Enter The Arena As Your Avatar -- The Spinoff!

"Okay, in hindsight, maybe I should've brought someone from modern times along."

Nicole rises from her seat.

"Like I said, Ban, no one'll stop you from opting out if you feel a little overwhelmed by all this."

Thor sits at the edge of his seat as he watches the fight, still gripping his hammer tightly.

Edited by IchigoMontoya on Jan 12th 2021 at 5:22:06 AM

Airy quickly makes her response to the first two statements, keeping quiet on the third comment, for now. "I've been in this place for a while. People from all sorts of worlds are around here. As for the dead or alive part... You're not the only one who's died." She makes a quick recovery by saying "People around here come back from the dead quite often, although... usually more intact. And, well, I've heard others comment on old friends and enemies being dead... Time, space... it's confusing, i'm still trying to figure it out completely." Airy quickly, to avoid herself being caught in a lie, says "Oh, I can help you in many ways. I know this place better than you do, and I can help you get to know some things, and some people. As for Michael... help relating to him depends, but not on anything personal." Airy quickly says "Are you friends, or... Enemies?"

Sovngarde

Shinryu switches wings to continue projecting their barrier, though that isn't enough to block all of the Shadow Flares, and some of them gradually chip away at their armored scales.

With a thought, eight copies of Rie's energy saber appear briefly around the dragon, each pair forming the vertices of a pyramid. They each form an X, which lingers after the hilts dissipate. Then, their appearance 'shatters' like a mirror along with their immediate surroundings, before spinning. As the X's move, they leave behind copies of themselves, until there's a whole array of them surrounding Shinryu, before they blink out one by one and their appearance returns to normal.

Noting the barrier around Iris, Shinryu makes Sephiroth the target.    "Kaleidoscopic Formation - Primus Terminus Est!"    Six X's appear all around the angel in a cube formation, then close in to chop him before disappearing, leaving only a short window both spatially and temporally for him to dodge. Then another six, locking on to Sephiroth's next position. Then another and another, continuously tracking his position from moment to moment.

Edited by AqueousBunnies on Jan 12th 2021 at 8:42:40 AM

Iris, protected by Wall, sees that Sephiroth is under a continuous attack. She narrows her eyes before flying towards him, swiftly dodging one of the Xs that charges for Sephiroth when she's near him, and then flies right underneath him.

"Keep your flight stable.", Iris says, looking serious, after which she spreads her wings and starts spinning, unleashing a whirlwind of feathers around herself and Sephiroth, who can't get hit by any of them because he's in the metaphorical eye of the feather storm.

Now, of course regular feathers wouldn't be able to block attacks like these. However, once the feathers have left Iris' wings and start to spin around the group, they suddenly crystallize, forming tiny, makeshift barriers that are each sturdy enough to fully block a single X attack. With this attack, Iris ensures that none of them can reach Sephiroth, allowing him a chance to potentially counterattack Shinryu.

Iris does hope that Sephiroth won't take too long in doing so though. Her feather supply isn't infinite, and if her wings run out she'll be unable to fly until they've regrown.

Alt.Demo narrows his eyes, recognizing that something is about to happen.

   "You must think I'm fucking stupid if you expect me to let you pull that off."   , he growls, running towards Lunastra. However, once close enough that Lunastra may consider a swift counterattack, he suddenly leaps up and over it, and the chains from the kusari-gama that he planted in its feet earlier return to his hands.

As such, the pull from the chains should be able to topple Lunastra over before it can attack. Alt.Demo has more than enough physical strength to get the job done. His power rivals Neuff's after all.

The creature then slams the red cat to the side with its tail before looking at Mad Rat, just in time to get struck by the blood beam, yelping for a moment due to the force of the attack, then leaping out of the beam.

Once out of it, it quickly looks itself over, then creepily licks some of the blood off of his claw...

only for it to spit it right back out in disgust, coughing a few times and immediately trying to wipe the rest of the blood off of its chest and arms.

"... that doesn't sound 100% real, but alright, I'll go with that.", he says to Snake. He then chuckles when he hears Nicole.

"I'm not gonna let some generational difference get in the way of this~"

"Micheal is my son, id call him a friend"

his suit creaked as he moved ever so slightly

"Theres very few people i could call an enemy, most being long dead. except henry, i dont kow where he is"

he paused, deciding he can reveal something about him that was nonchalant on paper

"I was a resturant owner, very sucessful"

Nicole offers Ban a smile.

"Alright, dude."

She shifts her gaze back to Snake.

"So what've you got planned for your next raid on the fortress? I mean, obviously, we'll have to get that AI outta the way."

Thor continues to watch the battle intently.

