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The seemingly solitary creature stood, looking out over the vast expanse of what had become of his home. Sand stretched as far as the unaided eye could see. Small, glinting particles shifting in the dry, desert wind.

The lands had changed in the last one hundred years that he occupied this earth. What had once been a lush, green grassland was now the dried bone of a desert. Where glistening, gleaming streams had once danced, there stood dunes and hidden oases. But, there was a great variety of life that teemed within that desert land. Hidden from the surface world, most of the life within that place dwell under the ground. Each and every spark of life, Ravi felt. For like him, they were bound to this forsaken land, a connection that was as much magical as it was spiritual.

Narrowed, slender shoulders heaved, bringing life to what many would have thought little more than a ruined sandstone statue. Glittering eyes shone brightly from behind the scarf that covered this strange, and slender creature's lower face. Ravi sighed. From around his wrist unwound a sleek, dust colored serpent. Those gemstone like eyes dropped slowly to the moving snake. The scarf shifted, indicating a smile that lay hidden below the fabric.

"Goga."

His voice rasped from a dry, grated throat. Serpentine head lifting, the side-winding Rattle Snake regarded the once elfin man with intelligent eyes. There was a fondness in the way the word had been spoken. The skeletal like fingers of his free hand lifted, stroking over the brow of the snake as his gaze shifted away.

He had a way to go before heading back to the temple of Sol. There was a particular Sanskrit scroll he had to find, and little time in which he had to find it.

"Hamaare paas mere puraane dost ko bahut kuchh karana hai."

His voice grated, as much spoken from his lips as it had been with his mind. Eyes drifted closed as he extended his awareness, seeking the magic that he knew in his heart would lead him to the scroll. Stepping forth, the tall, skeletal figure seemed to simply vanish within a sand dune, only to appear stepping out of another one not far off. And so, Ravi and Goga started their quest.

New to this site, looking for any and all that would like to join in. I'll flesh out the world more as we go! Happy hunting!

Raziel stood on a dune, his white eyes looking over the desert waste. His quest for vengeance seemed to have led him down a path the wraith had never before seen in his many years. He could have sworn that he had seen every inch of Nosgoth during his days as a vampire, yet, it would seem not. At first glance, he thought this desert to be the planes of blood, rendered to sand under the corruption Nosgoth suffered under Kain insubordination. Yet, he would soon find that he was not in Nosgoth at all.

Cloven feet disturbed the sand below as he made his way down the dune, thankful he no longer had lungs for the dusty air to irritate. In fact, he didn't even have a mouth, or throat. The skeletal being hid this deformity by wrapping a tattered cloth around his lower face. Yet it didn't hid the rest of his body. Blue, exposed muscle, trydectal bone hands, and nothing but a spine for a stomach. The tattered remains of wings hung from his back. A clear indication he was not of the normal sort.

It wouldn't be long before his pointed ears picked up on the sound of a voice, speaking in a tongue he had never before heard. Curiosity being in his nature, the wraith moved towards the voice to investigate.

Hanska Ravi's life had been a strange one. In all his trapping the desert lands, he had never encountered a creature of the likeness that now tread across the gritty terrain.

The sensational awareness of another sentient being was slow to come about at first. Several dunes past the first he entered, the Sand Druid would pause. It started as curiosity, tickling his mind. There was something new within this land. A land that he was bonded to, body and spirit. Sands shifted, and as they did so, so too did the crumbling visage of the druid. Features that were once sharp smoothed, the only constant was the glittering eyes that burned within their gritted sockets. Gemstones, Sunstone in color, sparkling in a face hidden behind the dusty remains of a kerchief.

Glancing down at the snake that wound itself about his wrist, the druid's brows furrowed. It wasn't a malicious manner in which they did, only curious. After all, Ravi tended to be more peaceful than not.

Lifting his arm, he settled the snake across his shoulders.

A whisper drifted across his lips."Gogaaa..." The snake writhed itself around his neck, head lifted, the slitted pupils of its eyes dilated. "Ek starnejar hamaaree bhoomi par chalata hai, mere dost."

Soon the druid stepped into a dune adjacent to the wraith, as he stepped from the sand next to the jawless creature, Ravi simply regarded him curiously. After the tick of several moments his skeletal arms expanded, a gesture of welcome flourished from him as he incline his head.

"I bid you welcome, my friend." As ever, his voice grated, akin to a rasping, loud whisper.

