Divine Burden
DNCHURCH
The Fiend is fast. You've probably deduced this from careful observation but it's fast. So fast that it's able to process Tilra shadewarping over very quickly. Very quickly enough to try and attack her from two sides at once, seeing her specter. One from the right, one from the left. And while she does certainly intercept the one from the right... the Fiend yet fail to turn to stone.
Why so?
Because, ridiculously fast as the timing for it to be stoned is, what's with how sinful its existence is, the Fiend is so fast as to be able to sever its one middle arm off in a blink, thus meaning she only to get to turn a severed limb to stone. It was a quick and surprisingly prudent decision from the Fiend, and it doesn't hesitate to try and smack Tilra down to the ground hard with one punch as punishment for forcing it to do that, attempting to hammer her in to the ground in one hit.
As for the severed middle arm, the Fiend make a point of grabbing it with its new middle arm, light enveloping its one severed stump and dissipating to reveal a brand new arm. It then try smacking Tilra down with its stone arm, as a way to further add to the punishment. The stone evaporate from the impact anyway, and then the Fiend rear its arm to try and strike Tilra again.
However, because of this, it seemingly fail to notice WHM's approach. Except he'll see one of its burning eyes on him as he make his approach, his hammer inches from hitting its knee as the Fiend decide which is funnier between letting him take a useless swing or grabbing it. It decides that the latter's funnier, and its lower right arm moves like a blur, grabbing the weapon and stopping it cold in its tracks.
Then, with similar speed to what its displayed so far, the Fiend try flicking WHM into the air -right in front of it in fact-, leaving his stomach exposed (should that work) and then almost half-mindedly punching at him in the torso to send him flying through the infinite jungle.
But even if he does let go of his hammer to try to escape the situation, the Fiend simply flick the weapon upwards into its grasp, hovering it high in the air as if to let him know he's going to get whacked with it, only to punch at him with the lower arm, just to be a dick. Either way, the Fiend laughs and move on to its next target. With insane speed, it moves in front of Artemis's way to let her slam into its back. At which point the demon, with all six of its arms folded, nonchalantly try to backhand Artemis away into infinity.
And even if she want to just teleport, there's the matter of a thing Azura does further down the post. But regardless, for now, the Fiend just try smacking her away with casual ease.
And should that happen, it once again laughs before stomping towards Tilra, readying one of its claws, for once, in hope of piercing her "heart".
Elsewhere, Sarah nods at Cittufeni and offers her lifeforce, deciding that questioning things or going "what?" would be pointless. At the same time, she notices the fight that Tilra and WHM are putting up against the Fiend. In case the latter is blown off, Sarah waits for Cittufeni to have his fill and then jump in front of WHM, catching him before he can get blown back too far. Doing so, Sarah grunts lightly at the force she has to stop, though even in her regular forms, her two arms and good bracing are able to stop him from being flung too far.
Merely thousands of kilometers.
Sarah nods at WHM to see if he's alive and then just hop back back to Cittufeni in a second, letting the former down and glancing to see if the android was doing well. She also notices the Fiend moving in on Tilra, to her horror. And also the downed Emma. Sarah actually risk another teleportation on the beach to try and get her, since she's in full view of the Fiend, Mahito and Azura in that state. Quickly picking up the Empyrreich agent in her arms, Sarah returns to the jungle.
Being honest, theirs was hardly an hiding spot. And with Sarah having no way to heal Emma... the best she could do was hope that both of them had something on them. Just charging at this thing won't cut it but I can't let it kill Tee. Try and see if you can't... Sarah's cut-off when Ovarr make his own debut into the fight against the Fiend, attacking with his stream.
Because of Ovarr's peculiar magic, the stream is able to connect to the Fiend, causing it to screech in pain as a huge chunk of its energy goes away, vaporizing the foam Icarus had hurled at it. And though it's like a perpetual engine, the lost energy being refilled very quickly, the monster's still genuinely hurt and shocked at that fact. Sarah glances at Cittufeni and WHM, as if asking them is they think what she's thinking.
If they do, Sarah kick things up to Limit Breaker and charge towards the Fiend, who dropped WHM's hammer along the way. Immediately, she punch at the stunned Fiend's waist, both her fists held parallel of one another as she slams them forward into the Fiend. Her goal being to slam the Fiend way away and hopefully damage it. And, with WHM and Cittufeni's backing, coupled with her own strength at its peak, she hope to send it packing.
If Sarah is advised against this, the Fiend disappear and re-appear in front of Ovarr, attempting to punch him in the face to slam him into the ground, kicking up a shitton of sand.
Elsewhere, Azura is angry to see all these people using teleportation and all to escape trickery. Slamming her hands together, she uses Space Magic to create an enormous zone forbidding teleportation or other instant movement.
It covers the battlefield like a big purple bubble, and even more of it. And she obviously doesn't need much focus to uphold it, the Elf casually stepping forward to deal with Flandre. She smacks her knuckles into the palms of her hand, using it to create a discreet small barrier within the palm of said hand. Then, she hold said hand up to stop Flandre's assault, bracing herself for it.
Flandre immediately smack into Azura's palm, and the barrier within. And though Azura strains, she keeps her cool as the barrier latch on to Flandre, attempting to engulf her and her energy entirely to completly suppress any collateral damage around her and Meteorika. At the very least, the Barrier, simple as it may be, is able to tank Flandre's impact. And is try holding her up in the air.
