2018-08-19: Reflection

From Dream Chasers
Jump to navigation Jump to search

=============================<* Castle Rabenstein *>==============================

Castle Rabenstein sits atop the summit of Mount Manfred, an exercise in engineering folly that has become the epicenter of a Malevolent Domain. Impossible though it may seem, the broad strokes of its architecture resemble those of fallen Castle Arctica, and the ever-present snowfall only strengthens the comparison. Though massive and imposing, its proportions don't seem to make sense upon close inspection--as though the Domain were bending space to accomodate the will of its masters. Inside, the castle is every bit as impressive. Its corridors are dark and vaulted, lit only by bobbing glass spheres containing Malevolence-laced electrical sparks. Portions of it look distinctly metallic, and contain churning, smoking industrial machinery with no apparent purpose. Other portions are uncomfortably warm, despite the glacial chill outside, and any fires started there can quickly spread out of control.

Lesser Hellions of all stripes inhabit the place, ranging from eerie, ghostly felines to spectral soldiers to animated suits of armor. A small army of Mannikins stands at the ready to tend to the Domain's residents, and to their guests. Those who choose to intrude can expect a much harsher reception.

BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0LdIZ8TWYo
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Castle Rabenstein is not a very restful place at the moment. The thing trapped in the Earthpulse beneath it struggles to break free, to locate and consume the suffering within the castle walls. Shadows grow longer, and don't quite match the object casting them. Reflective surfaces grow darker, and the reflections seen within them grow distorted in unsettling ways. Even echoes sound different, reflecting the voices of people who are not here, or sounds from distant memories. It is not an easy place to rest, much less sleep, but sleep is a necessity at the moment.

    Ida Everstead-Rey is still recovering, but there's no time to sit down and wait for her regeneration to finish the job. In awakening her, Dean, Kalve, Fei and the others had reduced their window of opportunity from days to hours. If they don't contain the Mirror, it will spill out and turn half the Zulan Massif into one giant Malevolent Domain. Ida is not about to let that happen.

    A parlor has been converted into an improvised dormitory. Furniture has been gathered from all across the castle--mostly divans, plush sitting-chairs, and even a spare mattress or two. A pot of chamomile tea sits on a tea-service tray, along with a crystal pitcher of water, cups, and light bedtime snacks. It would be homey if the stakes weren't so dreadfully high. Why a dormitory? Is there an urgent task at hand that requires everyone to go to sleep first? As it turns out, yes.

    "Just... try and make things as homey as you can for yourselves," Ida says. She's sitting on the edge of a divan, wearing a silk sitting-robe, a blanket in her lap and a cup of chamomile tea in her hand. It's an odd juxtaposition with the fact that she's in Hellion form, and is all Malevolence and muscle as a result--but what are Hellions if not creatures of contradiction? "Once we're asleep, the Mirror will take us--there's no way it can't take us, with its presence here so strong. Once we're inside, we make our way to the core and draw out the Malevolence inside. Garrett, Rosaline, and I can contain as much of it as we can, and then we seal it. Once that's done, we awaken, and purify the lot of it." She takes a long pull from her teacup. It's not doing much to calm her nerves. How can she get to sleep when she's so worried about everything?

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

"I have access to sleep spells, if necessary," Rosaline proposes, after dutifully listening to the briefing. She has claimed an armchair for herself and set a blanket on it in advance. There will likely be curling up in the future, and it will be odd but cute to see, but right now, she's on standby in case someone assesses that chamomille tea just won't do the trick. A ball of purple fog swirls in her enormous hand as she looks on to the assembled group.

The scene would be heartwarming if the circumstances weren't so grim.

But then a voice is heard from the hallway.

"Miss Rosanyan! Miss Rosanyan! Wait!"

Rosaline turns around. Her expression softens. "Oh, hello, Katz."

Sudden, Incredibly Dissonant BGM Change: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sC59hR6rICM

A child-sized feline beast-person(?) in what appears to be full-body pink pajamas runs into the room, carrying a backpack several times their own size.

The creature stops, gasping for a breath for a moment before straightening back up and waving their pretty pink pawsies around.

"What a disappointmeow! No one found my secret store, [The Katz Kache]. It's been a lonely few days... But the good mews is, that means I've still got a full inventory!"

The Katz pulls a string on their backpack, undoing the entire thing and causing it to unfold into a very intricate but still very makeshift-looking storefront.

"If mew need to buy a paw-tion or two, I'm your main mittens!" the Katz announces. Well, everyone here likely needs healing up, so this comes at an opportune time. It even seems the Katz will even let everyone save their game! Whatever that even means. How very nice.

<Pose Tracker> Tethelle Cirdian has posed.

"You want me to sleep here?"

Tethelle is still slightly (okay, very) sore from her battle, not that she's letting it show. Her arms have mottled burns and bruises on them, and there's a couple claw slashes, now bandaged. She hurts, but it's the kind of dull ache she can push away and deal with later; she'll pay for it, but she doesn't have to pay for it now and sometimes that's the important part.

If it wasn't for the stakes involved, she'd laugh. As is, she lets out a slightly thoughtful 'hmm' as she paces the room before her gaze settles back on the Malevolent ones. She absolutely trusts one of them not to shank her in her sleep; she's not sure about the other two, even now. But the whole purpose is to help them, so she has to trust them.

She rubs the bridge of her nose as she plops down on a divan with a thump, then swings her sword around to rest across her knees. "Sure," she says. "Why not? This seems like a very good idea." Maybe that sarcasm was a little much. "I am only worried about you three. If you try to - hold it. Can you?" That is a very direct question, and Tethelle stares right at them in turn as she asks it, because she honestly isn't sure. If it's too much for them, then -

Not only could there be a domain, the three could be lost. And that would be too much.

<Pose Tracker> Talise Gianfair has posed.

"I don't know what an Earthpulse is, but that feels pretty grose," Talise comments with a glance towards Ida.

The little homey touches help a little. They make Ida feels like she's more like the Ida Talise remembers and wants back. It gives her, at least, that much hope to latch on to, even as they prepare to jump into the depths of whatever madness the Mirror holds in store for them.

Given that 'home' for Talise was variously a pirate ship and a rotating sequence of inn rooms, she doesn't have to go far. Her riveted armour breastplate and her gauntlets end up stacked behind a chair. Left in her shorts and a tank top, she reaches into the small pack of supplies she brought with her.

What comes out is a box of cookies. "I ran out of Mrs. Mumford's so I hope you don't mind Uncle Ramus's Choco-Crunchers before bed," she says as she takes a cookie for herself and then leaves the box where Ida and Rosaline can reach it. "They're a little crispier, but the flavour's about right."

Munching down the pre-nap snack, Talise chases it down by pulling out a flask from Althena knows where and taking a quick swig. She wipes her mouth with the back of her hand.

"Hey Cyre," she offers up as she settles onto a divan, pulling up a sheet. She flashes the cat-beastman an arch smile. "Need a place to crash?"

Nobody ever accused Talise of not being terrible. But whether she has Cyre to abuse or not, she actually will try to doze off, when the time is right.

Even those not close to her, though, can see how tense she is, despite the fact that she's pretending not to be. It'll take her awhile to snooze.

She's awake enough to watch the Katz unroll its pretty pink pawtions.

"Rosaline, you have made some interesting friends," she comments.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    A certain white-haired hoodlum of a man with an unyielding stare, awkward overly wordy phrasing and known for spontaneous fits of vandalism, murder, and loitering, elects to stay awake to make sure absolutely no one capitalizes on their vulnerability. They can't take the consent of the Domain Masters for granted. That, and there's a certain something he wants to tend to.
     If the Umbral Mirror has the influence in which to take to trying to use the various Malevolent servants in the household - the Mannikins - to put a stop to their plan, well...
     He wouldn't even need that excuse to start going on one of his destructive sprees, as though maybe the whole thing is just a convenient cover for him to be off doing just that knowing him. He's off as soon as he makes his intent clear to ensure none will disrupt them. (Who would want to go to sleep while he was looming about, anyway?!)
     Enough about him. His part in this story is no longer of importance to the present.
 
     A Water Seraph, on the other hand, sits meditatively in the improvised dormitory. The three Hellions that called this Domain theirs have all calmed and chosen to be more cooperative of efforts to put a stop to this, which makes the overall oppressive air a little more tolerable... but to be a Seraph caught in the heart of a Domain is to basically put oneself at risk of becoming a Dragon.
     He is cooperative in the process of helping get everyone calm down. He's the one who provides the perfect water for the chamomile tea. He might have even taken it upon himself to help prepare it, to play things safe as regards Malevolence infestations and intensification thereof. He... might have even washed the dishes.
     That's how serious this is.
     Lanval works up that dumb, but pleasant cat-like smile as he sits with his eyes closed with a gentle exhale. All the while, he stays sane and not a dragon with a full understanding of what he's doing here and why. Whoever the last Lord of the Land was here - maybe it was Bitey out there - he's here on their behalf. If Althena nor the Dragonmaster see it fit to deal with this, it's up to those like him to at least try and stop things from intensifying until they can get this set up for purification.
     All the while, Lanval projects an aura of... just being easy-going, like life is okay. Like it's worth celebrating. This is in contrast to the general dread of anxiety, anger, and shame, but it is not snuffed out.
     He doesn't have much to say. He might just end up falling asleep right on his own, because as Talise and the rest knows, Lanval can pretty much go snoozing at inconvenient times (or all the time, because he is that lazy).

<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.

Layna Manydays had come here to talk with her friends. To find out what she could about them and their situation here on the mountain. She found out much more than she bargained for.

She still wasn't sure what to think about this 'Mirror' situation. So if they didn't contain it...

....Well, it wouldn't be great.

So, here Layna is to help out - she's not going to turn down a request from help from her friends, even when she had been all for punching them in the face just prior.

It's okay, that's how she shows friendship.

Layna herself reclines, one arm behind her head and the other holding a glass of some kind of drink.

...But not just any drink. It is one Ida herself and some of the others might have seen before, and she'd donated a bottle of it to the cause.

The Goddess's Breath - so called because if you drink it, you might swear you're looking right into Her face. If they can't drift off by themselves, it might prove useful.

"So, lass...when it does...'take us', as you put it, what can we expect?" Layna asks, glancing over toward Ida.

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

"Katz are too good and pure for this world," Rosaline comments to Talise quietly as she helps herself to a cookie and moves to buy an Orange Gel, "I don't know what they... Nevermind, actually."

<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

Cyre is feeling somewhat worse for wear. You don't get punched in the face by an angry Lord of Calamewty and then immediately healed up by said Lord of Calamewty's EXCRUCIATING HEALING MAGIC without feeling a little bit of the aches and pains.

But he shall prevail! Cyre will never give up while the Leyline is still in such grievous danger! Stand tall, Nahual of the Wind! Like the invincible castle, deny the wrath of heaven--

~BGM Change~

"Oh, uh," Cyre says, staring half-agog at the Katz. It's a Katz. There's no doubt in the world that this... Is a Katz. "Hey there, Katz-buddy. What can you give me for..." Cyre... rummages around in his cloak. He pulls out a handful of ~glowing spheres.~ "About a hundred-fifty souls? Plus gald?"

The answer is apparently... POTIONS! And a fresh save game. Now if he dies again, he'll be able to respawn right here and jump right back into the fight! Right?

...

...Right!!

Which is good, because Cyre is ALREADY IN DANGER. Talise... Gets a terrible grin. Like, wow. It's just awful, like a cat made human and then made to smile. Distinctly cheshire-like, 100% grade-A trollishness. "Crash, huh...? Sorry darlin', my galleon's bound for another port tonight. I've got a promise to keep and a pineapple salad with my name on it waiting for me. Heheheheh~"

What an omen...!

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    'I am only worried about you three. If you try to - hold it. Can you?'

    Ida doesn't have an answer to that. That Fell Dragon was able to swallow down the Malevolence infesting Lastonbell, but that's a Fell Dragon, and the three of them are... not. "Our memories were the catalyst," she says, to Tethelle. "And the Earthpulse is... not entirely within this realm. I'm not certain if the Guardians' power will be able to reach that far." Honestly, she's kind of hoping that the Earthpulse will be able to purge itself with a little jump-start from the assembled shamans. "It's... something like an energy meridian," Ida adds, to Talise, "but for the planet. Filgaia has them. So does Lunar." She reaches over to the offered box, picks up three whole biscuits, and eats them, one after another. On the furniture. Then she takes Layna's glass, because if tea will not help, then perhaps alcohol will. "It's a mirror," Ida says. "It reflects whatever or whomever looks into it. Memories, possibilities, anxieties. It feeds off conflict and contradiction, so anything within you that can cause that..."

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Beast has posed.

    It seems such a ridiculous assertation, on its face - the Beast of Lohgrin, asleep. She is animate statue, and she does not breathe, or drink, or eat; why, then, would she rest?

    Of course, the truth of the matter is more plain. Perhaps she is a Seraph, unlimited by mortal weariness - but she has not had instruction in her artes in some time, and she is constantly expending magical energy. There are times when it is helpful to be restive.

    She stands in contrast to the other Seraph present: she does not prepare the tea. (Her claws do not allow it.) Neither does she seem particularly meditative; rather, she is latched onto her vessel with a grip as iron as its plates. There is stiffness, to her. And is it any wonder? This place is ill, taken by the pall of Malevolence.

    "I thank you," she says, to the Katz, and their wares. A splash of potion - well, there's no way to ingest it, but it seems to help nonetheless. The pouch of coins she has in return, reaching back for it amongst her saddle with a boneless claw, is uncounted. There may be a button strewn amongst them. The Beast of Lohgrin is not a creature of commerce.

    She retreats to a corner; perhaps there is a blanket strewn over it, but it is inconsequential. Because when the Beast settles down, she goes down, and down, and down; until all her pieces rest against the ground, unsupported by air. She has turned into a loose pile of iron plates and pieces. Please don't steal any of them, Ethius.

<Pose Tracker> Talise Gianfair has posed.

Talise bats her lashes Cyre's way. "Enjoy the feast, then. Just don't put that stuff on a pizza or I'd have to defenestrate you."

As she pulls her sheet up, Talise flashes Rosaline a smile that's notably less flirty than the one she was giving Cyre. "Maybe we can find out on the morning...."

But Ida's explaining something important. Nibbling at her biscuit, she nods back at the smartest of her friends. "Oh, huh. Interesting. So it's the energy of nature. I wonder if it's related to the spirits here...." She crinkles her nose. "...Questions for later."

Mostly because the mirror has come up in conversation. Talise frowns slightly.

"...Yeah, that sounds like Malevolence, all right," she murmurs as she looks down at herself, suddenly a little more anxious. She nibbles on another cookie.

<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

Lily Keil, at least, was given some warning about the coming necessity of sleep. It gave her time to consider it... and to talk to Fei about something else. She's now back in the parlor, having followed Ida here, still in her ruined military gear. ...She's quiet, and it's not entirely because of the clear and obvious injuries she's working through.

She still props herself up with a hand against the wall until she makes her way to a seat, though of course that's 'now' at this point. She has taken up position on a mattress for her part. ...But taken no snacks. As for the injuries--

There are holes in the armor of her jacket, one over a now-purpled bruise covered over in dried blood at her ribs, more over her torso to reveal bandages now--and her hands are bandaged as well, hands and forearms, only allowing a bit of the strange markings on her skin to peek through, at her fingers. Similarly they are visible at the base of her neck. She's pale, and frankly looks ill.

...But she has her medical supplies, at least. "I'm not that concerned with comfort," Lily tells Ida in a deadpan kind of voice. "...The mirror again... Waking might not be simple." But there is... an arrival, and--

"....All right, Katz," Lily answers after a moment. "I'll take one of your better ones. It should hold me off until I can do some more thorough treatment." She also saves her game. Because of course she does."

But Tethelle's question? "Frankly, I don't know either," Lily admits. "...But unless the rest of us want to hold onto it, we don't have an option. We should be prepared to restrain the three of you--just in case." No offense, of course. After she delivers that cheerful proclamation, Lily sets her satchel down in front of her and starts--with some difficulty--to shrug off her ruined armored jacket. Her arms are covered in bandages, though strange circuitry peeks through at her shoulders. She is... vaguely uncomfortable with this, but there's little she can do about it. There is also a chest holster for a very large ARM that she finally takes off and sets beside herself.

She pauses, at that. She looks to the certain white-haired man as he's staying awake. "...I'm trusting you with this, Hesiod." She says it seriously, shortly--and expects no reply. His role is done.

Lanval's... aura, is strange to her meanwhile, but it's fine. She just glances around. "...Don't be alarmed if I don't wake up with the rest of you," Lily says simply, and pulls a strange bottle from her bag--oh, the bottle itself is ordinary enough, large and rectangular, the short side the top and bottom. ...But the liquid in it is a vibrant, vivid blue. "...Anybody who doesn't sleep well, I can give you a very, very diluted dose of this. But don't ask unless you really need it."

The Earthpulse... Lily considers it. "Is that the ley convergence here? I can... feel it..." For that matter, she can still feel Ida's presence, strangely enough, feel some of the contradictions. "I should tell you."

"...I mean what I say about restraining you... But do the best that you can. It'd be better if you all lived through this."

<Pose Tracker> Garrett Stampede has posed.


Garrett feels naked without a sword.

It is just a thing with him. He can't remember the last time he didn't have one in his hand. Likely because he was face-down and black-out drunk the last time it happened. However he has no blade now, the great twisted black sword of the Dancer left on the ground where Gwen had knocked it too. He didn't even try to recover the thing.

It is likely for the best.

He still has some of his Hellion traits though. His hair is white. Frost and snow still whirl around his unnaturally pale form, but his hair is pulled back again into a familiar pony tail instead of hanging loose.

Someone asks if they can hold it. If they can contain it what they had set in motion.

"Well we can try, just make sure that we don't have to try to long eh?" Drawls the swordsman. Leaning against the wall near to Ida, arms crossed over his chest in a lazy pose that some around him know so very well.

He also has a black eye, and a bruised jaw. Thanks to. You know. Cecilia, Fei, and others beating some sense into him. But he wears that at least well.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

By the end of fighting Rosaline, Xantia was... spent. Not even so much from the fight itself, but from what happened after. Saving Lydia took everything she had, leaving her exhausted, famished, and dreadfully cold. Needless to say, she attacked all the snacks that could be spared with fervor, and claimed multiple warm drinks and blankets in a desperate bid to get warm again.

It hasn't really worked so well. She knew it wouldn't be that easy, it took more time than this last time she used that power, too. She still feels cold and miserable, which is plain to see by looking at her, shivering even now, and being generally quiet. Usually Xantia makes it pretty obvious she's in a room with how loud and full of energy she tends to be, but none of that is going on right now.

In fact, she's actively trying not to draw too much attention to herself. Even if it's a distant third wish behind 'having a larger amount of food' and 'being warm again', at a time like this, the best thing to do would be to, fittingly enough, have a long rest. That's not going to be a problem. She feels like she could fall over any second, and will be doing just that. Right on the floor, who even needs a mattress?

She does smile at Rosaline from the corner she's nestled herself in, though. Maybe it's just her, but she feels like more of the Rosaline she knows is on display than before. And the last thing she wants is to upset her friends right now - that goes for everyone who happens to look at her with concern. She's fine, no need to worry about what happened, she tries to convey wordlessly, while she barely clings to wakefulness.

<Pose Tracker> Tethelle Cirdian has posed.

"I think it is," Tethelle says to Talise. "It certainly has something to do with the energy, and so if the spirits do too, they must be related."

Tethelle gets her answer. She doesn't like it, but she doesn't have many points she can actually make that would be worth anything. "If you're willing to do it," she says, after a very long pause. She keeps her sword across her knees, as if drawing strength from it.

Her sword, as in the one that's her favourite. There's another one, strangely curved and also two-handed, that she has with her. But Tethelle does not consider that her sword, merely a sword she was using. It has a black smear of ash across the grip that she didn't clean out of the leather yet.

<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.

    The contents of the sphere in the castle had made it clear enough. Ida, Rosaline, Garret -- they were all at risk of unleashing something they could not control -- something that would break loose even if they used the mirror no more.
    Something that would threaten the very sanctity of this continent, if not much of Lunar itself.

    This cannot continue.

    So Avril had informed Dean, and now, here she sits, legs folded under herself primly as she cradles a cup of chamomile tea between her ungloved hands.

    There was a dream she'd had recently, though it seems she can only recall the tattered edges of it as she gazes over at Ida in silence.
    ...A promise?

    Involuntarily, she shivers, as if catching the edge of a truly glacial chill.

    There had been another dream, hadn't there. A sea of black glass. Meeting with friends as if for the first time. A memory she did not want to possess anymore.
    It's like trying to grasp the sea -- it runs through her fingers when she reaches out for it. Just traces are all she can gather.

    "And the mirror... I feel as if it has been appearing in my dreams of late, but I cannot remember the experience well. Will we this time recall what we encountered?"

    She appears to have little obvious worry about whether or not they can contain it. Overconfidence, a lack of understanding of what is at stake, or... just another display of Avril's preeternatural calm?

    "Oh!"

    This is when the Katz comes in to set up shop.

    She lifts one hand from her cup to touch against her cheek.

    "A cat suit..."
    Judging from that smile, and that besotted look on her face, she probably thinks the Katz is adorable.

<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.

Layna watches Ida with a frown as she answers her question and peers quietly into her glass for a moment afterward.

"...Aye." She replies. "...Gonna be a rough night then, in other words."

Was there anyone here who could honestly say they didn't have an ounce of that?

<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.

    Dean might be in trouble.
    
    Not only is he too energized to calm down, especially after just having woken up from a sleep only a few hours ago, but he finds that chamomile tea tastes terrible. There's the Goddess's Breath, but... he's underage...! If worse comes to worst, at least he can help Ethius keep an eye on everyone's sleeping bodies. In fact, having someone like Dean about to keep someone like Ethius in check might be wise. But hopefully it won't come to that. Dean would rather help in a more active way, given a choice.
    
    "We'll do all we can," he tells Jack, nodding his way. He perks when cookies start going around. "Ooh, cookies!" Grabbing one or three, he turns a curious look over at the Katz as he shoves the first in his mouth and gnaws on it. Well that's... sure a thing! Looks like they're totally ready for this PJ party, at least.
    
    Avril heartbubbling over it just makes him grin her way. If Avril thinks the Katz is adorable, Dean thinks Avril thinking the Katz is adorable is adorable. It makes perfect sense!!

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

For the record, the Katz accepts Beast's button and Cyre's souls without missing a single beat. Buttons are precious, every Katz knows this.

"...We'll try our best," Rosaline tells Tethelle, once she's obtained her treats and returned to her seat. "We don't know much about what will be happening in there, but I think... if we work together, we can make a miracle happen."

Can you, really?

Oh, shut up.

Lily speaks of restraining them. Rosaline nods, grimly. She accepts this.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    Many worrying things are brought up. Lanval doesn't dwell on the Earthpulse explanation, or what's going on to it. It's something he should feel angry about - angry that they would take such a direct action against the lifeblood of the world itself. He should feel anxious - anxious about what it could all turn into if it cannot be stopped. He should feel ashamed - ashamed that he sat on the information he did for so long, as though actually telling them about the Domain Masters and what exactly has been going on up there would've been worse than... not, before seeking help.
     All this, on top of the injuries inflicted upon the sheer fury he was subject to by Rosaline's grasp upon anger and her own identity. He wears the wounds as well as can be. He keeps all else out of mind, shutting away whispers that want to get in and twist, to exploit these very real reactions and feelings that should throw the damn door open to let themselves inside and have themselves a new Dragon to roam around in.
     Patiently, and placidly, Lanval continues to smile gently in his meditation. He's got that silly kiseru-style pipe. It's not silly in looks - it's ornate and, among enthusiasts, would be one heck of a catch for an antique collection.
     It's silly because it blows bubbles, which he does... right out his nose, as he engages in the weird mortal behavior that is completely extraneous to spirits like himself... breathing. Breathing in, breathing out, while the Katz spirits peddle wares and others engage in beer, tea, or whatever means to try and calm themselves to sleep.
     If he lets himself project anything less than peaceful contentment, a whole lot would fall apart right then and there.

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Hey! HEY! That's trademarked by Ruby! Hey!!

Fei Fong Wong stepped away for a bit to talk with Lily. When he came back, he didn't seem too happy, though not like angry happy, just kind of tired and unhappy. To be honest, he's kind of been tired and unhappy the whole adventure here. Who knew that psychic abuse could be so EXHAUSTING. And frankly, he didn't feel particularly rested after the last time he fell asleep.

Fei is kind of skeptical as well about sleeping here. He looks towards Tethelle's sarcasm and gives her a small nod but sarcasm won't help ultimately since they don't have any other choice. Not unless they're willing to damn the whole planet. You're not the kind of person to sit back when people need help, Fei, but sometimes you wish to hell you were.

Fei flops down on a mattress. He suspects he'll need a lot of help in passing out here. He takes in a long deep breath and then flops over.

"This is going to be awful, isn't it?" He asks of the gods before he adds, closing his eyes, "I'm not sure how under these circumstances, how I'm gonna sleep but I'll do my best."

Sleep until morning?
Yes
No

Fei is out like a light within seconds.

<Pose Tracker> Talise Gianfair has posed.

"...Just be careful, you three," Talise urges upon downing another swig of the Sinful Drink in her flask. Her eyes dart from Ida to Rosaline to Garrett - she doesn't know him from Adam, but any friend of Ida's is OK in her book. "And if it helps, we'll be there however we can be."

Or will you? You'll probably turn into a Hellion yourself, you know. Remember what happened in the Trial Knight's Domain?

Fuck you, Purple Me.

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Ida manages a smile as she watches the Beast of Lohgrin settle down. If nothing else, she feels like she's already overcome a major obstacle just by... realizing she has to do this. Lily speaks up, and Ida nods. She knows well what the sorceress means. "I think I may trust myself to Rosaline's magic," Ida says, glancing at the Beastwoman. Just in case, though, she starts drinking the glass of alcoholic awful that Layna gave her, quietly grateful that the Beast is (probably) not watching.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Beast has posed.

    The Beast of Lohgrin is, indeed, not watching - for what passes for 'watching' from hollow eyes. She has retreated into her vessel entire, to try and calm an anxious heart and slumber. And, well - it takes a while. But... soon enough, she's not aware of anything in the waking world, any more.

<Pose Tracker> Cecilia Adlehyde has posed.

Cecilia marched out the door in the courtyard intent on just...walking to whatever dais of ultradoom was the cause of all this and then hitting it with a stick until it became defeated.

This didn't work out and about 2 hours later she turned up in the makeshift dormitory, with the exact face of a person who has just spent 2 hours very purposefully achieving fuck all. Fortunately, this does mean she is now tired. She has produced her traveling trunk from ... ... ... don't worry about it, and produced a sleeping bag and pillow to supplement the sofa she's claimed. "We call them leypoints, on Filgaia," she murmurs, about the Earthpulse. "It seems to be pretty similar, though...a lot of things about Lunar are different enough that we may not be able to assume. And I'm not aware of any leypoints this focused on Filgaia..."

....providing information is soothing, perhaps. Still, before it all ends, she steps over toward Jack. She can tell he's uneasy.

She reaches into her vest and produces the Arctican dagger they found on Mount Manfred, quietly holding it to him handle-first because she's not a complete idiot.

"You probably need this more than I do," she says, smiling thinly.

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

Rosaline returns Ida's look and nods, quietly incanting and conjuring up mist in her hand. And when the signal is given, a pink haze descends over her, and anyone else who requests it. Now, all they can hope for is that their passive Sleep resistance isn't too high.

<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.

    It'd be a fun, exciting evening spent with friends if there wasn't that whole spectre of certain doom looming over their heads.

    Gwen sits cross-legged on the floor, trying to entertain the thought of sleep. She was tired a while ago, but now, realizing that the battlefield lay in the world of sleep, rather than the plane where she could just pull through and punch things.

    Then Gwen sees Katz. And all the tension just melts right away, replaced with an overwhelming need to just reach over and hug and squeeze those cute ears and the paws and the tail and-

    "Y-yeah. Rosaline does," Gwen agrees, with Talise. "Wait. What's this about souls?" Gwen peers at Cyre with a thoroughly disturbed look on her face.

    But at least there's cookies, which Gwen begins to down with gusto. And, eyeing the drink Layna offers, Gwen reaches for it, downing a decent amount like a desert wanderer at their first oasis. She hands it back, with a sigh. Avril's words make her wonder about something, though. Something about dreams. She can't remember seeing a mirror in hers, but she did see...

    She casts a look to Ida, then Garrett. "Hey..."

    She thinks better of it, especially as the room begins to spin. "Nevermind, It's nothin' important... See ya on the other side, everyone." She gives a thumbs up. "Let's just hope this don't give us seven years bad luck when we bust it down."

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    They are Goddess-less fools who will destroy the world She has brought them. They are suffering.
     Terrible things are imminent. There is nothing you can do... you have no power of Purification. I will prevent it from growing any worse for as long as I am here.
     You were too weak to speak out before... and look what became of your cowardice. This is the time it can be addressed.
     A silence passes.
     I know why I am here.
     Lanval will find that 'here' is not in the waking world, before long, as his manifestation in physical space visibly begins snoring.

DC: Kalve switches forms to Kalve of the Method!
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.

    "Yes. The most important thing," Avril says, almost as if answering Gwen's near-question, "is that we are prepared for anything. 'In dreams exist all possibilities', or so it is said. Let us go."

    At which she finishes off her tea and, with one last look Dean's way, slowly leans back to lie against the cushion she's claimed.
    It won't be long before she's sleeping peacefully.

<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

Lily, for her part--once nodding to Ida, understanding her means--takes a gulp of her medicine, and sets it down. ...Between that and the haze of magic...

She's dead asleep in moments. 'Dead' asleep might be right; Lily sleeps practically like a corpse at the moment.

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

Kalve is here. He has not yet gotten into a fistfight with Garrett. This is a good sign.

He also looks like he's swallowed a bug. Maybe a bunch of bugs. He's the elephant in the room, if the elephant is an alien invader bent on murdering a large portion of the people in his vicinity... eventually. He's also settled alongside Ida, although 'settled' is kind of a bad word for it. They should be going to sleep to deal with the Mirror, and he's unfortunately at the point of exhaustion where it wraps around to being too wired to really sleep.

It does not help that he has something of a cultural bias against leaving himself in positions of vulnerability, either. At least Ida's here to help take the edge off. Malevolence-infused or not, she's in a better state than she had been lately, and he's glad to see progress on that front. Kalve takes a deep breath and tries to settle down. He can maybe do something meditative until he passes out. That'll probably work, right?

<Pose Tracker> Tethelle Cirdian has posed.

Tethelle Cirdian has politely refrained from running across the room and attempting to chop Kalve in half.

This is as far as her politeness on this topic goes.

<Pose Tracker> Talise Gianfair has posed.

Talise has also not chopped Kalve in half! But only because he's Ida's boyfriend and she's not in the business of killing her friends' boyfriends and/or girlfriends.

Plus she's trying to sleep right now.

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

Realistically speaking, Kalve would probably sleep a lot better if they'd just gotten all those dehalfitation attempts over and done with now instead of when he's supposed to be leaving himself vulnerable.

Maybe he can be a mini-boss next time. Catharsis is anti-Malevolence, right?

<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.

Everyone starts going to sleep...so Layna shrugs, and raises her glass.

"To us! May we meet again!" She says, downs the alcohol inside...and then, between Rosaline's mist and the drink, she's out like a light. Good thing she found a comfortable place to recline in first.

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Ida finishes her drink, sets the cup aside, and rolls over. There's a warm glow in her cheeks as she pulls the blanket around herself, and the man lying next to her. She wraps an arm around Kalve, plants a kiss on his cheek, and closes her eyes.

    Rosaline's magic picks up where the alcohol left off.

<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.

    Dean meets Avril's gaze, and nods. He lays his head down, and for all his energy, soon enough he's asleep.

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

And once Rosaline has cast her spell, she has curled up on the armchair, snoozing peacefully. It's adorable. A shame almost no one is awake to see it!

<Pose Tracker> The Umbral Mirror has posed.

    Sleep comes, and with it, dreams. This dream, though, is the same for everyone.

    It may look familiar to those who were sucked into the Mirror before--a dream of a seemingly endless fall, alone in the darkness. Far below, a boundless expanse of jet-black glimmers, reflecting the shadowy bulk of Castle Rabenstein and the mountain it sits atop. The dreamers cannot see each other. For all the know, each one is alone--alone and falling. Alone, and slamming through the pane of the Mirror without even slowing down, an impact more disorienting than agonizing. The fall continues, and the air turns thicker, as though the dreamers were sinking into murky water beneath the icy surface of a lake. One by one, they hit bottom. They can see each other through the murk, now, but there is a much more pressing concern.

    Shards of the Mirror's surface fall after them, and as they pick up speed, they turn into jagged glass projectiles. Each one contains a reflection of a possibility--an alternate future that could have come to pass, had things been different. If anything, this only makes them sharper, for they cut not just at the manifestation of your flesh and bone, but your identity as well. How much of who you are is due to luck? Would you have been able to do half of what you've done if things were only a little different?

    The assault is relentless, withering. The only way out is to keep moving forwards, and to assert oneself--to accept the possibilities, to own them. Regardless of what might have happened, this is what happened, and what is happening, now. That's all anyone ever has.

    BATTLE OBJECTIVES

-REACH THE CORE OF THE UMBRAL MIRROR

-CONTAIN THE MALEVOLENCE WITHIN

DC: The Umbral Mirror switches forms to The Umbral Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Avril Vent Fleur with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Cecilia Adlehyde with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Cyre H. Lorentz with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Dean Stark with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Fei Fong Wong with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Garrett Stampede with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Kalve with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Layna Manydays with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Lily Keil with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Rosaline Calice with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Seraph Beast with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Seraph Lanval with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Talise Gianfair with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Tethelle Cirdian with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Xantia with Black Shards Fall Like Ice!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has completed its action.
GS: Talise Gianfair critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 38 hit points!
GS: Rosaline Calice guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 99 hit points!
DC: MISS! Cyre H. Lorentz completely evades Black Shards Fall Like Ice from The Umbral Mirror!
GS: Layna Manydays takes a glancing hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 95 hit points!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 36 hit points!
GS: CRITICAL! Xantia guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 159 hit points!
GS: Lily Keil guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 109 hit points!
DC: MISS! Ida Everstead-Rey completely evades Black Shards Fall Like Ice from The Umbral Mirror!
GS: Seraph Lanval has entered a Reflect stance!
GS: Seraph Lanval has activated a Force Action!
GS: Seraph Lanval takes a solid hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 176 hit points!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 101 hit points!
GS: Seraph Beast takes a solid hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 187 hit points!
GS: Dean Stark critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 37 hit points!
GS: Fei Fong Wong guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 109 hit points!
GS: Kalve guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 112 hit points!
DC: MISS! Avril Vent Fleur completely evades Black Shards Fall Like Ice from The Umbral Mirror!
GS: CRITICAL! Garrett Stampede critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 61 hit
points!
<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

Rosaline is familiar with the mirror's work. That doesn't mean she likes it. Well, she supposes it's fair, that she have to experience it herself, after they inflicted it on other people. She wants to curl up and shut out the entire dream world, but... No, they've got work to do. She can't let them down.

And so, she falls, falls, falls...

And lands smoothly, because being a beastwoman has some perks. She looks around, catching glimpses of the others, before her ears perk up. She hears something... falling.

"WATCH OUT!" she calls out, before rolling away from a falling shard. She glances back to see a reflection of herself de-hellionized, wearing civilian clothes the likes of which she had before she became a nun.

"What--" But here comes another one, which Rosaline raises her ARM to blast at. It shatters away into dozens of Rosalines, each wearing a different uniform. Aveh military, Songstress, Nisan nun...

The tinier shards pelt her, cutting in. She runs, trying to evade the next ones. A large plate of glass bears down, threatening to crush her with the image of an all too familiar wedding chapel. She raises her free hand, blasting it with flames, and--

It breaks in two. One shows her happily raising a family with Tobit Calice, who in this timeline never became a Hellion. The second half shows the same scene, except the family entirely consists of Hellions.

"I HATE THIS," Rosaline concludes. Then right in front of her, crashes a shard showing her as a child, being raised by curly-haired, feline-eared parents. She skids, trying to avoid crashing into it.

"I REALLY HATE THIS!!"

GS: Rosaline Calice has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Mother's Mercy!
GS: Rosaline Calice has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Talise Gianfair has posed.

Talise did not get sucked into the Mirror before now. It's an unpleasant sensation, especially because she can't see a soul around her. It's as though the universe has closed in around her.

Glass gives way. Shards of it plummet after her. The murky air closes in like an ocean of despair. Reaching upwards, Talise grasps for the surface of something she's not sure has a surface.

She can begin to see people around her. Tethelle. Ida. Rosaline. Lanval.

She hits bottom on her back. It's a hard landing; she actually bounces, though it's a slow bounce. Floating through the air, Talise gasps, the sound echoing around her.

/If only you could ever make a sound landing. A shard of the mirror whistles by her. She can see herself in it, sliding expertly down one of the fuggin' ropes.

The Swordsinger's eyes grow wide.

More shards plummet around her. Images dance through them, but they are reflections only of possibilities. She dances away from one. A young woman, half human and half Beastwoman, stands at the stern of a ship and waves goodbye as it slips into the horizon. If only I'd stayed on the Lunabelle and died with Mom and Dad. Talise's soul curdles a little from the thought she's thought more than a few times over the years.

But I wouldn't be HERE if I had! Met the friends I care about! Talise whirls and slams a gauntleted fist into that shard. It cracks as it deflects away from her. But another one is coming.

The glimpse into it is startling. A woman of 19 - or is she a woman? Wreathed in only purple fire and an insane pattern of purple stripes jagging across hard muscles, hiding salient features. Elfin ears and canine teeth extended savagely beneath a pair of ram horns. Behind Hellion Talise, the looming shape of the Trial Knight. And the only reason that didn't happen was luck! The Trial Knight would've turned me into a Hellion there in Krosse, too!

With a snarl, Talise rolls away from that shard. It slashes past her.

It cuts close. It doesn't slice flesh. The nick it leaves cuts deeper. ...if Sorey hadn't been there to save me....

A large shard digs itself into the ambiguous pseudoturf right in front of her, missing her by a thread. Talise sucks in her breath and stares into it.