He drew his hands before him once more, thin fingers steepling before his abdomen as he studied the being that stood before him now. His judgement retained for the time, of whether this was friend or foe.

" Ah ... I see. Sand . . .

So much sand . . . "

The small kit dragged onwards through the barren keeps of choking dunes. Simple, foolish curiousity had lured it here, a fish surely, to a razor hook. Except, the bait had already been stolen. Thanks to its closed eyes, it didn't have to worry about being blinded. In a physical sense anyways...

The creature was learning so many new things, in a land of seemingly nothing.

" Ahh, hot... "

As a particular kind of spirit, it did not eat nor breathe normally, though eating is good for a Keaton's health. So such luxuries. The desert ruled with an iron fist. Every now and then, the small critter would puff a small cloud of golden spores. An indication of spiritual growth.

For the first time in its rather short existence, the Keaton was weary, and lonely. The sand listened, but did not speak. Keaton felt the grainy, ancient aura flood its senses.

" So... full... "

Full of nothing, it would seem. Only sand... sand... sand...


The bright yellow Yokai fell lightly into the sand with a small puff of sand and spores. Its three tails lie limp, as the bedraggled body saw purpose no more. Days and days with nothing but sand. Suppressing, crushing, hollowing.

It was all too much for the ghost fox. It lay on the desert grounds, its mind too weak to continue.

" Keaton...
Should not have come here. "

There was a beauty to the place. It lent an ease to the eye with muted colors and glistening grains. It showed the power of nature when she was given inhospitable circumstances. It displayed her ability to adapt and strive, it showed her might with the way the seldom sage, or occasional oasis would peek through the dunes.

Nature rared her mighty, willful head and she strived on. She strived on in the insects and arachnids, in the flora and fauna that battled for it's survival in these baking Outlands. Nature was powerful, and she always, always found a way to overcome.

One such display of this adaptability encircled Ravi's neck at this very moment. Goga. Goga, a name in Ravi's own language that meant King of Snakes.

The Rattlesnake shifted it's head toward the druid as Ravi spoke to the wraith.

There issss a sssstrangenesssss hereeeeee Brother.

There was no indication outwardly that Ravi had received the message. Nary even a flick of the eye. His gaze remained casually upon the wraith, but his mind... it was free to commune with his spirit brother.

Is there? Friend or foe?

Goga's tongue flicked outward as he uncurled from the druid's neck and slithered to the ground. I will go ssseeee. Ravi still didn't seem to notice.

Go carefully.

It did not take the snake long to find the strange presence he had sensed. Slithering hypnotically across the sands he drew within a few feet of what appeared to be a strange little fox.

"Littleeee oneeeee...?" There was no physical voice, and even if there had been snakes lacked the physical structure to speak. No, it was Goga's awareness that reach out to the creature. "I can show you wateeerr..." The manifestation of Goga's voice was a strange thing. Within one's mind it would have sounded like a whisper hissed upon the wind. "You have but a little further to go."

As the Yokai lay upon the ground, a strange new feeling crept in, folding the corners of the fox's paper mind inwards. Drenching it with pitch, poisonous ink. Hopelessness. Misery. And most painful of all, was the twisting lonliness. Had these thoughts and emotions been willing to fester, the Yokai might have been beyond hope.

But its savior came in the shape of a curious serpent. Oh to rejoice to feel the shifty, writhing aura of something living and thinking. Though it moved not from its spot upon Mother Natures terse lap, its tails swished.

As a Spirit, any language or means of communication was understood. In fact, without so much as realizing it, the Keaton communicated back the same way it was contacted. Making not a sound.


" You are not sand! Pretty pretty thing! Anything but the sand! I dont need sand. Sand is deaf. "

It seemed to forget all about promises of water, caught up in how exciting this new aura was.

" Saving saving thing! I don't know what to call you! "

The voice spoke inside the tongues of the consciousness in an odd, androgynous chirrup. The eerie note of a spirit, yet the musical harp of a child.

" Take me with you good master! "

The fox rolled to its feet in renewed vigor, its long ears perked, and tails swishing wildly.

About the size of a small fox itself, it leaned down to where its nose nearly poked the serpent.

Goga was anything but sand. His coloring mirrored the dusty hue of sand, his dry scales were keeled and decorated with dark spots littering its body from nose to tail tip. In short, he was a beautiful creature. Even if he was something that many living things feared.