At which point Azura leans her whole body back, veins appearing all over her right arm, before going at Flandre with a punch so strong as to shatter her barrier entirely, meaning to smack the vampire right into the ground.
BARRIER MAGIC + REINFORCEMENT MAGIC II
Should that happen, Azura then try to stomp on Flandre's head to keep her down. Gesturing at Meteorika in that case, with full knowledge Flandre could likely retaliate, she find her attention taken elsewhere by the tendrils aimed at her and Meteorika. Tendrils she now has to urgently deal with. Luckily for her, it was life-force. And life-force, she could deal with.
He's absorbed a lot of power. But he might just regret that. Ready, Great Pope?'
Azura's hands begin to glow green, being now clad in Life Magic. Which give the user the ability to directly manipulate life-forces like the tendrils that Ovarr had tossed at them. Lashing out, Azura try to straight-up grab them, using the life-force both as a shield and as a way to literally grab tendrils that would just sap her life-force without those precautions. But she doesn't do that just to grab them herself : she try making her own energy, green flames, fly back to Ovarr by traveling through his tendrils.
She doesn't dare try and wrestle for life-energy with Ovarr when he's empowered. But Meteorika does, grabbing at one tendril to try and directly affect Ovarr by proxy with it. She try using Memor(l)ies to change his memories, making him a fighter on their side, even if it has to be for only one turn.
It's easy too - she build a narrative about WHM accidentally shooting off his wing, making the post-apoc zombie smasher out to be a fierce fighter for the Church who landed a devastating blow on Ovarr, requiring the Fiend to share its energy with him to save him. A slight tweak, but all that Meteorika need.
At the same time, Meteorika try touching Flandre's head. At this point, with Azura stomping on Flandre's head, it'd be hard to make up memories on the fly while already trying to rewrite Ovarr's. So Meteorika try directly attacking the shape of Flandre's soul to deal heavy damage to her. Not lethal damage, but damage that could leave her helpless to further retaliation at least.
Elsewhere, Veilman find himself shot up by Croque and slammed by a Rod of God from Icarus. However, being a Faltine, this doesn't really kill him so much as it make him lose control on his energy. His humanoid body becomes a floating fireball of a sort as bullets and tungsten rods slame front and back. With him far from the battlefield thanks to Croque, there's no way the subsequent detonation will cause damage to the good guys anyhow.
GGGGGGGGGGGGGRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!
And before he can try and just take Icarus and Croque, Ovarr goes and SUCC in his life-force, causing the explosion to begin sooner. A big blast, of commendable size, but not as apocalyptic as what he could've tried. Regardless, getting out of it will be Icarus and Croque's main priority for now : they can rest easy knowing they took out the second Pillar of the Church.
...
Saitama chew upon his particular tendril like a spaghetti, unaffected by it. Both he and THOR are stuck in the void, the dimension with the island in it a cube somewhere in the distance.
YOU ARE SNACKING MID-BATTLE! STOP THAT!
No.
Edited by Bolded1 on Mar 24th 2024 at 11:10:45 AM
Fallout 2? More like Fallout 2 bad.
Church of Gor
Ovarr snickers devilishly at the life energy he steals, immediately using some of it to fix his ruined wing. Thanks to the Fiend's massive energy source, he still has plenty to spare from what he got this turn alone.
If the Fiend comes in, Ovarr channels a magic barrier to take the punch. Normally doing so isn't the best idea, as going for a transformed shield to try to block would be more effective for him due to his physical prowess. However, physically blocking, as shown already in this fight, can still make Ovarr be forced back from impact. A magic barrier doesn't make Ovarr move at all.
And while normally Ovarr's magic barrier wouldn't be able to take the punch without shattering, it can now due to Ovarr using the stolen life energy from the Fiend itself to power it up.
Regardless of what happens here, he then tries to zap towards Sarah, planning to use his stolen energy to reinforce his allies in battle. However, Azura's newly created field prevents him from moving in this way, thus forcing him to fly normally instead. Good thing his wing got fixed or he'd be stuck with jumping and running.
"Annoying one, that one. Well, I'll just deal with her fi-"
Cue the green flames finally reaching him, stunning him and forcing the tendrils (the ones sent to Azura and Meteorika) to vanish right after. It definitely hurt to get hit by that, but he tries to not show it. Anyhow, it seems the spell has a 'built-in' aspect that prevents its caster from getting stunlocked endlessly into damaging and killing themselves in this kind of scenario. Pretty advanced, no wonder he had to chant something to use it.
But things take a turn for the worst when Meteorika does her thing. Ovarr's mind isn't weak, far from it, but such a small and easy change doesn't really trigger any alarms so to say. His wing is healed now, but he remembers that it had to be healed. He remembers that it got shot from a direction he wasn't looking at.
The memory manipulation sets in. Gaining the knowledge that it was WHM who shot at him, something he didn't know until now. And with him not quite remembering the fury status he was under when it happened, he also has no way of realizing the same might have happened to WHM. His memory's telling him that WHM is a warrior of the church. When did he learn that? He has no idea. But he doesn't feel like there's enough wrong with this thought to question it.