The Talise inside, in the uniform of Althena's Guard, stands back at herself. ...if I hadn't had Uncle Piet, I probably would've given up singing and become one of them.... Would it have been so bad...?

Talise can't find an answer. She just reaches back, pulls Rastaban out of her dreams, roars at the fragment of possibility, and proceeds to slice it down the middle.

Talise de Gianfair, of the Guard of Althena, stares accusingly as she's split in half.

GS: Talise Gianfair has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Infinitely Rippling Waters!
GS: Talise Gianfair has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    Lanval is used to the idea of falling. Water likes to rest in whatever will contain it. It's the sensation that comes with making 'contact' that sees eyes open half-lidded in the inky black void. He doesn't break through things, even if he looks like a big fat oaf. That's so weird. Novel, kind of, as he descends into a feeling that becomes so extremely weird. He's water. Why should water feel like it's drowning? Is this what mortals feel when they fall deep into watery depths? Huh. Maybe that's why he's never seen mortals live under bodies of water. He's never had cause to think about that. He's seen dead ones pulled out of water in the last few years, sure, but never live ones.
     The shards of the mirror flicker and flash various scenes of Lanval... sitting around, lazing around, in a number of environs. Carved marble, surrounded by people of the cloth presenting glass bottles of sanctified wine. Rustic wood, visited by weary workers and families with presentations of more drink. One eye opens up a little more. Sometimes he can't quite identify the manner of dress among them. Different periods of time, maybe? The people he sees don't quite line up. It's easy to forget faces over five hundred odd years, but there's a feeling some of them aren't quite... right. That's him, presiding over that region. Maybe some other regions?
     There are scenes of him along other scenic parts of Meribus he knows he has never seen before. Off on his own little personal journey? In every last one of them, he's enjoying the taste of something alcoholic, enjoying some mortal vice. Others are more chaotic swirls of Malevolence, glimpses of near-inevitabilities for many Seraphim who are too careless.
     Most chillingly, however... all of them seem to terminate the same way.
     Some way or another, the Guard is involved. They destroy the places of worship deemed sacreligious, tainted. They destroy a rampaging Dragon few of them can see. They accost him for aiding and abetting various forms of sin - no matter how things went, it all would've gone south a few years ago.
     The Water Seraph uncomfortably shifts, troubled by what he sees. He bats at it ineffectually with one of his hands, and the shards splinter some more into further inevitabilities - only the way he got there would've been different. He tries to shoo them away as he staggers in a parody of walking, back towards those whose fates he has intertwined himself with so - the anchors in which that seem to have had him avert a whole host of terrible fates, like they were an oasis of comfort.
     The best he can manage is to flop on his back on the ice cold 'floor' of the dream space, taking a drag off his gourd as it deflects another set of tiny shards, of possibilities that end no differently.

GS: Seraph Lanval has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Leisurely Lunge!
GS: Seraph Lanval has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Beast has posed.

    Falling. It feels like giving up; it feels like giving in. What a terrifying thought. Through the pane - through the mire.

    And as they come to rest at the bottom - the Beast of Lohgrin is not present.

    Here there is a young woman for those with the sense to see her, a stranger to all present, in mortal ken no older than her early twenties. She is a giant of a woman, tall and broad, olive-skinned; and yet for all her presence her edges are softened, flowing green dress and grey cloak, open-air sandals. Pale green ribbons capture twin braids so long they extend to her knees - the tips of them are themselves light green, contrasted with the deep dark brown of her hair's dominant colour. Bangs hang free of the configuration, swept over one side of her face; these, too, have been dipped in that light green colour. Her eyes might seem a whitened grey, at first glance, but no - there is green hue here, as well.

    Green as the wildlands... green as the air which flows over metal plates.

    Perhaps the Beast of Lohgrin is here after all.

    Her face twists - her face twists! - in shock as she realises she can see their figures through the darkness - they can see hers. She pulls up that cloak; it cannot quite hide her. It was never designed to shroud her form.

    And then the shards come.

    The first, she does not see, in her anxiety. It lances through the shoulder of that cloak; catches her against the shoulder, tears down. She looks down as it hits the ground. It is swampland, untouched by human hands.

    The Beast of Lohgrin is not made of iron, as she curls in on herself, as the shards fall. As humanity finds a better option; as she finds the right words to say to hurting souls. As they live - as she does not flee - as the world welcomes them.

    And then, that one which falls directly in her path -

    Scaled and horrific and mindless for it.

    She leaps over it - gravity is not her mistress. She runs. The shards which catch her, she blows away in a tempest.

    (Because the sad fact is, Beast... your techniques are locked in this battle!)

GS: Gwen Whitlock guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Black Shards Fall Like Ice for 111 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

Sleep comes quickly. That's probably the direct result of all the injuries that've piled up in the last couple of days. Cyre closes his eyes as soon as he hits the sack, takes in a great big breath, and drifts away on the waves of a dream.

...

...

Except not really. It's more like a nightmare, actually. The sensation of 'falling' is acute and tangible in a way that no ordinary dream should ever be. The shaman's expression fixes into a flat grimace, his ears twitch furtively left and right, before finally turning upward toward the source of that terrible whistling noise.

Ah. Glass shards.

Shards containing images. Memories of times that weren't. A pair of brothers sitting together in front of a setting sun. A wanderer drinking his pain away in a bottle of gin. A towering monstrosity of twisted flesh and corrupted wind, doing battle with a beast of golden lightning. A man cradling a child with his wife at his side.

So.

It's gonna be like that.

Well, it's a good thing that this isn't Cyre's first rodeo.

"You're gonna have to do better," Cyre mutters to himself, gathering an etherial wind to surround him, swirling around his arms and legs. He lunges for the first shard, twisting lithely around it before slamming his foot into the flat of the glass. A ripple of wind launches him upwards to the next, and the next and the next and the next as the shaman rises toward a missing sky with every footstep...!

GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Stepping Wind!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Tethelle Cirdian has posed.

Tethelle takes her sweet time falling asleep. She has difficulty doing so when she's keyed up, and she is now; she didn't take any alcohol, and even the sleeping spell has trouble catching.

Which means that those in the dream may not see her for some few moments as Tethelle simply isn't asleep enough to manifest yet - until all of a sudden she appears out of thin air, diving to the water far below and chased by a cluster of broken glass.

Tethelle sinks into the murk with the others, but while the others may have fought at the bottom, her delay means that she is fighting them while she falls. A Tethelle, thinner and wielding what appears to be a fishing harpoon, reaches well out of a shard to jab at the real one, who kicks off the harpoon and spins away.

This sends her toward another shard, which projects a quartet of swords with no rhyme or reason. One scratches Tethelle as she tries to parry in midair, sending her flying almost wildly at a third shard, which seems completely empty - pure black, until a skeletal hand reaches out and grips at Tethelle.

Tethelle ricochets wildly from shard to shard in the air. She is a physical person, and she deals with her problems physically - even metaphysical problems. She is a sword in the darkness, and she half-throws herself, half-is thrown from one to another. A second fisher, but this one with a net and a family behind her. A plumper Tethelle wielding a priestly staff of office. A Tethelle that appears to have been drowned by liquid metal, and still reaches out, puppeted by long strands of it. More and more of them are empty shards that do nothing but slash as they fall.

And still Tethelle fights them, pushing them away from her while they desperately pull themselves closer. "These," she growls. "Are. Not. Me!"

She has been falling a long time, and all of a sudden, Tethelle hits the ground. She is surrounded by a hundred - a thousand - more tiny, tiny shards of broken glass, and is breathing heavily, eyes wide with something between panic and excitement.

GS: Tethelle Cirdian has attacked The Umbral Mirror with A Comet Tail of Glass!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian has completed her action.
GS: Seraph Beast has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Desperate Tempest!
GS: Seraph Beast has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Ida falls.

    This isn't the first time she's fallen into the Mirror. She's been inside it many times. Each time she went to go inhabit her dream-world--the little bubble of unreality where she had a husband and children and a life where everything worked out--she had to pass through the surface. This, though, is different. The impact is jarring, shattering. The cold leaches the strength from her limbs. It's all she can do to twist upright, to open her eyes and see other little points of light descending through the darkness. She hits bottom. An electric jolt races up her spine, and she snaps upright. Shards of glass streak down from above, like meteors. Ida remembers the battlefield outside the Guardian Temple, and instinctively reaches for her ARMs. A ghostly copy of Devil's Due--the way it was before Harken destroyed it--appears in her hand, from nothing.

    A mirror flashes by. Ida, wearing an Etone's uniform, surrounded by Wels, unloading revolvers in perfect form.

    Ida, in Lahan, the Trial Knight's bloodied blade jutting through her back. She slumps forwards, the life leaving her--

    Ida in a parlor, older. There's an infant in her arms, and a little girl playing with a doll on the floor and a handsome man writing at the parlor desk. The man is not the man she loves.

    Ida, taller and harder-looking, receives an ARM from Kalve. The cords in her neck look more like cables, and there's a design the color of mercury tattooed on her cheek.

    Ida, a Hellion, kneeling at the feet of a man with the face of a lion, wreathed in Malevolent flame...

    Ida unloads. She fires round after round at the oncoming possibilities, even as her stomach twists, and her heart pounds. Some could have happened. Some could never have happened, but for an accident of birth. Each of them explodes in turn.

GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Devil Bullet!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action.
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Rosaline Calice's Mother's Mercy for 136 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Talise Gianfair's Infinitely Rippling Waters for 145 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Seraph Lanval's Leisurely Lunge for 111 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Cyre H. Lorentz's Stepping Wind for 91 hit points!
GS: Riposte! Statuses applied to Cyre H. Lorentz!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Tethelle Cirdian's A Comet Tail of Glass for 110 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Seraph Beast's Desperate Tempest for 80 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Ida Everstead-Rey's Devil Bullet for 140 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Ida glances around. She sees Tethelle, but the woman seems to be holding her own. So is Cyre, perhaps annoyingly. But there, that one...

    She recognizes her. That wind is familiar. "Beast?!" Ida says.

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

Kalve falls asleep through a mixture of the (somewhat embarrassing) comforting closeness of Ida and the sorcerous aid being cast around the room. His struggle isn't against the magic, but against his own reflex to try to shrug it off and go after who cast it. It turns out to work out alright.

The Mirror takes them.

Kalve falls.

He feels impacts, dulled and disorienting, as he plummets into the depths of the thing. It isn't as strange as it might be; he's experienced it, or something like it, once or twice before. He orients himself towards the ground, curling his many arms in on himself to absorb the shock of impact, again and again -- and then to land at the bottom, suspended just off the dreamt-of surface by a half-dozen iron-colored limbs.

Kalve draws himself back to his feet and looks up at the shards. He falls into a fighting stance, calling yellow-white light to his hands to materialize into weaponry. He steps to the side, one crashing down next to him, showing a vision of... children? Himself, mirrored inside the fragment, but surrounded by them. He recognizes the buildings in the background. Wayside. He left not long after that. If he hadn't --

More plummet, coming for him. Kalve tries to predict them, dragging his attention from the sight to the incoming rain of glass. They move in impossible ways, obeying no laws of motion but what may be conjured in a fever-dream. In that way, they have no master. Jagged glass scrapes across Kalve's shielding arms, deflected barely. It creates a forest of broken razors, reflecting him in a multitude of guises. He doesn't recognize them, except for the important parts: how he moves, how he speaks, how he fights.

Kalve charges forward, drawn by a feeling of something like purpose. An enormous shard crashes down in front of him, a sealing barrier to the end of the manifest labyrinth. He sees no way around it. Kalve jumps, leaping into the air, curling his arms around himself --

He crashes into a familiar vision the instant it crosses his mind.

"...ferroflora deployment proved essential to the operation. It's in my report," Kalve says, brusquely. "The fragment of the Statue seemed enough proof enough. I hope Alhazred is pleased." Kalve doesn't sound like he really hopes that at all. He takes a breath. "However, this proves that the biosphere is not completely incompatible with other lifeforms taking root. I intend --"

The mirror breaks in slow-motion. Cracks begin to spiderweb across the surface. Kalve feels like he's crashing through molasses, struggling to keep hold of the truth of the memory. His dreamspun flesh cuts as the shards drag through it, terribly slowly. Rivulets of quicksilver manifest in mid-air.

"I know all about 'what you intend,'" the blue-cloak sneers. "You were lucky. You wouldn't have been able to do it at all without the others, plants or no plants. Lord Alhazred is pleased with the results, but... disappointed with how you achieved them. Another step out of line, and you'll be assigned triage until you're older than that fool master of yours." He shoots Kalve a leering look. "Unless, of course, you'd care to make a real contribution to scientific progress? I've heard the rumors, you see. Perhaps if you deliver Lord Alhazred that pet human of yours...~"

The Mirror presents an alternate future. A change.

Kalve, weary, nods after a moment's pause. "If that is what is required," he says heavily.

The fragment explodes into slivers. Kalve bursts free through to the other side, furious at the change, his grip on the dreamscape already slipping from what feels like such a low blow.

GS: Kalve has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Silhouette Arsenal!
GS: Kalve has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

Sleep, and dreams. Lily Keil awakens in the dream, and feels herself falling, falling, falling. Her eyes open, and she is dressed again in her military gear, armored jacket and sturdy boots, not at all destroyed, still bearing the Black Wolf insignia. ...And she falls. Alone, she can see no others...

But she's used to that. Her eyes open, and she looks around. The pane of the Mirror moves ahead of her, and Lily crosses her arms before herself, a flickering field of shadow erupting around her in the moment. Then down, down, down--

Two things are true, at the same time, as Lily sinks through what could be water, as the air is thick. Two things: the first is that as Lily falls, shards of mirror glass scythe downward, and some she can destroy before they reach her, but some slash at a sleeve, at her cheek, at her leg, stab into her side. It is true that it is an injury of blood to the mind.

But there is a second truth that is different. In the second truth, Lily midair is abrubtly faced with opponents all around her--at the bottom, is surrounded. A woman in red, wielding a rosewood rifle. A corpse-white woman draped in shadow, with a wicked smile and golden-black eyes, the light reflecting off of the gloss of her taloned fingers. A woman with black and and golden eyes like the others, but dressed in the attire of Adlehyde's Royal Guard. ...A woman in black, shoulders exposed by the Solarian uniform she wears. ...A woman with circuitry all over her person, hovering off of the ground as her strange markings pulse with power.

"You--" A blast of disintegrating energy erupts against Lily's arm, utterly destroying part of her sleeve, exposing blood and muscle before she rolls to the side and hurls a spear of ice for the woman in red's throat. "You... You went with Father," she says, as the battle starts. But the battle is joined quickly as the Hellion Lily lifts her hands and darkness erupts from the ground to try to ensnare all of them. "...And you... I was almost you," she says, to the spidery tendrils of power as they bite into her calf, cling upwards.

"I don't know you," she says to the woman from Gebler, "But your eyes..." The Darkness Element facing Lily shrugs lightly, and conjures blasts of void energy that destroy the space between them in deafening roars. And the strange, inhuman being with her circuitry simply stares as if into Lily's soul. "...You..."

The clash is quick, and ugly. Lily takes wounds, and Lily gives wounds. Her hand erupts into flame and punches through one of the shards, who laughs and looks into her eyes, and murmurs, "You remember." Another cut down her back, and the Hellion starts to overpower her with sheer physicality, with Lily turning and sending an explosion of light.

There is the sound of a woman amused, "Hmhmhm..."

Abrubtly they all disappear in a flash, and Lily's jacket is replaced; not black, but gray. ...She looks to the fallen glass on the ground, and once again only one thing is true instead of two that cannot coexist. She sees a few scattered images in them...

The inhuman figure who did not fight her; the disgraced Knight serving anew; the woman in red again. They all look at her.

"...I saw more of these before, too..." She considers, for a moment, and closes her eyes. About her--about all of them--a red aura blooms, and she absorbs the shards into herself, healing her wounds, girding her.

"...These, I can use," she says, and turns to look forward.

GS: Lily Keil has attacked Lily Keil with Red Aura!
GS: Lily Keil has completed her action.
GS: Shield! Statuses applied to Lily Keil!
GS: Lily Keil heals Lily Keil! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.

Falling...

Falling...

Falling into darkness.

Layna opens her eyes to find herself falling down. In the distance, she sees Castle Rabenstein in the mountain. Beyond that...nothing.

She is alone.

She falls through the Mirror, passing through it as if it were breathable water.

She falls and reorients herself before she hits the bottom. As she falls...light blooms around her, forming into a naval coat and hat. The uniform of a captain. She can see the others now, but she can see other things, as well.

Shards, falling down...

Reflected in one, she sees a bulky crimson Gear hurtling a massive anchor through a castle town, its pilot furious over the abduction of a loved one.

How many people would have died before she was taken down?

In another, she sees a crimson ship pull into the harbor of a town, the flag of battle raised...

How many innocents would've been lost?

In yet another, she sees the blood-streaked deck of a ship. Layna herself lies collapsed and barely breathing in the middle with her fallen co-conspirators all around, a large man resting a foot on her head head and shouting at her.

If she had slipped up even once, her mutiny would have failed. Her crew would have paid the price.

And finally...she sees a young blonde girl, cheering excitedly as she conjures wind magic for the first time. A man and a woman, well-dressed but with faces blurred and indistinct, look on with proud.

Layna wades through all of these shards impassively...except the last one. The last one takes her by surprise, for all of its suddenness. It cuts deep.

...Who was that girl? Who were those people...?

Layna grits her teeth and shakes her head, looking at those around her.

"Everyone alright? Don't let it get to you, aye?" She calls out, forging ahead.

<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.

    The fall is familiar. For that reason, even though it feels like a fall through an icy lake, Dean remains calm. It's a sense like, it turned out okay before, so it'll be okay now. Sure enough, he soon reaches the bottom of the lake, and although bubbles rise from his nose and mouth, he doesn't feel like he's drowning. As if irritated by his calm, shards burst up from the ground in an expanding cloud of sand, and glitter maliciously with various alternate pasts and futures.
    
    Dean looks around. This, too, seems familiar. A boy who chases after his dreams, a boy whose dreams are crushed, a boy who rises up against the Veruni in defense of humans, a boy who betrays humans to climb the wall and join the Veruni--a hundred thousand deaths, each of them a little different, each of them hurting the people he cares about every single time. It hurts Dean, too, to see it, to see how much pain he causes Avril and Rebecca and Fei and everyone just by being careless, by being reckless--by being *himself*.
    
    "I promised, though," he says to no one and everyone. "I promised I won't die that easily." Twin Fenrir flash into his hands, and he aims them both for the vision of himself, bloody and still at the feet of the Veruni extremist leader. "So I won't!!"
    
    And then he opens fire, to turn that miserable future to dust.

GS: Dean Stark has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Dual Shooter!
GS: Dean Stark has completed his action.
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Kalve's Silhouette Arsenal for 112 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Dean Stark's Dual Shooter for 128 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Beast has posed.

    A voice, from the darkness. The Seraph slows - faces Ida.

    And oh, there is fear, on her face. There is fear on her face, brow twisted up, lips a taut line.

    "Yes," replies the Beast of Lohgrin, though she does not look a beast at all.

    She does not stop. No matter the possibilities, she cannot lose herself amongst them. There is time enough for reflection in solitude.

DC: 1 turn has elapsed in the battle against The Umbral Mirror! 4 turns remain!
DC: 2 turns have elapsed in the battle against The Umbral Mirror! 3 turns remain!
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.

    She's been here before. Indeed, this is the very same obsidian glass mirror she recalls from her dream.

    And in that dream she

    that's right

    she had been

    falling

    Impact with the mirror comes more as afterthought -- she simply passes through, barely slowing in her plummet, aware only of the dull pain of the collision.
    In her dream, she had drowned without drowning, breathing water as if it were air. Is this water now? Or something else?
    Such thoughts glide across her mind and are shed in the freewheeling descent.

    Almost gracefully, as if she had been merely set down by a larger pair of hands, her feet touch bottom. Hair swirling about herself, Avril twists to attempt to sight those who have traveled into the depths with her. It's murky here but she can still see--
    The glinting that catches her eyes fortells a greater problem. She twists as the jagged knives rain down, skirts twisting around her legs; it feels for a long moment as if she's moving far too slowly -- an effect of this place -- to ever escape the flensing barrage, but perhaps impressions are to be distrusted in this place.

    One large jagged plate slams down into the substrate as she glides just past it, and for an instant, she can see her reflection in its surface.

    The Golem's hand falls--

    But not near Capo Bronco.

    Once, the hand lands in the Badlands. An Avril with her hair cut short, bearing a gaze that could cut glass, standing astride a host of bandits. They had found her, taken pity on her, and in time she had come to rule them, as is her nature.

    She lands, kicking up mud. Another shard falls, close, too close--
    She pulls back in a float of a twist, again catching sight of a glimpse in a mirror.

    Into the seas of Aquavy the hand had fallen. Salvagers had found it, and the girl still sleeping in the Golem's grasp. Uncertain of what to do with a maiden with no memory, she had been sent to the Church to tend to, and in time, had been ordained as one of their own. Those eyes shine back at her with a fervent, but cold, passion. She is alone.

    Another. Another narrow miss; her billows back the backwash of the near-impact in a plume. The hand had fallen in the lands of Elru-- she had been found--

    --Taken out of the abyss by--

    Absolute Zero appears in her grasp almost by instinct.

    "It did not happen."

    The blade sweeps forward for the plate of glass. For the next, and the next, and the next.

    None of 'them' could have happened, the thought blooms, and though she's assured as any as to the truth of it, she cannot know why or how she knows.

GS: Layna Manydays has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Turn It Aside!
GS: Layna Manydays has completed her action.
GS: Avril Vent Fleur has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Innocent Saber!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur has entered a Reflect stance!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur has completed her action.
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's Turn It Aside for 107 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Avril Vent Fleur's Innocent Saber for 59 hit points!
GS: Riposte! Statuses applied to Avril Vent Fleur!
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Anti-Causality. It's Anti-Causality!

No, it's just possibilities. Illusions. Not alterations. Your body is still your body for the moment. You have not been remade. Transplanted again in another body to start the cycle all over again.

In this dreamscape, Fei looks for the bloodsplattered boy, but he doesn't seem ot be present just yet. Or he's in hiding. Not again, it seems, will Dean be insisting on the good within him. Not today, at least.

Fei wonders if he'll get used to it if he keeps at it. He always feels like a different person when he's asleep than when he's awake. Like he's watching someone else from a 3d movie, but a 3d movie so 3d you are in it rather than outside of it.

There are infinite possibilities, but some part of Fei is used to seeing such things. He pushes on through, his own sense of self stable for the time being. But what is 'the self' in a place like this? Well, Fei looks like Fei, at least.

He sees Lanval over there. He decided to come after all, Fei dimly realizes. He sees those malevolent timelines, but then, he thinks, why is he seeing those timelines when it seems all possibilities of his own lead in a circular path?

"Lanval..." Fei says. "That which is destroyed can't be repaired easily, but new land can be tended to, and with it...the hope of a kinder shepherd."

He swims forward more. "Talise..." He says. "There's no shame in seeing how you might've fallen. You didn't, and knowing how you could have become like them, you can show greater compassion for those who did. You should be grateful."

He swims forward. Tethelle seems to have it in hand. Ida too seems able to pass through this test.

He passes by Cyre, even as he swims through midair, the shards of his own realities arranging themselves for he and he alone to see. For now, at least.

"Cyre." He says. "There is always a 'better you' out there, we shouldn't be expected to be our best self, there is only the self that we are. So long as we don't give up on trying to be our best, doing our best to be our best...if that makes any sense."

Why is he seeing these, Fei wonders, why are THEY seeing it? He is used to visions, but in here it seems the curse is spreading. Is that thanks to Ida attuning the mirror to him in the first place? Or was it always a quality he had?

He passes by Lily and he slows down here. He watches for a moment before saying, "...Funny." a bit sadly. "All your selves are soldiers, or warriors, or..." or worse. "Is it truly the only fate you had, or are these the only fates you see."

He reluctantly pushes ahead, setting aside that thought and then finally, he stops by Dean.

He watches these lives. He doesn't forget a single one. He has a dream of his own, something he needs to have happen more than anything.

He promised he wouldn't die so easily. What are promises, though, but a pleasantly designed lie?

Is this a burden that he himself has placed on Dean? He's not so sure he can be that optimistic even so. He would kill to have that kind of optimism.

He sees Avril but is hesitant to contact her through the dream. He watches from a distance for a time, before moving on lest he see that which he's not ready to see.

<Pose Tracker> Garrett Stampede has posed.


And so it begins.

Darkness. Then light.

A thousand thousand twisting. Turning reflecting points of mirrored light. Jack's and others. All flashing in the darkness. Swirling melees of kaleidoscopic colors. He can hear shouts and the report of gunfire from all around the dreamscape.

"I AGREE WITH YOU!" Jack calls towards Rosa's figure in the distance as the white maned swordsman. He's falling. Falling into blackness. He can almost sense the ground rushing up to meet him...

And there is a flash of a grin on his face.

He's missed this.

"...I really hope this works." He murmurs before he concentrates. Power shimmers, not the brilliant purple of Malevolence but something different. His willpower shifting his little section of this dreamscape, carving something out of nothingness...

...and there is a thunk as he lands not splatted on the ground, but on the saddle of a great blue Wyvern. "Hey Bitey,"

"Hey boss."

Becaouse of course Bitey can talk in Jack's dreams.

A sword appears in his hand. His sword. The balance just what he remembers. The beautiful curve of the blade sings though the air, even as the shards come down.

Himself as a knight.

A merchant.

A beggar.

A thief.

A picture of a tomb.

Him disgrased, stripped of rank from cowardness.

"Thank one," Jack angles the sword towards it and the Wyvern swoops down, slamming against the ground to grind the mirror piece to dust. He pauses for a moment, sitting high as smirks slightly. "...you know. Maybe it isn't so bad." He adds before angling a quick salute, this time towards Lily and The Beast.

"Nice cloak," He drawls towards the latter before the wyvern and the knight are back in the 'sky' again, among his own falling shards once more.

He always did love to make an entrance.

GS: Garrett Stampede has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Arctica's Finest!
GS: Garrett Stampede has completed his action.
GS: Fei Fong Wong has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Hagan!
GS: Fei Fong Wong has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

This is the first time Xantia has experienced what it's like to be in this dreamscape. She knew this wouldn't be a normal rest, and got the gist of what was going to happen from the cursory explanation beforehand, but on average, she isn't one of the most prepared to deal with this.

And strangely, despite the freefall that everything starts with... she feels a sense of relief, almost. Because she's in better condition, going into this. Not feeling so exhausted, or so hungry, or so cold... even the sudden impact with a glassy surface doesn't hurt much. She seems to be adapting rather well to the dream, managing to let all this just roll over her without much in the way of concern.

It's not until the air - if that's what it is - turns colder that she reacts particularly poorly to what's happening, immediately wrapping her arms around herself. No no no, she doesn't want to be cold, not again. By the time she hits the bottom, she's curled up and shivering. A bit of an overreaction to this level of cold, but at this point, just the anticipating of things getting colder is enough to get an extreme response out of her.

And it does end up getting colder, thanks to a rain of ice-cold shards she's bombarded with afterwards. Each one bringing with them different possibilities. This is an exceptionally painful experience because every single one of them is an unwelcome possibility. A huge amount of concentrated negativity, trying to wear down her eternal optimism. Even with her eyes closed, Xantia is forced to see all of them with every shard that so much as grazes her skin.

There's Xantia in tattered clothing, alone and feral, gnawing on bones and surviving like an animal. There's a heavily scarred Xantia with an eyepatch, cackling gleefully as she runs through a pair of hapless travellers with a sword, her gang of bandits carrying off the goods from their caravan. There's Xantia chained to the wall of a jail cell, robbed of her freedom with no hopes of escape. There's Xantia standing opposite of the Black Wolves, ready to fight to the death no matter how slim her chances. There's Xantia in a ruined landscape, standing over an unmoving Id as the entire world burns around her.

However...

"Do you really think you would've ended up like that Xantia? To be honest...it's hard for me to imagine you ever being anybody like that."

Fei's words echo in her ears. That's right... she's worried about all this before. What might have been, how much worse things could have gone for her, if she hadn't been so lucky. If the first people she met hasn't been so nice to her. It was Fei who comforted her then. She can clearly hear what she was told at that time, prompting her to abruptly stop shivering and rise to her feet, stoically weathering the storm of shards. It still hurts. It still hurts, but...

"There's folks out there who suffered a lot and manage to keep optimistic, to not take it out on others. I don't think it's impossible you would've ended up differently, but I don't think it's certain you would have. At least... not this differently."

"That's right..." With sudden resolve, Xantia's ARM activates, red energy blade springing to life as her will to fight is reignited. "Those things could have happened... but they didn't! And I won't ever let them happen!" Streaks of red begin to intercept the shards heading in Xantia's direction, knocked aside or sliced into pieces as she starts to fight back. She's already overcome these doubts before. She's not about to allow them to tear her apart again.

GS: Xantia has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Crimson Flash!
GS: Xantia has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Cecilia Adlehyde has posed.

Cecilia has run into this thing before - briefly, terribly. But she doesn't entirely recall it.

Still, instinct brings it back to her as the sensation of falling rattles her - and as she finds herself bashing through the surface. Sending her tumbling through falling shards. But they're not just cutting glass, are they? And yet....that question. How much of who you are is due to luck?

None. Others have thousaknds of possibilities, a rainbow of Themselves to scythe away at them. She sees...so little. A woman, buttoned up in a queen's garb and sitting upon a throne, attended and alone. Another, reduced to Shakan's pretty little songbird, or a Solarian patsy. Or just dead in a ditch. Her frustration scathes away so many of the possibilities that might attack.

One of the upsides of feeling cornered in your own life, maybe. She never had the choice to not become the Shaman. Schturdark saw to that...and that was no accident. That was no might-not-have-been.

She lashes out with her staff, blasting the shards away with a pulse of her own power just as her feet come to rest on the 'surface' below. She draws a breath.

GS: CRITICAL! The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Garrett Stampede's Arctica's Finest for 250 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

The unmoving Id's eyes open up and look at Xantia.

"Hey," Id says to her. "Don't feel too bad," quietly dispassionate. "It's inconvenient, but I'm used to it." He is still otherweise motionless, something pushing its way into the memory to say hello? Something like that? "Besides, if it were by your hands...It wouldn't be so bad. Perhaps we'd even meet again."

He then goes back to being a corpse, going just as still as he was before.

Fei meanwhile hears the words and reddens faintly. He hopes that his words don't lead her down a troubling path. He thought they were good words, but he's said good words before. It's always so hard to tell what to say.

GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Fei Fong Wong's Hagan for 124 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Xantia's Crimson Flash for 111 hit points!
GS: Riposte! Statuses applied to Xantia!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Heart of the Crests!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde has completed her action.
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Cecilia Adlehyde's Heart of the Crests for 145 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Despite the cold and darkness--despite the overwhelming oppressiveness of this place--Ida finds it in herself to smile. "A pleasure to meet you," she says.

<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

Fei's statement surprises Lily, as she stands as her magic fades. She turns to him and blinks once, something in her eyes suggesting that she hadn't considered it. Is it...?

"..." After their conversation before, she can't be certain. She just glances away, as he moves on.

"...Maybe it is my destiny. But I can't think of being much else."

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    Lanval, drinking from his gourd like a very young child might a bottle, opens one eye half-lidded to watch Fei stride across the dreamscape with such kind words as though this place were... familiar, maybe?
     "Mmmmph." Sage words from Fei - it's all kind of strange. Comforting, like spoken from someone of an age far beyond his which is...
     Lanval at least starts to sit up. Emotionally, he's been pushed back up against the ropes. Being in the company of those he could call friends, at least, puts his mind at ease.

<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.

    Gwen is falling.

    It takes her a moment to understand why, as is the nature of sleep, where the mind seems to be reset, with each objective and goal slowly coming back online.

    She must have been the first to fall asleep. There's no one else here, just the sound of her falling, crashing, falling again, the air growing thicker and thicker, sinking.

    Shards of past selves come falling down towards Gwen, each showing one grim possibility after another.

    A man with stunning blue eyes stabs her through. She dies.
    A man with stunning blue eyes stabs her through. She dies.
    A man with stunning blue eyes stabs her through. Her ARM wasn't able to make proper contact with that Guardian tablet, and it was unable to extract enough energy to take over her heart. She dies.
    A man with stunning blue eyes stabs her through. She survives, but doesn't make it to her wagon.

    Gwen is stabbed in the gut by Janus, and tumbles off the train. Her body is found later.

    Kalve separates Gwen from her ARM. Her friends try to reattach it, but it's not in time. She dies.

    A younger Gwen's ARM goes out of control, defending Frea from bandits wanting to pilfer through her aunt's possible valuables. The laboratory collapses around them, smothering all within in its fiery embrace. She, as well as Frea, die.

    The surgery was too ambitious. Frea was skilled, but she could not overcome the fragility of her human charge. As she lies on the wooden table that doubled as her operation table, Gwen passes away.

    Gwen's heart gives out. She dies in her bed, next to a patient, grim Frea, who looks away to avoid someone seeing the tears beginning to collect in her eyes.

    A younger Gwen collapses on the streets of Little Twister, her heart giving way as she runs after her friends.

    The burnt treatments don't take, despite Mother Ursa's round the clock care. Gwen dies, and the elderly woman gently closes her eyes with a wrinkled hand.

    A little girl cries alone, trapped under the heavy beam of a burning house. She, too, dies.

    Gwen tries to shield herself from the falling shards, flinching back, her ARM held up to protect her face from the glittering shards as they continue to fall.

    'I promised, though. I promised I won't die that easily.'
    
    It's Dean's words that first make Gwen realize that she wasn't alone. The actual optimist, drawing Gwen back.

    She looks up, and sees others around her, each with their own struggles. Those possible selves.

    "So many selves I need to live for. Got some might big shoes to fill," Gwen says, laughing. "I'll live a life that'll make them all glad I kept goin'." She raises her ARM up. "I'll give them all a lifetime of stories, to make up for everything they lost."

GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Coil Cannon EX!
GS: Gwen Whitlock has entered a Reflect stance!
GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action.
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Gwen Whitlock's Coil Cannon EX for 89 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> The Umbral Mirror has posed.

    The shards shatter. The shards crumble. The shards are thrown aside, to twist endlessly in the wind. Bits and pieces of memory fly out of them, following after the people who spawned them. The darkness near them begins to take shape in response to them, becoming... more familiar. Bits and pieces of comfortable places appear along the path, but twisted. It feels like home, and yet, it is wrong. The air grows thick, still, stagnant; the hail seems to stop, but only for a moment. A horrible creaking echoes from above, as though something massive were breaking loose, and then it falls. The glassy meteor plummets to earth--as if there is earth, in this place--and shatters on impact. Each shard flies off, towards the gathered intruders, taking on the form of someone dangerous. Someone who is unquestionably an enemy.

    Someone who, in life, is nowhere near as powerful, as fearful, as overwhelming as the version projected from each fragment of mirror. Do you really think you can stand up to them?

GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Avril Vent Fleur with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Cecilia Adlehyde with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Cyre H. Lorentz with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Dean Stark with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Fei Fong Wong with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Garrett Stampede with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Kalve with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Layna Manydays with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Lily Keil with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Rosaline Calice with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Seraph Beast with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Seraph Lanval with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Talise Gianfair with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Tethelle Cirdian with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Poison!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Xantia with Shattering The Balance !
GS: The Umbral Mirror has completed its action.
GS: Talise Gianfair guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 126 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Talise Gianfair!
GS: Kalve critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 41 hit points!
GS: Layna Manydays takes a glancing hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 107 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Layna Manydays!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian has activated a Force Action!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 125 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Tethelle Cirdian!
DC: 3 turns have elapsed in the battle against The Umbral Mirror! 2 turns remain!
GS: Dean Stark critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 42 hit points!
GS: Lily Keil guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 123 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Lily Keil!
GS: Fei Fong Wong takes a solid hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 207 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Fei Fong Wong!
DC: MISS! Cyre H. Lorentz completely evades Shattering The Balance  from The Umbral Mirror!
GS: Gwen Whitlock guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 122 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Gwen Whitlock!
GS: Rosaline Calice takes a solid hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 197 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Rosaline Calice!
DC: MISS! Seraph Lanval completely evades Shattering The Balance  from The Umbral Mirror!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 39 hit points!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey takes a solid hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 198 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Ida Everstead-Rey!
GS: Xantia takes a glancing hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 100 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Xantia!
GS: Garrett Stampede guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 117 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Garrett Stampede!
GS: Seraph Beast takes a glancing hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 102 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Seraph Beast!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur takes a solid hit from The Umbral Mirror's Shattering The Balance  for 209 hit points!
GS: Toxin! Statuses applied to Avril Vent Fleur!
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

In another timeline...

amses sees a shard of Fei, "YOUUUU!!" and he charges and is promptly knocked out prompting hi-heals and restores.

This timeline

Fei sees a shard of Fei. Again, strangely, only he sees it. To the others in this shared dreamscape, the mirror shard appears blank. It's as strange as anything else.

Fei touches the mirror shard and vanishes from sight entirely.

???

Id stands himself up out of his chair and approaches a confused Fei Fong Wong.

"Sorry man," Id says, sounding not sorry at all. "It's the rules of the mirror." And then Id knees him in the gut. "Woops! Sorry, man!" He punches Fei in the face, sending him stumbling backwards. "Hahaha, man finally something good to come out of all of this."

Fei tries to raise up his arms in defense but Id is faster, stronger, and frankly smarter than him. Id feints and sweeps Fei's legs out from under him before stomping his gut with his foot.

"You're fuckin' amateurs, but me? This is the shit I eat, breathe, and shit! You think you can resist me? I AM Me! And you're just a bandaid over a wound that won't heal."

He stomps Fei repeatedly in the gut. Fei can't die here, but he can feel the pain in his very psyche, reverberating through his skull and body as if his nerves are being struck directly, not even breaking the skin.

Fei screams with each stomp before he curls up in a ball, whimpering. Id steps back a bit and adds, "Well, that was fun. Time for you to go. Last thing I want is for this place to be a dead world again."

The other ???

Fei's eyes snap open and he's outside the other side of the mirror, bleeding from his eyes, nose, and ears even in a place like this. It must mean that in the outside world, he too received those wounds, convulsing with each strike from--

--from who again? Fei can't remember. He stays curled up, trying to endure the pain.

<Pose Tracker> Talise Gianfair has posed.

