"Escort you to— yes, sir." The female slave said, leading Tesseract to where Vaas was, clasping her hands. "I still wish to know what those alchemists are, sir... even if you belayed those orders, it simply does not sit well for me to just ignore it."

"An alchemist is a person who experiments with various minerals and elements. They are usually fonts of knowledge."
Facing Vaas, Tesseract relayed the bad news.
"It seems we will need to scavenge materials from the ammunition."

They do have medals for almost, and they're called silver!

"I figured." Said Vaas, sitting cross-legged on the floor. Behind him was the bag, disembowelled of its contents, and he'd placed three of the four magazines he'd summoned on the floor in front of him. The last one was loaded into one of the AKs leaning up against the wall, an insurance policy in case they had to shoot their way out. "Okay, we're gonna need a pair of pliers or something. We're also gonna need some pipes and something to put over the ends, size doesn't matter but it has to be a real tight fucking fit, and maybe some nails or coins or whatever if you can find them. You go and get us that shit, slave girl."

As she scurried away, Vaas pried a single bullet out of the end of the clip, and held it up between finger and thumb for Tesseract to inspect.

"This is a bullet, hermano. I figured you already fucking new that, but we've got a busy night here and I don't want you getting lost. We pull out this bit at the top, then we empty out the powder. These are probably chinese, and I don't think anyone's used actual gunpowder since the eighteen-fucking-hundreds, but it still explodes so I don't give a fuck. We put that shit into a pipe or a little metal box or something, put some bits in there for shrapnel, and all we need to make it into a bomb is work out how to set it off. That's the easy bit. Now, this..."

He swivelled the thing around, giving Tesseract a view of the non-business end.

"This little bit in the middle here is the primer. We might need that too, we might not, but it's more explosive and I figure we're gonna want as much as can get, you know? It's the bit that goes off when the hammer hits it, and then it sets off the rest of the shit inside, and then you shot in the face. Simple, huh? We could really use these things for detonators, but the big fucking problem here is that we've got about ninety to get through and primers are an absolute pile of motherfucker to get out. Any questions, hermano?"

"No questions. I understand the workings of rifles and cartridges. I do not know what experience you have had with sorcerers, but in my universe, a gun is still a gun. It will kill a sorcerer as effectively as it would a human. Magic doesn't affect it's workings."
Tesseract sat down, and began hand-prying bullets from their casings. His considerable strength made it quite easier.
"We could use the bullets themselves as shrapnel."

They do have medals for almost, and they're called silver!

"No magic where I'm from, hermano." With no pliers and less considerable strength, Vaas was using his teeth, spitting the bullets into a bowl he'd liberated to hold anything they needed to keep. The cigarette was resting behind his ear, stubbed out so as not to cause acute onset explosion. "Lot of stupid fucks who think there is, lot of weird bullshit that kinda looks like it, but not much else. That's it. You want to go kill some fuck, you got to do it the hard way."

He mimed a gun and fired the fatal shot with a click of his togue, whistling a body falling to the ground. He was smiling.

"You might not have noticed, but I don't exactly fit in around here, you know? Back on the island it's all about running packages, growing crops, selling off any tourists stupid enough to get themselves caught, keeping motherfuckers in line, that kinda shit. No giant witches or big-dick magical kings anywhere. We got tigers, we got alligators, we got a big stupid fucking tribe, but we ain't got no wizards, hermano. Good to know I can still shoot them if they show up, though. What's it like, anyway? You just kinda wave your hands and it happens, or what? You said you haven't got any fireballs or that kinda shit, but you obviously still got something under there. What can you do, wizard man?"

edited 22nd Apr '14 8:14:17 AM by TheMalignancy

"Magic is an internal energy. To use it, we merely focus the energy into the effect we wish. However, there are multiple magical disciplines, and a person can only use one discipline. The most common two are Elemental magic, and Energy Throwing. Elemental Magic focuses on the four classical elements. Energy Throwing allows the user to fire energy beams from their palms, eyes or mouths. For the most part, a person may choose whatever discipline they wish. However, Sensitives, psychics for the most part, and Teleporters are both disciplines one must be born with an inclination towards. Witches and Warlocks also fall under the umbrella of disciplines one must be born into. Symbol magic, on the other hand, is available to all."

Vaas might noticed that Tesseract hadn't actually told him what his own magic was. It seemed he was reluctant to share all his secrets.

They do have medals for almost, and they're called silver!

