Enter The Arena As Your Avatar -- The Spinoff!

The Offer of a Lifetime

   "Very well, but only because you asked so politely,"    the illusion of Myth!Loki replies.    "You see, that donkey-headed charlatan from Egypt, Set, thought it would be funny to move in here and try to usurp my rightful title as the reigning harbinger of chaos."   

He conjures an image of Set for Katre and Troa to study, then dispels it.

   "Normally, I would challenge that worthless piece of garbage myself and make him regret ever setting foot here, but..."   

He raises his shirt to reveal a nasty-looking scar where Gorr's Necrosword had pierced the real Myth!Loki.

   "Until I can fully recover from my run-in with a self-righteous brute calling himself the God Butcher, I'm in no condition to face him. Fortunately, who should fate guide me to but two of the most powerful goddesses I've had the pleasure of seeing in action?"   

He grins at the wicked Sisters.

   "Destroy Set on my behalf, and your freedom will be guaranteed. Bring me his ugly head on a spike, and not only will I personally deliver all of your enemies to you in chains, but my sons Fenrir and Jormungandr will happily serve as your loyal war beasts in the conquests to come!"   

To drive the point home, he conjurs an image of Katre and Troa riding atop Fenrir and Jormungandr, respectively, clad in regal black armor and wearing crowns fit for an empress upon their heads.

Loki continues his act, hoping his plan would prove successful.

Edited by IchigoMontoya on Feb 7th 2020 at 2:47:24 AM

The shaking dies down for now.

Getting an ass beat and needing to go run to someone else heh? Heh... mock Troa.

Kinda make me doubt the part where you bring our enemies in chains, but ya know, as long as we're freed, that's good. We'll do the revenge, you go back to being greasy.

You'll need to unlock the bindings if you want us to fight Set... though we'd need to find him first, and you'd need to make sure that no one interferes. Such as, our sisters. They're gonna run in.

And the animals... yeha they're cool but we dislike the whole medieval look. We'll stick to the future.

Edited by Bolded1 on Feb 6th 2020 at 10:48:50 AM

The illusory Myth!Loki smiles, pointedly ignoring Troa's uncalled for and hypocritical insult.

   "Locating Set ought to be a simple task for a peerless telepath such as yourself, my dear Troa. As for your sisters, well... they won't have a goddamn clue what's going on."   

He turns on his heel.

   "Now, I'm going to need some time to prepare the ritual that breaks your restraints. Tell no one about our little meeting, and meet me atop that mountain in a few days."   

He points to the Throat of the World, and his smile spreads into a full-on grin.

   "I do look forward seeing you both again, my bloodthirsty little beauties."   

With that, he disappears in a flash of light.

Now that the plan had been set into motion despite the... less than ideal timing, Loki's gaze flickers to Pseudo, and his lips curl into a smirk.

"Heh... I hope you found that every bit as entertaining as I did."

Edited by IchigoMontoya on Feb 6th 2020 at 2:21:44 AM

They shrug and begin to converse to each other, in Xir language.

"It was. Now we'll have to wait and see if this plan bears fruit or not.", Pseudo says as he turns back to Loki.

"Anyhow... I was about to take a small break. If you have time, do you want to join me?"

Loki nods, rising from his seat.

"I wouldn't mind treating myself to a well-earned drink after today's success."

Edited by IchigoMontoya on Feb 6th 2020 at 2:37:04 AM

Pseudo gets out of his chair as well, leading the way to the cafeteria. Which, Loki will be able to note, is also fortified.

Looks like Pseudo wasn't kidding when he said he wanted to fortify the entire base.

Loki follows after Pseudo, studying the base's fortifications as he does so.

Space Fortress Gravitas

Narktus stands in a sub-level, deep in the underbelly of the Space Fortress.

Oh yeah small reminder: THIS THING IS THE SIZE OF A SMALL PLANET.

He stands in some kind of meeting room across from Hit.

"Freelancers, roll call!"

One by one, they jump in. "Hit, present as always."

   "Momon, present."   