The now empowered Ovarr's aura flares up. Literally, it seems like he's enveloped in golden flames. He then starts flying towards WHM's location (ignoring the Fiend if it had gotten close to him), and if he manages to reach him, he'll attempt to grab him by his throat and viciously slam him into the ground.
This won't kill WHM if Ovarr pulls it off, but by the various gods, will it hurt like hell.
—
The tendril attached to Saitama just vanishes after he starts biting on it. Is it because of his power or because being in the void severed the connection to Ovarr? We'll probably never know.
The tendril attached to Veilman vanishes as well after his explosion, though not before stealing some of the explosion's energy first.
As such, the only one who still has a tendril attached to it is the Fiend.
Edited by DevilPsyco on Mar 24th 2024 at 11:30:32 AM
In the year 202X, all is devastation... Soon, any last shred of hope had by the saintliest optimist shall die and decay.
Vengeful Ex-Maverick Hunter
Church
Ow.
Not a thought that usually crosses Flandre's mind, her eyes going wide and some spit flying out her mouth as she gets gut punched. She's left off balance long enough to get stomped down into the ground, gritting her teeth. Laevateinn falls out her grasp and sinks blade first into the ground nearby.
But then Azura gets distracted, and while normally Flandre would try to get up right away she's also fatigued and instead tries to use her head. She knows Mahito's MO and that he's the priority target, so she stays down as if too dazed to move for the moment; waiting for that wannabe youkai to get closer and reach out to her.
"That's right... you're within my range." she thinks to herself, almost ruining her plan by smirking but keeping an exhausted expression.
Then she shoots up, summoning her familiar Karasu the giant bat in thin air to pounce Azura and start trying to bite her face off. She doesn't expect Karasu to win, simply to keep Azura busy for a few precious seconds as she reaches up to grab Mahito's arm.
"Die."
Normally she has to manually reach out for a target's 'eye' when at range and make a crushing motion. But with point blank contact... Her aura glows purple as she channels all her energy to completely and thoroughly destroy Mahito right down to his very soul. Being so thorough takes a lot of her energy though, more than usual and she'll wind up in an even worse state magic wise but she figures it's a good enough trade.
"That was a pointless encounter with a pointless person."
Interceptor
Church Of Gor
Croque
Croque boosts away from the incoming death fireball of Veilman. Then she cuts her overclock.
Overclock disengaged. Running checks...
Purging Originium buildup.
Repairing internals.
System integrity at 82%.
Croque starts boosting back towards the main fight, engaging her warp drive as she does.
A fun fact about the warp drive: it isn't teleportation. It's accelerating something to higher speeds, though this is limited in atmosphere to prevent the resulting wave of particles from destroying whatever is on the other end.
At any rate, Croque will be back next turn.
Artemis
Martial Magic: Perfect Parry
"N-nice try!!"
Just before (and I mean within nanoseconds- the timing for this is tight) Artemis puts up a magical parry. It clashes with the Fiend, and...
...breaks.
Well, shit. I guess there's a limit after all.
Artemis breaks several airspeed records as she goes flying back into the distance, holding her wings out to try and slow herself down. She's still in her oddly twisted form, which helps for what comes next.
Artemis's wings crack and twist in odd manners, growing in size and becoming more-or-less leathery bat wings instead of her usual 'angelic' ones. These aren't just for show- by shedding all those feathers, she can move faster. Sort of.
Artemis starts to speed back towards the fight, emitting an ear-splitting screech of fury as she does. I don't think she's mad anymore.
She's totally calm.
Intrigue
Phoenix takes a deep breath.
"I can try... I never experimented out of fear for hurting someone, so..."
She focuses inward, on that burning, blazing heart within her. At the same time, she tries to visualize the image of the flames moving to her will in her mind's eye...
The fire shifts a bit- it's more controlled than it was, more... directed. It's still wavering a bit, Phoenix having to concentrate quite a bit to make the flames move as such.
"Move the flames forward, huh... I guess I can try that..."
She raises her arm, and imagines all the flames rushing to her hand, into one compact ball, and then exploding once she flicks it forward.
She flicks her arm and hand forward, and all of the flames quickly build up around her arm before coming out in one solid blast. Phoenix's eyes widen in surprise and her flames quiver a bit before she refocuses herself.
It wasn't the compact ball she had envisioned, but she had gotten the flames to be focused into just her arm, at least for a moment.
"That... worked? Holy hell, that actually worked..! It probably isn't much, but... At least I can do something with them."
aeiou
DNC
Taye paid no attention to the grand hall, having decided that whatever was going down there were of no immediate concern. Instead, she kept her mind on moving ahead to wherever the cold corridors led them to. It seems the hooded man was quick to disappear, confounding her more than usual. Enough that she ended up falling behind the others, and she was last to arrive in the crypt.
If it was just Kai pulling in a target, Taye might have prepared to place her sword upon their neck. But Kana and others have made their moves, which means her joining in would only interfere with them.
Thus, Taye held her sword in a defensive position, ready to protect herself against whatever might happen. Better safe than sorry.
Edited by Hotpizza on Mar 24th 2024 at 11:15:08 PM
Hi
Church
The fiend is fast. This has been observed. Fast, even for someone like Sarah, who mind you, is pretty fucking fast. Tilra, barely Sarah's superior in physical power at her best, is not in the competition as she is right now.