You've nothing to worry about, Mr Tatu. I'll do the best I can... given the circumstances. Nui replied with a wide smile. She playfully juggled her parasol between her hands while looking at her teammates beside her, sizing them up for the task at hand. She frowned and looked back at Tatu. Although, I'm not sure if they're up for it. Assassinations doesn't look like their strong suit and I want this to be as quick as possible if we don't want thieves stealing... she added with a huff in her voice.

Vote. .#Bayonetta 4 Smash

"You guys got it all that organised, huh? Sounds like some Final Fantasy shit." Said Vaas, spitting another bullet onto the pile. While he was aware of the risk of lead poisoning, he was also aware it'd have to fight it out with all the other poisons in his system to find room. "So you make all that up yourself, or is there some kinda magical union up at the top telling you guys what to call everything? Actually, fuck it, I don't care. You didn't answer my question, hermano, I don't think you understood what I was saying. You said you don't have fireballs, you don't act much like a psychic, and I'm guessing you'd have said if you could just teleport in and grab whatever it is the boss wants. What do you do?"

"...I am a Bonebreaker. With a touch, I can shatter the bones in a person's body. It is quite an explosive shattering, forceful enough to send bone shrapnel far from it's origin point. Very effective if used on the left-hand side of the ribcage or the skull."

This man was to be his teammate, if they were to work together and formulate plans, his abilities would have to come to light sooner or later.

"And there is a government system, the Sanctuaries. Representatives of the Sorcerer community in a country, usually corresponding to modern national lines, with a few exceptions, come together and elect a Grand Mage, who chooses two more people to create a council of Elders. The Americans have recently begun spearheading attempts to create a Supreme Council, a magical United Nations, essentially. Of course, their motives are suspect. The current grapevine is that it is an attempt to gather allies for a takeover of the Irish Sanctuary."

edited 24th Apr '14 1:55:35 PM by GeekCodeRed

They do have medals for almost, and they're called silver!

   "Then lead them. Why, I am recruiting you to be a general, am I not?"    Tatu said, smirking.    "Show me you can lead a squad. Maybe I will reward you more? Depending on your performance, of course. Now, the time you three spend here talking... is time that could be spent planning your assassination on your target's Kingdom."   

Vaas laughed, nestled about halfway between gleeful schoolboy and ironic sociopath.

"You see, hermano, that's what I like to fucking hear. That's some hardcore useful-ass fucking shit right there. We can use this, Tesseract, we really fucking can. This gives us fucking options. No more of this 'I don't know magic' bullshit, okay? You have something useful in your head, you fucking tell me."

"Okay." He continued, carefully reorganising the contents of his head. In front of him, his fingers beat a tattoo to the rhythm of his words. "Okay. Okay, okay, okay... So this means we're not fucked if we have to shoot our way out, I guess. You might be able to fuck up the king if we you close enough, maybe, but that at least gives us something to try if we need to, and we only need one of the AKs now. I still don't care about the union, by the way. Oh, and those FUCKING PLIERS ARE TAKING FOREVER, YOU FUCKS."

The echo died down around them. Someone in the hallway yelped. Vaas smiled.

"Seriously, hermano what the fuck is up with that?"

edited 28th Apr '14 5:39:17 PM by TheMalignancy

"This is a upper-class household. It's likely that there are no pliers present." Tesseract said, continuing to dump black powder on the table.
"However, I must remind you, that killing the King is a secondary objective. The object we are to retrieve takes priority. Tatu insinuated that once the King dies, the surrounding area would no longer be... suitable, for us. Therefore, acquiring the object may become impossible after his death."

They do have medals for almost, and they're called silver!

The second after Tesseract said his opinion about the pliers, a slave rushed in, covered with sweat, and dropped a pair of rudimentary iron pliers on Vaas' feet, bowing to him before running out and back to his position- not bothering his masters.

"Quite. shall we get going then?" Yuyuko asked, curious as to where they would end up. It didn't really matter if Nui wanted to lead or not, no one said she had to follow.

Conception is sin Birth is pain Life is toil Death is inevitable

Medusa had to let out a light sigh of resignation as they were disappointingly denied any more information about what they needed to do. Apparently results were second to testing them as a group. She wasn't a big fan of working with others, but it didn't look like she had a choice. Her gaze shifted over to Nui as she commented on what she thought of the groups capabilities. Seemed a bit silly for someone dressed so loudly to doubt the assassination skills of others. "You do not need to worry about me. I am no stranger to assassination." She said with a shrug.

"No pliers, huh?" Smugged Vaas, grinning like a shit eater. With his mouth freed up and no longer full of full metal jackets, he sank back into his own rhythm, a sort of frantic mental sprint with the occasional break for gesturing.