"Mimi, reporting!"

"Daroach, present!"

"Cerebrumic organ, not-absent!"

"Myo, reporting."

"Alpha Man, also here."

Narktus pauses as the last of them◊ teleports in. "I don't believe we've met."

"Course not. Never had anything important enough for me."

Narktus raises an eyebrow under his mask. "The time an unspeakable abomination threatened to peel reality like a banana wasn't important enough for you?"

"... Musta just missed that, sorry."

"Whatever." Narktus looks up at the ceiling. "GLaDOS, brief them."

"Your current employer has recently acquired complete knowledge of a universe whose inhabitants are present in the Arena and could potentially prove troublesome to his plans. He has assigned you each a target from that universe, along with a full dossier and pre-recorded instructions for how to proceed. You may move to eliminate them at your own discretion, but it would be preferable to move out all at once."

Each Freelancer takes out a small, squarish hologram projector device, like the ones Hit used to receive contracts.

And each is projecting a hologram of someone from the same universe as Aeleris and Terlette.

"We'll get it done."

   "As you command."   

All the Freelancers warp out. Moments later, Narktus does too.

Solitude, Winking Skeever

Thor and Loki sit at the bar of Solitude's inn, conversing amongst themselves over mead.

"So, once Pseudo receives those blueprints from Platinum and creates that device, our work can finally begin in earnest."

"Good to know..."

Loki raises an eyebrow.

"Is something troubling you, Thor? I thought you'd be a little more excited about the prospect of either Set or those rabid curs meeting their end."

Thor lets out a heavy sigh.

"Honestly, I'm beginning to have second thoughts about this whole bloody scheme."

"...Come again? I don't think I heard you correctly," Loki says. "Please don't tell me you're starting to believe the Sisters' claims that our plan is doomed to fail."

"No, it's just... I've been thinking about what Pseudo said in regards to lying to our allies. Ain is among my closest friends here, and when she eventually learns of our plan, she's going to be furious," Thor admits. "And we would deserve every last bit of her wrath."

"Assuming she even figures out what we're doing."

"She will, Loki. It's her blasted job to uncover these kinds of plots. And Deut... Odin's beard, I don't even want to imagine how heartbroken she'd be..."

"But what about Set? How the Hel are we going to deal with him?"

"We'll find another way. One that won't involve betraying our friends' trust. As for Katre and Troa, I know exactly what you can do about them."

Loki nods in response, looking intrigued.

"I'm listening..."

"Once they've shared the location of Set's base with their 'benefactor', reveal that you've been deceiving them the whole time, just like you did with Porky," the god of thunder explains, smirking. "No only will their ensuing tantrum be immensely satisfying, we'll know where to find Set when it comes time to vanquish that bastard."

The god of mischief takes a moment to consider what his brother was suggesting, then grins deviously.

"Admittedly, it's not quite as glorious as our original strategy, but... I'm hardly one to complain about a chance to top my victory over that wretched little swine."

With that, the Sons of Odin clink their tankards together and drink up once more.

Edited by IchigoMontoya on Feb 7th 2020 at 9:55:31 AM

Raven Rock

A warrior clad in white is sitting on a bench under the ashen sky, reading a book. At a strange sound, he looks up, and he sees a rift open up in space.

Narktus, the masked conqueror, emerges!

...

Aeleris gives him a look of confusion and suspicion. "Who are you?" he asks.

"A man on a mission," Narktus answers, drawing his lightsaber. "And you happen to be an obstacle."

Aeleris sighs and sets down his book. "We fight on my terms," he states. He begins to rise off the ground and hovers away, to the Temple of Miraak.

Narktus replies with an annoyed grunt. Energy begins jetting out from the undersides of his boots, and as it builds up, it begins lifting him off the ground Iron Man style. It suddenly bursts to full power, sending him rocketing off to the Temple.

Temple of Miraak

Aeleris touches down on the surface of the temple gently. Narktus slams down feet-first across from him, spraying dust and rock everywhere.

Aeleris draws his sword, while Narktus switches his lightsaber on.

