Mahou Shoujo Troper Magica --Kaikin Ward--

"Tch."

Letting go of her weapon, Rei deftly swung around to the back of the Demon before leaping up onto its shoulders. In a single motion, a golden spear introduced itself to the creature's head, dispersing the gathering energy; in the next moment, the azure Magical Girl leaped away, activating her signature attack:

Detonate!

Together, both crimson and golden lances obeyed their master's command, shredding her enemy like so much tissue. The power of the explosions forced the watching Alicia to shield her eyes; unbeknownst to either combatant, a second Demon snuck up onto the distracted newbie, lasers ready to fire....

edited 12th Nov '11 9:21:38 PM by Midreus

Posting live from AFA - man you guys moved on fast without me. Got me a Kyubey trolling T-shirt "trust me" for the lulz.

Moving so fast meant inertia prevented her from stopping. The Royal Blue Blader chose to bust straight through instead, ripping through her obstruction with her immense momentum.

Ciel landed in the stark white sand, transforming instinctively. She immediately counted the Demons, all concerns about her social life pushed aside for the moment as she quickly determined the most effective means of taking on so many.

edited 12th Nov '11 9:41:14 PM by AceOfScarabs

Vera took her gun fully charged and aimed it at the demon attacking the bystander. She noticed that the beam was splitting into different colors this time, something that near never occurred. "It's my lucky day." she said. "You? Aren't so lucky." she taunted.

A light glimmered in the sky for a brief moment. Then, before the Demon could fire off its blast, a spear struck down through its head, descending as though it was a bolt of lightning. Dropping down from the rooftops, a green haired girl appeared beside Alicia, emerald spear in hand.

"That was close... Are you alright? You should be careful too," she told her.

She felt it.

dodge

Her instincts clawing at her.

In an instant, she turned around to meet the source of her chill, raising her arms instinctively to block the inevitable attack—

— only to find it crushed by the strength of another Magical Girl.

Alicia blinked a couple of times at Sachiko's sudden entrance before snapping out of it. "Thanks... I thought I was dead there for a second," she replied.

At the same moment, Rei dashed back to Alicia's side.

"Thank you for saving my friend," she said, giving Sachiko a cursory examination before returning to her ready stance. "I apologize for being rude, but let's save introductions for later; there should be more of them to come."

Sensing the shockwaves from other fights breaking out around her, Ciel decided to try and wrap up the fight as smoothly as she could without getting herself killed.

Concentrating briefly, she leapt ahead, blazing blue trails from her rollerblades. These flares fluctuated wildly as her magic flowed through them, forcing them into elongated rails that ran around the Demons.

Thus restricting their movements, she expertly blasted between them, repeatedly kicking or swiping them with the hot blue contrails chasing her, while making sure to pace her attacks to allow for easy evasion between strikes.

Vera thought. Is that a new Magical girl? she asked mentally. There's miasma everywhere! she said thinking, and splitting the blaster into six. "Cool!" she said outloud.

All three groups are in different Demonspaces. There's a reason I've been splitting stuff up. =)

Vera's beam struck the closest Demon in the back, blasting it forward a few feet. As it straightened and turned around, the mall fell away. The stunned civilians gasped as they hit the sandy ground; some landed badly and went sprawling into the dust, while others barely seemed to notice. Vera counted eight in total, including Alicia's guests and the woman being attacked.

The Demons blurred into a phalanx between their erstwhile target and Vera; the Magical Girl saw the woman choke and gulp a huge breath as the Miasma slowly stopped flowing over her face. She went right back to sobbing, though, and the Demon at the head of the 'V' moved, something rustling under its robes. It raised a thin, skeletal hand, as gaunt and porcelain-white as its face, and bright beams of energy burst from its fingertips.

—-

Ciel had struck hard and fast, gaining an advantage in surprise over the pack of Demons that had ambushed her. As a small mercy, there didn't seem to be any civilians caught up in the Demonspace; with the amount of energy flying around the desert, she certainly hoped there were none. The strange white sand flashed into blue-tinted glass as she ducked between two Demons; there were four in total, but only one - the one that had first startled her - was taller than a few meters. As Ciel watched, it shrank in height - and the other three grew to meet it, midway between its old height and theirs. Then they turned as one and raised their hands, crisscrossing Ciel's laser-blue path with deadly white energy.

—-

The green-haired girl's appearance had saved Alicia's life, but Miasma continued to boil up from the alley's underlevels. It rolled like water, bubbling malevolently up from bulkheads and sewer grates, and when the alley fell away, the transition was like a slap in the face. The sudden sense of other was nothing new to the experienced Magical Girls, but this was somehow much worse than normal; even Rei had to choke back a sudden wave of nausea as the world inverted, then reinverted itself in the space of a nanosecond. The Demons Rei and Sachiko had killed dissipated, their Remnants falling slowly to make little dimples in the sand, but none of the three paid attention.