For several seconds the snake studied this creature, this Keaton. And he found that there was an innocence that lingered about the adorable thing. An innocence and something more. What was it? The serpentine creature was not sure.

Even as the nose of the Keaton nearly touched the snake did Goga test the air with his tongue. Curiouser and curiouser Goga slithered forth till he had closed the gap between him and this thing of innocence. Had he the ability to chuckle he would have.

"Noo. Not ssssaand. I am called Goga. I have come to assssisssst you, should you need it. I am no masssster. However, I shall take you to mine. He will help you little thing."

Goga slithered around the front paws of the fox spirit. The snake emitted a sense of calm and reassurance. "Thissss way, little one." Tongue flickering still, the snake started back the direction he had come.

The Keaton had recovered its former vigour and energy in what seemed like only moments. Its tails swished and thumped excitably, stirring up dwarven whirlwinds in the wake.

" gooooga! Gogaaaaaa! Goga! "

The Yokai tested out loud this time, as it was more talking to itself. It hasn't even questioned whether or not following this snake was a good idea. It wasn't in its nature to. It saw something interesting, it followed. In this case, Goga was likely this creatures last hope anyways, so it didn't entirely mater.

Following behind the graceful, gliding Goga, Keaton walked with supple youth , and ghostly elegance, in its own way of course. The bright, sunny pelt hailed the merciless Sun, making the Yokai look near metallic. Black tipped tails wagged, eager paintbrushes on the canvas of the world. It certainly did not blend in, as not many creatures possessed three tails.

" Goga is not sand! Sand is very big. Goga is small! "

It chirped to itself joyfully in a series of liquid trills and clicks.

"What welcome could there be in such a hospitable land?"

Raziel would ask, seemingly aloud even. Being jawless did not prevent the wraith from speaking. He retained an ability from his days as a vampire, and ability called The Voice. It allowed vampires to speak with one another through their minds. Raziel had taken this ability and morphed is as so he could project his voice for all to hear.

He watched the sandy being before him through slightly narrowed eyes, unsure if he could trust this being. He seemed friendly enough as of now, But Raziel had learned many things in his many millennia. A serpent left the being, headed off in some direction where the blue creature of the underworld could feel the presence of a ghost. His very being urged him to devour this soul and send it to the afterlife, but he would be damned if he feed his so called master.

"Yet, I have seen things of far stranger."

He would continue, accepting the welcome.

Goga was quick to lead this spirit, this Keaton to the druid. In their short traveling, the serpent found that this little spirit was energy. At least, more energy than one of his ilk was known to spend. The thought amused the cold blooded creature deeply, and once more, had he the ability to chuckle, he would have.

'The sssand isss not big, little ssspirit. It isss many. A sssingle grain isss sssmaller than a sssingle hair from your ear.' Such realizations had not occurred to the serpent till he had truly been awoken. Till he had bonded with the Sand Drifter. 'The many sssmall make a large.' Sometimes this awareness still bewildered Goga. After all, he had only been a snake once. A snake that held nothing special about him. He had been quite typically a rattler. Sleep, eat, and expel excrement, seek to reproduce. The most bare, and most natural inclinations of a creature.

And then it was different. He had felt beyond his normal awareness. He felt the need to seek out this being, this Ravi, and bond with him. It had been the calling of a familiar. It was in that manner that Goga's world changed far more than he would have been comfortable with. But magic had a way of doing that, now, didn't it?

'We are nearly there.' And so they were! Ahead, in the short distance the presence of Hanska Ravi and the Wraith would soon be felt, and a few moments after that, they could be seen.

Meanwhile, the druid continued to regard the Wraith in that curiously polite manner of his. Ravi was not an evil creature. Though, to that point, he wasn't quite a good creature as well. He would offer protection to those that needed it, to those that deserved the fighting chance. So too, were there darker times. Times when his bloodlust was something feared by the few enemies that he had had. Those times were so few, and so far between. In part because he was something that blurred the lines of good and evil. Something that realized it was all a matter of perception. And one's perception tended to be easily swayed.

The Sand Drifter lifted one skeletal like hand and drew the scarf from around his mouth. Strange features, elven and yet not, features that shifted as did the very sands of his home, once sharp, now smooth, once smooth, now sharp. The only constant were those eyes. Those glittering, sunstone eyes. Eyes that burned with the very brightness of the sun itself. Eyes that saw beyond the veil of shadows, and offered an acceptance that was, perhaps, so rarely given. Ravi smiled.