"Do understand that this is nothing personal," Narktus says, beginning to pace in a clockwise circle around the temple.

Aeleris paces clockwise in response. "Good. I'd be worried if someone I never met had a grudge against me."

"Take it as an honor. I have countless powerful beings under my command, but I came for you personally."

Aeleris rolls his eyes beneath his helmet. "Typical humble-bragging from a wannabe villain. Have you anything original to bring to the -" He suddenly jumps aside as Narktus smashes into the ground where he had just been standing. Already, his breathing grows short from the first surprise of the battle.

"Pragmatism, I suppose," snarks Narktus.

"Well, shit."

Depths of Despair - Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2

Zero's Lab... Somewhere

There's a knock on the door. Zero opens it remotely and sees Daroach, smirking slyly.

"Sorry about this. It's nothing personal, just business." The mouse tosses a device onto the floor and promptly teleports away.

"Son of a-"

The lab is promptly engulfed in a titanic antimatter explosion.

Edited by KiriK on Feb 7th 2020 at 12:05:29 PM

Platinum locate the explosion from his lab and frown. Shortly afterwards, he immediately kick up the security around his own lab.

Aeleris thrusts his sword at Narktus, who effortlessly parries it. While a true Jedi or Sith might be surprised to see a lightsaber clash with a non-cortosis weapon instead of slicing clean through it, Narktus has long been used to the idea of unbreakable magic weapons. He steps back from Aeleris before advancing forward with a two-handed upswing.

Aeleris narrowly backsteps out of the lightsaber's reach, feeling the heat and hearing the hum of the Laser Blade through his cushioned helmet. He quickly realizes the danger and launches himself back with his telekinesis.

Rather than attempt to close the distance, Narktus simply unleashes a volley of energy blasts from his offhand, keeping Aeleris jumping around and unable to formulate a counterattack.

At least, that's what he's going for, but it doesn't stop a huge-ass fireball from slamming into him and exploding, covering the temple grounds around him in flame.

Aeleris smirks, only to gasp as he suddenly sees Narktus upon him in the middle of a jumping attack, about to plunge his lightsaber through the warrior. He raises his sword to defend, but the lightsaber plunge is a feint, and Narktus proceeds to switch stance mid-jump, diving foot-first into Aeleris' chest and slamming him into the ground. He stomps on Aeleris a couple times and is about to deliver a finishing slash when the chimeric man unleashes a burst of sound magic from his body, blasting the conqueror off of him.

Narktus lands on his feet, looking down at the ground, but when he looks up, he sees that Aeleris is no longer where he once was. Aeleris then slashes him across the back from behind... which doesn’t even scratch his armor. It does, however, make Narktus briefly pause, before instantly whipping around and sending Aeleris into the wall of the temple with a point-blank blast.

Aeleris drops from the wall and lands on all fours, panting. He unhooks some kind of latch in the underside of his helmet, takes in a long, deep breath, and exhales a cloud of fog. It's laden with all sorts of hazardous properties, but every square inch of Narktus is armored, so the only effect it has on him is obscuring his vision.

Christopher Chickadee, the infrequently-seen soldier, is snoozing in the middle of God-knows-where.

"I... can... seeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee..."

Before he wakes up, he gets laser-eyed through the skull.

Troa and Katre are roaming around the Arena.

Ya think he knew you can't use your powers when you've got the restraints on?

I don't think so. Dummy.

They still, powerless or not, notice that something is off though, and Troa smirks.

Hehe, someone's just getting their shit kicked in somewhere.

Some time after his chat with Loki, Thor exits the Winking Skeever before heading out to resume his search for Hela.

Aeleris closes his mouth-latch and begins teleporting throughout the fog, repeatedly making various strikes at a very irritated Narktus before retreating into the veil. Each sword swing only makes sparks against his armor, each blast of fire or water or frost or lightning or wind is shrugged off.