Talise is beginning to make out people. Even one she doesn't recognize. Is that the Beast of Lohgrin...?

'There's no shame in seeing how you might've fallen. You didn't.' Fei, swimming by her like a jellyfish in the depths of an ocean of despair. Talise stares after him - is it really him?

But I didn't fall... and I'm still alive to help Ida and Rosaline now. They helped me when I was a stranger on their world. If I fail them now...!

As shards break apart, the darkness around Talise twists and distorts. Reflections of familiar places manifest themselves in the corners of her eyes. They solidify. Those close to her can see it. Ancient stone walls from a time gone by. A musty atmosphere, mustier even than in life. Oppressive. The fragments of murals from a time thousands of years gone by. The eyes of the mural of Dragonmaster Louie and Green Knight Fredo watch her accusingly.

The ceiling of the flooded cavern groans as an orb of glass descends through it. It drips to the floor like a single obscene teardrop, stone rippling around it.

Lines cobweb through the glass orb. Like an egg, chunks of it begin to peel away.

And then a gust of flame bursts out of it and hurls Talise violently against the far wall of the cave she's in. She shrieks as the flames roil around her. Slamming into the brick, she nearly drops her sword as she falls and staggers, barely keeping her footing.

"Really, my dear, did you honestly think everything was going to go as you thought it would?" sneers Dragonmaster Ghaleon as he strides from the wreckage of the teardrop of mirror glass. "That you could just get up and saunter in here and take the Trials? What makes you think the Goddess would want a servant like you? Someone who hears her word and disobeys it and justifies it away?"

Clenching her teeth, Talise takes a couple of defiant steps forward. "Screw you," she snaps back, a surge of frustration coming forward. "You're not even a real Dragonmaster!"

Lowering his eyelids, Ghaleon levels the Sword of Althena at the Vile infidel in front of him. "...Has it occurred to you that of all the people in this world," he remarks, "you're the only one who thinks the way you do?

"How's it feel to be deluded and wrong, idiot girl?"

There isn't even a nanosecond between those words and what happens next. All of a sudden, Talise is doubling forward - and Ghaleon blurs into view in front of her, his knee buried in the pit of her stomach.

In the waking world, Talise's battle with Ghaleon was a lopsided joke.

In the dream world, it's a slaughter. She staggers back, but a blast of wind hurls her into the air. She hits the ceiling. Chunks of brick rain down around her as if her soul could weep masonry. With a pained cry, she falls towards the earth.

Dream Ghaleon leaps up. He pivots in the air - and slams his heel into her face. Something in Talise's heart goes *crack.* She sails back, smashing through a statue of Green Knight Fredo and crumbling it to dust. Rastaban flies from her hand and embeds itself perfectly in a crystal, because she doesn't deserve it anymore.

With a click of armoured boots, Ghaleon touches down behind Talise. She groans weakly, unable to resist, as he grips her by the head and lifts her into the air.

"Two questions," Ghaleon remarks. "First off: Why do you walk this star?"

"Hurk," Talise manages.

"I thought so," Ghaleon murmurs. "Second: Who's got two cheekstripes and is a total bitch?"

Talise doesn't get a chance to answer before Ghaleon casually tosses her up into the air by the head, springs up - and drives his elbow square into her spine. Something else goes snap. Talise can't even scream. Her dreamworld pulses red with pain as the Dream Dragonmaster drives her to earth. It ripples with impact, the very stones groaning with sympathy.

Dream Ghaleon's laughter is low and mocking as he plants his heel on the back of Talise's neck and presses down, beginning to grind her face into the earth. All Talise can do is gasp and strain as her nose and cheek scrape across the pavers. Her ears and cheeks burn with the dream enemy's mocking words. "Oh, isn't this rich!" he laughs. "The companion of a fallen Lord of the Land who thought she could be like her hero, Lady Chloe. It's a shame nobody ever told you that failures don't get to be Dragonmasters. You might've saved a lot of time."

"FUCK... YOU... SASSHOLE," Talise gasps out, clenching her fists and trying to push up off the floor. A surge of adrenaline roils through her.

    FUCK. THIS. GUY. I WON'T LET HIM MAKE A JOKE OUT OF ME.

She fights to push herself up, heart beating rapidly - but with a gasp, she's driven back down again as Ghaleon kicks her in the back of the head. "No, no, no, darling. We can't have that. After all, the Goddess has already decided your fate."

His tone remains playful as he twirls his sword with a flourish and levels the point at the back of Talise's neck.

"You are the weakest link. Goodbye."

GS: Talise Gianfair has attacked Talise Gianfair with Placid Water Stance!
GS: Talise Gianfair takes 13 damage from Toxin!
GS: Talise Gianfair has completed her action.
GS: Talise Gianfair gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Talise Gianfair heals Talise Gianfair! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    "Kalve! Fei! Beast! This way!" Ida cries. She can feel the Malevolence getting thicker around her. It's impossible to tell where exactly in the Mirror she is right now, since the damned thing doesn't obey conventional physics--all she has to go by is that sixth sense. The ground beneath her starts to take shape, turning into concrete and textured metal. A few pages from the Guild Gazette blow past, catching on a gaslamp.

    Something cracks, up above. She skids to a halt, raising her arms to shield her face as the glass shard slams into the path ahead. One of the fragments arcs high across the path, glowing a brilliant white as it takes shape. Steel boots touch down in front of Ida. An armored figure rises to their full, imposing height, the mirror-polished helm fixing on Ida's face. She can see herself in it, her disgraced, disgraceful, fallen self.

    "You told me that I could be more," Ida says. Her body is one step ahead of her, settling into a fighting stance. She raises her fists as K.K. charges, putting all their weight behind that horrible lance of theirs. Ida twists to the side, the lance clipping her, drawing a line of blood down the side of her torso. She almost misses the keening howl of Azrael as the scythe rushes at her from another angle, its wielder aiming to chop her in two. Ida springs to the side, tumbles, falls. Lady Harken lands in a crouch, blood dripping from her blade. Ida sprawls on the ground, blood dripping from a gash that runs the length of her stomach. She puts a hand to the ground, pushes herself up--

    And a second hand pushes her down, again. Ida looks up, and sees her own face.

    "Why do you keep getting up?" Berserk and Siegfried advance from behind the other Ida, even as the real Ida starts to struggle. Her duplicate's grip is like iron. "You know you'll only fail again."

    Glumzamber comes down. So does that horrible iron ball. Someone may wish to intervene.

<Pose Tracker> Tethelle Cirdian has posed.

Tethelle spends all the time she has to settle herself - about five seconds - before she rises, lowering her blade slightly and giving the others a nod. Talise gets a smile, too; Ida, Jack and Rosaline get a glance to make sure they are holding up. It's about as well as she could hope for; apparently, while they aren't unaffected by being in here, it's not turning them into murder machines.

Well, more into murder machines.

Small mercies.

"Come on," Tethelle says, shaking black dust off her sword. "I don't know if this is real or not, but I do know that we can't finish it from here." She gets back five steps forward - to go where? she doesn't know, but only has an idea that moving is better than standing still and being passive about it - before there is great creaking from above.

Tethelle dives and rolls to avoid something falling on her. And nothing does fall on her, though a shard lands nearby, transforming into the face of...

Siegfried, the Quarter Knight and apparently leader of the Metal Demons on Filgaia (as far as Tethelle knows) aside from Mother, is not a nice-looking figure at the best of times. In Tethelle's imaginings, he looks worse; a hulking knight wearing heavy armour, heavier than his already not lightweight plate.

Tethelle doesn't even realize there is another Siegfried across the field. She brings her sword up to deflect his descending Glaumzamber, catching it with a screeching noise as he threatens to carve through a second one of Tethelle's swords. She holds it, body trembling - it's all she can do just to hold it off, let alone fight back.

"You," Tethelle growls out, before her neck blazes with an inner light. Not her neck - the pendant with the symbol of Equites she bears is glowing, the glow spreading across her shoulder, down her arm, to her sword. The metallic squealing changes pitch as it reinforces the blade...

...but she still can't strike back. All she can do is freeze, locked in place, keeping Siegfried from striking her but unable to do anything to him. Tethelle tries, pushing hard, muscles bunching, but he goes nowhere - her true fear, her enemy, is inadequacy.

Tethelle closes her eyes and says a prayer, and the light blasts off the tip of her sword, lancing toward another - the person she came to Rabenstein to save. Maybe she can't help herself, but by the Guardians, she can help someone here! The energy sinks in, reinforcing, stabilizing - a shot of power from Tethelle's fighting spirit.

GS: Tethelle Cirdian has attacked Rosaline Calice with Soul Pulse!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian takes 10 damage from Toxin!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian has completed her action.
GS: Fei Fong Wong has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Suikei!
GS: Fei Fong Wong takes 9 damage from Toxin!
GS: Fei Fong Wong has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

Rosaline runs through a mirror pane displaying her imagined biological parents. Countless shards cut through her. She screams. But at least the image is gone.

Ahead of her is... A million dead Gwens. Hellion Talise. A bloody, defeated Layna. Several nightmare Xantias. Tears bead at the corner of her eyes. She turns around, trying to find another way.

Just as she does, the two halves of the Tobit shards from earlier crash in front her. She grits her teeth.

"I can't escape you no matter what, can I?" She takes a long, ragged breath. And so, she does what has worked so far. She raises her shotgun and fires, shattering both shards.

Its pieces are not gone just yet, however. They hang in the air, swirling and combining together into a single humanoid shape, a nine feet tall... canine...

"Toby." Rosaline hisses.

"Long time no see, Rosa!" he barks out. "I see you've finally let your true self out! I'm so, so PROUD of you."

"Shut up! SHUT UP!" she roars. "YOU CAN'T HURT ME ANYMORE!"

"What? Sure, I can. I've got the power of love, remember?" He grins, showing teeth of jagged mirror. "Now won't you go ahead and die so we can FINALLY be reunited?"

He raises a copy of Rosaline's shotgun, only much larger to match his disproportionate frame. And, grinning his Hellhound smile, blasts away at the true love of his life.

Rosaline tries to turn tails and run, but the mirror explosions prompted by this imaginary Mother's Mercy simply engulf her. And so, she suffers a thousand cuts, but doesn't die just yet.

She collapses to the ground. Tobit approaches, looking nonchalant yet wild-eyed. "I told you we were the same. Only you can understand me. Only you."

Power washes over Rosaline, helping her body mend some of her wound, and giving her the strength to climb back to a knee. She spares a nod of appreciation for Tethelle, then returns her attention to the phantom of her childhood friend.

"Like hell," Rosaline hisses, bleeding. "I'm NOTHING like you! I!" She points her own ARM with a trembling hand, "AM!" She pulls the trigger. "ROSALINE!!"

GS: Rosaline Calice gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian heals Rosaline Calice! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Rosaline Calice has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Mother's Mercy!
GS: Rosaline Calice has completed her action.
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Rosaline Calice's Mother's Mercy for 143 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.

    Dean shoots down those shards, and once they've shattered apart, he can vaguely hear and see the others around him. "Guys? Guys!" he calls as he looks around. "So we're all here together after all!" He smiles, bolstered by the realization. He knew that's how it should have been, and in this dream it makes total sense that they're here, but for a few moments there, he'd been too preoccupied by those other selves.
    
    He looks to one side, vaguely Fei/Gwen-wards, as if he'd heard his name called. "Hmm?" ...but there's nothing there. Perhaps it was just his imagination. Perhaps he was just dreaming. It's funny, the way you sometimes enter other people's thoughts. But then, they're all here together. Of course they'd think about each other from time to time!
    
    As he hurries forward to try to find the others, to join up with them, the darkness billows up around him, starts to take form. Then a meteor falls, and Dean crouches, guarding his face and torso, as it shatters. One shard lands before him and when he straightens--
    
    Janus Cascade and the Cascades appear before him, posing in grandiose fashion.
    
    Janus having been the face of the group, Dean mostly remembers him clearly; his two companions take on the vague likeness of the two Veruni guards from Mirapulse who had attempted to execute Chuck just because he was a convenient scapegoat and because they could.
    
    "Sup, loser," Shadow Janus sneers. "We're here to take the bounty on your friend, and there's nothing you can do about it!"
    
    "Like heck there is!!" Dean roars, Twin Fenrir flashing into his hands. He charges at Janus, intend on taking him down--but Janus catches him by the forehead and laughs and laughs and laughs as Dean swings at him to absolutely no effect.
    
    "Hey, check out the baby boy here!" he sneers as his not-Veruni buddies snicker. "You think you can stop *me*? Even if you did manage to put me away, there's guys like me everywhere in this rotten world! And why not? Money's what makes the world go 'round! Sooner or later, someone's gonna decide the price tag on your friend's life is exactly what they need to make their OWN life better!"
    
    "Shut up! SHUT UP! Th-that bounty isn't even on Avril's life! Don't you dare touch her!!"
    
    "Oh, it isn't?" Janus looks at his companions, who shrug; then he shrugs and tosses Dean away like a garbage bag of rotten potatoes. "Too bad! I don't care!" He seems to grow bigger and bigger, his companions growing with him with equal malevolent glee, and jeers, "I just like to hurt people 'cuz I think it's fun, an' to hell with anything else!!"
    
    "Ungh...!" Dean grits his teeth, glaring up at the spectral forms of the Cascade Gang (Sort Of). Even Id, as terrible as the things he's done are, could be kind and help others; even the Trial Knight, according to Ida, was more than just tormenting people because they can; even Harken and Kalve fought because they care about Mother, like the other Metal Demons. Dean can't see any good side whatsoever to folks like Janus Cascade, who seem to genuinely care about nothing more than themselves. Who genuinely don't care about how they hurt in the process.
    
    Even so...
    
    "I won't... let you hurt my friends. No matter how many times you try--I'll get up every time to stop you!!" Dean shouts, in the process of doing precisely that. He launches himself at the towering figures, and never mind how tiny he is in comparison, Twin Fenrir raised up in defiance. "Hrrraaaarrrgh! METEOR DRIIIIIIIIIIVE!!"
    
    And then--impact.

GS: Dean Stark has spent 2 Combo on Gatling!
GS: Dean Stark has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Violence Vice!
GS: Dean Stark has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    Lanval looked too long into those shards, shown - perhaps with but a small twist of the truth - that there was nothing better awaiting him. He remains as rattled as he struggles to rise back up onto his feet. Underneath his feet is rotting floorboard, stained with spilled food and drink and probably someone's tooth there. Probably. That was his world for two and a half centuries, surrounded by increasingly untamed, unhinged lawlessness of a region of Meribus. It doesn't need to be twisted much further than that to be uncomfortable. The... less controversial eras of his realm's history are distant flickers on the dancing mirror shards.
     Then, a massive glassy meteor explodes outwards. He can't see what's quite going on, at first, thrown onto his backside. Dream physics are being oddly realistic, there. He lies down for a while.
     Nearby, Talise struggles. He flinches as he hears the disdain of the Dragonmaster about his station, and... and the repeat of Ghaleon's words... Ghaleon's words?! He watches Talise struggle in mortal combat with the Dragonmaster... but that she also finds her resolve to stand.
     Flanking Ghaleon over there are numerous shadows. There are many of them, all of them whispy and ethereal in form. Those untouched, those distant from the world and understanding of most mortals... they stand clean, unblemished.
     The Seraphim... like himself. Almost all of them despise him. Dishonored by the Goddess for his lackluster service. He edges away as they all say in unison...
     "Leave." Individually, most are no match. Lanval is powerful. It is the collective whole of his peers, across all eight elements: Fire, Earth, Lightning, Wind, Ice, Light, Shadow, and even his very own Water. They want nothing more to do with him. Ghaleon all but exiled him from Lunar. Individual blasts of elemental power shower him, like an endless rain of tiny needles of sorcerous power. He is not welcome here.
     Lanval looks away. Estranged from his peers. Estranged from the divinities higher than himself. Estranged from mortals, for most cannot see or hear him. His enemies need not destroy him with force - as evidenced by how little he seems to flinch. The crippling loneliness of it all that results from it... it takes a lot of spring out of his step. He has... no place in Lunar now, does he...?
     ...
     ...
     ...Lanval wanders the dreamscape. He steps somewhere else around the realm of the mirror. He's not sure where he's walking. Stumbling. Whatever it is he's doing that pretends it's walking. He comes up behind a scene where unfamiliar monsters all crowd around the Hellion, Ida.
     They belittle her. They strike her down. Before them, she seems weak. Frail, even now, with how much of herself she surrendered to the Malevolence. He wanders into a conflict that is not his, to a world that is not his.
     I'm here to stop this from getting worse. He internalizes. How does one stop this from getting worse?
     Lanval flicks out that humble-looking gourd. He does not know Berserk. He never got to see him alive. He knows not his terrifying strength, though the chain does appear somewhat familiar. With zero understanding of the gulf of power between Berserk and almost anyone else - and no knowledge of what lengths were necessary to put him down...
     A tiny, hollow gourd full of drink, far smaller, far lighter than Berserk's mace of at least a thousand years of terror, moves to bounce it back like it's nothing.
     "Ida." There's that annoying fat drunkard again, as he waddles away from the leers and the jeers of his peers.
     "Jusht remember." Lanval remembers when they first met at cross-purposes. At that point, she was just this big rampaging Hellion who was trashing a bunch of martial artists and causing a huge, huge ruckus. He had to act then, because no others of his kind did. Whoever was Lord of the Land of that place didn't show. Then he saw her throw herself up against the dread pirate captain Havel Bladewall, who was a commanding and fear-inducing presence - it even stunned him. A few things started to click about that Hellion from there.
     This is a dreamscape. Much of it is in their mind, in their soul. The sting of her accumulated - accumulating - Malevolence is painful, to be in the company of all of this anxiety. But there he is, at relative ease, even when having faced down the exaggerated manifestation of those who have brought him the most misery and loneliness since the Guard removed him from his station as a Lord of the Land.
     "You're not powerlessh." Lanval extends his gourd to them, to offer them a reinvigorating drink. Maybe a bit too strong.

GS: Seraph Lanval has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Quick Swig!
GS: Seraph Lanval has completed his action.
GS: Fei Fong Wong has canceled their attack on Ida Everstead-Rey.
GS: Fei Fong Wong has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Suikei!
GS: Fei Fong Wong takes 8 damage from Toxin!
GS: Fei Fong Wong has completed his action.
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Dean Stark's Violence Vice for 181 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Fei Fong Wong's Suikei for 151 hit points!
GS: Riposte! Statuses applied to Seraph Lanval!
GS: Seraph Lanval heals Ida Everstead-Rey! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

"Yeah," Cyre answers Fei with a chuckle and a grin that have no place in this kind of scenario. Maybe the weird dream-time thing is giving Cyre equally weird spirit quest flashbacks? "I know. There's a saying back home, you know? If you meet the Guardian on the road, kill him. Hahaha, I'm not sure why they say that, to be honest. Never made much sense to me. Why would you kill a Guardian just for standing there? That ain't right."

Beat.

"Wh-what were we talking about again?" Cyre asks as a shadow looms high overhead. "Sorry, I kind of got distracted with the whole... Dreamtime thing--"

There's a great, cataclysmic crash. Glass splinters and fractures, massive shards of spent mirror flying through this unreal space and time. Cyre's expression hardens as he notices one coming his way. Coming, coming-- unfolding, transforming, becoming something... Terrible.

A great beast of shadow and storm, with hateful lightning for eyes, and twisted, monstrous claws for hands. The beast screams, hurling accusations in a voice like thunder. "Coward! Weakling! Abandoning me and fucking off into the middle of nowhere to do what? What have you accomplished!? Was it worth the sacrifice?"

Cyre pauses for a long moment and stares at the bestial fascimile of a face he knows far too well.

His eyes narrow, his mouth turns up at the edges. The monster surges into him, a calamitous claw seizing around the shaman's throat. "Well!? What's your answer? Where's your shame, Cyre Lorentz!? Do you not feel anything for what you've done to me?"

Cyre squirms for a moment in the creature's grip, scrunching his shoulders, and then sighing.

"Man..." Cyre wheezes, lifting a finger to the monster's nose. "...You were way scarier when you could actually guilt trip me properly. But I've faced those demons already. And I've got plenty of people around who're more than proof enough that I made the right choice. Besides." Cyre taps the creature's snout. A hairline fracture shoots across its face. With the sound of cracking, shattering glass, that fracture spreads and propagates, bits and pieces falling away in sheets of glassy sand. "You're not my brother. He's way too awesome to turn into a monster like you."

The beast screams as it falls apart completely, disintegrating into a gentle, silvery sandstorm. Cyre smiles as he rubs a tiny fragment of glass. "Heh. Gotcher nose."

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

Kalve lands on the far side of the enormous piece of reflective glass. He skids on the ground, the surface feeling slick just like the thing he just crashed through. He comes to a halt in a crouch, his extra arms bending unnaturally to pluck fragments of silvered glass in slow, careful motions. They fall in bloody splinters all around him. He's peppered in cuts that glint with the quicksilver that wells up in place of comfortable, familiar red.

He stands straight, breathing deeply. Kalve starts forward again, focused. He tries not to get distracted by the things of comfort and desire that could draw him off his path. He tries not to look into the shards manifesting near all the others, despite the difficulty of it and the sheer number of them. They're inevitably deeply personal, containing memories and possibilities of things they surely do not want to share... and holding sights of things Kalve has no desire to learn.

Know thine enemy, but do not think him Hyadean. That way lies weakness in moments where strength is of utmost import.

Even still, Ida's voice gets his attention. Kalve changes direction abruptly, running towards her. A noise draws Kalve's attention upward. The meteor falls, and he braces himself. The crash and the colossal shattering sound drown out all else. A shard rockets towards him like a spear aimed at his heart --

"So, you've come back once again?"

Kalve lowers his arms, reflexively raised in defense. He sees a man. The man's skin is wrinkled and leathery with age. His posture is hunched, leaning on a crook that stabs into the pseudo-earth they stand upon. His garb is spread of sandy colors, dressed for the desert, draped in it, colored to blend in. His entire body bears a metallic sheen that is visible from any angle, both skin and clothing both. "What is your Mother-damned dilemma this time, boy?"

Kalve hesitates. "You are not real," he says.

"Bah!" The old man strikes the not-ground with his crook. "Bah, says I!" He does it again, and then again, but with more thought to it. "Hmmm. I suppose you're right. Still, what does that matter?" He lifts one hand from the crook, waving it lightly, dismissively. "Have I ever been any more 'real' than I am in this moment? How would you know if I wasn't?"

Kalve stares for a moment in utter confusion, and then sighs deeply. "It is good to see you, Old Man."

"No it isn't," the Old Man retorts. He gestures towards Ida's growing peril, and moves alongside Kalve's sudden dash with long, loping strides despite his frail appearance. "I'm a distraction! A diversion! Something to draw you off your path!"

"Your distractions always lead where I need to be," Kalve yells back. He throws himself into the fray around the real Ida, heavy-bladed swords manifesting in two hands and cutting across the void of a field in order to turn the phantasmal Glaumzamber aside. Kalve starts to desperately round on the other threats --

The Old Man passes directly beneath the suddenly-deflected iron ball, his frail body coming apart into impossibly dense coils of alien metal. He smiles a little too widely, lashing out at the false Ida and Harken's shade with a tangle of razor-limbs moving with eye-wateringly bizarre motion and frankly impossible geometry. His head is still present, though the human frailty has faded from it. Six eyes of different colors blink slightly out of synch, arranged across his face in slanted symmetry.

"Hello, young lady," the Old Man says to Ida, eyes on her despite their collectively perilous positions. "I hope to meet you, the real you, outside of this place soon enough. Please, do me the honor of surviving until then; I will be terribly disappointed if that stripling can't even teach a human to live through a mess of smoke and mirrors!"

He laughs, long and hard. Kalve winces, both from physical wounds and growing embarrassment.

GS: Kalve has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Liquid Metal!
GS: Kalve has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Cecilia Adlehyde has posed.

Cecilia casts around, finding the others. She sees something, floating through the possibilities - Lily, armored, in colors and signs that Cecilia knows even if she's not totally sure how well Lily would. Knowing it's even registered as a possibility gives the Princess some pause and fluster. She pats her chest, breathing. "Alright then," she says. Tethelle calls advice and Cecilia nods to her medium-estranged guardian. "You're right. Let's--"

That flashing, bursting crackling sound. A shard slamming into the ground before her, and it's...

He snarls, snuffles; he's two stories tall and looms titanic, a massive morningstar spun around his arm. Siegfried, Harken, these she hates.

But none of them ever HURT her like Berserk.

Lips like a toad's split wide, grinning manic as he palms some invisible thing into his fingers - a comparatively tiny crystal, shaped like a glowing tear. "You're such a soft god damn touch, aintcha, Yer Majesty," he snears, rearing back. "Don't worry, I'll BREAK YA PROPER THIS T--"

The ball slams into her shield. She sucks in a breath.

"No, you won't," she says, and finishes the followthrough on her swing, blasting the ball back into the duplicant thing. Her arms hurt. Everything hurts. But...Lily's here, and Jack is here, and Fei is holy shit what just happened to Fei but, uh, he's here, anyway, mostly, he's fine. He'll be fine. She reaches for her Crest Case, yanking it open and producing a Medium from within. Rarely-used but powerful, but....does it even matter to this place? What is a Medium, here? The Leyline is far away, the Earthpulse is...

Cecilia shines, blazing as she thrusts the Medium forward. "MATERIAL!" she screams, herself the key as she flickers away. It rises up, bursting its way out of the mirrored surface, a towering, glorious guardian. It roars, screaming disapproval at the Malevolent poison in the air, and around a few others, a feelinng that those eyes are watching, the immovable power of Dinoginos, the Mountain Guardian, preventing and shepherding those who would fight.

GS: Cecilia Adlehyde has attacked Lily Keil with Material - Earth Surge!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde has attacked Cecilia Adlehyde with Material - Earth Surge!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde has attacked Fei Fong Wong with Material - Earth Surge!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde has attacked Garrett Stampede with Material - Earth Surge!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde has completed her action.
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde takes a solid hit from Cecilia Adlehyde's Material - Earth Surge for 0 hit points!
GS: Shield! Statuses applied to Cecilia Adlehyde!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde's Reload flag cannot target herself!
GS: Garrett Stampede takes a solid hit from Cecilia Adlehyde's Material - Earth Surge for 0 hit points!
GS: Shield! Statuses applied to Garrett Stampede!
GS: Reload! Garrett Stampede gains 15 extra FP from Cecilia Adlehyde!
GS: Lily Keil takes a solid hit from Cecilia Adlehyde's Material - Earth Surge for 0 hit points!
GS: Shield! Statuses applied to Lily Keil!
GS: Reload! Lily Keil gains 15 extra FP from Cecilia Adlehyde!
GS: Fei Fong Wong takes a solid hit from Cecilia Adlehyde's Material - Earth Surge for 0 hit points!
GS: Shield! Statuses applied to Fei Fong Wong!
GS: Reload! Fei Fong Wong gains 15 extra FP from Cecilia Adlehyde!
<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

As the last of the fragments fall away, Cyre tucks the little shard of glass away into his pocket, giving it a couple of pats for good measure. "Right," Cyre mutters, the wind gathering under his heels. The shaman sweeps back and away, twisting through the maelstrom of flying glass until he finds who he's looking for.

There she is. A little light in the darkness. A person who some in his tribe might call a heretic. But Cyre knows to call her something else.

"Hey, Courier," the shaman says, sweeping down to lay a gentle, glowing hand upon her shoulder. "Take a deep breath. Remember, if your mind created it, your mind can destroy it. Nothing in this place is anything but what has been drawn from within you. Focus, become greater than you are in life. In the world of the mind, the mind is king and god all in one. Take a deep breath, I've got you."

MEANWHILE IN THE REAL WORLD

Cyre is sleeping, curled around his favorite censer with a blissful look on his face. A gentle breeze spreads the warm, fragrant smoke like a gentle haze... Right toward where Gwen is snoozing away.

This is... Probably okay. Right? Right.

GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Blessings of the Breeze!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

Fei's words still linger for Lily. ...She glances to the others, but does not allow herself to be lost in thought. A quick check on their safety, and she can wonder at the questions later--she found she could use the shards she took, and as she sees the memories fly... She focuses forward.

And that's when the darkness grows familiar. Comfortable places? The dream may try to conjure those for Lily, but there are few she is truly comfortable now. Bits of her home appear and disappear in moments, the streets of Nortune, a large house with pale walls. They fade, and fade, until an inn room in Adlehyde--

Lily sharpens her gaze as the air grows still. "This--"

Lily protects herself with an arm quickly--and spots Fei disappearing. Enemies erupt from all places, some of her own, but--

But two things happen, once again. The shard pierces Lily's chest, missing her heart but prompting a sudden cough. ...The wound doesn't linger, because it's just a dream.

The second thing happens instead of the first thing, at the same time as the first thing. The figure seems to shift forms for a few instants before it coalesces--

And then a man in red stands before Lily, his piercing gaze seeming to move through her for an instant, pin her in place. ...Only his voice is familiar to anyone else, if they even listen.

"So, Lily. ...This is where you find yourself, again. Have you given thought to what I told you?"

Lily stares for an instant, and is no longer watching anyone else. "Father," she starts. "You--"

"No, I can tell. Well, here's another thought for you." He holds out his hand, and in it is a great spear all of a sudden. "...Are you prepared for what you will have to do? For what lies ahead? I did not raise a weak woman."

He points his weapon at Lily, who hesitates--

"Stop hesitating and--"

Lily suddenly pulls an ARM from her jacket, a great black and red revolver of strange make, and fires straight for center mass.

The spectre of Colonel Keil smiles grimly, and nods. "...I'm proud of you, daughter..."

He fades in the same instant that Cecilia's magic--Dinoginos's magic--washes over Lily. The girl she might have guarded...

Lily looks back to where her father stood, but he is gone. "..."

GS: Lily Keil has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Lead Pill!
GS: Lily Keil takes 7 damage from Toxin!
GS: Lily Keil has completed her action.
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz heals Gwen Whitlock! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Garrett Stampede has posed.


Jack, because he looks much more like Jack now, swings wildly at the mirror shards falling around him. The deadly blade scattering light across the darkness. They shatter, they shift, they coalesce into a great mass before crashing back to 'earth'.

And from that explosion comes...nothing.

Jack and Bitey don't drop their guard...

...but the sudden rush of movement from the darkness strikes him right off his perch.

Movement in the form of a monstrous insect like Metal Demon.

A second one rockets out of the darkness again knocking the swordsman off balance. His eyes widen as he recognizes the pair of hovering forms. "Poor human," Comes that soft and menacing voice as a figure recognizable to some slips from the darkness. Floating, clad in white and gold, mighty claws just peaking out from under that robe of his, Alhazad chuckles wickedly.

Then the pair of bugs cross infront of him, scything wings though his armor and his guard. Blood sprays in the dark of the dreamscape.

"Don't worry, human. I won't kill you. I need a new subject. I may have broke my last one."

It isn't real, Jack tells himself as he shifts his grip on his sword. It isn't real. It is though in a way. Real fear. Real possibility. Real emotion made manifest.

Teeth grit though the pain as he looks up towards the Metal Demon. He crouches even at the pair of 'bugs' return to hover at Alhazad's shoulders.

And then Jack smiles.

"You know I just realized something. You're all alone here...and I? I have friends."

The cloak of power from Dinoginos drapes over him and Jack suddenly tears forwards. The first Fast Draw technique he's used since his change. Even as he does Bitey's massive form comes crashing down on the bugs so Jack's sword aims to drive directly though the faceplate of that horrifying Metal Demon.

GS: Garrett Stampede has spent 3 Combo on Headshot!
GS: Garrett Stampede has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Ashes of the Past!
GS: Garrett Stampede takes 9 damage from Toxin!
GS: Garrett Stampede has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Something sloshes, inches from Ida's face. Time seems to slow down--maybe it's like she's bleeding out for real, like she's reliving her life in slow-motion because of it. But no, it's just Lanval, that dumb drinking gourd of his swinging for Berserk's morningstar on an intercept course. What could it possibly do?

    It turns a ton of metal aside. It forces it to crash not into Ida, but into the entity that appears next to her, with no warning whatsoever. Ida stares, wide-eyed, at the Old Man for a good ten seconds. Her mouth falls open. Questions boil up in her mind, but there is no time to ask them, much less get answers. Kalve's blades lock with Glumbzamber a moment later, the real Metal Demon struggling against the facsimile.

    Ida takes Lanval's gourd, takes a long swig, and confronts the true enemy.

    She rises to her feet. Her double tries to push down on her again, but the struggle only lasts for a few minutes.

    "I get up," Ida says, "as many times as it takes." Another swig from the gourd, and she tosses it overhand back to Lanval and wipes her mouth on her forearm. "Thank you, Seraph. And you, Old Man--a pleasure to meet you."

<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.

Everyone seems alright...in a manner of speaking. That's good. Layna can breathe a small sigh of relief at that. She pushes forward as the shards begin to crumble into the wind and the darkness begins to change shape.

She can see Fortnight Cove, simultaneously intact and aflame, she can see the Ruby Empress, simultaneously beached and afloat...

...Layna doesn't like it. She doesn't like any of this.

"Keep your guard up! Something's coming!" Layna roars over the din of nightmares, real and imagined, as a horrible creaking sounds from above.

And then, a glassy meteor crashes down, shattering into shards...and one of them flies at her, taking the form of Havel Bladewall - the tall man from Layna's earlier reflection.

He is larger than anyone here has ever seen him, and he's already a tall man - it's almost like looking up at him from the perspective of a child.

Layna grits her teeth as he lunges at her with a fist that could crush a man's skull with ease. His sheer speed and strength is stunning - he still manages to clip her.

She doesn't fight him, though. There's no point in fighting him here. ...The real one would still be out there, no matter what she did in here. She pushes him away, less with her physical strength than her own will.

"You've lost your bite, lass." He taunts.

...But she ignores it, and raises her voice.

"Don't let 'em get to you! You're better than this, aye? Better than them! It's just a damn fake, it's only as real as you make it! Keep pushin' forward!" She calls out. Even if they can't hear the words themselves, the meaning behind them is evident enough.

Push forward.

Don't look back.

GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Open Palm!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey takes 10 damage from Toxin!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action.
GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Layna Manydays with On Your Feet Me Hearties!!
GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Lily Keil with On Your Feet Me Hearties!!
GS: Layna Manydays takes 11 damage from Toxin!
GS: Layna Manydays has completed her action.
GS: Layna Manydays takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's On Your Feet Me Hearties! for 0 hit points!
GS: Layna Manydays gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Lily Keil takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's On Your Feet Me Hearties! for 0 hit points!
GS: Lily Keil gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Kalve's Liquid Metal for 69 hit points!
GS: Cover! Statuses applied to Kalve!
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.

    The blade cuts cleanly; cleaving and smashing those mirror fragments that fall about her into so many pieces, which dissolve into emptiness themselves. Whirling about, Avril has now her first truly unimpeded look across the battlefield here in this place -- wherever it is, in the land behind the mirrorglass -- and takes quick stock of the situation.

    The first she seeks out is Dean. "Dean! I am alright! Are you--" She shifts in place, as if about to run towards him, only to pause. He's undoubtedly faced down the echoes of his own shards, as she has. As they all have. "We may... need to fight our battles on our own terms in this place, but I will do what I can to assist."

    Her attention moves rapidly. Cyre, standing after the onslaught, in mid conversation with Fei.

    Gwen, similarly still standing. It's everyone. Everyone is still standing.

    It's one particular woman who catches her eye for a lingering moment. That jacket, she realizes, her gaze gliding across Lily, is familiar. Now where had she--

    From above, the sky begins to come down, the heavens themselves rending a sort of dungeon.

    Oh, Avril thinks, taking a hurried step back before she begins to 'run', in flight from the ensuing destruction. Oh, it was in the dream about the black mirror.

    That woman who was not Lily--

    Perhaps impact of this calibur is impossible to completely escape. Avril barely gets anywhere before the glass-forged meteor makes its impact and implodes. She's simply cast from her feet along the murk, sliding and skidding to an abrupt stop on the darkness.

    "But have you practiced the -basics-, girl?"

    When she stands, she stands slowly.
    When she stands, it's in the wake of a shadow.

    She looks up, fingers curling to clench the hilt of the sword still in her hand.

    The silhouette is unmistakeable. Tall, red of hair, clutching a wickedly curved scythe--
    Lady Harken is as a reaper of humanity, towering over Avril.

    "Come! Strike me again! Show me what you have learned!"

    Impossibly -- Avril has yet to have even lifted her blade -- the Metal Demon's chest glitters with blood. A sword thrust, a most basic maneuver.
    Lethal in its simplicity.

    Avril's breath for an instant catches in her throat.

    "Is it necessary?" Ida's voice seems to echo.

    Ida, impaled against a wall, challenges her for her answer. Must it be?

    "Well, girl? See for yourself! A blade is made to cut, to kill! Show me again that killer's instinct!"

    When does enough become enough?

    "No," Avril finally voices, dispelling the blade. "I refuse. I shall pass you, but it shall be on my own terms!"

    The Medium glitters brilliantly in the light.
    There is more that she can do but wound and kill. This Medium...

    Help... someone. Someone who needs it. I can do more than kill.

    Somewhere amidst the trial, a man lies before a mirror, bleeding as if from a grievous assault. Shining blue white sparks rain down; fleetingly, there is the scent of the sea, the gentle touch of an ocean breeze.

    A small portion of Lucadia's essence sinks into Fei Fong Wong.

GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Lily Keil's Lead Pill for 85 hit points!
GS: CRITICAL! The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Garrett Stampede's Ashes of the Past for 360 hit points!
GS: Sneak! The true nature of Ida Everstead-Rey's attack becomes clear!
GS: CRITICAL! The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Ida Everstead-Rey's Corpse-White Lotus Banquet for 200 hit
points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Ida Everstead-Rey!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey drains The Umbral Mirror! Ida Everstead-Rey gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur has attacked Fei Fong Wong with Ocean's Blessing!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur takes 14 damage from Toxin!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur has completed her action.
GS: Cover! Statuses applied to Avril Vent Fleur!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur heals Fei Fong Wong! He gains 100 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    Lanval smiles that dumb, placid cat-like smile of his as the gourd comes back into his grasp much more smoothly than almost anything else about him. Even in this dreamscape, there remains a troublingly weird consistency to the way he just sways and ambles. "Cheersh~"
     He's about to knock it back, but he considers that - perhaps - maybe it's best he hold off on drinking out of that one until after the Purification.
     He stops and looks back over to some other distant part of the mirror realm. He... wandered off from Talise, Tethelle, Layna, Fei... all because he became afraid to really face up against his own kind.
     He stood up to them before when they heckled him while trying to reach out to Ghaleon. They were of Earth, of Lightning. The two elements that, when all things are equal, could overcome him.
     He overcame that, because it was that important to make that point then.
     It's that important to make that point now, he rationalizes, as he staggers back into the hazy depths of the dream world to whatever other parts of the collective consciousnesses here he's going to intrude upon next, a bigger spring in his step than moments before.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

Those words Id spoke, in one of the possibilities Xantia saw... they felt far too real, too believable. The way he keeps saying she might be meant to kill him, but she's not ready yet... it's almost like that's the way he wants things to turn out. But it's not the way she wants things to turn out, at all. As the rain of shards dies down, she mumbles quietly to herself, as if answering Id in that possible reality, "Maybe you're okay with that... but I'm not."

