At the area, the sound of the waterfall was probably quite useful to overlay the sound of Kara and Izzy approaching. A fairly well toned, white figure appeared to be streamlining the tree trunks that he had collected with his claws, slashing away errant branches, and making the tips pointier. His white body had bronze-like plating at his shoulders and hips, perhaps some kind of armour.

"Barioth. Since when did they come this far south? Explains the temperature. Stupid ice cats." Kara muttered. Reaching into her acorn, she withdrew a single vial of green liquid, dipping a tail spike into it, and hurling it at the offending pile of tree trunks.

Izzy's eyes swept up and down the muscular sabre-toothed man. "Daaang," she breathed with admiration. "He's big." She kept her head down, noting the bronze plates he was wearing and looking for any obvious weaknesses. She didn't want to get pinned down by this opponent--she had her strength in terms of her array of magic, but if she got caught in a physical contest of brawn she would be nothing. Best to strike hard and fast and keep the upper hand.

The explosion from the slime-coated tail spike did not include the Barioth in the radius, but it was strong enough to scatter the pile of tree trunks that he might have otherwise used as cover.

In the instant after the explosion, Izzy leapt up from hiding. While the saboteur's senses were still recovering from the effects of the explosion, she traced a circle in the air, pouring her energy out into a small diagram.

"Gah! Who's there? Ruined a perfectly good pile of tree spears, I hope you know," He growled, recovering from the surprise and stepping towards Kara and Izzy.

The barioth took a step in the girls' direction, ready to bring the fight to them the moment he saw them. Perhaps a step just too hasty on his part, not seeing anything amiss until the last moment. The magic circle Izzy made in the air locked onto him. A shimmering bolt of energy erupted from the circle, flying directly toward him, followed by another, then another. The white rune pulsed faintly with each kinetic bolt fired, letting out just over a dozen in less than half that time.

"Bwuh?!" The first few blasts staggered the Barioth, but he dropped to one knee, bracing for impact of the continued assault, knocking both shoulder plates off and flying to the sides. Despite being under fire, he pushed off the ground hard to leap into the air, evading several of Izzy's bursts unless they were redirected mid flight.

Spreading his arms, he actually kept aloft, taking a deep breath and a white blast appeared from his mouth, landing just in front of Izzy and Kara, erupting into a brief tornado of slush.

Kara wasted no time, leaping out of the way, and rebounding off of the side of the path to land on all fours beside the Barioth with a growl, twisting around to smack him with her tail, knocking him back a few paces and knocking the plates on his hips off as well.

Izzy watched the first few shots of her spell land, then remembered to move before she was caught flat-footed. She ducked right, hoping to get around the white cat while he focused on Kara.

She didn't make it far before the barioth's leap into the air caught her attention. The last few kinetic bolts sailed off into the air, unable to keep up with the sudden movement. Izzy stopped moving, crouching in the grass to watch as he hung in the air for a couple wingbeats, waiting to see what he would do. This was a mistake.

The buff cat spat a cold, white burst at the girls. Kara leapt clear immediately, but Izzy's reflexes weren't prepared. She threw herself away from the impact, but she wasn't fast enough to avoid being glazed by the icy wind. Her armour blunted the shards of ice from slicing open her skin, but it couldn't stop the cold.

Izzy landed heavily and rolled a few paces. The trees and undergrowth conveniently sheltered her from the barioth's immediate line of sight as she recovered.

There was movement on the tree next to her.

"Wait a minute, I recognize that bug..." she said.

"You've got some nerve attacking me like that," The barioth growled, "Are you even worth my time? Look at yourself, you're just a runt!" To accentuate the point, he twisted his body and rammed himself forward, shoulder angled to try and catch Kara with the full force behind it.

She pushed herself back, but it wasn't quite fast enough, and he knocked her back and into the air. After a flip, she clawed the ground with her hands to regain balance, landing on all fours. Her eyes flashed red as she took a deep breath, letting out a feral roar that seemed louder than her small frame should be able to do. There was a rattling sound and she flipped forward, her tail spikes sticking on end as she slammed her tail into the barioth and the ground. He was caught very much off guard by the ferocity behind the attack, the spikes drawing blood.