Eventually, the fog begins to disperse. Aeleris promptly seizes hold of Narktus with telekinesis, trying to examine him for a sign of a weak spot. Narktus slowly, shakily raises his hand, resisting the magical hold... and then Aeleris is frozen, seized by Narktus' mimickry of the Force, interrupting his telekinesis. "What?!"

"Slippery little fuck. Aren't you a knight?"

"More of a mercenary, actually," Aeleris responds dryly.

"Well then." Narktus slams Aeleris into the floor and pins him down there, stomping up. He raises his lightsaber for a finishing blow.

Aeleris' eyes flash gray. Narktus starts to react, but then time freezes. The Dragon Warrior, free from the hold of the Force, stands up. He rushes at Narktus and unleashes a series of furious strikes against his prone body, trying to whittle away at the overlord's armor, but the longer he keeps time frozen, the more his head starts to hurt. He has only left a small scratch by the time his control slips, and he smacks the lightsaber from Narktus' hand before he completely loses his ability to concentrate, and time resumes.

Narktus is about to punish Aeleris with a slash when he realizes his lightsaber is gone. Incensed, he settles for decking the chimera in the face, flooring him yet again, before recalling his weapon with the Force.

Aeleris huffs and gasps for breath. He teleports up on top of the wall of the temple, holding onto the ornate structures for support. Then he holds up his sword.

Narktus narrows his eyes.

Cracks form along the blade of Aeleris' sword. Light pours from the cracks, then it shatters into splinters, revealing the true body of the weapon - a crackling, ferocious torrent of elemental power in the vague shape of a blade.

Narktus gets in a ready stance. He switches off his lightsaber. Then he holds it out, as it transforms in its entirety into Krampus' sword.

By the time it finishes changing shape, however, Aeleris is upon Narktus, and he thrusts his elemental blade, gouging straight through Narktus' armor and inflicting a significant stab wound. Unfortunately, Narktus' body is as resilient as the stuff protecting it. The conqueror whacks Aeleris aside with the flat of his blade, coating the side of his helmet in frost.

Aeleris does not care. His old buried fury is resurfacing. He lets out a bestial roar as he slashes at Narktus diagonally, aiming to cut him in two... and failing, as Narktus' own sword blocks the strike. Narktus proceeds to do a spin slash, sending forth a wave of frost from his position that coats the ground in ice and encases Aeleris, too. However, Narktus notices Aeleris' sword beginning to react, so instead of leaving him there to either freeze to death or break free, he delivers a mighty stomp kick, smashing Aeleris out of the ice and sending him tumbling away.

Aeleris grunts and yells again, stabbing his sword to the sky to make its elements go haywire before launching a torrential wind at Narktus with a horizontal slash.

Narktus calmly walks through the wind.

Aeleris is startled, and he proceeds to blast Narktus with lightning... nothing. The electricity arcs through his armor, but away from his open wound. A flaming crescent Sword Beam that explodes on impact, like the Infinity Sword’s full-power projectile. The explosion engulfs Narktus in flame and he disappears.

Aeleris’ expression begins to lighten, before he suddenly gets impaled by Narktus, who is completely fine save for his cape being burnt and tattered. He spits up blood, which turns to shards of ice from Krampus’ sword. His entire body is being slowly frozen over from inside...

It is not to be. The last of the rage, the chaos, the pain and despair that brought about the Id, bubbles to the surface.

His body trembles as he drops his weapon, bringing his hands up to his forehead. Narktus yanks Krampus’ sword out of him, dropping him to his knees, but then the conqueror retreats back and waits to see what happens next.

Falkreath, Falkreath

Mikael Crest stands in the graveyard, kneeling in prayer to the fallen.

Two sets of footsteps approach. He stands up and turns around to see two figures. "So, you're the ones who sent that message?"

   "Indeed. I heard you were a noble warrior and mentor, so I wanted to give you a chance for an honorable death."   

   "There is no point to this farce."   

   "Have some measure of respect, Nabe. He accepted our offer."   

Mikael unsheathes his daggers as his purple scales flare up around his back, arms, neck, cheeks, etc. The spines on the back of his tail rattle menacingly. "I suspect your victory will not be as certain as you like to think."