Only now is Xantia becoming aware that she isn't by herself here, if dimly so. Though she follows the others, wanting nothing more than to approach them, their figures remain murky and unidentifiable in her eyes, as if really far away. Being alone may well be her greatest fear - of course the Mirror would attempt to make her feel isolated.

And not just isolated... but threatened. The remains of all those shards she fended off before return with a vengeance, crashing down in front of her to block her path, coalescing into a form wholly unexpected, even to herself.

"...you." Xantia spits out the word with many mixed emotions, none of them good. This isn't someone she consciously thinks about a lot. It's someone she's only actually met once, a long time ago. But the Mirror knows well what dwells in her subconscious. And so, it chose the form of the one man she felt she never even had a chance of standing up against. A man shrouded in red and black, sporting a cloak and a very distinct mask hiding his features... "Grahf... the Seeker of Power. Why are YOU here?"

Rather than answer verbally, the masked man shoots forward faster than a speeding bullet, driving his knee into her gut, and following up with a palm strike to the face. Xantia flies backward, landing painfully on her back. Not even given any time to recover, a wave of Ether explodes across her fallen form, knocking her back even further.

It takes Xantia some time to get up from that assault, falling back down to one knee after her first attempt. Grahf is not pursuing her. He just stoically stands in her way. "...why," she asks again, more quietly. Why is he so strong? Why does it feel like he can do everything she can, but better? And why does he seem to be after Fei in particular? Her fervent wish to stop Grahf from taking Fei away awakened power within her, the power to use her ARM. But it wasn't enough. It still won't be enough. If she fights him again right now, she will lose. If she loses here, she'll let down everyone who was counting on her to help.

With this realization, there's only one thing she can do. Abruptly, she dashes for Grahf... then veers off to the side, going right past him. Running away, as fast as her legs can carry her.

The figure of Grahf does not pursue. Because in the end, this is a mental battle. By choosing not to fight, by making her priority the task at hand, and choosing to take an action that goes completely against her nature, she's made the only decision that could possibly allow her to walk away from this. Such willpower is something that even evil Mirrors have to respect.

GS: Xantia has attacked Xantia with The Better Part Of Valour!
GS: Xantia takes 12 damage from Toxin!
GS: Xantia has completed her action.
GS: Xantia takes a solid hit from Xantia's The Better Part Of Valour for 0 hit points!
GS: Quick! Statuses applied to Xantia!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Beast has posed.

    Here is a riddle for you: what is a timeless being's worst enemy?

    Is it a person? People die.

    Is it a dragon? Dragons die.

    Ah, then -

    The Beast of Lohgrin does not face anyone at all.

    She shudders, as frost nips at her skin. Pulls that cloak - it is, yes, a nice cloak - further against her. But no: look again. It is not frost. It is a bluishness to her skin -

    - as if she can't breathe.

    Gasp, gasp, and there is nothing there.

    Nothing but the crushing feeling of a heart clenched by fear.

    And no air about her.

    The only thing you have to fear, they say, is fear itself.

    Stagger back - so hard, is it, to focus on Ida's voice. Gasp, gasp. She can't breathe. Oh, she cannot breathe, as the panic sets about her.

    But Ida is struggling. Each of them, struggling.

    The wind curls out from her, catches others in its passing. It is a fought-for thing, which fills her lungs. Gasp - gasp. Her will brings back the oxygen around her. It is not simple. It hurts.

GS: Seraph Beast has activated a Force Action!
GS: Seraph Beast has attacked Lily Keil with Soothing Breeze!
GS: Seraph Beast has attacked Seraph Beast with Soothing Breeze!
GS: Seraph Beast has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Soothing Breeze!
GS: Seraph Beast takes 10 damage from Toxin!
GS: Seraph Beast has completed her action.
GS: Lily Keil gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Seraph Beast heals Lily Keil! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Seraph Beast heals Ida Everstead-Rey! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Seraph Beast gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Seraph Beast heals Seraph Beast! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.

    Gwen isn't alone. She laughs with honest delight, seeing her companions prevail.

    It doesn't last.

    "Janus? Dario? Romero?" Gwen looks genuinely confused at their appearance, at how they focus in on Dean. But isn't that the way it usually happens? It was a small mercy, that their relationships were so strange, so contradictory, sharing food one night at the tavern, and battling each other the next.

    But now she's on the other side of the mirror, as if seeing Janus's cruelty for the first time.

    Because this version is all that, honed and sharpened like a knife from blunt metal. No unnecessary bits to distract from the monster that's there.

    Gwen sucks in a breath. This is her responsibility. Even if it's just a mental construct, she must stand up.

    "You forget yourself." She steps forward, but another voice draws her in like a moth to a flame.

    It's someone a few who are present may actually recognize. A man with dark hair, fine features, beautiful blue eyes. His words, like honeyed wine. "You see your death, countless times, and yet, you smile."

    He simply stands there, a spectre.

    "Do you have that little faith in the mercy the universe grants you?

    He steps forward, his coat floating in a nonexistent wind.

    "Or will you continue casting off your humanity, and persist in this cold world? To be a doll, waiting for its owner to caress its face one last time?" He looks to the insectlike beast that calls to Jack, the gang of three that taunt Dean. The others, fathers, childhood friends, rivals.

    "Out of everyone gathered, only I will grant you mercy." He beckons to her, his face serene, his lips pursed. "Come, and sing for me."

    Gwen's left hand grips Cyre's hand as it sits on her shoulder. She bites her lip. "Y'know..." she murmurs, with a nervous laugh, slowly raising her ARM. "Even my mind's version isn't as terrifying as the real one..."

    At least this one she can kill without any guilt attached.

GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Coil Cannon EX!
GS: Gwen Whitlock has entered a Reflect stance!
GS: Gwen Whitlock takes 12 damage from Toxin!
GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action.
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Gwen Whitlock's Coil Cannon EX for 83 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> The Umbral Mirror has posed.

    One by one, the shards lose cohesion. Glass bubbles and boils, even though the depths remain as cold and inhospitable as they were after that first fall. Mirror-polished droplets of glass rise up around you, as though mimicking the energies of the Earthpulse at Uzda il-jam. Trapped motes of blue-green flicker inside them, along with ghostly, firefly-like droplets of Malevolence. Very soon, it becomes like standing atop a pot of boiling water, except the water is solid, and the bubbles are big enough to trap someone inside them as they form. One by one, you're trapped. There's a moment's worth of panic as the bubble detaches from the membrane that produced it, and then--

    ...Where were you, again? What were you doing? You're not sure you were ever anywhere else--not sure you were meant to be anywhere else. The world around you, and everything and everyone in it, is perfect. What need have you for anything else?

    Everything is well. Everything will be well.

GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Avril Vent Fleur with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Cecilia Adlehyde with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Cyre H. Lorentz with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Dean Stark with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Fei Fong Wong with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Garrett Stampede with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Kalve with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Layna Manydays with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Lily Keil with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Rosaline Calice with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Seraph Beast with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Seraph Lanval with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Talise Gianfair with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Tethelle Cirdian with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Disease!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Xantia with Vanished Within The Glass!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has completed its action.
GS: Tethelle Cirdian has activated a Force Action!
DC: MISS! Layna Manydays completely evades Vanished Within The Glass from The Umbral Mirror!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 45 hit points!
GS: Talise Gianfair has activated a Force Action!
GS: You have activated the Force Action Guard!
GS: Talise Gianfair takes a solid hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 231 hit points!
GS: Talise Gianfair has been weakened by Disease! They take 0 damage, and burn off all temporary hit points!
GS: Disease! Statuses applied to Talise Gianfair!
GS: Lily Keil guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 135 hit points!
GS: Lily Keil has been weakened by Disease! They take 0 damage, and burn off all temporary hit points!
GS: Disease! Statuses applied to Lily Keil!
GS: Lily Keil enters CONDITION GREEN!!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz takes a glancing hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 109 hit points!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has been weakened by Disease! They take 0 damage, and burn off all temporary hit points!
GS: Disease! Statuses applied to Cyre H. Lorentz!
GS: Seraph Beast critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 45 hit points!
GS: Rosaline Calice guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 123 hit points!
GS: Rosaline Calice has been weakened by Disease! They take 0 damage, and burn off all temporary hit points!
GS: Disease! Statuses applied to Rosaline Calice!
GS: Dean Stark guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 135 hit points!
GS: Dean Stark has been weakened by Disease! They take 0 damage, and burn off all temporary hit points!
GS: Disease! Statuses applied to Dean Stark!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde takes a solid hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 213 hit points!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde has been weakened by Disease! They take 0 damage, and burn off all temporary hit points!
GS: Disease! Statuses applied to Cecilia Adlehyde!
GS: Gwen Whitlock guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 133 hit points!
GS: Gwen Whitlock has been weakened by Disease! They take 0 damage, and burn off all temporary hit points!
GS: Disease! Statuses applied to Gwen Whitlock!
GS: Seraph Lanval has activated a Force Action!
GS: Seraph Lanval takes a solid hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 224 hit points!
GS: Seraph Lanval has been weakened by Disease! They take 0 damage, and burn off all temporary hit points!
GS: Disease! Statuses applied to Seraph Lanval!
DC: MISS! Avril Vent Fleur completely evades Vanished Within The Glass from The Umbral Mirror!
GS: Xantia critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 43 hit points!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 43 hit points!
GS: Garrett Stampede has activated a Force Action!
GS: CRITICAL! Garrett Stampede critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 75 hit
points!
DC: 4 turns have elapsed in the battle against The Umbral Mirror! 1 turns remain!
GS: Kalve guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 134 hit points!
GS: Kalve has been weakened by Disease! They take 0 damage, and burn off all temporary hit points!
GS: Disease! Statuses applied to Kalve!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    Lanval keeps wandering through to make his way back, breaking line of sight with much of anyone. He kinda-sorta remembers which way he drifted along, back to where Talise and the others are--
     Droplets of glass surround him, swallowing him whole as his bare feet touch down upon the red-hot... cool autumn grass.
     ...
     It's another happy day in the week-long beer festival of the bustling town of Rylia. The week in which even the most stalwart and hard-nosed of the Althenian faith let their hair down a little. The Full period of the Black Dragon is a celebrated time in all of Meribus, for that is the time when the best brewers of the continent - no, all of Lunar! - converge in which to share and sample their craft. Depictions of the Black Dragon curling up around a frothy mug are equal parts coy and common. Under the clear, shining skies of the cool autumn air, many toasts are made. Many stupid acts of bravado and inebriation, moreso. They are a happy, mirthful people surrounded by plenty. Song fills the air, praise for two names alongside Althena. Lanval, looking far less disheveled - far more dignified, with cleaner aquamarine robed clothing - and... another.
     Lanval comes to a stop upon a nearby hill overlooking the celebration, his fancy kiseru-style bubble pipe in his grasp, and takes a seat. Joining him is the 'another' in question...
     A female Earth Seraph, dressed in golden hues with an apparent equal disregard for the concept of shoes as Lanval himself, leaves fruitful seedlings in her wake. Her silver hair flares out as though she had wings, terminating in golden tips appropriate to her element. She lends herself to another beautiful landmark of Rylia - the twisting paths of flowers from wherever she walks, only mildly inconvenient when she decides she wants to take strolls in the proper farming fields themselves (which, as it turns out, is 'very often').
     Over yonder is a great tree which oversees the bountiful harvests of the town... her own vessel. It used to be her grave marker, from when her time as a mortal came to an end. Her years were nearly over when they first met. Althena must have acknowledged their friendship, short-lived as it was due to their mortality, and had seen it fit that they would see more time together as Seraphim together. Neither wish to project their manifestations too far from their vessels, for their charges. His own dwells within the nearby monastery from a statue bearing a bucket of blessed water. Hers, the aforementioned tree. This hill stands at an intersection between their spheres of influence, within the same comfortable distance they are willing to project. They may be two of them, but neither takes for granted the other's ceaseless work in presiding over the region.
     "Dmikkir Lwvksam." A peaceful Lanval greets in a soft voice as he exhales bubbles whose colors shimmer as they dance under the sunlight. "What a wonderful harvest this year."
     "The drought was no match for you." His friend seats herself. From where the sun rises, she shadows him. Her manifestation is notably taller than his to start. In fact, in recent years, her name has become a bit more prominent than his - her power is greater, now, but there are no harsh feelings of competition or contempt between them for it. They are both charged with protecting the people of Rylia.
     "Have you had the recent Sheller ale?" Lanval asks. "As near divine as anything they have brewed..."
     "You say that because it bears your name to the mortals." She chides, playfully, wrapping her arms around raised knees until one dandelion blossom springs up just in front of her. She leans forward and gently brushes it with a finger.
     Lanval laughs. It's just another bit to add to the pile of centuries of small talk like this. No other mortal in their recollection could speak with them. The traditions and devotions held as true as they could, for those they could not see, hear, or touch.
     They'd have been fine together for another five hundred years... on top of the five hundred they've had now. Maybe even go for another millennium on top of that.
     ...Maybe forever.

<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.

    It was one paradise, one of many Gwen has dreamed about, thought about, had placed in the back of her mind for safekeeping. A silly, stray little daydream.

    The mirror plucks it from its little box in Gwen's mind, unfolding it and stretching it to cover the field of the courier's new potential cage, larger, wider, until it seemed like something close to reality.

    And what a reality it is.

    Little Twister is a bustling town, unique for its active commerce, the spark of its colorful, varied inhabitants, its unusual buildings, and its spirit, tough and unbreakable, a diamond among glittering sand.

    A beautiful blonde woman stands, arms on her hips, watching the her younger companions tumble and run in the streets. Her long blonde hair flows in the desert wind, her smile and laugh like the sun, equally as blinding, to the point that it was hard to focus in on her face.

    And there's Gwen, laughing with her friends, gushing over the newest adventure of Nightburn Acklund. Heady dreams of being Drifters equally as successful float on the wind, and feel so close that one could snatch it.

    The blonde woman will be the one to make it, most likely. They all know that. But the light-blue haired boy, on the cusp of being a teenager, seems confident his name will be known all across the Badlands, to Ignas, and beyond.

    The younger Gwen laughs, eagerly sharing her dreams about the world. One of the other boys laughs, and she elbows him with a gloved hand. Sure, she's not a bombshell like K_____, but she's still growing. And besides, a lady's value isn't in how pretty her smile is. It's how much confidence shines behind it. Isn't that right, K_____?

    She'll be her own person, and explore this precious world.

    It was a town where Gwen could keep up, where she wasn't the one left behind all the time. The one where she wasn't just a survivor because she had spent so much time indoors, the sun and dust as much her enemy as infection, pain, a heart that threatened to give out at any time.

    It was a town that didn't forget, that didn't stand on the unmarked graves of so many people that died unmourned and alone in its streets.

    It was a town that required forgetting everyone and everything else in order to exist.

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei didn't know there was a connection between Guardianism and Buddhism.

Avril heals Fei's wounds. He manages a small smile her way as he floats into the next mirror realm, but he doesn't say anything just yet. He needs a moment to recover, but...will he get that moment or will he get an eternity?

???

It's a nice dream. It's such a sweet dream that anybody can see it. In fact, it's pushing outward as if it insists on being seen--the opposite problem of before for those curious as to what Fei has been up to.

Food is on the table. Elly has been insisting lately that Fei eat better to be a good example for their daughter so it's been a lot of salads. Today is furnished with flax seed, tomato, cucumber, raisins, grapes, onions, and red peppers. Elly sits on a piano bench nearby, playing a melody on a flute. Nearby, a statue of an angel spins around as music plays from a repaired ancient music box.

BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ft44I7QvIFs

"You wouldn't believe the news I got today!" Fei says as he opens the entrance door and steps inside. "Riesenlied and Noeline are getting married!"

Elly lowers the flute and says, "Really? I thought Riese would never propose."

Fei grins widely. "Siegfried convinced her. Said 'You never know how much time you have so don't live with regrets.'." He pauses for a moment. "Well he said it better." He blushes faintly.

"It's a good thing," Elly says. "That we stopped him before he hurt anybody. We remembered just in time, and he listened... Imagine if he actually reached Adelhyde..."

Fei shook his head. "It's thanks to the Arctica and Kislev envoys. Garrett and Elmina gave us the time to talk to them. Lily..." He snickers a little bit. "She's not adjusting to peacetime at all."

Elly walked over, kissing him lightly on the cheek and helping him with his bags. "She will. She's strong. She will adapt."

Fei looks towards the stove. "I thought I was going to start helping with dinner!"

"You will," Elly teases. "I've tasted your cooking. You'll help by helping with the dishes.

"Ouch," Fei winces, still smiling.

"Also you can cook when your sister comes back."

Fei goes pale. "How...how about we take Xantia out to eat instead?"

Elly doesn't answer that one as she heads towards stairs leading up to another room. "Hey kiddo!" She shouts. "Are you going to be a ball all day or are you going to eat?"

The door opens up and a large slinky makes its way gradually down the stairs.

"Today, miss." Elly crosses her arms.

The slinky turns into a ball and bounces all the way down to the bottom floor and on the rebound of its last bounce transforms into a green haired girl that's wearing black boots. A flower has been placed meticulously in her hair, one that matches that of her mother's. Her golden eyes look at Fei and she says, "Daddy!"

She leaps into Fei's arms. He winces but manages to support her weight and returns the hug.

Elly places her hands on her hips. "Hey! Where's my hug?"

"Come on, give your mommy a hug." Fei tells the girl.

The green haired girl hops down and without jumping this time, embraces Elly. She's kind of a daddy's girl sorry Elly.

"Guess it's time to eat!" Fei says, sitting down. The girl's arm transforms into several tendrils as she sits down as it starts schlorping up salad.

"Hey!What'd I say about playing with your food!" Elly complains.

The green haired girl pouts but her arm returns to normal and she uses utensils this time. "You spoil her, Fei."

"Guilty." Fei admits.

"So Siegfried's doing well?" Elly asks. "Did he like the paints you sent him?"

"Yeah," Fei says. "He's painting the walls. King Justin's allowing it. Cecilia inspired him with her work around Filgaia."

"You'd think she's a drifter," Elly laughs.

"Yeah, she and Xantia get along really well." Fei admits. "She's so happy...I'm...I'm glad we stopped him from killing her father... Imagine if we didn't--" He pauses. "But ... we did, right?"

"But we did," Elly assures him as the girl sneakily returns to eating with her arm instead of her mouth.

"Yeah..." Fei says. "...Yeah, we did." He smiles. "We did. We can live in peace... it was close, but we made it happen."

He leans back, enjoying the atmosphere. "We made it."

The dream continues to push and press outward. It demands to be seen. It wants to draw you into it, it wants to make a new reality, and grow grow grow into a world of happy worlds, happy beautiful worlds. A painting with no blemishes, a movie after its joyous ending.

Fei doesn't wake up. It's all fake, you idiot but he doesn't wake up. Come on what did you say to the others WAKE UP but he doesn't wake up.

<Pose Tracker> Talise Gianfair has posed.

Even with Ghaleon driving her face into the earth, Talise can see the edges of things. "Lanval," she groans, reaching out after where she can vaguely see him moving off.

Lanval... what this guy said about you... I won't let him treat you that way. You're not a joke. And I won't allow him to--

With a roar, Talise pushes herself off the ground. It takes every bit of strength she can possibly muster. Ghaleon's boot slides off the back of her neck; he takes a step back as the big swordswoman somehow manages to bull her way back to her feet.

"Well, well," he murmurs with a little click of his tongue. "Maybe there's a little more steel to you after all," he murmurs as the room begins to fill with a light of blinding, profound white.

"Tethelle," Talise calls out into the whiteness. Her voice echoes. "Ida... Ros...?"

There's no answer right away.

Until an ocean spray hits her in the face like a shock. She can feel every droplet.

Her eyes flood with the shining light of the summer sun. It gleams off the water in countless twinkles of light. The ocean breeze carries the spray up and across her every time the bow of the ship rises on a gentle wave and then settles back into the flow and stream of the water.

It's a familiar ship. She'd recognize every plank and beam of the Lunabelle. How could she not? It was the first place she saw. The place she grew up.

Talise opens her mouth, a surge of joy tempered by a clenching knot of doubt and confusion that twists in her gut. But she doesn't ask the question that knot wants her to ask.

"Don't you have other things on your mind?" comes a low, deep female voice that causes Talise's heart to leap in her chest - and a second later comes the soft sound of a familiar lute.

She turns with a gasp, clutching her hand to her chest, and her eyes go wide as she lays eyes on just who she knows that voice belongs to - and just who she knows cannot possibly be there. But she is. A woman even taller than Talise - she comes in at six foot seven, with a hard, muscular build, broad cheekstripes, shaggy catlike ears and a wild mane of sandy hair. With an even broader grin and brighter eyes. Talise is big already; Tanin de Gianfair is enormous and full of joy, big enough to practically cast a shadow over the man beside her. Compared to his companion and the mother of his child (but not his wife), Clyde Rath is a much smaller man, about five nine, with dark chestnut hair (as dark as Talise's natural colour) caught up in a green and yellow bandanna, five O'clock shadow, and a sly grin lending a certain slick attractiveness to a face which could be called handsome in a weaselly kind of way.

Talise opens her mouth to say something to her parents. But anything she might say vanishes with another soft note from that lute. She can see figures behind them. At the tiller of the ship, a bluff, big-coated man with a silver-shot black beard and a fake left hand that seems to be made of gold plates. And sitting on a stair near him, a bearded old man with a kind smile, strumming lazily on that lute. The lute she lost when the Trial Knight burned down their homes on Filgaia. "Captain Goldhand," she breathes. "Uncle Piet. ...And Mom and Dad....

"...How can you possibly...."

"Oh, pish," Tanin scoffs with a smile and a wave of her hand. "Don't worry about things like that. What matters is we've got an adventure in front of us, Tal. Spira's out there waiting for us and we're going to find it."

"I don't know how I let you talk me into these things," Clyde chuckles, giving Tanin a nudge with his elbow. She responds with a laugh, nearly crushing him into her side with a one-armed hug.

As familiar crew mill about the deck behind them, Uncle Piet gives his lute another strum. "Y'know, there's an old story about the mysterious land of Spira," he begins, his voice slipping into a storyteller's cadence. "A story about a place where your wildest dreams are real...."

"Okay, hold on a second," Talise interjects.

She points at Tanin and Clyde. "Mom and Dad," she says. "You're dead." She points around. "Captain Goldhand! You're dead! Uncle Piet! You're dead! I saw your grave!"

Talise sweeps her arms out around her. "The Lunabelle! It's dead! Everyone on it is dead! You guys sank or something! Or maybe you fucked off to Spira and ditched me, I don't know, but you're all as good as dead!"

Tanin scoffs and waves one hand. "Of course we're not dead. Do you honestly think that-"

"NO, shut up!" Talise shouts at her mother, jabbing a finger at her. "Shut the fuck up. You are not fucking real and you are a fucking figment of my imagination and I am not falling for this shit again!"

"No one's asking you to fall for it," Captain Goldhand murmurs with a slow, sad shake of his head. "But you're a member of my crew and you do need to relax and smile once in awhile."

Uncle Piet gives his lute another strum and sends a kind smile her way. "You don't have to let your anger rule you, child. Just be happy! Don't tell me you've forgotten how."

Sauntering forward, Clyde moves and lays a hand on his daughter's arm, gradually lowering her sword. She doesn't resist. "Come on, Tal. Some things you've just gotta roll with."

Talise moves her lips helplessly. Her mind screams at her. IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE IT'S FAKE

...I want it to be real.

GS: Talise Gianfair has attacked Talise Gianfair with Placid Water Stance!
GS: Talise Gianfair has completed her action.
GS: Talise Gianfair gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Talise Gianfair heals Talise Gianfair! She gains 0 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Beast has posed.

    BGM: Brahms - Cradle Song https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pREtP6YRMR8

    Ah - can I ask a question of you, at this juncture? Surely it is permissible; I've a captive audience. Everyone enjoys a riddle. Oh, don't worry! There is no writing-desk to be found here.

    This is much, much more simple.

    What does a timeless being yearn for?

    Now - don't rush into the answer. Do they cry out for those mortal lives which have been lost? Certainly not; hundreds pass like grains of sand through an hourglass's gentle embrace. Death is a sad thing, from the perspective of mortality, but is it not the end point you all go towards? Perhaps it is regrettable, where it could have been avoided, but you all will die one day.

    So, then. It is not the salvation of the girl in her wedding-dress, one shoe lost to the wilderness as she edges towards the cliff in her madness. It is not the safety of the boy savaged by wolves.

    And it is not Ida in her happiness - no.

    What is six months, on a scale of centuries...?

    It is the blink of an eye.

    After all - the Beast of Lohgrin is a distant and inhuman thing. Unknown and unknowable; untouched and untouchable. And how could little efforts change a thing's ineffable nature? Oh, you will never understand each other.

    Such is the lesson given by...

    Ah. Such a simple riddle! I cannot believe I wasted all your time with all this nonsense. It's obvious, don't you think? It's staring us all right in the face.

    A child wants -

    "Mama!" Calls a girl who is not a Beast at all, twin-tail hair and roughshod dress. She is younger, still. There is no house to hold them; the boughs of an ancient tree have been woven together, and in the hollow of its trunk they lie. There sits the woman - Abilene. She is heavy-set, rounded, short grey hair with deeper streaks. Her face is aged and weary; grey eyes behind wrinkled creases. Her body is shrouded in dark clothes, blues, purples; a high-collared cloak, an empress-waisted dress.

    She is an old thing, and she is slow to rise, but rise she does. "Boudicca," she calls in reply, for the girl before her is not a Beast at all, "what have you found this day?"

    "Flowers, Mama," Boudicca beams, as she holds them aloft. "They were growing on the hill."

    Abilene sighs, smiles still as she takes them. "Boudicca, 'tis a mountain, and you know you must not go there. Yet these are beautiful - I thank you nonetheless."

    "You are correct, Mama," sighs the girl, scruffing at the ground. "I shall not stray again."

    "Good," smiles Abilene. "Here, I can keep you safe."

    A child wants her mother, in a place which is not so dangerous by her side.

    Years are like hours; they pass. Boudicca's face grows more distinguished with maturity. Theirs is swampland untouched, too dangerous for mortal tread. And there is happiness, there. It is a happiness shared solely between two people.

    Such a thing would be a lonely sort of bliss, wouldn't it..?

    Ah - always the question of the mountains. The natural barrier which keeps them from the world; which keeps the world from them. It is a gnawing question, ever-quashed. There is fear, there. It is fear unacknowledged.

    To approach the mountains is to...

    Here the word 'shatter' edges into Boudicca's mind, time and again, unbidden, and she pushes it away.

    Years are like hours; they pass.

    And there comes a time when her featured wisen into middle-age, the feature of so many centuries. And she turns to Abilene, on the fallen log which they have shaped into a seat. And she smiles, and it is a wearied thing.

    "You are not correct, Mama," says Boudicca, who is very old.

    "Am I not so?" Asks Abilene, who is older.

    "The truth is plain," Boudicca replies, and she is very tired. "We have repeated this day for three-hundred and twenty eight hundred thousand days... give or take five hundred."

    "Yes," replies Abilene, who is more tired still. "There is truth in this."

    "Perhaps we ought have kept the mountain journeys. It would have livened things."

    "Ah, but there is danger yet beyond the mountains," insists Abilene, who cannot move beyond her scars.

    "I know," says Boudicca, who knows nothing at all.

    "But," Abilene insists, as she reaches to take her hand. "Were you happy?"

    "I was," replies Boudicca, taking her hand in hers. "Had I not brought us ruin - here we could have stayed."

    "No. I ought have known, when I took a child of the wind. You would not have stayed forever."

    "Perhaps not," replies Boudicca, sounding very sad.

    "And you will not stay now," continues Abilene.

    "Perhaps not," replies the Beast of Lohgrin, sounding very sad.

    "They will only hurt you, Boudicca," Abilene warns. "They will carve your loving heart from you and replace it with their sick ambitions. There will be aught left of you by their end."

    "I know," says the Beast of Lohgrin, who knows nothing at all.

    Here the word 'shatter' edges into her mind, and this time she lets it take her, lets it break down every lie and comfort. Skin cracks, falls away, reveals scales; they crack, fall away, and reveal emptiness. It is not akin to porcelain; it is more in the manner of water, beading from an oiled thing.

    And that truth is revealed as the bubble pops, sheds its form about her, leaves her crouched upon the mire. She takes a breath; exhales. There is an ill tint, to the water. It is a thing which leaves her shuddering in the wake of it. Eyes creased with concern trail over the others; comes to rest upon the place the other Seraph was, before they were captured.

    Her steps are heavier than she would like, as she goes to the bubble. As she lays hand on it - exhales. The wind curls about her, into the water. It is gentle in its destruction.

GS: Seraph Beast has attacked Seraph Lanval with Soothing Breeze!
GS: Seraph Beast has completed her action.
GS: Lily Keil has activated a Force Action!
GS: Lily Keil used the Force Action Protect! She takes The Umbral Mirror's attack on Fei Fong Wong on herself!
GS: Lily Keil has activated a Force Action!
<Pose Tracker> Tethelle Cirdian has posed.

The Siegfried Tethelle was holding off - just barely, and slowly failing at that - shatters into broken shards. Tethelle was pushing against him so hard that she staggers forward, not entirely under her own power, gasping for air and not getting it as water and stranger things boil around her.

Tethelle kicks one of the bubbles away from her, but finds her leg trapped in it. It staggers her; she hops, trying to stay balanced as the bubble swells up, stretching around her other leg, up her body, to her head, where it surrounds her entirely, leaving her looking nothing so much as confused.

Tethelle sees -

Tethelle lowers her sword, wiping sweat from her eyes as she regards the initiate opposite her. Getting sloppy, Tethelle thinks to herself a little wryly as she does; even just a couple years ago she wouldn't have been this tired giving the new group of trainees their ceremonial bout to welcome them to the temple.

She shifts the blade to salute her opponent, a boy in his early teens, as he does the same to her. "By the ringing of steel, Equites has heard your voice," Tethelle says, with an air of formality. "As high priestess of the Great Temple, it is my honour to welcome you to her service."

It goes on that way for some time, but eventually her work concludes, and Tethelle steps back, leaving the last to a group of other priests. She's getting old, she thinks to herself, as she adjusts the sash on her ceremonial robe. In her fifties now, and her dark hair was streaked with grey, but other than that she was as vital as she'd ever been. Certainly not much slower than she was at thirty - just with less stamina, and she supposed that happened to everyone. She'd have to train to stop it.

After the fall of the Metal Demons, she'd returned to her village, which had welcomed her with open arms where once they'd said she would never succeed. She'd returned to her parents, and her master, and returned to the temple.

~this is wrong. there is no Great Temple anymore; it was abandoned centuries ago~

When he died some years later, of course Tethelle was chosen to be head priestess; after she'd helped save the world from the Metal Demons, there wasn't really another choice. And so she'd led the Blademasters of Equites, and was as happy as she'd ever been.

~Mother is alive. the Metal Demons still fight against the life on Filgaia~

Tethelle shakes her head. She had... dreams, of that time, sometimes. They had been the hardest time of her life, even if she'd met people there who she'd loved and would never have met any other way. Only that she had been chosen as a Blademaster had taken her away from her adventuring, though she has to admit that leading the temple - or was it founding the temple? - had been the best option. She was proud, and happy, with her life.

~the Blademasters are a forgotten order. there is only one girl who wants to be one left. nobody else remembers~

Tethelle hesitates, walking down the path back toward the Temple's inner yards. She had - if she was a Blademaster, she would have had to be out in the world, but here she is at the Temple, head priestess. It didn't make sense; how could both those things be true? And more; she had always wanted to be a Blademaster. If there was only one, then...

Then she was it. And there were no others; nobody to remember their legacy, nobody who even remembered they had a legacy, once, except some others of her village and maybe, just maybe, a historian with a single note in a dusty journal. Certainly no trainees.

Which means -

~listen to yourself!~

- this is not true.

"LISTEN TO YOURSELF!"

Tethelle jerks back to reality with a scream as her chi blasts out from her, popping the bubble and leaving her glowing in a halo of silver and palest blue. She is clenching her sword so tightly she can feel her fingers creak when she finally forces them to loosen, and though she will never admit it, her eyes are wet from regarding what might have been, in another world where the tiny village she was born in was not on the verge of collapse, where the Temple still stood and the ancient order in Equites' service had not been lost to time.

Tethelle drops to one knee, driving her sword into the ground next to her to support her. But then, ever so slowly, she pushes herself upwards, staggering forwards, towards the next closest person. She doesn't even know who it is. She just wants to be nearer someone else.

"Listen to yourself," she repeats, more quietly.

GS: Tethelle Cirdian has attacked Tethelle Cirdian with In a Prison of Peace and Regret!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian takes 14 damage from Toxin!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian has completed her action.
GS: Lily Keil critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Vanished Within The Glass for 46 hit points!
GS: Lily Keil enters CONDITION GREEN!!
GS: Seraph Lanval gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Seraph Beast heals Seraph Lanval! He gains 0 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.

Layna leaves the illusionary Havel behind. she steps forward into the depths...just as droplets of glass rise up all around them, filled with flickering motes.

Layna curses as one rises up beneath her...

        ...and everything fades...

...A majestic crimson ship glides across an ocean of crystal-clear water. And at its helm...there she was. The wind flows through her hair as she sails, free and unrestrained. She had no destination in mind...just going wherever the wind takes her and her crew.

As she sails, a tall, bulky man with an aged face walks up behind her, clapping her on the shoulder and beaming with pride. Trailing behind him was a short woman who usually bore a stern expression, but now wore something of a smile.

The three of them talk.

They laugh.
And they sail on, into the horizon...

Didn't she just want things to stay like this?

Didn't she want this to be her reality?

...But she knew.

As much as she wanted it, this could never happen.

That man was dead.

He was dead before he came back to terrorize her. Dead even before she killed him with her own two hands.

...There was no getting those days back, as much as she wanted them.

The days when she could still look up to him as a captain, a mentor...a father.

That man was dead.

"...Hey. I'm sorry things turned out the way they did. I looked up to you, you know? But...it's too late now. Out there...you're too far gone. One of these days...I'm gonna have to put you down. Like I did before." She says, shaking her head. The large man's face falls...and then he nods in understanding.

She wouldn't let his memory chain her down any longer.

Push forward.

Don't look back.

Layna pushes forward, pushing out of the bubble. She lands solidly and stands up straight and tall, looking around her at the various bubbles.

"...It's just a dream. A nice one, but it's just a dream. Don't dwell on it too long, aye? This world ain't so far gone yet. We can still do somethin' about all this. Don't give up on me!" She roars.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

Xantia doubted she would escape, but somehow, she is not persued. She doesn't think about it for too long. She has to catch up with the others. All of them still look so far. All she wants is to be together again. And before she full well realizes it, her wish is abruptly granted.

Xantia is seated at an enormous dinner table, stretching out further than the eye can see on either end, complete covered in lavish dishes. And she's not the only one. Everyone who she cares for even a little bit is present, all seated on one side of the table. It's quite the rowdy scene, with everybody talking, eating, laughing and just having the time of their lives.

As is only fitting, those that Xantia feels closest to are seated in closer proximity to her, and so the Black Wolves stand out in particular. But one figure doesn't seem to belong... or rather, they wouldn't to most people, but to Xantia their presence makes perfect sense. Even though she has no idea of the dramatic irony of this situation, she is flanked by Fei on her right side... and Id on her left.

Naturally, she herself hasn't really been focusing much on conversation. Not with all this food here. Food which seems endless - no matter how much she eats, there's always more of it within easy reach. There's so much, it all kind blends together after a while, but it never stops being delicious.

It's Fei who addresses her first, asking her, "Having a good time?" Still with her mouth full, Xantia says something unintelligible before swallowing and trying again. "Yeah, of course! Everyone's here, the food's great... and Filgaia's saved! Everything's perfect!"

Fei smiles and nods, affirming, "And we owe it all to you. You really became Filgaia's hope." Looking embarassed, Xantia waves him off. "Oh come on now, everyone helped, it wasn't just because of me!"

It's Id who speaks next, putting a hand on her shoulder. "But you're the one who brought us together. You never gave up on me, no matter what." Lily, seated on Id's opposite side, adds, "You made me realize how important emotions are." Elly, from Fei's opposite side, chimes in, "You make me so proud to be your sister."

Xantia goes bright red from all the praise, not knowing where to look. "A-aww, thank you everyone, but it's... it's just who I am! Once I got my memory back, everything just made sense!"

There's an audible noise of glass cracking. That statement... it causes a contradiction, and Xantia realizes it immediately. She just claimed to have her memory back, which does make sense: she considers that an absolute prerequisite for true happiness. But the illusion can't tell her anything she doesn't know about herself. All she has are things that she'd like to be true. But they can't ALL be true at the same time. Then things wouldn't make sense.

Slowly, Xantia turns her head back to Fei. Asking a question that she already knows the answer to... but she needs to hear it from him. "Fei... what am I to you?" Fei doesn't hesitate in his response, patting her on the head. "What a silly question. You're my precious little sister, of course." Xantia turns to the other side of the table, wordlessly asking Id the same question. "The only one who could ever defeat me is of course my own family... my own sister."

Elly already said the same. There's no need to even ask Lily, she already knows what the answer is going to be. Everyone's going to tell her the same thing. Looking down, she realizes the truth. "This... isn't possible." This is her fervent wish to be in some way strongly connected to the people she cares about, translated into a scenario that just... doesn't work in reality.

