2023-04-08: Sunless Sea
- Log: Sunless Sea
- Cast: Talia, White Knight Leo, Lemina Ausa, Seraph Harmaus, Hiro, Rixia, Marivel Armitage, Jean, Ivan, Margaret, Layna Manydays, Seraph Lanval, Shige Kiwako, Zed, Magilou, Gwen Whitlock, Ruby and Cirea, Zophar
- Where: Pentagulia - White Tower
- Date: April 14, 2023
- Summary: The way out of prison necessitates rescuing Lucia. The Vile Fiends and their comrades venture to the Goddess Tower. They find her... but they also find Althena's Guard.
<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.
The Vile Fiends and their comrades (and, in a couple of cases, foes) were released by the mysterious figure known as Mystere.
They made their way through the underbelly of Pentagulia. As a newer city, few parts of Pentagulia can be described as ancient; it was only built in the last hundred years. Still, there are parts that are much older, and their path led to some catacombs that far predate the founding of the city.
They gathered, coming in small groups, until they arrived in a small, octagonal chamber. There, they find an ancient statue of the Goddess; it is white and unlike the darker grey ones built more recently. It is also worn; the walls here are worn, too.
There are stairs, leading up.
Voices carry down the stairs -- which may call for quiet. And, indeed, those stairs lead into a large room that is something of a command center.
Quite literally, in fact; an ancient holograph emitter, a blue orb set into a green steel contraption, is broadcasting an image of... Spira? It shows Sin, paralyzed, outside Bevelle. A smaller image shows the Heimdall Gazzo on Filgaia, wreathed in storms.
The Goddess, black-haired and stern, stands with her arms crossed. Ghaleon stands next to her, clad in armor. There are also other figures here -- members of the Guard, summoned to attend her.
And behind them, in a barrier of golden light, is Lucia. She is suspended there.
"Sin has been immobilized," Ghaleon says. "We're less certain of the status of the warship that Rhadamanthus launched."
"So I see," Althena says. "I will need to enter my Tower -- and prepare to handle... this interloper." She motions, dismissively, with a hand to Lucia.
Ghaleon nods. "Then--"
"Go to Spira," Althena commands. "Dragonmaster, I would have you see to it that Sin is destroyed. I do not want to risk its interference any further."
There is a brief register of surprise on Ghaleon's face. Then, he nods. "As you command."
There is a flash of light -- and Ghaleon vanishes into it, the burst of blue energy crackling in his wake. Then, Althena looks to Leo and Lemina, two of her Four Heroes. "I want you to watch over her. It will take some time," Althena says. "And only I can do this part."
She turns -- and gives a baleful, incensed glower to Lucia behind her golden prison -- and vanishes herself.
That leaves the Guard inside of a large, octagonal room. It has walls of blue steel -- like many of the oldest parts of Lunar -- and the emitter in the center of the room, though it winks out. In the left corner, there is a stone stairway leading up.
At the south, there is a door -- which leads into the catacombs and, eventually, out. And, finally, at the north is a small teleporter tile. It is inactive. It might seem all there is to do is wait...
...except for, down that stone stairwell, are those who broke free from prison.
<Pose Tracker> White Knight Leo has posed.
Mystere has vanished. He trusts the Fiends to finish the job on their own--to rescue Lucia, and find out if what she said really was true.
Incidentally, White Knight Leo stands at Ghaleon's right hand, lips tight as he watches the displays. He can count the times he's been down here on one hand, and he took a different path, but there's no doubt in his mind: the Fiends and their allies are nearby.
"'--and prepare to handle this interloper.'
"I understand," Leo says, with a bow. His eyes are dark, and ringed with shadows left by sleeplessness. 'Interference', he thinks. Not 'destruction'. What is the Goddess--
Ghaleon vanishes. Althena glowers at Lucia's unconscious form. Fresh dread builds in Leo's stomach.
"I hear and obey, my Goddess." He bows again. He does not dare meet her eyes, nor does he rise--not until Althena is gone, leaving him alone with Lemina.
"Blue Magus," Leo says. He turns to Lemina. "Goddess willing, this will all be over soon." 'This'? What is 'this'?
<Pose Tracker> Lemina Ausa has posed.
Lemina feels uniquely privileged to see this space. ... honestly, she's appreciating that more than she's worrying about the situation at hand; it's the sort of opportunity she'd never have had when she was having her... childish tantrum. She remains quiet, though; she is in the presence of a Goddess and ought to act like it.
"Understood," Lemina says, with a deference she's never afforded anyone else. If there's a contradiction between this and anything else she's done or said, she's not thinking about it.
She looks to Leo as she's addressed. "We can hope!" she enthuses, sunnily, as she waits.
Absently, she begins fussing with the device at her wrist; it's become something of a habit of hers, whenever she's unsure what to do. She unseats and re-seats two Crests.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.
There is one ahead of the rest, lurking within the entrance to this innermost sanctum. There can be no mistaking Harmaus, even in silhouette: caught by the illumination from within, he appears to be but a shadow.
"Jaeja," Harmaus rumbles, his back to those who have come here to rescue Lucia with ready questions on their lips. "If it seeks, it finds it not! Gone, the false Goddess is, gone to 'Her' tower... And without even 'Her' Dragonmaster? Ah... wonders me much its intentions..."
Rising to his feet, he begins to trot into the room proper, his gaze settling on the heroes Althena had left behind. "And now... seeks it Lucia's death? Ah... and seeks it," he says, turning his head to look back over his shoulder, "Lucia's life! Wonders I which succeeds? Matter of 'Goddess' is what matters me. Matter of truth, of what lies behind! This? Less, less, yet. Little need has I for failed 'Lord'. But... it wonders me."
Light has begun to dance about his form, the pale light of an aurora in the winter's sky.
"No love has I for Althena's pawns! Yet, love has I less for those that foil me! Who claim and fail understanding! I tires of it -- alone, I seeks and finds the truth!"
His aura alight, he begins to float up into the air.
"It finds Goddess only through me!"
<Pose Tracker> Hiro has posed.
Hiro wishes that he felt one hundred percent. He still hadn't overcome the feelings surrounding his failure, but that didn't matter. They needed to get to Lucia.
As he bid Mystere farewell with a thanks towards Leo, the groups of escapees gathered, "Everyone ready? We gotta hope this time we catch them by surprise."
Well, other than Leo, he won't be surprised.
They make the stealthy trek upstairs, and at the top the few at the front halt the rest, silent as they listen. Casting a glance askance.
"What's in her tower..." Hiro murmurs, as his eyes grow wide, "... wait. Is she planning to?"
Persuade her, just like they did Lemina, as Liath noted - a warning he failed to fully comprehend at the time.
As Althena sends Ghaleon away, a breath eases out of his chest. They wait, and wait for the fake Althena to depart.
"We're getting Lucia out of here before she can do whatever she's planning. Leo and Lemina, hopefully we can talk them down because..."
He hopes neither will, especially after 'Mystere' helped. Lemina still seems to care about Lucia too. All the same...
"Harmaus?" Hiro says, after listening to his whole speech as he rises in that pale auroral light, still angry over what happened before, "I don't have time to waste pitying you today. Right now, you're not some seeker of truth. You're just another obstacle on our way to her." And after he says that he motions to the others, "Go. Go!"
Hiro rushes out, past Harmaus, the group still a bit haggard from prison life, Hiro has his sword drawn. "... All we want is Lucia. Whatever this phony Althena is planning to do to her, we're not going to let it happen."
As his eyes look from one to another, warily watching Harmaus out of the corner of his eyes, "Lemina, Leo. I've known both of you for years, and I don't want to fight either of you. Just move out of the way. I may not know much about what's going on here but whatever you think a command from this Althena is worth..."
He lowers the tip of his sword, away from them, "I do know one thing. Your friendship? It means more to me, than your loyalty does to her. If that means anything to you then... please, let Lucia go."
<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.
Talia is running along with the others.
When she escaped, she didn't have a sword. She does now; she got it while they were looking around the catacombs, when she went hunting for a weapon. It is a long, slender, double-edged blade that is two-toned with gold and silver. She doesn't have a sheath.
It's so new that she hasn't even told her brother about it. She glances sideways at him as they enter, flashing him a smile. "Surprise, no?"
She tilts her head for a moment.
Then, she looks back at Hiro. She nods, and her expression becomes more serious -- and then she mutters a curse, softly, under her breath. "He's really trying this, here...!?"
She looks at Lemina -- there's a briefly apologetic look -- and then at Leo. She looks more conflicted, then.
Then, Talia looks at Harmaus. She narrows her eyes, before drawing her sword. When she does, a couple of runes on it light up. "We're getting Lucia," she declares to him, "and then we are leaving! Your truth isn't here, Harmaus! And I doubt it's one you will want, after you find it!"
DC: Talia switches forms to Mystic Knight Talia! ==== +buckets: Pentagulia - White Tower ======================================== '| *Lemina Ausa (Boss 1) - Margaret, Magilou, Ivan, and Jean (4/4) '| '| '| '| *White Knight Leo (Boss 1) - Rixia, Zed, Marivel Armitage, and Hiro (4/4) '| '| '| '| *Seraph Harmaus (Boss 1) - Seraph Lanval, Layna Manydays, Shige Kiwako, '| '| Gwen Whitlock, and Talia (5/5) '| '| '| '| Unassigned Players: White Knight Leo, Lemina Ausa, and Seraph Harmaus '|
<Pose Tracker> Rixia has posed.
Rixia's... Rixia's been a subject of contention to some of the Guards that were on duty in the last 24 hours or so.
First, there was the supposed desertion of the Goddess' order to arrest the prisoners. She made herself very scarce there, seen running away, and then... there was news of some of the prison-stationed Guards on duty being attacked by, as fate would have it, by an individual of the Guard that matches her description.
She's been through a lot of panic, but Lanval and Layna have helped her settle through... some of it. That their path leads only deeper into the heart of Pentagulia just makes her stand more on edge -- she'd really rather abscond from it all rather than face her sins. What Althena and Ghaleon discuss isn't something she understands, but...
She'd really rather turn tail and run here, but Hiro's driven to rescue Lucia. ... yeah, there's no way he could turn and run at this point. But there, above them, there's the Blue Magus, Lemina, the Seraph Harmaus, who was there before when Marivel was attacking, and... and...
'Go, go!'
The decision is made for them, and Rixia tumbles out and-- well, her white Guard outfit is somewhat stained with Guard blood at the moment. It doesn't feel good to have to face the music.
"C-come on, Mister Leo! I've seen the look in your eyes! This isn't right! I know you know this isn't right!" Rixia blurts out, forced to draw her gunblade out at the ready. "That's not..."
She scrunches her face, and then just lays it out on the table clearly:
"That's not a goddess I want to follow..."
==== +buckets: Pentagulia - White Tower ========================================
'| *Lemina Ausa (Boss 1) - Margaret, Magilou, Ivan, and Jean (4/4) '|
'| '|
'| *White Knight Leo (Boss 1) - Zed, Marivel Armitage, Hiro, and Rixia (4/4) '|
'| '|
'| *Seraph Harmaus (Boss 5) - Layna Manydays, Seraph Lanval, Shige Kiwako, '|
'| Gwen Whitlock, and Talia (5/5) '|
'| '|
'| Unassigned Players: White Knight Leo, Lemina Ausa, and Seraph Harmaus '|
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
Marivel Armitage walks in at a patience pace, looking at a a pocketwatch. She has returned to her humanoid form from her 'bat' form and hums lightly to herself as she taps the item lightly. "Let's see... Judging about now...Should be the day." She closes the watch.
"I'd like to thank our friends at the Guard for arresting Mariel and I. Thanks to that, we learned what I needed to learn down here."
"Harmaus," Marivel says. "Are you curious about what we found down there, what we learned? This time, tis not a prank at all."
Her gaze turns past Lemina and towards Leo. "You can check with Mariel if you do not believe me. I can understand a bit of a lack of faith at the moment but..."
Her eyes slant towards Hiro for a moment before going back to Leo.
"Thanks to the hero Mystere's assistance-- Mariel Shige and I found some Elw runes underneath the city. Of course, even from the Memory Maze I would have no idea what they meant. They were a crude writing, unlikely to ever be written by a true Elw's hand--or even anyone who used to be one."
"But," Marivel says. "Mariel was able to translate them all the same and do you know what we learned, Heroes?"
"The ritual would drain Lunar of life and leave it in a state akin to that of Filgaia."
"So," Marivel says, extending a hand and snapping her finger. Power fills Rixia as Marivel uses a small portion of her magic to enfuse her with strength and power.
Marivel look a bit dizzy for a moment after, bringing her hand to her forehead. "...Still haven't recovered..." She murmurs before looking back up to Leo.
"So," Marivel says. "My friend, if you are still willing to see myself as such..."
She thinks of Kaguya's words to her.
"Whatever your plans are, are you willing to gamble the people of not just Pentagulia and Spira--but the whole world--to see them to fruition?"
<Pose Tracker> Jean has posed.
Jean had a few drinks, and sat down to meditate. 'Sleep' is a luxury she can't really afford at the moment; she's been awake longer than this under worse conditions, so that much is fine. When Hiro calls?
"I'm ready," Jean says.
She approaches clad in gray, claws at her sides. It's not the uniform of the Shadow Dragon, but something different, something more like she wore when hunting them. ...It's also not one of her dancing outfits, by the same token. She walks after Hiro, her green hair up in a sidetail, and she looks to the others.
Harmaus. Leo. ...Lemina.
"Hiro," Jean says, from behind. "...They're not going to listen. If Leo were going to step aside, then... He would've by now."
She approaches Lemina, instead, coming to a stop some strides away from her, still with the group but obviously facing in her direction.
"...Lemina," she says. "I think there's something wrong. You shouldn't know the stances--or some of the magic--that you know." She remembers, she discussed it with Magilou...
"But I know it isn't as easy as saying so."
"So, Lemina..."
"For the sake of our friendship. For you. I'll show you my resolve!"
Jean steps back into a familiar stance--it would look familiar on any adherent of the Dragon styles. She sinks her hands into her claws.
"I won't let a false Goddess have my friends. ...Not Lucia... and not you."
"So come on!"
GS: Marivel Armitage has attacked Rixia with Power Boost! GS: Marivel Armitage has completed her action. GS: Rixia accepts Marivel Armitage's Power Boost for 0 hit points! GS: Hyper applied to Rixia! GS: FP up! Gleam activated!
DC: Jean switches forms to Shadow Hunter Jean!
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Ivan nods as Talia shows off her new sword. "Oh, good, you found-- ..." A blink. It would be normal to pick up any old sword while escaping, but this one seems special. "Wow, that's nice!" Not much time to admire it though, when there is Lucia to save. He gives a 'see, I told you??' gesture to the others when they find Leo exactly where they might expect to find him -- fighting for the wrong side. OBVIOUSLY he wasn't the one who helped them escape, that would be crazy!
He's accompanied by the awful new Blue Magus they met before, Lemina. And... Harmaus? Ivan doesn't know what Harmaus's deal is, but Talia seems to have previous dealings, and with Hiro facing off against Leo, he focuses his attention on Lemina.
"You! Didn't you say you consider yourself Lucia's friend? How can you be keeping her captive here?"
<Pose Tracker> Margaret has posed.
How does Margaret feel right now?
It's a good question. Incredulous discovery upon discovery had come, topped on top of an impossible hope and the assistance of help unlooked for; help not just from the Blue Star, but from an entire alternate star entirely, who had COME to the Blue Star.
Just as Margaret had.
Joy redoubled when Dollie arrived too, even if the healer woman had experienced her own gutshaking fury. Margaret could not ease it, and frankly she thinks some of it is the grieving process, and it is why Dollie is bringing up the rear.
In that momentary hideout, Margaret had been able to wash up. Instead of a bandage she had been able to wrap her numbed hand up into a reasonably comfortable shape with some actual spare cloth, albeit derived from a bedsheet. Assistance had let her do something with her hair too, for she had realized, perhaps belatedly, that having a long mane of glossy black trailing behind you looks *incredible* but also slows you down.
And so, Margaret's hair has been wrapped up and heaped up into two opposing loose buns, each bound in white cloth, with a severe part down the center of her head. Is it the most glamorous of styles? Maybe not. Is it going to be easily grabbed? Not so much. And that is perhaps the most obvious change in her appearance as she stalks upstairs and gazes towards the others present.
The White Knight is given a melancholy look. Her eyes, which look eight years younger between makeup and respite, say: I still meant it.
Harmaus is given an incredulous look, but then her gaze tracks towards the Blue Wizard, Lemina Ausa. How does Margaret feel about her?
"Well, well, well! If it isn't the Magic Guild of Vane, in the ascendant at LAST!" Margaret shouts.
"Do you know, once, I dreamed of taking Neo-Vane for my own," Margaret says as she struts inwards, head tilting backwards slightly, eyes wide. "I thought, whether it was in five years or in fifty, when Borgan finally cacked it and went to the worms, I could make things better. I could mend the bridges, if they hadn't been mended already. I thought that would be a kind thing. But I suppose my dreams have changed, and that one's been left behind, now. Ruins, nothing more."
"And now I come here, at last, and I see that YOU have found that seat yourself!" Margaret says, and she smiles with literally zero amusement or honest emotion behind it. "Congratulations. But do you know," she continues, "in my own opinion, as a mage, as a property developer, as a lot of other things, there's something that HEROES oughtn't to do."
A nebular aura sparkles around Margaret as her spells come to her. Her left hand tightens into a fist, and then comes down to grip the hilt of her blade. Perhaps the last she has with her. "They oughtn't to STAB people," Margaret continues, "*especially* not when they're giving up peacefully. But ultimately, that's just my opinion."
She stalks forwards. "Perhaps you have different feelings," Margaret continues. "Come. Let us REASON together, darling. Let's have a civilized debate about *appropriate force*."
Her eyes flick back and forth a little towards Ivan and Jean. The look of cold fury on her face doesn't disappear, but there is, perhaps, a transient sense that she's re-checking the room. But it's brief.
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
At first, Layna had been overwhelmed by the sudden reappearance of Havel Bladewall in her life - now, from what she has heard, with Althena's Guard. It was a heavy blow.
...But. She's one to sit and mope around for long. And she always stays true to herself, regardless of what happens. So when Rixia gave herself and Lanval the opportunity to escape, she gladly took it. And now, after taking the opportunity to relieve the abandoned warehouse of some of its goods... she's here, at the foot of the Goddess's Tower. But before that, there are those who would stand in the way. Layna cracks her knuckles - and then sends Rixia a grin as she pleads with Leo.
"Aye, good on you, lass. I'm proud of you. Lay your heart bear to the world!" Layna encourages, then turns her attention toward Harmaus.
"...Still don't like us, huh? Well, alright, then." She says, cracking her knuckles. "You wanna see who'll come out on top? Then I'll show you everything I've got and let you decide for yourself."
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.
Lanval's with the rest. Someone brought a large amount of lamp oil for him, unwittingly, as a focus for his powers. That's a neat trick the Seraphim have - using items aligned with the element they're strong against makes it easier to channel Artes through, and for him, that's... flammable liquids of all kinds.
So he drank even more from the storehouse and he's okay enough now, (meta)physically. Same old jolly large-frame Lanval. Well, large-frame Lanval. There's not much here to be jolly about.
He's not far off from when Rixia first appears, and he's taken aback by how quickly she asserts herself to try and reach out to reason to Leo. As for Lanval himself...
He's walking straighter up, stepping forward until hearing what Marivel has to say about 'the ritual.'
"That'sh bad." A bit too understated, for how severe that is, taking the wind out of a lot of any dramatic declarations he has to say as he's holding his drinking gourd close. That piece of the very Water of Filgaia itself of which he's been entrusted, as the Oracle of Schturdark.
"Mmmm. Thught 'd have a looooot more ta shay," Lanval murmurs, humbly, in the heart of Pentagulia and in the face of the source of so many of his woes that led up to him being swept into the lives of the Drifters (and/or tripped over), so, he looks to the glowing, floating, Harmaus with one eye partially open in a squint.
"Mmmm." He scratches his chin as he considers the deal. Find the Goddess only through Harmaus.
"Do ya want the truth, or do ya want whatever yer thinkin' ta be made real? Mmmph. Goddess... or no Goddess," Lanval takes a sip, "'m not lookin' fer that, sho ya ain't pointin' the right way."