In an immediate follow up since the tail slam hit, she spun around to knock him away, this time further than her original hit. On the ground, and probably unnoticed, the plates that fell off of the barioth managed to flip back over. One of the konchu managed to notice Izzy, and naturally did what a konchu does best, curling up into a ball and rolling at her.

Izzy got to one knee. She wrapped one gloved hand around the hilt of her sword, keeping low so the barioth would forget about her. With the other hand she plucked up the insect.

She looked up to check Kara's progress, but found more pressing matters coming her way. One of the scraps of armour was rolling directly toward her. With no time to react, or bring her sword up, she thrust her fist out, backed with the force of her aura.

Izzy winced. There was a faint crunch from her hand at the moment of impact--the small insect in her hand had perished. The konchu bounced away, once again on its back.

Izzy was certainly not on the barioth's mind as he shook his head, recovering from the impact from Kara's tail, "Certainly a quick little thing. Quick to move, and quick to anger," he smirked, "What? I said nothing that wasn't true," while he talked, he was lowering his centre of gravity, clearly preparing for another leap.

"Hey, you, with the bad dentistry!" Izzy called, appearing from the bush at a run. The barioth turned. He'd almost forgotten he'd seen two girls hiding in the bush, much less count the 'felyne' as a serious threat.

"Yeah, I'm talkin' to you! Are you mad I broke your stupid armour?" It didn't matter what she actually said, she just wanted his eyes on her.

Izzy made a straight line for the ice cat. It would have been pathetically simple to dodge out of the way if he actually thought he was in any real danger. Where a moment before he'd been prepared to pounce on Kara, he adjusted course and pounced at the human girl.

Holding her fire until there was no chance to escape, Izzy raised her empty hand, clenched in a tight fist since she punched the konchu. She shut her eyes and opened her hand. From her palm there was a brilliant flash of light--the peculiarly explosive reaction of a flashbug's bodily fluids mixing with the oxygen in the air.

The barioth didn't have a moment to guess where he'd gone wrong. He unintentionally checked his own momentum, flailing out with his wing-arms and dropping to the ground in front of Izzy. Not his best moment.

Kara growled as the barioth had turned, but there was something wrong in Izzy's stance to Kara, the lack of a readiness to dodge. That told her that Izzy was prepared to do something. Taking the opportunity to prepare something of her own, she reached behind her, looking back to grab a violet vial from her pack. It was quite lucky she did so, looking as she poured the flask over her tail spikes at the moment the flash happened. Without hesitation, she leapt into the air, landing with a satisfying thud on top of the barioth with another flip, slamming the poisoned tail spikes into his back.

The barioth's face took a slightly purple hue as the poison entered his system. Dazed or not, he wasn't going to take this laying down. Taking a breath, he let out his own roar of defiance, before whipping around with his tail. Kara was knocked back by the force of the blow, wincing as she felt the blow and the chill from it jarring her arms which soaked the main impact.

Izzy stumbled back, covering her ears. The roar was positively deafening from this close. She fell to one knee just in time to avoid being clipped by the same swipe that knocked Kara back.

"All right, all right, we hear you, you dumb brute." Izzy came up from the barioth's blind spot, swinging her sword two-handed. The blow landed on the back of the big cat's neck. The sword failed to penetrate the thick plating, but it got his attention.

Unlike with her initial charge, Izzy knew enough to keep her feet moving in a fight. She jumped to the side as the barioth turned to swipe at her with a wing blade, then attacked again, this time connecting with his other wing blade, momentarily matching muscle for muscle. Right where she did not want to be.

The barioth, registering the hit, suddenly drew breath, rearing back before blowing another ice blast towards where he detected Izzy's blade. The blast itself was not angled right to hit her, but the whirlwind that resulted when the blast hit the ground certainly was.

Kara pressed forward, wing blade sharply impacting the barioth's side, but not powerful enough to pierce the natural plating.

"You just don't know when to give it up, you are not strong you little runt," He growled, back handing Kara to stagger her, before twisting his body around, smashing his own spiked wing arm into hers. There was a loud crack sound, and Kara's howl. Her left wing blade was broken.

"Want some more?" He brought his claw in an uppercut, but even though she was hit, Kara went with the motion, backflipping and slamming her tail into the barioth again, knocking both of them apart.

Izzy was blown away by the icy surge of wind. She landed in a pile of partially frozen slush, shivering. Her bare arms and legs had started to numb with the constant cold.