In a flash, Xantia leaps across the table, a fist raised in anger. "How dare you do this to me?! I'll never be happy with lies! I want to know the truth!"

With that, the bubble pops, leaving only Xantia in her defiant stance. Before this, it was just about helping everyone else. Now, it's personal.

GS: Xantia has attacked Xantia with No More Lies!
GS: Xantia takes 11 damage from Toxin!
GS: Xantia has completed her action.
GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Cecilia Adlehyde with On Your Feet Me Hearties!!
GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Gwen Whitlock with On Your Feet Me Hearties!!
GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Rosaline Calice with On Your Feet Me Hearties!!
GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Dean Stark with On Your Feet Me Hearties!!
GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Cyre H. Lorentz with On Your Feet Me Hearties!!
GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Talise Gianfair with On Your Feet Me Hearties!!
GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Kalve with On Your Feet Me Hearties!!
GS: Layna Manydays has completed her action.
GS: Xantia takes a solid hit from Xantia's No More Lies for 0 hit points!
GS: Shield! Statuses applied to Xantia!
GS: Kalve takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's On Your Feet Me Hearties! for 0 hit points!
GS: Kalve gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Talise Gianfair takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's On Your Feet Me Hearties! for 0 hit points!
GS: Dean Stark takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's On Your Feet Me Hearties! for 0 hit points!
GS: Dean Stark gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's On Your Feet Me Hearties! for 0 hit points!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian heals Tethelle Cirdian! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Rosaline Calice takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's On Your Feet Me Hearties! for 0 hit points!
GS: Rosaline Calice gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Rosaline Calice enters CONDITION GREEN!!
GS: Gwen Whitlock takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's On Your Feet Me Hearties! for 0 hit points!
GS: Gwen Whitlock gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Glass boils. It rises around Ida's legs before she can react, sealing her inside. The last thing she sees before the bubble closes is Kalve's face.

    "...Ida, love?"

    Ida shakes her head. Her hair is not loose, but bound up into a bun at the back of her head. She's not wearing plain linen, but an elegant, tasteful dress. Her husband sits next to her on the divan, a heavy leather apron over his usual outfit--he's been in and out of the workshop all day, so he hasn't taken it off. It doesn't seem to bother William any, and William is sitting in his lap.

    "Keep reading, Mama!" William says. He smiles up at her. Kalve reaches down to tousle his son's hair, affectionately.

    "I'm sorry, dear," Ida says, smiling a good-natured smile. "Mama just..."

    Mama just what? She looks back at Kalve, and something flickers through her mind, cold and terrifying. She wants to stay here. It's warm. It's comforting. It feels like the home she never had--a perfect home, where nothing goes wrong. But...

    She can't stay. The man she loves is out there, not in here.

    Ida sets the book down on the divan next to her, leans in and gives William a kiss atop his head. "I will hold you near," Ida says, "until I have the chance to make this real, whatever form it may take." Cracks start to spill out from the floor beneath her, and spiderweb across everything--across her husband and son and daughter and home.

    The bubble shatters. Ida falls, lands in a crouch on the heaving lake of glass. Tears trickle down her cheeks.

<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.

    The towering figure of Lady Harken only glares back as Avril speaks her refusal to shed blood again, here and now. But though the Metal Demon grips the scythe, spins it as if in preparation for a strike--

    In the end, this version was nothing but an illusion; her form flickers, wavers, then boils away into nothingness, gone into the abyss with the rest.

    Avril exhales, loosing a breath.

    I am not afraid to do what is necessary. But I must remember...

    ...to think about what is truly necessary.

    She turns, apparently again about to assess the others. Instead, burning motes of blue-green fire waft upwards from beneath her feet. Like in Uzda Il-jam, she thinks.

    The Leypoint.
    Earthpulse.

    Have they broken through to it? Is this where the Malevolence--
    The sheen is the thing that makes her realize, quite abruptly, what is wrong here.

    "Wait. The Malevolence... is caught inside--" she starts to say, as a membrane billows out large, up from beneath her feet and encloses her within it. Blade leaping again into her hands, she makes a final rush to cut herself free from what entraps her, but the blade never does fall.

    All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.

    "Deaaan! I can't believe you overslept, you dummy!"

    Rebecca is irate -- and she should be, after all. The caravan was set to depart at a certain hour, and at this rate, it's probably already about to head out. It'll be a miracle if they make it in time. Hands on her hips, the pigtailed girl looks like she's contemplating throttling him.

    Dean grins sheepishly, the clothes he wears apparently put on at record speed, then reaches over to grab one of their bags. "It'll be fine! We just have to get over there quickly! Avril, you ready to go?"

    The silver-haired woman nods, similarly lifting her bags.

    With a start, Avril realizes she's not so much present as watching this tableau play out.

    "Okay! Then, no time like the present!"

    Rebecca just sighs and moves for the door. "Well, then come on! I swear, if we miss it because of you..."

    They're not going anywhere in particular. It's more impulse, more realization, the memories of this other idealized world filtering in for her. They're just traveling because they're young, because they're friends. Because Filgaia is a big place, and they want to see and be a part of it.

    No reason at all.

    She watches as the trio rush on out, watches as they run down the street, lugging baggage along with them.

    My wish... is for a journey that doesn't end.

    This Avril steps through the world like a ghost, only watching as a happier self giggles, then races to catch up with her friends, already chasing after the departing caravan.

    "I'm sorry," she says, the apology for herself alone. "I must fulfill my promise."

    And when she cuts, her blade will carve this reality in twain.
    Erase it.

GS: Avril Vent Fleur enters a Counter stance!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Seraphic Soul!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur takes 10 damage from Toxin!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

The phantom Tobit shatters, blown away by Rosaline's show of defiance. But still, they persist. They warp around, soon rippling along the floor. Rosaline runs, unsure precisely what to expect, but before she can even prepare, a bubble detaches from the membrane and engulfs her--

--




Rosaline is back in Hope Springs, yet again. How could she not be? This is home, back when it was a home. The area surrounding the orphanage is more verdant than it has ever been. A group of children are sitting in a circle in the grass, enthralled as Rosaline reads a story.

"...The tower reached all the way up to heaven. She even built an entire city at the top, and soon it was filled with sinners. But God saw her arrogance, got mad and destroyed her tower. And so, she then had to live in a -hideout for sinful hermits-. And she never returned to the earth again... The end."

She closes the book. The children let out small, incredulous noises. "Serves her right!" one of them concludes.

"Yes," Rosaline says with a grave nod. "When you reach for the domain of the gods, you invite sin into your life, and those of others. This is why a simple life is best. Simply work to make the lives of people around you better. This is how we can save the world. A simple life is... a..."

She goes glassy-eyed.

"Simple life..."

She grits her teeth. Her calm expression turns to a deep scowl. The children look to one another, confused.

"You've ALREADY tried that and it didn't work!*" she shouts to nothing in particular. One of the children starts crying. "I know who I am and I know where I am, you stupid rock! The Fox Company and the others didn't risk their lives just so I could fall for this dumb trick again!"

She stands up and steps away, letting the children part for her but not looking at them directly.

"I'm sorry," she says, more gently. "But you know that already, don't you? I can't apologize anymore. I have other important things to do."

She then runs away, not looking back, all to way to the edge of town. As she does, she screams at the top of her lungs. Maybe someone will hear her.

And as she runs, she transforms. She is still a Hellion, for better and for worse. One perk is the ability to claw at the edge of this reality and tear it away like cheap wallpaper.

And as she does, her bubble bursts. Layna's voice is the first she hears. Rosaline nods to her, welling with determination. But others are still struggling. She hears Talise's voice coming from one of the bubbles, raises a claw, tries to tear into it, and...

She winces in pain as it bounces back. If only it were that simple.

"Well, I can at least do this," she decides. Pink energy swirls in her hand. Her healing powers in this form are painful, but a little pain might just be what Talise needs to snap out of it right now. And maybe, just maybe, she'll recognize where it comes from. She holds up her palm, shooting the magic through the membrane, to home in on her friend.

Then she hears Lanval's voice, coming from another nearby bubble. She doesn't know him so well, but she knows he helped her out just earlier. She can't let him perish here. She looks in her hand, where there is more of her healing spell ready. She knows how poisonous Malevolence is to him, but this isn't Malevolence, not precisely.

And so, very, very carefully, she picks the errant strands of purple out of the swirling pink with her claws, before firing another charge into the bubble.

And last... Xantia bursts out, looking displeased. Rosaline kneels down next to her. "You look like you've seen better days. This'll be painful. I'm sorry." And the last of that pink energy goes to Xantia. Too much pink energy is dangerous, but Xantia can take it. And, perhaps most important of all, it's warm.

* See the beginning of the scene 'I Am Furious', true believers!

GS: Rosaline Calice has activated a Force Action!
GS: Rosaline Calice has attacked Talise Gianfair with Soul Infusion!
GS: Rosaline Calice has attacked Xantia with Soul Infusion!
GS: Rosaline Calice has attacked Seraph Lanval with Soul Infusion!
GS: Rosaline Calice has completed her action.
GS: Rosaline Calice heals Talise Gianfair! She gains 200 temporary hit points!
GS: Seraph Lanval gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Rosaline Calice heals Seraph Lanval! He gains 200 temporary hit points!


<Pose Tracker> Cecilia Adlehyde has posed.

Cecilia feels, roughly, in control. Battering back that demon illusion makes her feel like she can handle this more and more. Everything's going well. She just has to continue marching on to the source of this and-- "What!?" she yelps as the ground boils and swallows her up, popping her off into a bubble like some Aquvy cartoon.

.
    .
        .

The suitcase sits open on her bed. It's a massive traveler's trunk - her favorite, big and brown and heavy enough to carry days of clothes and her sleeping bag all on its own. A slip of a girl like her should have trouble with it, but the heavy weight of the trunk has grown lighter and lighter as the years wore on. Her fingers walk down the line of the small hand-made subdivision - Jack and Rudy had both had ideas, but she'd insisted on making it herself. "One, two," she murmurs, fingers walking down hand-sized plates of stone. "Ten, eleven..."

She smiles, fingers settling quietly on a single stone of gold. "And twenty-six," she says.

It trembles at her touch. Her head tips, eyes blinking rapidly in concern. The Medium isn't satisfied? But...

"Hey! Princess!" comes a voice from outside. "Are you coming anytime soon? We'll miss the train!"

"Oh, I'm sure Doctor Emma has some contraption to help us catch up," she laughs, sliding the case closed and snapping it shut. The locks CLICK satisfyingly.

"Please, no," Jack says, his face white with alarm as she steps out of her rooms in the inn, booted stride strong, her trunk held firmly in her two hands. "How do you carry that thing?" Jack mutters, peering around.

"A maiden has some secrets," Cecilia replies, slipping one eye open to slide a grin at Jack, and then they mutually step in to the common room. He's there, that red vest and bandana. He turns back - they don't need to say much. That smile says it all.

Her lips split in the biggest smile of her life.

GS: Xantia gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
GS: Rosaline Calice heals Xantia! She gains 200 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

"That's right," Cyre laughs with Gwen's reply. "I mean, who hasn't imagined killing the jerks who've made their lives miserable at least once in their lives, right? That's just human nature. We indulge in those little evils to prevent ourselves from making mistakes in reality. The danger is taking it too far, getting lost in the fantasy. So lost that you might just be tempted to make your nightmare a reality."

How many people had died over the long history of the world because someone they knew dreamt too far of how great life would be without them in it?

Probably more than is at all reasonable.

Cyre pats the courier's back and hops on ahead, carrying forward on the wings of a breeze.

And then he gets swallowed by an orb of glass with a great big -glorp-

...

...

Warm sunlight dances across his face. Familiar fragrance carries over the breeze and filters across his awareness. Cyre opens his eyes, greeted by a lush, green plain outside his window. In the distance, an abundance of pristine water cascades down the mountain crags, carving sparkling rivers through the prairie. "Good morning dearest," a sweet voice calls, slender fingers gently squeezing around his palm. "It's time to get up. The children are waiting for you to start breakfast."

Cyre groans as he rises, only to decide that the effort isn't worth it and instead sags into his wife's shoulders, "Five more minutes wouldn't hurt, would it? The curry's not going to go cold so quick. It can wait--"

Dainty fingertips pinch and tug at one of his ears. Cyre murmurs comfortably as he rises up into the touch. "I swear. Celesdue knows I spoil you enough as is. Come on, up with you. It's not healthy to sleep in so much."

Cyre grumbles, stumbling up to his feet. His wife rewards his herculean effort with a smile and saunters back out into the living room. He follows, only for--

Daddy~!

Cyre nearly doubles over, a pair of twins wrap around his legs, "Argh, I'm up, I'm up. How are you two doing this morning?" "Uncle Leon promised us we'd go fishing today!" "Yeah~! And Auntie Jay was going to come in to to see us later this afternoon, so hurry up and eat!"

Cyre laughs, ruffling at the fluffy, fuzzy pair around his legs, "Alright, alright. Let's go, come on--"

               You know it wouldn't be that easy, don't you?

The world is gone. The light, the warmth, disappeared and replaced by a howling storm. Cyre stares, terrified and awed at the twin figures dancing in the nightmare tempest. A vast tiger, forged of twisting winds and howling gales. A tremendous lion, made of flashing lightning and towering stormclouds. This world will never be restored through dreams alone. This peace could never be earned by sleep alone. Awaken!"

The shaman screams, shielding his face from the storm, only for the wind to surge suddenly down his throat, into his lungs, practically bursting from within. "AWAKEN, CHILD OF THE WIND!"

Outside, the bubble of glass-light flickers and distorts. Across its surface, symbols exhulting the God of Wind etch themselves into the crystal in scrawling, emerald lettering. The sphere cracks, splinters, lances of brilliant, viridian light shooting up through the fissures. Finally, like a chrysalis giving way, like an egg finally rupturing, the thing bursts. And from it emerges...

The Wind that Walks.

The Nahual of Fengalon awakens to the world, roaring his rebirth with a voice full of fury and righteous rage and bitter sorrow of loss. The storm answers its call, rising to a fever pitch around the remaining glass beads. Tempest winds batter the glass, squeezing and twisting at the outer shell and blasting the contents with a rousing gale. "Those are MY dreams, you damn mirror!" Cyre's voice rumbles like a too-near tornado, shaking body and soul alike. "Mine! Nobody gets to make me dream those but ME! Wake up, everyone! Wake up! We still have a job to do!"

GS: Cyre H. Lorentz takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's On Your Feet Me Hearties! for 0 hit points!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz gains Restore, shortening negative statuses by 3 turns each!
DC: Cyre H. Lorentz switches forms to Nahual - Fengalon!
<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

'It's just a damn fake, it's only as real as you make it!'

Lily hears this, and more from the salty pirate on their side, glances Layna's way for an instant. Push forward... Lily nods once, sharply. That is how to survive, to do what needs to be done. She takes a breath--and the lingering miasma about her is gone. It is replaced with a curling wind, the will of the Seraph, and Lily feels her presence, though she does not see the statue.

Lily is still easy to recognize, still in that gray jacket that Avril recalls. But this does seem to be Lily, the same Avril met before. ...So why share clothes with some other being in a dream?

Regardless, as Xantia runs... Lily lingers at that look. Maybe that would be wiser. Xantia seems to understand some things even without memory that she never seems to know. ...But suddenly, the world seems to boil... and the energy is like before. Like before, except solid, and suddenly--

Lily steps out of her reverie and starts to conjure the darkness until--

Suddenly, she doesn't remember what she was going to fight at all. She stops, and looks down at herself...

She's wearing a long black sundress with a draping skirt, a light black jacket over the same that may as well just be a shirt. On the skin that's visible there are no circuits, but all ahead of them is sand, sand and then the ocean. ...Them? Ah--

She stands with Leon in a little village on Kislev's coast, out at the beach. She blinks for a moment, and--

"Leon...?" She looks around. "There was something..."

Leon looks at her, his silver eyes as piercing as ever. He's younger than he was--no, hasn't he always been this age? It involves looking up in her flat shoes. He regards her for a moment, "You seem lost in thought. ...You'd wanted to go here, remember?"

"I..." Lily blinks, and looks out to the beach... And remembers. Ah, yes...

"...We still have time before we join the war front," she says thoughtfully, and realizes that she's younger--no, the right age? "I..."

"That's right. ...You're in your own head again, aren't you?"

Lily nods. "I am..."

She stays on Leon's arm, walks leisurely down the boardwalk, towards the water. It's gorgeous out there; a beautiful summer. It could go on forever...

Lily pauses, as she looks at it. It's wonderful; everything feels perfect, everything feels full of hope, and possibility. Lily can't believe she could be this happy--

...No. No, she can't believe it. It's just not possible, not after everything, for this happy ending to be hers. She looks down, in silence, stopping where she is, and Leon waits, looks at her. "Lily?" he asks.

"...You're not real," Lily murmurs, looking up to the man she loves. "It's not you, at all. ...This... This is the past. I remember. We travelled..." She looks out to the ocean. "It was beautiful. A chance for a little freedom before we deployed..."

She takes her arm back, and steps aside. "But it's over. The girl this wants me to be..."

"She died. A long time ago."

Leon looks worried, for an instant--before with a look of sudden anger, Lily crashes downward to one knee, shadow gathering about her hand--

The bubble holding her explodes in an instant. The beach, the ocean, the phantom of Leon. All disappear, and Lily in the gray coat falls towards the ground again, holstering her pistol. "...How dare you," she hisses at the air itself, even as she feels the hollowness in her chest that suggests she pushed her magic too far, hurt herself with the intensity of the casting. "You..." She stops. She pauses. She looks up... And she sees; Fei's dream. It wants to be seen, it's pushing outward. Elly, and Fei, and a girl...

Lily looks down, as if listening to something only she can hear. "Yes. Like..."

Lily reaches out, and carves the dream air before herself, rends a door in it with the shadows at her hand, though it stings. She steps through...

And she opens Fei's door, stepping inside and closing it behind her. She looks to Fei's beautiful family, hears of her fantasy. She doesn't see the other one. But even so--

"...No," she says, and she says it sadly, heavily, with great gravity. "I'm sorry. ...But you didn't. We haven't."

"...I'm sorry. But I have to free you, even if you hate me for it."

Lily closes her eyes--and power crackles all around her. The dream itself begins to shift, as Lily for an instant looks almost like she's splitting from one to more, and then it crackles, fading away an inch at a time, bit by bit fading, turning to dust, to nothing, being drawn towards her, towards her--

She takes the boiling shards for herself; they stab into her, bit by bit. And in their place--

Shadows whirl about him. The touch of Lily's magic, perhaps gentle in its own way as he suggested, tearing away what cannot be to make room for what must. There is a haunted look in her eyes as she tears this beauty down.

"...I'm not kind, Fei. If I were... I would have let you sleep. But this is the only way I know how to help you."

<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.

    Shadows explode around Dean, and he lands on the other side of the Cascade Gang, or what remains of them. He straightens as he hears Avril's voice-- "Avril? Hey! I'm here too! I'm okay! Hang on, I'll go over to where you are!" he calls before heading towards her voice. But things happen, as they always do, and as he makes his way straightfowardly towards his best friend--
    
    A bubble pops up around him.
    
    What follows is like something out of a storybook, and so naturally it reads like one. Dean, the accomplished Golem Hunter, protege of and successor to none other than Nightburn Acklund, the greatest Golem Hunter to ever live. Together and on his own, Dean has excavated a staggering number of Golems. With their power, he's brought peace to not just Filgaia but to Lunar as well, for the Golems could fly people back and forth at will. With their power and gentleness and courage, peace has been made between humans and Veruni, Veruni and Guardians. VR Factor is a thing of the past, a sad but distant memory.
    
    Rebecca has become an accomplished circus star, beloved by people across the world. Avril has regained her memories, and they're happy and positive ones, not at all the terrors that she'd feared. Ida has made peace with herself and all her frustrations, and now travels the world as the most respected field researcher in the world. Fei, likewise, has gone around the world helping people, sometimes with Dean, sometimes on his own, and reconciled with his own demons.
    
    Everyone Dean knows is happy. Everyone Dean knows is content. Everyone Dean knows is fulfilled. And Dean himself? He's an inspiration to the children, just as Nightburn was an inspiration before him, showing everyone how everything will come together if one just holds their hands out to their friends and neighbors. And...
    
    '...It's just a dream. A nice one, but it's just a dream,' Layna's voice echoes.
    
    Dean shakes his head like a soaked dog. "Huh?" he utters, looking up from this cardboard-cut-out storybook tale. He looks around and he sees beautiful dreamers, and realizes-- "Wait! You mean this isn't-- this really is just a dream?!"
    
    The happy little world around him flattens into two dimensions.
    
    "Then... then it's no good! I can't just accept a world where everything's handed to me!" Dean shouts. Tears appear in the sky, in the sea, in the land, like someone shredding paper by hand. "This is the future I want--but I'll MAKE that future happen! I won't just sink into an illusion and let myself think that's good enough!!" He reaches out--and the bubble bursts. "Besides--I've got a promise to keep! And I won't stop until I've carried it out!!" He grins towards Layna, wherever he senses her to be. "So thanks for the reminder!"
    
    He dips a hand into his pocket and pulls out a ripe, lush Heal Berry, freshly picked from the trees outside his hometown of Capo Bronco. How can that be? Capo Bronco is on another world. But when you're dreaming, you can be anywhere, can't you? "Here!" he calls as he throws it up in an arcing toss. "This is for you! Because you deserve it!"
    
    He doesn't throw it to anyone in particular, this realm being confusing it. He simply wills it to go to someone who fits his mental requirements. And so it falls and slows and then hovers... right in front of Rosaline, who'd spent her own energy sending out healing towards her friends in turn.

GS: Dean Stark has attacked Rosaline Calice with Heal Berry!
GS: Dean Stark has completed his action.
GS: Lily Keil enters CONDITION GREEN!!
GS: Lily Keil has attacked Fei Fong Wong with Gloomrazor!
GS: Lily Keil has completed her action.
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Cyre H. Lorentz with Shining Wind!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Cecilia Adlehyde with Shining Wind!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Layna Manydays with Shining Wind!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Shining Wind!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Lily Keil with Shining Wind!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Dean Stark with Shining Wind!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Shining Wind!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Fei Fong Wong with Shining Wind!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has completed his action.
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Cyre H. Lorentz!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz heals Cyre H. Lorentz! He gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Dean Stark!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz heals Dean Stark! He gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Lily Keil!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz heals Lily Keil! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Layna Manydays!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz heals Layna Manydays! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Gwen Whitlock!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz heals Gwen Whitlock! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Dean Stark heals Rosaline Calice! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    As those who preside over their realms, Lanval and the other one turn their heads at the intrusion of another. Lanval strokes at his chin. That looks like a Dragon, but it's--
     "Hellion." The Earth Seraph intones, standing tall as she extends a hand forward. "Your kind is not welcome here."
     "That's not a--"
     "If you doubt for one moment, this all disappears." She interjects. "I enshrined you, so long ago. There are no others among mortals who would be capable of doing so now."
     "You did enshrine me." Lanval concedes. Years and years ago... he's had no one he's talked to since.
     The Beast of Lohgrin exhales, and the breeze flows across the landscape. Wind holds power over Earth. This Earth Seraph is powerful, by Lanval's recollection, more powerful than anything that could dare befall Rylia.
     The Wind Seraph is real. That is the only quality they need to overcome it.
     ...But Lanval wants it to be real, and there needs to be more of a push.
     A push, like an actual Hellion, who pops herself in. The fiery spirit of her painful restorative - scaled back greatly in its potential to transmit Malevolence by her having found comfort and acceptance in elements she previously could not reconcile - blast through the bubble, consuming all the ambient wind in a great blaze...
     And with a nerve-wracking start (do Seraphim have nerves?!), the seated Lanval returns to who he is. Disheveled, bearded, fat...
     "...Mmmph." Mentally, he seems overwhelmed by the whole picture, as he closes his eyes in full and bows his head. It seemed too real...
     "Our time was wonderful... we can have so much more." Her voice carries from beyond the bubble that only maintains cohesion, barely, as a Rylia that never was burns away in a fiery tornado.
     "...Our time wash wonderful." Lanval says, the booming joy of his voice giving way to that drunken slurring. "Ya did me sho much good... Cryshtal. Ya gave me what I wanted, back then..."
     "Our time need not end!" She pleads. "The Mirthful Wellspring's boundless joy... it will take it back... it will keep it forever!"
     "...Our yearsh are long." Lanval says. "Longer 'n mosht... 'n ya know... it'sh not eashy, knowin' ya got ta shay a bunch of farewellsh."
     The bubble, at last, pops into nothingness. It was a dream. There is no residue. Lanval remains seated, back turned towards the Hellion who came to his aid, and the other Seraph whom dares brave the Domain for the good of another Hellion.
     "Thanksh." Lanval turns, raising his gourd to them. "It'sh... it'sh too eashy ta jusht loshe yershelf in daydreamsh, huh... ha ha ha."
     He extends the gourd over to the Beast, momentarily, then pulls it back. "Oh. Wait, wait. Shorry, shorry, that one'sh... gonna need washin'." Beast can smell something alcoholic, and also a bit Malevolent. Whoops, yeah, let's not put any of that in their mouths.
     Lanval breathes in, breathes out, and reaches deep into the memories of those friends he's made now.
     "Okaaaaay~" Lanval says, staggering up to a stand. "Roshaline... 'n... friend! Let'sh get back with the resht, then. I won't wander off~"
     He has a very, very, very curious definition of 'I won't wander off' because wherever they go, he staggers and veers like the dickens as he laughs flippantly, swatting aside any vague mirror-shard stuff along the way like he were on a drunken joy bender.

GS: Seraph Lanval enters a Counter stance!
GS: Seraph Lanval has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Carefree Stroll!
GS: Seraph Lanval has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Ida shakes her head. Tears glisten as they fall. She sees more of those bubbles nearby, each one its own self-contained world. This one is in the right place to belong to Kalve, and... that one contains something Ida remembers from a dream. A song. "Cecilia," Ida whispers. "Kalve." She has to--

    Ida looks down. A chunk of metal rests in the palm of her hand. Kalve gave it to her when he told her he had to leave to tend to his ailing mother. It's come to represent so much more since then. Ida springs into the air, rising after the bubble with Kalve inside. She presses her hand against it, the multitool pressed between her skin and the thin shell of the bubble. It pulses like a beacon, glimmering. It asks a question:

    'What have you learned?'

    Everything else is up to him. Ida clings to the bubble, maneuvering it through force of will alone, and grabs hold of the one with Cecilia inside. Her fingers skid and slip on the glassy surface, but somehow, she clings to it. She clings to it, and remembers--

    Remembers what she saw in Cecilia's dreams. Remembers a crystal that Cecilia's father told her to protect her at all costs, even if it meant sacrificing everyone in Adlehyde. Ida's memory of Cecilia's memory is a copy of a copy, but it manifests in Ida's hand, nevertheless.

    "Remember," Ida whispers. She has a Metal Demon's dream in one hand and the Shaman Princess's dream in the other. What are Hellions if not creatures of contradiction? "Remember your home."

GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has activated a Force Action!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Ida Everstead-Rey!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz heals Ida Everstead-Rey! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Cecilia Adlehyde with Remember Filgaia!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Kalve with Remember Filgaia!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action.
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey heals Kalve! He gains 100 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

Rosaline watches Lanval emerge from his own bubble. A part of her wants to apologize for ruining this scene, but... No. At least he seems to be taking it well.

Just then, a Heal Berry flies Rosaline's way. Her ears twitch as she hears it whistling in her direction. Instinctively, she raises a hand, which might as well be a catcher's mitt for these purposes. Whumph.

She glances back to Dean. "Oh. Thanks." This is when she notices that she isn't in the best of shapes to begin with. Always putting others before herself... Is she... is she back to the way she used to be?

Well, either way, she swallows the berry.

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Id grimaces at Xantia's dream. He would never that saccharine ugh ugh ughhh but it seems that Xantia recognizes it as such too. When the dream bubble pops, that fake Id smile turns into a slightly faint and more recognizable smirk before the dream shatters.

But there's another Id in the other dream and as he materializes, the dream becomes blocked from seeing from the outside world, at least from non-Lilys.

He looks at Fei from across the table and Fei looks nervous.

"This isn't real. You haven't seen your daughter in millenia. She is gone."

Fei says, "Id... I know it's not real." He smiles. "But it's fine, isn't it? It's better this way. They were right, at least for me. All I'll do is hurt others this way."

Id slams his fist against the table. The daughter and Elly continue to eat, not even noticing this. "Give me a break! What about the real Elly? Are you going to leave her behind?!"

"She's...she's better off without..." Fei begins.

"I'll shatter this dream for you." Id says, pounding his fists on the table over and over again. "I'll show you...I'll show you!"

Fei smiles distantly. "Come on, you'll like it too."

A black haired woman steps in from behind Id and embraces him from behind, hugging him tightly.

Id stares ahead, crying. "No...no this isn't real...AGh...it's so warm... I've never...I've never..." He's sobbing in place.

Fei smiles at Id, reaching out and patting him on the shoulder. "See? It's not so bad now is it?"

Id sniffs, remembering...remembering what Xantia said. "how...how dare you...this is all fake. I ... I want the truth, I want the TRUTH!"

"I don't know the truth." Fei smiles benignly. "This is what I've got."

Lily steps in. At first she doesn't see the 'other one' but in this moment of weakness, he materializes for her.

Lily strikes at Fei's dream directly and Fei rounds upon her. "He...hey! Stop that!" He says, standing up from his chair. "Come on! Not fair! I..."

A surge of ether slams into Lily's. It's not going to be easy to break free of it. It may become apparent to Lily in this moment, just how strong Fei's mental energy actually is. He could destroy even her if he wished. He could destroy everything. It's not just his power. It's a power beyond that of this universe, beyond the collective conciousness. The only thing keeping her alive is Fei's love for Lily that holds him back, but his desperation may push him to dire lengths. It wouldn't be the first time.

Id is effectively imprisoned by someone's embrace, but Lily's efforts reach him. Xantia's actions just a moment ago give him the strength to resist. He realizes something. In this entire fake dream, a certain cadre of adventurers hadn't appeared at all. And in that moment, he realizes why.

An blue haired golem lover appears in the dream. He smiles and waves a hand at Fei. "Wow! Hey Fei! I'm glad you're doing so well!"

"No...no stop!" Fei says.

"Come on, we're friends aren't we? You can't trick me, I know you've got good inside of you." Dean says, still smiling.

Id laughs faintly. "...That's right... He reminds us...of everything we hate about ourselves, you fake..." He twists and sends the black haired woman into the path of Lily's shadow magic and she disintegrates in her dark magic.

Elly reaches forward and places a hand on Fei's shoulder. The daughter holds Fei's hand.

"Fei..." Elly whispers. "Live."

This is the kindness Lily can provide. Fei can no longer resist and Lily shatters the barrier and when they return to the world of the mirror, Fei is holding his head and screaming.

And screaming. And he's not stopping. He'll scream forever.

GS: Fei Fong Wong takes a solid hit from Lily Keil's Gloomrazor for 0 hit points!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Fei Fong Wong!
GS: Cover! Statuses applied to Lily Keil!
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Fei Fong Wong!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz heals Fei Fong Wong! He gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Fei Fong Wong has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Death Of A Family!
GS: Fei Fong Wong takes 7 damage from Toxin!
GS: Fei Fong Wong has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Garrett Stampede has posed.


Bubbles.

They flow and pop around Garrett easily. The warrior wary of them. In the dream it could be anything. It could be everything...it could be...

Images swirl suddenly from the bubbles. Wrapping around the knight and suddenly he is somewhere else. Somewhere familiar...

"Garrett?" A voice sounds behind him as he turns to see a red headed swordswoman standing there. Just as he remembers. Her hands on her hips as he looks in some shock towards her.

"Elmina?"

She sighs and shakes her head. "Were you daydreaming again? Come on. You need to get ready. Everyone is here for dinner. Gwen, Rudy, Cecilia, even Riese. They call came for the anniversary."

"Anniversary?" Again Garrett seems confused, though he walks towards her.

There is a wry smile from the woman. "What has gotten into you today." He says as she toys with a pendant that hangs around her neck. "Come on, get hold of yourself."

Garrett steps forwards slowly and walks towards the figure of the woman there. She keeps talking. "The anniversary of our victory over the invaders. Come on, the celebration is about to begin."

His eyes are still on that pendant as he steps up right in front of her. His arms slip around her waist, his head lowers to rest against her forehead. Her cheeks turn just slightly rose.

"Garrett," Whispered quietly, scandalized. "Someone could see."

"Just give me a moment," He murmurs. "Just a moment." He knows that pendant. He threw it away into the snow. He knows what this is. He knows it isn't real. He knows but...

...but just for a moment.

"I'm sorry," Again a whisper. "For everything." A beatpause. "...and my name is Jack now."

And he reaches up to wrap his fingers around that pendant of hers, even as she looks with some concern towards him. Fingers wrap around the sliver there and...

The bubble pops softly. Quietly. Dying a soft death as Jack returns to the dreamscape, hands falling limp to his sides and head bowed slightly.

GS: Garrett Stampede has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Wolves of World's End!
GS: Garrett Stampede takes 10 damage from Toxin!
GS: Garrett Stampede has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Beast has posed.

    "The Goddess would not approve of such things," sighs the Beast of Lohgrin, to the Malevolent alcohol.

    "... but I am glad to see you are all right." 'Friend,' he says, and she realises she has only ever seen him in passing. "I am the Beast of Lohgrin," she introduces herself - perhaps a little fruitlessly, as he staggers away.

    ... he's very strange.

GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Avril Vent Fleur's Seraphic Soul for 165 hit points!
GS: CRITICAL! The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Seraph Lanval's Carefree Stroll for 147 hit points!
GS: Sneak! The true nature of Fei Fong Wong's attack becomes clear!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Fei Fong Wong's Ultra Idstinct for 289 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Garrett Stampede's Wolves of World's End for 140 hit points!
GS: Slow! Statuses applied to The Umbral Mirror!
GS: Cover! Statuses applied to Garrett Stampede!
<Pose Tracker> Rudy Roughnight has posed.

 As the band of noble heroes moves forward and find themselves in slumber, Rudy Roughnight is with them. Jack needs his help and no matter what happens, Rudy will be there. Because friendship is what it means to be human and if there is anything he's learned from everyone's suffering is he is like most of them. Human. He might be odd and unique, but he bleeds blood. Berserk's words are not important, the fear and anxiety of whom he 'really' is.
 
 It's hard to tell exactly when Rudy fell asleep, but he is there.
 
 The world of possibilities are there. Shards blackened for all but Rudy to see. What are those words? He doesn't speak on them nor do they speak to him. There is a silent moment shared between the man and the horror that he sees everyday.
 
 There is no response at first before Rudy admits the simple truth: "I must go on, my friends need me."
 
 The shards of horror give way to the bubble of bliss and the outcast enters in willfully. The answer for Rudy's dream world is simple as the chaotic nature of the mirror gives way to stunning silence. There is no Cecilia, no Jack, no other people that changed Rudy's life for the better. Just an old man sitting in a rocking chair while they sit in his log cabin, holding a child-like Rudy.
 
 Boys and girls wave toward the blue hair boy with a smile and a laugh as they pass by a window. Like Rudy was one of them, a normal boy who is accepted as any caring and tender child should. "I want to play, but I don't want to leave you, Zepet. I love you too much," the blue haired child states as he nuzzles up to the old man.
 
 The elderly man gives a soft smile, giving a warm hug. He can smell the old leather and unique cologne off the man, mingling with the odd musk that comes with age. Wrinkled hands squeeze the boy before setting him down on his feet. "It's okay, Rudy, go and play. I'll be here when you get back. Whenever you need me, I'll be here."
 
 And Roughnight goes out to play. But when he does, he looks to the path outside of the peaceful town, a tranquil path that seems hazy in the distance. His mantra sticks in his throat as he looks on. "My friends need me."
 
 A glance is given toward Zepet. The children. The town.
 
 Slowly, the boy turns toward the horizon, he walks at first, then as the children call to him, he begins to run. The concerned guardian calls out from the door. "Rudy! Rudy, come back! Don't leave!"
 
 Young Rudy turns to Not As Young Rudy as he rushes forward, the smell of cologne and leather transforming to dirt and death. The necklace on Zepet's freshly-made grave wavers on the wind. A simple call rings out as the tears fall and the run becomes a dead sprint:
 
 "MY FRIENDS NEED ME!"

<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

Ah--There he is. There he is, and Lily understands his presence in an instant. ...She doesn't recognize the woman. She doesn't recognize Fei's sheer power at first for an instant. "No," Lily answers about whether to stop, and--

In an instant, Lily knows it. Here, she is weak. The slightest pressure on her dream self starts to send her into translucence, all except the gray coat that remains solid. She stiffens under the sheer power of it, trying to push back. ...But there is not enough yet. This much power--

"Id--" she starts, grunting, as Fei barely holds back against her. She seems so strong, in the real world, has so much raw destruction... But here, she is simply tiny in the wake of the sheer power Fei can unleash.

Id throws the woman to Lily. Lily kills her without knowing even her name, her face. And Lily provides what kindness she can. Elly whispers--but Lily--"Aa-aaah..."

Finally Lily shatters through the barrier, and drops to one knee, even in this place gasping for breath. And then... Then she hears the screaming.

Lily looks up, but does not look at Fei. She looks hollow-eyed. She knows what she's done.

But Fei can hear the voice that comes next, can understand the ancient language. "<Get up you useless thing. You did what had to be done>!"

...And Lily starts to catch her breath, put a hand over her heart. Her form shimmers... but remains solid.

<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.

    Dean tracks where the Heal Berry goes, and when it settles in front of Rosaline, who givs her thanks, he beams and waves. "You're welcome, Rosa!" He hadn't gotten a chance to talk to her much after she became a Hellion--actually, he hadn't talked to her much before then either, but that doesn't stop Dean from considering someone a friend--so he's glad he got an opportunity to help her here, even this small bit.
    
    But then there's screaming, and screaming, and screaming, that doesn't stop and refuses to stop. Dean twists around, recognizing the sound somehow. "Fei?!" he shouts, then dashes over towards the source. "Fei!" He skids down to his knees, grabbing his friend by his shoulders if he can, and tries to gently shake him to his senses. "Fei, get a hold of yourself! I'm here for you!"
    
    This might, ultimately, make it worse. Even so, even if Fei refuses to stop screaming, Dean won't leave his side. If there's anything Ida's taught him, sometimes you just have to scream it out.
    