"What 'm lookin' fer... ish a friend in need. 'n I don't think yer pointin' the right way fer any of that."
He has a look over to Layna, briefly. This could be the last chance they have to snap Harmaus out of what he's got going.
<Pose Tracker> Shige Kiwako has posed.
Shige's bringing up the rear, so to speak. The feline was all, but climbing up the walls before finally lapsing into something of a stupor during her stint in the cells. Now that she's free, there's something of a finality though. That realization she can't just bail. Hide out on Filgaia for a while. Maybe leave the barracks haunted with loud poltergeists or something.
She lets Marivel speak though. Her knowledge on the subject basically started and ended with "This will kill the planet and do other horrible things." She does nod in agreement with the Crimson Noble when her name comes up.
She isn't reaching for her pack like she normally would. Partially because her own stash was stolen and probably already consumed. Partially because she didn't like the local wine she'd found. Mostly though, it boils down to something of a realization that she can't just numb it all when it's this bad a situation. She needs to face it head on. No hiding, no blurring it out.
The lantern is lifted in her left hand. Casting long shadows before her. Silent, still looking haunted herself. More confident about what she has to do and what must be done.
There's a small voice in the back of her head insisting silence is better than trying to say anything serious, creepy or even funny. She defers to that voice for now at least.
<Pose Tracker> Zed has posed.
Zed--
Is not here.
In fact, anything resembling a Zed-shaped object mysteriously vanished from within the prison minutes ago, leaving a decidedly Zed-shaped dotted outline in the space he had occupied. This is, as all reputable and well-regarded Zedologists know, probably not a good thing for anybody else. In fact, it may incite a distinct sense of creeping doom among those who know him well. A Zed Dread, you might call it.
Where could he be? What could he be doing? What manner of schoolyard mischief is he unleashing people who might actually deserve it upon reflection?
WHO KNOWS!?
You. Soon. Because up until this moment, this encounter has been distinctly Zedless. But then, someone mentions a threat to the world-- a threat that might end all hope of Filgaia ever regaining its sparkle. A threat...
That a true, dark hero cannot abide.
"WAIT!"
The voice roars. From nowhere, lightning flashes, thunder crashes! Just behind a pillar, a distinctly dog-shaped golen alien creature sits with its face trifurcated and a LIGHTNING GUN extruden from is gaping maw. And up above, standing dramatically on an appropriate ledge, there is...
...The silhouette of a great warrior...!
"White Knight Leo-- I know the pain in your heart. You, who are torn between doing one's duty and doing what one knows is right, hear me!"
...His scarf flutters majestically in a wind of pure imagination...!
"It's deja vu! I've just been in your place before! High on your god's deceit, no idea where you should go! I know it. And I know what you do here! One last bout, isn't it? One last duty to finish, and then-- AND THEN, you will listen to your heart!"
...His hair-- green as the forests of a Filgaia that once was and, if he has his druthers, shall be once more...!
"But then you finish, and the dread strikes! You can't decide! So maybe-- maybe one more time. Maybe you buy yourself more time to choose. But the clock is ticking, White Knight Leo! There will soon be a time when there will be no more time to turn back!"
...His sword, a fierce fang from a distant and long-dead star, menaces with an edge of deepest midnight speckled with sparks of purest starlight...!
"Tell me, White Knight... Why wait? Seize the truth within you, finally let your righteous fury overflow, and decide-- now! NOW! NOW IS THE TIME! AHAHAHA~! But... I can tell... you are still troubled..."
He leaps! He strikes with the weight of a rising meteor, sword trailed by an aurora contrail of psychedelic starfire!
He is...
...Wearing a black domino mask over his eyes.
...And his scarf is red instead of orange.
"WORRY NOT! Before your indecision dooms two worlds to inexorable decline, I, ZEDANE THE TRIBAL, shall clear your vision and open your eyes to your true path! The path... OF THE ~LIGHT HERO~"
...
...
That's Zed. That's just Zed. It's just. Zed.
Or... is it...?
GS: Zed has attacked White Knight Leo with Saint Arts - Starstrider's Valor! GS: Zed has gained 1 Combo! GS: Zed's stances have changed to Avenger! GS: Zed has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
Magilou, of course, is here. She's escaped prison with a terrifying goth and a himbo who loves swords too much, like it's 9564 SD.
She is not leading the charge. It might even be possible to miss her, towards the back, hands all laced behind her head as her eyes lid to watch Harmaus. The arc of her back exposes the bandages around her midsection, obscuring what would normally be an exposed belly. They're less bloody than they were. That's the power of an elixer and a dressing change! "It's too bad," she says, to Harmaus, all too distant. "Not that I don't understand the urge to do something right yourself..."
Magilou sighs, with a vague shrug. "Medissa always made caretaking look so easy. I wonder how she did it?" She ambles out, at less of a breakneck pace to Talia, but it's to that fellow assassin she looks when she says: "Take care of him, won't you?" It sounds like such a nice and hopeful statement, not knowing how much blood they both have scattered behind them.
"Haha, I just don't feel like it..."
Don't accuse her of sentimentality.
Particularly not as she follows off along behind Margaret, whose hair was carefully done up. (Magilou's still hangs long down her back. "I fear nothing!", she chirped, at the time.) Her pace is unhurried, fingers laced behind her head. It's a quiet comment. They often are.
"If, indeed, you've any reason at all," she follows up on Margaret's tense statements, stepping out behind her and holding a paper doll delicately between her fingers. "I'd say you can't much build a relationship off of a knife wound, but it's hardly the worst impression an Ausa's made on me. Oh, the stories I could tell you!" She could, and she doesn't, with a knife-eaten grin.
(She smiles aside, apropos of nothing, as Zedane the Tribal bursts in. Men and their swords. A thousand years has changed nothing.)
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
The age of these parts of the fortress, as well as how they compare to other parts, aren't lost on Gwen. Maybe, if she wasn't already looking at them due to the strangely familiar (but still hopelessly unreadable) Filgaian runes or hadn't been staring at stone walls for days in a vain hope of something stimulating to look at to pass the time between meals and sleep, she might have missed it. It did bring up the question of what all of this conspiracy was for. Power? Influence?
Well, it doesn't matter. Because of Lucia's quest, the conspiracy has been discovered. After doing her good deed of helping those two nice Solaris agents get out of prison, and bodyslamming into poor Loren down some stairs, Gwen herself is on a roll.
Seeing everyone gathered, Gwen breathes a sigh of relief and straightens, her eyes scanning for that nice masked Leo annnddd he's not masked, and standing against them.
".... Make up yer damn mind, man, at least Kaguya committed to the whole bit..." she grumbles under her breath, striding forward.
.... Which is when Harmaus trots into the chamber, lights dancing off his silky fur.
Gwen doesn't think twice. Her right palm reaches out, and she promptly fires at the light Seraph.
"Was patient with you once," the courier says, her words gaining a brusque edge that manages to get snake past the cheery armor. "Ain't gonna do it again. Get out of the way or I'll keep shootin'."
So many displays of bravery, love, friendship, and calls to bonds that have gone untied. They are all the fabric that weaves the story of this climax, in the break of despair the heroes had to deal with during their imprisonment. Gwen... shall shoot the damn cat who wrapped her up on thorns, and she already feels it was all worth it.
GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Crackshot! GS: Gwen Whitlock has gained 1 Combo! GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action. ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= ____________________________| Form The Heretic Son |____________________________
GS: Seraph Harmaus suffers a terrible blow from Gwen Whitlock's Crackshot for 119 hit points! GS: Cripple applied to Seraph Harmaus! GS: Charge!! You gain 40 FP! (That's 25 more than usual!) GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! GS: White Knight Leo solidly guards Zed's Saint Arts - Starstrider's Valor for 64 hit points! GS: FP up! Power Burst and Guard bonus activated!
<Pose Tracker> Lemina Ausa has posed.
"Oh, come off it, Hiro," Lemina fires at the explorer as he pleads with her. "Don't act like she's not just undoing all the stuff you did." She can't even pretend to buy into this; she nearly rounds on him, but Jean intercedes.
"Something wrong?" she asks, incredulous. "I learned this from the man you and Pearl killed -- after you killed him. And the magic... well, Althena's been mega-accommodating on the library front." She nearly rushes Jean right then and there, but Ivan asks her a question -- and she's happy to answer. "This will correct the years of awful things that Hiro's done, that's all." Her high ponytail sways as she moves to get into her stance --
And then it's Margaret who intercedes. Suddenly everyone has something to say to her. "I'm not going to take that from a traitor." The zeal of a convert always does run hottest. "Interrupting the Blue Magus's magic is its own crime. And don't worry -- I'll raise Vane to the heavens."
"After you're dead and gone."
Magilou addresses her. Lemina's eyes narrow, and she says, "I guess I've got my work cut out for me. I'm already going to be changing how the Ausa name is remembered."
She slides a Crest into her belt. It reports, "POWER!" as it has twice before, now, and then Lemina settles into her stance more fully and begins the work.
One might expect Lemina to lead the assault with a spell -- with a great show of her new magical power. She does not. Instead, she springs forward toward those who have made themselves her enemies with a speed one might not expect from Lemina -- toward Magilou, then Ivan, then Margaret. Each of them gets a quick, vicious palm strike. It's only Jean who receives something different, as her bracelet glows with the power of its current Crest. It helpfully reports, in synch with Lemina's own voice, "Aqua Laser!"
That upturned palm sends out a burst of light ringed with spiraling water. Lemina knows better than to fight Jean 'cleanly' in a similar style.
GS: Lemina Ausa spends 1 Combo on Link! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Lemina Ausa with Dragon*Driver: Power!! GS: Lemina Ausa has gained 4 Combo! GS: Lemina Ausa has launched an attack Link! GS: Lemina Ausa's stances have changed from Counter to Counter and Hero! GS: Lemina Ausa accepts Lemina Ausa's Dragon*Driver: Power! for 0 hit points! GS: Hyper applied to Lemina Ausa! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Jean with Light: Aqua Laser! GS: Lemina Ausa has gained 1 Combo! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Ivan with Blue Dragon Strike! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Margaret with Blue Dragon Strike! GS: Lemina Ausa has gained 1 Combo! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Magilou with Blue Dragon Strike! GS: Lemina Ausa has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Jean takes a solid hit from Lemina Ausa's Light: Aqua Laser for 191 hit points! GS: Riposte applied to Lemina Ausa! GS: Margaret takes a glancing hit from Lemina Ausa's Blue Dragon Strike for 71 hit points! GS: FP up! Evade bonus activated! GS: Ivan takes a glancing hit from Lemina Ausa's Blue Dragon Strike for 81 hit points! GS: Shield applied to Lemina Ausa! GS: FP up! Evade bonus activated! GS: Magilou solidly guards Lemina Ausa's Blue Dragon Strike for 74 hit points! GS: Shield applied to Lemina Ausa!
<Pose Tracker> White Knight Leo has posed.
"We can hope," Leo says. If he hopes, it is the hope of a desperate man. He stares at the deactivated emitter for a few long moments, as if it will come back to life and show him something uplifting.
Light blooms in the doorway. Leo's sword clears its scabbard in remarkable time. His gaze falls on Harmaus, and his expression twists like he'd just stepped in something truly foul. "You." His voice is a growl. "You dare defile the Goddess' sanctuary, Hellion?!" But Harmaus isn't alone, and Leo's eyes dart up to those behind him. His chest tightens with tension.
"Nor I, you," Leo says to Hiro, his voice tiny. "Or you, Lady Rixia." She's made her choice, it seems. But they're both pleading with him, and he can feel his heart twisting, breaking--
Leo's ears flatten out at Marivel's accusation, and he glances about the assembled escapees. "Mariel isn't here," he says, the anger rising again. "How convenient for you. 'A test. A trial. A chance to rescue my beloved.' You terrorized this city, threatened its people--"
Then--
Leo's jaw tightens to hard those close to him can hear him grind his teeth. He's like a spring that someone kept winding and winding without any regard for metal stress. He settles into a defensive stance, hands shaking. Rixia and Hiro's words echo in his mind.
And then he surges forwards, meeting Doom Bringer with his own sword with a clash of sparks. He shoves the weapon aside, powering through the strain in his shoulders, and sweeps his sword in a bright, eye-searing sweep. Light fills the control room, the bulk of it aimed directly at Zedane. Leo wastes no time; another pair of air-cuts send twin Demon Fangs flying at Marivel and Rixia. Leo steps forward, settling into a slightly different stance as he swings one-handed at Hiro.
His eyes are dark, angry--like smoldering coals.
GS: White Knight Leo has attacked Marivel Armitage with Demon Fang! GS: White Knight Leo has gained 3 Combo! GS: White Knight Leo has attacked Rixia with Demon Fang! GS: White Knight Leo has gained 2 Combo! GS: White Knight Leo has attacked Zed with Radiant Blade! GS: White Knight Leo has gained 1 Combo! GS: White Knight Leo has attacked Hiro with Flashing Crescent! GS: White Knight Leo enters a Counter stance! GS: White Knight Leo has gained 2 Combo! GS: White Knight Leo's stances have changed from Counter to Counter and Stoic! GS: White Knight Leo has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Hiro solidly guards White Knight Leo's Flashing Crescent for 80 hit points! GS: FP up! Power Burst and Guard bonus activated! GS: Zed takes a glancing hit from White Knight Leo's Radiant Blade for 62 hit points! GS: Blind blocked! GS: FP up! Power Burst and Evade bonus activated! GS: Rixia solidly guards White Knight Leo's Demon Fang for 50 hit points! GS: FP up! Guard bonus and Gleam activated! GS: Marivel Armitage solidly guards White Knight Leo's Demon Fang for 50 hit points! GS: FP up! Guard bonus activated! GS: White Knight Leo has completed his action. ==== +buckets: Pentagulia - White Tower ======================================== '| *Lemina Ausa (Boss 4) - Jean, Ivan, Margaret, and Magilou (4/4) '| '| '| '| *White Knight Leo (Boss 4) - Hiro, Rixia, Marivel Armitage, and Zed (4/4) '| '| '| '| *Seraph Harmaus (Boss 5) - Talia, Layna Manydays, Seraph Lanval, Shige '| '| Kiwako, and Gwen Whitlock (5/5) '| '| '| '| Unassigned Players: White Knight Leo, Lemina Ausa, and Seraph Harmaus '|
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.
His gaze meets Magilou's own. It lingers there; one ear twitches. And pointedly, Harmaus looks away from the one who perhaps knows his heart best.
"I does dare. I comes to slay its false Goddess, White Knight!" is Harmaus' retort to Leo.
He isn't on anyone's side. Neither will he simply let any of them pass him by -- or do as they have been ordered. He is here to test them, to try them -- but unlike in the Light Shrine, not for any higher purpose. He will obstruct their advance simply because they are so counter to his wishes.
"Ah? My truth is not here?" he says, echoing Talia in a tone that can only be mockery. "So thinks it, wrongly! Source of all lies dwells here. Once I peels it back, only truth remains! But if Lucia is what it wishes, then... I permits it not! Lucia seeks 'Althena'. 'Althena' is mine own to slay, false and true alike! And should true Althena not be..."
He trails off, letting the remainder of that sentiment go unstated, because Marivel speaks of something he does not yet know, ever a clear way to gain his attentions.
"Yes? Then it speaks!"
And Marivel does.
Harmaus responds in laughter. "Ah! See, see, the truth of the Goddess! Ever has She sought thus! But I slays Her -- I returns Lunar to what it must be! ...And yet, it stands in my way? All of it stands in my way!"
To which Lanval simply asks, in much the same sense that Magilou herself once had, if he seeks the truth that exists or the truth he wants to hear.
"What exists! The truth that exists!" Harmaus snarls, well and truly riled at such needling. He had been calm before when others had spoken to him, but here and now, he is alight with rage. "I hears it speaking to me! I finds it -- alone!"
So he wants to see who comes out on top, Layna asks him, perhaps rhetorically. "Ha... hahaha! Yes! Then it shows me -- it shows me its power! I sees, here and now, whose will prevails!
Hiro--
Hiro refuses to have anything to do with Harmaus, for all that he's just another obstacle in their path, now. Leaving the matter of the mad Seraph to others, he rushes past to engage the Blue Magess and White Knight directly. Harmaus, for his part, blooms with a brilliant light.
This is when Gwen shoots him. The force behind the shot is strong: Harmaus is flung back to impact a nearby device and briefly tumbles to the floor. But the spiritual body is not the same as flesh and soon he rises again, his aura blinding.
BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKHUcCQ65mg
"It tries me not!" he calls out, and light erupts from him in a single lancing burst, tracing across the floor as it arcs towards Gwen.
Nor does he stop there, his amber gaze settling on Talia. "Ah... learns now the pet its final lesson! -Embrace what is hidden-," he intones, white light burning brilliantly about him. "Synkatathesis!" The fire that comes for her is a blinding white with the barest hints of blue trailing behind: its heat is a there-and-gone thing but it touches not flesh at all. This is a flame that consumes the spirit.
"-Only that which is true is fit to grasp. Now, prove yourself!- Phantasiai!" Nor does it end with her: a brilliant white halo erupts around Talia and telescopes outwards in a wash of solar fire, seeking to but scour and burn away all that they touch.
GS: Seraph Harmaus spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Sudden Dawn! GS: Seraph Harmaus has gained 1 Combo! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Talia with Synkatathesis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has gained 2 Combo! GS: Seraph Harmaus spends 1 Combo on Poison! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Shige Kiwako with Phantasiai! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Seraph Lanval with Phantasiai! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Layna Manydays with Phantasiai! GS: Seraph Harmaus has gained 1 Combo! GS: Seraph Harmaus has completed his action. GS: COUNTER! Talia counterattacks Seraph Harmaus with Blizzard Blade! GS: Talia solidly guards Seraph Harmaus's Synkatathesis for 0 hit points! GS: Break, Jam, Poison, and Slow applied to Talia! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Sufferer activated!
<Pose Tracker> Hiro has posed.
Hiro casts a glance aside at Marivel's explanation of the Elw runes and the ritual, emotions stewing within them then back forward at Leo and Lemina.
Jean says they're not going to listen, and he tells her quietly, "One last gasp for a miracle I suppose." Before he flips his sword up, "One last attempt but... I'm already prepared to make one with my own hands, if they don't come through."
Lucia had made enough miracles for all of them, it was time he made one for her.
Lemina though? Hiro looks at her, and there's a distinct frown, "I still don't have any idea what you're talking about Lemina. 'What I did'? You were there when the Guardians tried to lift the Curse on her! You think if it was something I did then they wouldn't have said something?!"
Something's wrong, she can't be in her right mind, there's just no way, but he doesn't know what words to reach her other than refuting them.
And then Zed straight up charges him, with a Nomme De Guerre, "Can't fault Zed for being consistent." A beat, "Wait is he trying to be Mystere? Is he already stealing your thing? ... Now that's cold Zed."
Leo's forced to defend, and he's on Hiro not long after, a Demon Fang swepping past him at Rixia and Marivel, even as he swings his blade. Hiro steps into it, meeting the blade in a parry. Sparks fly even as he tries to hold back Leo's sword, arms shaking.
And he looks him right in the eye, unflinching. "Rixia's right. It hasn't been in your eyes for years now Leo. Not since before Gagazet, Bevelle... Luca."
There's a look in his eyes of hardening resolve, like he's made a decision of his own, "It's time to stop running into walls Leo. It's time to make some actual decisions. Because this righteous anger you're putting off?"
Suddenly twisting the blade away, he begins a series of flashing sword movements and cuts, trying to beat him back. "I'm just NOT SEEING IT! That's not what you're really angry about - IS IT LEO?"
GS: Hiro has attacked White Knight Leo with Sword Dance! GS: Hiro enters a Counter stance! GS: Hiro has gained 3 Combo! GS: Hiro has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Layna Manydays solidly guards Seraph Harmaus's Phantasiai for 23 hit points! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Jam and Poison applied to Layna Manydays!
<Pose Tracker> Margaret has posed.
