to hide her face. If the spell had worked she surely would have been blinded further but whoever it was who'd cast the spell was knowledgeable enough to know that it would benefit them against the vines if it worked.

If it did, she'd escape whatever flames she may have conjured unharmed.
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| 𝑰𝒏𝒕𝒆𝒓𝒂𝒄𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝑾𝒊𝒕𝒉: | 𝑴𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏𝒊𝒏𝒈: @Matthew Campbell @Alphonse Toussaint|
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There was only one way anyone could've describe the scene unfolding:

Pure, unadulterated chaos .

What should've been a peaceful night of sleep before a daytime of interest and adventure was shockingly interrupted by screams that raised the girl from her sleep like the Cŵn Annwn themselves had been released upon her. In a swift movement that suggested she might've been braver than she really was, she'd grabbed her wand from it's place beneath her pillow and rushed towards the noise; skidding to a stop as she bore witness to the chaos, just as she watched her housemate's body be wretched from view and her current roommates erupting into action.

Taliesin Annwyn wasn't a brave sort. She was prone to fantasy and adventure, but that was limited to her imagination and to her stories. In reality, as she was quickly realizing in this moment, she was anything but brave. Frozen in place with fright. Her eyes swept across the room, watching as her peers were seized in their places and starting to sling spells about as they fought for their lives. Their literal lives. Were... were they all about to die? Here? Tonight?

The First Year couldn't help her trembling, feeling every bit of being a helpless child as her eyes tracked around the room. What even was this plant? Taliesin fancied herself very good at identifying plants. Herbology was one of her best subjects. It couldn't be Venomous Tentecula. Things would be playing out very differently by this point if it were, right? Was it Devil's Snare? She'd only ever seen the small ones in greenhouses or in books. Never something to this scale.

Distracted by all her ponderings, or perhaps too numb with fear to notice, by the time she'd realized it was even encroaching on her position, the vines had already started their tethering to her. That was when her body seemed to shock back to life again and she started struggling, "No, no, no!" she whimpered, her heart pounding in her chest, panic cramming itself into her throat. She needed to do something. Something. Anything. Anything while she still could, "Incendio!"

It was the first thing to come to her mind. Anything to escape.

FINAL MODERATION OF PART ONE
Standing in for Lawrence in this moderation round to end part 1 of the event!

Of this large group, one person was immediately unsalvageable. @Matthew Campbell was gone into the darkness almost before anyone else could open their eyes. Four of the remaining six, all of whom had awoken to find themselves restrained from the waist down, managed to cast paired spells at the vines strangling their lower halves: @Akerrah Koné with a Lumos Solem and @Damien Dragonclaw with the less powerful but no less effective Lumos, versus @Taliesin Annwyn's Incendio and @Siobhan McCarty's slightly more terrifying Incendio Duo. Though none of the spells managed to completely shake the kids free from their vines immediately, it certainly scared the plants enough to let them go after a beat or two. Unfortunately, two children who hadn't woken up at being restrained - @Alphonse Toussaint and @Ruth Fairchild - were not so lucky, and were dragged into the darkness following Matthew. Were they sleeping through this all???

The four who were left standing were free to leave as they wished, though, because as if satisfied with their kidnapped charges, the vines shrunk back into nothingness and vanished seemingly into thin air. Perhaps those still all right could proceed to part two and meet up with the other residents of the Traveller Wagons and the Rumah Adat...

Rolls:

Reducio