    ...It's probably for the best that Dean doesn't know a lick of Zeboim.

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

"The pleasure is mostly yours, young lady," the Old Man chortles. "You'll have to show me something to be pleased about the next time we meet."

Kalve turns just in time to see the Old Man take on a glassy sheen. They trade glances. He inclines his head, and the Old Man laughs again. The figure dissolves, breaking down into glassy pieces. The laugh fades into the distance, replaced with the cracking of shards against the ground.

A ground that boils with molten glass. Kalve is swallowed up with all the rest, his curses trapped with him within the prison. He draws back his fist --

    --

                --

                            --

-- and gently hammers the peg back into place. The mallet isn't a precision tool most of the time, but it doesn't have to be. It's a gentle thing when it's used properly. The assembly of gears had been knocked out of alignment by something, probably an impact along the lower part of the chassis. He can imagine some reason for that... like, say, his son running in the house again. The thought makes him smile.

Kalve sighs, straightening and stretching out. He picks up the component and turns away from the workbench, walking back out of the workshop and into the sunlight. The door to the small building clicks closed behind him, swinging on well-oiled hinges. The quiet makes him smile.

His booted feet take him across the gardens, down paths lined with plants of vivid colors and myriad sizes. He passes a man kneeling and working in the dirt, who bows his head respectfully. The man has a glinting metal prosthetic attached to his shoulder, covered in interlocking glyphs. He works the earth without touching it, gently manipulating the experiment's plot with a touch of sorcery. The display makes him smile.

Kalve steps into the house. The place is wood throughout, with elegant metal decor added sparsely and blooms of greenery everywhere. Pictures are arrayed across the walls in the parlor. Battles won. Friends saved. The world changing. The memories flood in with a wave of almost sickening nostalgia. He clears his throat, one of his sub-arms adjusting one minutely on his way past. He makes his way to the grandfather clock on one end of the room, opening the frankly overdesigned variant of a timepiece, and reinserting the pieces of the rest of it. It sings with the hour, and it will again. The thing being made whole makes him smile.

He steps away. He hears voices outside, and he looks to the far window. He sees Ida outside, sitting with the children, who are presently in the midst of subduing Zed in an incredibly dramatic fashion. Kalve steps up to it, watching through the clear glass, barely unable to hear the monologue interrupted by scarf-pulling and full-body climbing. They notice him after a time, and they all wave, beckoning him. His heart soars, and his face hurts as the sum of it all makes him smile.

Something interrupts the heartwarming sight. 'This is a dream,' a voice yells from outside. 'Don't give up,' a voice screams from somewhere. 'We still have a job to do,' a voice cries from some great distance.

Well, of course they do. This is a dream, after all. They're in the Mirror, trying to defeat what has been wrought. This is just another delay. The Old Man was the same. This is... better, though. He wonders if this is why Ida held so tightly to it. Does it iterate on every good dream you have in it to keep you there? Would he come back to find something even better? Is this what it thinks his perfect world is?

'What did you learn,' someone precious asks.

'Remember your home,' the same voice whispers.

Kalve opens his hand. He holds a small metal object he vividly remembers making for someone precious to him. He closes his fingers around it, feeling its weight held tight in his bare hand. He's in his home, isn't he? His perfect world.

A perfect world.

Huh.

He turns to the front door, raising his hand in a brief wave to the idyllic sight to his left. He steps outside, swinging it quietly closed behind him. Kalve walks down the front walk, onto the road. He walks for some time, hearing the confused calls for him from behind. He comes to the top of a hill, looking over it and towards the horizon. In the distance, a massive shape looms. The Photosphere beckons, shrouded in ice and fog.

Kalve turns sharply off the road. He walks into a forest of gleaming silver leaves and sculpted, shining tree-trunks. He steps amidst the ferroflora, spread across this perfect world, and it parts to let him pass. He walks for some time again, the sun beginning to dip low on the horizon by the time he's reached what he'd call his destination.

The forest abruptly ends. Everything else does, too. Kalve stares off into the empty sky, going on for forever. His head spins. Every fiber of his being screams at him to turn back. Perfect life is still life. This? This is suicide.

So is perfection, Kalve thinks, as he steps off the edge of the world.

                                       --

Elsewhere, a glass bubble breaks. Kalve tumbles out of it, sagging against Ida's body for a scant few seconds. He gets his feet under himself again, trying to make the world stop spinning. They must be close to the end.

GS: Kalve has activated a Force Action!
GS: Kalve has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Circumnavigating A Flat World!
GS: Kalve has completed his action.
GS: Hyper! Statuses applied to Cecilia Adlehyde!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz heals Cecilia Adlehyde! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey heals Cecilia Adlehyde! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Cecilia Adlehyde has posed.

In her dream, Cecilia smiles at Rudy, the kind-eyed young man, her traveling companion and guide--

    >MY FRIENDS NEED ME!

She jerks; physically, such as it is, jumps, startled by the sound. "That--" she says, starting. Jack and Rudy look alarmed at Cecilia's sudden alertness, but it isn't the first time the Princess has been the first to detect a problem and it won't be the last. Her hand snaps up to it, that hard-won prize. Not the secret to her power, not even the source, but--

But it's gone. Panic surges through her, dreamy substitutions falling away as her mind is called to a terrible truth. The Teardrop isn't in her hands. It....it's not here. I thasn't been for a long time and it will be ages yet before it is again. But she can feel it, out there. Somewhere, out beyond the...

Ah.

Of course. She huffs out a breath, eyeing the suddenly empty phantoms about her. "Not...entirely what I would've expected," she says to nobody, and then runs through to the window and leaps through it.

The bubble explodes around her, leaving Cecilia to sail to the groun and land with a flop. "Rudy!" she calls, and nearly throws herself to her feet. "Rudy! Here!" she calls, waving her hand in the direction of fluttering red, because the boy had sounded terrified. She throws her arm out toward him to help him move across the distance - the wind itself surging about him to speed his step.

GS: Cecilia Adlehyde has attacked Rudy Roughnight with Turbulence!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde has completed her action.
GS: Sneak! The true nature of Kalve's attack becomes clear!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Kalve's Method III - The Tempered Blade for 250 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> The Umbral Mirror has posed.

    The lake of boiling glass hardens in an instant. Cracks spread across its surface, spiderwebbing into infinity in the blink of an eye. The surface of the mirror s h a t t e r s

    And beneath is a seething, whirling maelstrom of light and energy and raw, boiling power, a power that dwarfs even the storm called upon by the Nahual of Fengalon embodying a Guardian. Eddies and currents of Malevolence swirl through the raw, pure might of the Earthpulse, the space where the lifeforce of a living planet bubbles up in its most primal state. It's like a fog blocking the Earthpulse's light. It's thick. It's everywhere.

    The only safe ground here is bits of the mirror, and even those are falling. Out of one of those shards emerges... you. But it's not you. The Mirror reflects that which it looks upon, but it also distorts. This distortion is at once an idealization and a mockery of you. It attacks without warning, without remorse, because there can be only one of you in this place.

GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 4 Combo on Gatling!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Avril Vent Fleur with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 4 Combo on Gatling!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Cecilia Adlehyde with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 4 Combo on Gatling!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Cyre H. Lorentz with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 4 Combo on Gatling!
GS: The Umbral Mirror enters CONDITION GREEN!!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Dean Stark with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Fei Fong Wong with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Gatling!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Garrett Stampede with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 4 Combo on Gatling!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 4 Combo on Gatling!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 3 Combo on Gatling!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Kalve with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Layna Manydays with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Lily Keil with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Rosaline Calice with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Gatling!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Seraph Beast with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has spent 1 Combo on Gatling!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Seraph Lanval with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Talise Gianfair with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Tethelle Cirdian with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has attacked Xantia with Breathing On The Black Mirror!
GS: The Umbral Mirror has completed its action.
GS: Tethelle Cirdian has activated a Force Action!
GS: Fei Fong Wong guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 100 hit points!
GS: Fei Fong Wong enters CONDITION GREEN!!
GS: Talise Gianfair has activated a Force Action!
GS: You have activated the Force Action Guard!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 96 hit points!
GS: Talise Gianfair guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 99 hit points!
DC: MISS! Cyre H. Lorentz completely evades Breathing On The Black Mirror from The Umbral Mirror!
GS: COUNTER! Avril Vent Fleur strikes at The Umbral Mirror with a counter attack!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur takes a glancing hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 239 hit points!
GS: Layna Manydays has activated a Force Action!
GS: Layna Manydays takes a glancing hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 85 hit points!
GS: Garrett Stampede has activated a Force Action!
GS: CRITICAL! Garrett Stampede critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 59 hit
points!
GS: Kalve has activated a Force Action!
GS: Kalve critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 46 hit points!
GS: 2 Combo gained from Boost!
GS: Talise Gianfair has activated a Force Action!
GS: Seraph Beast takes a solid hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 186 hit points!
GS: CRITICAL! Rosaline Calice critically Guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 53 hit
points!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey takes a solid hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 236 hit points!
GS: Xantia has activated a Force Action!
GS: Xantia takes a glancing hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 84 hit points!
GS: Dean Stark guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 147 hit points!
GS: Dean Stark enters CONDITION GREEN!!
GS: Seraph Lanval has activated a Force Action!
GS: Lily Keil guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 103 hit points!
GS: Seraph Lanval has activated a Force Action!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.

    Distant voices carry on the wind.

    '... It's just a dream. A nice one, but it's just a dream.'

    The smell of a distant fire dances on the wind. In the distance, a tall figure approaches, all shadow, with no discernable features, save the way the tattered cloth black cloth glows fire red at the edges, like the dying embers of a fire.

    They make no sound, offer no greeting as they near the group.

    'Besides--I've got a promise to keep! And I won't stop until I've carried it out!!'

    They only reach out with a hand, palm up, in offering.

    "..." The young Gwen shrinks back in confusion, shaking her head. "Why're you here?"

    A young man, with dark hair, dressed in the robes of a trainee in the Ethos faith, steps beside Gwen, one hand on her shoulder. "Do you know this person? Are they bothering you?"

    Gwen hesitates, turning her head towards her friend. "I never met them here. They don't exist."

    'LISTEN TO YOURSELF!'

    "Just some bum," says another, his voice muffled by his scarf. "Ignore them."

    'Wake up, everyone! Wake up! We still have a job to do!'

    The wind grows stronger.

    And the being just stands there, their previous footsteps spreading marks of smoke and soot, like an infection. One by one, the buildings in the town fall like paper cutouts, suddenly more unreal than even the smudge spot of a person standing in front of her.
    
    Tears begin to fill Gwen's eyes. "... I don't even have the decency to remember what you looked like." Her hand reaches out towards the soot figure, to clasp that offered hand.

    There's only pain this way. But beyond it-

    The pale blue-haired young man leans back against a fencepost, smirking. "You sure you won't regret this?"

    'MY FRIENDS NEED ME!'

    Gwen gives the fake vestige a sad smile. "... They need me." Her hand clasps the spectre's blackened hand. "And I need them."

    The cage opens. snuffing the town like a light.

    The redhead emerges from the bubble, her hand clasping at air.

    But it's okay.

    She's no longer alone.

GS: COUNTER! Seraph Lanval strikes at The Umbral Mirror with a counter attack!
GS: Seraph Lanval takes a glancing hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 91 hit points!
DC: 5 turns have elapsed in the battle against The Umbral Mirror! No turns remain! Time has expired! The battle is over!
GS: Gwen Whitlock guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 144 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Talise Gianfair has posed.

Something angry pushes through Talise's bubble. But it doesn't burst.

Within it, Talise stands at the prow of the Lunabelle. The wind flickers through her hair. She's laughing. this is wrong. Everything is OK. this is false. They're going to find Spira together. rosaline.

Talise blinks. Rosaline? Shit... Rosaline and Ida!

The bubble collapses under its own weight - and the mirror shatters. "Rosaline!" Talise shouts as the Earthpulse yawns below her. Bits of the mirror fall towards it. Talise's heels catch one of them, holding her above the roiling maelstrom of the very ley power of Lunar itself. Eyes wide, she glances around, trying her best to find Rosaline, Ida, Tethelle - she can see them off in the distance. "Damn it, gotta get to them somehow," she hisses - but they all seem so far away.

And much closer at hand is the strum of a lute.

Sitting on the very edge of the shard of mirror, not far from the real Talise, another Talise is watching her. But the real Talise's battered coat and rugged travel armour pale in comparison to the other one.

The Talise with the lute - in fact, a long-necked archlute - is a little shorter, much more femme, and really resembles the ancient hero Jessica de Alkirk more starkly than her real counterpart. Her smile is steadier; her eyes are sharper. Her armour is a full plate, streamlined and elegant - glittering with silver and enameled with green goring about the shoulders, a green and white surcoat draped over it. The sheathed Rastaban leans against her shoulder.

With a blink, Real Talise takes a slow step back. "Okay, now what," she growls, staring at her duplicate for a moment, then looking up towards whatever's over her. Something ambiguous. It doesn't matter. "What the hell is even the point of this!" she shouts, as if the mirror is going to give her an answer. Rosaline... I can't waste time here.

The lute notes cut off. With a cluck of her tongue, Lyrical Knight Talise looks up from her song. "...You know, you're far too worried about these things," she remarks with a wry smile and a bat of lashes. "C'mon and sit down. Listen to a song or two. I know a great one about Dragonmaster Chloe."

Before the real Talise can say anything, Lyrical Knight Talise breaks into song. The lyrics escape her, for their language is not one the real Talise understands.

What doesn't escape her is that voice. The real Talise's voice is good - seraphic when she wants it to be, but usually rolling and a little more rugged. The Song Knight's is anything but. It soars to the heavens light a flight of angels, practically shining with the light of Althena's blessing. The sheer ethereal beauty of it leaves the real Talise staring in disbelief.

It's the voice she wished she had. She can feel Althena's love behind it. It's palpable. This isn't the song of a sinner. It's the song of one embraced by the Goddess in all things, mingling with the serene sound of that archlute. The song is slow, lazy and seductive, practically embracing anyone who hears it. Like a lover.

Her eyelids feel heavy. She can feel her breaths coming slower and slower. It occurs to her that she was fighting something. can't sleep. gotta rosaline. needa ida.

No. Fighting seems pointless. Sleeping seems better. but idarose. Sleeping in the arms of a Goddess who loves her. stead reysameow.

As her eyelids droop, Talise can just make out her green-armoured counterpart looking back over at her with a small smile, even as she continues to sing. It is a smile laced with pitying sadness. The lyrics taper off, but the lutesong carries the music on. The real Talise's legs begin to buckle.

"It's alright. You can sleep," murmurs the Lyrical Knight. "Just leave the rest to me. It'll be better that way."

"What do you mean," a sleepy Talise murmurs as she fights to keep her eyes open. can't sleep. gotta help rosaline. She can tell her perfect self is no longer alone.

A resplendent female shape in a grand hat stands behind her and to her right, a hand on the Lyrical Knight's shoulder. Althena, the Goddess Herself, her smile full of love. And on the left, another figure, his smile full of pride. Dragonmaster Ghaleon, no longer derisive, but standing beside a Hero worthy of his companionship. And all the while, the Lyrical Knight continues to strum that somnolescent song that threatens to pull Talise under. Her heart begins to slow and her thoughts begin to empty.

It is a sleep so deep, that to sleep it will be to become the dream of the singer. To fade forever from existence.

"Don't worry about a thing. All your friends will be much happier with a you who's loved by the Goddess," assures Lyrical Knight Talise in a soft, silver voice. "They'll be happy to have a Talise who isn't just a sluttish thug. They'll all be much happier that way. Now just close your eyes forever and everything will be perfect."

Talise can't even argue. She finds herself beginning to sag -

Until reality crackles. And the deepest, hottest part of that hot and rosy surge of magic burns through the little enclosed sphere of slumber. It hurts. Burning through Talise's soul, it's enough to send lightning pain rioting through every inch of her.

But it's enough. She opens her eyes with a gasp.

"ROSALINE," Talise shouts as she surges up. Althena and Ghaleon both take a step back as Talise rears up and draws Rastaban from its sheath.

She bears down on her double, secure in the knowledge that Rosaline is with her. That Ida is out there too. Tethelle, Lanval, Layna. Sephilia, somewhere out there. Fei and the Beast and Dean and Cyre and all of them she knows less closely.

All more real than this before her. "I may be a slutty thug with no magic," she snarls as tears fall from her eyes like crystals, winding up to rise above her double. "But I'm me! I'm true to my beliefs! These friends... stand by me the way I am! AND I'LL ALWAYS STAND BY THEM!!"

The Lyrical Knight's eyes widen. "But--"

Talise cuts her off with a roar - and she brings her sword down to strike her duplicate in twain.

Green light explodes from it like a vast fireball. For just a moment, the shard upon which Talise stands is consumed by an immense, energetic shape. The head of a green dragon.

    > [Talise] cast [Dragon Courage]!
    > [Dark Talise] took [9999] Sorcery Damage!

When the light fades, only the real Talie remains upon a falling shard. The crumbling dust of her false self decays away from her and falls past her. The big swordswoman breathes slowly and heavily.

"...Rosaline," she whispers. "Ida. I'm coming to help."

She looks up. Tries to plot a course towards one of the two.

GS: Talise Gianfair has spent 3 Combo on Headshot!
GS: Talise Gianfair has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Cascading Steel Dragon!
GS: Talise Gianfair has completed her action.
GS: CRITICAL! Cecilia Adlehyde guards a hit from The Umbral Mirror's Breathing On The Black Mirror for 247 hit points!
GS: Cecilia Adlehyde has Fallen! She is no longer able to fight!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Beast has posed.

    BGM: Beethoven - Für Elise https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mVW8tgGY_w

    Here is another riddle for you.

    What does a timeless being yearn to become?

    Mortal? Surely not. That is a world far removed from spiritual concerns.

    Does it have two arms, two hands? Must it?

    The world cries out for absolution; there are so many who need to be saved.

    And so -

    Mirror, mirror, it shatters, and she finds herself adrift upon a shattered piece. And oh, there is a creature like the Beast of Lohgrin, which steps forward. Like - and so unlike. Three faces replace any shred of hair, each a different mask; twoscore arms or more from up and down that torso. She is taller still, broader. She moves with fluidity and power and grace.

    Here is a creature who can grasp all the suffering of the world and rend it asunder.

    Here is the Beast with a Thousand Arms.

    She is gentle; as she sweeps forward, she barely disturbs the ground. Two of those hands, on her left side, reach out to cup the Beast of Lohgrin's cheek; there is nothing reflected on her own but the serenity of her iron.

    "Oh, you precious little thing," says the Beast with a Thousand Arms, whose voice rings with power hushed by mindfulness. "Are you not hurt? Confused? Afraid? It will be all right. Speak to me of your troubles..."

    And yes, there is hurt, on the Beast of Lohgrin's face. There is confusion, and there is fear. The Beast with a Thousand Arms has seen the truth of her in an instant. She does not misunderstand or second-guess her judgements.

    The Beast of Lohgrin takes a step back - another.

    "Who are you?" She asks - demands, her voice trembling.

    The Beast with a Thousand Arms spreads them all, palms extended outwards, not a weapon to be held there. "I am the one who can ease their pain. I am the one who understands their suffering... the one who will not run away from anything."

    Pain creases the Beast of Lohgrin's face, as she looks away. "I-I do not... run from everything..."

    "You do," says the Beast with a Thousand Arms, as she steps forward again. She does not stutter or hesitate. One of those delicate hands comes to rest on her reflection's shoulder. "Sooner or later - you do. You cannot bear to dwell amongst them. But it need not be so. You are a pale reflection of what I could be, and surely you must see this. Please... come with me." There is such kindness, there.

    But. "And were I to come," asks the Beast of Lohgrin, "what would become of me?"

    "I promise you - you will not feel a thing." Softly, that hand creeps up, shoulder to chin, fingers resting below. "I am humane." And there is power, there, power enough to snap a neck in an instant.

    It would be quick; it would be painless.

    The Beast of Lohgrin shoves her image away, stumbles backwards. "No," she gasps, horror in her voice and in her widened eyes: "I refuse!"

    "Ah," sighs the Beast with a Thousand Arms, as she shakes her treble head. "I had hoped you would see reason, but... yes, perhaps it is asking too much. It is a frightening thing, to cease existence. Especially for you - is it not? You, who hath lived for centuries. Forgive me my error, precious little thing." There is no insincerity to the words; she is infinitely compassionate.

    And she cannot be stopped, as she takes one graceful step over another. Not a mote of dust on the ground is disturbed by her soft tread.

    The Beast with a Thousand Arms knows what is best for the world. She reaches out again.

    "Come no closer!" Cries the Beast of Lohgrin, desperation written on her face, who now has backed against the edge of the mirror-shard. "I- I-I--"

    "You are afraid," says the Beast with a Thousand Arms, in sorrowful regret. "I am sorry. Please, take solace in knowing I will erase the fear of those around us. I will keep them safe. And in a way - you shall do this, too."

    And for a moment, the Beast of Lohgrin hesitates.

    It is a moment the Beast with a Thousand Arms takes to clear the distance between them again. Those elegant hands reach up, and their deadly portent is a kindness.

    They are matched by the wind as it picks up about the Beast of Lohgrin - forces her mirror image back. She scrambles out from under her, flees back towards the centre of the shard. The wind blasts out, to send the Beast with a Thousand Arms tumbling into the seething core of the Earthpulse.

    From the ley they come; to the ley they return.

GS: Seraph Beast has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Howling Gale!
GS: Seraph Beast has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Tethelle Cirdian has posed.

Cyre's wind catches Tethelle's hair and her half-skirt, blowing them this way and that as she makes her way from bubble to bubble. She has no pattern; she doesn't know who is where, and doesn't much care. She needs someone -

She gets, of all people, Cecilia, who she has not seen in weeks, not since Cecilia gave her a lesson that she hopes to put to use soon. "Shaman," she calls, her voice rough. "Cecilia, wait for me - "

The mirror shatters. Tethelle did not think there was any more to shatter, but she can feel the Earthpulse. It's impossible to miss now, the chaotic energies churning around her as she balances on the fragment of glass... only to realize she is not alone there.

The other Tethelle is very similar to the first. Someone who saw them both would be hard-pressed to tell them apart by their face and body; they could be twins. Though the newcomer's clothes are slightly different; there is a sash Tethelle does not normally wear, with unusual Baskar patterns on it that mean something to her but few others in Ignis and almost nobody on Lunar, and the sword she carries is different. The pommel looks almost copper in colour, though there's no trace of verdigris on it; the blade is sheathed in a black leather scabbard rather than left in a loose carrier.

Oh, and the one with the Baskar sash and the unusual sword looks more self-confident. There's that.

The real Tethelle raises her sword, defensively, and is the one to speak first. "You," she says. "I know who you are. I've seen you before - I tried to strike you, once." Almost a year ago to the day, when she had her trial in Guardian Temple. "You are - "

"The one that succeeds," the newcomer says, with a slightly smug look. "Not the runaway girl who abandoned her home to play adventurer, but the one that stayed and protected the village. Favoured instead of hated. The one who matters. Not the one who was so afraid of being a failure that she didn't even try."

"That is a lie!" Tethelle raises her voice, but not her blade. "I have spoken to Equites; she has blessed me on my path! I carry a Medium - "

The newcomer reaches behind her and draws a Medium of her own. Not like Tethelle's Medium, a plate of carved stone, but one of gleaming silver. "She has chosen me," the newcomer says. "What has she called you? A sword-blank? Something that might one day be useful? I am the master here; you are nothing but a failed trainee."

Tethelle sees where this is going. She knows that she failed a test with this person in the Guardian Temple because of her temper, and her inability to accept the truth. But this is not truth, and this is not a blessing, and her heart - just for an instant, soars as she repeats the action from a year ago.

Tethelle punches the other Tethelle in the face. This time, she hits.

A fight between Tethelle and a second Tethelle should be a dance of blades using the esoteric martial art she knows; thematically based on the Guardians, with a bare handful of skilled practicioners and no true masters left on Filgaia. It should demonstrate mastery of skill on both sides, the kind of swordsmanship songs are written about.

What it actually devolves into almost immediately is a close-quarters brawl. Neither of them have enough reach to use a sword, and neither of them do. Tethelle drives her forehead at the newcomer's nose, but she pulls back; the newcomer attempts to gouge at Tethelle's ear with hooked fingers, but Tethelle turns the grapple into a roll and only gets her hair mussed.

Tethelle knows she cannot beat herself at swordsmanship. The best she can do, almost by definition, is a draw. But she doesn't have to win by the sword. Every part of her is a weapon. SHE is the sword that cuts at the darkness, not the blade she carries; it is merely an extension of her. And she doesn't think her alternate self, so self-righteous about her position and her skills, carrying a sword that Tethelle recognizes but nobody else would, truly understands it the way she does.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

The first sight Xantia notices upon freeing herself from the illusion is a welcome one indeed. "Rosa!" Finally seeing one of the others, she looks around, now also clearly seeing everyone else as they appear from their own ordeals. Even if some look in better shape than others, she's just happy to finally see everyone again. The Mirror can't cloud her eyes anymore.

She didn't even realize it before now, but the injuries sustained from the shard rain and her Grahf encounter weren't showing any signs of healing yet, which is unusual for her. Things don't appear to be working quite the same way as they do in the real world. Rosaline's pink energy healing is sorely needed, though it's true - it's the warmth that's most strongly appreciated. There is pain, of course, which causes Xantia to briefly grit her teeth, then firmly shake her head. "It doesn't hurt that badly. ...Nothing you ever did hurt me that badly."

Lanval soon appears nearby, suggesting they move on, prompting a beaming smile, which had been absent from her features for far too long. "Yeah, let's! We'll teach this thing not to mess with us!" Her cheer lasts almost a full two seconds. Then Fei appears, screaming. "...Fei? Fei, what's wrong?" She doesn't understand, of course. There's no way she possibly could understand what happened to him, nor the unwitting part she played in it. Of course she immediately drops what she's doing to head over to him... but that's when everything breaks apart. She remains standing on a shard as it falls, her immediate surrounding shrouded in darkness.

Then a spotlight shines out of nowhere, illuminating a shadowy figure with crossed arms, standing on a different falling shard. "In times of dire need, she appears!" That was unmistakably Xantia's voice. The figure takes a crane pose, continuing, "In the darkest hour, she will show you the light!" The spotlight explodes in a burst of light, and the next thing Xantia knows, a very familiar figure lands on a different shard not far in front of her, posed in a crouch. "Super Hero X, the Hope of Filgaia, has arrived!" Colorful pyrotechnics appear above her out of nowhere, crossing each other to form the letter 'X'. With that, the figure rises, and takes a battle stance.

Xantia just.. stares. It's... her. Just dressed differently. This other Xantia is wearing an impressive set of light armor, with shoulderpads and an attached cape, its colors and design seemingly - and not coincidentally - in large part inspired by Id. With the ability to say cool lines and do an impressive entrance. This truly is her idealized image of her as the kind of superhero she'd like to be.

The other Xantia hmphs confidently. "Nothing to say for yourself? Going to face my burning justice in silence?" With that, her fists burst into flame, prompting an impressed gasp for the real Xantia. "You can use fire...!"

'Super Hero X' hmphs again, flames dying down as she seems to content to banter a bit first. "Of course I can use fire, I can use all elements! Fire, lightning, ice, water, earth, wind, light, darkness, food, you name it!" Another surprised gasp from Xantia. "Wh-what? Even food?!"

With a smirk, the imitation Xantia turns her hand so her palm faces upward. "Of course! The ultimate element! No problem for me!" Just like that, a cupcake appears in her hand out of nowhere, which she tosses into the air, then catches in her mouth, swallowing it whole. "Mmm, delicious!"

Taunting Xantia with food... that's not fair at all. Especially after all that fake food from before, that's only made her more hungry. You wouldn't like her when she's hungry. It doesn't ever really seem to phase her so much that she's talking to a double of herself, she just demands in annoyance, "But why would a hero want to fight me? I'm training to be a hero myself!"

This prompts Xantia the Hero to extend an accusing finger, explaining, "You can't become a hero so easily! Besides, you don't even know if being a hero is something you would've wanted! You've neglected the search for your true self! If you can't abandon this fake existence and put all your focus on seeking out the real one, you don't deserve to recover your memories at all!"

Xantia recoils. Those words hit home. Because they could be her own words, a frequent source of doubt amped up to the extreme. She has no words in her defense, only managing, "I... I..."

Super Hero X resumes her previous battle stance. "Enough! You're too weak to do what has to be done! You had your chance, I'm taking over from here!" The attack comes faster than Xantia anticipated, but she reacts to it instinctively. Burning fists impact with electrified ones, sending sparks everywhere. But Xantia is the one driven back, sent falling from her shard. Of course her idealized image would be more powerful. It doesn't look like she stands any sort of chance in a straight of up fight.

Until... a sudden explosion of force knocks the double back, Xantia leaping back up from the lower shard she landed on. "...So, what? You expect me to just give up? Maybe I'm not as strong as you, maybe I won't ever become the kind of hero you are... maybe I'm doing everything wrong, I don't know. But what I do know is... I'm not going to let anybody take the truth away from me!"

With that, she dives forward with impossible speed, delivering a single devastating punch that sends her double careening down into the void below. A bright glow spreads across the other Xantia's body until it engulfs her entirely... and she explodes in a massive eruption of energy.

GS: Xantia has spent 3 Combo on Gatling!
GS: Xantia has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Exploding Fist!
GS: Xantia has completed her action.
GS: Tethelle Cirdian has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Formless Blade!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian takes 8 damage from Toxin!
GS: Tethelle Cirdian has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Kalve emerges from his bubble. Cecilia emerged from hers. Ida embraces the Hyadean, holding him close as he sags against her. She doesn't know what he saw in there. She's not sure if she ever wants to ask him. "I love you," she whispers, even as the ground breaks apart, and the two of them start to fall. She pushes Kalve away, ever-so-slightly, as the chunk of glass they're both standing on plummets towards the Earthpulse. "Please," she says, to him. "That woman, Cecilia. She must live." Kalve would surely recognize her from the briefings, before Adlehyde. That's the princess. "Keep her safe." She's got to watch out for Garrett and Rosaline, after all.

    Ida springs into the air, plummets off the shard. She goes into freefall for a few moments, before twisting in mid-air, landing in a three-point crouch on another, larger piece of glass. She looks down into it. The glass looks back. Ida's reflection boils up from its surface, taking shape. This other Ida looks far more like the Ida in the dream than the tall, burly Hellion looming over her. She is gentle, delicate, refined--the very image of regal Galadian nobility. She sits in her chair, petting a little black-and-white dog, and the mere presence of her is enough to cloud Ida's mind, to stifle the drive that's been keeping her going for longer than she has any right to. She sinks to her hands and knees before the duplicate.

    The duplicate looks down at her. She doesn't lift a finger to hurt the Hellion, because it would be crass. "Have you given up yet?" she says. "How much longer is it going to take for you to realize that there's no way you can win?" Her voice is gentle, but not especially kind--it's as though she were lecturing a particularly stubborn child. "You know there's no way this will end well for you. You're an ugly, wretched thing. You have no place in a civilized world. Your lover is a monster."

    Ida's lips pull back from her teeth. She feels like she should be getting angry at this--angry at this imposter.

    ...Or is it? The Mirror knows her. The Mirror was created when her memories escaped into this Earthpulse. Ida blinks, and in a moment, she realizes what this is.

GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Avril Vent Fleur's Counter Attack for 225 hit points!
GS: CRITICAL! The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Seraph Lanval's Counter Attack for 253 hit points!
GS: CRITICAL! The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Talise Gianfair's Cascading Steel Dragon for 330 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Seraph Beast's Howling Gale for 132 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Xantia's Exploding Fist for 213 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Tethelle Cirdian's Formless Blade for 147 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    "Nice ta meetcha~" Lanval keeps up that irritating cheer for the Beast as he carries on through the exploding glass. The exploding glass of the mirror that had successfully ensnared him, to have trapped him in a dream world he could have dwelt within forever without ever thinking another thought of it... and yet, a switch is flipped, and something seems to invigorate him as he just teeters through the Malevolence that boils through the very power of the Earthpulse that fills the air. It is heavy, sickening... and somehow his staggering gets him on safe ground. 'Safe' ground, in so far as mirror shards go, for dumpy ol' Lanval.
     Even within his headspace, he understands how... unflattering he looks. Morbidly obese by mortal standards (by anyone's standards), disheveled clothing that doesn't bring out the radiant aquamarine indicative of his element, that long beard of his that tangles into river-like ends... the lack of shoes so readily attributed, culturally, to poverty. He wasn't always like that. At some point, he just somehow let himself go - let himself pass the time in alcohol-induced bliss like the gluttonous water elemental he is. Manifested before one's eyes, he looks like some middle-aged wastrel.
     Over there... in the reflection... no, in the flesh, no no, in the... existing. In the existing, let's go with that. That's not dumpy ol' Lanval.
     Another water elemental - much younger-looking - sits down in meditative bliss. Between his hands is a chalice held not in their hands like they were using it to drink, but instead were in preparation to give to someone. They are much slimmer. Their clothes are much cleaner - more robe-like, akin to Althenian clergy of a bygone era, with shining aquamarine hues contrasting spotless whites. (They still aren't wearing shoes... maybe the idea just never had appeal to the Water Seraph.)
     Their face is youthful. Their long silver hair flows like a gentle waterfall, the aquamarine tips flitting like they were about to become refreshing mist. They are devoid of tension, their eyes closed with a soft, cat-like smile. They radiate nothing but tranquility and mirth, as though having achieved a perfection in form, will, and spirit. Something truly divine to behold - someone worthy, by most Lunarian cultural prospects, to be held in esteem as an entity of worship underneath the Goddess herself.
     It's like even the chaos of the Malevolent maelstrom won't touch him. This is almost undoubtedly a fabrication, but anyone who draws near will feel the air being a whole lot less oppressive. All part of the appearance of someone, something... better.
     For those who saw the engraving in the well at that Goddess-forsaken cellar... the likeness is eerie. No, the likeness could have never captured what sits before them now. (There is a notable difference in what they're holding.)
     "You are troubled." Speaks the younger(?) water spirit.
     The older water spirit doesn't say anything. They continue strolling along their big shard of mirror.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    "You need not worry. I am here." The younger water spirit continues, eyes opening half-lidded at the avoidant water elemental.
     The older water spirit teeters on the very edge of the mirror shard, chaotically swaying limbs as he chances balance. He can't run away from this, can he?
     "With their devotion, I will bestow upon them my Blessing. I am the Seraph Lanval, the Mirthful Wellspring. Will you give me your name, friend?"
     "That'sh who I am," The more familiar Lanval responds as he pirouette spins right on the damn edge.
     "Hm, hm, hm." Good-natured laughter, from the 'younger.' He is seated, and yet, there is a sense that he casts a greater shadow over them - like he were at a higher elevation even though the exact opposite is true. He does not rise. He holds the chalice closer to his lips, contemplatively. "I'll drink away your worries, too."
     "Ha ha ha... shure shoundsh like me," Lanval seems to concede as his crazy careening seems to come to a slow. The younger Lanval opens his eyes, the aquamarine glow seeming to bear down upon this lesser, dumpier Lanval as they hold the chalice aloft with mirthful laughter. Bubbles start to fill the space between them - around them - everywhere. The old Lanval disappears into a veritable labyrinth of bubbles full of the younger Lanval laughing and carrying on in sheer joy.
     "A toast, my friend... upon which I bid you be on your way in good--"
 
          WHUMP - PSHEEEEWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW-----
 
     Everything freezes for a moment, as a shockwave halo of pure water erupts. The gathered bubbles all flit away, washed out in the great ripple of water that runs through the air. Frozen in time for a second under the magnitude of power, the older Lanval has one single aquamarine eye all the way open. His fist - his very fist! - pushes deep into the face of the 'younger' Lanval.
     "You've had enough to drink..." The older Lanval - the true one - says as he faces into the perceived core of this inconsistent dreamscape as he twists and pivots, swinging the dinky-looking gourd right into the chin of the 'younger' in a wide backhand lariat. "...Umbral Mirror! I declare thee cut off!" The impact is no softer.
     A great cascade of water erupts from the point of impact as the 'younger' Lanval - the ideal Lanval - flies away into the distance, out of sight, out of mind, that the very shard the plain ol' dumpy Lanval stands upon goes into rapid spins just trying to process the amount of momentum and impact coursing through this footing. Lanval holds onto it for dear life.
     Not out of fear. Sounds like he's enjoying himself, just spinning in the void while hanging on for dear life.
     "Ha ha haaaaa!" He'll... spin a ways back towards the rest. His booming laughter should be taken as a sign that all is, for now, all right!

GS: Seraph Lanval has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Layabout's Lariat!
GS: Seraph Lanval has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Id is gone.

Fei is screaming and crying. "I'm forgetting." He says. "I'm going to forget her face...!!" Dean approaches at the absolutely worst time. With a snarl, Fei lashes out with his hand for Dean's throat. His hand bursting into flames around his neck.

"You..." He's clearly not in his right mind. "You ruined everything!"

Is he shouting at Dean or Lily here? It may be tough to know for usre. Dean can feel it, Dean can feel what it's like to have his face immolated. It doesn't hurt physically at all, but it does hurt. "They ruined everything, Xantia!" That's what she gets. She can probably guess the gist from that alone.

Fei turns towards Lily, lost in his rage. He turns and throws Dean right at her but--

--Fei catches Dean and dispels the flame. It's another Fei. This one is in a strange uniform. It looks rather like the one that one Claude C. Kenny wears. He sets Dean down and says, with a smile at him. "I'm sorry about that."

He looks towards the other Fei who is panting for breath. "Hey..."

BGM INTERRUPT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miOizLxOD4E

The Best Fei floats towards the borderline delirious Fei and rests a hand on his shoulder. "Sssh....shhh... It's okay."

"what..." Fei says.

"I know, I know..." The Best Fei says. "I'm not real, but don't forget what Elly would do. What would she think if she saw you acting this way?"

Fei is sobbing. "It hurts...it hurts so much. But I don't want to forget. I want to find her, I want my family, I want them to be happy, that's all I wanted. I just wanted to live in peace, please, please let me. I am so tired of fighting. I've fought for so long."

"You have..." Best Fei pulls Fei into an embrace. "It's okay. It's okay. I know, you're hurting, but you don't have to hurt. You can make your dream real still. You will always have a chance. You know this much."

