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A Ravens Heart and a Witch's Soul....(Anaeria and runawayninja only please! )

Naya grinned cheekily and let him pass, following him silently while she agreed "Yup, I actually do, seeing peoples' faces when they are unguarded is quite fascinating you know, some people even make weird ones that are hilarious! You're not one of those, your eyebrows just go up a little is all that happens, no fun at all." Once they reached the room that had been assigned to the lone 'priest' in their group, she slipped in after him quickly before he could close the door and then grew entirely serious, a shiver making her hair shake visibly. "Do you feel that ominous sensation Lord? It's like there's something just....not right at all with this place. The people barely talk at all and I jumped a foot when the human servant moved downstairs, it's like she doesn't....doesn't exist somehow."


Ariana smiled and then laughed as well at having to call Rafe Gustav, letting her beautiful pack mate feed her slowly and savouring the food, though truthfully her belly felt slightly nauseous. "I still can't feel my legs if it makes any difference, but I can feel the area over the wound, which is a good thing, it means I'm healing...even though it burns like a bugger." Trying to move her legs resulted in nothing happening, and the lycanthrope buried her head in her pillow after a moment with a short, hard breath of air expelled from her lungs. She did not want her Rosy to see her cry. Even temporarily, the loss of her legs was a devastating blow to the Lycanthropic woman, and a shudder ran down her spine as her mind automatically turned to the worst, somehow egged on by the environment until tears were leaking from her eyes into the pillow and she choked. "Oh god....what if my legs don't work after I'm healed...."
 
Rafe looked at Naya like he were to reprimand her. "I'm not your 'Lord' remember? The Raven Lady is our Lady..." He frowned, looking at his room carefully before entering and he pulled her inside it, shutting the door. "Yes, I do feel it. Something is wrong with this whole town...come here..." He brought her to the window and pointed down the road at a small shrine to the Raven Lady. It was half-collapsed, with vines grown heavily over it. It looked like it hadn't been touched in several months, maybe over a year. "No Ravenholmite would leave a shrine in that state...therefore...the whole town...something is wrong here."

White Rose looked down and then looked at Ariana, wanting so badly to make her feel better. She poked her leg softly and then grunted as she pounded her fist on it once. "Well...if your legs don't work then I guess you'll just have to learn to walk on your hands, won't you? Hehe, that would look pretty silly...wouldn't it, Wolfy?" She gave a soft laugh, hoping that bit of dry comedy would cheer her up.
 
Naya bit her lip at the reprimand then responded "Sorry Gustav." The next time he wanted to call himself something, she'd find him a name that didn't sound so...odd. Following him to the window she looked out, and then frowned at the sight of the shrine. She hadn't noticed it coming into the town, her attention had been on Ariana earlier, but now that she saw it she went paler. ".....Uhm..Gustav....I think this might be a ghost town...did you see any actual sign of the village name? I can't read, so I don't know which town it is....but that shrine looks familiar...it really does....and I haven't been into any towns in over a year and a half...." Looking at Rafe, she frowned and swallowed hard, an idea that perhaps they were in a literal ghost town, one that wasn't as friendly towards them as it seemed to be, coming to her thoughts.

Ariana didn't feel a thing, though she had to force a soft laugh from her lips when she heard her lovely Rosy call her Wolfy, something that irked her when Naya called her that, but sounded like a love-name from Rose's lips. Turning as best she could with her legs useless, she lifted her upper body up lightly and then pressed a gentle kiss to her pack mates' lips, her eyes still teary but considerably cheered up, oddly quickly in fact, just from her pretty mages' words. "Indeed, that would be funny to watch...I'll get my legs back soon enough, I just need some patience....and a new pillow. This one smells old." Wrinkling her nose a little as she pulled back from the kiss, she smiled, cheeks pink.
 
"I touched Elondra's hand...seemed corporeal to me...I don't know, I can't quite put my finger on it." He sighed and looked at Naya. I'd rather not do nothing, but I don't know if there's something we can do..."

Before White Rose could do or say much more, Elondra slowly knocked and opened the door, slipping into the room, smiling softly and holding a dull chalice. "Good evening, ladies, I apologize...I just noticed your condition and...I brought some spiced wine, prepared with herbs that should help take the edge of your pain...and it doesn't taste bad either..." She offered it to White Rose who looked at it and sipped some before drinking.