Zedane the Tribal! The Hero of Light! His presence eases Margaret's heart. So do many others here. Jean herself, and Hiro, however much Hiro may have suffered. The Seraph Lanval, a jolly and wise figure. The ancient and fell sorceress M. Armitage. The twins Talia and Ivan; young Rixia; the pirate queen Layna; the doughty drifter Gwendolyn (Margaret is not sure if that is Gwen's full name; she assumes, though, very well) and last but surely not least, the melancholy Shige.
And, of course, Magilou too. Margaret steals a glance towards her, but only a small one. It would be beyond tragic to lower her guard NOW.
"Oh, that's quite a bark," Margaret retorts, still kind of half-grinning at Lemina. "Care to come over here and show the bite?"
Lemina slots something that says POWER. As in, the audible word becomes audible to Margaret's gracious elven ears.
Margaret's eyes flick slightly to the side. That wasn't in the plan.
Lemina then springs forwards, swiftly, and all of Margaret's pleasant strategizations/fantasies about just immediately bullying Lemina with high speed backhands and solar plexus strikes until her lunch money fell out evaporate like spilled rubbing alcohol on a sunny front step! The look on Margaret's face clearly communicates this: it speaks, just as her momentary regard to Leo a few moments ago was, but this time it says: OHHHHH NOOOOOOO
Starlight Express keeps Margaret from eating an entire wagon of manure. She is already pulling back when Lemina gets close enough to palm strike, but it's mostly a hip thing, and so her blow's followthrough hits her nonetheless... hits her and sends her flying backwards nearly three yards, not quite enough to hit the ground but enough to land on her arse and bounce for a moment. "Guh!" she says, before pulling herself upwards and dashing inwards--
"Doing your exercises, I see! But there's always going to be a gap between what you can learn from manuals and the experience you win on the COLD STREETS!" With this Margaret draws her blade, aiming to simply and directly carve a big slice out of Lemina; an outcome that has discouraged many a mage since Lunar was young.
GS: Margaret has attacked Lemina Ausa with Swift Retribution! GS: Margaret has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Jean has posed.
"Right," Jean says. "We'll make our own!" She nods firmly to Hiro. They are, in this... on the same page. But Jean is not the only one with reasons to face Lemina, of course. She glances to her side, at Magilou, who she'd poken with about this. To her other side, to Margaret, of Neo-Vane. To Ivan and Talia, with Talia's new sword and Ivan's--
"Right. 'Undoing' the harm Hiro apparently did. That's the story, right?"
Maybe she should be madder that Lemina stabbed Magilou. She cares about Magilou. But that's practically a 'hello' in their kind of life. It just doesn't register so badly.
After they killed him?
"Lunn's ghost?" Jean says, and narrows her eyes. "I didn't kill him. But I'm glad he's dead. He was a monster, Lemina. He was everything I opposed--he was playing us, all along!"
'Power', Lemina says. But Lemian launches into the others, and it' s a surprise, all right. But Jean knows how to defend against that maneuver.
Unfortunately, that's not the maneuver she's using.
The burst of light and water crashes into Jean and knocks her flying backward into the wall, impacting hard. She never was that great with magical assaults. Lemina knows that...
"The Lemina I know wouldn't be so ruthless. She never had the killer instinct to stab Magilou like that. It was one of her better qualities. Greedy, vain, grasping..."
"...And kind-hearted. That's the Lemina I knew."
"But..." Jean picks herself up off the ground, and wipes some blood from her mouth on the back of her hand. "You know me well enough to know it'll take a lot more than that to take me down."
Jean does not drop into a martial stance; instead, she sets one foot down before the other, quickly walking to a beat only she can hear. She whirls, next, and then leaps, trying to get up into Lemina's space and spin and twirl around her, keeping close to try to keep her attention on her.
As Jean dances the steps, fluttering wings begin to crash up and around the two of them, violet-winged and spreading poisonous dust--illusions, of course. But they are real enough. They don't affect Margaret, though. Only Lemina. Despite the fact that now they're all whirling together here.
"But you know I'm right about Lunn. Why else would his style be so similar to mine? Because he taught me the martial arts."
"And do you know what he said the point was!?"
GS: Jean has attacked Lemina Ausa with Butterfly Dance! GS: Jean has gained 2 Combo! GS: Jean has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
"How did Hiro get to be some kind of supervillain who's poisoned Lucia's mind and body? Does that look like a person with that kind of power? He's just some guy!" He sweeps a hand out at Hiro, then adds, "Sorry, Hiro!" in case this, um, unflattering argument is overheard. "What if it's all exactly what it looks like instead? Exactly what Lucia said it was? The people WITH power used it to lie to you! To everyone!"
Lemina comes at them with a flurry of martial arts moves, which comes as a surprise. Ivan draws on his acrobatic training to flip away from the attack, which clips his leg instead, leading to a hard landing as the sting radiates up his body. He unsheathes his umbrella, unfurling it with a burst of golden light that carries both a knockback force and a wave of what feels like judgment.
"What if that isn't the Goddess you're following? What do your actions mean, then?"
GS: Ivan has attacked Lemina Ausa with Umbrella Rebuke! GS: Ivan has gained 2 Combo! GS: Ivan has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Seraph Lanval suffers a terrible blow from Seraph Harmaus's Phantasiai for 56 hit points! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Seraph Lanval's Poison Ward may block the effect! GS: Jam and Poison applied to Seraph Lanval! ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= ____________________________| Form The Heretic Son |____________________________
GS: Seraph Harmaus solidly guards Talia's Blizzard Blade for 40 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Harmaus gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! GS: Lemina Ausa solidly guards Margaret's Swift Retribution for 44 hit points! GS: FP up! Guard bonus and Gleam activated! GS: Gamble: Lowest! Lemina Ausa takes a glancing hit from Jean's Butterfly Dance for 6 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lemina Ausa gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Lemina Ausa's Mute Ward may block the effect! GS: Poison applied to Lemina Ausa! GS: Mute blocked! GS: Hyper and Quick applied to Jean! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Gleam activated! GS: Lemina Ausa partially guards Ivan's Umbrella Rebuke for 79 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lemina Ausa gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Dispel! Hyper, Riposte, and Shield removed!
<Pose Tracker> Rixia has posed.
Marivel grants her power, and also speaks of dangerous portents -- that's what the Elw writing said. What ritual is it, though...? She doesn't understand. She understands so very little. Margaret and Magilou being here does soothe her, because she's always relieved to see them be well and... she didn't find them on her way out. Layna encourages her to bare her heart out, and Lanval in turn seems to ruminate further on the matter of the ritual...
Leo's desperation comes through to her, though. "I-- Mister Leo, come on--" She whimpers as the White Knight tears through the air and a Demon Fang comes her way; she's barely got her block up in time, and still gets shoved to one side of the room, a little dazed.
"W-what do I do now? I don't want to raise my sword against him... but..."
In the end, what can she do? Run? Again? That's all you know how to do, Rixia, the words seem to echo and reverberate inside of her heart. He's stressed, he's frustrated, he's lashing out with violence. But it doesn't seem like their words fall on empty ears, either; he wouldn't be this upset if he didn't know, on some level, that they're right.
"... Mister Leo... it was like that for me too. I'm just a backwater village girl... in the end, these stories about Zophar and world destruction and rituals that would leave the world a husk are a bit over my head. But..."
>> detecting high concentration of magic residue in area
>> drawing...
She raises her gunblade high, as the ambient magics that the various casters are throwing around the room start to make their way around towards her, rapidly turning into blue spehres that wither away into the Sleeping Lion.
>> utilising symbological procedure to synthesize magic
>> initiating...
"I hate seeing my friends fight. I hate seeing you and Hiro fight. I'm tired of seeing the important people in my life suffer. That much, even someone like me can understand... so..."
That magic doesn't stay inside of her, though -- instead, there's an enormous rise of digital hexagons around Marivel, Zed and Hiro, as quite literally--
>> overclocking memory capacity
>> synchronously junctioning to designated allied targets...
>> hp-j vit-j spd-j spr-j status-def-j: active
--she junctions Magic in a wide area and enhances their defensive capabilities in one fell swoop.
GS: Rixia has attacked Hiro with Junction Overdrive! GS: Rixia has attacked Zed with Junction Overdrive! GS: Rixia has attacked Marivel Armitage with Junction Overdrive! GS: Rixia has gained 2 Combo! GS: Rixia has completed her action. GS: Rixia heals Hiro! He gains 82 temporary hit points! GS: Quick and Regen applied to Hiro! GS: CRITICAL! Rixia heals Marivel Armitage! She gains 78 temporary hit points! GS: Quick and Regen applied to Marivel Armitage! GS: Rixia heals Zed! He gains 81 temporary hit points! GS: Quick and Regen applied to Zed! GS: Gwen Whitlock solidly guards Seraph Harmaus's Sudden Dawn for 79 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Zed has posed.
Swords lock and clash. Zed, STILL MID-AIR, clenches his abs into DIAMONDS to hold the dramatic pose for long enough for him to lean into the back of his curved blade. Why? Because he needs to GRIN MENACINGLY at the dark-eyed hero on the other side.
Leo... forces him back! Zed leans into the momentum, throwing his weight backwards as he arcs gracefully through the air. A wave of pure light follows him, but--
He, too, has a blade with which to clash! He just need wait for the right moment--
Magic is <<junctioned>> into his very being. Somehow. Zed is not used to feeling magic like this. It's weird. But not unpleasant. More importantly, it's a sign!
"Zed-- ZAN!" Zed shouts, kicking off an ancient pillar to cut through the blade of blinding light! The demon appears on the other end, only to kick off the ground again and into a lightning fast horizontal cut!
"Don't you see, White Knight Leo!? Your emotions are in conflict. Your heart and your duty are at loggerheads! And so your own heart itself into ribbons!" He turns, racing back, his movements a magically overdriven blur as he dart-slashes again and again and again! "Is this not what opens a heart to the cloying darkness of Malevolence? Tell me, Leo! After seeing your beloved mentor fall prey to the conflict within his heart... You would walk the same path...?!"
"Break free, Leo! Before it's too late!"
<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.
"I'll explain later!" Talia tells her brother, flashing him a brief smile. Then, her eyes meet Magilou's -- and she nods once. "I'll do what I can, no?"
Talia's eyes are back on Harmaus. He came to slay the false goddess -- not a thing she minds, but the timing is terrible. And, besides, he seems to be ready to oppose them. She holds her sword in his direction, two-toned blade gleaming -- and her eyes narrow, angrily.
"If it's through you, then so be it!" she snaps. She glances to the side -- to Gwen -- and then back at Layna and Lanval. Talia nods at them both, before she dashes forward, and closes in with Harmaus. Fire shoots at her -- blinding, brilliant, and white. Fire shoots through her, blazing brightly, and sappering her spirit.
Her blade lashes out, and as it does, ice shoots down the length of it. A thick coating, made layer after layer, to make it solid; then jagged edgs, which shatter when the sword strikes for his Hellionized form. "And stop calling me a PET!"
The ice explodes into shards, before Talia swings the blade up again in front of her, while leaping. As she does, her sword sweeps up -- and an arc of white light is left in her wake.
"Luna Rondo!"
GS: Talia has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Luna Rondo! GS: Talia has gained 1 Combo! GS: Talia takes 33 damage from Poison! GS: Talia has completed her action. GS: Zed has attacked White Knight Leo with Secret Sword - Lightning Flash! GS: Zed has gained 1 Combo! GS: Zed gains 33 THP from Regen! GS: Zed has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
Marivel says, "I did," to Leo. "And I was wrong to do so." She admits it as easily as breathing. "I've been a true villain. In the ways that I hurt you, Leo, I ask your forgiveness..."
She bows her head, moments before a Demon Fang slams into a power seal barrier that ripples around her. Marivel isn't blown to bits, but she looks wearier and wearier as the effect fades around her. She stumbles to a knee, closing her eyes for a moment and exhaling slowly.
She straightens up and adds, "...But I haven't murdered civilians."
She looks into those rage-filled eyes. "If Hiro wishes to hate me forever, he has the right to but you are one of the few who does not. And you know that, Leo, because you are at the end of the day--a good man. We've both let despair rule us..."
"It is time for you to resolve the contradiction in your own heart, my friend." Marivel says. She is sympathetic to Rixia's concerns. Her support is greatly appreciative because Marivel is talking grander than she really can carry right now. "If you continue being divided against yourself, you'll lose your opportunity to save this city, you'll lose the opportunity to save your world... And mayhaps more besides!"
She extends a hand and unleashes a wave of bright red and purple power, a crimson seal crackling around Leo that will sap his strength physically. Marivel still isn't unleashing anything overtly harmful.
But maybe that's just because she can't.
GS: Marivel Armitage has attacked White Knight Leo with Power Seal! GS: Marivel Armitage has gained 1 Combo! GS: Marivel Armitage gains 31 THP from Regen! GS: Marivel Armitage has completed her action. GS: Seraph Harmaus partially evades Talia's Luna Rondo for 95 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Harmaus gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Evade bonus and Sufferer activated! GS: Shige Kiwako takes a glancing hit from Seraph Harmaus's Phantasiai for 26 hit points! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Jam and Poison applied to Shige Kiwako! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated!
<Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
Harmaus looks away; Magilou does, too. She'll have to trust it to Talia. She's... too close to this one.
"Hmm. People learning from monsters after they're dead..." Magilou cocks her head, and declares her feelings on Blue Master Lunn's legacy, with cheer: "Thanks! I hate it!"
(She declares this from behind Margaret. Obviously. That's the most fearless position to state anything in. She meets Margaret's eyes, and her trollish smile fades to something nicer, for a moment. Just one.)
"... far be it from me to claim it's impossible to change the weight of a name," she adds, smile turning sly. "I just doubt you're the one to do it."
But Lemina does have power -- sorry, sorry, POWER! -- and Magilou finds herself, shortly, having to bring her shikigami doll between herself and Lemina. It extends to the size of a greatshield, hovering in front of her outstretched hand; in defiance of everything paper is, it manages to hold, against the reverberating strike of her palm. The momentary impact sends great ripples out along the surface of the shield. The minor spirit who dwells inside it protests, and Magilou feels those complaints, channeled into her bones.
But she is, herself, untouched.
"Oh, if you want this to be some brutish contest of strength, I'm sure you'll win," Magilou pouts, as she shrinks her paper doll back down, to spin beside her hand again. "But if you want to be a 'Magus', you really ought to focus on your magic, don't you think? Let me show you."
A windy-green Seraphic glyph appears beneath her feet, as that shikigami spins beside her hand. "Is it hot," Magilou asks Lemina, at the precise moment when she's disengaged with the others, or is it just me? Crown Fire!" It wasn't a question at all -- it was an invocation!
An invocation which threatens to consume Lemina in a fiery tornado, wind feeding the flame in an all-too-casual marriage of the Goddess's elements.
That magical sense about her has her looking Rixia's way when she raises her Gunblade to Draw, too, and she sends another little ('little'!) flurry of magic off towards her clever little ARM for her to eat up. "You're doing great, fluffybutt!" She yells to Rixia, across the way.
Magilou is a great mentor. Just don't ask her how Harmaus worked out.
GS: Magilou has attacked Lemina Ausa with Crown Fire! GS: Magilou has gained 2 Combo! GS: Magilou's stances have changed from Counter to Avenger and Counter! GS: Magilou gains 10 FP from her Daredevil! GS: Magilou has completed her action. GS: White Knight Leo takes a glancing hit from Zed's Secret Sword - Lightning Flash for 66 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! White Knight Leo gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Mighty applied to Zed! GS: FP up! Power Burst activated! GS: White Knight Leo solidly guards Hiro's Sword Dance for 50 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! White Knight Leo gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Power Burst activated! GS: White Knight Leo takes a glancing hit from Marivel Armitage's Power Seal for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! White Knight Leo gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Cripple applied to White Knight Leo! GS: FP up! Evade bonus activated! GS: Gamble: Moderate! Lemina Ausa takes a glancing hit from Magilou's Crown Fire for 37 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lemina Ausa gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Mighty applied to Magilou! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Evade bonus activated!
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
Lanval reaches out to Harmaus. Layna... at this point, she thinks it might be too late. But Lanval doesn't - so for as long as he thinks that, she'll do her best to give him whatever opportunities she can.
But, he wants them to show him their power. Well... if he wants it, she's just going to have to go all out like she said she would, isn't she?
"Alright then. No holding back, here. Just lemme know when you've had your fill!" She says, then glances toward Talia as she looks her way. She returns her nod with one of her own - and then braces herself, as Harmaus releases solar flame. It scorches and burns but she forces her way through it with a grin.
With an incantation, the winds surround her. She rushes toward Harmaus, lightened by the winds, and unleashes a punch in his direction. Her body may be lightened, but the force behind her fists has only intensified.
GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Dread Momentum! GS: Layna Manydays has gained 1 Combo! GS: Layna Manydays's stances have changed to Avenger! GS: Layna Manydays takes 28 damage from Poison! GS: Layna Manydays has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Shige Kiwako has posed.
Truth be told, she's seen Harmaus in action, but it still caught her off guard. Caught on the periphery as she was. Arm up, over her eyes, she scowls and reaches up as though she were about to adjust a non-existent mask. Oops.
"You'd return it to what? A ball of dust? Not happening. Too much work." She's trying to sound flippant. She mostly comes across as anything, but. Oh well. That lantern is lifted high though. The light flashing. Pushing away the shadows and casting it's own strangeness instead. Figures of old soldiers. Guardians themselves taking vigil. "Can't let it happen." This comes out more firmly. More natural sounding at least. The light moving to try and strip away Harmaus's 'truths' at least that's the thought that spins around in her head briefly. That lingering nastiness.
She steps forward, confident now. Leaving that light behind, the faint remnant of a long forgotten standard left behind, casting that light.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.
Harmaus has that way of interrupting sound with the fury of light, just as Lanval's about to speak up when the corrupted Light Seraph turns his power upon Talia. Seraph Lanval intones a Seraphic Arte that is lost in the shuffle, summoning forth a pillar of water as a defensive measure as that solar fire races forward.
The defensive effort on Lanval's part comes off as token at best - even diffusing the encroaching solar fire and light does nothing to blunt the rampant conviction and desires of Harmaus turned strength, beyond leaving little prismatic rainbows dancing in brief before all loose moisture evaporates against the solar flame, leaving Lanval reeling and looking a bit singed.
"...Even to the end," Lanval murmurs, "the way ya shay -grasp- ish really funny," because slap fights over one's grasp of Ancient Tongue pronounciation are forever, but that levity stops until he can clearly see Talia is all right (she's yelling defiantly), as he asides to Layna.
"Hey... Layna," Lanval remarks, "ain't no one gonna shed much tearsh fer Harmaus, maybe... but what'sh goin' on with him right now, ush Seraphim would wish that on no one." Ragnell's anguish over a particular Fell Dragon still rings to him even now, despite their differences.
Beat.
"But part of helping 'em... it kinda doesh involve beatin' the tar outta 'em, sho," keep doing what she's intending to do, is the short of it. He keeps one hand defensively on top of the drinking gourd while the wake of the solar fire still burns about him.
"Whatever 'truth' yer lookin' for... we're lookin' at shomethin' that'sh gonna change thingsh fer everyone," Lanval says. "Better... worshe... it'sh true shtuff ain't gonna shtay the way they are now." He only has to look over at Rixia and how she's struggling with the White Knight - and the White Knight himself! - to know that.
The chant he has next is lost in the flood, and we don't know who's proud to bathe in their wages of blood, but here at the perception of the world's end, they aren't ready to cast off tomorrow yet - even if they fall seven times or more.
What isn't, is his own contribution to the next volley.
"Hallowed Tides~!" Lanval calls, as sanctified waters start to swirl like a whirlpool to try and lock Harmaus in and make it much harder for them to move around.
GS: Seraph Lanval has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Hallowed Tides! GS: Seraph Lanval takes 34 damage from Poison! GS: Seraph Lanval has completed his action. GS: Shige Kiwako has attacked Seraph Lanval with Hallowed Ground! GS: Shige Kiwako has attacked Layna Manydays with Hallowed Ground! GS: Shige Kiwako has attacked Talia with Hallowed Ground! GS: Shige Kiwako has attacked Shige Kiwako with Hallowed Ground! GS: Shige Kiwako has gained 2 Combo! GS: Shige Kiwako takes 27 damage from Poison! GS: Shige Kiwako has completed her action. GS: Seraph Lanval accepts Shige Kiwako's Hallowed Ground for 0 hit points! GS: Restore! Jam and Poison removed! GS: Lock state applied to Seraph Lanval! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Shige Kiwako accepts Shige Kiwako's Hallowed Ground for 0 hit points! GS: Restore! Jam and Poison removed! GS: Lock state applied to Shige Kiwako! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Layna Manydays accepts Shige Kiwako's Hallowed Ground for 0 hit points! GS: Restore! Jam and Poison removed! GS: Lock state applied to Layna Manydays!