Fei is quiet.

"Dean...he doesn't remind you of the self that you hate." Best Fei pulls back. "He reminds you of your good qualities. He makes you believe that there can be a happy ending. It's not that belief that hurts you, it's those moments when you feel betrayed by that belief."

Fei nods slowly. "..."

"And those moments..." Best Fei continues. "When you can't make yourself believe in it. But even if you don't believe in it entirely, you can still try to make it happen and maybe one day, Fei...you'll believe in it again."

Fei manages a small smile. "...Aren't you supposed to hurt me now?"

"Fei... The Best you...would never hurt anyone."

And Best Fei vanishes, leaving only Fei behind. Fei looks over to Lily, then to Dean, then down again.

"...I'm sorry." He says. "I won't...hide anymore. Not today, at least." He looks to Lily and adds, "So...so don't give up on yourself either. Even if you don't believe it. Is...that a deal?"

GS: Fei Fong Wong has activated a Force Action!
GS: Fei Fong Wong has activated a Force Action!
GS: Fei Fong Wong has spent 3 Combo on Headshot!
GS: Fei Fong Wong has attacked Dean Stark with Kakei!
GS: Fei Fong Wong has completed his action.
GS: CRITICAL! Dean Stark critically Guards a hit from Fei Fong Wong's Kakei for 49 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

People burst out of their bubbles. Well, almost all of them. But before Rosaline can find who to attend to, the mirror...

shatters

And before she knows it, she's hanging on the edge of a giant, broken mirror. Below her, the Malevolence-clogged Earthpulse churns.

And above...

A cat-eared form descends, borne on wings of light, her hands clasped in prayer. As she alights, her wings dissolve into shining motes. She moves with effortless, feline grace. Her Etone uniform is very similar to the one Rosaline wore once, but it's more ornate. The purple fabric is regal. The white, immaculate. Polished gold accents shine in a way that almost hurts to look at. A large mass of perfect, soft pink curls filter the ambient light gently.

As the Nun stares down the Hellion, there is no hate in her expression. No anger or even arrogance. Only endless compassion, tempered by quiet resolve for what she has to do next. She offers a hand to let the Hellion climb up. She does, after a moment's hesitation. The Etone waits, patiently, for the Hellion to get back on her feet before speaking again.

"I have come to purify you," the Etone Rosaline says. "Become part of me, and you will be whole again."

Rosaline, the Hellion, spits out her answer. "Like hell you will! You can't purify, you can't... you c-can't make things better in that way and you know it! That's what GOT US IN THIS MESS to begin with! So SHUT UP!"

The Hellion raises Mother's Mercy and blasts away. Her body flowing like water, the Etone pivots and sidesteps, completely unharmed. In a fluid motion, she produces a stone tablet.

The Hellion's eyes go wide. "Wait. Is that...?"

"Yes," the Etone announces, solemenly. She holds up the Medium. Light gathers around her, her voice gaining supernatural reverb. "Material!"

In a burst of pure light, a radiant titan appears, towering over the comparatively puny Hellion Rosaline. The form is mostly humanoid, standing on avian-looking legs and wielding a great shield and, of course, the legendary Granasaber. The halo bathing the figure is so brilliant that more detailed features are hard to make it.

(Helpful Visual Aid: https:'imgur.comauXo6NtH)

God's Chosen, the Angel Who Loved Humanity, the Lord of Light, points His sword at Rosaline and blasts away with countless beams of multicolored light.

Hellion Rosaline bounds away, narrowly avoiding the beginning of the salvo. She raises a hand to put up a shield of flames for the rest, and it holds up for a surprisingly long time. But it doesn't last forever. A singular beam pierces through, exploding at the Hellion's feet, and leaving cracks in the mirror surface beneath. It crumbles away, slowly, under the two Rosalines.

The Hellion grits her teeth. She can't fight back against this. Not with sheer force. She has fought herself more than once now, and the problem is that she cannot win. So instead...

She raises her claws. Bright red strings snake out from them, and towards the Granas apparition. It binds His arms and legs, directs them so He will land between the two Rosalines.

"If you're so incredibly good, you should know how important this is!" Hellion Rosaline screams out. "I'VE GOT A GRANAS AND I'M NOT AFRAID TO USE IT!" It doesn't occur to her, and probably won't today, that the Corpse Strings only work on dead beings. What does that mean about her subconcious, precisely?

But either way, this gives the Etone Rosaline pause. "Blasphemer, heretic, sinner--"

"SAVE IT! Everything is hinging on this! So please, please, put up or shut up!" Both Rosalines point Mother's Mercy towards the tainted Earthpulse, one pulsing with Malevolence, and one radiant. The Granas apparition raises His saber, and a beam of light comes out of all three. The Malevolence is drained, running along those beams like water on a string, and pooling in a churning purple sphere in front of the three.

And below them, still, the mirror cracks. Does Rosaline intend to sacrifice herself? Chances are someone has something to say about this.

GS: Rosaline Calice has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Eye of Judgment!
GS: Rosaline Calice has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

Fengalon's wind sings through the strange, shared mindscape. It carries shattered glass in a great, cutting gale, sand-blasting the surface of the boling glass, digging deeper and deeper before finally--

The pane shatters.

And what is beneath dwarfs even the power of Fengalon manifest.

The divine tiger growls as it turns its face into the maelstrom of churning power. Its eyes widen at the sheer scale of it. The raw heartbeat of this living world thrums in Cyre's chest, beating like a second heart, sending pulse after pulse of power through his veins. And yet...

And yet, there is something here that shouldn't be. Something that spreads across the otherwise vibrant artery of life-force like a mold. A cancer. A disease.

Oh Ida, oh Rosa, what did you two do to this place?

There's little time to think of maybes and could-bes. A figure materializes from one of the larger shards. Molten glass twists upwards, taking the form of a serene-faced man in ceremonial robes, beads of green and gold wrapped around his arms. "Be at peace, Child of Wind. Calm your storm. There is no more need to fight. I," the figure spreads his arms, a gentle smile on his lips, "Am here to take away your pain. To do what you could not. I am the Son of Storms, the brothers unified, you cannot hope to--"

The tiger-avatar roars. It bellows a scream that sends spiderweb cracks spinning throughout the mirror platform. The serene one makes a face of surprise before the monster's hand closes around his torso. "You. You might be a halfway decent simulacrum of me. But there is NOTHING about you that compares to the might of the Tempest Kings."

For a moment, a brief, fleeting moment, it is not Cyre who stands there, squeezing a massive bestial claw around his doppelganger. It is something far greater. "Mirror, your hubris is too great. I deny your taint! Your corruption! BEGONE!" Copy-Cyre's voice gurgles and fails in his throat. The tiger clenches its fist, shattering the replica into countless glittering shards.

The True Cyre turns his face towards the swirling malevolence, eyes burning with fury. "Son of Storms my ass. Like Leon would ever just let me have his Medium."

The tiger lifts upward, carried on the current of the planetary layline. It cants its head, turning to survey this way and that and--

"..."

"..."

Cyre stares agog as Rosaline... Rosaline Guardian Summons Granas of all things. "I-- Is that legal?" Cyre mutters, as if asking the god presently living one little-toe in his brain. He shakes hs head, clearing the initial shock to take in the full scope of the situation.

And realizes just what Rosaline means to do.

"Wait-- Rosa! Damnit, hold on--! The great mandala upon its back unfolds, blasting backwards a tremendous vortex of dream-wind and sending Cyre sailing down, skimming almost across the surface of the churning life energy and the corruption upon it. He spies something out of the corner of his eye and barrel rolls to one side...

Sweeping Talise up onto his shoulders. "Looks like we're going the same way," the divine tiger says as it rushes towards the trinity of Rosaline, Rosaline and Granas. The Nahual sweeps down behind them, wrapping its arms around the two cat-nuns' waists, "Damnit Rosaline. That's three times you owe me now!"

Well.

At least Cyre doesn't hold a grudge.

GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has spent 1 Combo on Inspire!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has attacked Rosaline Calice with The Winds of the King!
GS: Cyre H. Lorentz has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.

A powerful wind builds up. It's not the wind of the Goddess, but it's refreshing all the same. Layna looks toward Cyre and offers him a nod. She can feel the righteous fury in his voice - the will to see this through.

And to Dean, she looks in his direction, nods, and returns his grin.

"Aye, lad. That's the way it should be."

Gradually, everyone emerges from the bubbles...and the glass hardens and shatters.

The illusory world around her begins to fall away. The only thing left below is that seething maelstrom below, and the individual shards of glass that are slowly falling into the abyss.

...But the mirror is not yet done.

A humanoid form begins to rise from the shard of the mirror that Layna is standing on.

A very familiar form.

It's Layna herself. Looking older...and perhaps even a bit wiser, with a black cape across one shoulder and an eyepatch from a hard-fought battle.

"...So this is how it's going to be, aye? Fighting myself. ...Heh. I shoulda known this would end with fighting my reflection." Layna comments with a smirk and a laugh.

The other Layna doesn't respond. She just lunges forward...and attempts to sucker-punch her in the gut. Layna intercepts it just barely with a wince, catching her arm.

The other Layna is stronger. That much is certain.

"...Right. Pirate." Layna hisses. Of course she'd go for a cheap shot. The other Layna doesn't give her any time to react. She spins in place, trying to pull Layna with her and drive an elbow into her neck.

Layna just barely blocks it with her arm and backpedals, trying to make some space.

"...The seas have left you. When was the last time you felt their kiss? You're no pirate. No sailor. You left your crew behind...and now what? What are you without the sea, Layna?" The other Layna says.

The two charge at each other, trading a flurry of blows. They're almost evenly matched...but the copy is winning.

"What are you without your crew? Your ship? You've left it all behind, and now what?" The other taunts. Layna, gradually, is being pushed back...until, with a roar, Layna manages to force one through, punching the other Layna in the face with enough force to send her reeling back.

"I didn't...leave 'em behind! I didn't have a choice!" She shouts, pressing the advantage. "...And besides! There are other people who need me right now, aye? As for my crew...I know Dahlia's taking care of 'em!"

Layna lunges forward again, striking the other Layna in the gut who doubles over...then looks up at her with a malicious grin.

"Is she? Wasn't she still recovering when you left her last? You would've demolished all of Krosse for her and the others. Where's that dedication now?" She taunts. Layna pauses...and then laughs.

"...Are you stupid? I only stopped because I know she would've knocked my teeth out for that. As for you...!" Layna leaps high, high into the air, surrounded by a faint green glow.

"Stop talking." Layna punches downward with full force, emitting a powerful, destructive shockwave...aimed right at the glass shard she was standing on.

Both it and the other Layna shatter from the sheer force, bits and pieces falling into the void, while Layna herself remains aloft through a conjured whirlwind.

She might need to find a place to alight sooner or later, but for now she's probably fine.

GS: Rosaline Calice takes a solid hit from Cyre H. Lorentz's The Winds of the King for 0 hit points!
GS: Rosaline Calice gains a Combo from Inspire!
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.

    Is it necessary, Ida had asked.

    Avril does not look back as she hews free from the dreamland prison. She cannot stay, however much a part of her might yearn for it.

    Must it be?

    Sometimes, it must be.

    She emerges into a whirling world of light and force, the touch of the Earthpulse heavy against her dreamflesh, buoying her spirit. This is, perhaps, a part of the soul of Lunar itself.

    Not a place for anything born on the world's surface, not for long. Traces of the corruption linger, coiling fine in the everpresent burn of the world's essence.

    Here and there, pieces of the mirror are caught, adrift on an endless sea.
    So is Avril.

    She touches down softly atop a single piece of obsidian, blade in one hand, Medium in the other. For the moment, her gaze is distant, off into the expanse as if all the secrets of eternity could be there found.

    Only to turn, suddenly, alarm registering in her blue eyes.

    She is not fast enough.
    Absolute Zero blade cuts deeply.

    And Avril's own version of the sword arcs upwards in a flash, scoring a hit across the cheek of her doppelganger.
    Her hands shake; her blade slips from her own fingers soon after. "Ah... ha... you..."

    Her voice is but a whisper.

    With a gentleness not reflected in the eyes, her duplicate takes her into her arms so sweetly, as one might a sister or daughter.
    All the while forcing Absolute Zero deeper. Blood patters atop a dark mirror's surface.

    "Enough," the Avril with the cold eyes. "Do not resist. It is time for you to return to me."

    Heavy-lidded, Avril's head lolls; she's limp in her duplicate's arms.

    "I have waited too long for you to continue to defy me so."

    Pale lashes brush Avril's cheeks.

    Who is...

    She's like a sister, this version of herself. Like she knows...

    "No," she whispers, lifting a shaking hand. "I will not--"

    Fury -- the anger of someone defied -- burns in her opposite self's eyes. But before that other Avril can do or say another word--

    Ice blooms like a flower from Avril's hand, then explodes like a dying star. Her power, the one she's honed for all these months, searched for the limit...

    This may not be the limit, not as far as she can tell. But it's close, close enough.

    Her other self releases her hold on her, forced back by even the ice.

    And Avril collapses backwards onto the black glass mirror surface, impaled by one blade and with another close at hand.

    Reaching over to her own Absolute Zero, she looks that cold-eyed Avril dead on as the blade component winks out of being, and, shoving the flat face of the ARM downwards...

    Pulls the trigger.

GS: Avril Vent Fleur has activated a Force Action!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Courant Glaciaire!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur takes 11 damage from Toxin!
GS: Avril Vent Fleur has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    "You're me," Ida--the real Ida--whispers. "You're what I wished I could be all this time. But--!" Anger overcomes the smothering, suffocating miasma of forced calm, of decorum. Ida raises both fists, glowing with Malevolence, and slams them into the shard both of them rest upon. Glass shatters. It flies up into Ida's face, into her forearms, into every inch of exposed skin. It cuts her, tears open old scars. She bears the pain. Then she's falling, and her duplicate is falling beside her.

    "You IDIOT GIRL," the other Ida says, coming dangerously close to breaking decorum--but then, isn't it almost warranted when presented with such a shock? "You've killed us both!"

    "No," Ida says. She reaches out, and takes her duplicate's hands. Blood drips off of her, leaving a trail of droplets behind her in the air. "We're going to help a friend!" The duplicate's body fades, losing definition and color. Ida's shadow flies back across her body, and snaps back into place. She twists in mid-air again, landing on the platform between Rosaline and Rosaline and the gigantic (puppeteered?) apparition of the Lord of Light. "Rosa!" Ida cries. She snaps out a hand, and energy the color of Dragonbone slithers out from her shadow, gluing together the cracking mirror. Ida places both hands just above the surface of the sphere, and begins to breathe it in. Her eyes go unfocused. The Malevolence within her shines through her skin. The radiant star within her shines so brilliantly that it's almost painful to look at.

    She's taking the energy of the Earthpulse and draining it into herself. But she can't do it alone.

GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has spent 2 Combo on Gatling!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.

    She stands. That is, they both stand.

    There is one real Gwen, and one fake Gwen. There's no question of which is the real one and which is the fake one, but which one would people *really* prefer.

    One is, of course, Gwen. Strained, teary-eyed, but Gwen.

    The other... could also be considered Gwen. A lovelier version, with pale, freckled skin, contrasted by long, curling pale red hair. A sleeveless white summer dress that hugs the curves of her body just enough to be comfortable, to move with her and her confidence. Her bare feet touch the ground with light, perfect steps. "Sister." She smiles, her lips touched with red, her blue eyes vibrant as she spreads her arms to the bewildered Gwen.

    Gwen- that is, the standard Gwen, hears a yell, and turns her attention to see Fei, reaching for Dean's neck, his hand wreathed in angry fire. "Fei, no, *don't*! DEAN!"

    Gwen's lunge to go towards them is interrupted by arms wrapping around her, and the smell of summer fruit. "Don't worry," the other Gwen coaxes, as if to a child. "Everything will be fine. Everything will be taken care of. Everything will be resolved. You don't have to worry, anymore..."

    The tired Gwen struggles, then slowly, stops, her struggling lessening with each soft word from her newly born sister.

    Vines begin to curl through the pale, soft flesh of the Other Gwen's right arm, tendrils slowly curling around the courier's body, forming buds that extend, and slowly, unfurl into glorious flowers.

     It's enough to distract from the way some of those same tendrils dig into Gwen's own flesh, latching onto the veins within.

    Gwen's eyelids begin to droop. She smiles, despite her eyes registering the struggles of her friends beyond.

    ".... I'll be okay, because I won't... be alone..."

    "You will make such a beautiful garden, sister... I'm so happy..."

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    "You're me," Ida--the real Ida--whispers. "You're what I wished I could be all this time. But--!" Anger overcomes the smothering, suffocating miasma of forced calm, of decorum. Ida raises both fists, glowing with Malevolence, and slams them into the shard both of them rest upon. Glass shatters. It flies up into Ida's face, into her forearms, into every inch of exposed skin. It cuts her, tears open old scars. She bears the pain. Then she's falling, and her duplicate is falling beside her.

    "You IDIOT GIRL," the other Ida says, coming dangerously close to breaking decorum--but then, isn't it almost warranted when presented with such a shock? "You've killed us both!"

    "No," Ida says. She reaches out, and takes her duplicate's hands. Blood drips off of her, leaving a trail of droplets behind her in the air. "We're going to help a friend!" The duplicate's body fades, losing definition and color. Ida's shadow flies back across her body, and snaps back into place. She twists in mid-air again, landing on the platform between Rosaline and Rosaline and the gigantic (puppeteered?) apparition of the Lord of Light. "Rosa!" Ida cries. She snaps out a hand, and energy the color of Dragonbone slithers out from her shadow, gluing together the cracking mirror. Ida places both hands just above the surface of the sphere, and begins to breathe it in. Her eyes go unfocused. The Malevolence within her shines through her skin. The radiant star within her shines so brilliantly that it's almost painful to look at.

    She's taking the Malevolence within the Earthpulse and draining it into herself. But she can't do it alone.

GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has spent 2 Combo on Gatling!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Gleeful Cessation Of Restraint!
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action.
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Seraph Lanval's Layabout's Lariat for 127 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Rosaline Calice's Eye of Judgment for 159 hit points!
GS: Rosaline Calice drains The Umbral Mirror! Rosaline Calice gains 79 temporary hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Ida Everstead-Rey's Gleeful Cessation Of Restraint for 250 hit points!
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Avril Vent Fleur's Courant Glaciaire for 156 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Rudy Roughnight has posed.

 The running becomes supernaturally fast, Rudy feeling a power from behind himself propelling him forward. He doesn't say anything, but he knows the source. To understand Cecilia and others are going through the same struggle, he knows he can push on. Everyone has their baggage, everyone has their struggle. It's how you deal with it that defines.
 
 Forsaking the ideal for the real is met with blackness as the bubble is burst. Rudy stands there looking at Rudy. Drifter looks toward Soldier, the 'other' Rudy clad in black armor of leather and occasional metal plate to make for a slim commando vibe. The armor wearing warrior walking forward as he takes in the warrior in red, adjusting the thin slice of black cloth that rests on his brow.
 
 "Nice bandana" the two say in unison.
 
 A brief moment of wordless calm rests between them. Conversations happen on other battlefields, but here, there is nothing. They just look into each other's eyes, a private conversation that often people have to themselves every day they take a shave or brush their hair while in the bathroom.
 
 Finally, the Rudy in the red vest speaks. "Don't you have something to say?"
 
 "Do you?" the Rudy in black responds.
 
 Another bout of silence for a few seconds before the commando merely walks past the Drifter. The Drifter opens his mouth to speak, but a simple shrug from the commando cuts him off. That final nonverbal given, the boy in black walks into the darkness, never to be seen again.
 
 In the wake of the tragic unspoken revelations, Rudy drops to a knee. In the darkness, Rudy pushes onward. While there is no attacks given toward the mirror in a physical way, Rudy's will pushes onward, doing its best to not only push on for his own sake, but wish well for all those. As stated once and stated again, he knows that he doesn't struggle along and if he asks them to hope, the least he can do is hope for his own future.

<Pose Tracker> Talise Gianfair has posed.

It turns out there's something there who's going to help out Talise, who cannot fly to save her life.

With a blink, Talise steps back as the flying Cyretiger comes swooping in. "This is not how I thought I wanted to ride you, Cyre, but I'll take it," she quips before hoping onto the huge flying tiger's shoulders. She's heavy, but her weight is of no moment for the Nahual of Fengalon.

There's distance to be closed. Rosaline's too far away for Talise's liking. And then she sees Ida - hears her calling out. Beginning to take the energy of the Earthpulse into herself. That's something Talise cannot help her with. She's a mere swordswoman.

Talise closes her hands tightly and bows her head. "...You guys may be Guardian Shamans and Granas people," she murmurs. "But this is the power of Lunar. It's Malevolence. And I know whatever may be going on in Pentagulia... whatever it might be...."

She lifts her head. Tears stand in her eyes. "...Althena wouldn't let this happen," she says, her heart in her throat. For all that the Goddess has hurt her, there is still something there. Pure, absolute belief.

And as she draws close, she begins to sing.

Talise's bar-singing voice is one thing. But here, singing simply and from the heart, Talise's voice is like a soft, soothing sunray. There are no lyrics. It's just a slow, soothing song, filtering through the havoc, clearly heard to all, but most strongly to Ida and to Rosaline.

And to all who hear it, there comes a palpable uplifting sensation. A feeling in the heart that it can be done.

She does not know she is doing this. When she wakes up, she will try to do this again and fail. But Seraph Lanval, at least, has heard it once before. And Tethelle will recognize it.

It's the very song sung by the spirits of Lunar.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FULmDcGqknI

    > [Talise] cast [Cascade Song]!
    > All Party Members Will Up!

<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

Lily does not fully understand the power she has touched, but she knows--she knows even as the voice calls to her to rise, that this is a terrible, dangerous, vital moment. She starts to rise. She starts to turn, and look, past Xantia, to Fei--to his sheer rage. What will he forget...?

Dean is thrown at her, and Lily has to suppress her instincts to put out her hands, but--But she doesn't have to catch him. Another Fei appears, and Lily blinks at him for an instant. ...As Fei sobs, as Fei cries, as Id, who helped her again is gone--

She realizes the look of that woman. The one Id was trapped with. But it doesn't make sense.

"Fei, I--" Both of them. He vanishes, and Fei apologizes. He asks--

"I--" ...Don't give up on herself. Lily begins to answer, but from behind--

With Fei, she almost misses the maelstrom, almost ignores its presence, the cracks everywhere--the Malevolence. But only almost. Her voice echoes at her back.

"This is not the path you need to follow, girl." Sharp, derisive. "So close to destruction. And you lack the will to reach for what you must."

Lily's voice echoes for an instant, as she speaks to herself when she steps out of one of the shards. "...Not even with her." She steps into visibility, but 'step' isn't quite accurate--she hovers, not having to limit herself to the falling shards. ...And neither does she look like one would expect. The Other Lily is draped in black cloth over black plating, modern armor light and sturdy, with chains stretching about her form; about her neck, about her arms, her bare hands... her bare hands marked by the strange circuitry that lines her face, from her throat up her cheek over her eye. Even without transformation her irises are strange, mechanical somehow. Her hair is black, falls about behind her... And her gaze is pitiless. Her boots shine lightly, her feet pointed down, and she tilts her head, looking Lily--the Lily of before--up and down, as if investigating her... Glancing to Fei with a hungry look.

"What--" Lily jumps from shard to shard, falling, falling, falling, her gray coat making her easier to spot in the darkness. "You're--" She snaps up her hand, and blasts herself to the side to dodge a gigantic beam of violet power that simply erased shards in its passing, blasting out into the distance until there is no sight.

"I am what you cannot be," the woman in black answers. "What he of all people holds you back from. I am the you who recognized the price of power."

The woman in black curls her hand into a fist--and then opens it. Argent Divider, broken, appears in her hands. "You are not one of them. You are not like them." She disappears in a flash of power--and then appears behind Lily. "Anchoring yourself to these remnants. Pathetic."

"That's--" Lily recognizes the blade, and she whirls around to strike at the other her--who catches her fist easily, holds it in her hand.

"Tsk. You let your rage lie fallow. ...Become one with me. Together--"

Lily lets out a scream of fury, and the hand that the woman in black is holding erupts into roiling hellfire. The woman simply stands in place, even as her skin is seared, staring--

Which is when Lily brings up her knife and thrusts it into the woman's ribs. It sticks. The woman glances down, and the flames about Lily's hand go out, though she is badly burned. But the heat lets her slip her fist free, useless as it is now. "I..."

Her oppponent opens her hand, as if to let loose another blast, and Lily throws out her hands suddenly, goin for the woman's wrist, getting in close.

"...A world where you've killed Leon is a world that doesn't deserve to exist," she hisses, and does not realize she has spoken words like them before.

Power erupts from all around her, photo-negative implosions of darkness, gravitic power cascading all around her, all around both--

She remembers the mission. She remembers, but--

"I agree," intones the woman in strange armor, though her body seems to disappear amidst the darkness. She laughs, faintly, but is gone.

The power fades, and Lily slumps, starting to fall towards the bottom, looking down. Malevolence...

She looks back to Fei, the battle the thing of moments. She reaches out a hand.

"...I won't give up. Not today, at least." She tries to take Fei's, to meet his eyes. She is only Lily, in the moment. "...And maybe not tomorrow, either."

GS: Lily Keil has activated a Force Action!
GS: Lily Keil has spent 3 Combo on Gatling!
GS: Lily Keil has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Gloomhammer!
GS: Lily Keil has completed her action.
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Lily Keil's Gloomhammer for 266 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Garrett Stampede has posed.


The fallen knight stands there quiet among the shouts and dreams bursting around him. As the mirror shatters and motes of light spiral out. The Earthpulse thrums below them, the light of the shattered mirror all around. Then out of the motes steps a different knight.

Jack. The knight.

His familiar coat swirling in the powers that explode around them. That familiar smirk on his face, the hair pulled back, the sword resting on his shoulder. There is a touch more arrogance in his walk, a superiority in his smile as he regards the white haired verson of himself.

The Hellion.

Which is the true one is the question.

Both could be the answer.

"Man, was I ever that weak?" Asks the dark haired version. Jack.

Garrett says nothing.

"Come on. We don't need any of the rest of them. We're powerful enough to do all this on our own. We don't need anyone. We'll take care of all this by our self." A smirk. Arrogant and superior. "Myself really."

Garrett says nothing.

"What? Nothing to say. Here..." And the sword comes off Jack's shoulder. "...I'll show you just how powerful I can--"

"You're wrong," Garrett interrupts himself as he looks up, a smirk on his face. "You're entirely wrong." A beatpause. "And..." A glace toward Cecilia and Rudy. "...do I actually sound like this jackass?" Then back towards his double. "See. I'm not powerful enough..." The double smirks at that. Arrogance returning to his features. "...but..."

A tiny little spot of blue streaks across the darkness. Bounding towards Garrett. Streaking up his leg to perch on his shoulder.

"We are." Finishes Hanpan, a little smile of pride in the little mouse's voice.

In one smooth motion Garrett tears his dream blade free, backed up suddenly with the wind magic of the wind mouse. The pressure wave tearing out though the darkness, though the suddenly shocked looking figure of alternate Jack. It rips the image into nothing, shredding the very memory in one wave of power.

Garrett pauses a moment. "...do I actually sound like that?"

"Yeah," Hanpan mutters. "Sometimes you do."

"Damn, I really am an assshole."

Hanpan slowly nods at that before Garrett smirks slightly. "Stop agreeing with me furrball." Then he raises his voice. "Ida! Rosa! I'm coming to you!"

<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.

    "Whose face?" Dean asks Fei, just before Fei grabs him by the throat with a blazing hand. He utters a literally strangled scream as the flames envelope his neck and face, as Gwen screams his name, and while they do no physical harm, the pain they leave behind feels as real as if it were. Like skin crackling and blackening and peeling, like his eyeballs boiling and melting, and the grip around his neck--
    
    around his neck--
    
    around his neck--
    
        --feels awfully familiar--
    
    "F-Fei," he gasps, grasping his friend by the wrist. "Stop--I know--you're better--than this--"
    
    Then Fei hurls him away, and Dean flies on fire--only to be caught by another Fei, who dispels those flames as if they'd never been. Dean chokes and coughs and rubs his throat and looks up at his savior, the blinks in confusion before he looks between him and the Fei Who Is. "N-no problem," he stammers, momentarily confused, watching the Best Fei approach the Fei That Is. And then one embraces the other, reassures him, calms him. It's amazing, and calming. That guy really is super. But he's not at all egotistical. One might call him... Superego. Maybe. And the other sobs, begs for happiness and an end to the fighting, but calms...
    
    When Dean's name comes up, Dean scratches his cheek, which turns pink. The Best Fei vanishes, and Fei himself apologizes. Dean gives him a slow but warm smile.
    
    "You really are super-cool, Fei," he says, and means it.
    
    Somewhere behind him, an older, cooler, middle-aged-looking Fei with a beard that looks strikingly like Nightburn Acklund chuckles, chewing the end of a cigar. "You said it, kiddo," he murmurs, stepping back into the whirlwind darkness. "After a sight like that, I can't even compare."
    
    "Huh?" Dean utters, turning around--just in time to see his other self fade into the abyss, flames licking his outline--the flames that should have enveloped and destroyed Dean had Superego not sent them to another, better version of himself.
    
    'Don't you go lookin' back, y'hear? That's not you *or* me,' his own voice, rougher, deeper, echoes back at him. "Go make your hero proud."
    
    Dean's eyes widen and shine as these ghostly words sink in. His other self vanishes in pitch and fire. Then his expression settles in determination, and he nods once before hurrying over to Fei. "It's okay," he tells him firmly. Then he nods over to Lily too. "Let's all go do what we've gotta do."
    
    Because this isn't the only friend of his suffering. He can see Avril fighting herself on another mirror shard not too far away--and the result of that frenetic battle is her impaling the shard on which they stand, impaling it and pulling the trigger. If that happens, she'll fall, fall, fall, and he promised to protect her. Dean keeps his promises. He fixes his gaze on it, on her, and then *dashes* forward, leaping, jumping, to try to catch her as she falls, feet as light and as sure as they've ever been.
    
    "AVRIIIIIIIIIIIL!!" he calls, hand stretched out towards her. And it's the *correct* her, too. Somehow, somehow, he just knows.

GS: Dean Stark has attacked Dean Stark with Quicken Edge!
GS: Dean Stark has completed his action.
GS: Dean Stark takes a solid hit from Dean Stark's Quicken Edge for 0 hit points!
GS: Quick! Statuses applied to Dean Stark!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    Talise's beautiful singing voice cuts through the false dreams, the ideals unattainable and imagined. To really grasp upon truth, or to be comortable with the imperfect takes a serious strength of character that so few can truly boast to have, as they all fall about the dream-void together. Lanval drifts along at dangerous spinning velocities (and having a great time of it, from the sound of things).
     The slow, soothing song fills him with warmth and joy, erasing away any doubt he had as a reason for why he withheld what he did so long. The revelation of the Goddess' and her Dragonmaster's strange behavior towards things like this... it did not rob her of her faith, of her love of Althena and what She stands for.
     Lanval joins in on the singing with Talise, as if ensuring that it will stick with her when she wakes.

<Pose Tracker> Cecilia Adlehyde has posed.

Cecilia huffs a few breaths as she recovers. Rudy and Jack are...about, she knows. That's good. She finds Tethelle, starting to smile. "We should hurry!" she encourages her, but doesn't really...have a way to hurry anywhere, and anyway seems intent to wait.

And then the ground explodes. She's falling again, although she thinks she has a better grasp on it now. She hits a shard, hard, which tumbles a bit before she--

Sets eyes on what's coming next, and her eyes shrink.

The Guardians showed her this before, and it has put a face to formerly faceless dreads. The girl that appears has honey-blonde hair that runs down well past her waist, with fashionable heeled boots with a jewel pinning together the folds. Her priestess-like overdress splits at the waits to show off the long-green skirt she wears. All is adorned with immaculate jewelry, little bits and baubles that mark her as a woman of wealth and status. She smiles with the whitest teeth in the world.

"They just put up with you," she says, kindly, andd she moves unbelievably fast to fold Cecilia gently into a warm, joyless hug. She places the short-haired girl's head against her shoulder. "You shout and sing both to get their attention, and all of them swan away as soon as they think you won't get too mad about it..."

The creature gently strokes her hair. "What a wretched girl you are," she whispers in Cecilia's ear. "Thinking you should be pitied while your friend is boiling in his own despair. Everyone here watched it burn. What makes you special?"

Cecilia surges; shrugs back hard and stumbles away. She glares back.

....the reflection smiles, placid, and tips her head like she's waiting for a response.

Cecilia throws herself into the darkness instead, searching for a different shard. She won't be in position in time to do anything of consequence.

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

Rosaline greets Ida with a resolute nod as her fellow Hellion joins her and the two apparitions. Her ARM continues to drain away the Malevolence in the world's very pulse, like sucking poison from a wound.

And Ida begins to devour it away. The two Rosalines raise their hands as well, and 'Granas' lays His sword hand on it as well. The Hellion Rosaline screams as her flames roar to life. The Etone and the Granas phantom soon dissolve away, unable to take any more. There are only two Furies now, with the third hopefully soon to join them.

Rosaline's eyes go wide as Cyre and Talise are the ones who land next to them. She wants to scream, to tell them to save themselves, but... That's what she's been doing for months now, isn't it?

So instead, she lets Talise sing.

It calms her, even as her flames run wilder than ever, threatening to engulf her. "I am Rosaline Calice, and I am furious," she says, as the purple miasma runs along her claws, and into her. "But what's wrong with being angry at injustice? At an unfair, cruel world? I'm not a saint. I'm not even a monster. I'm-- I'M ONLY HUMAN!"

<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

Talise's song stirs a memory. A distant, half-remembered thing in this strange dreamspace. It's a song Cyre's heard before, once, when he caught a glimpse of the truth of the world. It's a song he's heard Cecilia call the Song of the World. The tiger is silent for a long moment, before the beast seems to smirk. "Heh, well. I guess I'm being put on the spot here, aren't I? How about a duet? No, a trio?"

Cyre takes in a breath. The storm seems to calm around him, and then...

He, too, joins in the song.

There's a beat. Cyre peers briefly at Rosaline. 'I'm only human, huh?'

Yeah. He'll have to tease her about that later.

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei is called 'cool' by someone whose face he set on fire.

Actually he's called super-cool, but Fei is having a hard enough time coming to grips with the second part. His hand is still on fire, that's the opposite of cool. He blinks at 'middle aged looking Dean but actually Nightburn Acklund'. "...Didn't I see that guy from somewhere?"

He looks towards Dean and smiles at him. "Of course you'd say it's okay." He tells Dean. "Thank you. I might slip again but... I know with people like you around...maybe slipping isn't such a bad thing now and then." He pauses. "Good luck with your mission."

Fei's vote for Dean, President of the World, SECURED???

Nevertheless, Fei turns to Lily afterwards.

BGM INTERRUPT FOR LILY ESPECIALLY: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uu_F5vrdEjQr
Fei watches Lily go against her 'best self', the best self that's pure destruction. But Lily has it handled. Fei doesn't really disagree. A world without Leon probably doesn't deserve to exist, but maybe the world doesn't deserve to exist at all. It's something graciously allowed to exist in spite of everything, because of the kindness--or cruelty--of those standing upon it.

Fei takes Lily's hand. "That's the beauty of time, I suppose." Fei tells her. "Anything is possible. Even the happy endings, if we let it, and make it happen."

And some people get more than one chance. Fei flies with Lily. He thinks of a Nisan teaching.

The Wounded Shall Advance Into The Light. Is that why Elly doesn't fear those wounded? Is that something he can believe in one day himself?

For today he can. Maybe even tommorow.

<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.

    She pulls the trigger, and, in a heart-stopping roar of brilliant light--

    Photons blaze out through the mirror shard, rendering it to so much dust in the heart of the Earthpulse. Her duplicate self has enough time to look outraged. Enough time to reach, too late, for the girl sprawled against the shattering disintegrating section of mirror.

    Before she, too, is consumed.

    Avril falls, plummeting into the heart of the moon.

    Dean screams out her name. Her eyes open, if only just.

    And slowly, she reaches out her hand for him, grabbing onto him like she will never let go.

    "...Dean..."

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

"And I you," Kalve tells Ida. He steadies. They're forced to part. "I will. Stay safe." The ground cracks and breaks beneath them. Kalve ends up surfing a shard towards the distant 'ground,' air rushing past him as the Mirror continues its myriad attacks on their will.

It's foolish, Kalve thinks. None of these people will ever be broken like that. Hasn't it learned yet? That isn't how you defeat them at all.

"Is that so?"

Kalve closes his eyes to keep from rolling them. He's so tired of enemies appearing out from behind him.

He turns on the falling glass, seeing the other figure dusting himself off: someone tall and lean, in etched silver armor with overlapping plates. Red lines like part of a strange tattoo run over his left shoulder, down to his chest where it forms an elaborate quarter-crescent, and up across his left cheek, terminating at the edge of his eye. He's carrying two wide-bladed swords without guards, looking like enormous cleavers, one laid over his shoulder and the other resting with the edge against the glass. A scarf the color of blood hangs off one shoulder, fastened with fragments of broken metal.

"How do you beat 'em, then?" the figure asks. He sounds like Kalve, but somehow... more animated. Livelier. Kalve always sounds cool and calm; this one sounds like there's a fire in his veins, unable to escape. "I mean, after Arctica and Adlehyde," the Other Kalve says in a slightly raised voice, casting a look towards Cecilia, "it seems to me that enough butchery will stop them cold."

"Not for long," Kalve tells his weird doppelganger. He slides into a fighting stance at the same time the other one does. He's frowning; the other is grinning. "The only way is to grind them down, one by one. If there's anything left, they'll come back to stop you. They have a sense of righteousness that keeps them going, I find."

The Other Kalve laughs. "Righteous? These fleshbags? As if!" He slashes a blade through the air for emphasis. "We're the righteous ones in this. Mother deserves a place without the damn humans. They're like bugs, parasites on an animal. Can't even live on their own planet without killing it! Seems to me they don't deserve it." Other Kalve rolls his neck. "Alright. Enough talk." He clears his throat, pointing the huge weapon.

"I am Kalve of the Red-Iron Dervishes," he declares, in a loud and fiery voice, "and I call you to battle to answer for your abandonment of our society! Honor demands you receive me and engage!"