"It is good...here Ariana..." She offered the chalice to her.
 
Ariana smiled, nodded her thanks and accepted the chalice, taking a sip of the wine, then a longer drink of it before she handed it back to the woman, her smile calm. "Thank you Elondra, it was kind of you to offer pain relief. Rosy is helping me by healing my wounds but so far i still can't feel my legs..I don't suppose you have a cure for that would you?" Already she could feel a sort of heat as the wine hit her belly, and then she remembered belatedly what alcohol did to her system and flushed a light pink. It had been literally years since she'd even touched a drop of alcohol, be it wine or mead or ale or anything else, and the spiced wine, though it tasted quite good indeed, went to her head immediately, making her eyes feel fuzzy and out of focus.

"Well then..let's go and ask her!" Sounding mildly exasperated that it hadn't apparently occured to him to ask, she smiled and turned towards the door to go and find the strange woman and ask her directly.
 
But the wine quickly did more than that. The wine was drugged and before she knew it, White Rose was slumped on the bed before her. Elondra was smiling over her. "Yes...just rest now...the master is waiting...soon you well all know what it is to be his thrall..."

Rafe looked at her and frowned a bit. "I...don't know if that's wise..." He started to pursue her, intending on stopping her, but then he just followed her as they caught sight of Elondra leaving the other bedroom.
 
Naya immediately hissed, the stench of something foul reaching her nose suddenly, and she bolted for the bedroom. "Get that woman!" Slamming into the doorjam, she looked inside to see White Rose slumped over the bed and Ariana on the floor, completely passed out, though the Lycanthrope's hands had become claws and she was twitching, trying to reach White Rose, or the woman, it didn't matter.

Ariana had felt the heat of the alcohol...and then something else as she saw White Rose stagger and then fall over onto the bed. The Lycanthrope snarled, her hands shifting somewhat into claws as she tried to lunge at Elondra and failed, her legs giving out completely so that she hit the floor hard and lost consciousness completely, her eyes rolling back in her head even as she tried to reach the woman in order to send her to hell.
 
"Naya!" Rafe was without his zweiahnder, but he drew his short sword, only to be shoved by a pair of hands that broke through a fake wall a bookcase was guarding. Rafe went tumbling over the banister and slammed into a table below, breaking it. The hands belonged to a tall, vaguely humanoid creature that stepped out of the hole in the wall behind Naya. It looked like a human frog, with black, scaly skin with bright green veins and red eyes that looked cruel and malevolent. It stared at Naya, intent on getting it's hands on her as Elondra simply walked down the stairs like nothing was happening.
 
"Oooohhhh you're mean!" Naya, the teal haired nymph, watched with some amazement as Rafe went sailing over the edge and out of sight, the sound of a table breaking within seconds making her wince in mock sympathy before the creature showed it's ugly face. Looking it up and down, the woman made a face at it and then wrinkled her nose "Eeeew! You stink! I'll call you Stinky!" A smile crossed her face as she dubbed the critter Stinky, and yet....the smile didn't reach her eyes.

When the thing went to touch her, the nymph slapped it backwards, her hit seeming to be that of a frail woman, yet sent the thing flying down the hallway, through said wall, and then out into the street. Her smile entirely gone as the thing vanished from her sight, the nymph woman shook the small film of water from her hand and it trickled into a small jar that she seemed to produce from nowhere, and to nowehere it returned as she headed after the woman, Elondra, a smile like that of an insane Cheshire cat spreading her lips. Leaping over the banister, or what was left of it considering it had cracked and a piece broke when Rafe fell, she landed beside him on all fours and looked him over critically before she lunged for Elondra, snake-like whips of water forming from the moisture in the air extending her reach. "Come here sweety, I wanna play with You!"
 
Elondra hissed at her and raced for the bar, pulling out a large butcher knife from behind it. "You cannot interrupt the master!" The stout and surly bartender pulled out a club and headed towards Naya menacingly, but a yelling and diving Rafe tackled him behind the bar and started to beat him unconscious. "Naya, look out!" Elondra chucked the butcher knife at Naya's head.
 