<Pose Tracker> Lemina Ausa has posed.
"Yeah. Don't think I'm the same slow, weak, naive kid you faced when our positions were reversed," Lemina says to Margaret, bringing up the arm with the bracer; she does need to test her new toys' durability. She meets the blade, pressing back against it; that'll bruise tomorrow, but today it's better than alternatives, and the bracer seems to be unharmed for the most part. It does swap crests from the force, though, reporting: "Wind!"
Lemina makes use of it rather than trying to swap. "Mighty Mistral!" Lemina cries, and blades of cold wind press in on Margaret and propel Lemina herself backward.
Jean confronts Lemina with a new possibility: that Lunn trained Jean. It's strange -- why would she lie about that? It makes her look guiltier, look worse, look like she could have even more easily slipped between his defenses. As Lemina fights through the barrage of illusory wings, Lemina decides... to humor her. Maybe something in that 'greedy, vain, grasping, and kind-hearted' speech actually got to her. "What was the point?" Lemina asks, before -- hurling a dagger at Jean from inside her cloak.
Lemina offers Hiro only a brief aside: "Why did you hurry us out of there so fast, then, if you didn't have anything to hide?!" She's... sure that's how it went.
Back to her immediate problems. Ivan attacks, and he gets the best hits on her yet -- that umbrella catches Lemina off guard. "Ha, an umbrella?" she asks, even as she's buffeted back by force. "That's mega-childish." After all -- it was Lemina who would've weaponized an umbrella like that, once. The more pressing part, however, garners a: "I know what my actions mean!"
Magilou goads Lemina -- and Lemina falls for it, already beginning to charge a spell... which she then has to discard as Magilou summons up that tornado. It still licks at her feet, even as she tries to evade. "I -- what are you even driving at?" Lemina asks, before reaching up and 'flipping the page' of her bracer again. She needs something a little broader. 'Thunder!' it reports, helpfully, as Lemina thrusts out both hands and cries, "Shining Flame!"
Jean, Magilou, and Ivan each receive a crackling bolt of lightning, wreathed in fire, from above. Lemina shifts into a more defensive stance again as her spell resolves.
GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Margaret with Wind: Mighty Mistral! GS: Lemina Ausa has gained 1 Combo! GS: Lemina Ausa spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Magilou with Thunder: Shining Flame! GS: Lemina Ausa has gained 1 Combo! GS: Lemina Ausa spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Jean with Thunder: Shining Flame! GS: Lemina Ausa spends 1 Combo on Gatling, loading 1 into Gatling! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Ivan with Thunder: Shining Flame! GS: Lemina Ausa takes 29 damage from Poison! GS: Lemina Ausa has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> White Knight Leo has posed.
Leo's only response to Harmaus--for now--is a snarl, deep and angry. Something close to the real anger Hiro's talking about. Something changed in him when the Goddess ordered her crusade, or even before. Despite this, and despite his mounting exhaustion, he remains the White Knight.
Zedane and Hiro press in on him together, forcing him onto the back foot. Leo responds with the defense of Waning Crescent, the style he developed himself: swift, minimalist parries, and steps that waste no energy. For a few moments, it's like the three master swordsmen are dancing, even if the clash is wearing Leo down. Sweat beads on his brow.
Zedane's words--
Goddess, Leo thinks, Heldalf must be laughing at him right now. It would be so, so very easy for him to--
"Doubt is poison," Leo says, as he sinks back against the display console. He grips it with his free hand, desperate for some solidity. "Doubt is poison." But there is horror in his eyes, and it only gets worse as Rixia pleads, and Marivel tries to calm him down.
"Mauri," Leo says, his voice shaking. "I can't leave her! Not--not after what he, what Ronfar--"
That is much closer to the anger Hiro guessed at. Marivel's sorcery sinks into him like a thick, dense blanket. He clenches his fist, and the floor rushes up--the earth and steel of the catacombs rising beneath Rixia in a single, razor-sharp spike. Leo isn't aiming directly at her, but it's close enough that even a glancing hit would hurt. He can't bring himself to do anything more to her.
Leo strikes. The air cuts before him, and a chaotic mass of energy boils out of him to fill it. It clings to him as he lunges forward, rushing through Zed, Marivel, and Hiro in a single motion.
GS: White Knight Leo has activated a Boss Action! GS: White Knight Leo has attacked Hiro with Tempest Howl! GS: White Knight Leo has attacked Zed with Tempest Howl! GS: White Knight Leo has attacked Marivel Armitage with Tempest Howl! GS: White Knight Leo has gained 1 Combo! GS: White Knight Leo has attacked Rixia with Grave! GS: White Knight Leo has gained 1 Combo! GS: Jean solidly guards Lemina Ausa's Thunder: Shining Flame for 84 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Jean gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Shield applied to Lemina Ausa! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: White Knight Leo has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Hiro takes a glancing hit from White Knight Leo's Tempest Howl for 83 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Hiro gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Reaper blocked! GS: FP up! Power Burst and Evade bonus activated! GS: Zed solidly guards White Knight Leo's Tempest Howl for 59 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Zed gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Reaper blocked! GS: FP up! Power Burst activated! GS: COUNTER! Rixia counterattacks White Knight Leo with Draw - Counter Magic! GS: Rixia partially guards White Knight Leo's Grave for 116 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Rixia gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Charge bonus and Gleam activated! GS: Margaret solidly guards Lemina Ausa's Wind: Mighty Mistral for 60 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Margaret gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Surge applied to Margaret! GS: Shield applied to Lemina Ausa! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Guard bonus activated! GS: Magilou partially evades Lemina Ausa's Thunder: Shining Flame for 152 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Magilou gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Gleam activated! GS: Talia accepts Shige Kiwako's Hallowed Ground for 0 hit points! GS: Restore! Break, Jam, and Poison removed! GS: Lock state applied to Talia! GS: FP up! Sufferer and Gleam activated! GS: White Knight Leo solidly guards Rixia's Draw - Counter Magic for 46 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! White Knight Leo gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Power Burst activated!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
"Gh!!" Gwen grunts as spiritual fire burns deep to her core, as if every part of her was corruption that needed to be washed away.
Their souls are far too big to burn away right now, and Gwen is no exception.
"I ain't here t'listen to you, I'm here t'support my friends," Gwen snaps, tearing off ratty glove covering her right hand. "They've been through tons of trials, some of which were *caused by you*." She punctates this point by throwing the wadded grimy rag straight at clean-looking feline spirit, her vitriol continuing on. "I wasn't there for all of them, but I'm here for this one." She rolls up her right sleeve and takes off her ratty cloth glove, letting the rapidly building heat of the Mockingbird disperse, now that it's free of its disguise. "So either you accept this ain't the time and step away, 'cause right now, you're *helpin'* that false goddess by giving her time to get away, ya fleabag!"
Hearing others join her, Gwen looks over her shoulder, fog blue eyes noting Talia's new weapon of choice. She grins. ".... Niiicee." Seeing Layna, Shige, and the Seraph Lanval there too, she gives a thumbs up. "Great! We'll get this done all quick-like."
Turning back to Harmaus, Gwen points her unveiled ARM towards him yet again and fires a larger, more powerful blast. "Sorry, Lanval. The time for feelin' sorry for Harmaus ain't now. He dragged me, Hiro, n' a bunch of people into that hell garden. I was gonna let it slide when he popped up before, but since he's here, I ain't holdin' back."
GS: Gwen Whitlock has activated Force Action: Snipe! GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Coil Cannon EX! GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action. GS: Ivan solidly guards Lemina Ausa's Thunder: Shining Flame for 68 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ivan gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Guard bonus activated! ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= ____________________________| Form The Heretic Son |____________________________
GS: Seraph Harmaus solidly guards Layna Manydays's Dread Momentum for 61 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Harmaus gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Guard bonus and Sufferer activated! GS: Seraph Harmaus solidly guards Seraph Lanval's Hallowed Tides for 31 hit points! GS: Entangle, Mute, and Poison applied to Seraph Harmaus! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! GS: CRITICAL! Seraph Harmaus takes a glancing hit from Gwen Whitlock's Coil Cannon EX for 76 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Harmaus gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated!
<Pose Tracker> Hiro has posed.
Hiro calls back to Ivan, "Actually! No offense taken! I really am just some guy!" Hiro calls back, maybe armed with the knowledge from a certain library. And Rixia asks what she should do, maybe not to him, "You've gotta decide too Rixia, just like he does."
Her magic floods him from the ARM, digital hexagons forming around him, and the junctioned magic quickly bolsters him. And he thinks at least, she made the right call.
"Aveh and Kislev were going at it while the Metal Demons were all over the place!? We were in a Warzone Lemina!" He doesn't really think of it as them rushing out of there, but okay!?
And there it is with Leo, as he answers what's going on. "Leo I've never had a little sister. I don't know what it's like."
Leo carves through them, as energy boils out of his strike, and Hiro drops and rolls to the side of it, even as it cleaves part of his own scarf in twain.
"But feels like to me Brotherly duty can take many forms. Is she your sister?" Hiro then hurls himself forward, as it feels like he's going to drive down at Leo with a vicious two handed slash.
At the last second though he twists the blade, coming down with the flat in a ringing blunt strike, that becomes a shockwave he sends through his body, trying perhaps to knock some sense into him.
"Or your excuse? You can leave, and still do right by her!"
GS: Hiro has attacked White Knight Leo with Concussion Sword! GS: Hiro gains 29 THP from Regen! GS: Hiro has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Jean has posed.
'He's just some guy!' Jean doesn't take offense on Hiro's behalf; quit the opposite, she nods along. "He doesn't have any great powers over Malevolence or anything like that!"
She thinks he's special, but for reasons of his heart, not his magic, even as impressive as that is by now.
But Magilou 'hates' something. Jean is disturbed by the possibility herself. But she metions strength and magic--
"Magilou! She's using the same style I used!"
But Lemina asks her a question. She goes with it. Maybe Jean can reach her--so, she pauses in her dance for a moment, and tries to meet Lemina's eyes. "The 'point' was... 'the bloody journey'. All that death, all that suffering--the power over peoples' lives! It was an end in itself! That's what he wanted me to be--a killer, with the opposite of remorse--glorying in pain and despair!"
"THAT's the legacy you're carrying now!"
The lightning and fire crash towards Jean, and there is the smell of burning upon her. She stands, stone-faced in the face of the obvious and clear pain, adopting a stance of strength to weather through it. "...He's the one who taught me to ignore pain, too. Because his teachers would give worse to anyone who cried out!"
Jean then steps back, and makes a complex gesture with her hands, channeling her energy into something that is not a spell at all. Then she closes her eyes--
And shimmers.
When the next heartbeat comes, there are two Jeans, which advance in perfect sync, making it hard to tell which is which as they cross one another's path and separate once again.
"Over, and over! He taught me the meaning of 'strength', and his definition was just death!"
Both Jeans whirl in close with a series of kicks and then shimmer into one another again, separating to hop close around Lemina. ...But Lemina may notice; there's a flaw in her technique. Without the fury and hatred of the Shadow Dragon... her duplicates are hollow. Empty.
Without the force they would otherwise hold. They are 'nothing', without the force of emotion infusing them.
GS: Jean spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: Jean has attacked Lemina Ausa with Slam Dance! GS: Jean has gained 2 Combo! GS: Jean has completed her action. GS: Marivel Armitage suffers a terrible blow from White Knight Leo's Tempest Howl for 129 hit points! GS: Reaper applied to Marivel Armitage! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated!
<Pose Tracker> Margaret has posed.
Blade strives against Bracer, and Margaret is no fell lord battling against a weaker foe in a thick and terrible Domain. (Ask her why she's fighting left hand.) Her blade skitters loose with a "hngh!"
Jean speaks of Lemina's traits. Margaret hears her. She has a little space to think thanks to her speed magic, and she wonders: Did I miss a chance to recruit her? Well, water under the mill now. Unless...?
Magilou calls her attention towards where Rixia strives with Leo. Her heart pangs for the girl. She knows what it must feel like, at least in part. "Bring him to his senses, Rixia!" Margaret cheers to her -- and she doesn't let a single drop of pain or doubt sneak into her voice. All that acting has its advantages.
Lemina's still there, though. How rude of her to not explode! A burst of wind. Margaret throws up her right arm to shield her face and leaps --
INTO the wind?
She bobbles upwards, nearly hitting the ceiling, before flicker-flashing into a sea-green outline for a moment and smacking into the ground, tumble rolling and leaping back to her feet with a "hah!" and a counterblast: "The most childish thing of all is to worry about seeming childish, Ausaaaa!!!"
Margaret throws herself forwards, twisting round and leaping with vaulting half-dashes to strike Lemina from several sides, not remaining within a nice comfortable space of reaction for more than a fraction of a second at the time. At the fourth strike she breaks away, coming up near Magilou and telling her, "I heard what she said," a nod to Jean, "and if you can make her spill her style's secret weaknesses I'd be much obliged; she isn't kidding about having eaten her big girl cakes, I can tell you."
GS: Margaret has attacked Lemina Ausa with Crimson Orbit! GS: Margaret has gained 1 Combo! GS: Margaret has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Rixia has posed.
"F-fluffybutt???" Rixia stammers to Magilou, her face red for a moment, sensing the extra oomph of magic coming into the little ARM's way. "Geez... thanks, though, Miss Magilou..."
"... that-- that masked guy has a point. Isn't being honest and open the better way? Isn't it how Malevolence gets you?" Rixia implores, because she didn't even think about that. "No, actually, it's not even about what could be. It's not even about what you owe the goddess, or what you owe the people you've fought with..."
But the topic suddenly shifts as Leo admits it: there's someone he has to protect. Mauri. Her eyes firm up for a moment, as she gets bounced around by that razor-sharp spike that grazes and causes her to fly to one side, guarded by a sudden barrier of magic that discharges back onto Leo. There's a quiet whimper and a groan as she lands with a thud, and she's quaking as she gets back to her feet.
Margaret's cheering for her too, telling her to bring him to his senses! Hiro tells her she has to decide. And... and maybe she doesn't have the courage to raise her blade against him, but there's still things she can do. Things like words, and--
"You can't... you can't protect someone well with a wounded heart, Mister Leo! To protect someone you love, you have to heal your heart first! And not only that... you have to learn to love yourself as well! Part of that is having to admit you made a mistake, and then working up from there, not doubling up on telling yourself that the doubt you feel is wrong!!"
--and letting the Sleeping Lion pump even more magic into her comrades. This is... this is safe, right? She hopes it's safe. An enormous mandala of power erupts from underneath her as she starts to channel all the sum total of the magic drawn in from around, and she lends her own Blessing of Light into the mix as well, a crisscross of lines dancing about in a pattern and erupting into a phantasmal hourglass that simply shatters behind her.
"I act now, in imitation of Light!!"
Suddenly, Zed, Hiro and Marivel are granted a powerful Junction of speed and power, as the Magics already applied go even harder. The magic feels synthetic, feels... unnatural, in some way, but it's certainly effective.
GS: Rixia spends 1 Combo on Inspire! GS: Rixia has attacked Hiro with Shatter the Hourglass! GS: Rixia has attacked Zed with Shatter the Hourglass! GS: Rixia has attacked Marivel Armitage with Shatter the Hourglass! GS: Rixia has gained 1 Combo! GS: Rixia has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Hiro accepts Rixia's Shatter the Hourglass for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz and Hyper applied to Hiro! GS: Hiro gains 2 Combo from Inspire! GS: Marivel Armitage accepts Rixia's Shatter the Hourglass for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz and Hyper applied to Marivel Armitage! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! GS: Marivel Armitage enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Marivel Armitage gains 2 Combo from Inspire! GS: CRITICAL! Lemina Ausa partially guards Jean's Slam Dance for 100 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lemina Ausa gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Hyper, Mighty, Quick, and Riposte applied to Jean! GS: FP up! Guard bonus and Gleam activated! GS: Lemina Ausa fully evades Margaret's Crimson Orbit for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lemina Ausa gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Drowsy blocked! GS: Quick applied to Margaret! GS: FP up! Gleam activated!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.
Here, Talia brandishes at him her new blade while telling him to stop calling her a pet. "Ah, it has new sword? A gift, perhaps, from Am--"
He's forced to evade quite suddenly, leaning hard to his left; even this doesn't see him free of Talia's single-stroke swordbeam. It grazes him in mid-air and he staggers, hovering still near where he had been struck.
He'll return it to a ball of dust, Shige claims. "It belives this? That I wishes... dust!? Jaeja. No, no -- if 'dust' is what I wishes, then I says so! Much ire has I for all that slew my Lord of Calamity, yes... but destruction? Ah... only as it takes to uncover 'truth'. Only that much!"
This is not something, as Shige and others may realize, that exactly contradicts her statement from before. One might assume the Malevolence within him had done something to his wits, had he not been that way nearly from the start.
"And what of its fill? Will it cry for mercy when it is defeated?" Harmaus calls to Layna, who promises him she'll show him all that he has. Even in this, he is unkind.
But Lanval, again, remarks on Harmaus' pronunciation. "Strange? Strange? It knows not of strange, drunkard!" Harmaus retorts, the linguistic debate even now carrying some petty weight with him. But he does not linger upon this particular point. "Hahaha... Thought I once to change world for others, but look! Look what they does to my Lord of Calamity! ...Salvation and truth is not for world. It is for me!" To this, Lanval responds in part with a volley of water, which twists and tangles about the airborne Seraph, dragging him down...
Where Layna can have a proper go at him. Battered thus, he escapes only after a moment's passage -- and flare of light -- which sees him escaping again to a higher point within this chamber.
"Matters me not," he replies to Gwen, from on high. "Knows I where 'Goddess' treds. It shall escape me not! Neither shall I suffer it," by which he clearly means Gwen and the others, "to again meddle in my quest!"
Gwen responds by shooting him, again. This time the bullet but clips him: yet, his aura burns brilliantly in the moment that follows. Is this anger, perhaps...?
Slowly, Harmaus alights on the ground, one foot at a time. His aura, until now brilliant, begins to fade; surely he has not been so terribly wounded just yet?
This, at least, is true. His light contracts upon his corpus and he, in this moment, vents but some of the corruption that has come to rest inside of him. From that point of contraction, his form itself unwinds. There is then light, harsh and terrible.
What stands before them when the light fades is and is not Harmaus: an expression of the Malevolence that contaminates his form, it takes the shape of a humanoid Hellion clad in pearl-grey plate armor. Violet light leaks from the helm's visor; said helm is also the only hint of the shape Harmaus had until-recently occupied, for it is adorned by a pair of points that suggest a cat's ears.
In its hands it bears a sword of light.
"Now... come! It shows me its power, its strength! Show me whose wish prevails! Mine, the Goddess, or its own!!"
In its hand, its blade pulses ever more brilliantly with light, nearly as if to underscore whatever emotion might be bouying Harmaus now.
It swings its sword from right to left; the light that erupts from the edge is as black as midnight as it arcs towards Gwen and Lanval.
From left to right, it repeats the action and the light that illuminates the world screams forth for Talia and Shige.
It finishes the combo by slamming the sword's blade into the floor. The sword's brilliance pulses wildly and erupts in missile after missile of violet-tinged light, all of which leap for Layna.
DC: You switch forms to The Catalyst! DC: Seraph Harmaus switches forms to The Catalyst!
GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Melanosis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Seraph Lanval with Melanosis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has gained 1 Combo! GS: That attack doesn't exist. [] GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Talia with Leucosis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Shige Kiwako with Leucosis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has gained 2 Combo! GS: Seraph Harmaus spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Layna Manydays with Bright Repeater! GS: Seraph Harmaus takes 23 damage from Poison! GS: Seraph Harmaus has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Zed has posed.
There it is.
There's the real reason.