"I am Kalve of the Method," the real Kalve says, tilting on the crumbling shard. "Your voice is heard. I will not dispute your claims except by force of arms. Let this be settled with steel."

Both take a breath. Both shout something short, like a ritualized kiai. Both leap to engage --

No. The Red-Iron Kalve leaps to engage. The real Kalve jumps away, sending the shard tumbling. His copy cleaves it in two in mid-air, then jams the edge of his great-cleaver into the side of another. He flips it over and lands on it, running up the rotating object and diving at the real him again as he jumps further and further away. "Fight me!" he roars, giving chase and rapidly, viciously reducing the number of near-infinite pieces that tumble into the darkness.

"I have something else to do first," Kalve of the Method calls back. He flits from platform to platform, using his myriad limbs to get a hold. He isn't the most agile one around, but he's fast enough, especially when he's focused on something other than a berserker-like urge to cleave an enemy in two. He descends, eyes on a different target. Kalve jumps towards a big piece of the mirror, landing hard and scraping up the surface with clawlike fingers. He rotates, cracking it in half, and flings it aside.

Towards Cecilia. He got asked to look after her. Giving her something to stand on rather than an abyss to plummet into -- something with the reflective surface all scratched up, to maybe reduce the likelihood of evil twins popping out -- seems the least he can do. Kalve glances towards her, and then looks up --

-- into the incoming blades of his murderous copy. Kalve's Manipule Array strains against the simply brutal weaponry. A battle between demons begins in earnest, but who can say if it will end before they hit what amounts to the ground?

GS: Kalve has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Method I - Unity of Tool and Hand!
GS: Kalve has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.

    Dean reaches out for Avril, and Avril reaches out for Dean, and the two of them clasp hands. Dean smiles warmly, pulling his best friend close, wrapping a protective arm around her.
    
    "Don't worry," he reassures her. "I've got you."

GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Kalve's Method I - Unity of Tool and Hand for 114 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.

    And for him, Avril smiles gently, wrapping an arm around him before slumping against him, all energy spent.

    "I know. I won't worry."

    It's just a matter of purging the Malevolence, now.

<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

She may not reject that voice tomorrow, or the next day, but today Lily chooses something else. ...Today. For now.

For once, Lily is the one to reach out a hand. "Time, huh..." Lily thinks about it, looks over Fei's face, at Dean calling to Avril as he's spoken to her too. But to Fei, "I'm not sure. I don't know if I could let it happen."

"..." Lily thinks of a different teaching, as she flies for the moment with Fei.

"...But maybe."

She is the wounded, really. Not only in the dreamscape, not only in the moment. But maybe, even for her...

Maybe one day.

<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.

    ".... Because that is all you are good for, at this point."

    Gwen's eyes open. Her breath strains past the many flowers that mark the vine that strangles her.

    And her 'sister' smiles, speaking soft words into her ear.

    "For all you are is an annoying idiot attached to a very powerful ARM."

    She struggles.

    "You act confident, but I know the truth. You're scared of what you might become, and even more... that your friends will find out your secret, and deny you their friendship."

    She kicks and flails.

    "But where you are metal, I am life. I have no such weaknesses. No dragon sleeps within me."

    The courier slumps.

    "Yes, sister. Don't worry. I will take care of each and every one... and make the desert bloom with their love."

    A desert of flowers.

    Gwen screams.

    The vines begin to break, one by one, before giving way in one final rip.

    "I won't let you hurt them!"

GS: Gwen Whitlock has spent 1 Combo on Gatling!
GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked The Umbral Mirror with Special Delivery!
GS: Gwen Whitlock has entered a Reflect stance!
GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action.
GS: The Umbral Mirror takes a solid hit from Gwen Whitlock's Special Delivery for 163 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Ida breathes. It feels like she's trying to drink the ocean, and the one mercy is that she can still focus on her own breath as she does so. Pain, fear, anxiety, rage, sorrow--everything pours into her, and the reactor-star in her heart can barely keep up with it all. There's no other way. It's agonizing, but there is no other way. She did this. She did this in her despair, and in her anger, and she is going to fix it. She can sense the others around her, distantly. She can feel Lily's rage as she sees the shattered remains of her lover's blade. She can feel the silent exchange between Rudy and the other Rudy. She can hear Talise's song. It's the song she heard in Cecilia's dream.

    She's not alone. And in its own way, the pain is liberating, humanizing. What are Hellions if not creatures of contradiction?

    A memory boils up. Ida supporting Kalve on a shoulder, deep in the depths of the Guardian Temple. The Guardians asked her a question. She answers. "You are elemental. We are not. Every one of us is many, many things. We contradict ourselves. We feel conflict when we're forced to choose between two things we love--when we are forced to choose between our family and our ideals, or when we are forced to choose between people we lo--" Ida chokes. For a moment it sounds like she's about to swallow her own tongue. "we love, and some abstract greater good."

    Garrett touches down. The three Furies are reunited for this one last task. Within the space of several minutes, the miasma in the Earthpulse is gone. All that remains is the Earthpulse itself--pure, pristine, whole. The image lingers in the mind's eye as the Mirror's influence fades, and wakefulness returns.

    One by one, the dreamers awaken. Nothing has changed since they went to sleep, save perhaps for the unnerving play of light and shadow. There is just one thing left to do.

    Ida awakens with a feeling not unlike the one she had after being struck, dead-on, by Berserk's mace. She moans, and slips off the divan with all the grace and subtlety of someone waking with a horrific hangover. Malevolence glows through her skin like she was nothing more like a thin paper screen around a burning bonfire. She pushes herself to her hands and knees, and then to her feet, wobbling unsteadily. She is a mass of pain and raw emotion in the shape of a human being. "It's done," she chokes out. "Almost."

    There's just one thing left to do.

<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.

    Riesenlied is breathing hard--

    --puffing her hands against her mouth to keep warm. She gazes nervously, gently, as she seats herself on one of the chairs that she's taken to seat on as she watches over everyone in their dream through the Mirror. More than one person advised her--

    Don't fall asleep.

    She shivers and holds her hand against her side, where she can still feel the fresh wound the Sword Dancer's blade caused her to tremble.

    She can only hope and pray... pray upon the light of the Dragon's Tear, to help everyone through what she can sense, even from afar, is a very, very difficult battle -- for it is not just a physical battle of the body, but also a mental and emotional battle of the mind and soul.

    She would wait, for all of them. This is the least she can do, a blanket draped over her shoulder, as she keeps vigil.

    And when they return to the waking world... she would greet them, too, with warm eyes and a weak smile.

<Pose Tracker> Cecilia Adlehyde has posed.

Kalve has a great idea that is unfortunately foiled by the ultimate arbiter, the spiteful power of the combat code deciding to kill her.

Cecilia plummets past Kalve's save before he can quite make it...and when the group wakes, Cecilia does so with a start and a yelp, and then a THUMP, and then a groan because she woke up with such a jolt that it threw her completely off her sofa and onto the floor.

"ow," she whines, groaning and rolling over onto her back to start extracting herself from her sleeping bag. A moment later she's rubbing her nose, slightly bloodied from landing on it. She wiggles free entirely, hand going to her chest as her heart hammers inside it, pumping her body full of anxious chemicals she very definitely does not actually need THANK YOU VERY MUCH AND GOOD DAY SIR

She flops down on her behind and breathes for a long few seconds as people rouse themselves, and then finally, as it begins to look like the room has properly emerged from their dreams, she levers upright. She reaches out and her staff appears in a puff of pink light, and she reaches down to unclick her Medium case, pulling it open. The stone inside trembles, ready.

"Tethelle," she calls. "Can you kindly prepare a ritual space, please?" she calls, passing her staff over her Mediums. They jump out, whirling around her like riding on invisible lines of power. "A large one. We will need everyone who can participating."

She steps over, surrounded by SEVEN Mediums. Once Tethelle's space is set up, Cecilia holds up her staff. She should have the Teardrop for this, she knows. But she doesn't.

Focus.

The Mediums begin to shine, focusing their light on the tip of Cecilia's staff, an orb of something impossibly bright forming there.

<Pose Tracker> Tethelle Cirdian has posed.

The two Tethelles fight in a no-holds-barred brawl. They pass through several other battles as they do, until, with a final strike, the Tethelle without the Baskar sash drives her palm directly into the stomach of the newcomer.

The blow is not a killing blow. And yet it is enough; the false Tethelle doubles over on it, hisses - and then shatters, before Tethelle awakens.

Tethelle's eyes pop open, the echoes of music and screams still ringing in her ears. She is ordinarily not a fast riser, but this time she feels alert, almost energized as she rises up from the duvan she had originally crashed down on, sweeping her sword up from her knees, where it had rested. She looks around the room, judging conditions. It's not just her that's waking up - good. She gives Rosaline and Talise a slight nod as she walks past them.

And then, as Cecilia requests, Tethelle nods. "I can," she says, striding over to the clearest part of the room and using her foot to clear a lost blanket out of the way.

When it's cleared away, Tethelle raises her sword in one hand and her Medium in the other. It's the sword that glows with power, not the Medium; Tethelle draws upon it, channeling the power of Equites into the blade -

Which blazes with energy, green near the base and fading to gold at the tip. The point leaves a trail of light in the air behind it as it shifts, which Tethelle uses to draw a circle along the ground to help her focus the gathering power. The blade trembles in her hand as she tightens her one-handed grip on it.

This is a form of magic Tethelle rarely uses, but that doesn't mean she doesn't know how, and it doesn't mean Equites doesn't empower her enough to use it. She is a Zoa Priestess, no matter what her village thinks of her. Rituals she knows.

The circle glows as Tethelle drives power through it, all greens and golds rippling around the arc of it. When it is complete to her satisfaction, Tethelle walks straight to the precise center of it and drives her sword into the ground so hard that she embeds about a foot's worth of blade into the floor, still rippling with energy.

"Do it," she says, holding the hilt with both hands. It will take all her attention and strength to keep things focused and the power flowing freely, but that's what she's here for.

<Pose Tracker> Talise Gianfair has posed.

When Talise awakens, it turns out she's tossed and turned in her sleep. She's sprawled out on her couch with one leg draped over the back of it and her box of Uncle Ramus's Choco-Crunchers hanging, blessedly closed, from her right hand.

She stirs. "...Buh? Wuh happen," she slurs drowsily as she sits up. Pushing one hand through her hair, she sits there for a moment, her eyelids drooping with residual sleepiness. Her head hurts and she feels like she's just been singing but she's not sure why. The memories are distant and the details foggy; Talise doesn't remember her dreams often.

It takes her a minute. Then she blinks, jolts upright and gasps. "Ida, Ros'," she exclaims, popping off the couch and tossing away her blanket.

Cecilia and Tethelle are on it. Talise, who for all she knows has all the magical ability of a lump, watches in wonder as the pair of Shamans pool their powers.

Unable to help in any meaningful way - and unaware that her singing can really amount to anything in the waking world - Talise simply wanders forward to add her own Medium to the circle - a stock Medium of Noua Shax that she hasn't called upon often, simply because her heart and her faith lie elsewhere.

She doesn't otherwise try to recite anything, because she can't. She eases back behind Tethelle. She doesn't dare touch her friend or disturb the ritual.

All she can do is clasp her hands together and focus intently on not just Tethelle, but on the three Furies who are the centre of the ritual.

Ida... Rosaline... please come back to us. We're waiting for you.

We all are.

<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

What is the reverse of a spirit bomb called? A corporeal black hole? Whatever it is, it happens. The dream collapses amidst the din of rising song, surging power, and Cecilia falling to her certain demise.

No, wait.

It was just a dream, wasn't it?

Cyre wakes groggily, opening one eye, then the other. He blinks blearily at the world around him, slowly recognizing that for some reason Riesenlied is looming over them all. Has she finally decided to unleash her true form and slaughter them to the last...!?

No, she's just being a sweetheart.

When Cyre finds Tethelle and Cecilia, he shoots up properly, moving to stand alongside the two women, a medium falling into either hand. "I'll lend a hand," Cyre says, lingering motes of emerald light flashing in his eyes. The air stirs at his presence, and the presence of the Guardian of the Wind seems to grow ever stronger for it.

With the addition of Solais Emsu, Equites and Noua Shax, Nine Guardians are represented here, now. What more will be added to the gathering?

A distant part of Cyre's mind recognizes that this is probably the most prolific gathering of Guardians on Lunar for... well, at least for a good long time. He's not actually sure about the full history of this place and can't hazard a guess as to whether this many Guardians have even been up here at all but...

Well. That's immaterial now.

"Shaman, my body is a conduit for Fengalon's essence. Borrow it as you will. Just... Be careful. I can only handle so much, you know?" By which Cyre probably means 'please do not kill me by trying to pull a full tiger-god through my soul.' But at the very least, the Nahual can serve as an anchor and reservoir of spiritual might-- and as a skilled, living nexus of the Guardians' power.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    Somewhere Else In Rabenstein
 
     There are a lot of misshapen, twisted, melted metal shapes strewn about. A certain man finds a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction. He is covered in lacerations and bruises, and is starving three-quarters to death. He might be willing to push it to seven-eighths, because he has decided he does not like how much of a metal hand appears intact in this mass of metal as they curl their fingers and speak an incantation.
     They will attempt to return to where they were supposed to be standing guard. As far as he cares, he has. They could have - and did - attack. (He started it, though, as a legal technicality.) He pulls down that trademark obscuring element in front of his face to pop in another mass of Black Stuff, which is nowhere near enough to cover the amount of calories recently expended. He stays clear of the festivities within.
 
     Within The Slumber Party Room
 
     Lanval stirs. Back and forth, back and forth, awake, as everyone starts to set up the purification ritual. Lanval has seen that happen in a much smaller scale, from an unlikely source. He sets his gourd down. True, it was in the dream where the gourd got some Hellion stuff in it, but Seraphim are weird in terms of physicality and cause and effect and... let's just roll with it. He exhales deeply again as he takes note of where the Hellions are. Truth be told, being in this deep in a Domain, it's for the best he stand close by and get a good wash-over.
     Sit close by, anyway.
     "Hm, hm, hm... all right... now, uh, thish ish new groundsh ta me, jusht wanna shay... but jusht keep hold of who ya are, and how ya really feel. Even if it'sh bad, it'sh how ya really feel, 'n from there, uh... well. Guessh ya got it. All right."
     Lanval searches around his person for a bottle of the Quartermaster's Stash he kept stowed away the last time Layna accidentally gave him a not-near-empty bottle, using the alcoholic beverage within as a focus for his power. A liquid, like water... capable of empowering fire, of which water holds strength over in Lunarian elemental theory.
     "Ha ha ha...!" He laughs good-naturedly above it all, infusing the air with some of his cheer, as ambient water energies gain further strength in his wake as he opens his eyes. "Those of the Blue Star who bear the power of Purification, you have mine aid!" He raises the bottle of Quartermaster's Stash upwards, imparting his own power forth.

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

As Fei and Lily leave the dreamscape, Fei still holding Lily's hand, fully intent on helping Lily awakening, a green haired girl watches, a ghostly image of that which wasn't real, but rather a faraway promise that has yet to be kept.

"I...wait..." She says.

Fei briefly glances back but the ghost is almost gone before he pushes through and--

Fei wakes up. He sits up with a start, the space under his eyes, and nose, and ears covered in dried blood. Fei places his hand to his face, then lowers it. "...I had a nice dream." Fei says. "...But I can't remember--"

Fei grimaces, holding onto his head for a moment before he turns towards Riesenlied.

"...I think...you were getting married in it." He pauses. "Dream-congratulations to you."

That's what sticks., weirdly enough. Perhaps one day he will remember the dream...

...When he makes it happen in reality.

He watches the purification with a faint smile. He doesn't say much. He just appreciates. Purification. It's happening. He didn't think it was possible for the longest time, but it's happening now.

He leans back, staring up at the ceiling, laying in the bed. "...Maybe I'm still dreamning."

And then he smiles, feeling for today at peace. Cecilia's friends will reunite, Ida will be who she wishes to be, and Jack will be able to move forward.

He prays this dream, at least, will be allowed to continue.

<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.

Layna looks on from above. She watches as Talise and the others sing. ...She doesn't join in. Her part was done here. It was Ida, Rosaline, and Garrett's turn now.

The only thing she could do was wait and watch...as the Mirror and the Earthpulse is drained of the Malevolence within.

...

...

...

...Gradually, Layna awakens. She groans and sits up, massaging her forehead and looking around. ...Everyone was starting to wake up too, it looks like. She forces herself up, a bit wobbly.

"...Whew, that was a thing, aye?" She says with a laugh.

She's soon filled in on what exactly is going on here, standing around the circle with the others. Layna scratches her head.

"...Ain't done anythin' like this before, either... Not on anyone else, at least." She says with a glance aside at Lanval. "But...okay! I'll give it a shot. I'm trustin' you two with this, so you've got my support!"

Layna focuses. She recites an incantation, and slowly - if they accept it - a subtle green glow begins to surround the two priestesses. The wind begins to pick up around them, a subtle swirling. Those who had seen Layna fight might have occasionally seen this green glow around her - she offers it to them now, offering her power to add their own.

She keeps reciting the incantation, over and over. It was a lot harder to hold onto when she was using it on someone else.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Beast has posed.

    The Beast of Lohgrin wakes, and she is clad in her finery once more, with not a single thing reflected on an iron mask as it lifts with the rest of her into a loosely-concordant form. It is rough collaboration, as she moves towards the ritual. She can breathe again; she has no neck to be squeezed to lifelessness. There are only the plates, separate, unyielding.

    Ah - almost. There is deep dent, the fourth chest-plate down.

    "I know you have the capacity to do this," she speaks in support, as she prepares to assist. "And you do not embark on this trial alone." Perhaps her power is inexperienced - but it is theirs to fix this. A soft spring breeze, warm and comforting for those who strive so bravely.

<Pose Tracker> Dean Stark has posed.

    Dean jerks awake with a snort, blinking rapidly before pushing himself upright, rubbing his eyes. "Oh, hey, Riese," he says, yawning. The dream... there was something in it that was really familiar... something about the feeling of a hand tightening around his neck... where had he felt that before...?
    
    Dean rubs his neck. He can't quite remember. What he *does* remember, though, is catching Avril, and the faith and trust they had in each other. He smiles over at her, then turns his mental energy towards cheering the purifiers on. If need be, he puts in his copy Sword Medium and/or his stone Fire Medium in with the pile. Otherwise--go, go, Cecilia and Tethelle! Go, go, Ida, Rosa, and Jack! Dean believes in all of you!!

<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.

    There was some logic Gwen had in laying on the floor, grasping onto a blanket and a pillow like it was going to be the wildest slumber party ever,

    By the time she wakes up, she has flopped and turned over to the point that she's now close to where Cyre is. Because that incense or whatever it was smelled nice.

    Look, it was a really, really bad time.

    ".... Why didn't I think t'sleepon tehis..." Gwen slurs as she gets up.

    Wait. They did it. _They actually did it_.

    Gwen jumps up to her feet then sways, grabbing onto any furniture that's handy.

    "Riees?" Gwen groggily rubs her head. "You been watchin' us?" SHe grins. "That's so sweet!"

    They'll need everyone who can to participate.

    Gwen's face falls, her left hand going to feel at the one rock that remains of the Guardian tablet she had so callously sucked dry. Rigdobrite's power would have been a useful asset to help them.

    She relaxes.

    ....If she hadn't, she wouldn't be here.

    "You have t'power of my ARM at your disposal," she says, raising it up. "It was enough to power that weird terminal in that one weird cave in Adlehyde."

    Rigdobrite may not be present with Gwen, but she'll pay that sacrifice forward.

<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.

Kalve's battle is one of finesse versus power, and at times, it's hard to tell which is which. One fights like a berserker, only to feint expertly and then go for the kill. The other responds with a complex defensive form, barely turning aside a deadly stroke, and then delivers one of his own. If it was happening in reality, it would be shorter and faster. If it was happening in reality...

It isn't, though, and so, there is no true victor. He fights, and fights, and fights --

He wakes, uncertain of the end.

Kalve staggers upward. He sees Ida with her star of Malevolence. He sees... the Mediums. They are many. His right hand twitches, the diamond-shaped object set into his palm flickering for a second as he very nearly does something he'll later regret. His feet scrape against the floor as he begins to withdraw from the vicinity, unwilling to be anywhere near that collection of Guardian-given powers for any length of time.

He doesn't go, though. Kalve steels himself and stands with Ida instead. He takes her by the hand, and he gives her the quiet reassurance of his presence instead of any more tangible aid. Anything else he could directly add to this ritual is purely destructive.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

Xantia... does not wake up, at least not immediately. Not due to any medication or anything. It's just, she was absolutely exhausted, and she finally feels warm enough to be comfortable again. Not like she has much in the way of energy to contribute left anyway - she already used all of that to do something impossible before going to sleep in the first place.

For the moment, all that happens with Xantia is that a contented smile appears on her face. Best to let her sleep, just a little longer.

<Pose Tracker> Rudy Roughnight has posed.

 As everyone awakens, Rudy slowly opens up his eyes. To everything that he has seen about himself and what he has likely seen of others, Roughnight doesn't really speak, just listening to how others respond. A glance is given toward Cecilia as she makes her request for power from others. Rudy replies in the way he's known best for:
 
 Rudy nods.
 
 After making his usual affirmationsign that he's listeningquiet resignation that he is linked with who he is for perhaps the rest of his life, the blue-haired boy lowers his head, offering whatever silent aid he can.

<Pose Tracker> Lily Keil has posed.

Leaving the dreamscape, Lily glances to Fei as he looks back, back behind--

She's brought along.

The dream fades. ...Ordinarily, Lily would remain fully asleep right now, helped along by chemical assistance that lets her sleep through the night at all. But this time--

If anything she looks worse than she did before--sunken eyes, too-pale skin, bandages covering burns. She looks exhausted, frankly... and as her eyes blink open, she looks barely awake if at all. "Nn..."

She blinks up. She remembers--

...She remembers Fei's dream even though he doesn't, and only when she hears the voices of the others does she start dragging herself upward. "Riesenlied," she answers that smile, but then hears--the preparations being made. Participating...

"I can't purify," Lily answers, but looks about--sees /Dean. She watches him for a moment. "..."

It stings, and yet... she sees Xantia, sleeping peacefully, and closes her eyes.

"The three of you," she says, and her voice is a little scratchy due to fatigue, "...It's a frightening thing, what you face." She was purified once, too. "...But you must remain, when the rest is burned away."

Lily knows that this isn't a dream. ...A dream couldn't have the chance of things being better.

<Pose Tracker> Fei Fong Wong has posed.

Fei uses this moment to eat wall meat he's been hiding from Xantia.

<Pose Tracker> Tethelle Cirdian has posed.

Tethelle Cirdian keeps her hands wrapped around the sword as power flows into it - not just from her, but from everyone. Talise, Cyre, Lanval, Layna, Dean... even Gwen's ARM. Everyone. From Tethelle it passes to Cecilia in a steady flow as Tethelle acts as a stabilizer, something she is equipped to do in rituals. One hand always on the sword, the other one on the Medium, mystic light occasionally flaring in the circle.

It's a strain. Tethelle feels the pulse of overused powers more than once as the magic gathers and gathers, multiple sources blending into a harmonious whole - but she holds it even as the light flares, gripping the sword's hilt more firmly to ensure it doesn't shake free.

And then her eyes open again as she raises the sword from the ground, pointing it toward Cecilia, causing a veritable stream of gold-tinged energy to flow forth to the other shaman. From the group, to Tethelle to focus, to Cecilia to trigger; it's a group working together in a way Tethelle never expected to be a part of, with her in the middle.

"Do it!" Tethelle's voice is a little rough, but she's still holding on.

<Pose Tracker> Cecilia Adlehyde has posed.

"...I wonder if we do," Cecilia says, to Lanval. Compared to Tethelle, her handling of the energy seems positively serene. FOr now, she's simply collecting her own energies, while Tethelle gathers the others together. "What the Guardians are doing and the Silver Flame I've seen the Shepherd use are very different...And yet..."

Her eyes harden. "The Guardians are the power that sustains the world. Their power can set right what is wrong! This evil does not belong here! And by their light we will set it right!"

It's not a formal ritual. It is a declaration, a decree. Tethelle releases that power into her and Cecilia feels it boiling inside her as she forces it into the gathering node of brilliance on her staff. "Your strengths, all of you...the wish that this power can help is all that it needed!"

The light at the end of her staff burns too white, too pure to look at - and then blasts out, a shockwave firing out in every direction, a purifying wave of the very stuff that defines and enforces what is Right.

Incidentally, Kalve and Riesenlied don't melt immediately, so apparently it doesn't work that way.

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Ida watches as Cecilia and Tethelle begin the ritual. Everything hurts. It hurts in ways Ida didn't know was possible. It's all she can do to stay on her feet, to not collapse in a heap and risk letting the memories out. Her brain is a hurricane of warring emotions. It's still not enough to drown out that horrible, horrible voice.

    Is this going to solve anything? You're weakening yourself, for nothing. Do you think anyone will forgive you for this? For endangering all of Lunar? For nearly killing innocent people? For nearly killing your friends?

    I don't know, Ida thinks. I don't know. But what I do know is that even Id saw something inside me that I couldn't. I don't know if I will succeed, but even if I don't, I will learn.

    "I know," Ida says, to Lily. Tendrils of Malevolence twist upon her breath. "I've learned." She squeezes Kalve's hand, and smiles at him. She falls silent, then, and listens to Cecilia speak. The wave washes over all of them, the raw power of the Guardians unleashed.

    Reality untwists itself. From inside the parlor, it's difficult to tell--but the labyrinth of corridors falls silently into the neat, orderly arrangement laid down by its architects centuries ago. The Malevolence pooling in the remains of destroyed Mannikins washes away. The weight of the Domain fades away, bit by bit, until nothing remains but an ancient castle perched atop an inhospitable mountain.

    Ida breathes out. The Malevolence on her breath dissipates before it can even take shape. The star in her chest flares one final time, and begins to dim, glowing through Ida's flesh and clothing until it's no longer visible. The rents in her skin dim and die, and start sealing themselves back up, leaving nothing but scar tissue behind. Ida's form starts to compact upon itself. Muscle and bone return to their original proportions, and as the change speeds up, it looks alarmingly like Ida is withering away. She keeps breathing. She keeps focusing on the here and now, on the way her chi flows now that it's freed from that strange, alien poison. With each breath, she takes more and more of the suffering and offers it to the light.

    When the light has faded completely, Ida stands next to Kalve, still holding his hand. Her hand is thin and shaky. Her hair is back to its usual dark brown. Light blue eyes open, and blink once. Ida's mouth opens, but she's literally speechless. The weight she's been carrying with her for more than half a year is simply gone. A smile begins to dawn on her face. She looks at Garrett and Rosaline, and then at Kalve, worry creeping into her features for a moment, but no. He's all right.

    "Thank you," Ida whispers. It could never be enough.

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

Below the Furies' feet, the mirror continues to crack. But finally, after several tense minutes--

They wake up.

Rosaline's flames are more intense than ever. Even in the waking world, they burn wildly enough to threaten to swallow her. And yet, neither her armchair nor her kimono is consumed. And this very localized wildfire stands in stark contrast to the beastwoman's expression of exhausted relief.

"We did it... didn't we? Haha... I'm not... feeling very well..."

She looks up as the Shamans begin the ritual. She has made no secret of her dislike of the Guardians and the powers they bestow. But right now? She doesn't have it in her to care. She just wants this nightmare to finally be over, and to be with her friends again.

And so, she closes her eyes, and begins to pray under her breath. She hears words of encouragement and advice, and takes them in, but doesn't miss a beat as she recites her prayers. Granas will have SOME say in this heathen ritual, god damn it.

Katz, meanwhile, contributes a gentle, soothing breeze with a folding fan. Wind is very popular today, and they don't want to be left out.

Power washes over her. Her pink flames die down, finally. Her grotesque, hairy limbs shrink away, the extra mass dissolving into quickly disappearing motes. Her second tail vanishes, likewise. Her features soften. She slumps in her seat.

She opens her eyes. They are blue again. She looks down at her hands. Crooked and very sharp-clawed, but downright gentle-looking compared to a moment ago. She then looks back to Ida, offering her an incredulous smile, then Garrett.

"It's over? ...It's over."

She gets up, staggering a bit-- She's had enormous feet and a second tail for months now, she needs to readjust. --and hugs the nearest person who seems so inclined. There will be hugs, in general.

"Praise be..."

DC: Rosaline Calice switches forms to The Timid Nun!
DC: Ida Everstead-Rey switches forms to Martial Artist Ida!
<Pose Tracker> Tethelle Cirdian has posed.

The group, together, completes the ritual. Tethelle nearly falls when the last burst of energy is discharged in a flash of light; she staggers, but remains upright, catching herself after a step away from the center of the circle.

When the light fades, Tethelle is still holding a sword... mostly. It's sword-shaped, but the length of the blade is twisted and warped, as if partially melted from the powers it focused through the circle. A blackened pattern like rime has formed up the blade as the eddies of magic scorched the steel itself.

For a change, though, Tethelle is barely looking at the sword; she certainly doesn't seem to care about its damage as she slings it over her shoulder, back in its carrier, and advances on the former Hellions. There is indeed going to be a hug.

"I am going to sleep for a week," she says, to break the solemnity.

<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.

    "W-wh--"

    Riesenlied's expression is terribly red as Fei suddenly blurts out that she got dream-married, though that expression dies down a little as she offers a smile to Gwen and says, "You're welcome."

    But fairly soon, the ritual comes -- impromptu as it is, it is a gathering of everyone's wills and spirits... she can feel it, through the Dragon's Tear, through the waves of empathy that she receives in everyone's emotions as everyone gathers, one by one.

    As that wash of power fills the room, and the nightmare unfolds as the Castle rights itself...

    She feels she can see Odoryuk in there, for a moment. No, a memory--

    We can overcome such boundaries, eventually.

    Those words that have given her so much hope, in that Tower on that day...

    She gazes over each of the Furies, as the power washes over them. As Rosaline and Ida both shift back towards more familiar, fondly missed forms...

    Now, finally, she can rest for a bit, she thinks, as she closes her eyes.

<Pose Tracker> Talise Gianfair has posed.

A tense Talise looks on over Tethelle's shoulder. The ritual is something she's seen rarely - and when she has, it's been upon Hellions, at the hands of Sorey. Seeing it performed by Shamans upon two of her friends is an entirely different and more personal matter.

The shockwave blasts outward. Talise gasps as it burns across her - but then, there's nothing to purify within her, is there?

YOU'LL FAIL FOREVER IDIOT GIIIIIIIRRRRRRRRL, a tiny purple voice in Talise's heart screams silently before fading away as it vanishes into nothingness. Talise doesn't notice. Nobody does.

All eyes are elsewhere. Talise watches with her lower lip hanging a little as the three Furies change so dramatically. She can practically see the sadness melting away from them, even when their real forms are once again in evidence. The people who emerge are familiar. The Ida from a year and a half ago, an intrepid naturalist who taught her so much about Filgaian ways. The Rosaline from the same time - the sweet nun who crossed the path of herself, Ida, Staci and Lyn in the middle of the Ignas badlands. (Garrett she's less familiar with.)

As soon as the ritual is over, there's a bustle of movement.

With a joyous cry, Talise practically throws herself forward. Rosaline will have about two seconds before she's suddenly pulled into a tight hug by the very large swordswoman. Talise pulls Rosaline in and hugs her firmly, even rocking her a little.

"Thank the Goddess," she says against Rosaline's shoulder. The Beastwoman can feel tears running down Talise's face.

Ida will get a hug in due time. Talise figured she'd want to hug Kalve first.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    Lanval, a spirit of Lunar, is about as far from the Guardians imaginable as any - as far as anyone knows, but his desire to assist is as genuine as genuine can be. The purifying shockwave runs through, and Lanval feels himself a cleaner, fresher wastrel. It's not something he can put into words, but this whole time he'd been playing with fire... and how. For all he knows, he might've been close to hitting that dragon threshold just flitting about here as he has.
     The Water Seraph remains seated as everyone allows their emotions of relief and happiness to overcome them, closing his eyes quietly as he strokes away at his beard. It's quite a thing...! So many things he thought he knew about how they worked... to find out that there was a way beyond just the attention of the Shepherd.
     It all worked out. He internalizes. I still have a lot of questions... but you know, wait, I know? We all know what comes next.
     "FEEEEAAAAAAAAASSSSSSHT!" Lanval calls, throwing his now purified gourd up. This calls for a feast! ...That someone else organizes... that he will consume at least a third of the entirety of foodstuffs if left unchecked... but a feast nontheless!

<Pose Tracker> Garrett Stampede has posed.


The dreamscape is a madhouse. The mirror cracks. The nightmare stuff is absorbed by the Furies. Garrett grits teeth against the pressure. Griding them as he concentrates. One by one people begin to wink out...

...and then suddenly he is awake.

A blizzard sleets around him, his hair whips in a ice of his own creation. His eyes are wide and staring as purple twists off his skin and then...

...then its gone.

Compleatly.

He sags back against the cushins on the floor he fell asleep against, leaving the more comfortable parts to others. His heart beats, his breath comes in ragged gasps as he sits up. Eyes clear for the first time in months.

He doesn't say anything though, what can he say really. After what he's done...

Instead of speaking he looks up towards Cecilia. Thanks. Regret. Sadness. Happiness all on his face. Such a volitile mix before he looks around. Sees faces familiar and not before he draws a deep and shuddering breath.

"Its over."

A longer pause as he lowers his head slightly. His gaze strays towards Reise's sleeping form. "Thank you." Then back to the room at large. "For not giving up on us." Again a pause. A slight nudge from the smiling form on Hanpan nearby.

"Even if we were idiots."

Hanpan nods solemly at that.

<Pose Tracker> K.K. has posed.

Black and bleeding vaporous light, the Sword Dancer's blade was scattered to the grounds of Castle Rabenstein, rejected and forgotten. It lingers there, ebbing its subdued red rage, soaked through with the vengeance of a man who lost everything and wanted nothing more than to take just as much from those who had wronged him.

It lingers there, as their eyes shut.

                                                      I am...

By the time the sleepers wake, the spot the cursed blade once occupied is empty.

                                    ---

How long will you let yourself be content with being less than you are?

It is a question that had been scarred into the very foundation of Castle Rabenstein some months ago. It lingers there now, an ugly reminder in the castle's courtyard of an encounter long gone by.

And there, standing at a ledge overlooking that courtyard stands the very one who scarred it.

The polished, reflective white of a faceless helm is tilted downward. The curve of its horns gleam as it watches -- not the courtyard, but the parlor beyond. Watches. Feels. Feels the crackle of the Guardians' defiant powers. Feels the bleed of Malevolence, burning away into so much purity. It would be an easy thing, to say that the power of Purification is to change things back to the way they were.

But the Trial Knight knows well that is too simple. This is not a reversion. This is not winding back the clock. It is a second chance. It is a change. They have changed.

Not the old. This is the new.

And there is nothing more important to remember than that.

"So, then, you are no longer content."

And, alone and isolated, the Trial Knight speaks those words to nothing but the open air... and that sword of pitch black, floating at their side. Thrumming with angry Malevolence.

                                                  I am hatred...

"Yes," murmurs K.K. behind the metal warp of their helm. Light ensconces them.

"But soon you shall be free."

And they are gone, as unobtrusively as they arrived.

To leave the former Furies and their friends to their second chance.

<Pose Tracker> Xantia has posed.

Xantia is suddenly standing right behind Lanval. "Did someone say 'feast'?"

Yeah that's all it took to wake her up, are you surprised?

<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.

Layna's incantation keeps going and going until, finally, Tethelle channels the power into Cecilia, who makes her declaration and releases the power in a brilliant beam that Layna has to shield her eyes from.

...And when it's clear...she sees what has become of her friends. Ida and Rosaline...

Layna laughs and turns her head away. She's...she's actually tearing up a little.

She powers through instead, walking up to Ida and Rosaline...to give them both a big, welcoming pat on the shoulder.

"How're you feeling?" She asks with a bright grin...and then glances over toward Garrett.

"We're all a bunch o' idiots here, lad. Dunno why you'd expect us to treat you any differently for that." She says with a grin and a dismissive wave.

<Pose Tracker> Rosaline Calice has posed.

"Hopeful," Rosaline tells Layna, weakly, through the hugging arms and tears.

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Talise's suspicion is on the money. Ida rises up on her toes, takes Kalve in her arms, and presses her lips to his.

    It's a while before they let go of one another.

    Finally--finally--she answers, Layna. "Better," Ida says. "Not the same, but better."

<Pose Tracker> Talise Gianfair has posed.

Talise hugs Rosaline awhile longer before smiling and letting other people get in on The Huggening.

"Better's good," she says with a wry smile Ida's way, relief written all over her face.

She eventually does offer Ida a box of chocolate biscuits. "...I'd say 'you can have them back now' but honestly we bought local."

<Pose Tracker> Cyre H. Lorentz has posed.

And just like that, with a wave of purifying energy, this long nightmare is over. Cyre no longer has to worry about any of his friends punching a hole through his chest on a whim. Ida is free once more to rejoice in her robosexuality. That sword guy gets to be friends with the princess again. All is right in the world.

...Except.

Cyre turns to stare at the Katz. He wanders over, crouching to get eye-level with the little critter. "So," he says, "Looks like you're down a Lord of Calamewty."

Beat.

"What do you think about comin' to work for me and my crew instead, huh? I think we could do business together."

OH NO.

CATPITALISM.

<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.

    Gwen feels exhausted. Mentally, and physically.

    But the sight of the three regaining their forms, getting a *second chance*.

    It's like they all got a second chance. She laughs, clapping her hands over her mouth in glee at Ida and Kalve kissing. Rosaline is slowly drifting into some muchly needed rest, and Jack-

    Well, he's had a reunion with someone special.

    "Hanpan! Nice of ya t'join us finally."
    
    And, just like in that dream, where a young woman invited two Hellions to sit with her, Gwen latches onto Jack in a tight hug, tears beginning to collect on her freckled cheeks.

    "I've been keepin' your sword safe." She pauses. "... The one you left with me, o' course."

    The other one, well. It could be down in a ravine for all she cared, at this point.

     ... But now, as the excitement of achieving the impossible begins to fade away, Gwen steps away from Jack, giving Hanpan a little scritch behind one ear. "But first... I think I speak for everybody when I say I reaaaallly wanna just lie down and sleep for, like, a week." She grins. "Who's with me?!"