V O L T E R R A HE SAYS "OH BABY GIRL, DON'T GET CUT ON MY EDGES I'M THE KING OF EVERYTHING AND MY TONGUE IS A WEAPON" As a general rule, Volterra is not a moral man. He lives in shades of grey; right and wrong are not easily defined, not etched across his mind like contours of a map. Of course, there are some things that he condemns and refuses to participate in - namely, anything that involves the harming of a child - but overall he errs towards the darker side of life. After all, he has made the battlefield his home. No true warrior can afford to allow his morals to get in the way of glory - every soldier must have an element of steel about his persona, else the thought of causing harm might cripple him. So why, then, does the idea of fighting Erthë feel so damn wrong? The leviathan has never turned down a fight in his life (not counting his refusal to engage Isopia, because that was different). Any obstacle thrown in his path he gleefully conquers, be it male or female, old or young. This filly, then, should be just another name on his list of victories, another practice session on his march to immortality. So why the fuck isn't it? The giant stallion throws his regal head high and snorts the cold autumn air as their conversation turns towards the girl's desire to spar. He cannot explain why, but it makes him ache to know that she wants to fight. It makes him itch to have this ache, and it makes him quiver to have this itch. It is a great conveyor belt of queer emotions for the blackened leviathan, and he stomps one hoof in irritation - not just at her, but at himself. She continues; there is no dissuading her. "For God's sake, Erthë!" he growls, flattening his ears in warning. Does she not know she is playing with fire? Does she not know that each provocation of him is like poking a sleeping dragon, that any moment he could wake up and eat her alive? His body is thrumming with restrained power, each muscle singing with pent-up energy. Yet his body's desire to engage her is met by an equal force in the shape of his stupid fucking mind and its stupid fucking ideals that he doesn't even fucking understand. He tries, he really does; he knows that she has weak limbs, and she's so damn tiny that he thinks she might shatter with one firm hit. Is that enough, though? Does his reluctance to engage her make him weak? Still, she persists. She wheels away to face him, readying herself; he unleashes a ferocious bellow and paws the ground again. "Fine! You stubborn....woman." Child. He'd been about to say child, until he realised that was not the case. She is...all woman. She has curves, she has edges, she has - as much as he tries to ignore it - allure. He does not feel the almost fatherly protectiveness towards her that he felt when he fought Ru; this is something else. It is certainly not paternal. Nor is it something he wants to dwell on when he forces himself to look at her, when he commands himself to look past the fact she's a 'friend' and see her as an 'enemy'. She's small, that much is obvious, the smallest he's ever faced. Her build doesn't reek of speed or agility, however; she's sturdy, but undoubtedly weaker than himself. From what he can make out, she looks hardy - stamina could be where she pips him. The weather and conditions are unremarkable, the temperature pleasant. It is perfect, except for his bloody morality crisis. "But at least allow me to teach you, so you don't get turned into a pretty white splat the first time you face a real opponent." The beast glowers at her, knowing that educating her is the only way his mind will allow him to engage her. He braces himself, chases away his dragons (they will have no part in this) and waits; she brandishes a magical bow, and fires. He sidesteps to his left just in time, and the arrow carves a thin bloody furrow into his right flank. Painful, but not hindering. "That was good, but don't rely soley on your weapons. In battle, your body is your most important weapon, and you must keep it sharp. Now, ready yourself. Watch the movement of my muscles and the shifting of my weight, and use it to try and see what I'm going to do." The behemoth lunges forwards, thrusting out his chest; he is obvious in his movements, exaggerating them for her benefit. He attempts to slam his chest into her own to try and barge her forcefully backwards, give her a taste of true battle; he does not pull his punches, because she has to learn. ______ 1/3 - 799 words

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Teaching notes:

Spelling/grammar/prose - This was perfect. I didn't spot any typos, and your writing has a gorgeous flow to it. I love the way you describe the surroundings, and some sentences were just breathtaking, such as 'Overhead the clouds were flying like tattered rags, crowding out the blue of the sky so that the midday light appeared to switch on and off and turned the surrounding landscape from dull, unsaturated hues of brown and gray to brilliantly vivid explosions of color.'