"I'm not saying we have to kill him, hermano, but if he gets between us and exit this means we're not completely fucked, you know? Anyway, he's gotta have some royal guards or something in there, and all we have is an AK and five, maybe six little bombs, if we're lucky. There are gonna be motherfuckers standing at the back. We need all the magical bone-voodoo we can get."

Any chance we could just timeskip past this to the palace? Vaas and Teserract have kinda done the we-can't-kill-the-king-yo conversation about eight times now, and I'm not sure how much longer we can stretch out making bombs.

edited 30th Apr '14 3:32:33 PM by TheMalignancy

"I have observed his guards. Whatever control he has over the people, his control over his guards is orders of magnitude greater. They did not move in the several hours I watched, barring their breathing. Much like a Cleaver."
Tesseract dumped another load of powder onto the table. He was making quick work of it.
"Alert one, and all might be alerted. We must take care with them."

They do have medals for almost, and they're called silver!

The Master's grin widens massively as he hears the demand for a counterattack. "We've got internal defenses but you're right. We can't cower in here forever. Moloch! Send your troops out for a counterattack! Now!"

The Master opens the comms channel to Gotou. "Me and the Professor will be out in a moment we just need to organize our side of the attack. Moloch's half can handle the counterattack duties, don't worry." Damn fool doesn't trust Yarvelling made this building impossible to raid. Via the tech of...no no it's just a coincidence. Maybe he learned from their tactics. He is not a Dalek supporter.

To Be Updated when I'm not Lazy

"FOOLS! YOU DARE DOUBT AKU'S CAPABILITIES FOR SUBTLETY?" Bellowed Aku, not realizing that this wasn't helping his case at all. "Allow me to demonstrate how my powers may be used in ways that my enemies would never expect." As Aku spoke, he shifted into a form that wouldn't stick out so much in a crowd◊. "See! *ahem* See, now I'm less likely to get us disturbed" Beamed Aku as he changed his voice to one more fitting of his new body. "Now, when do we get started?"

edited 3rd May '14 12:06:24 AM by Eachiunn

"Okay." Vaas began, pausing to dump another load of powder. The pliers made the work easier, but they were also a good tool for gesturing, an extra seven inches of metal to emphasise his point. "How about this, hermano? We give these little fucking IEDs to the slaves, once they're done. Three of them we get near the king, tell them that if they set them off it'll look real pretty and he'll be all impressed and shit, that sort of thing. Say it's a present, you know? If we have any left, we get those fuckers to go into the crowd, and tell them set theirs off when they see the king get his present. I've seen this kind of shit online, and the crowd is gonna lose all of their shit as soon as it goes off, start screaming and running around going crazy and not knowing what the fuck is going on, all that shit. We're gonna have to try and get this thing while that's happening. If the guards can't see us over all the assholes trying to find their legs, they can't stop us. If we get lucky, most of the motherfuckers are gonna be too busy trying to find their own legs anyway."

edited 3rd May '14 2:09:03 PM by TheMalignancy

Tokyo

The Embassy

Skirmish

As Kirei threw his black keys forward, reactions were mixed. Forneus simply "swam" further upwards into the air,avoiding them. Andras twisted his body, avoiding any direct hits, although he hissed in pain as two of them grazed him, which was followed by a strangled yelp as one of them embedded itself in his forearm.

Gamygyn was dodged two of them by rearing up on his hind legs, but that simply left him vulnerable for the second Kirei needed to grab him. Holding up the full weight of a demon horse might be difficult, if the Black Key was not embedded in his shadow in a way that prevented him from falling. And so Kirei was able to begin his chant, which caused Gamygyn to cry out, although it sounded more and more like it was coming from further away, as his form began to bubble like a melting statue...

And then Kirei would find one bolt of ice and one of fire coming at him from different directions. Andras stood panting in a kneeling position, pointing his good arm towards Kirei. Forneus, the only one still unharmed, was hanging a few feet in the air up above.

Running Running Running

Meanwhile, Sachiel and Phlogious were in hot pursuit of the Chaos strike force, running right into Zeal's shadow blast. Sachiel was thrown back with a cry, his armour hitting the ground with a satisfying *clang*. But the fiery Phlogious was minimally affected, and began firing a rapid barrage of fireballs at Greed.

They had trouble ahead as well; the fairies had lost the element of surprise, and the angels were disintegrating whole groups of them with bursts of light. Some of them took the initiative and spared a few blasts for the party on the ground; Greed would have to avoid small pillars of light coming from on high. They wouldn't hurt him that much, but even through the ultimate shield they would burn somewhat.