Naya snarled, the sound much like Ariana's canine growl of menace as the bartender was engaged by Rafe....well, more like attacked head on where the knight began to systematically beat the crap out of him. She REALLY liked this human man. Mildly distracted by the crazy Elondra's chucking the knife at her head, Naya ducked and then pulled a Rafe; she dove for the woman and brought her to the ground hard, her weight now much heavier than her previously light, nearly unnoticeable one. Slamming a fist into the womans' temple, she yelped as a fistful of her hair was grabbed and yanked, then snarled, her canines elongating into rather nasty looking fangs.

Grabbing the dazed womans' face with her hand, she snatched a bottle of the tainted spiced wine that had been left on the table and upended it over the womans' face, forcing her mouth open with a thumb and a very sharp nail. Sitting on Elondra until the woman passed out, mostly from the fumes, the Nymph got to her feet again slowly and then growled and kicked the woman in the side, not to directly hurt her, but just out of sheer annoyance that two of Naya's new play toys-erm, friends, had been injured somehow.
 
Rafe got up from the floor, looking over at what she had done. "I'm glad you didn't kill her, good work. Something is controlling them..." He moved to look out of the front door, a full storm going on outside, but that wasn't what really shocked him. Outside, circling the inn, were the entire town, chanting loudly like a prayer. Rafe slowly moved inside and shut the door. "The whole town is out there...I doubt we could escape without hurting them...if they didn't get us by sheer weight of numbers." Rafe received an underhanded blow when the amphibious humanoid that Naya threw outside burst back in through the door, knocking Rafe to the ground. It was making some weird clicking noise, but it's expression was one of annoyance as it formed a large ball of slime and threw it at Naya, aiming for her head. Rafe growled out and dug his short sword into it's calf, opening the wound as much as he could, causing a bright, lime green fluid to come gushing out.
 
Letting out a shriek of surprise and disgust as the thing she'd thrown through the wall came back, sending Rafe to the ground and threw a slime ball at her head. Ducking, yet again, she felt it splatter over her back in recoil as it hit the wall. Immediately her skin began to steam and felt like it was burning, the few spots of goo clinging to her flesh and causing a rather nasty acid-like burn that she yelped and had to form water over in order to get it to dissipate. While she did that, Rafe was dealing with the thing by stabbing it in the leg, which was all well and good except that it seemed to bleed green goo and it barely even seemed to notice the wound.

"Ohhhhh now I'm pissed." The chanting outside was annoyingly loud, and growing louder in her ears as she turned to the pumpand broke the spigot right off, which brought a gout of water to her hand. Spinning it in a sphere, that slowly flattened out the faster it went between her flattened hands, the nymp's eyes went faintly orange as she shot the small, flat disks of water at the fiend. The disks were moving fast, little more than a blur and the edges of them were sharper even than razors as she slashed and hacked at the fiend with them, wanting it to die but too scared, yes she admitted she was scared, and in pain from the burns and too angry to really focus on anything but the fiend and her disks tearing it to shreds slowly but surely. "die, die,die,Die,Die,Die,DIE ALREADY YOU STUPID FROG-THING!"
 
The creature howled out in a strange, croaking voice, clearly in pain from her assault. However, it's wounds started to knit together and it began to recover from her assault when Rafe came up against it and drew his blade across it's neck, almost decapitating it with a long slash and the creature finally fell over dead. Rafe paused to gather his strength and then he looked at Naya. "Are you alright Naya...?" After her asked, his mind flew to Ariana and White Rose and when he heard Naya's response, he raced upstairs only to find the two gone. "No!!!" Rafe raced over to the hole in the wall that the fiend had emerged from. It was a secret passage, a staircase that led downstairs. The air coming from it smelled musty and briny.
 
Nodding, gasping for air as the fiend finally died, but a little ticked that it was Rafe who had killed it, Naya wheezed that she was fine and then staggered after him as he bolted for his friends. Coming up behind as he shouted, she staggered back as he spun to the hole in the wall where the thing had originally come from.

As a Lycanthrope, Ariana's body dealt with poisons and foreign substances oddly, so, though she woke up first, she was also ridiculously drunk, entirely human, and very much still naked, though surprisingly she could feel her legs now. Opening her eyes blearily, she blinked slowly and looked around with a quiet moan as the world around her spun though she herself didn't move.