All this vanished from her mind when she heard Kara's howl. Izzy forced herself up, clumsy with stiffness. Fighting her chattering teeth, she noticed the rain had left long shallow pools all over the ground--including below the barioth's feet, his weight making him sink just a little bit into the soft mud. Perhaps just enough.

Izzy traced another seal on the surface of the water. Though not affixed to a firm surface, it glowed faintly beneath her hand. With a surge of will, the water suddenly flash froze beneath the barioth's feet.

This was a non-issue for him, being a creature of ice, but just for the moment his feet were immobilized.

"You. Leave. Her. Alone!"

The barioth had to strain his neck to see Izzy coming. A billow of steam seemed to be forming off her sword. Izzy charged at him, leaping into the air. She brought her sword down. She might have struck him in the back of his head if he didn't twist. Instead the blow fell on his back, next to the shoulder. He was well armoured there, but the blade was hot from the transference. It would have stung at least a little.

The barioth wrenched his feet free of the thin ice...

The barioth growled at the hit, wincing under the elemental fire-like effect. Shaking his head he muttered, "Got to give credit to your felyne. She's stronger than you. Tricky too," As he pulled his feet from the frozen ground.

The barioth growled at the hit, wincing under the elemental fire-like effect. Shaking his head he muttered, "Got to give credit to your felyne. She's stronger than you. Tricky too," As he pulled his feet from the frozen ground.

Kara, however, wasn't listening. She was already in mid air, taking advantage of this new opening that Izzy gave her. Despite a broken wing blade, her aim was still good, and she slammed her tail down on top of him, sending him into the ground head first. There was no reprieve as he pushed himself back up, with Kara twirling around to slam her tail into his face. There was a satisfying crack as he recoiled, tusks broken cleanly off of his face.

Kara snarled at him, "I. Am. Not. Weak."

The barioth stood up, "Lucky hit," He spat, face returning to normal hue. The poison apparently wore off. Leaping up, the barioth maintained air for a moment, before diving directly towards Kara and Izzy in what would be a full body slam if it hit.

Kara, using her advantage of being on all fours, put her full strength into leaping airborne. Incidentally, she cleared herself out of the way of the Barioth's charge. Unfortunately she couldn't grab Izzy with her, or perhaps that was fortunate, as she also didn't know if Izzy could land safely.

Izzy didn't freeze up when the big cat leapt into the air. She glanced behind her, backing subtly as the barioth hung in the air, aiming his dive. Kara took off with finely honed cat-like reflexes diving free, but Izzy had a crazier idea.

"You keep saying 'lucky' as if that's gonna change that you got you ass whupped by a pair of little girls!"

Izzy's panicked squeak was lost in the rush of wind from the barioths' pseudo-wings. The strike came even faster than she could have expected, but she didn't need to outrun the attack--she only needed to outrun a tree.

As soon as the barioth folded his wings to go for the dive, Izzy about-faced into the trees as quickly as she could. She swung herself around the thickest tree she could reach in the split-second rush and waited for impact.

The barioth did dive directly at Izzy, knowing that it'd be a lot harder to hit Kara in mid-air, but what happened was a bit different than what Izzy expected. Landing on the ground about a foot from the tree, the barioth's momentum kept it moving forward, and he clawed the trunk, twisting around it and slamming into Izzy. It was not quite full force, but it was still a decent body slam.

"Eep!" Izzy squeaked a second time when a claw that seemed like it must be almost the size of her head slammed into the trunk next to her. She had no time to react--though the barioth had lost much of his momentum, his strength and ferocity were not abated. He slammed into her, knocking her off her feet backward. Despite her armour the impact rattled through her body, throwing her several feet away. Her sword fell somewhere nearby.

When her eyes refocused, she saw the barioth winding a follow-up. She forgot about her sword. Escape was the essence of the moment. She rolled over and saw she had landed near one of the larger pieces of log that had been scattered and destroyed by Kara's explosion. Without hesitation she crawled into the narrow gap formed where the log was propped on one side by a rock.

A moment later the barioth ploughed through where she had just been squeezing. In his haste to get to her he leapt over the log, knocking it loose of the position it had fallen, erasing the natural gap that had formed.

There was no Izzy on the other side.