I always say that keeping up a good standard of grammar and overall writing is the easiest way to rack up points in the judging rubric. Eliminating typos and ensuring your spelling etc is up to scratch is basically a couple of free points in itself, so it's great that you've obviously already got this down to a T!

Emotion - This was amazing as well. I really felt Erthe during this post, her inner strength and resolve. In fight posts, it can be really hard to make your character's personality shine through especially in mundane spars with no real feeling - I've fallen down on this a few times myself. So it's great that you managed to keep in tune with her personality whilst also incorporating the tricky surroundings of a fight. As long as you keep true to her character and make sure the judge can visualise how she's feeling, you should do fine in this section.

Attacks - I liked the attack, it was clear and concise. I'd have maybe liked to see you be a bit more specific on exactly where on the big butt she's aiming for - the right, the left, or just all of it - in order to help your opponent respond better, but aside from that small niggly thing it was great :D

Damage taken - N/A, but I'll run through the dice roll system now to give you an idea of how to respond to Vol's attacks (if he hits lmao).

So, we have our dice roll thread here. Each time one of us attacks, the dice will be rolled to determine whether the attack hit, and how much damage it did. The formula looks complicated, but when you break it down it's not that bad!

Character Name: Erthe
Attack Number: 1/3
Attack: 1d14 rolled for a total of: 10 + 1d2 rolled for a total of: 1 + 5.5
Damage: 1d6 rolled for a total of: 1 + 5.5

So this is the formula that determined how much damage I had to take from Erthe's first attack. For the purposes of taking damage, ignore the strikethrough bit - that just decides whether the attack hits or misses, but you don't need to worry about that because the admin will state underneath whether it hits or misses. The bits you need to look at are the italic and underlined numbers. The underlined number is Erthe's damage stat - 5.5. If this was a roll for Vol, it'd say 8 instead. The italic number is the dice roll to determine the level of damage. It's a 6 sided dice, so 1 is the least amount of damage you can do and 6 is the most. In this round, Erthe only rolled a 1, which is why I had Vol take such limited damage from the attack.

These are then added together, so 1 + 5.5 = 6.5. That's why Vol had 6.5 HP deducted from his full HP of 80.

Now, when it comes to writing out the damage you take, you need to look at both your opponent's damage stat and the damage dice roll. Basically, a character's damage stat shows how much their attacks hurt - in other words, Vol's attacks will hurt more than Erthe's, even if they roll the same. As Erthe rolled a 1, I took a really minor cut - if Vol rolled a 1 for the same attack, Erthe should probably take a deeper cut (but still nothing serious). Vol's damage stat is higher than average, whereas Erthe's is about average, and she can improve it through buffs!

These are the vague guidelines I use when deciding how to take damage:

1: Very minor bruise/cut that won't impact movement
2: Reasonably minor bruise/cut that won't impact movement
3: Quite painful bruise/cut that won't impact movement/maybe a pulled muscle
4: Moderate bruise that restricts some movement/reasonably deep cut/badly pulled muscle/sprain
5: Severe bruise that restricts movement/muscle-deep cut/maybe a very minor bone fracture/serious sprain
6: Very severe bruise that will restrict movement/severe muscle-deep cut/broken or fractured bone

I then edit for my opponent's damage stat - so if I was facing an opponent with a damage stat of 3 and they rolled a 5, I'd lean more towards taking a moderate/severe bruise rather than a minor bone fracture, depending on the attack. Also, when I mention 'impacting movement', it's because judges can deduct points if you don't continue to mention your previous injuries and have them affect your character. Like, if you fracture your hindleg but then have your character rear up to attack, the judge would deduct for that. Obviously some attacks wouldn't impact movement, aka light bruises, but whenever my opponent rolls a 4 or higher I have my character continue to be affected by that injury throughout the fight. That's just a basic guideline though - if you fought an opponent with a really high damage stat, you might be affected throughout the fight by a 3 dice roll!

I hope this makes a bit more sense now, but feel free to ask me anything :)

Other - You mentioned the surroundings and height/weight differences well. Our surroundings aren't TOO remarkable so they probably won't have too much of an impact on the fight, but Erthe and Vol's differing stats might. Erthe's got higher endurance than Vol so she won't tire as fast, so you could incorporate that later on in the fight too. Overall though, this was a really good post!