Edited by IchigoMontoya on Jan 12th 2021 at 5:58:21 AM

Sephiroth gives Iris a silent nod of acknowledgement, then flies at Shinryu, physically striking with his arm-wing before immediately dashing really far away with all six of his other wings. There's a large enough gap between them that Shinryu will have to either keep attacking from far enough to give him time to react, or close the distance itself.

—

Fu appears beside Thor. "Relax a little. If she really dies, we'll revive her immediately and disqualify the other team."

Lunastra starts to rise into the air in a graceful motion - and then gets flipped on its back, dispersing its flame aura entirely and giving Alt.Demo some extra time to whale on it as it rolls onto its side.

<Hah!> Heart surrounds itself in a bubbling sphere of blood-energy, then tries to divebomb into the creature.

"I can show you visuals later," Snake says with a sigh. "For now, I think you should have the gist of things. Are you planning to stick around?"

"No more raids for a bit. Narktus will be ready and blow us down himself before we get close. Instead, the Defense Federation -" he gestures to Jotaro "- will be awaiting his inevitable retaliatory strike to cut it off at the pass."

Edited by KiriK on Jan 12th 2021 at 8:01:38 AM

Sovngarde

Shinryu matches Sephiroth's wing strike with their own, spinning in the air from the force. Seeing him dash away and splitting up from Iris, its body flickers for a moment. Then, they choose to close the distance... by simply teleporting in front of him, using their momentum for a big tail slap in return.    "Did you forget I could do this?"   

Gravity Screw, breath attacks, sword beam spam, shockwaves and now teleportation... In case it wasn't clear before, all of these combined should clue them in on the nature of Shinryu's abilities - this version, at least. And just to drive the point home...

   "Spell in Waiting - Resonant Echo!"    If Iris took this moment as a breather, it would come back to bite her, as a grey, translucent copy of Shinryu suddenly flies in to fire off a couple Wyrmwaves from their mouth in her general direction.

Edited by AqueousBunnies on Jan 12th 2021 at 9:28:44 AM

"As much as I do wanna face Narktus... you've got a point there. Here's hoping Space Girl's folks can keep his troops from finding this place," Nicole says. "I'd hate for them to destroy all the perfectly good beer this bar's got stocked up."

She removes her leather jacket and ties it around her waist.

"Anyway, I think I'll stick around. I wanna catch up with the rest of y'all and learn what else you got done on this mission. Maybe get Ban acquainted with everyone."

"Would it not be better to intervene before any potential killing blows can actually be dealt?" Thor says to Fu. "I would rather not be forced to watch her die at all."

Edited by IchigoMontoya on Jan 12th 2021 at 6:22:06 AM

Sephiroth is sent reeling from the tail-slap.    "Perhaps I did. Break!"   

Sephiroth casts a spell and tries to turn Shinryu to stone. Naturally, to bypass the 'no-kill' rule, if it works at all, they'll just be left open for a follow-up or two before the stone breaks, instead of being effectively killed.

"If I have the time to see one coming, yeah. But sometimes I just don't."

Edited by KiriK on Jan 12th 2021 at 8:24:30 AM

She does indeed take the breather, and thus ends up getting blasted by Wyrmwaves, hitting the ground, though not getting too damaged thanks to Wall. She grumbles when she gets back up, then notices that her necklace is gone. She quickly looks around in a panic, and-

CLONK

Well, she has it back. She also has a bump on her head now from it falling on it.

Nevertheless, she's relieved and immediately puts it back on. After letting out a sigh, she looks back up at Shinryu, eyes narrowed in anger.

"I'm being played for a fool here. But I'll show you."

Her necklace glows for a moment as she conjures up a tiny fireball on the palm of her hand. And when I say tiny, I mean 'smaller than a fingernail-tiny'.

Iris then flicks the tiny fireball up into the air, after which she immediately flies upwards at high speed, passing by the fireball, and then proceeding to flip-kick it down towards Shinryu, a glint in her eyes and a grin on her face right before she kicks.

The tiny fireball spirals down at immense speed. And if it hits... well...

A massive and extremely powerful explosion will occur, the attack being much stronger than any of the other attacks Iris has used in the tournament so far. This attack is comparable to Super Nova in terms of the potential damage it can do to Shinryu, but unlike Super Nova, this attack isn't an illusion.

One small but significant trait of this attack is that it'll pierce through any potential counter-energy blasts, simply flying through without exploding. Barriers and shields aren't pierced, but whether they can actually block the full damage of the resulting explosion instead of shattering and letting a lot of the damage through anyway depends on the strength of the shield/barrier.