Clash - Overlord

   "7th-tier magic: Chain Dragon Lightning."    Nabe launches a ferocious dragon-shaped streak of lightning at Mikael... who catches it in the palm of his hand.

"I am dragon lightning." He responds by imbuing the electricity into his daggers and charging in, capitalizing on Nabe's surprise with a barrage of electrified stabs and slashes.

Nabe is taken aback and injured somewhat, but then Mikael pauses and raises his daggers in defense as Momon delivers a brutal strike with one of his greatswords, sending him flying backwards.

   "Nabe, feel free to sit this one out. I am Momon, the He... Mercenary. Remember that in the next life."   

"... I suppose I should." Mikael blasts Momon with a barrage of lightning bolts, then charges in with a storm-powered divekick.

Momon feigns staggering under the lightning in order to let Mikael get close, then tanks the kick without flinching, smacking down the Draconian with the flat edges of his blades.

As Mikael braces himself against the ground, springs back up into the air and sprouts his wings, Momon comments,    "Your enchanted daggers... they remind me of a bandit I once fought. Her name was... Cl..."   

   Crap, I don't remember!    He throws one of his swords at Mikael.

   "Her name was irrelevant."   

Mikael stops the blade with his daggers and strikes it down with a double overhead swing. "Should I bother asking what happened to her?"

   "Hmhmhm... I think you'd be better off not knowing."   

"Figures." Mikael swoops down and stabs his daggers into the visor in Momon's helmet.

   "Oh, she did that too."   

"Did she do this?" Rising back into the air, Mikael draws a bow, pulls it back, and fires a piercing bolt of lightning instead of an arrow!

The speed and impact catch Momon completely off-guard, knocking him on his ass.    "... I can say with utmost certainty that she did not."   

Mikael continues flying around, pelting Momon with lightning arrows, trying to keep him down.

   "Shield Wall."   

A mystical barrier materializes over Momon.

Solitude

I'm Not Nice - Super Paper Mario OST

Quoth, the avian soldier, wildly fires piercing plasma rails at Mimi,◊ who lazily evades them by simply floating around the city.

She creates a ring of Rubees around herself, then sends a wave of Rubees along the ground, blowing Quoth into the air, though she lands on her feet.

<Why exactly are you doing this?>

"Mimimimimimimimimimi!"

<Not an answer!> Quoth fires a lucky hit that rips through the barrier and knocks Mimi to the ground.

"Heh... Money, of course."

<... What?>

"You can't deny that money makes the world go 'round! And Rubees in particular make my day..."

<So you're murdering a commanding officer in an empire that encompasses nearly 1/4 of its observable universe... for some pretty rocks.>

"Wouldn't anyone, if the pay was good enough?"

<You sicken me.> Quoth begins aiming another, charging shot - but then a Rubee spears her through the chest, dropping her to the ground.

"Oops! Sorry if I made your ulcer worse! Mimimimimimimimimi~!" Mimi throws another Rubee through Quoth's head, finishing her off in... brutal fashion.

Edited by KiriK on Feb 7th 2020 at 1:24:41 PM

Hjaalmarch

The Maximoff twins wander through the marshy lands of Hjaalmarch, discussing amongst themselves as they go.

"Pietro, how could Ultron possibly be the leader of these... Cyber Angels? In case you forgot, Vision completely destroyed his last body."

"Maybe his AI found one last emergency body before that drone got blown up, or some alternate Ultron's behind these new super bots. Weirder things have happened here, Wanda!"

Edited by IchigoMontoya on Feb 7th 2020 at 11:10:07 AM

Three out of◊ the group of◊ Ken Tahn's former bandits◊ happen to be near Falkreath. Naturally, upon hearing the sounds of battle nearby, they start running away like hell.

"I ain't up for this madness!"

"Who's idea was it to come looking for provisions in this area!?"

"Yours!"

They continue to flee while letting out some rather unmanly shrieks.