Behind Izzy the portal she had opened crashed shut behind her as the gateway was destroyed. She ran a quick count of limbs. Everything was there. There was no time to rest, though. With no anchoring gate, the layer of reality around her was terribly fragile.

"Hey! Over here!"

In an instant, Kara was on top of the Barioth, stabbing spikes into his back with both her hands, before leaping off of him, hardly being careful about unnecessary force with her footclaws. Landing a few good feet away, she smirked at him as the spikes exploded and he roared in pain.

Izzy emerged, coughing and covered in mud and dirt, from a foxhole over a dozen metres from where she vanished, much to the distress of the felyne who had taken refuge there from the rain.

She took a moment to gather her bearings, then noticed she had ended up not so far from where she'd left her backpack earlier. Keenly aware of her lack of a weapon, Izzy ran to the pack to find something she could use to help Kara out.

Kara didn't wait for long after the boom before she was right up in the barioth's face again. Slashing left and right with her wing blades, and drawing blood from where his natural armour was getting worn out. A good swat from the barioth in retaliation wasn't enough to hurt her, but it did stagger her long enough for him to give her a strong kick and knock her into a tree. Withdrawing breath, he blew another ice whirlwind, but it was at one of the logs, hurling it into the air and through the tree Kara had been knocked against. Thankfully she had dived out of the way in time. Certainly showed what he intended to use the logs for.

When Izzy dove into her pack, she had no idea what she was looking for. She needed something, anything to hit the barioth with that might leave a lasting dent in his ego. She pulled an herb out of the acorn-shaped backpack and stuffed into her mouth, chewing the bitter leaves while she thought. Though she could barely keep her teeth from chattering, she could already feel the rapid healing effects easing her aches.

Wasting no time, Izzy immediately went to rummaging through the mass of collected junk with stiff fingers. What hadn't the girls thrown at him by now? Fire would be the most painful to the tundra cat, but with the cold and the damp, Izzy would be wearing herself thin by the time could muster a spark. She was not built for war.

If only Kaz were here. She'd fry the brute bully with a blast of textbook fireballs in the time it took to complain about the weather.

A rush of wind and slush hissed through the trees somewhere behind her. The gust was punctuated with a loud, splintering crash. Izzy flinched, as if she needed any more reason to lose focus and panic. With a force of will, she pushed the fight out of her mind for the moment to concentrate on the task at hand.

Her hand brushed up against a handle buried deep in the pack. It took a sharp tug to pull it free, revealing a sheathed sword, about two feet long. It was her training gladius from Basic Combat—lost and forgotten in the depths of her bag.

It wasn't much, but it was a weapon. That and a distraction and she might have half of a plan, and Izzy knew exactly where to find a distraction. She dove back into her backpack and came back up with just the instrument for the job—a three-pronged boomerang-like implement.

"Kara!" Izzy shouted. She had lost sight of the battle for the moment. The nargacuga was good, but the first step of the plan was to get the barioth off her tail long enough to catch her breath.

A flash of inky black forty feet to Izzy's right landed for a bare second, then leapt up over another log impact. "I'm making us some cover. Watch out!" Izzy tucked the sword sheath into her belt and rushed to catch up, stopping short as soon as she saw where the barioth had taken up shop on one side of the clearing he had made, next to a cast-off pile of logs.

Without drawing attention to herself, Izzy extended her consciousness out into the air around her. Fire would be near impossible, but it would be only too easy to work with what she was given. The rain had already kicked up a low, clinging mist, helped along by the ice the barioth was throwing about. She knelt down in the mud and spread her arms out, raising them slowly as if she were lifting a great weight.

Starting at Izzy, then spreading rapidly from her across the whole clearing, the steady rain exploded into a dense fog. Izzy willed the wall of fog crashing through the clearing to envelop the barioth. Within seconds, anything beyond five feet was utterly obscured by a solid bank of grey.

Izzy let out a breath. That working was the hard part—everything else was pure will and raw aetheric muscle now.

She pulled her goggles down over her eyes. The lenses took on a faint orange glow and the fog covering the landscape peeled back before her eyes, revealing a forest of cool colours dashed with colder areas of melting ice.

Izzy took a moment to allow her perceptions to adjust, slowly winding up her boomerang arm. Against this background, the barioth's thick insulation should have masked his body heat, making him nearly invisible to infrared vision. That might have been the case if he had not just been fighting. Worked up as he was now, the ice cat's body radiated with elemental cold.