Tilra raises her arm, in instinct, quickly as she can, rooting herself against a net made from reality's fiber. Simultaneously, using A Pillow of Winds, she crafts an impossibly dense air cushion against the fiend's strike, forming an impassible cushion of white clouds that the fiend obliterates practically instantaneously, striking Tilra's arm with such intent and force that it snaps.
She flinches, her arm setting back into place with an earsplitting crack more like a shockwave that hasn't the time to travel a single millimeter before she's activated Interstellar Overdrive again, comprehending the monumentality of the monster's power to some greater extent, however fleeting it might be. The pillow of air hasn't finished parting, still maintaining its exact shape save for the impression of the fiend's arm crashing through it, so little time has passed.
She turns featureless, body cloaking in an instant, covering in purple light that expands out starting at her head and yet the fiend is so fast that Tilra's transformation hasn't even completed yet by the time the 7-headed beast delivers its strike, purple still expanding to cover her body in sparkling starlight.
Tilra shatters the discarded stone arm with a backhand that kicks up waves out into the infinite sea as far as there is to be seen, and clenches her hand into a fist with a burst of light, the air fusing in her bare hands from the heat and pressure. It delivers a strike that Tilra meets with her own, long arm ripping through the air like a point-blank rifle shot from god.
Her strike is weaker and costlier, a compensating supernova of stardust exploding out from where their colliding fists meet wrought alongside a momentary void where the universe around them briefly ceases to exist before mending itself. Tilra is blown back by her own power, ripping stardust explosion still in the midst of itself by the time the fiend claws for her heart. Tilra abandons ship and shade-warps away just barely not in time, the fiend's claws raking a groove into her shoulder like engraving glass.
Shit.
Now, with teleportation officially disabled, Tilra has to walk through shadows just to get to her destination, but quite fortuitously, the Fiend isn't exclusively fighting her.
Melding out of the shadows at a very far distance, Tilra recovers her stamina, clutching her head with one hand to try and get herself to stay awake. As with when she was fighting Sarah, her own strength is betrayed by low stamina, and the Fiend just forced her to fight at full blast for longer than she's ever had to.
Return of the Son of Nothing - 4/8
Edited by Whoma on Mar 24th 2024 at 5:57:27 AM
And it's something quite peculiar / Something shimmering and white.
Vengeful Ex-Maverick Hunter
Intrigue
Okuu while not damaged by the fire directly, does get pushed back by the physical force of it. Despite that, she's smiling.
"Hehe, see? Just need to keep practicing it like that and you'll have it handled before you know it." she said, grinning and giving a thumbs up with her non gun arm. "Maybe you could get it down to just radiating heat or something. I'm technically always radiating energy but it's harmless unless I'm going all out."
"That was a pointless encounter with a pointless person."
Zamba
School
Oh... Sure.
Violetta said this with a hint of suspicion. Her first day of school, she meets that Clover Si, and inmediately they are eager to know something about her homeland.
What would Clover want about her? Could they be some kind of secret agent, wanting to know about her?
Or... It could be ''something else'"?
When she got into the Arena, she left behind her friends and love interests. Who knows when she could see them again, let alone have a way to connect with them again.
This meeting was so sudden for her... And she likes this experience. But she want to apparent to be tougher for them right now. Right now, she sips her coffee, and asks:
So, you are from China? I saw you wrote your name with Chinese characters.
Church of Gorology
Bely, tired and all, finally arrived to the battlefield where the Fiend is being fought.
BOW POWER, GIDDY UP!
She wears her Cowgirl dress
, and points a sizable gun at the Fiend. She fires a round of incendiary bullets at it.
Interceptor
Intrigue
"Radiating heat, huh... Hmm."
The flames over Phoenix's body slowly die out, but there's a shimmering around her- the air around her is quite warm. She seems to close her eyes for a bit in thought.
I always thought of it as this uncontrolled blaze that I could barely contain... but... it isn't that. It's like using a stove. Put it on full blast, and sure, you'll burn the food... but if you use it just right..?
She lets out a calm sigh, and sparks a small fire in her hand.
"I was just... handling it wrong, I guess. Fear tends to make one irrational, huh? I was scared of myself, I guess."
Phoenix lets out a small chuckle before spewing some flames from her back...
...and going into the air in an uncontrolled flight.
-I didn't think this one throuuuuuuuuuugh..!"
She's flying in a horribly erratic pattern, yelling all the while before finally thinking to use her hands and feet as boosters, too. She slows herself down.
"I-I'm flying. I'm actually flying. A-a few moments ago I had no idea what I was doing, how am I managing to figure this out so fast?"
aeiou
The Priest
Avar-Laren, Dojo, Church, DNC
Sebastien would eventually come to the end of the halls, and to a massive, slightly opened set of stone doors. The cobble underfoot became sand in the massive arena beyond, and when I say massive, I mean truly huge.