Something moved in the distance, and the roars of Demons echoed across the thousands of miles of sand.

edited 13th Nov '11 8:20:27 AM by RedSavant

Ciel didn't even have time to think, even with her greatly enhanced sense of perception. Only her muscle memory saved her, as her legs moved of their own volition, making her ollie right off her rails and over the crossed beams of hurt. She caught up with her own muscles a moment later, delivering a wicked kick that was meant to break up their tightly-packed grouping.

As she landed, she felt the wave and mentally groaned. "Ugh, not another large wave! And in broad daylight too!" At least I won't need to hunt tonight with the sheer VOLUME of Remains they're going to leave.

edited 13th Nov '11 8:37:11 AM by AceOfScarabs

Vera saw the demons and knew that the only way to deal with this was to kill those bastards. She tried to step away from the blasts as best she could, slowly though. She took the six guns and noticed that they were all different colors. She decided to spread out her options and target each gun at the demons, aiming with telekinesis. A shot of red, orange, yellow, green, and blue light shot at the demons, while Vera manually pointed the purple blaster at the leader.

edited 13th Nov '11 2:05:07 PM by RhymeBeat

Machi Nazuna waited. And waited. And spotted her chance.

She ran up to the front lines with Rei, Sachiko and Alicia wielding her knives.

"Heard you girls might need some help. Glad to oblige." As she dropped down to her battle stance, she stealthily picked up the dropped remains that the others had failed to notice. As if nothing happened, she continued talking. "This place... Sorta makes me feel sick but let's try to do well, okay?"

The great desert.

Rei was familiar with it, of course, and it was Alicia's second time here; but the feeling of wrongness was just the same for both of them.

For Rei, however, nausea rapidly turned to cold fury. Of course.

Nazuna was here. It didn't matter if Rei hadn't caught her in the act: she knew what the girl was up to by her mere presence.

Thieves will always be thieves, after all.

"I see you, thief," she hissed. This time, there would be no mercy. She'd beat the truth out of her right now.

Rei was upon Nazuna in a flash, two spears already in her hands. As one, both weapons were swung in opposing directions: the red lance aimed to shatter Nazuna's spine, while the golden spear intended to crush her lungs.

Alicia widened her eyes in shock as she saw Rei lunge. "Rei, what are you—"

"Fighting a thief," Rei replied simply via telepathy, not letting herself slow down. "Don't worry; engage the Demons. You can do it."

Alicia paused for a second, momentarily stunned by the reply. Thief? What did she mean by that? Was that girl a— no no, she should focus. Rei had faith in her, after all. Shaking her head, she drew her twin revolvers and took aim at the nearest Demon she could find, charging her weapons with violet magic.

edited 13th Nov '11 7:12:30 PM by Midreus

"Woah woah woah!"

Nazuna quickly summoned up her daggers, wielding them in either hand. She hastily deflected both the incoming spears, though one of the spears managed to graze her. She jumped backwards from Rei, clutching her cut left arm with her right.

"I understand that you may have some sort of grudge against me, but-" Nazuna threw both her daggers at a nearby demon, "-I think you could save it for later. We seem to be in a bit of a bind and I'm just here to help out."

Sachiko looked over at Rei and Nazuna, wondering what had happened there, before turning back towards the roaring Demons. I don't know the situation between them; I can't judge. And right now, dealing with the Demons are more important.

Materializing an emerald spear in her hand, the green-haired girl pointed its tip at another Demon. She waited for the Demons to make their move - there was a chance that if she hurled her attack at them now, they'd all descend upon her and Alicia as a group.

Vera couldn't be sure, but it didn't look like the beams of light struck the same Demon her first attack had. Whether it was the same one or not, though, the multicolored attack sent the creature reeling backward; its lasers danced crazily across the sand, scoring little rivers of glass in tiny trails across the pure white sand. A nearby man started to scream as one beam traced across his leg; his trouser cuff burst into flame near the line of cloth that had simply disintegrated, and angry red flesh was visible underneath. Fortunately, the beam seemed to have dealt him only a glancing cut; the depth of the injury, however, left no doubt that it would have severed the limb had the exposure lasted any longer.

The other two Demons began to recharge their mouth lasers.

Ciel's mighty impact broke the Demons apart, but they regrouped quickly. As Ciel blinked, they were around her, forming a circle of ten or so meters' radius - a killing ground. They raised their hands; Ciel had only a moment to react before the lasers shot forth again. She felt in her gut that, unless she moved fast, the lasers would deal crippling injuries to her limbs at best.

The Demons ignored the sudden duel that had broken out, continuing their attack on Alicia. White panes shot forth seemingly from nowhere, slicing at the gunslinger, and two of the Demons began charging laser blasts. They shimmered in place, similar to what they did when trying to dodge an attack - but this time, they seemed unable to decide whether to aim at Alicia - the most salient threat at the moment - or Rei, the most dangerous girl in the Demonspace.