The Hunter◊ and the Huntress◊ are actually near the area Narktus is fighting in. They're about to go take a look at what's going on before they get contacted by Hub through an earpiece.

   "Don't approach that battle! Until Mara gets back, we're supposed to lay low."   

"She has been gone for over three months now. We are getting bored.", the Huntress replies.

   "I'm bored too, but they're Cyber's orders. Andropov noticed that a surplus of battles started happening at the same time, so if there's a connection, we'd be getting involved in something big."   

The Huntress groans in annoyance.

"Fine. Brother, we-"

She then notices the Hunter is trying to sneak towards the fight. After an awkward pause from both, the Huntress starts dragging him away from the fight, to his chagrin.

"I don't like it either. But we have to obey. The Assassins are the only ones who can give us what we desire."

The Great Light◊ and Des◊ are nearby Falkreath as well. Des starts looking around.

"I'm getting a bad feeling about this place. It may be best to turn around."

"I'm not diverting the search's course, no matter the reason."

"You're gonna get yourself killed if you keep wandering aimlessly."

"I'm not wandering aimlessly. I'm searching for Tobajas."

"You're still searching for him, yes. It's been years. At this point you should call it quits."

"No!", the Great Light snarls, turning their head towards Des, who raises her hands and pretends to look nervous.

"Alright, alright. But I'm not going to keep following you for months on end. I have a job to do after all."

"One you managed to automate.", the Great Light says as they turn back around and continue walking.

"That doesn't mean I can just ignore everything and do nothing.", Des says as she floats after him.

Edited by DevilPsyco on Feb 7th 2020 at 8:12:00 PM

Aeleris clutches his head. His grip tightens so much that his helmet crumples and tears apart, and then his hands move to his forehead. His grip keeps tightening. Blood spurts from his skull. And he screams. He screams, and screams, and screams so loud that the temple walls begin falling apart around him and Narktus.

His armor falls apart piece-by-piece, slowly exposing his surprisingly thin, lanky build. That doesn't last long, as he begins transforming, starting with the fingers currently pressing against his cranium in a crush grip. His digits thicken, his nails turn into claws, his palms widen, then narrow again. From his wrists to his shoulders, he begins bulking up. Not to the extent of the Hulk, closer to a well-kept bodybuilder.

His pectoral and abdominal muscles expand and multiply. His entire upper body becomes equally as muscular as his arms. Veins begin bulging out of his neck as he looks to the sky. There are tears in his eyes. The screaming now sounds more like the desperate wails of a banshee. His top incisors elongate like fangs or tusks, while both his top and bottom canines grow huge, pushing out other teeth with spurts of blood, until they resemble the canines of a wolf, or perhaps a chimpanzee.

Narktus backs further away. He could attack at any moment, but he does not, for fear of somehow exacerbating the immediate situation.

Aeleris falls on his side and curls into the fetal position, unable to breathe. His legs snap with a sickening sound as they, too, begin bulking up. His feet splay out and lengthen from the ankles, becoming like those of a bird. Tendons snap as bones are stretched apart from each other, then reform once the bones regrow to match their new lengths, pushing aside any flesh in the way. He becomes 'they', or perhaps 'it' would be more appropriate, losing all identifiable sexual characteristics - thankfully for the sake of anyone looking, because Aeleris is now completely naked. Fur sprouts from the bare skin from the top of their neck down to the waist, feathers consume their upper arms and torso, and their forearms and legs down to the ankles become clad in serpentine scales.

Aeleris stands back up on their avian feet, eyes sunken and hollow, all color gone and replaced with vacant ring-shaped markings, arms finally dangling limp with exhaustion. Yet still they wail. The tail of a giant snake protrudes from the base of their back, coiling around them, and ending in a strange fusion of a fish's fin and a scorpion's stinger. A second set of vertebrae erupts from the center of their back, no flesh covering it, just bones held together by bare sinew. The second spine ends in a skull like a hybrid of a deer with its horns, a dog with its teeth, and a dragon with its general shape. Finally, the elytra of a beetle begin growing from their shoulders, followed by a pair of bird wings and a pair of bat wings layered over those bird wings, all growing out of their body as simple masses of flesh and bone before slowly, painfully, gaining definition, feathers, and skin flaps.