Leo barrels forward like a human cannonball, overflowing with the violent impulse. An unstoppable, indefatigable force.
Zed... braces.
Leo smashes into him, two blades locked as Zed is forced back and back and back, the two digging a chaotic trench through the once pristine Zeboim-era floortiles. And at the end, they're in that position again, swords clashing against one another. "He's right, you know," Zedane, taking the role of the Devil on Leo's Shoulder for tonight's festivities, says with a smile. "I was in your position too, once upon a time. My family-- the people who I loved and respected were all walking face-first into hell, and love and duty had me following them every step."
"But then, I met new people." Claude, Princess Adlehyde, Ida. Hiro. Aura. "I saw the world." Arctica, Adlehyde, Saint Centour. "I hurt a lot of the people I cared about, chasing after the family I loved and admired, and finally-- finally, I couldn't take it anymore."
"They were family," Zedane says, a note of remorse in his voice, "...But I couldn't keep sacrificing myself for their happiness."
He kicks away, disengaging. Zed whirls back, feet weaving a tight spiral before unleashing all of that rotational momentum in a rolling, dancing sequence of bladework. "Would family want you to keep hurting yourself for them like this, Leo?! If you decided to walk away, family would support you! Love you no matter what! The duty of siblings is to stand with one another! And there's nothing stopping you from walking your own path and still supporting her!"
GS: Zed accepts Rixia's Shatter the Hourglass for 0 hit points! GS: Blitz and Hyper applied to Zed! GS: Zed gains 2 Combo from Inspire!
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
"See? Just some guy! He can't even keep up with Ruby half the time! How could he be an evil mastermind?" Don't keep making it worse just because you got permission, Ivan!
Ivan's judgmental umbrella receives judgment in turn.
"Mega childish??" Ivan sputters. "An adult can use an umbrella! Nobody should have to get soaked in the rain! It's not like it's covered in little ducks or something!" He turns it around in his hands a bit for a quick check in case it has any embarrassing patterns on it he never noticed. He finds it covered in the same abstract golden whorls as always. Maybe a few of them could be ducks if you used your imagination...
Woe, all of this means he is holding an umbrella aloft in a sudden MAGICAL THUNDERSTORM and a bolt of fire-wreathed lightning sizzles through him. He coughs out a puff of smoke, thoroughly humbled, nerves buzzing with painful aftershocks.
"A-all right, so you know what you're doing -- what are you fighting for, then? Are your goals still possible if the Althena you're working for is a sham? What will you do if she hurts Lucia or never gives her back her freedom?"
He sweeps and spins with the umbrella, gathering power. "Umbrella! Please do something... persuasive!" A wave of new, unshaped golden force spirals off the canopy and whirls round Lemina, though its exact magical intentions remain unknown until the moment the power should collide with her.
GS: Layna Manydays partially evades Seraph Harmaus's Bright Repeater for 163 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Layna Manydays gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Ivan has attacked Lemina Ausa with Umbrella! Do what you will.! GS: Ivan has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Talia solidly guards Seraph Harmaus's Leucosis for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Talia gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Blind applied to Talia! GS: FP up! Arcane Font, Sufferer, and Gleam activated! GS: Talia enters CONDITION GREEN!!
<Pose Tracker> Zed has posed.
A moment before Zedane launches into his buzzsaw (and tirade), more magic is junctioned into him. He might just burst with arcane energies! He's not made to handle this! But it sure does make his spiraling cut even more furious...!
GS: Zed spends 1 Combo on Poison! GS: Blitz! Zed has attacked White Knight Leo with Forbidden Move - Astral Dance! GS: Zed enters a Counter stance! GS: Zed has gained 2 Combo! GS: Zed gains 33 THP from Regen! GS: Zed has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Gwen Whitlock solidly guards Seraph Harmaus's Melanosis for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Gwen Whitlock gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Drowsy applied to Gwen Whitlock! GS: FP up! Charge bonus activated!
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
The more besides turns out to be Mauri. Marivel remembers her as one who burned her alive among other terrible things--She can see the family resemblance but she didn't really want to presume it.
More energy slams into Marivel and sends her sprawling onto her back. The barrier that has been protecting her shatters and she slams into the floor back first. There is a secondary shimmer that flickers away.
Marivel slowly pukes out some black smoke off to the side and then pushes herself into a crouch. She looks back up for Leo's eyes.
"...Leo," Marivel says softly.
"You can't protect the one you love by doing things you know to be wrong simply because you are desperate and carrying deep sorrow."
She stares into his eyes, her crimson eyes wet.
"That is why we fought. And that is why I lost. You already know this. Althena's path will not save your sister. Only your own can do that. You chose this already."
Rixia fuels her power once more but MArivel is still unwilling--or unable--to unleash an offensive strike against Leo so she takes that imitation of light, using her own sorcerous talent to augment that Junction with a bit of Time magic herself, imbueing it with both the MIghty Guard of the Behemoth--and a more followup empowering besides it, sinking back to a knee as she does so. "Just...commit to your choice. Believe in it. Believe in it, Leo."
GS: Marivel Armitage has activated Force Action: Extend! GS: Marivel Armitage spends 1 Combo on Link! GS: Blitz! Marivel Armitage has attacked Zed with Mighty Guard! GS: Blitz! Marivel Armitage has attacked Hiro with Mighty Guard! GS: Blitz! Marivel Armitage has attacked Rixia with Mighty Guard! GS: Marivel Armitage has gained 1 Combo! GS: Marivel Armitage has launched an attack Link! GS: Blitz! Marivel Armitage has attacked Zed with Spells In Waiting! GS: Blitz! Marivel Armitage has attacked Hiro with Spells In Waiting! GS: Blitz! Marivel Armitage has attacked Rixia with Spells In Waiting! GS: Marivel Armitage has gained 1 Combo! GS: Marivel Armitage takes 53 damage from Reaper! GS: Marivel Armitage gains 25 THP from Regen! GS: Marivel Armitage has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Hiro accepts Marivel Armitage's Mighty Guard for 0 hit points! GS: Quick and Shield applied to Hiro! GS: Hiro accepts Marivel Armitage's Spells In Waiting for 0 hit points! GS: Pray grants a random effect! Burst and Surge applied to Hiro! GS: Hyper applied to Marivel Armitage! GS: Rixia accepts Marivel Armitage's Mighty Guard for 0 hit points! GS: Quick and Shield applied to Rixia! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: CRITICAL! Rixia accepts Marivel Armitage's Spells In Waiting for 0 hit points! GS: Pray grants a random effect! Quick applied to Rixia! GS: FP up! Gleam activated!
<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.
Shige's spell settles over Talia -- washing over her, through her, and buoying her where Harmaus drained her a moment before. She glances at the other woman, nodding her thanks, before she looks forward. Lanval says that saving Harmaus -- if it can be done -- may take beating the tar out of him.
She can accept that!
"Not from Amaranth, no," Talia says to Harmaus, her eyes narrowing for a moment.
Lanval moves back -- and his form glows and fades, until Malevolemnce overtakes him. Humanoid and armored, now; violet light shining upon them, and with a blade of pure light. She sucks in a sharp breath. She has seen this before.
Harmaus's blade sweeps out -- and light explodes, striking into her. It is brilliant enough to blind; she has to bring her hand up, over her face, for a moment. The effect lingers, nagging at her.
Then she swings her sword out, twice. The blade cleaves down, and two bolts of brilliant white light explode off it, and hurtles off towards him.
"Can't you see what this is doing to you!?" she demands. "Do you really think there's anything on the other side of this? This is madness, Harmaus! Strength won't change what happens!"
GS: Talia has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Double Demon Fang! GS: Talia has gained 3 Combo! GS: Talia has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Zed accepts Marivel Armitage's Mighty Guard for 0 hit points! GS: Quick and Shield applied to Zed! GS: White Knight Leo suffers a terrible blow from Hiro's Concussion Sword for 78 hit points! GS: Disrupt and Shieldbreak applied to White Knight Leo! GS: Hyper applied to Hiro! GS: FP up! Power Burst activated! GS: Zed accepts Marivel Armitage's Spells In Waiting for 0 hit points! GS: Pray grants a random effect! Burst and Quick applied to Zed! GS: Hyper applied to Marivel Armitage! ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= _____________________________| Form The Catalyst |______________________________
GS: CRITICAL! Seraph Harmaus takes a glancing hit from Talia's Double Demon Fang for 67 hit points! GS: Cover and Hyper applied to Talia!
<Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
"Oh, yes, you're not weak now," Magilou agrees, too easily, after Lemina speaks against Margaret. "You're powerful, aren't you? And no one can take that away from you! Unless you put one... foot... out of line."
She's not the only one who can meld the elements, it seems -- because flaming lightning cracks out, quick as a whip. Magilou, somehow, manages to be almost as quick despite her clearly-communicated lack of physical prowess: she quick-steps back, a hop and a skip, and it's the edge of the lightning which connects instead of the middle of the storm.
Her bangs go all frizzy for a moment, and, of course, get RIGHT in her face. "Phoo," Magilou huffs, as she puffs them away. ... it hurt more than that, but she has an excellent poker face. What was that about ignoring pain, Jean? Anyway. "Bad choice for a thunderstorm, buddy!" She calls, to Ivan, so unsupportive of his umbrella.
Looking back to Lemina: "I rather think you're the one driving the points. No, I will never be over it!!" The stabbing, that is. Deeply unpleasant. Never mind that she's feeling pretty good, after that elixir. It's the principle of the thing. "But don't you think your position at the top's a lot more tenuous than the tenure you're playing at? Even if you were the youngest spiritual leader the world knew, unmatched in power and potential... yes, I'd say you're the sort of person who gets discarded as soon as they break." Not a personal story. Anyway.
(She is distracted from immediately retaliating against Lemina by Harmaus's transformation. "It can't be helped," she mutters, parenthetically.)
Lifting her hand in a stage-whisper to Margaret, she says: "If you can paralyse her somehow, she'll have to rely on her magic. I noticed it when I was training Jean, a while ago. Just be sure to get enough of her limbs that she can't go around going handsprings to get around it. Here, I'll start..."
Raising her voice again, she grins, to Lemina. "If you think you can hold on to this lofty position you've grasped... you should at least be strong enough to match the magic of the Millennium Witch. It is I! The evil sorceress Magilou, who has ever stalked the halls and valleys of Lunar, chronicler of its Tales and destroyer of its most sacred idols! All magic, all spirits flow through me, ancient and unmatched! And I'll tell you something else --"
In the middle of taunting Lemina towards her, a shadowy purple Seraphic glyph lights beneath her feet. "... you're all about to get a lot closer! Gravity Mine!" The swirling dark orb doesn't LOOK like much... until Lemina gets into its range. Then she will know the crushing gravity of a black hole, dark as space itself, pulling her into herself.
GS: Seraph Lanval has activated Force Action: Accelerate! GS: Magilou has attacked Lemina Ausa with Gravity Mine! GS: Magilou has gained 1 Combo! GS: Magilou gains 10 FP from her Daredevil! GS: Magilou has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Seraph Lanval partially evades Seraph Harmaus's Melanosis for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Lanval gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Drowsy applied to Seraph Lanval! GS: FP up! Evade bonus and Gleam activated! GS: Shige Kiwako takes a glancing hit from Seraph Harmaus's Leucosis for 0 hit points! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Blind applied to Shige Kiwako! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Gleam activated! GS: ROU|LET|TE: Low! Lemina Ausa solidly guards Ivan's Umbrella! Do what you will. for 31 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lemina Ausa gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Misery inflicts a random effect! Weaken applied to Lemina Ausa! GS: FP up! Arcane Font, Guard bonus, and Gleam activated! GS: ROU|LET|TE: Moderate! Lemina Ausa takes a glancing hit from Magilou's Gravity Mine for 54 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lemina Ausa gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Cripple and Entangle applied to Lemina Ausa! GS: FP up! Arcane Font, Evade bonus, and Gleam activated! GS: Lemina Ausa enters CONDITION GREEN!!
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
No one's going to shed much tears for Harmaus, Lanval says. ...But it's a fate Seraphim wouldn't wish on anyone.
"...Aye. I get it, lad. I know you gotta. I'm behind you - whatever it takes." She replies with a nod. She nods, too, and offers him a grin to continue as he points out that helping him does involve fighting him. "Well. I think I can do that much."
The light of Shige's lantern undoes some of Layna's burns. She sends a nod her way, appreciatively - and then, a nod toward Gwen.
"Aye, that's the spirit." She says, as she says they'll get this done quickly.
Harmaus calls back to her, and Layna grins.
"Never been much for crying, myself. Me... whatever happens, whichever way this fights go... That's just how it is. That's the way of those of the sea. Always has been." Layna says, then grins. "But either way, I've got no intention of being defeated here."
And Harmaus... Harmaus transforms. Humanoid, clad in armor, now, violet light leaking from his helmet. And he attacks - Layna finds a volley of light rushing her way. She tries to weave out of the way of it - but light is quick, and they all connect. She wheezes and stumbles back - but her momentum isn't broken for long as she rushes forward. She thrusts a hand toward him -
She attacks, but not on the physical level. She seeks to drain him of his very stamina, stealing away his energy to add it to her own reserves of strength.
GS: Layna Manydays has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: White Knight Leo suffers a terrible blow from Zed's Forbidden Move - Astral Dance for 203 hit points! GS: Poison applied to White Knight Leo! GS: FP up! Power Burst activated! GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Plunder Life! GS: Layna Manydays has completed her action. ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= _____________________________| Form The Catalyst |______________________________
GS: Seraph Harmaus solidly guards Layna Manydays's Plunder Life for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Harmaus gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Charge!! You gain 40 FP! (That's 25 more than usual!) GS: FP up! Charge bonus activated! GS: Layna Manydays drains Seraph Harmaus! Layna Manydays gains #-1 ARGUMENTS MUST BE NUMBERS temporary hit points! ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= _____________________________| Form The Catalyst |______________________________
GS: Your HP has been set to 1738.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
The shimmering light of the umbrella's magic chooses to sap at Lemina's POWER, a particular glow lingering on her new device before it fades. The sparkles also sting a little, as if in admonition.
<Pose Tracker> Lemina Ausa has posed.
Margaret, first to be aggressed, is in turn first to aggress back; she hops into the wind and weaponizes it against Lemina, striking her from all angles. Lemina holds up against the onslaught, but...
"I'm not going to take that from someone who used to work under Borgan!" Lemina shoots back; even if she now works... with Borgan? Hm. Surely this makes sense somehow. Professional rivalry?
Jean advances on Lemina, and even as she tries desperately to guard herself against the onrush of blows, she cannot, quite. Jean is her martial superior through and through -- even a flawed technique is still more than a match for hers.
She does notice, though, the emptiness -- the feeling that Jean is resisting using her anger, and weakening herself.
... It's an odd thing to notice, because it matches what she was taught. The truth in Jean's fists forces Lemina back, back. "I'm not carrying it -- I'm using it to build my own!" she insists, though she's a little shaky on it... has she really made this power hers?
Ivan presses her on what she's fighting for, and she says, "The restoration of Vane, like always! And the rest of it -- it won't happen! I don't need you trying to put a wedge between me and the Goddess! I know who I'm pledged to!"
Magilou presses a similar but distinct point. "I'm not going to -- break! I'm mega-tough and mega-strong! And the Goddess wouldn't abandon me! Even if what you're saying is true, it doesn't matter and it never will!" It... has to be true. They've invested so much in her; she has to... she has to honor that. She has to honor that.
Even as Ivan and Magilou's magic presses against her -- even as she struggles against both the power of that umbrella and the power of Magilou's gravitic magic -- she's planning her next move. Ivan's magic interferes with her belt, which means she'll need to use her bracer instead.
What... is her next move?
That's easy. Her bracer goes clack, clack, clack and --
'Ice.'
But that's an element Lemina already has... what is she --
"LOUD COOLNESS!"
Ice lances out from her in all directions; it twists and spirals around for everyone pushing in on Lemina, trying to lash out with countless ice shapes and buy her back some separation. Despite her newfound talent for close combat, she's still a mage at heart.
GS: Lemina Ausa enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Ivan with Loud Coolness! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Margaret with Loud Coolness! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Jean with Loud Coolness! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Magilou with Loud Coolness! GS: Lemina Ausa has gained 1 Combo! GS: Lemina Ausa takes 31 damage from Poison! GS: Poison expired! GS: Lemina Ausa has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> White Knight Leo has posed.
After everything that's happened, Leo is not in a place to think clearly about tactics. That bull-rush--the Tempest Fang, barely held together--leaves him open. He shoves through the blade-clash with Zed, drops out of the air, and lands in a crouch, his back turned to the others. Hiro capitalizes, bringing the flat of his blade down on Leo's brow. The White Knight sees stars, and staggers back against another bank of strange consoles.
It hurts almost as much as the words arrayed against him. Is Mauri just an excuse? Is it impossible to help her, to cure her, when he's so conflicted and broken? Does he deserve to respect himself after what he's done? Is he doomed to fall here?
Still dazed from Hiro's strike, Leo can do little to stop Zedane's buzzsaw of bladework. Dozens of little cuts rip open across his upper body, staining his white uniform with red. He stumbles against the display console, his chest heaving. "Blue Magus," he says, "accept this blessing--"
He pulls the White Dragon's Crest from where it hangs around his neck. Nothing happens.
It's drained. It's still depleted from protecting the city, that's it.
"She was sick," Leo whispers. "So pale. Clinging to life." His eyes narrow with wounded anger. "Ask Ronfar--he was by her side, too! He was the one who thought he cured her! And now... now she's--"
Malevolence seeps out of Harmaus' form, curling around Leo's ankles like an affectionate, persistent cat. He feels it, looks down, and his whole face TWISTS. A note of REJECTION resounds through his soul, as if that alone could ward it off.
Leo says nothing more. Instead, he sheathes his blade, crouches, twists--
And then DRAWS and CUTS in a single motion.
A moment later, metal SHRIEKS as Leo's blade leaves its mark in the ancient chamber's walls. Part of a console simply flies loose, and clatters against the floor. Anyone caught in its path, well... Leo was not intending to hurt, but he was intending to cut. To cut, and nothing else, because that would drive the conflict off.
GS: CRITICAL! Gamble: Very High! Margaret takes a glancing hit from Lemina Ausa's Loud Coolness for 157 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Margaret gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated! GS: Margaret enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Layna Manydays has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Plunder Life! GS: Layna Manydays has completed her action. GS: Gamble: Moderate! Ivan takes a glancing hit from Lemina Ausa's Loud Coolness for 96 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ivan gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated! ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= _____________________________| Form The Catalyst |______________________________
GS: CRITICAL! Seraph Harmaus takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's Plunder Life for 0 hit points! GS: Charge!! You gain 40 FP! (That's 25 more than usual!) GS: Layna Manydays drains Seraph Harmaus! Layna Manydays gains #-1 ARGUMENTS MUST BE NUMBERS temporary hit points! GS: Your HP has been set to 1738.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.
"Only fer ya, huh--" Harmaus doesn't give Lanval much time to sass back, as Harmaus' Malevolence overtakes him anew like it did in those caverns where the Primarch of Geo rested (and wanted to continue resting, undisturbed). Gwen has made her position quite clear, as one of his victims.
Lanval is already moving with an alacrity and grace his seemingly uncoordinated nature obscures, a back-flip away from the blackened light in the wake of the sword's swing that he does not escape.
The worst of it being blunted can - and should - be accredited to Lanval's retreat to Shige's shadow-hued line of slim silhouettes of sentinels cast by her lantern. The Malevolence washes through him, challenging his convictions and honesty. He, too, sought a truth as to why he suffered the indignities* he did.
* That tavern was raunchy beyond definition in its final days, by mortal standards its removal was an improvement, but even so... that's where a part of the Boundary was being reinforced despite everything.
He holds onto why he persists against the grain of Meribus' and Glenwood's cultural directions in spite of everything. 'Fallen Seraph' he might be, he still holds the well-wishes to a happier world with one small joy at a time. Preferrably a dozen at a time, but, you know.
"Only fer ya," Lanval repeats when he centers himself. "All right," once more, intoning a Seraphic Arte chant while Layna's got the lion's share of the attention, culminating in...