I have no idea whether the lightning works on the Black Key; that's up to Just Some Guy.

Gotou's Base

Outside

Yuriko never saw the attack coming. As the Tiberium shards ripped through her and the laser fire tore at her body, the spell slipped from her grasp, surrounding herself with a large, unfocused cold zone. This somewhat lessened the effectiveness of Kane's flamethrower, but it still surrounded her in flames. Her avatar began to lose form, drops of Magnetite dripping to the ground, turning being absorbed by Tiberium in places and turning it white.

"'Messiah?'" she asked, her voice sounding far away, though not weak. "The ultimate joke of Law... that anyone should need saving. Those who cannot save themselves should just fall, and remain free in doing so. Like they say in this world:" As she became nothing, one final whisper could be heard on the wind. "No gods... no masters..."

---

As Amon smashed open the gate, he would find himself face-to-face with Chaos's initial reserve force. Unlike the casters on the roof, these ones were all beasts of some description. At the Master's commands, they ripped into the Black Hand in a whirlwind of claws and teeth.

A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they will never sit in.

Phlogious blast hit Greed's back, and although the ultimate shield allowed him to ignore it, there was still that small feeling of pain lingering after the attacks. He suddenly reached for Desco's arms, putting them around his neck. "Hold on." He grumbled, as he clenched his fists and started running forward, towards the incoming blasts of light.

In an instant, red sparks started covering his body, as the homunculus grinned. Desco would feel a tingling sensation as the body she was holding onto morphed and clicked into a new shape, the rough texture of Greed's shield now replaced by a fluffy furry one, as Greed shapeshifted into a black direwolf.

With Desco holding onto his neck and with plenty of space on his back to sit, Greed continued to rush forward, using the increased agility of the direwolf body to dodge the pillars of light, diminishing the damage he would get from them.

Moving with the fluidity of water, Amon did his best to let his army take the blow for him. The important part right now was for him to reach his objective and end their stay on this mad battlefield. He took to the shadows- but not before shouting "ATTACK!", putting all of his power behind that command so it would cause quite a distraction.

---

   "Excellent. Now then, step forward into the portal... and good luck, Generals."   

Tatu snapped his fingers and disappeared, leaving behind nothing but the swirling orange portal. Once they stepped through, Aku, Medusa and Nui would find themselves in the noble Kingdom, the sun rising above the horizon, the sandy streets empty- although the sounds of the population waking up could be heard althroughout the place, with dogs barking and people yelling. Their wooden windows closed, the newly arrived Overlord's sights were immediately directed towards the ominous golden palace, within five or ten minutes of walking distance.

Meanwhile, in the rich neighborhood hills, the slimeball from the previous day burst into the home of Vaas and Tesseract, guided by one of the slaves. "Masters!" He called out, his fingers still trembling from all that gold-touching he had done on the previous nights, his smile now wider, to the point one could swear it was about to pop out of his mouth. "Masters! Damned slave, go wake up your Masters, tell them the King's party is about to start! " He yelled, and one of the slaves hurriedly took off towards the room Vaas and Tesseract were in, knocking on the door several times to get their attention towards the slimeball's yells.

Desco held on to Greed, feeling the unexpected change underneath her as he shapeshift. Yogsothoth floated along with Desco, keeping pace with Greed and shielding Desco from the blasts above. Although effectively harming Yogsothoth has the same effect as hurting Desco herself, having the same impact on her overall health, she couldn't feel the damage dealt to him. "Wooo!"

edited 8th May '14 4:52:19 AM by StephanReiken

"I hear a lot of fucking yelling, little slave hermano. What does he want?"

Vaas' voice was unusually cool and quiet, coming from an alcove just a little while up the corridor. Its owner was leaning against the wall inside, carefully balancing his second wind against the desperate cocktail slowly sweating its way out of his body, gently smoking in an extra ingredient to take the edge off. He'd left about half an hour beforehand, when he started noticing Tesseract's meaningful glances between his lighter and their their new clutch of IEDs.

The alcove lit up as he inhaled, bathing him in orange light. As was the universal rule for all-nighters, he looked a little worse for wear. There was some definite fraying around the edges, a certain uncomfortable slickness that suggested the baths in the main hall were going to be getting some attention very soon, but it was all contained in a hasty latticework of drugs and counter-drugs. His eyes were alert but not frantic, and his voice was steady but measured. With all his sharper bits wrapped in cotton wool, Vaas was beginning to approach normality from the other side.

"Fuck. The party's starting, isn't it?"

edited 8th May '14 10:03:06 AM by TheMalignancy