At last, the sounds of agony cease. 'Aeleris'' wings fold up, and their elytra close over them.

With one hand, Aeleris reaches up and slams the skull down over their human-ish head, causing the two heads to fuse into one, like a natural helmet.

Narktus is completely unfazed. He waits to see what will happen next.

But he doesn't see it before the Aspect of Id delivers a devastating punch from right next to him, instantly carving a crater into the ground on the opposite side as Narktus is sent flying. He stops himself in midair, transforms his weapon into the Gáe Bulg of Irish mythology, and hurls it like a harpoon straight through the Aspect's torso. Upon impaling them, thirty barbs erupt from its length into their flesh like hooks buried in the mouth of a fish.

It would seem that either no pain could compare to that which Aeleris just experienced, or they're still in pain and are just over it now, because that doesn't make the Aspect so much as flinch. They fly up to meet Narktus, clawing at him in a wild frenzy with the talons adorning their feet, and surprising strength behind it too.

Narktus is pushed around by the kicks, but not very damaged. He yanks the Gáe Bulg out of the Aspect while they're in close proximity, transforming it once more into the Labrys, the double-headed axe with which Hephaestus cleaved open Zeus's head, giving birth to Athena. He swings it into the Aspect's side, with predictable results - enough force to blow them beyond the horizon, spraying a trail of dark green blood in their wake.

Mikael grunts and swoops in, trying to wrap his bow around Momon's neck...

But he just gets grabbed by the face instead.

   "There was a reason I discarded one of my swords the moment you took flight."    Momon chokeslams Mikael into the ground. The mysterious warrior then pulls the daggers out of his visor and drops them next to him.    "You may have these back."   

"I would say thanks, but..."

   "No, no, I get it."   

   Shit! I broke character!    In a momentary panic before Ainz's emotion-suppression kicks in, he impales Mikael with his remaining greatsword, killing him.

   "No hesitation to deliver the killing blow after final words. Just as expected of the great Momon-sa...n."   

Vague Estraole

Terlette is having a wonderful day.

Then the Rabbits storm in and open fire on her.

First Warning

She blasts them away with gold lightning and draws her sword, ready for battle, but a rhino-symbol grenade lands by her feet.

"SH-"

BOOM.

Terlette lands on her back with a trail of smoke as Myo, plus helmet,◊ approaches through the explosion.

"For one reason or another, our boss doesn't want you killed. Says it'd have... complications. So if you surrender now, we won't have to beat you within an inch of your life."

...

Rabbits win!

Vague Estraole

Mani◊ is relaxing by herself, eating a sandwich, when she hears the grenade's explosion. Normally, she'd be inclined to go check it out.

But she has a sandwich. And she must finish it.

Near the battle with Mikael... that just ended, a scouting Space Pirate◊ happens to catch a glimpse of the battle. It hides before it can be seen, thinking its options over.

Normally, their policy would be to attack. But Ridley is looking for the blonde boy specifically, and with him as their priority, the Space Pirate figures it should not get sidetracked here.

As such, it continues on its merry way, taking a detour route so that it won't be seen.

The Aspect catches themselves. They wait for Narktus to catch up, then intercept him with a deafeningly loud blast of sound.

This knocks Narktus' mask off.

And while his true face wasn't described the last time it was shown, given the grisly details of Aeleris' transformation into the Aspect, why not?

His reptilian eyes glare at the Aspect, surrounded by wrinkled skin. Either he has been scarred and burned to the point of disfigurement or he just naturally looks as fucked-up as the burned half of Two-Face. His lips are wispy-thin and barely reach each other while closed, seemingly taking legitimate effort to even get them that far. His teeth alternate between canines and molars, and his gums have a gap in the front of his face through which a tongue covered in barbs is visible. He has four tusks protruding from his cheeks, which have been visibly filed down to get them to fit under his mask. He has a 'beard' made of small tentacles. His nose is perfectly smooth, with only a single ‘nostril’ and many smaller pores lining its sides.