"Blessed Drops!" Lanval calls, as large, sanctified globules of water splash and smash down on the humanoid knight that represents Harmaus' current track down the path towards becoming a Fell Dragon, knowing that Harmaus' sheer power won't let him be bound by the whirlpool for long.
GS: White Knight Leo has attacked Zed with Reaping Crescent! GS: White Knight Leo has attacked Marivel Armitage with Reaping Crescent! GS: White Knight Leo has attacked Hiro with Reaping Crescent! GS: White Knight Leo has attacked Rixia with Reaping Crescent! GS: Seraph Lanval has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Blessed Drops! GS: Seraph Lanval has completed his action. GS: COUNTER! Zed counterattacks White Knight Leo with Counter Attack! GS: Zed takes a solid hit from White Knight Leo's Reaping Crescent for 275 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Zed gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Power Burst activated! GS: Healthy! For entering Condition Green, Zed receives 100 temporary hit points. GS: Zed enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Hiro takes a solid hit from White Knight Leo's Reaping Crescent for 267 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Hiro gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Power Burst and Guard bonus activated! GS: Hiro enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: CRITICAL! White Knight Leo solidly guards Zed's Starry Night - Starbow Rodando for 86 hit points! GS: FP up! Power Burst and Guard bonus activated! GS: White Knight Leo has attacked Lemina Ausa with The Crest Grows Dull...! GS: White Knight Leo has gained 1 Combo! GS: CRITICAL! Rixia suffers a terrible blow from White Knight Leo's Reaping Crescent for 262 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Rixia gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Rixia enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: White Knight Leo takes 25 damage from Poison! GS: White Knight Leo has completed his action. GS: Seraph Harmaus suffers a terrible blow from Seraph Lanval's Blessed Drops for 173 hit points! GS: Charge!! You gain 50 FP! (That's 35 more than usual!) GS: Seraph Harmaus enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Cripple expired! GS: Marivel Armitage solidly guards White Knight Leo's Reaping Crescent for 125 hit points! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= _____________________________| Form The Catalyst |______________________________
GS: Lemina Ausa solidly guards White Knight Leo's The Crest Grows Dull... for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lemina Ausa gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Gleam activated! GS: Gamble: Moderate! Magilou solidly guards Lemina Ausa's Loud Coolness for 107 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Magilou gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Arcane Font, Guard bonus, and Gleam activated! GS: Magilou enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Gamble: High! Jean takes a glancing hit from Lemina Ausa's Loud Coolness for 113 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Jean gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Evade bonus and Gleam activated! GS: Your HP has been set to 1465.
<Pose Tracker> Shige Kiwako has posed.
To her credit, Shige does actually try to parse what Harmaus says. Then she scowls. "You're not whole." She shakes her head and waves her hand, dismissing that thought. "You're like a remnant. A lingering shade. There. Spinning, A memory, but not wholly there." She locks eyes with the corrupted Seraph. "I'll give you the same rites I gave others like you."
The transformation gets a look towards Mr Poltergeist, wondering briefly if he's got a similar form. Or a similar fate. Something to look into later. Once more she tries to cover her eyes. Slow, her vision washed out in light. Leaving trails and spots. She blinks a few times and mutters darkly. Though she continues, "I'll make sure you aren't forgotten when you're gone."
To the others, she tries to check on them. Realizing that trying to stem the corruption would just overwhelm all of them. She grits her teeth. Relying on the lantern itself to blanket the area around her. Those shadows at the edges gaining more defined features. Countering the light from Harmaus with shadow this time. Whispers, accusations. Clinging and bitter cold. All the nastiness one expects from a haunting. Even remnants of the Lord in question. She had been there. The name drawing it's memory forward. Just the hints of it. Needling.
"Stay with us Mr. Poltergeist." she doesn't fully know what he's going through, but she can see that concern. "Just stay with me, follow the light to the end." There's a faint pause. She should work on that. Might be more than a little fatalistic.
Layna's nod is met with her own. And something of a grim smile.
As with Lanya, Talia's nod is met with one too. "I've got you both, don't worry." She tries to sound reassuring. There's another pang of realization that that also sounds final. She needs a pep talk coach.
GS: Shige Kiwako has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Haunted Ground! GS: Shige Kiwako has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Hiro has posed.
He's nodding along with Ivan until, "I mean I keep up with her okay! She's just her own woman!" Hiro then looks towards Rixia, and there's, this long moment where she's looking at her, like something she said struck a chord in him.
And he squares up his stance, standing up straighter, as that Junction of Speed washes over him. As Marivel's Crimson Noble Rites flow through him in the power of a Behemoth, and some Time Magic.
Leo is dazed, and for a moment he doesn't press that, letting him talk. It's difficult to hear. "I get it. When Siegfried almost killed Lucia, when she was laying abed... I felt the same. Helpless. It's only natural you'd want to protect her." Hiro gives him a sympathetic look, "Especially seeing what she's become now."
The malevolence though affects Leo, and Hiro finds himself saying, "Leo wai-" He doesn't wait, the Metal Shrieks as his near Iaido cut of the Waning Crescent style. Hiro is cut. And blood seeps out through the links in his armor, staining his clothing, as he staggers, but...
Wiping blood away from his mouth, he coughs, "I understand. There's nothing I want to do more than stay with her." He squares up his stance, and leaps at Leo, "It's why we're fighting right now!"
His image splits into three. And its his turn to STAB, as each one thrusts its blade at Leo, stabbing so viciously it rends even visible dark wounds within the air itself.
Each pulls its blade out of the attack, and as the other two Hiro's fade, each void space spasms, and the air rushes in violently to fill it from all directions, making Leo the center of a violent, cutting torrent of slashes.
"If you continue down this course, tell me the truth Leo. Do you really think you can protect her from HERSELF?"
GS: Hiro has activated Force Action: Lock On! GS: Hiro spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: MYSTIC ARTE! Formation! Blitz! Hiro has attacked White Knight Leo with Trinity Crisis! GS: Hiro has gained 1 Combo! GS: Hiro's stances have changed to Hero! GS: Hiro gains 30 THP from Regen! GS: Hiro has completed his action. ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= _____________________________| Form The Catalyst |______________________________
GS: Seraph Harmaus takes a glancing hit from Shige Kiwako's Haunted Ground for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Harmaus gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Hex applied to Seraph Harmaus!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
It should, between the five of them, be enough to take care of Harmaus. It *should*.... if it was against anyone else but Harmaus.
Gwen grits her teeth in a grim smile, noticing how the Malevolence snaking off Harmaus is beginning to snake onto Leo. "Shit... Think I spoke too soon. Everyone, hold on!" If Shige needs a pep talk coach.... well, Gwen might not be the best, but she certainly has her share of pep in the face of uncertain danger.
A sword shining with a black light swings for them; Gwen swats at it with her ARM. "HA!" It's less the exclamation of someone who has seen their trap being sprung and more like someone just before they plunge their hand into a pile of concrete bricks.
And it certainly feels that way, as Gwen converts whatever energy she *could* gain from it, which remains not that much beyond if she simply tried to attack the Hellion head on.
The hand of the Mockingbird is cocked outward, like the courier was preparing to grab something to the side. The hand tenses into a fist, sparking a chain reaction that travels up the black framework between plates of the explosed arm. It's not quite the brilliant pale gold energy that happened in the battle with Marivel in the Void, but it's enough to speed her onwards, and temporarily express the corruption in her soul like a heavy object hitting a puddle of water.
GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Bounding Flight! GS: Gwen Whitlock has gained 1 Combo! GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action. GS: Gwen Whitlock accepts Gwen Whitlock's Bounding Flight for 0 hit points! GS: Restore! Drowsy removed! GS: Amplify, Hyper, and Quick applied to Gwen Whitlock!
<Pose Tracker> Jean has posed.
Jean... can imagine Magilou is probably right about Lemina's power. She grimaces--both of her grimace--as Magilou says it. She has no words for Ivan's mighty umbrella; she has to focus on this technique, on Lemina.
Besides, Magilou's already spilling the 'secret weakness' for Margaret's benefit. She doesn't need to!
"Are you?" Jean asks Lemina of building it. "Can that legacy be anything but death and pain as long as you build on that same foundation?"
The restoration of Vane. Who she's 'pledged' to.
The ice spell comes. Jean is not fond of ice attacks; she comes from hot climates. So it is that even when she dodges out of the way, the chill of it still gets to her; she strains to evade, and her muscles protest painfully. She has to ignore it, for now. Just like Magilou. They are alike in many ways. This is one of them.
Both Jeans recover themselves in a moment. "Lemina," they say in unision, "You know this isn't right."
Then she lunges--one comes in with a barrage of punches and kicks, driving Lemina if successful into the arms of the other--who is already gathering up power. Her hand glows, a brilliant vivid pink, rather than the deathly violet of the Shadow Dragon. She gathers up her energy, and advances on Lemina.
With a slamming palm strike forward, she endeavors to blast Lemina back and hopefully knock some sense into her; the energy does not burn. It crashes, it floods, life energy overwhelming. ...But it, too, is 'empty'.
Empty, unlike the pain in Jean's eyes as she looks at Lemina now.
GS: Jean has activated Force Action: Lock On! ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= _____________________________| Form The Catalyst |______________________________
GS: Jean spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: Jean has attacked Lemina Ausa with Shadowless Palm! GS: Jean has gained 1 Combo! GS: Jean has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Ivan is briefly scandalized by Magilou's accusation that he was foolish to bring an umbrella to a thunderstorm (nevermind that this isn't actual weather) blushing crimson.
Then, back to Lemina.
"Why are you so sure? Because she gave you power? Isn't that just like letting her buy your loyalty? You're going to hope everything's all right and bet Lucia's life on it?"
A storm of ice shards issues forth, such that no umbrella could stand against it. Ivan tries to use footwork to dodge the shards, jumping, turning, and dancing among them. He manages to find their rhythm well enough to evade the worst of it, but still comes away embedded with a few. "You know... so many elements!!" It is half complaint, half compliment. Ivan, alas, doesn't have access to his one element, unless he decides to risk taking off the amulet that's protecting him from the unknown risk level that he might get so carried away with battle emotions that he turns into a wrathful melting phoenix.
...He decides it hasn't come to that. But he does have a fire... burning in his heart! And a ring full of surprise weapons. He charges Lemina, wielding his umbrella, at first, only to sheathe it at the final moment, and summon forth, with a flash of his ring -- a warhammer the length of his own body, swooping down for her!
GS: Ivan spends 4 Combo on Poison and Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Ivan has attacked Lemina Ausa with Inferno Heart! GS: Ivan enters a Counter stance! GS: Ivan has gained 3 Combo! GS: Ivan has completed his action. GS: Lemina Ausa suffers a terrible blow from Jean's Shadowless Palm for 163 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lemina Ausa gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Cripple, Entangle, and Weaken removed! GS: Hyper and Quick applied to Jean! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Jean drains Lemina Ausa! Jean gains 85 temporary hit points! GS: Lemina Ausa solidly guards Ivan's Inferno Heart for 91 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lemina Ausa gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Poison blocked! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Gleam activated!
<Pose Tracker> Margaret has posed.
Ivan's impassioned defense of the noble umbrella makes Margaret nod along several times for a moment. Yeah! Show her what for! Or perhaps what she's fighting for. For a moment further Margaret wonders: Is it that mysterious? She's obviously --
Wait, Margaret thinks, brow furrowing. Jean knew her. They were cronies. Thick as thieves, or thief-equivalents anyway. If you spend a lot of time with someone and it's not carefully defined you'll understand them better. *I* would obviously have been susceptible to such an offer (so Margaret reasons) had it been *made* to me, but *I* am not *Lemina Ausa*. I am *taller,* Margaret thinks, before going into several dozen more rapid-fire interior affirmations while her face is dark with thought.
(One ear pivots towards Magilou as she speaks, and Margaret nods gravely, once. Her eyes turn towards Harmaus as he assumes THAT form anew...)
(And past him... with pain on his face... Oh, shit, Margaret thinks.)
Her eyes turn to her blade, where the old Celesti steel, refurbished, still mostly bears the painted-on runes. The last prepared blade. If I do this now, she thinks, then the Goddess--
I'm thinking like a hero, Margaret concludes, her eyes closing for a moment. She sweeps her arm up in a half circle to hold her blade above her head, head tilting back. "All in," Margaret says. "RUNE BLADE--"
And that's when the ice storm comes.
Twisting spiralling glaciation, with fractal splendor and profound cold - very LOUD coolness indeed - erupts around Margaret, hiding her from view. There is a small nodule that probably contains her and it begins pushing backwards towards the walls of the space, battered as they are increasingly becoming.
"ignite!"
The ice glows.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xTzwdA4oAg
There is a great noise within the ice, like the spring breakup in places where the lakes freeze, or far enough north or south for the sea to get its cloak of ice. And then with a sparkle of burning light, Margaret erupts upwards, alighting momentarily on one of the spindles of ice with her blade glowing with luminous flame, and she looks down towards Lemina.
"You're right," Margaret says.
"It is pretty 'cool.' But true power comes within your heart--"
Margaret kicks off as she brings the sword upwards and slings it around as if she were trying to strike a ball, and with a coronal eruption that forms a glittering arc of silent sorcerous light (and which will only sting, like, a tiny bit if it nicks Jean or Ivan; probably won't even notice) it lashes forwards, the blade guttering like a candle but not quite going out as she comes down in a heavy two-feet stomp that crushes some of the legacy ice beneath her boots.
"It isn't something you can be *given.* You might be getting a leg up from that device," Margaret says, "but the root's within you."
DC: Margaret switches forms to Rune Blade IGNITION!
GS: Margaret spends 1 Combo on Link! GS: Margaret has attacked Lemina Ausa with A Continuous Motion...! GS: Margaret has gained 2 Combo! GS: Margaret has launched an attack Link! GS: Margaret has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: Margaret spends 3 Combo on Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Margaret has attacked Lemina Ausa with THE GREAT DIVIDE! GS: Margaret has gained 2 Combo! GS: Margaret has completed her action. GS: Gamble: High! Lemina Ausa takes a glancing hit from Margaret's A Continuous Motion... for 77 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lemina Ausa gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Slow applied to Lemina Ausa! GS: FP up! Evade bonus and Gleam activated! GS: Lemina Ausa solidly guards Margaret's THE GREAT DIVIDE for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lemina Ausa gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Guard bonus and Gleam activated!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.
It seems that he will never stop making assumptions about her and Amaranth -- about how much of her doing is truly Amaranth's doing. For all that he had claimed, in his own convoluted way, that he had washed his hands (paws?) of the business he had with Amaranth, it seems he still bears animus regarding. Perhaps Talia will need to beat it out of him.
If, indeed, he's capable of learning anything at all anymore.
As she says to him -- can't he see what this is doing to him? He had said to her -- and Kaguya -- before that he was well aware of what track this was setting him upon. What it would eventually cause him to become.
"Is there?" the Hellion that Harmaus has become replies as she cleaves at its form; though it twists sharply, the paired bolts set forth by her blade catch it on its right shoulder and from there the armor itself bleeds black. "Is there nothing? It knows little and less, still! I finds out! I presses through to other side and seizes what was lost!"
He's not whole. This is something that is true on a metaphysical level about Harmaus, if not on the physical/spiritual. Magilou had noticed it already: what happens to the kids who are left without guidance? They find their own. He'd found it in Anitia, and once she had passed--
"Tcha. Long lives I, but many, many yet mistakes me for 'ghost', yet," Harmaus grouses, lowering its blade a touch if just for this moment. "Alive, I am! I am the Seraph Harmaus, and I lives seven hundred and seventy-seven years! It thinks I dead because it lives so little, little, yet? Soon it dies, and I-- I continues on--"
The shadow hounds it. It looks to an outside observer for the moment as if it is fighting an opponent that none can see, for it is in truth fighting the very shades and whispers that only it can see. And once its blade takes the shade, well, it is too late, right? It's already inside. Harmaus breathes hard, exhausted for a critical moment perhaps as Gwen charges what power she has within her ARM. This may well buy her time.
To Layna's declaration, Harmaus laughs. Not in mockery, no -- but it laughs the laugh of one delighted. "So few! So few thinks so! Perhaps this is why world riddles with lies? So many thinks only of gains, of power--"
Such declarations are cut off when Lanval's sanctified droplets slam into it, one after another and seemingly without end -- an answer, perhaps, for Harmaus' statement that he shall take the truth of the world for himself and himself alone. Staggering under the impact, the Hellionized Seraph seems to falter in the moment, and herein is where Layna makes her own play: she aims to steal some of the Harmaus' power for herself. With a grunt, some crucial component that makes up Harmaus is ripped free from his form, tearing away in so many sparkling motes. "What... what has it done," Harmaus rasps.
It staggers forward, its left hand outstretched as if reaching for something it cannot grasp in that moment. But in the next, that hand finds purchase on the hilt of its blade and it raises its shining sword to the heavens.
When the blade falls, it drops like a meteor. It slams into the floor again and again. From each connecting blow, blue light leaps forth: like hottest flame, like deepest water. Such light will cut and it will burn and it will drown. Layna and anyone else near to and about her -- Lanval, Gwen -- all of them will feel its wrath.
Even as that light lingers it closes on Talia. No trace of blue can yet be found in its blade: it is yellow, as purely so as sulphur, as the color of a buttercup. When it swings its sword, it means cleave Talia in two -- or so it would seem from the arc it intends the blade to track. This sword's blade will not cut flesh, such as it is. But it will cleave other things should it strike true, and it will burn.
It rounds then on Shige, thrusting a single armored hand held out towards her. Malevolence coils and roils there in Harmaus palm before it erupts forth in an unyielding wash of corrupted light.
===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus =======================================
_____________________________| Form The Catalyst |______________________________
GS: Seraph Harmaus has activated Force Action: Fury Shot! GS: You have activated the Force Action Fury Shot! GS: Seraph Harmaus spends 1 Combo on Poison! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Cyanosis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Seraph Lanval with Cyanosis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Layna Manydays with Cyanosis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has gained 2 Combo! GS: Seraph Harmaus has activated Force Action: Lock On! GS: You have activated the Force Action Lock On! GS: Seraph Harmaus spends 1 Combo on Poison! GS: Seraph Harmaus enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Talia with Xanthosis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has gained 3 Combo! GS: The Force Action Fury Shot is already active!
<Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
"Oh, I'm sure the Goddess would never abandon you," Magilou assures Lemina, grinning all too sharply. "I'm sure that child of hers destroying everyone over there over his abandonment has nothing to do with you. Surely some other Goddess made the Seraphim! No relation."
Magilou knows who Lemina is pledged to, too.
But -- LOUD COOLNESS lances out, and Magilou is forced to deploy her shikigami-shields again to protect herself. (Three of them, at all her frontal points; there are so MANY icy spires, all seeking to skewer her again.) She has no cosmological weakness to ice, with an affinity for every element, but... that doesn't mean it isn't more effective than it could have been.
Call it psychological.
"She's /cheating,/" Magilou pouts, to Ivan, when he praises/plaints Lemina's broad array of elements. (As if Bienfu isn't helping /her/ cheat.)
She takes a moment to appreciate Margaret's GREAT DIVIDE, because, well -- it's great, actually. "Now there's a point!" She crows, a hand hammering the air.
"But I guess... you won't believe that this can be taken from you, will you? Not unless I show you." Eyes to Lemina again, there's the beginning of that same magic again, those fluttering white-lilac butterfly petals coming off of her as the Light flashes.
"Spell Absorber."
GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Shige Kiwako with Undying Light! GS: Seraph Harmaus has gained 1 Combo! GS: Magilou enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Magilou has attacked Lemina Ausa with Spell Absorber! GS: Magilou enters a Counter stance! GS: Magilou has gained 2 Combo! GS: Magilou gains 10 FP from her Daredevil! GS: Magilou enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Magilou has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Talia takes a glancing hit from Seraph Harmaus's Xanthosis for 36 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Talia gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Disease, Poison, and Reaper applied to Talia! GS: FP up! Arcane Font, Sufferer, and Gleam activated! GS: Layna Manydays suffers a terrible blow from Seraph Harmaus's Cyanosis for 117 hit points! GS: Delay, Disease, and Poison applied to Layna Manydays!
<Pose Tracker> Zed has posed.