Should Shinryu be turned to temporary stone by Sephiroth's attack, the explosion from this small but powerful fireball will not kill Shinryu or destroy its body.

Alt.Demo immediately channels his Nen into his claws to strengthen them, then tries to go nuts on Lunastra by clawing and slashing as rapidly as he can, wherever he can.

The creature actually appears slightly panicked and leaps out of the way of Heart's attack. The cat, now watching, seems to be stunned at the realization that, somehow, Mad Rat and Heart forced the creature on the defensive.

"If ya can tolerate me.", Ban jokes to Snake, grinning.

"In all seriousness, if you've got enough booze and a place to spar, I'm stayin'. I'll help out with chores and stuff to validate me being here when we're not on some anti-Gravitas mission. What do you say?"

He then pauses.

"Whoa, is it a good idea to talk about your plans out in the open? I mean, we're pretty far-out, but is it 100% safe?", he asks, raising an eyebrow.

Edited by DevilPsyco on Jan 12th 2021 at 3:28:29 PM

Lunastra takes massive damage, losing some of its scales and fur to the relentless attack.

As soon as it's back on its feet, it gives Alt.Demo an eerily human Death Glare before flying off.

Heart makes a sound like it's about to cough up a hairball, but then it spits a blood projectile - then strafes to the side and spits another, then does it again. These blood balls move to the beat, making them deceptively slow.

Meanwhile, Mad Rat goes for another body-smash attack, to prevent the creature from getting out of the blood-balls' way instead of to damage it directly.

"So you're basically gonna be a member of the group without officially receiving a badge?" Snake jokes.

"It's never going to be 100% safe. At least down here, it's easy to notice any spy equipment. Not a lot of tables or chairs to look under."

"A member without an official badge? You mean like me?" Nicole chimes in, chuckling lightly. "But seriously, as far as safe places go, an underground bar at least cracks the top five choices."

Thor lets out a sigh.

"Oh, that's reassuring."

He glances back at the fight.

"Why the Hel did you never think to use that attack against Thanos or the Cabal, Iris? Perhaps we could have salvaged some success from those disasters if you had..."

Edited by IchigoMontoya on Jan 12th 2021 at 6:48:18 AM

Sovngarde

Shinryu, surprisingly, doesn't have Contractual Boss Immunity, and the Break spell actually works, turning the dragon's body in stone.

For all of half a second, before they recover.    "Spell in Advance - Refresh!"    The instant Shinryu heard the word 'break' and recognized what the spell was, they thought to start casting the cleansing spell to counter it, combining it with outright time travel (even if only in a very limited form) to have it activate immediately. They have to finish casting it to prevent a paradox, though, which while not leaving them nearly as defenseless, does put them on the defensive.

After the echo disappears, Iris begins her severely overcharged fireball, and they're kept busy with the Refresh for just a moment too long. One eye glances towards the fireball, and being able to read the amount of energy packed within, Shinryu has a look of Oh, Crap! on their face for the first time since they've appeared in this arena. It reflexively draws one wing over its body to try futilely to defend themself...

   "Time Compression."   

With the rest of the world in Bullet Time, their own body included, Shinryu takes a moment to think. Dodging won't work - the fireball is positively huge. It'll easily eat through any barriers they can conjure with this stretched instant. And even in this more powerful form, the cooldown for self-teleportation isn't that short.

But what if the explosion wasn't there anymore?

   "Secundus Terminus Est..."    An array of six X's appears surrounding the slowly expanding ball of flames, already starting to scorch its wing and scales. The Sword Beam rearranges and expands into a large cube, containing the explosion and also small bits of Shinryu's own body - too late to turn back, just focus on damage control.

   "Plane Shift!"    The cube retracts into oblivion, taking everything inside along with it.

From everyone else's points of view (unless they could also see in super speed), Shinryu just erased Iris' ultimate attack. But the toll shows a moment later - not just the regular damage that it couldn't prevent, but that the dragon is also starting to look winded from casting so many high-level spells so quickly, and they can't muster a retaliation. The tide is starting to turn.

Edited by AqueousBunnies on Jan 12th 2021 at 12:29:13 PM

Iris, naturally, can't see in super speed. However, that doesn't mean she's fooled. She notices Shinryu's condition and knows that it must've done something exhausting to defend itself. And that's good enough for her.

Grinning eagerly, she suddenly starts launching a bunch of burning feathers down towards Shinryu, attempting to either overwhelm him with the sheer amount of attacks, or tire it out by making it cast more barriers, figuring that Sephiroth might be strong enough to deal the deciding blow if Shinryu is out of stamina.

