Pingly awoke suddenly after being assaulted by flashbacks of memories, the first thing he noticed as his senses slowly came alive was the bitter cold surrounding his body. Panic soon overcame him as he attempted to move, to adjust himself, to curl up to warm his flesh only to realize that such movement was impossible. His eyes shot wide and he began a desperate struggle to free himself, as no amount of thrashing seemed to do him any good he slowly forced himself to calm down, dimly realizing that he was able to breath perfectly fine, taking several slow deep breathes he began to search for the cause of his predicament.
Realizing that he was surrounded by a crystalline substance at least a foot thick made seeing outside of his prison difficult at best, impossible at worst the fractured images leading him to no real revelation, his tired mind still reeling and attempting to wake up completely after his slumber and utter panic. As he became more aware he took a moment to marvel at the shield of ice about him, it was thick and seemingly impenetrable but allowed him to breathe easily. He sent out a slight probe and determined the source of the shield as magic of his own creation.
Closing his eyes he forced himself to fight through the flood of hazy memories of his past and to try to remember why he was here. His eyes snapped wide and let out a soundless roar of fury as the memories began to fly back. Selrani! That bitch, it was all her fault! His fury did not abate as he recalled the press of her soft full lips against his own followed by the agonizing pain of the knife in his chest and the panic of being unable to draw breath.
He forced his anger aside as more of the event came back to him, he had watched her begin to walk away and had powered through the drug in his veins pulling forth every ounce of magical power he had within him he unleashed it. His eyes closed as the feeling of the magic surging forth felt like it was ripping his very being to shreds, he gave a small smirk figuring he had wiped out the meddlesome elf and at least half the landscape with his single attack he opened his eyes and saw that not only was not everything destroyed but Selrani was still very much alive and retreating. He began to notice the
cold settling in around him at this point and he raged on the inside that one of the hated night elves had ended his life. Sending a prayer out to the ancestors to please allow him to live long enough to take her with him he tried futilely to cast just one more spell, but his energy was used up and the cold was embracing him and dragging him down to blackness.
Forcing himself from the fog of memories he realized the spell he had unleashed with no real direction had taken on a different form and that must be where this tomb of ice had been summoned from. Fully awake and interested now he set about trying to trace how he had cast the spell and how he could take it apart, a few tugs at the spells general structure led him nowhere and no matter how often he tried to dismiss it nothing was working. He supposed he would have to blast his way free with what energy he had built up in his sleep but was worried about the repercussions it would have on his body and how weak he would become.
In the midst of his deliberations the forest had grown silent and eventually the sound of low growls assaulted Pingly's ears, he looked to the mouth of the cave and gasped in shock when he pieced together the image of the intruders. Four-legged monstrosities with tentacle-like appendages sprouting from their bodies and sharp-toothed maws. "Predators then" Pingly thought to himself and wondered how long he had been asleep as he saw these creatures prowling about. He was curious, but unafraid, as two creatures moved towards him. He assumed the ice would keep him safe, so he kept an eye on them but ultimately dismissed them, only half paying attention as one finally reached his tomb. One of the tentacles reached out and brushed against the outside surface of ice, immediately Pingly's eyes flew open as his body went rigid with pain.
The contact was brief, just a curious touch but Pingly still had trouble recovering from the horrific pain. Now alarmed he watched in dread as two more of the tentacles came in contact with his shell and upon their touch let out a soundless scream of agony. He felt his magic energy being drained from his body, and it felt like he was slowly being ripped apart from the inside, in a desperate attempt to to escape he spiked his magic into the ice surrounding him. With a mighty crash and what sounded like an avalanche of sound his mighty prison blew apart, out and away from him as it's epicenter.
His knees hit the cold floor of the cave and he fell onto his hands, slowly lowering his forehead to the floor, taking deep ragged breathes as he tried to recover from the torment of the monsters leeching his life force. He slowly pushed himself up to a kneeling position looking for his unwelcome guests, he found them pulverized underneath chunks of ice. He let out a long breath he hadn't realized he had been holding, and let out a small nervous laugh before forcing himself to his feet, stumbling a few times before he found his balance. Going forth to the corpses he tried to study them but they were beyond recognition. His stomach growled and he considered eating the creatures momentarily but stopped himself sensing something less than natural about them. Soon he moved on, wanting to put as much distance between himself and any more of those monsters as he could.
The progress was slow, his body already weakened from being inside of the ice now even more so with his sporadic expenditure of magic, he had no way of knowing how long he'd been suspended like that but knew food and water had to be a priority. His entire being screamed with fatigue at each faltering step but he had to keep going, not knowing if anymore of the magic-consumers were about and knowing if there were he could not defend himself again. He took a slow breath through his nose hoping to smell for anything edible, his lunch was clearly running short however and he only caught the faintest scent of animal, too old to know what specifically, but he had no desire to encounter anything living right now.