Taking advantage of his momentary blindness, Izzy hurled the boomerang at him. Whether he sensed it coming or not, the device clipped his ear and glanced off his head. As it sailed away, the magic of the boomerang took effect, locking onto a return trajectory coming in for a second pass, its approach concealed by the fog.

Izzy knew she couldn't hope the boomerang-cover trick to keep the barioth distracted for very long, so she wasted no time. She drew her training gladius and held it low to her side, blade pointed down. Ignoring the shivers of cold and adrenaline, Izzy took deep, stabilizing breaths. Slowly, purposefully, she drew her will into her right hand and waited, watching the barioth's frustration grow.

Kara's breath came in quick, rapid bursts, in time with every leap she made. Much of it was connected to her training. Don't stay in one place. Don't make give him a target. Strike when unexpected.

The problem was that the barioth was entirely expecting her now.

"Kara!"

Kara's ears twitched at the call, and she landed. She didn't need to see Izzy to know where the human was, and she leapt away before the next impact could strike.

"I'm making us some cover. Watch out!"

Kara nodded even though Izzy could not see her. The barioth, however, had a different impression of the type of cover that Izzy was going for.

"Cover isn't going to stop these!" he boasted as he inhaled deeply. Yet, rather than launch another log, he blew an icy tornado through the trees. He needed to flush Kara out in order to get a clear shot at her.

However, the rising mist made that impossible. Knowing that she was now hidden, Kara closed her eyes and went still, focusing on her breathing, taking deeper, quieter breaths. She knew how to remain hidden and knew to take the time to recover.

"What is this?" The barioth asked, before hearing the impending projectile part the air. He swerved to one side, feeling a sting as it clipped him, "Really? Really? Are you just throwing sticks at me now?"

He began to laugh at how absurd he found that idea, and was still laughing when the boomerang made its return trip right square at the back of his head with a solid thunk. A quick swat sent the boomerang flying away, but he heard its impending return and growled, "What sort of trick is this?"

Yet, as he went to swat it this time, there was another growl as Kara took the opportunity to strike the outstretched limb with her uninjured wing blade in a quick strike and leap away. The Barioth's growl of frustration turned into a howl of pain as a solid crack sounded through the area, and his outstretched limb was scarred. Unhindered, the boomerang landed square against his head yet again, and he fell to the ground with an almost comical thud on his knees.

Stretching his wing arms, he took a deep breath and leapt into the air once more, breathing a wider but vastly weaker whirlwind downward to clear the mist.

Kara's eyes shone red as she roared, leaping into the air before he had the opportunity to react. She slammed her uninjured wing blade into his already injured back, and with her other claw smashed a phial into the same spot, before flipping to knock him out of the air and leap off of his back. She landed not far from Izzy, leaning hard on her hand to skid on the ground to turn and face the barioth once more. She faltered briefly, both of her wing blades now visibly scarred and chipped now from intensive use.

For his part, the barioth tried to get up, but couldn't. He made gutteral sounds as he got on to all fours, his body not responding to his efforts, and the yellow liquid seemed to visibly spark along the point of impact on his back.

Izzy's plan was working—the barioth was allowing his frustrations with the girls override his better judgement. The moment the mist cleared she would have him right where she wanted him.

Then with a suddenly orange-warm blur across Izzy's vision, Kara leapt back into the picture. Izzy lost track of what was happening but clearly heard the sharp ‘crack' before the blur leapt away. Moments later there was an upward rush of motion and a blast of wind dispersing the fog and revealing all opponents.

An ear-splitting roar followed by a burst of speed from the Kara blur shot into the air. Izzy switched back to normal vision just in time to witness the ice cat crashing back down to the earth.

The barioth tried to stand, but he couldn't move. He was nowhere near where Izzy wanted him. She hesitated. Her focus slipped just a bit.

Come on! Roll with it! Izzy raised her sword level at the barioth. She had intended to do with the spell more or less exactly as Kara had already done, so it fell to her to be the follow up instead. She gripped her sword arm with her other, attempting to control the shivering. Rather than let the energy unravel entirely, she unleashed the kinetic lance the moment she had a shot.