Vera charged up the shots, finding them easier to manage, even if they put out less power. She slashed her guns horizontally aiming for the stomachs of the demons slashing them from both left to right and right to left. She tried to get herself into a position to dodge when the demons lasers were to fire.

The Demons would soon find that they had little reason to care about Rei for the time being.

Choosing not to answer Nazuna, Rei discarded her spears as she finished her swing, forming a new lance instead. In a flash, she was next to her enemy again, making a powerful thrust aimed at Nazuna's heart.

Noticing the white panes flying at her, Alicia dove to her side to avoid them, rolling into a crouching stance. Her revolvers were now fully-charged, and she was ready to take on both their recoils at once; without any hesitation, she took aim at the two Demons who were powering up their lasers.

She took a short breath.

Lock-On
fire

Two great violet spheres flew towards their targets, one for each Demon.

edited 13th Nov '11 10:42:54 PM by Midreus

Rhyme, I'm not entirely sure what's going on in your post. A, how would charging a shot make it less powerful, and B, if she's charging, how is she 'sweeping' the shots?

Alicia's charged shots were intercepted on their course by the Demons' lasers; one exploded spectacularly, throwing dark purple smoke across the field of engagement, while the other was merely grazed. A strange interaction between the two types of energy caused the sphere to spin wildly, destabilizing its path; it struck the ground halfway between its intended target and Sachiko, blowing sand into the sky in a massive plume.

Bedtime!

Sachiko squinted, half to see through the cloud of dust that was raised by the explosion, half to prevent the sand from getting in her eyes. Making out the Demons Alicia was attacking beyond the haze, Sachiko hurled one spear then another, magic accelerating them to deadly speeds.

Dammit, they didn't work!?

Gritting her teeth in annoyance, Alicia squinted, trying to see through the cloud of sand. The moment she made out the silhouette of one of the Demons, she pointed both revolvers at it and let loose a flurry of normal shots.

Machi once again deflected the blow with a newly formed knife, pushing the thrust off to the side. She then created a quartet of smaller kunais held between her knuckles in her free hand, threatening to take defensive measures against Rei.

"Rei, please! You're going to get us all killed! The demons are going to overwhelm us without the two of us fighting against them!"

edited 13th Nov '11 11:13:19 PM by neobowman

Splitting the gun made the charge time less and each individual gun less powerful And as she uses lasers it's kind of like moving a laser beam across a target.

Tapping just a little more magic, Ciel pushed beyond normal human peak performance and moved, dashing faster than they could track her. The demons were unable to correct their aim, and the beams did little more than score the ground where she had been a moment before.

She realised that it was definitely time to thin the crowd, so with a sudden spiral-shaped burst of blue plasma, her high-speed lunge cut into one of their number, forcing them to scatter and shredding her unlucky target.

edited 14th Nov '11 12:15:11 AM by AceOfScarabs

For a moment, the world seemed to slow to a stop.

Her attack was deflected. With the strength she had placed into the thrust, there was no way for her to stop normally. She would continue moving forward, and for just a split second her back would be open to attack. She could hear Nazuna begging her to stop her assault, and she could see the kunai the other girl had formed in her free hand. A counterattack was inevitable.

"Then, let's end this right now," answered Rei.

Mana Burst

In an instant, she halted all motion, a great burst of blue energy surging forth from her person to cancel her forward momentum.

It was a technique of her own design, although it was costly and inefficient, and she disliked depending on it; yet it was also her most useful ability, opening up all sorts of new defensive and offensive maneuvers to her. In this particular case, it was offensive in nature: taking advantage of her new positioning, Rei blindsided Nazuna by pulling her spear back towards her person with all her might, smashing the enemy Magical Girl in her side and sending her flying a good dozen or so feet away.

No mercy was shown, just as she promised herself; with another burst of magic, Rei sent herself flying after Nazuna, pinning the prone girl underfoot before pressing the tip of her spear against Nazuna's neck.

"Their battle has not even begun in earnest," said Rei coldly, "but ours is over; one false move from you, and I will sever your head. Now, tell me: why do you steal remnants?"

The sheer inertia Ciel carried made it impossible to stop without wasting energy. It was a fact she had learnt and studied and trained to overcome, and she did that now by transferring a good portion of that kinetic energy into her rollerblades, causing the blue arcs under her wheels to flare and blaze outwards. She then dumped the energy into a devastating kick.

A wicked crescent of Royal-blue scythed outwards, even as she seized a disintegrating Demon arm and held the crystallising remains to her 'Gem.

I'd like to rationalise that Ciel takes full advantage of her momentum and inertia to increase her damage without depending too much on magic. She's not very powerful magically, but she has learnt how to exploit physics. Besides it also gives her a reason to jumpkick enemies with the energy from a great height like she did when she saved Alicia earlier.