   "The shit? It just flew off!"   , Alt.Demo growls, but then calms down and sighs. He hadn't asked for this fight in the first place, better to just let it be over.

He then notices the scales and, remembering that he hadn't eaten anything today yet, picks them up.

   "I wonder if cooking something with these will make these edible... and if I'll get anything from them."   , he mutters to himself as he walks off.

   "There was a noodle restaurant close by..."   

The being just keeps evading, but starts to get more and more frustrated again.

Cue it suddenly, with no warning, unleashing a Mouth Beam attack, trying to vaporize all three of them.

"Whoops.", the cat says, leaping away from the attack just in time.

Meanwhile, a time ripple slowly starts to appear near the battlefield.

"Well... alright, I'll trust your judgement.", Ban says.

"So, since I don't have any of these badges, am I even allowed to come in?"

   "Perfect. Come forth, Pale Horse!"   

Reaching his normal arm out and creating a sphere of blue light,◊ Sephiroth calls down the horse of Death upon Shinryu, aiming to shrink it down to make it physically weaker, inflict them with overwhelming sadness so they can't regain their energy as quickly, and finally... turn them into a frog.

Whether or not this works, he immediately follows it up with a flash of searing light. If Shinryu gets hit, they will be forced to sit through the illusion of a meteor hitting the sun and turning it into a solar-system-destroying supernova, dealing major psychic damage and causing another status effect, this one totally randomized.

Mad Rat is about to get skadooshed, but this time Heart stops time entirely before he dies and pushes him out of the way, saving them both.

<That wasn't rewinding, don't shoot me!> quips Heart before sending blood balls into the ground. These leave red spots that, moments later, erupt into huge crystalline structures meant to stab and skewer.

"You're already here," Snake replies with a chuckle.

"The badge is just a symbol of who you stand with - and it's also a way to contact you in a pinch."

"Yo, spiky dude in red." Jolyne leans over the counter and offers Ban a White Russian. "This hit yer fancy?"

"Jolyne, where did you learn to make that?"

"Prison."

"Right..."

"If you're friends with them, you're always welcome, badge or no badge."

Nicole raises an eyebrow when Jolyne whips up a White Russian for Ban.

"You learned how to make that in Narktus' dungeon? Yeah, we're gonna get along just fine, you and me."

Thor wordlessly continues to watch the battle.

Sovngarde

Out of effective counters for the moment, Shinryu tries to fly away from the burning feathers, but there are simply too many, and some of them start hitting him and pinning him down. They endure the burns for a moment, before teleporting out of the attack range.

Unfortunately for Shinryu, Sephiroth still has several heavy hitters up his sleeve, and the Pale Horse hits them before they can flee again, getting turned mid-flight into a frog before dropping unceremoniously back to the grass. As Sephiroth charges up and fires Supernova, it seems to be only be able to look on with resignation in its puppy-frog eyes...

Interacting with their innate psychic abilities, everyone sees an image of Dagrún and Reuben bracing Rie by the shoulders, while she tries to parry and push back against the Supernova with her gunblade.

"We can't lose..."

"Hold on...!"

The force of the attack is too much, however, and with a skid, Rie loses her footing. The screen of fiery light utterly envelops them, and it looks like the battle is decided...

"Gun Metal Soul."

As everyone fades back into the real world, Shinryu has returned to their dragon form, and looks exhausted, but is still standing, with no signs of any status effects. Sephiroth gets the sense that the Supernova should have finished them... but didn't.

Eight seconds.

Edited by AqueousBunnies on Jan 12th 2021 at 10:48:38 AM

Sephiroth narrows his eyes and casts another Wall, this time buffing his own defenses. The Wall over Iris is still there, though.

Edited by KiriK on Jan 12th 2021 at 9:56:24 AM

While Iris can see it, she doesn't act, only able to go back down and stop firing feathers, otherwise her wings may not have enough feathers to fly for the rest of the day.

Then the battle stage turns back to normal, yet Shinryu is still standing. She looks suspicious of it.

"It may have something like my strongest barrier... guaranteed survival at the cost of all remaining stamina.", she thinks to herself.

"And if that's the case..."

She then grabs a single crystal out of her pocket, holds it on her fingers, then flicks it towards Shinryu, trying to see if this attack is enough to defeat the dragon.

"Stopping time isn't the same as altering time, don't panic so much.", the cat says.

This time the creature does a pretty impressive manoeuvre, reacting fast by jumping when the spots appear, resulting in it jumping on the sides of the crystalline structures and evade them.

The cat then notices the growing time rift.

"Agh... hey, knock him in that rift, and your time crimes will be forgiven!", the cat calls out to Mad Rat and Heart.

"Ah."