Like a magnified version of the bolts she'd thrown earlier, the lance streaked through the air toward the barioth. Her hesitation cost her focus, but the spell still carried the majority of the force she had gathered. Instead of all that energy connecting behind a point, the barioth was blanketed with a wave of force at an glancing angle centred on his shoulder.

The ice cat spun through the air out of control, landing some twenty feet back, with his arm bent at an angle that did not look natural.

Izzy did not hear her own guttural scream of adrenaline and fatigue, nowhere near as impressive as Kara's roar from before. She charged wildly at the fallen barioth. He didn't even have enough of his senses intact to do anything but groan, much less attempt to fight against the lingering neurotoxin locking up his body. Izzy jumped onto his prone back, her tiny body almost comical mounting his. She clung to his neck, holding her gladius to his throat.

"S-Surrender. You are our p-p-prisoner now."

(If the barioth surrenders, Izzy will stay on him until Kara can tie him down. Of course, I know enough not to expect that outcome, so that said; Izzy talks a mean game but she can barely feel her hands at this point. The para should wear off any second now, giving him a chance to make one last futile stand or attempt to flee. Whichever he does, he'll have to shake Izzy off his back first, who clings desperately as long as she can. The bent arm is probably a dislocated shoulder, but that won't necessarily do more than slow the barioth down for long, even if he doesn't just pop it back in at his earliest convenience.)

With a growl, the Bariorth staggered underneath Izzy, unbalanced by both the toxin still affecting himl and her weight shifting towards one side as he moved to get off of his injured shoulder. Perhaps it was the sound of him shifting his weight as well as Izzy's distraction that prevented her from noticing her assailant.

Thankfully, said assailant was just a round ball of chitin, but it was still enough to knock into Izzy's side, and send her off of the Barioth.

As the Barioth struggled onto his feet, he gave a snort, "Ha, you-you should be the ones surrendering."

He couldn't do much now, but he started to chuckle, before he let out a groan. Kara didn't give him time to get up, landing with a downward slice with her good wing blade. With that, he succumbed to his many injuries and fell still. Kara breathed heavily, even as her eyes lost their red glow. Her hands shook as she stood upright, in spite of the cold leaving the area with the Barioth no longer sustaining it.

"Izzy?" She asked. Normally, Felynes would dig to get away and recover in a relatively hidden spot. She didn't see Izzy do that, and for that fancy shield that Izzy had shown her, she was a little bit worried, her voice betraying her emotion.

Moving over to where she had seen Izzy land, she saw that the Konchu was no longer there. She guessed Izzy gave it a good kick, as opposed to swatting them with a tail given Izzy's lack of a tail. Kneeling, Kara used her good arm to help prop Izzy up. She wouldn't be able to carry Izzy, but she could at least help her up.

"You're trembling," She observed.

If Izzy was going to offer sharp wit in response though, it was cut off by Kara suddenly growling, shifting her grip on Izzy to leave her good wing blade free, plucking another spike from her tail. The small humanoid shapes that were approaching were very similar to the Velociprey they had dealt with the other day, but had more muted colours of yellow and grey. Genprey and two Gendrome. They were not what Kara was looking at, however, her gaze directed towards the shaking trees as she felt the ground tremble.

Kara inhaled sharply as she saw the massive deviljho push through the foliage. Although Kara was used to being small, the deviljho would have towered several feet over any Nargacuga.

"Not good," Kara muttered, hand poised to throw the spike in her hand as her tail struck the ground in frustration. She was nearly at her limit, and she was sure Izzy was not doing so good either.

"See, we told you it was this way!" One of the gendrome barked at the deviljho.

Another piped up, "Too slow, Kevin looks like he got mauled."

"By those? He got killed by a runt? And some weird thing? What is that anyway?"

Kara's eyes narrowed, and she growled, her eyes beginning to flicker with a red aura again. She couldn't deny the damage her body had taken though, and she winced, the pain keeping her temper in check for now. She had to get Izzy somewhere safer first, and she wouldn't be able to do that if she gave in to her temper. She shifted her stance a bit, getting ready to move...

One minute Izzy was staring down at the barioth, the next minute she was thrown from his back. Disoriented as she already was, she lay in the grass for a couple seconds, piecing together cause for the sudden pain in her backside. She never even saw the konchu spin away into the underbrush.