'When Siegfried almost killed Lucia,' Hiro says. Zedane looks profoundly uncomfortable for a moment. Yeah, that's one of those things that made him decide that HEY MAYBE THESE GUYS AREN'T GREAT. Hearing how it affected Hiro--
Isn't great either.
But he's moved past that. He wants to think he's making up for it now.
But a moment's reverie is all Leo needs to exploit. He swings in a vicious, lightning-swift arc. A cut to drive all conflict away. Zed...
Denies it.
Not the cut. But the intent behind it. The desire to turn one's eyes away from conflict and strife. With a roar, he steps into the cut, channeling the fury of the Behemoth imbued into him by Marivel's magic. It isn't without cost-- splattering blood paints a quicksilver silver rorschach across a nearby computer screen. He strikes in that moment, rushing into the gap to keep pressing the attack.
Leo won't be able to look away. He will make sure of that.
"I don't know what happened to your sister," Zed says, once again blade-locked-- for the third time tonight, in fact. "But I do know that you're breaking yourself down trying to save her. If she's intent on walking down an ill-portuned road, then following her into darkness will only see the destruction of two souls!"
Zed darts back as the myriad Hiros charge in-- only to revolve on his heel once the crisis of swords concludes. One strike, horizontal. "Leo-- if what you've been doing all this time hasn't saved her..." Another, diagonal. "...Why do you think that continuing will somehow do the trick...?" A third, horizontal again, forming a Z that hangs in the air like a watermelon-hued star of disaster. "That's not brave or dutiful! That's just plain old madness!"
One more cut, crossing the diagonal.
"Broken hands can't pull anyone from the brink! You won't save anyone if you can't save yourself! If you know in your heart what's right, then you only hurt yourself by turning away from it!" He swings, and--
An explosion. A catastrophic release of power.
...That inexplicably glows in the shape of an oversized 'Z'.
GS: Zed has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: Zed has activated Force Action: Snipe! GS: Zed spends 5 Combo on Headshot and Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Blitz! Zed has attacked White Knight Leo with Split Ladle - Sakura Supernova! GS: Zed has gained 1 Combo! GS: Zed gains 29 THP from Regen! GS: Zed has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.
"What is there to lose if nothing is what's on the other side!?" Talia shouts back at him, her blade swinging down. The runes on it glow, bleeding light from them in wisps and tendrils.
The light lingers on her, and then its blade comes down. She swings hers up -- but she can only parry it for a moment, before it slips free and catches her side. Talia hisses as it cuts through -- into her -- and she feels something inside of her.
Some terrible, twisting corruption. It burns -- and she screams.
It burns. It hurts. She lags, a little, before she launches forward.
The rune on the sword flashes gold. A second flashes silver. Then Talia surges forward, and her form becomes an outline of pale silvery white, intangible, and she shoots clean through a column, only to reappear right next to Harmaus. As she does, she swings her sword down, and hacks it for his side.
GS: Talia enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Formation! Talia has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Displacement Slash! GS: Talia has gained 1 Combo! GS: Recover! Blind and Slow removed from Talia! GS: Talia enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Talia takes 37 damage from Poison! GS: Talia takes 53 damage from Reaper! GS: Talia has completed her action. GS: Lemina Ausa solidly guards Magilou's Spell Absorber for 0 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Lemina Ausa gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Lemina Ausa's Mute Ward may block the effect! GS: Mute blocked! GS: Hyper applied to Magilou! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Gleam activated! GS: CRITICAL! Seraph Lanval suffers a terrible blow from Seraph Harmaus's Cyanosis for 97 hit points! GS: Seraph Lanval's Poison Ward may block the effect! GS: Delay, Disease, and Poison applied to Seraph Lanval! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: CRITICAL! Seraph Harmaus solidly guards Talia's Displacement Slash for 181 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Harmaus gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Riposte applied to Talia! GS: Charge!! You gain 50 FP! (That's 35 more than usual!) GS: Seraph Harmaus enters CONDITION GREEN!!
<Pose Tracker> Rixia has posed.
Marivel grants her a powerful shield and also twists time around her, which she can acutely sense; it's perhaps scary how in tune with Time Magic she is now, despite what she plays with being an imitation thereof. "What happened to her...?" she has to ask, because she doesn't know. She won't understand any better unless she asks, no matter if it hurts, but...
It all starts with Leo. It has to.
The Malevolence starts to seep out of Harmaus' form, and Rixia stammers, "Is-- is this the right time to be fighting?!" The console is cut in one fell swoop, and Rixia finds herself stumbling again and yelps as she dives for one side and covers her head with her arms. It's the most she can do. A piece of debris hits her, but she's not pinned underneath it.
"Haah... haah..." Rixia staggers to her feet again. She's somewhat cut off, which is what Leo wants. She's just glad that the floor didn't give way below her...
"I don't know what happened to your sister... but I know there's a man in there that would do anything for her. But the problem is... sometimes, that 'anything' might be too steep a price..."
She lowers her head. Dread is starting to fill her heart. The Malevolence is so thick, she can start to feel its palpable grasp again. Is it proximity to Harmaus? No, not just that...
>> significant distress and shock detected in user, combat performance degrading
>> attempting to adjust emotional equilibrium...
"When I visited Hiro in the jail cells, when the thought of being able to reach for a key and free him came to mind, it was like a devil whispered in my ear." She stares down at herself, at the blood on her uniform. "I... cut someone. I spilled their blood. For the first time in my life. I'm still sort of in shock at that, to be honest... I kinda wanted to throw up. I didn't know that Mystere fellow would come rescue everyone a moment later. I wish I waited! But... but I can't take that back...! This deep despair I feel..."
>> warning, warning, unable to adjust user vitals
>> attempting direct junction override... adjusting temperament of user to self-survival...
She breathes in deep and shakily, as her gunblade rises up, even seemingly against the reluctance of her arms. She looks like she's fighting something else they can't see, right now. Those purple veins are starting to creep up from the corners of her cheeks.
"When I came here, I knew there was no taking anything back... I'm so sorry, Mister Leo. You took me in, clothed me and fed me, protected me through so many battles, and all I did was end up betraying you..."
>> completed junction override of user functions
>> assessing strategic objectives, shifting to tactical level 1...
The air around her starts to rattle violently, as she starts to access magics beyond which she should have the knowledge for, not even being able to comprehend a basic grimoire of magic. It's ancient, synthesized magic, the likes of which should likely draw attention from beyond the stars. The strain on her is quite visible, even as she starts crying with a little, sad smile on her face.
>> objective: eliminate all enemies.
Her throat seizes up momentarily. Her nerves are fully strained as she blurts out, almost hoarse: "Sorry... and thanks for everything, Mister Leo..."
She thrusts her arm out-- and underneath Leo's feet, a mandala of intricate and complicated magic completes, suddenly detonating in large, shining columns that threaten to disintegrate with the localised force of a tiny, tiny, horrible apocalypse.
GS: Rixia has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: MYSTIC ARTE! Formation! Rixia has attacked White Knight Leo with End of Heart! GS: Rixia has gained 1 Combo! GS: Rixia has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
MArivel sees the Malevolence curling around Leo like a cat that keeps coming back the very next day. "No!" She shouts, standing up--she knows that Malevolence is a force that you can reject conciously all you want--but will still find a way in even if Leo knows just how bad it is--maybe not normally, but in a precarious situation such as this? Almost certainly.
Before Marivel can act on it, Leo unleashes another powerful diagonal slice that catches Marivel in the chest and sends her sprawling flat on her back. Black smoke erupts from the wound sharply--but briefly.
"Ghnn..." Marivel hisses through her teeth as she listens to Leo tell the story of Mauri. She knows damn well if Leo hadn't shared this story, she would not see any difference between the Red Priestess and any other fanatic. Was it really Ronfar's doing? She barely knows the man but...
"Lady luck be kind," She mutters as she stands herself up to her feet.
She takes in another breath before running forward like she's about to pounce Leo!
But she doesn't. Instead she drops down near him and bites down upon the growing Malevolence around Leo, absorbing it into her own body, trying to suck up as much as she can into her own body.
Her eyes slit into draconic pupils--but she tries to pull that spiritual poison away from Leo in the process though it can only do so much in a world full of it.
This puts her well within head chopping range too, but Marivel focuses on this work all the same.
"Leo, please... I don't want to lose anyone else either...
Her lowered guard is lowered further when Rixia, way out of expectation, unleashes a massive blast. "Rixia, too much!"
But she dare not interrupt her work.
GS: Blitz! Marivel Armitage has attacked Marivel Armitage with Marivel's Defense Drops To Zero! GS: Marivel Armitage has gained 1 Combo! GS: Marivel Armitage takes 53 damage from Reaper! GS: Marivel Armitage gains 26 THP from Regen! GS: Reaper expired! GS: Marivel Armitage has completed her action. GS: Marivel Armitage accepts Marivel Armitage's Marivel's Defense Drops To Zero for 0 hit points! GS: Break applied to Marivel Armitage! GS: FP up! Sufferer activated! GS: CRITICAL! Gwen Whitlock takes a glancing hit from Seraph Harmaus's Cyanosis for 40 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Gwen Whitlock gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Delay, Disease, and Poison applied to Gwen Whitlock! GS: Gwen Whitlock enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: White Knight Leo suffers a terrible blow from Hiro's Trinity Crisis for 291 hit points! GS: FP up! Power Burst activated! GS: Strain! Hiro takes 52 damage! GS: CRITICAL! White Knight Leo suffers a terrible blow from Zed's Split Ladle - Sakura Supernova for 429 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! White Knight Leo gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Power Burst activated! GS: Strain! Zed takes 60 damage! GS: White Knight Leo suffers a terrible blow from Rixia's End of Heart for 282 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! White Knight Leo gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Cripple removed! GS: Strain! Rixia takes 39 damage!
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
Layna glances toward Lanval. He seems to be coming to revelations. ...She just hope they don't crush him. She'll do what she can for him, but right now it's hard to do more than focus on Harmaus. He's too dangerous to let herself be distracted for long.
She chuckles.
"Let's not get too ahead of ourselves. me, I love gaining and power, too. But you gotta be able to recognize the situation." She comments. She makes contact - he seems, surprised, and she grins. "...Consider that another secret from us seafarers."
He takes up his sword, and then, it descends. Layna braces herself as blue light, like flame and water both, consume her. She grits her teeth. It threatens to tear her apart, to burn her to ash, to drown her - she maintains herself through this, through no small effort. She backpedals away from him, hauling a fist back. Her right bracer ignites with flame... and then she punches forward, reciting an incantation as she does. A powerful burst of wind wreathed in flames rushes out toward Harmaus, threatening to scorch whatever they touch.
GS: CRITICAL! Shige Kiwako partially evades Seraph Harmaus's Undying Light for 167 hit points! GS: Misery inflicts a random effect! Entangle applied to Shige Kiwako! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Gleam activated! GS: Layna Manydays spends 1 Combo on Poison! GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Searing Tempest! GS: Layna Manydays has gained 1 Combo! GS: Delay expired! GS: Layna Manydays takes 27 damage from Poison! GS: Layna Manydays has completed her action. ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= _____________________________| Form The Catalyst |______________________________
GS: Seraph Harmaus partially guards Layna Manydays's Searing Tempest for 182 hit points! GS: Seraph Harmaus's Poison Ward may block the effect! GS: Poison blocked! GS: Charge!! You gain 40 FP! (That's 25 more than usual!) GS: FP up! Charge bonus activated!
<Pose Tracker> Lemina Ausa has posed.
Lemina grits her teeth, but Jean's illusions press through -- and this time, they hit, and they hurt. Her eye screws shut and she's battered back, back, back by Jean's empty palm.
She sees that pain, and just... "Why do you keep acting like we're friends!? You helped Pearl kill Lunn, you abandoned me --" Wait, what? That's new. "And now you want to swing right back around and act like none of that happened?! Like this doesn't mega-suck?!"
She skids away, only to be battered yet further back by Ivan's warhammer. That one she defends against a little better -- but it doesn't do her any good, as Margaret lashes out with that mighty blade. She's fully committed to ice right now, and that flame -- even though it's just as much her element as ice, normally -- stings extra for it. Her posture sags as she's knocked back, and she hisses, "I know that!" and to Magilou, "I'm not cheating -- just augmenting! The Ausa bloodline's been cultivated to be able to master any element for more than a thousand years -- of course the power's within me!" The more pressed she gets, the more she retreats into those feelings of anger, hurt, and self-superiority -- feelings that don't sit quite right on her.
(She was never that into the Insane Ausa Family Planning Initiative for its power. The elaborate illicit romances were the fun part.)
Gritting her teeth as Leo offers her that blessing, Lemina says, "Don't waste time on that -- you've already used up all the magic in that Crest," frustrated at Leo taking a seemingly pointless action. "I'll end this myself."
Magilou insists she'll take her magic from her -- and Lemina feels her reaching out, just like when she stopped her from casting the arte she learned in the library. This time, she centers herself -- and while Lemina loses the tail end of her current ice magic, and the spell she was working on building next, she manages to reach out and absorb some of that power back -- either from that magic itself, or from Magilou if she has to.
"Let me show you," she hisses, "how little you can take from an Ausa! I don't need these toys -- I just like them." She raises both hands; one gathers crimson red energy, while the other a mix of blue, black, brown, and white.
"The rest of you can burn! Nova Flame!" she declares, slamming the red energy straight down; it comes to a point just below her and then billows out in all directions, engulfing the area surrounding Lemina with bright red flame. Her eyes remain on Magilou the whole time, though. "And as for you --"
"I was waiting for you to do that."
Lemina sweeps her hands -- both, now that the other is free -- out toward Magilou, announcing:
"Imprisoned by the coldest cold -- there you shall perish!"
That ball of energy gathers into itself, becoming impossibly bright. It doesn't issue forth, though; instead, spires of ice begin to form everywhere around Magilou -- lancing up and through and around her, fully devouring her. It's not far off from Lemina's old Earth-Ice combination magic, Final Embrace -- but that was always designed to coordinate with others, to hold targets in place, to enable her friends.
For all her talk of being pledged to the Goddess... Lemina is her own ally.
All that ice shatters, raining shards inward toward Magilou. The sound of its shattering comes almost loud enough to be an attack in its own right.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.
"She'sh been callin' me a 'Poltergeist' 'caushe I'd been breakin' bottlesh," Lanval does clarify for Harmaus' edification, in a fleeting, flippant moment of conversational calm as regards Shige's playful moniker. "There wash shomethin' I really had ta shtab with a bottle, needed ta be juuuusht right."
Unnatural alien shrubby trees, sometimes, do need to be stabbed with broken bottles. It is the highest form of physical violent aggression Lanval knows and recognizes, a thing you do not do lightly.
It may say a lot that he hasn't thought to prepare a broken bottle for even the likes of Harmaus. (Yet?) This is also because he figures Harmaus does not need another strange bit of Truth to seek right now, and there is no telling what nuggets of knowledge and intrigue might yet catch his attention. There are some dormouses that do not need to feed that Hellion-Seraph's head, right now.
This costs him the quippy follow-up to Layna's stealing of some aspect of Harmaus' might, because Lanval is standing 'heck yes' levels of alert as the shining blade that wants to shine a desired color rather than its true one comes slamming down, again, and again, and again.
Lanval makes a great show of about two-thirds of the tantrum before he gets squished and wedged underneath one of the blades directly, dipping him in that blue light, into the abyss of hottest flame and the pressure of the deepest water. Even lifted and flung out of it, he's hurled clear into some of the burning wake of this Malevolence-fueled obsession.
There is a moment where one might assume Seraph Lanval stands to be lost to its grasp, as Malevolence roils and blights about his frame, with only a few staggers outside of where the corrupted light burns shows that it doesn't quite stick.
It's a near thing, as it always is.
"It'sh alwaysh the one that rationalize themshelvesh inta their li'l contradictionsh that're the tough onesh," Lanval remarks, as an aside to Shige. "Mosht Seraphim, when they get like that... even talkin' ish beyond them. Seraph Harmaus ish one of the shtronger Seraphim I've, uh." Known? "Exishted alongshide." Gentle.
Talia's screaming of wounds she's subject to, and Rixia's own conflict with what she's doing against what she believes helps keep Lanval's current, immediate timeline of urgency grounded, even knowing Layna can handle herself against the worst Malevolence wrings. (She's a Seer of Water for a very good reason! Several.)
Gwen has no reason to hold back. No one does.
Lanval suddenly goes down on his back as to avoid some of the other sorcerous crossfire going on over at Lemina's share of the conflict, takes a meditative swig from his drinking gourd, and holds up a hand.
"'nother truth ish, Harmaus... there ain't nothin' ya can take fer jusht yershelf, now." Lanval murmurs out another series of Ancient Tongue incantations, broken up by. "Maybe ten, though. Ha ha ha! Sleepin' Bubble~"
A soporific bubble flits from Lanval, slowly, surely, leisurely... looking to collide and pop against the Hellionzed Seraph's form.
GS: Lemina Ausa spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: MYSTIC ARTE! Lemina Ausa has attacked Magilou with Absolute Prison! GS: Seraph Lanval has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Sleeping Bubble! GS: Delay expired! GS: Seraph Lanval takes 27 damage from Poison! GS: Seraph Lanval has completed his action. GS: Lemina Ausa has completed her action. GS: Seraph Harmaus suffers a terrible blow from Seraph Lanval's Sleeping Bubble for 118 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Harmaus gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Seraph Harmaus's Drowsy Ward may block the effect! GS: Drowsy blocked! GS: Lemina Ausa has activated Force Action: Extend! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Ivan with Nova Flame! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Jean with Nova Flame! GS: Lemina Ausa has attacked Margaret with Nova Flame!
<Pose Tracker> Shige Kiwako has posed.
Shige Kiwako kind of earned a personal bit of misery dredging up memories to antagonize, truth be told. Doesn't mean that corrupted light washing over her is welcome by any stretch. The corruptive nature dredging up all sort of her own unpleasant memories. Her head all, but spinning. She had been almost successful at getting out of the way even with a neat little twist, but it hadn't quite been fast enough.
"Jokes on you." she starts, taking a moment to try and find her footing. "Been drunk enough this is nothing." Not really. She's not having a good time for one, but she stays on her feet. Only swaying a little. The bravado helps in her head though. Keeps her grounded on the lantern in hand. "Been dealing with the aftermath too. I've accepted it. I've taken them to the other side."
Sure, there's things that she usually drowns out bubbling at the surface. Smells, sounds. Her fingers clench. "A pitiful shade. I'll drag you where you belong if I have to." She's got a darker tone there. Anger even.
The others pull her out of it though. Pain, suffering. She can help with that. That's what she's supposed to do, right? It's at odds with what she's thinking now though. Stop the suffering by ending the root cause. Or extend it by trying to put a bandage on it. She shakes her head a few times and lowers her hand.
She fumbles with her pack for a moment. A slender cigar pulled free. A ritual she'd normally handle alone. Like she's trying to ground herself. One end is put in her mouth and bitten off. The familiarity trying to ground herself.
"No. I'll protect what's there. I'm just the guide." She says this more to convince herself than anything. Still. The lantern is lifted again. Redoubling her efforts to purify the surrounding area. To help light the way forward.
GS: Jean partially guards Lemina Ausa's Nova Flame for 143 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Jean gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Shige Kiwako has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Hallowed Ground! GS: Shige Kiwako has attacked Talia with Hallowed Ground! GS: Shige Kiwako has attacked Layna Manydays with Hallowed Ground! GS: Shige Kiwako has attacked Seraph Lanval with Hallowed Ground! GS: Shige Kiwako has attacked Shige Kiwako with Hallowed Ground! GS: Shige Kiwako has gained 2 Combo! GS: Shige Kiwako has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Seraph Lanval accepts Shige Kiwako's Hallowed Ground for 0 hit points! GS: Restore! Disease, Drowsy, and Poison removed! GS: Lock state applied to Seraph Lanval! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Gwen Whitlock accepts Shige Kiwako's Hallowed Ground for 0 hit points! GS: Restore! Delay and Disease removed! GS: Lock state applied to Gwen Whitlock! GS: Shige Kiwako accepts Shige Kiwako's Hallowed Ground for 0 hit points! GS: Restore! Blind and Entangle removed! GS: Lock state applied to Shige Kiwako! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: Layna Manydays accepts Shige Kiwako's Hallowed Ground for 0 hit points! GS: Restore! Disease and Poison removed! GS: Lock state applied to Layna Manydays! GS: CRITICAL! Margaret solidly guards Lemina Ausa's Nova Flame for 125 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Margaret gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Arcane Font, Guard bonus, and Gleam activated! GS: COUNTER! Magilou counterattacks Lemina Ausa with Counter Attack! GS: CRITICAL! Magilou takes a solid hit from Lemina Ausa's Absolute Prison for 502 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Magilou gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Shield applied to Lemina Ausa! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Gleam activated! GS: Strain! Lemina Ausa takes 100 damage! GS: Magilou has Fallen! She is no longer able to fight! GS: CRITICAL! Ivan partially guards Lemina Ausa's Nova Flame for 196 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Ivan gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Arcane Font activated!