Naya looked at Rafe and caught his arm to get his attention, her expression serious. "Rafe, if we go down there, we'll be inside of this master or whatevers' lair, where it's most powerful. Don't you think you should say a prayer or something before going down there?" She'd already muttered one to the Goddess, not any one with a name, just in general, and her own powers were focused more on healing the burns in her back and a long line of red that whipped over her side than on offence at the moment.
 
"My goddess is with me...she hears and sees me, and I'm not going to leave them down there. If it means walking into the jaws of hell, I'm going there." His bestial rage was partially affecting his thinking as he pushed on down the stairs. The smell only grew, but Rafe was intent on proceeding, despite that a short sword was his only weapon. He wasn't going to be talked out of this course of action. The bottom of the spiral stairs opened into a massive cavern. Rafe cast a quiet spell, praying to his goddess for his magic, and his holy symbol glowed brightly enough to light up the cave. It looked ancient and started more stairs, probably other hidden passages, emptied down here. Rafe pushed onward, heedless of any danger, but the smell of other amphibian-like creatures made itself known.

When Ariana awoke, she found herself and and White Rose chained to the wall of a small cavern, with three of the aforementioned creatures arguing amongst themselves in the center of the room. There were other chains and bloodstains on the walls of the cave around them. The air was rank with the creatures, mold, and death.
 
Ariana blinked until her sight cleared and then whimpered as the alcohol in the drink turned her body more sensitive, her nipples hardening in the cold, damp air of the room. Uttering a quiet moan, she lifted her head to peer about her, entirely confused and feeling more than a little disoriented, the first things she focused on were the fiends in front of her. Her body was still naked, and the chains at her wrists and ankles kept her spread eagled on the wall beside White Rose, who was the same though she looked much less lewd since she still wore her dress, somewhat tattered as it was. A low, somewhat weak growl escaped the Lycanthropes' throat, ending in a whine as rough stone dug into her back.

Naya cursed as Rafe headed down the stairs, her form hesitating for just an instant before she was gone, completely vanished into the form of mist and slipping outside, past the chanting humans and to the stables, where Alexandria was snorting and trying to kick the door to her stall down. And suceeding as the nymph sped inside and grabbed the sword that Rafe seemed to wield better than the half sword. The weapon was abnormally heavy for the nymph, and she clicked her tongue lightly at Alexandria as the horse crashed past her and began to raise a huge fuss amongst the humans with her hooves. Speeding back to the inn in the confusion, Naya hauled the sword up a few times, the blasted thing feeling heavier by the second, and she headed down the stairs after the human knight, her power, innate as it was, lower than she'd have liked though the twin whips of clear, fresh water that lashed at the things in the shadows kept her from getting attacked outright as she tried to catch up to Rafe. "Godsdammit human slow down a little!" Muttering under her breath, she picked up the pace as she spotted the holy light ahead from Rafe's holy symbol.
 
One of the amphibian humanoids, seemed to have the upped hand and started to walk towards Ariana, though it's expression looked no less fierce than the others for having won whatever argument that had occurred. "Female, you are going to give me a child...the master must have more thralls. We Skum need human stock to breed with..." He approached her with those slimy hands.

Rafe was slowed only by having to explore the caverns, discovering a few dead ends and such. He nearly came over a straight down drop before he saw it, but he held still, looking down at the edge, only to see a figure moving at the bottom. There was something large down there...it was a massive grey ooze. A huge blob with bits of metal equipment and bones in it's mass. It...was being fed the leftovers of the unfortunate...
 
Ariana's eyes widened at the thing told her she was going to give her a child, and then, instead of getting pissed off, she started to laugh. Confusing, yes? Well, since she was also drunk out of her tree, she laughed even harder as the image of one of the amphibian things as a child formed in her mind and her laughter turned to shrieks of glee as she shook, shaking her head rapidly back and forth, her cheeks red and her body temperature off the charts as her body struggled, and failed, to purge the alcohol from her system, the one 'poison' that her body seemed to be unable to deal with sufficiently. "AAAHAHAHAHAHA! Hehehe....no way...I'm not gonna give you some kid....that'll look..like youuuu-ahahahahahahaaaa!" Shaking her head as she continued laughing, she shut up fairly quickly when one of those slimy hands grabbed at her breasts and began to toy with her nipples, the sensation off and completely disgusting. "Ahaha...ha....oh FUCK NO! GET THE HELL OFF OF ME!" Suddenly feeling more awake, though no less drunk, her laughter turned to anger in the space of a second as the slimey goo on the things' hands began to slide down her belly in thin, disgusting lines.