After a moment a single urgent though finally pierced the haze. Get up. She rolled over, trying to ignore how much she wished she could just stay lying down. Clumsily, Izzy got to her hand and knees. She scanned the ground to see where her sword landed, then realized belatedly that it had never left her numb, white-fingered grip.

"Izzy?"

Izzy looked up to see Kara approaching. "Hnnnn," she managed. She found herself practically being picked up off the ground. Kara's strength gave Izzy a stable focus to ground herself and find her own strength. Kara's body heat was like a small fire next to Izzy's cold numbness, even through the insulating scales.

"M'fine," she slurred.

"You're trembling."

"My bag," Izzy never got to finish her sentence, suddenly deposited in Kara's other arm. She wanted nothing more than to curl up on the nargacuga and go to sleep, but a nagging in the back of her mind prevented her from giving in.

Humanoid figures swarmed up to the edge of the clearing. Yellow velociprey. Genprey. Izzy pushed herself to her own two feet and squared her stance. The genprey yapped back and forth but for some reason Izzy couldn't concentrate on what they were saying.

Then the ground shook. Nothing dramatic, just a slight but tangible tremor. Izzy saw the deviljho. It was almost twice her height, probably no less than a hundred times her weight.

"Sh-S***."

"See, we told you it was this way!" One of the gendrome barked at the deviljho.

Another piped up, "Too slow, Kevin looks like he got mauled."

"By those? He got killed by a runt? And some weird thing? What is that anyway?"
All day it had been this way with these runts, forced to work with something she would consider dinner or nothing more then a slight bug underfoot. "Excuse me?" Her voice growled out like the deep heat of a furnace kicking to life. It was deep and gravely, but still had a definite feminine tone to it. "DO NOT think for a moment that you can speak to me as such you little whelp. You're only saving grace is that I have to follow you for now." Her voice was heard before she was seen.

Crashing through the undergrowth, which to her was a few small trees and even a few medium ones, the Deviljho came into view. Towering at a generous 8'06" which due to her hunch came in at eye level 6'06" she was an impressive if not terrifying sight. The deviljho was frowning looking outright pissed by this point in time. She was young lacking the obvious scars most elder jhos had when they reached adult hood, but the most definitive scar she had was a double claw mark across her face. The wound looked fresher then her other scars and a couple of her jaw spikes looked a little crooked. Her piercing yellow eyes scanned the scene in front of her as she settled onto her muscular legs. Stretching a bit her shoulder creaked like old timbers as she flexed her hands and talons seemingly getting ready for a fight.

She paused though when she saw their marks. She cared nothing for the dead Barioth, a slight rumble in her stomach was a clear sign how she felt about the fallen monster. "...furthermore young lady, you should do well to respect your betters, showing so little is how you got into this mess!" The words finally hit her, one of the yappers had been talking DOWN to her. Turning her torso a bit, which caused the large muscular mass of a tail behind her to swing some and take out another tree, she faced the littler monster. "Did you just?...You can't be that stupid." She growled before glancing back at Izzy and Kara.

"They're the ones we're after, just hurry up and do the deed 'princess!'" Another one of the yappers, the larger alpha this time, shouted at her trying to give her orders. The Jho snapped at him her teeth crunching the air before she growled her left foot stamping a print into the ground. "You think I'd enjoy fighting them? They are clearly worn out from combat, it wouldn't be a fair fight. I doubt even YOU could take them in this state, you needed me after all." She growled again and her eyes shifted to look at the human and Nargacuga. "Maybe THEY can actually help, my father is clearly deranged or bewitched. No Deviljho would listen to a flying bird and take such rash advice!" Her breathing had grown heavier now.

The Genprey and Gendrome all started to chatter among themselves before the other alpha spoke up. "We knew you were weak! Come on we don't need her we'll take all the credit and she can continue to live in exile like the idiot she is!" The group turned and started to advance on the injured pair. They however, did not expect or think the Deviljho would interfer given her circumstances. They were wrong.

The Deviljho let out a tremendous roar, and her muscles bulged. Her chest, arms and legs becoming more defined and red scars glowed all along her frame from her body heat. The area went from cold to tropical in an instant, the only trace of the barioth was the slush and corpse. "ENOUGH! NOW YOU DIE AND I FEED!" She was fast for something so big and heavy, lumbering she used her bulk to crush the first Genprey into the ground. The bodycheck turned into a roll, cementing the unfortunate pack monster into the ground, it's leg twitching a bit. In the same motion the Deviljho was back on her feet, red sparks flying from her mouth as she crouched and then pounced landing on one of the Alphas.