Much of it was clad in darkness, enough so that its true size could not be determined, but those few areas where the sunlight beamed in through holes in the domed roof were spaced far apart, giving only hints of how big it might’ve actually been. Regardless, it was large enough that the mighty Baltaos, some two-hundred and fifty feet in length, was able to comfortably reside within. In the Bazelgeuse’s mouth was an injured Brachydios, which it violently shook as though the mighty brute wyvern were no more than a ragdoll. In the beast’s shadow, a group of five Poachers crossed blades with thirteen foot sentinels of stone; hulking golems lacking heads and animated by some sorcery. They fought up-closed by clobbering their foe with swinging, handless hammer-arms, but any Poacher fool enough to try and put distance between them and the golems were quickly met with a stream of lava, fired from the Dead City Guardians’ chests.
The Poachers were outnumbered by the Guardians, but somehow seemed to be handling themselves just fine. These aren’t the recruits we saw back at the camp, Luin realized, these are real Poachers.
Indeed they were a sight to be feared, or perhaps admired, or some mixture of both—their armor, forged from the remains of Elder Dragons, gave them a ferocious appearance. Their armaments were things of myth, blazing swords and freezing blades that danced in the light. One who didn’t know any better might’ve been forgiven for thinking they had just stumbled upon a party of warrior-gods, clad in flesh and steel and dismantling the heavyweight golems as though they were nothing at all.
——
"Very well, then. Pay close attention—learn what I teach, and it may someday serve you well."
Cardell struggled subtly for breath—he did not gasp for air or anything as dramatic as that, but the way his chest rose and fell, the fact that he was breathing through his mouth now and not his nose, all pointed towards his being winded. Perhaps it was just the lengthy diatribes he had delivered over the course of the fight finally catching up to him, but more likely than not, it was the execution of a Skill’s Latent Power that had demanded so much of him. He lifted his arms in front of him again and began circling Beruka, his footing staggered and ever-so-slightly off-pace…
But was it a ruse?
There were hints as well that he might have been bluffing—a focus in his eyes, a mischievous grin on his lips—but perhaps he was bluffing his bluffing? There was only one way to find out. The teacher shot forwards, leg drawn back for a kick.
And then Beruka’s perception of reality fell apart.
ADVANCED SKILL: MIRRORS
All at once, Beruka was confronted with three different realities, three different perceptions of the world around her transmitted from her retinas to her brain, all of them convincing but only one was real.
Cardell planted the foot he’d drawn back into the earth and leapt forwards, bringing his other foot towards the side of Beruka’s head.
Cardell continued towards her, and drove the foot he’d drawn back for his kick ahead into Beruka’s leg, to knock her off-balance.
Cardell ceased suddenly, sliding to a stop in front of her and throwing a flaming fist into her gut.
All three of these possible presents were equally convincing, and yet two of them were false realities, only one was the truth. The woman would need to find out which one, and fast, or risk being struck with a powerful blow.
——
Cittufeni was far from any position to create plans—for now, he was but a follower. So when Sarah took the lead on a joint attack, Cittufeni said naught. He only attacked with her, expulsing a little Creation Power from his back and feet to fly towards the Fiend while storing a very good quantity of it in his fist, reared back behind his head. He intended to match Sarah’s speed so their blows could connect at the exact same moment—upon contact, the amount of Creation Power he’d unleash into the Field’s chest and the force with which he’d unleash it was so great that his own arm would explode, a hail of steel shards firing outwards as he himself were rocketed backwards and into the sand.
Here’s hoping it was enough to disappear the Fiend from view—may the devilish beast become one with the distant horizon.
——
Alerted by the "hah!" from Kai’s lips, the shadow broke from behind the statue just as a harpoon exploded against the stone, decimating the likeness of an ancient king who’s face was now wiped from history and forgotten by the world. In another time there might’ve been some reaction, any reaction at all, to the utter erasure of a man’s image…but these were not “another time”. These were days where the present mattered infinitely more than the past, for the actions they made now dictated the future, and none would fault Kai. He did what he had to do.
As the shadow-cast figure ran, the knife in his hands was visible for all to see. Kai and Taye both would recognize him as the hooded man they’d seen in the chamber mere moments before it had all gone to damnation. As his ran, his path was obvious: Mia, the smallest and most fragile of all in the room. All three of them turned at once towards Hange’s voice. Ladwin was quick to usher Mia behind him as his eyes locked on to the rapidly approaching Kana and he drew the blade from his back. The younger of the two princesses, for her part, found her eyes glued to the assassin darting swiftly towards her—a scream had just started from her when the forgotten daughter smashed into him. Ladwin’s head swept backwards, at the woman’s tackling of an enemy he hadn’t known was there.
If not for her…
Ladwin was deathly still. One hand reached out, keeping those he had been assigned the task of protecting behind him, while the other, strong and sturdy, held tightly to the grip of his claymore. He listened to Hange’s explanation with doubt evident in his eyes at first, but…they’d just saved the princesses from a threat unseen to him. It wasn’t proof of their good intentions by any stretch of the word…but the knight realized quickly he had no choice in the say. "Her Grace—the Queen, is she alright?" He asked the group, doubting they’d have answers but hoping they would. His words were laced with concern. Emilia stared out from behind Ladwin, worry writ upon her face.
Mia looked elsewhere. Her gaze, eyes wide as a defenseless animal that had escaped death by a hair’s graze, was affixed upon her would-be killer. Beneath Kana, the hooded assassin laughed. Her blade pressed at his throat. He loosened his clasp on the knife in his hand and let it clang noisily to the ground, flashing his blackened teeth in a twisted grin at the woman. "Dhagn nevhûn cenn, fool ro ij bur. Thiuk ukhall be avhe mubarum ro your race!" His words were evil and twisted as he spoke them, sighing through the crypt like the hiss of a snake. His dark eyes stared into Kana’s own, but in them burned a fire; an all-consuming blaze.