Soon all Pingly could do is put one foot in front of the other and hope that he had not lived through Selrani's dagger and those.. things just to die from hunger and dehydration. Thankfully the wooded area was cool, the dim morning sun barely reaching through the canopy of trees. Just as he had reached the edge of his strength he heard the sound of running water, he hurried to the sound on hands and knees and upon reaching the river he thrust his head under the surface taking in long drinks until he felt he would be sick before pulling away and rolling over and closing his eyes finally feeling like he could rest, he almost immediately fell asleep with a final hope of not being discovered in his sleeping state.
He awoke just as the sun was going down, slowly opening his eyes he tried to resist waking but nature had felt fit to punish him for drinking all of that water and he hurried off to relieve himself. He took the time now to look at his gear, wondering what shape it was in after his time being immobilized. His chest and legs were covered with simple leather armor, a deep brown in color that stood out against light blue skin, both were beginning to fall apart from frequent wear and abuse but Pingly was the only one of his kind left and there was naught to be done for it. He removed the chest piece slowly revealing the muscled planes of his torso, fingering where the wound had been he snorted back a laugh. Not even a scar remained from the wound that had almost killed him.
Pingly slipped his armor back on as his mind wandered, he had always had a strong regeneration, even more so than his other troll brethren, and he would heal from almost any wound within moments. Unless he was frequently casting in which case he would fear that his wounds would never heal at all, taking days or weeks for even the simplest of wounds to close up. He wondered briefly why this was, which he had done many of times without answer, shrugging he went about his business. All this thinking on an empty stomach was doing him absolutely no good. He turned to head back to the river before he heard a very slight rustling of leaves, immediately he froze in place listening for the source of the noise. He hoped it was no animal, still not in prime fighting strength, but as he twitched his nose taking in the scent of the air around him an almost inaudible growl came from his throat. That familiar smell... Elf... his pupils dilated as he jerked his head in the direction of the smell, it was faint, probably only one. Pingly's pure hatred of the Elven race would not allow him to let even one escape if he could help it, even in his weakened condition, especially with the recent troubles he'd been having to make his hatred more complete.
He began to charge in the direction he thought the elf was at not worrying for stealth assuming that the elf, with senses nearly as strong as his own he could grudgingly admit, had already picked up on his presence. He burst into a clearing, sliding just enough as he came to a halt that he slipped underneath the three-pronged blade that came flying by his head, it was a glaive one of the elves favored weapons. Pingly cast about for sight of his prey and roared in delight as he saw it in front of him. The elf was covered from head to toe in dulled, dented armor. It had the look of being hastily made and that it had seen a lot of conflict recently. "'Ello lettle elf, come to die have ya?" the elf didn't bother with banter, simply drawing a sword and charging with a downward swing. Pingly reached up catching the swing by the hilt with one hand, at full strength he could have stopped the strike entirely or at least pushed it away but in his current condition he was barely able to stop it's momentum and had to roll to safety trying to conjure either fire or ice to hurl at his enemy he felt a small moment of dread when it didn't appear.
He roared in frustration as he danced backwards, dodging the clever swings from his opponent, ducking down he kicked into the elves chest the force knocking it back and startling a noise from it, a female then from the sound of the gasp, but doing little else. Pingly backed into a tree trying to catch his breath, the next swing of the elves sword clipped through a branch above him as he ducked, the branch coming down and colliding with his shoulder, this saved Pingly's life. The weight of the branch knocked him slightly off balance just as the elf stabbed towards him, slicing a thin line across his neck as opposed to just ending his life instantly. The wound stung, it was nothing serious but it made Pingly all the more desperate, and the next blow from the female he had no defense for, he threw his left arm forward to stop her from cleaving a fatal blow the sword easily biting deep down into his flesh, straight to the bone.
In a blind rage Pingly pulled his arm straight back, luckily not injuring himself more in the process, and snatched the first thing he could use as a weapon from the ground.. his right hand found the branch that had saved his life earlier. Swinging the impromptu club with adrenaline enhanced strength he crashed it down upon the elves arm snapping it through the armor. The next swing smashed the helm from her head, Pingly caught a glimpse of violet hair and traditional Elven markings, she was beautiful as were all the females of her race. She looked nothing like Selrani, with her hair being moonlight white, but in Pingly's rage-addled mind their faces became one and the same. He roared aloud and began to bludgeon the elf over her head, neck, and chest. She died long before he had finished, but as his anger slowly left him he collapsed beside her.
Carefully, he removed the now dented beyond repair armor, and forced himself to look at his adversary, he swallowed bile as he realized how much damage he had done to her, and felt his eyes beginning to mist when he remembered how young and scared she had looked before he had killed her. As his emotional turmoil played out, the extremes of anger, then sadness, then relief that he was alive all ran their course he growled in disgust at himself. Of course she looked young, the immortal race always looked young and his tribes youth had not been saved from the violence either. The small spark of pity faded once more into the inferno of helpess rage and heartache that he had felt since he awoke that faithful morning and after honoring her briefly as a warrior he began his feast.