She didn't even give it time to beg before she started eating it, head first she tore the Gendrome apart devouring it like it was a snack. As soon as she finished she turned her hunched form and snapped at one of the genprey causing it to yelp as it's tail disappeared into her hungry maw. By this point the remaining Gendrome and the few genprey had decided discretion was better and started to flee the area. They scattered and didn't look back, not even slowing to help the slackers, a few of which ended up as food for the angry brute behind them.

Once the dust settled the Deviljho's color returned to the standard dark dirty green and her scars visiblity faded. She was salivating though, her acidic drool hissing as it hit the ground. Breathing heavily she shook her head and turned to face the Nargacuga and, what she assumed was a hairless Felyne. Her eyes darted between the pair and the dead barioth. "...you gunna eat that?" She asked, an almost hunger crazed look in her eyes.

For all that Kara was, quick tempered, and trying to prove her strength at every opportunity, the fact remained that she was the first born of her litter. As her feline eyes narrowed, darting between each of the gen-pack and the Deviljho, she once again began to bring her wing-arm around Izzy protectively. But as her ears flicked and she listened, her expression changed from focus to shock. She couldn't believe this gen-pack were that stupid as well. Then she heard the roar.

In an instant, she brought Izzy into her arms and knelt down, her powerful legs poised to leap out of the way, and her tail balancing her as she waited. She recognized the look in the Deviljho's eyes. A predator searching for prey. Although she stood out as black against the ground, and she knew that the Deviljho had seen her already, she was counting on the panicking and provocation of the gen-pack to keep the Deviljho's attention. By staying still, she could keep her and Izzy out of immediate notice, but she remained ready in case she had to move in an instant.

Perhaps she needn't have worried. Once the gen-pack were scattered, the Deviljho had calmed down, but now approached them. No, not them, the body of the Barioth. Kara's sharp eyes could see the Deviljho beginning to salivate.

"...you gunna eat that?"

Kara shook her head, standing upright and carrying Izzy back a few paces, clearly leaving the body for the Deviljho, "No," she confirmed, in case the Deviljho were waiting to hear a response, "But if you are, we did use a few different poisons in our battle against him."

It was a fair warning, but somehow Kara felt that the Deviljho's powerful stomach and hunger wouldn't care too much as long as it was meat...

( For the record, phials used include: poison, blast and paralysis. Poison was one of the first ones, and probably purged from the Barioth's system; you can't make blast meat in game so there's probably no trace of blast left; but paralysis was used last, so using game terms the meat might still be slightly tinged, not as much as if it were raw meat with the poison directly applied to it )

Izzy had been standing under her own power for all of fifteen seconds before Kara wrapped her broken wingarm around her again. The immediate threat of a fight ebbed as the raptors bickered with the green hulk, and with it, Izzy's concentration. If no one was going to try to kill them for at least a couple moments, maybe they would have time for a quick nap?

Then came the roar. Izzy's legs turned to jelly. Without warning her feet went out from under her—only for her to find herself flopped over Kara's arms. She did not have the presence of mind to resist her lot.

Sounds of carnage came to her ears distantly, as if from a memory of a dream. Though the barioth was dead, Izzy's clothes and armour were soaked through, and the cold had not yet dissipated. Her lips were starting to turn bluish as she drifted to the edge of consciousness.

Kara stood up in response to something the deviljho had said. Izzy's sword tumbled out of her hand. The unexpected motion roused Izzy momentarily. She looked around in a groggy haze, then to Kara.

"My pack," she mumbled. "Flat black rock, This big." Izzy showed Kara her hand, failing to keep it from shaking.

(Not to make this about me when a new character is being introduced, but Izzy's probably going to need some combination of shelter, dry clothes, and warmth before she's back to fully functioning snark status. Not that she's at emergency levels of hypothermia--the heat stone should sustain her until they return. With the mission more or less completed, the comforts of civilization are a just a short trek away for further character interaction.)

(In other news, it is apparently possible to eat an animal you've poisoned because in general you're only taking in a small amount of the poison in their body... though it highly depends. All the same, I figure Jho should be fine, save for maybe a little indigestion from the sheer number of substances applied to that body.)