Naya in the mean time, found Rafe fairly damned fast once she figured out where he was. Panting, she grabbed his arm and slapped the sword handle into his hand, the weight from it disappearing even as she groaned. "Your sword....is too damned heavy....next time...bring it with you, you lunatic!" She was going to rant even more, but then stopped at the sounds of laughter cutting off, followed by a howl of anger from the female Lycanthrope down a small side tunnel, in a room off from where that odd blob was pulsing.
 
Rafe growled as he heard the commotion. Someone was messing with Ariana. And now the beatings were going to come. Rafe brooked down the side tunnel that he heard the voices come from, running as fast as his legs could carry him. He took the blade from Naya's hands, though he had the feeling he might not use it. He felt the animal in him rising, demanding to be set free. Someone was disturbing his flock mates. They were calling down the thunder from him. Well now they were going to get it. When the cave emerged, he found the captive room where the girls were and he bellowed out a cry, getting the attention of the Skum from Ariana and the still unconscious White Rose. Rafe charged right at the one molesting Ariana, looking as though he intended to attack him. But instead, when the Skum swiped at him, he rolled past him and with a deft upward swing, he cut Ariana free of her bonds.
 
Hitting the ground with a sharp cry as the chain that attached to the shackle smacked her on the head, Ariana got to her feet and swung the four inches of said chain as she got up, whipping the Skum who'd touched her in the face and hearing a very satisfying crunch of bone as it's jaw shattered. Since the shackles were holding faint traces of silver in them she couldn't shape shift, but she could certainly still fight, and did, moving as best she could until she was in front of White Rose, protecting her still unconscious packmate while her hands balled into fists. She was still completely drunk, and would remain so probably until the next day, but anger was a great focuser, and she was focused indeed, not even noticing that where that slime hit her, her skin grew warm and somehow more pleasant feeling. All Ariana cared about was that she wanted to kill, yet couldn't while the shackles bound her.

Naya slipped to the side of the cavern as the scene unfolded, her smaller form darting around the Skum, a watery whip tripping one up while a ball of liquid shoved itself down the throat of the one that fell, drowning it slowly while she searched for a key for the shackles themselves. She somehow doubted that magic would just open those thick looking metal cuffs, and finding a key would be a good idea....plus it seemed that Rafe needed to let loose some of his anger.
 
With his best fighter (that he knew of) evening the odds, Rafe felt more free to engage the Skum. He shifted to the half-human form and it was something odd. It was a strange mix of man and bird. His hands grew longer and he had large talons instead of fingernails. His whole form grew taller and much leaner, but his arms and chest especially bulged since birds had well developed arms and chests for extended flight. His wrists had small plumes of black feathers and his silvery hair became a mass of black feathers, and his eyes became golden and black like a raven's. Still gripping the blade he charged forward at the one that Naya attacked. Being amphibious creatures, the water didn't choke it much, it more seemed to discomfort it for a moment, but it's gills were able to process the water fine. Rafe grabbed his two-handed sword and threw it forward like a spear, impailing that one through the chest and he ran forward and gripped it with his claws, giving it a firm headbutt in the face before he attempted to bite out one of the eyes. That was a mistake. It tasted awful and he spat out what he bit, unable to get that nasty taste form his tongue. He retrieved his blade from the stunned creature and quickly lopped off it's head with his enhanced strength.

There was a third Skum that was encircled by the three of them, growling in it's amphibian way as Rafe turned to it and as Ariana beat on her assailant viciously.
 
The one that was after Ariana had managed to splatter more of its goo onto her body, and the wolf woman was savage as she beat its' head in with her fists and pure fury. Snarling, her canines on her upper and lower jaw had gotten longer, but were still too small to be of any real use, giving her a more fey appearance as her ears became more triangular as well and her eyes flickered with gold.