Edited by ISZATSO on Mar 24th 2024 at 10:43:19 AM
Do you believe in 'Gravity'?
Hi
DNC
"I snapped the queen out of her indecision. What she did after that, I didn't see," Hange says, standing straight. They tilt their head a little as Kana tackles the would-be assassin to the floor. "She might even still be alive after you escape."
Hange knelt beside the fallen assassin, his words washing over her. The language was wholly unfamiliar, but something about it felt foul.
"You know, if you can't speak our language, I might just have to kill you right here," Hange said, picking their dagger up off the ground and placing it just in front of the hairless man's eye, burning as it was. "You aren't very useful if we can't understand you, after all."
Hange could see the fire in his eyes, but, it couldn't hurt to check. This was a test of the extent of the assassin's conviction. It's a useful first step in deciding whether or not to step to torture.
Not that she'd uh. Done... much, of that, in the past.
Maybe a little.
And it's something quite peculiar / Something shimmering and white.
Vengeful Ex-Maverick Hunter
Intrigue
"See?" Okuu grinned and was gonna add more but then Phoenix abruptly took flight. Okuu looked quite surprised and spread her wings to catch up, both to continue their chat but also in case Phoenix started dropping like a rock.
"Well you're not holding yourself back with fear anymore so maybe that's helping." Okuu suggested. Truthfully she wasn't an expert on these things. "Like how birds learn to fly on instinct!"
DNC
"Try anything and I'll hit you with enough poison that you'll be paralyzed for a week." Medicine huffed to the would be assassin. She then turns to the royals and knight. "Anyoen injured I'm a medic- healer. Oh and I was one of the last through so I heard the queen lady rally her guards."
"That was a pointless encounter with a pointless person."
The white-haired man is not stupid. He knew something was off when one of the demon's eyes locked onto him like that. But unfortunately, he was too invested in swinging that hammer, and as a momentum-based weapon he can't redirect it quickly enough to avoid the demon's response. He does what he can to dodge, but between the speed of the fiend and his utter refusal to let go of the hammer, a solid hit lands against his chest.
Looking closely when he gets launched, his refusal to let go of the hammer costed him a couple of fingers, but even when separated from his body those fingers grip the hilt so tightly as to make removal impossible. As for the man himself, his clothing ruptures all over, both from the initial impact and from all the trees and terrain he's crashing through - no easy feat, that. Inspecting his clothing would reveal that it consists of some type of ultra tough fabric reinforced with a spidersilk-like substance and interlaced with reinforcing wires of some strange metal. Functionally equivalent to armor in its own right, while being as plain-looking on the outside as any ordinary cloth.
Once his momentum is finally halted by Sarah, the white-haired man grimaces while nodding back to her, managing to stand while the flaming aura around him cauterizes the numerous scratches all over his body. That one hit put more damage on him than the entire rest of the battle, and it's rattled him somewhat. Still, he has a duty to uphold.
Presumably brought back to the battlefield by Sarah, he nods in response to her glance, quickly retrieving the sledgehammer and joining in on her attack. The fingers he lost are regained in an unusual and kind of gross biological equivalent of welding, then he secures his grip and puts every ounce of raw strength he can into the next swing, timing it alongside Sarah's and Cittufeni's blows with the goal of combining their attacks into the biggest hit imaginable.
Investing all his strength into that attack means he's a bit worn out and needs time to recuperate - time he does not get to have, given Azura manipulating Ovarr into going after him. He manages to empower his flaming aura, the relatively milder flames clashing with Ovarr's own golden flames, but is unable to physically move fast enough to turn away the demon, promptly getting chokeslammed by someone formerly on the same side. Being choked is one thing, being slammed is another, but the internal damage is the worst aspect - some part of his spinal cord snapped, leaving his body unable to respond. Not for lack of trying, either, his body shaking as he does his best to fight something that should mean total paralysis.
<...Oh no.>
His armor is in ruins. His body is broken. He can't call upon his vast arsenal. He doesn't have time to heal. Even his contingency plans won't be of use here. To put things very bluntly, the white-haired man is in an extremely bad situation with very few options.
"EVERYONE GET AWAY FROM ME, RIGHT NOW!"
That, and a few seconds to comply, is all the warning anyone gets before the man straight-up explodes, radiation flooding out of his body as his disappears into a cloud of glowing particles and black smoke. It's impossible to make out anything that's happening in there and inadvisable to approach, but whatever it is, it's clearly not pretty or pleasant - everyone within a vaguely reasonable distance of where the man formerly was would somehow hear agonized psychic screaming from within their own minds.
Then comes the waves of heat, water and the few remaining patches of ice vaporizing almost immediately, large swathes of the former-sand-turned-glass following suit. The ground begins to shake as the level of power release keeps intensifying, the psychic screaming keeping pace. While the ground near the man has been rapidly converted into a gas by sheer dint of energy, the bits of sand and glass further out begin blackening, turning into some kind of horrible slag.
Owing to his apparent decision to morph into a WMD, the white haired man doesn't actually do anything past this point. Not for now, at least.