He then looks over at Jolyne, taking the White Russian, taking a sip and looking delighted.

"You bet! I like it here already, hahaha~"

<It keeps avoiding my attacks!>

<On it!> Mad Rat leaps and dashes towards the creature, then does another barrage of 'flinging himself at it'.

"Oh, no, I went to prison in my own world before then."

"Long, bizarre story."

Sovngarde

Iris' crystal shatters harmlessly against Shinryu's scales, a Beehive Barrier appearing right over it. It seems like Shinryu has a short period of invincibility with that final defensive ability.

Seven seconds, to be precise.

That short time span isn't going to be enough for them to charge another large assault, let alone a decisive one.

But as they've demonstrated, they can cheat time.

Six.

   "Spells in Advance..."    Shinryu calls out as it takes off, and their voice starts to quaver and split into their components - whether from being unable to hold it completely together or to multitask more easily, it's hard to say. Perhaps both.

Five.

   "Teraflare!"    A great energy ball suddenly appears in the dragon's mouth, firing off a multitude of individual Flare projectiles to rain down upon the All-Stars.

Four.

   "Tertius Terminus Est - Final Liberation!"    A dome of X's would surround Iris and Sephiroth, attacking all at once and giving virtually no room to dodge this time around.

Three.

If this final series of attacks is enough to down them, then Shinryu would have had all the time in the world to charge them afterwards. Otherwise, the All-Stars would only need to give him a poke so that he's no more, and the damage would be reverted to resolve the paradox.

Two.

Shinryu tucks their wings, and uses their own body as a makeshift Meteor in one last attempt to bludgeon them into submission.    "Dragonsong Dive!"   

One.

Edited by AqueousBunnies on Jan 12th 2021 at 11:22:48 AM

"Huh... between that and the fact that your dad here went up against someone like Dio, taking on Gravitas must be the least bizarre adventure you've ever been on," Nicole replies, sitting down upon the table. "So, uh, how the hell did you wind up in jail the first time, girl? You really don't strike me as the hardened criminal type."

Setting Mjolnir down beside him, Thor watches the battle continue.

Sephiroth blankets Iris in his wings, causing all of the attacks to hit him for full force while leaving her unscathed. He wasn't dodging this anyway, and at least this way, one of them will stay standing.

The direct impact from Shinryu is enough to send Sephiroth careening into the ground, leaving an impact crater with a tremendous explosion!

...

When the dust has settled and the smoke has cleared, there lies Sephiroth, stripped of his Safer form... and his shirt, leaving only pants and muscle.

He plants Masamune in the ground and pulls himself up to his feet, then reaches a hand out to Iris, his eyes emitting a green glow.

   "It's all... up... to you...!"   

Suddenly, there's a pulse within Iris.

The natural state of reality is a spiral. Galaxies form spiral clusters, DNA creates a spiraling double helix, and the scale of power increases exponentially but always maintains the same shape. The spiral... is everything!

For a moment, Iris's pupils (haha) turn into spirals, and a green energy erupts around her, instilling the primal force of Spiral Power, revitalizing her and making her more powerful in direct proportion to how Hot-Blooded she currently is.

And then, Sephiroth collapses.

DOWN!

Edited by KiriK on Jan 12th 2021 at 10:30:27 AM

"... eh, it was worth a shot."

She then gets ready when Shinryu starts to prepare a big, final assault, but is caught off guard by the speed of the attacks.

But to be honest, she's caught off guard even more when Sephiroth shields her from them.

She does still get knocked back at least a bit from Shinryu's impact, though thanks to Sephiroth shield her she's still able to fight for at least a little while longer. She quickly turns to look at Sephiroth, about to ask if he's alright when she is given Spiral Energy by him, momentarily locking up as her eyes change and her now green aura spikes, creating the visage of a second pair of wings, made entirely out of aura.

Her power, now reacting to how hot-blooded she is, grows immensely as Iris shows a wide grin while glancing back at Shinryu.

"Sorry to tell you this, but..."

She fully turns to the dragon now, using her energy to create a regular fireball.

"Victory is ours!"

She now just throws it at Shinryu, but then suddenly flies into the fireball mid-launch, having it flow around her aura as she starts to spin, attempting to perform a powerful, pin-point strike against Shinryu.

The creature, in mid-jumping still, gets struck and nearly trips backwards. As the rift has fully opened behind it now, the cat immediately leaps towards it, going for a head bash, hitting the creature and making it, as well as itself, fall through the rift.

The rift then closes again.

Ban sits down, continuing to drink happily. This place turned out to be amazing. And if Meliodas and Elaine been here, it'd have been outright perfect.