"It is not always so desolite, this land. There is a beauty to it, should you have the want to see it." His tone was cultured. His words held a love of the inhospitable land that he was so intently and spiritually tied to. "And, I believe we have company."

As Goga and the Keaton drew within sight, Ravi turned to offer a kindly smile to the Cub and the Serpent. "To you, small one, I bid welcome as well. I am Hanska Ravi and this, this wonderful place is The Outlands."

(( Awwww! What a punny pun! ))


Keaton tailed behind the serpent eagerly, though as they were coming into view, the kit began to feel this new, horrid thing. Its sharp, grisly, ancient fingers tickled at Keaton's primal instincts.

Fear

Never before had Keaton felt this before. As nothing posed a threat to Keaton as far as living things went. Only other spirits, or undead weapons could physically harm the Keaton.

Once near Ravi, it made not a sound. The small form quivered, and it crept its way inbetween the druids legs. For comfort or protection, was debatable


" . . . "

Its small spirit picked up on the immediate danger of the wraith directly opposite it. A prey beholding the predator of predators.

The hunter of hunters, and the killer of killers.


Though its eyes were always closed at a happy upwards slant, the slant had made itself more flat, giving it the look of annoyance, despite it being simply terrified.

The aura...

The wraiths aura was unlike any the Yokai had seen. Vast, stormy, and hard to decode. Too hard to understand, yet still enough to make the kit quiver.

Of course, due to this, the kit was also drawn to the spirit. Out of curiosity, and of that strange magnetism that drew one to their worst fears.


" Hi R-ravi... "

((Sorry about that, My internet access is rather limited at the moment.))

"I suppose I should be wise enough to see that. I had learned the very same thing in my home, Nosgoth. Though now she is but a corpse of her former glory."

The wraith spoke with longing to see his home as he had in his days as a human. Bright, and full of life. Though now the land was a wasteland, wrought by none other then the hand of the very man Raziel had been seeking revenge on for centuries. The same man that had turned the once proud vampire into the vile phantasm that was the wraith standing before them. He made a sound as if her were taking a deep breath, despite his lack of lungs.

He would notice the soul he had felt before was growing closer, as well as the serpent. Soon, the two came into view, he saw the soul was that of a fox with many tails. His white eyes looked down at the creature, seeing it cower between the legs of the male before him. It was strange, seeing how he was feared even by beings he had never seen before. He gave an inward chuckle.

"There is no need to fear me, little creature. I refuse to feed the so called 'God' that slinks about the Underworld. The squid can starve to death for all I care."

Felix didn’t like the desert, not because it was hot, not because it was cold, not because it was harsh or big or anything of the like… But because there were no people in it. The man lived for company, but he also had some semblance of duty, and that meant finding a druid for a little icy yaoguai. She had done him a favor and that was not something to look on lightly, not when magic was involved. The little witch would suck out his soul if she had a mind to. Lucky, she didn’t.
Pulling out the tiny copper device in the palm of his hand the roguish man pulled down the cloth that covered his face.
“Find Ravi.” He whispered, parched words through chapped lips the same he’d been coaxing the arcane compass for the past week. It was so lonely, Aora owed him an ale. If only for kindless.
The little thing spun to life, spinning like a child’s top before letting loose a high pitched, if quiet, squeal. They were close, so close. This was the loudest it had been for many days.
Picking up his pace Felix struggled over the next dune to see two shapes and a small creature below. The man had never met Ravi, but someone stick thin and made of sand wasn’t exactly a common occurrence. Foot slipping the rogue tumbled down and down, not that he really complained, this was the end of his journey, this was the fastest way down.
“Raa-aaa-aaaa-aaa--Ve-ee!” He landed on his ass end with a hefty humpf only to stagger to his feet. “RAVI! YOU BAG OF SAND!” He was moving forward quickly, whatever she wanted with him Felix didn’t care, just that she did and that he was almost done. The sheer rude action of interrupting whatever was going on overshadowed by a need to get out of this god damned desert.
“Aora wants you. Not tomorrow, not in an hour, she, wants, you, NOW.” It perhaps was an odd thing to say, seeing as they were a long way from nowhere and a few steps out of town. But it was his choice of words as the man spat sand from his mouth.
The tiny top was shoved into one of the leather bags at his side and out came a greyish lump of sandstone. Across it’s dusty surface was carvings of runes intentionally lost to time. Something that damned icy yaoguai had collected and hoarded and made sure others in this world weren’t able to get their hands on. Just like everything in her library. The stone was cracked in his chapped and dirty hand sending the grey unassuming bits of rock circling in the breeze.
In less than a second Felix would be gone, Ravi along with him and anything stuck within a half foot in every direction of their person. Hopefully the poor fox knew better than to stay between the sand-man’s feet but if not, the yaoguai could deal with it, it would be her problem.