And when he speaks, his face from beneath the nose to his chin splits open down the middle, revealing that his jaws are bifurcated.

   "You've angered me. Congratulations, it's personal now."   

The Aspect even breaches the veil of mute delirium, seemingly just from the shock of watching him speak.    "Wh-what the... I..."   

Narktus rockets shoulder-first into the Aspect, carrying them across Solstheim and into Skyrim before finally crashing together into Skuldafn Temple.

Within the ancient ruin, the two monsters continue their fierce brawl. The temple collapses around them, yet still they continue fighting, the mere shockwaves of their impacts creating space in the rubble.

The Aspect forms a chitinous exoskeleton around themselves, morphing one hand into the claw of a pistol shrimp and launching a shockwave of force at Narktus as it snaps shut. The impact dents his chestplate, but he responds by sweeping the Aspect off their feet with Labrys before slamming the axe into their back, smashing the elytra and creating an even bigger shockwave that blows the remains of Skuldafn Temple clean away.

Almost as soon as that is done, the Aspect begins regenerating. They contort their legs over their head and effectively dropkick Narktus as they spring off the ground, holding onto his shoulders with their feet before frantically bashing away at his face. He grabs them and throws them away, and as they take flight once more, he follows in pursuit.

The aerial battle is long and frantic, too much to describe in words, but it at last ends with Narktus flying up above the Aspect and slamming Labrys down as he descends, dragging them down with him Great Aether-style, finishing with a mighty explosion upon Riverwood.

When the smoke clears, the Aspect’s lower body has been separated from their upper body. They launch away from Narktus with a burst of sonic power to begin regenerating.

Narktus transforms his weapon back into a lightsaber, approaching menacingly.

No sooner is the Aspect able to stand again than does Narktus bring them down on all fours with a Force Choke.

   ”I believe I once told someone that if I really wanted them dead myself, nothing would stop me. And now you’re learning that yourself.”   

   ”fff-*gk* yourgh...“   

Narktus stifles a chortle. Then he gives in and starts laughing maniacally. With his off-hand, he reaches down and grabs the Aspect by the head.

   ”I’ll make it quick, but in case you have an afterlife or respawn, remember this: You’re not the only target from your world.”    Narktus snaps the Aspect’s neck and tosses them aside.

He hooks his lightsaber back on his waist, builds up power within his gauntlets, and finally unleashes a gigantic beam of energy, sustaining it until nothing is left.

Central Hub

Future is What We Are - Ken Ishii

Frag is battling the neon-clad mercenary hand-to-hand. In terms of physical strength, their armors appear to make them equal, but it seems like Frag has more skill, from how he keeps Alpha Man on the defensive.

Frag smashes Alpha Man down on his face with a blow to the side of the head, but this is exactly what the fake hero was hoping for. He braces against the ground and activates his thrusters, almost-literally melting Frag's energy shields with the exhaust!

Irritated, the artificial human activates his unusual Laser Sword and starts swinging. Alpha Man rolls out of the way and onto his feet. He continues to dodge, all the while bearing a cocky smirk...

until Frag stabs him through the leg.

Alpha Man looks at Frag, then down at his leg, then at Frag.

He then wraps his arms around his foe's head and snaps his neck.

In the Central Hub, Copy Robot◊ observes the fight's outcome from behind a wall.

Ouch... I almost feel sorry for that guy., he thinks to himself as he looks at said guy's corpse. Anyhow, I'm not getting involved in this.

He teleports away.

Markarth

Glali Nik runs through the city of Markarth. She ducks into Understone Keep, opens her pendant, and her heart sinks as the colors on the jewel fade away one by one.

Hiding next to the door, she pulls out her phone and starts frantically going through things until she reaches the message app. She sends a single message to Nicole.

Help I'm in markarth and someone is trying to kill me

Anakin, having felt a disturbance in the Force, is running towards mad at Nik's destination, sensing her position through it.