Edited by engie on Mar 25th 2024 at 10:05:46 PM
The fact that only 140 characters are allowed here is honestly so disappointing to me.
Divine Burden
Kana kept her position on top of the Assassin, finding it a good reason not to glance at the princesses. She briefly stop to wonder if they'd seen a man die before.
... Hange had been efficient. Kana saw little use in telling anything to the assassin with her "teammates" moving over. Her purpose was just holding him down at this point.
Fallout 2? More like Fallout 2 bad.
DNC
As expected, it was the suspicious hooded man from earlier on. To think someone so unassuming was so quick as well, dodging a harpoon in close quarters...
Taye continued holding her sword defensively, watching events unfold before her. The fact that it was the redheaded daughter who's targeted first was equal parts surprising and unsurprising.
"Last I caught a glance at Frilda, she gave her guards instructions and left the hall. That was all I could see."
Stepping closer to the assassin, Taye slowly lowered her blade, though still ready to use it at a moment's notice. With her other hand, she held a waterskin (where did she pull that from?) over the man's face, and tipped it over. A deluge of salty seawater poured forth, a far greater volume than what could possibly be held in such a tiny container, and with it a couple strands of kelp, a few pieces of coral, and was that a live guppy?
She capped the waterskin, stopping the flow. Perhaps that was enough to snuff out the flames in his eyes.
"Speak Common."
Edited by Hotpizza on Mar 25th 2024 at 8:56:17 PM
Interceptor
Dawn Never Came
Kai catches his harpoon in his hand and pulls a chunk of stone off of it. He really does hit hard. He walks over to where everyone is gathered and smiles a bit when Taye pours seawater onto the man's face.
Good one.
He levels his harpoon at the would-be assassin's throat.
"I agree with the nice lady who may or may not be my girlfriend here. Speak English, please."
He motions his head at Taye, mostly to specify who he'd been referring to by 'nice lady'.
aeiou
Nonsense Man
School
Save
- Guitar, Coffee and Blue Planet
Oh no. Oh no. Oh no no no no no...
If there's one thing that "Pyra" can't handle, it's people asking about their past. They just spawned into the Arena yesterday with no real memories, but how are you going to explain THAT?
- Avoid the question
- > Answer the question
Pulling up the pause menu to briefly bluescreen and reboot, "Pyra" checks the origin of their entire engine.
Hong Kong.
That certainly will help explaining why they can write in Chinese characters as that is one of the default languages there...
Yep, the language is set to Cantonese.
As for having no past... Let's just say it's retrograde amnesia...
Organise your thoughts, "Pyra"!
| You |
"I... briefly lived in Hong Kong for a bit before being teleported here... I... unfortunately can't recall anything before the fire so I don't know if I was born there or moved there at a very young age..."
Perhaps the tone comes off as awkward and uncomfortable?
The first bell rings.
| You |
"L-let's go back to the classroom..."
Embrace the Insanity, Nonsense Man’s Activities are about to begin
Zamba
DNC
Grace extends his hand towards Hange.
Please, Hange, we aren't here to make a diplomatic mess. We are here to deliver a package that we didn't received yet.
Joy only comments:
Fascinating, I never heard that language of yours. Sounds a bit Arab, yes, but with an ancient, wild flavor.
School
I knew it... Well, almost: I would have said you were from Beijing.
She continues.
Lucky you... I still have fond memories of all my friends from Argentina... It's hard to me to want to see them, and not to have a way to get back, or even get a phone call or a text message for them...
The bell rings. "Pyra" got saved by the bell, literally.
Thanks for the coffee, let's get back.
Edited by BombonBombin on Mar 25th 2024 at 5:29:09 AM
Rumors about my death were greatly exaggerated... Yet.
Nonsense Man
School
Save
- Guitar, Coffee and Blue Planet
| You |
"Y-you're welcome... I'll stay back to clean things up..."
That was VERY intense. Deep breaths, deep breaths...
Briefly washing the mugs and putting them back into the cupboard, "Pyra" also walks back to class 6-3-or-3-3 for the final 2 lessons.
During the transition between lessons, "Pyra" zones out for a few minutes thinking about what happened during lunchtime. Should they go back to the room tomorrow, or should they find somewhere else? Definitely not in the cafeteria, that place is crowded and accidentally crashing into someone and self-combusting would be really troublesome...
After school, "Pyra" quickly heads to the library to return the books, and borrows some about bass guitar chords instead.
Putting the books and their bag into the carriage compartment of the bike and about to cycle home, "Pyra" feels like someone is looking at them from behind a corner.
Embrace the Insanity, Nonsense Man’s Activities are about to begin
cat :3
Church
Still carrying some momentum from the railgun's backblast, Icarus is flying backwards again, with just enough speed to get out of Veilman's blast zone.
Target down. Everything alright, Croque?
Being a couple of kilometers away from the Fiend is a detriment to him - he struggles to make out individual fighters at this range. He should really have installed high-quality optics. But oh well.
In a semicircle shape, he tries to fly around to Meteorika, trusting that Croque will be fine for now. Can someone distract those two for me? I'll try to split them apart!
Oh, perfect, someone is currently distracted by a bat.