As the foxling slinked between his legs, Ravi would kneel, thin fingers stroked over the brow of the little creature tenderly. Goga circled the legs of the kit once, twice and slithered up the extended arm of the druid. Ravi smiled. In that instant one might see that he was a creature that looked foul and felt fair. If such a thing could be said of the druid.

As the voice of the wraith touched his ears, the sand drifter lifted his gemstone gaze and studied the other creature. His mannerism was strange to the drifter, but so too would Ravi's be strange to him. That ever shifting facade slipped into a smile as he nodded. He could certainly understand the wraith's words. Even a corpse could retain some of the former beauty it had. Be it of land or otherwise. The Druid looked as if he were going to say something, but that something was cut off by the voice that broke through the stillness of the desert. The lanky creature slowly stood, his gaze turning in the direction of Felix.

Before another word or utterance could escape the sandling, he was gone. Transported to wherever it was, whatever it was that Aora made her him. As the connection of his homeland was broken, the features of the druid would grow more solid, with every loose particle of sand falling away to leave only the sculpted sandstone of his face. It was a strange face, both alien and kind, hinting at the elf he had once been. Hinting at the beauty he had once had. As the druid stood, taking in the new scene, those gemlike eyes came to rest upon the man, Felix once more. "Perhaps, perhaps a warning should be given, should this happen again." There was no malice in his words, however. Just that almost detached amusement.

Keaton churred slightly as the rough, ancient fingers slid through the Yokai's silky fur. Its tails swished eagerly, seeming to forget its earlier terror. What a lovely sensation it was. It had never been pet before, and already the spirit lavished in the attention. Whether appealing to its senses, or its mentality, it was a little difficult to say.

The kit looked up as it felt a rough, rowdy aura clamber up, then tumble down the countless grains that made up just a single dune.

The kit didn't understand what exactly was going on, and when the strange stone was chucked, the kit scrambled away, not wanting to be hit.

As the strange rune took effect, the kit watched, or rather felt, the new aura, and the auras of Ravi and dear Gogma, vanish.

It was so sudden, the sand filling the spots they once stood. Keaton chirruped, accidentally running into the wraith. It layed there, looking around for Ravi, then up at Raziel.


" Good morning! "

It hoped that Ravi and the others would return soon. But for now it had to adjust, and acquaint itself with the spirit in front of it.

Mint staggered across the sand dunes, his eyes squinted nearly shut. The peeping noises that issued from his nose bounced off the rocks and sand all about him, reflecting back to his enormous ears. The thick brown fur covering his entire body and wings caused him to sweat profusely in the beating sun. The bat-like creature staggered into a shady enclave between two rocks. How he had gotten here, he didn't know. His evil master Obscuro had likely gotten a message from his deity, telling him to send a slave to murder so-and-so or such-and such. He had sent Mint. That must have been it. A murder mission, which Mint could never remember doing. But then why was there no bodies? No one anywhere, as far as the eye could see...
and who would be out here, worth killing? Mint pondered these things quietly as he waited for the cool of night to fall so that he could go out and hunt for tasty insects.

Mint awoke with a start. His ears twitched, informing him of a nearby presence. A druid, by the dusty smell, accompanied by a snake and a spirit. Though Mint could not hear his screeches bouncing off the spirit, he could smell the lemony tang of the supernatural. The sun was long since down, and the waves of heat and light that had bombarded his senses were gone.
Far away, he could smell the rancid odor of deathflesh, mixed with the sour brimstone scent of demons. Must be a wraith. Flapping out of his stony enclave, he called out, "Hark, druid! Snake! Wandering spirit! I request thy company. I am lost and would go with you; for with companions one is never truly lost." He once again wondered if his master had commanded him to come and murder someone. It occurred to him that he might have killed a friend of this trio... and he drew his dagger, just in case.