Naya bolted around the half human and half raven knight, diving under a slash of a webbed paw of another Skum and hit the wall hard with her shoulder. Letting out a quiet squawk as pain shot down her arm, the nymph snatched a set of keys from a hook at the far corner and began to make her way over to Ariana, who seemd to actually be having some fun as she continuously smashed and gouged at the Skum's head, the fiend dying rather slowly and begging her for mercy as she did so. The wolf woman would need a bath, Naya noticed that absently as she darted around the last of the Skum to remain alive, then yelped as she was drawn up short, a slimy, webbed hand clamping down around her wrist and yanking her back against an equally slimy body. "EWWWWW! Get OFF!" A short shriek, from the Skum, and the thing literally began to bubble, the water within its' body boiling as Naya grew angry. The thing moaned piteously as it began to cook from the inside out, and it released the nymph, who got rid of its' slime on her body before finally got to Ariana, who was standing over her own dead Skum and looking around avidly for more.

The redheads' cheeks were pink, and she was looking dazed, the slime on her front having made its' way all the way from her breasts, past her nether regions and was sliding down her legs now. As the nymph approached and handed the wolf woman the key to get the shackles off of herself and Rose, the nymph noticed a faint scent in the air from the woman, amidst all of the stench of death and such. She smelled like sunlight, and lavender, and it shot something warm into her belly as she registered that it was an aroused scent from the Lycanthrope and hurriedly backed away. Naya liked the pretty woman, but she was not about to do anything to her in this cesspool of madness and gore.
 
As Ariana freed herself and Rose, the wall furthest from the tunnel leading out of the room began to shimmer and slowly dissolve, revealing a small underground passage with a pool of water in it that led elsewhere. The wall had been an illusion and rising from the depths of it was a creature that was utterly hideous to behold. Something about it's fluid movements and it's strangely familiar yet wholly alien biology stuck a disturbing chord in the heads of those that viewed it. It was something wicked and certainly the source of all that was wrong in the town.

It managed to project it's speech into the minds of the heroes around it. ~"So I see you managed to overcome my slaves. You will serve me well when I chose to leave this town..."~ Suddenly, Rafe let his sword drop as he cried out in terrible agony, gripping his head. He fell down to his knees as the creature started to strip away his mental defenses with as much precision and skill as a surgeon. Only his divinity prevented him from succumbing totally and instantly as he fought the mental attack, but even so, the creature wrested partial control of his form, causing him to growl deeply and turn towards his formal allies, his fingers flexing as he took step after resistant step towards him. ~"Who will be left amongst you to serve me? I'm looking forward to this..."~ The creature could only control one person at a time without fully enslaving their minds, which took time.
 
Ariana snarled, holding onto Rose as she lowered the woman to the ground gently. The shackles were gone now and she shifted partially with a deeper growl as she spotted her packmate turning towards them, his mind controlled body after he cried out, the agony and pain as the...the thing, tried to take him over. "You want to fight me Beast? I can Fight you." Her words were a vicious snarl, her teeth bared as her form shrank and twisted, becoming fully Wolf....but not as she had been.

Lycanthropes had their own gods and goddesses, and this place held no true goddess, defiled and forsaken as the shrine had been. Plus, it was night and very much near a full moon, giving Ariana more power than she'd have during a new moon, when she became little more than a human woman. Looking to Naya, who nodded and gathered the water within the room, using it to form shackles and restrictions that were harder than steel and nearly impossible to break, she sent them snaking out towards Rafe's body, hoping to pin him as Ariana set to work.

There were things in this world that beasts like Mages and vampires, humans and knights and witches knew nothing of. The deep, dark forests and their secrets both precious and dangerous, the feeling of having run down a fresh kill and the willingness to share it with a pack, the feeling of the blood of a freshkill sliding down a parched throat and the dying thrashes of the kill as it died a proud death, no matter the species. No one knew of that except for the wild wolves and the Lycanthropes born as Ariana had. The Call that she sent out, to her own Godess, the Lady Night, was silent, but the blackness that covered her eyes, becoming like twin pieces of the night sky, her well of power within her burning brightly as she Pushed. A shockwave, not physical but mental, snapped like an arrow from the wolf, whose fur shimmered like someone had thrown faery glitter on it.

The Push had been a mental summoning, backed by the power of a goddess, who aided her Lycanthropes whenever they should call upon her to aid or save a packmate, the Call was not negotiable. The mind of the creature was forced to obey her, and Ariana knew what she would do next. If the fiend didn't break free somehow and if Rafe didn't touch her. No one could touch her in this state, as she had never done this and her hold over her own magics was tenuous at best.
 
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