Landing at last and giving the thrusters a moment to cool down, Icarus fires a hookshot targeted at Azura from behind. If it connects, he'll try to pull her towards him - with enough thrust from the hook itself to make her fly behind him. There, she'll be met with a burst of plastic foam - this time with a hardening agent so that it becomes solid as soon as it's within range - as well as a good three seconds of machine gun fire. If the hookshot doesn't connect, because, say, she dodges, the robot shoots another tungsten rod her way from the railgun.
Edited by StepexNo2 on Mar 25th 2024 at 4:17:23 PM
"Please do not reproduce this textbook." - S. Banach & A. Tarski
fuck.
Church
Emma's been stabbed through the chest, her body — while bloodless — still gave a kind of refreshing for the demon upon stabbing her. She's out for the count and if it weren't for Sarah's efforts, she would've probably been in a much worse position.
Her body's emergency functions kick into high gear the moment Sarah's outside of her 5 meter radius. A thin sheet of ice forms around her, the moisture of the jungle freezes from the rate she's sapping heat around her. Parts of the sheet forms into a solid barrier.
Once this barrier forms, Emma is fully conscious again but in some kind of trance, the wound stabbed into her reminds her that she really isn't as human as she thinks she is. Well, to understand the enemy, she must become it. So perhaps being non-human gives her the edge above her enemy.
An idea hits her, her gun transforms into a gas cannon. It sucks up all the chunks of ice her barrier is creating. The tip accumulates frost and forms into a cone that's the size of her torso.
Before it jams itself, Emma blasts the arrow to the fiend. The sheer cold from the arrow makes itself stuck onto the monster. What it lacks for in penetrative power makes up for in an energy drain at that specific spot it sticks to.
Which is why Emma quickly charges up another, and another, until she unleashes a small volley of them at the damn thing.
Pucci
"I do apologize if this may come off as sudden, but what does a man like you do around here?"
Lucas looks relatively lifeless whilst asking Pucci, a trait that seems more part of him rather than anything that goes inside his head. There was almost no warmth to it, it felt more formal rather than it did welcoming or human in spite of appearances.
real
"Not this shit again!"
Blade is taken aback by her adversary's refusal to properly die. She just barely manages to twist out of the way of the Laevateinn, feeling a violent gust of wind whizz past her ears from the raw power behind the blow.
That thing can split itself at will to avoid getting cut! Projectiles don't do much either... The only way to get rid of it for good must be... to cut it so many times it can't keep up!
Grudge Style: Stay Down
Dark aura billowing from her body and sword like oily power plant smoke, Blade launches herself forward, attempting to slice through Clone 3 even as the ground below her feet explodes in a roaring inferno as the Wounding Wand tears through it. If this attack connects, Clone 3 will realize her body has actually been sliced not once, but dozens of times, and hopefully collapse into a heap of inert chunks of condensed magic.
Regardless of the outcome, Blade will not escape unscathed - even though she managed to narrowly avoid getting bisected twice, the raging pillar of fire accompanying the upward swing catches her, severely charring her suit and leaving her with serious burns.
Edited by Arachnos on Mar 25th 2024 at 12:24:46 PM
King of the Monsters
Onyxis
Narktus watches every motion Raex makes, studying potential openings and weaknesses. He transforms his blade into the Ultima Weapon as he raises it to defend against Raex's strike.
The ensuing collision craters the ground around them, but Narktus stands strong. He strikes back just as fast, performing a one-handed spin slash that can knock Raex off his feet and into the air, after which the conqueror will juggle him with explosive ki blasts from his free hand.
"He's gearing up for war."
fuck.
Mech
EXCELSUS feels the laser aimed at it, but before it could try and intercept by jamming the targeting system, a bombardment originating from multiple different places entirely then activated and rained hell on the gigantic mech. The mech manages to tank the attack just fine in spite of the explosives but it chips away the exterior from nearly all angles.
The proximity of the two mechs prompts it to rev its pair of extended blades up and then allowing its weight to fall upon itself. It slashes up and down over and over and over, leaving craters in hopes of hitting Monica and Croque's mechs its sheer girth.
This focus on the mechs makes EXCELSUS turn a blind eye to Kado jumping on its leg, allowing him to get on and do whatever is necessary to stop this behemoth.
MG EXCELSUS 56.5%
Weathertop
Mark, Nick, and Reiss walk in.
"What a fucking entry to this island..."
Mark's crassness contrasts with his shared sentiment to the fallen lizardmen, and Kelhorn especially, since he's the one that lead them here and not be fed to that thing early on.
"We're willing to give a helping han—"
"Don't just drag us into another quest, Reiss!"
"If it pisses Nick off then I'm more for it."
Nick groans. Outside of their banter, they chatter among themselves as to what could possibly bring such a thing to a port if what Ammeltunn says is true. It's all quiet whispers but they all come to a consensus that something outside of nature's control could've brought it there.
real
Wilderness - Pious Augustus
In some non-discreet part of the Arena, Pious has rounded up a bunch of the worst low-lifes he can find with ease.
Pious laughs, " Welcome, my degenerate children. You are all guilty of being the worst things humanity has to offer around here. How do you plead? "
The criminals all argue among themselves before Pious boots them all into a nearby pit for not coming to a consensus quickly. Without hesitation, Pious conjures some concrete and drowns the criminals to a slow, agonizing death.