<Pose Tracker> White Knight Leo has posed.
The Malevolence does what it does, like a spiritual version of a universal phenomenon. A negative ionic charge attracts other negative ionic charges. Malevolence seeks out a conflicted soul, even if it can't breach that soul's defenses. And that is what this particular plume does.
'Especially seeing what she's become now.'
"What she did to Bevelle." Leo's voice is tiny. "I told myself there were reasons. Fits, perhaps. The lingering touch of plague." There is another option. An option Leo sees, in front of him, and tries to ignore. "I don't... know," he says, to Hiro. "But I must TRY!" His voice breaks. Three Hiros come at him at once, and Leo can only stop one of them. His blade leaps in to parry the first strike to his right, and he twists to try and turn the rest into glancing blows. Blood splatters to the floor, and soaks the White Knight's tunic. Again, it hurts NEARLY as much as Hiro's words.
Zed's words, too. What has he done to help Mauri, beyond fretting over her safety and being reminded that she's fine? Beyond being hurt and wounded over suspecting his old friend somehow turned his sister's temperament inside-out, but only sometimes? Leo stumbles back, still reeling from Hiro's assault, and those three cuts carve a bright red
-Z- into Leo's chest.
Marivel lunges. Leo backpedals, finds his back to a wall. He glances down--is she eating the Malevolence?!--but there's no time to process her, because Rixia--
Leo's eyes meet with hers, misted with tears. "I know," he whispers.
The ARM fires. Sorcerous energies boil around Leo as the mandala ignites, turning him into a dark silhouette in a column of radiance. The wall behind him melts, falling outwards with a groan. The blast shaks the room. The forcefield holding Lucia's unconscious body collapses like a soap bubble popping.
And in the wreckage is Leo, still clinging stubbornly to life. Bits of rocky armor stick to his bloody skin: the remains of the spell he used to save himself. He's gotten up and stumbled away from worse.
But lying here, at least, is one thing he can do to bring an end to this.
<Pose Tracker> Jean has posed.
Magilou is harsh, but Jean can't fault her for it at the moment--Lemina needs to see the truth, even if it's painful. But Margaret--Margaret advances. True power...
What's in Jean's heart? Is there anything there, anymore? She feels so... empty, now.
"Remember!" Jean calls to Lemina. "It is within you! I've seen your magic! It's mega-impressive, even without these things!"
But there--Wat?
"I what?" Jean says. "I never abandoned you!" Of course it 'sucks'. But Lemina seems to feel it, at least. "I don't know what you're talking about! And you know this doesn't add up! Why don't we stop, and talk about it!?"
The fire comes. Jean throws up her arms to guard herself, and her claws take the brunt of the damage. Even managing to guard it, it's still almost too much. Her will is beginning to give out. How can she reach Lemina, like this...?
But suddenly--
She was 'waiting'. Jean watches the spell rain about Magilou, and she remembers--the spell she shouldn't know...
"Magilou!" Jean calls in alarm. "Lemina--"
She looks around at them. Ivan and Margaret... Margaret obviously cares for Magilou.
"Get Magilou out of here!" Jean calls, in unknowing echo of her attempt to ssave Lucia. Perhaps this one will go better, as Jean rises to her full height and extends her hands, claws-first. She starts to gather Power, more power than Lemina has ever seen Jean muster before. "Let me show you what Magilou has taught me!" Jean calls. "I won't give up! On her, or on you!"
Lucia's free. Jean looks to her--and she knows she's doing the right thing.
".....You're about to get a lot closer!" Jean intones, and then lifts both of her hands as she completes the spell. "GRAVITY MINE!"
This time, it's Jean's magic that sweeps around at Lemina, seeking to trip her up, to knock her backward into the trap and into the debris that their battle has caused. She doesn't have to stop her.
She just has to slow her down.
GS: Jean has attacked Lemina Ausa with Gravity Mine! GS: Jean has gained 2 Combo! GS: Mighty and Riposte expired! GS: Jean has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Lemina Ausa solidly guards Magilou's Counter Attack for 189 hit points! GS: FP up! Arcane Font, Charge bonus, and Gleam activated! GS: ROU|LET|TE: Low! Lemina Ausa solidly guards Jean's Gravity Mine for 90 hit points! GS: Shieldbreak applied to Lemina Ausa! GS: FP up! Arcane Font and Charge bonus activated! GS: Strain! Jean takes 36 damage!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
Chop, chop, chop. With the aid of the energy coiling in half of her body, Gwen makes a bid to leap over the shockwaves, only managing a few skilled leaps before she stumbles, the infectious corrosion once again gaining ground on her body. "Gh..." They can't to this for too long; it's costing them way too much time.
Shige's 'guidance' does a better job of purging the thorny snags of Harmaus's unholy light, allowing Gwen's soul to be restored to her previous status of 'better than usual'.
Talia surges forward with that impressive rune sword, proving that it's not just the weapon that has changed, but her bag of tricks. The courier seizes on this oppurtunity to charge... and charge in, as well.
The others have better arguments to combat Harmaus, but Gwen would agree with Lanval: words will not reach this Seraph, even if Gwen would be the last person to look down on someone else for trying, over and over again.
She'd be a hypocrite if she even dared to fault anyone for that.
Leaping in front of the Hellion, Gwen lands a one-two combo, starting with a bright flash of light to the face, though, unlike Harmaus's own, the only banishment this could provide is a temporary reprive from sight.
Gwen pants, inbetween attacks. She's still not at 100, it seems, and Gwen can onlt look forward to a long escape out of here, rather than a nap at some inn or campsite.
With an intake of breath, the redhead presses in with another beam attack, only this time straight to Harmaus's body, rather than from afar. Her frustration bleeds through with another grunt, as if Harmaus was another heavy load she had to get done before the day was through. "Gh!!"
If only Harmaus was just that.
GS: Gwen Whitlock has activated Force Action: Lock On! ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= _____________________________| Form The Catalyst |______________________________
GS: Gwen Whitlock has activated Force Action: Snipe! GS: Gwen Whitlock spends 1 Combo on Link! GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Quasar Palm! GS: Gwen Whitlock has gained 1 Combo! GS: Gwen Whitlock has launched an attack Link! GS: Gwen Whitlock has activated Force Action: Full Clip! GS: Gwen Whitlock spends 2 Combo on Headshot! GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Coronal Discharge! GS: Gwen Whitlock takes 31 damage from Poison! GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action. ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= _____________________________| Form The Catalyst |______________________________
GS: Seraph Harmaus takes a glancing hit from Gwen Whitlock's Quasar Palm for 0 hit points! GS: Seraph Harmaus's Blind Ward may block the effect! GS: Blind blocked! GS: FP up! Countermeasures and Evade bonus activated! GS: Seraph Harmaus suffers a terrible blow from Gwen Whitlock's Coronal Discharge for 173 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Harmaus gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Jam applied to Seraph Harmaus! GS: FP up! Countermeasures activated!
<Pose Tracker> Hiro has posed.
Hearing Rixia shift tone, as the ARM makes that sound, "Rixia - whatever told you that, you don't need to listen to it! That's not how we resolve things here. It's-" When he hears the ARM make that sound, his heart just breaks a little.
Innocence dies a touch, and all he can do is talk to Leo, "Then try! But try while doing what your HEART tells you!" Hiro tells Leo, even as Leo collapses, as the shockwave blast from Rixia's ARM bursts the barrier.
Hiro's eyes snap to her in an instant, as he takes off running. "Lucia-! Lucia...!" He shakes her a moment, gently, then putting an arm around her, then when that proves inadequate, sheathing his sword, and picking her up.
"What did they do to you?" He whispers.
Unconscious as she is, he wraps her own arms over his shoulders, hoisting her up, and putting his hands behind him to hoist up her legs.
"Alright, I've got her! Everyone, let's get out of here before reinforcements come!" The question is... where!? How?
There's not a lot of options in this room!
<Pose Tracker> Ruby and Cirea has posed.
They may have accomplished what they set out to do but things are LOOKING GRIM! Because more of the Guard could come at any moment, and who knows when the Fake Althena might show back up.
And then the sealed door on the South end of the chamber pops right open. As a young girl with pink hair and a yellow bow on her hair yells out, "Ta-da! Everyone be properly thankful as Ruby - Red Dragon Extraordinaire - has SECURED YOU ALL AN EXIT! What would you do without me?" With a pop, and a poof of smoke, she's returned back to dragon form. "No time to waste! Go go go! No Narcs allowed!"
Ruby zips down the corridor she opened up, flying and flapping wings towards a large room.
The escape route comes to a dead end!
"Just hold on a second! Yo Cirea! Did you get it working yet!?"
Or at first it looks like a dead end; a large room, overlooked by a small balcony about a floor above that connects to a different part of the tower. In the room is a symbol on the floor: an eight-pointed star with a vague similarity to a compass rose, similar to but different than Vane's teleporters and currently not activated, and the balcony above has a large podium or platform facing down into the room - clearly the controls, but unfortunately out of easy reach. With the security in the state it is from the active ecape, runes have lit up on the railing to form a barrier, making it impossible to climb up from the lower level.
If this is the way out, it doesn't look like it's active, and it doesn't look like anyone can use it...
...until a tiny figure pops up, looking over the edge of the control panel. Barely a foot tall, with elven ears and hair the red and orange of fallen maple leaves, dragonfly-style wings fluttering. "Hey! Up here!" Cirea, the fairy that a few Drifters have met, waves her arms energetically to get attention. "Get everybody on the platform, I don't know how long I can make this teleporter go, because they'll figure out someone is up here."
Cirea ducks back down, out of sight. This is just like the teleporter she used to get out of her old tower, she thinks. Did *he* make it too? But she knows how to run something like this, even when they've got it turned off. She just has to pull this, adjust this rune, draw something new in with a small metal wand that still looks big in her hand...
With an electrical *pop*, the panel suddenly lights up, and an instant later so does the teleporter pad beneath. Letting out a whoop of success, Cirea takes off. She manipulates one of the railing runes - they're meant to stop people from coming up, not down - and a patch of barrier blanks out. She squeezes through it before it reappears, a tight fit even for her, and half-flies, half-drops toward the platform herself. "Come on! Let's go go go! We can talk when we're out!" Ruby totally gives Cirea a Pawsie in a 'high five' before going through herself.
<Pose Tracker> Magilou has posed.
"Within you, yet you need that gadget to make full use of it?" Magilou wonders, airily, on the Ausa's Family Power. "I really hope it keeps working for you. Interesting how they gave you a trick to use instead of having you tap into your power directly, isn't it?"
Magilou could say a thing or two about Final Embrace herself, really -- largely, that developing that Arte was never enough to catch up to him. That man, who used...
"I won't let you!" Magilou yells -- and she is angry, in this moment, really, actually angry.
The ice does not shatter.
It stops.
Magilou arrests the Arte -- erases it. There is no hint of Absolute Prison, where it should have claimed her. The spell simply isn't.
All the ice that was inside you is inside me, now.
All that sorcerous might -- every inch and whit of it -- broken down to its inherent molecules, the rawest units of power, magical mitochondria which Magilou draws into her own veins. Her body is the conduit. Her body has EVER been the conduit. She alone was capable of hosting 49 Malakhim inside her -- an impossible number, framed against the otherwise-impressive numbers of a handful of souls. It was so, so easy, adapting her signature Arte to consume every danger imaginable.
All it took was feeling it.
And feeling it, now, again, takes everything from her.
"No," Magilou gasps, doubling over herself -- and it would be elegant to say that she sinks to her knees but the word is dropping, more like a stone than a leaf on the breeze. They'll be scraped, later, underneath her stockings. She scarcely notices. "Master... stop it..!!"
Magilou knows the workings of Final Embrace.
Magilou knows the workings of Final Embrace, because she was tested against something far greater.
And Jean -- Jean surely recognises the weight of crying out, even as Magilou's eyes shut tightly and she abjures the world.
<Pose Tracker> Hiro has posed.
Hiro casts one final glance at Leo's near insensate body as Ruby presents the exit. "You'll find your way."
And then, he turns and runs after Ruby, unconscious Lucia in tow. He saw the horrifying result to Magilou.
He saw.
But he also trusts that Jean will get her out of here. He has to.
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
Marivel watches Leo go down. She exhales slowly and stands herself up. She can't take in any more and also escape. Hopefully that will be enough to spare Leo.
"...Alright, see you later."
And with that she makes her way to the escape route.
<Pose Tracker> Zed has posed.
It's--
Done.
"Hrmph, down, huh...? At least I'm pretty sure that purple stuff can't infect a brain that's unconscious. So, the next time you wake up, you'd better think hard about where you want to end up. Purple is definitely not your color." Zedane harrumphs, and then--
Takes off like a shot after Marivel and Hiro and Lucia. A golden, doggo-shaped <thing> follows shortly thereafter.
Goldie... does not want to be left behind in this place...!
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Ivan misses any factual innacuracies Lemina might let slip -- he only knows about her friendship with Hiro and Jean secondhand. It feels instead to him like the conversation has slipped to Lemina's pride in her family line and what she's capable of. His expression goes a little colder and more resigned. "I guess you really don't care," he says -- of Lucia's fate, or the possibility that the Goddess is a lie. "As long as you get what you want."
Flame comes for them, and Ivan is momentarily engulfed before bringing forth the umbrella again, forging a golden barrier to keep from being burnt to a crisp. The flame that reached him burns and scorches, even fire aspected as he is.
When it passes, he snaps the umbrella shut, tracing patterns in the air with it, before raising it skyward and unfurling it again. Motes of light rise from the canopy, dancing about in an immitation of flames before swarming for Lemina in a storm of holy light.
A series of critical events transpire -- Leo, felled, Lucia freed, and Magilou suffering some manner of catastrophic magical indigestion. And Ruby is back, helping them get a way out!
The time has come... to run! He nods to Margaret, who is going for Magilou, putting up another golden barrier to help cover their exit.
GS: Ivan spends 4 Combo on Poison and Gatling, loading 3 into Gatling! GS: Ivan has attacked Lemina Ausa with Stars of Fury! GS: Ivan has gained 1 Combo! GS: Ivan has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.
"...Jaeja," Harmaus utters, responding to Lanval's clarification regarding Shige, and in spite of itself and its goals. Even in spite of the gravity of this very situation. "Are fools, yet."
To Shige more directly, it speaks thus, "Pitiful!? It understands not what it faces. But it tries as it might! I will not banish as it thinks!"
Is Harmaus aware of the effect his very presence is having upon others in this room?
Even if he were, it is likely that he wouldn't care. Leo is no ally of his, for one, and for another... hasn't he expressed the opinion prior that Malevolence is no curse but a blessing? That it permits one to access the primal power of this world?
What if there's nothing on the other side? What if all that awaits Harmaus is oblivion?
"Then... I accepts that," Harmaus answers, after but a moment's hesitation. "Better oblivion than a truthless world!" Even now, he is defiant: he will have his way or no way, whatever the costs -- even to himself -- might be.
It is merciless as it cleaves through Talia, as it turns to unleash its might upon Shige. But this is the critical error: it turns its back on Talia as it does so, and thus, when Talia appears at its side, it doesn't notice until that moment her blade cuts deeply. Only its 'armor' spares it a graver wound, and even so, black blood seeps from the rent.
She is not the only one to set upon it in this moment: Layna advances as Harmaus staggers under Talia's blow. Another to pile on while they can, perhaps -- best to take advantage of the moment, lest it be lost. And as they may too be aware, the corrupted Seraph's very presence is proving toxic in this place. The sooner they can bring this to an end, one way or another, the better. And Layna does her part by swinging at Harmaus with a fist wreathed in a burning windstorm.
It, mercifully, staggers.
There is nothing one can take for just themself. "Ah...?" Harmaus breathes, righting itself. "Thinks it thus? Then if it thinks it stops me, it tries! It tries, and it fai--"
Further protest might be cut off by a bubble that pops with a decided wet snap in Harmaus' helmeted face. If it were not for what Gwen does next, Harmaus may well have followed up with a swing of its blade for Lanval. Instead, there is light.
And then there is a brighter, deadlier light. Black blood dots the floor; the far wall has a scar that will never be erased so long as it stands.
Surely, they must have it on the ropes. Look at it now: black ooze seeps from various cracks and breaks in its armor. It leans on its blade, carving a bright smoldering line in the floor where its tip touches. Seraphim don't need to breathe, but Harmaus' chest rises and falls as if from the exertion. And... shouldn't maintaining this form be further weakening the Seraph? Won't eventually his will give? He'll succumb to--
Harmaus heaves out another unncessary breath. With a roar, it swings its sword first for Layna, all the colors of the rainbow rising as an arc from his blade's edge. It explodes in a brilliant display before it ever touches her, and herein lies its threat.
Harmaus has not ceased: all that is gold glitters in the blade it bares for Lanval; much as it had been for Layna, this swing brings forth but light, but such light: here is an explosion of gold unlike any most eyes have ever seen.
Harmaus limps as it takes the step following. It's struggling, and perhaps they will mark that fact well. Yet, for all that it might struggle, that hardly means that it is powerless. It thrusts that blade towards the ceiling, towards the heavens.
Violet-red light EXPLODES off of the sword, raining down in a terrible storm of destruction all about Harmaus. With the power Malevolence has granted it, it will scour and sear the very flesh from their bones.
"PERISH!" Harmaus calls out, one final expression of its ire.
===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus =======================================
_____________________________| Form The Catalyst |______________________________
GS: The Force Action Lock On is already active! GS: Seraph Harmaus spends 1 Combo on Interrupt! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Layna Manydays with Cauda Pavonis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has gained 2 Combo! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Seraph Lanval with Chrysosis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has gained 2 Combo! GS: Seraph Harmaus takes 31 damage from Poison! GS: Seraph Harmaus has completed his action. GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Shige Kiwako with Iosis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Iosis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has attacked Talia with Iosis! GS: Seraph Harmaus has gained 1 Combo! GS: Seraph Harmaus takes 25 damage from Poison! GS: Seraph Harmaus has completed his action. GS: Talia accepts Shige Kiwako's Hallowed Ground for 0 hit points! GS: Restore! Disease, Poison, and Reaper removed! GS: Lock state applied to Talia! GS: FP up! Gleam activated! GS: CRITICAL! Talia takes a solid hit from Seraph Harmaus's Iosis for 236 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Talia gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Arcane Font, Guard bonus, and Gleam activated! GS: Seraph Lanval has activated Force Action: Accelerate! GS: CRITICAL! Shige Kiwako takes a solid hit from Seraph Harmaus's Iosis for 212 hit points! GS: FP up! Arcane Font, Evade bonus, and Gleam activated! GS: Shige Kiwako enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Seraph Lanval partially evades Seraph Harmaus's Chrysosis for 0 hit points! GS: Infect! Debuff durations extended!! GS: Seraph Lanval's Cripple Ward may block the effect! GS: Seraph Lanval's Mute Ward may block the effect! GS: Break, Jam, Mute, Slow, and Weaken applied to Seraph Lanval! GS: Cripple blocked! GS: FP up! Evade bonus and Gleam activated! GS: CRITICAL! Layna Manydays takes a glancing hit from Seraph Harmaus's Cauda Pavonis for 0 hit points! GS: Blind, Disrupt, and Interrupt applied to Layna Manydays! GS: Layna Manydays has lost 2 Combo from Interrupt!
<Pose Tracker> Rixia has posed.
Marivel tells her she's overdoing it.
Hiro urges her to resist what it's telling her, that it isn't true -- that's not how they do things around here. Just like before, when he told her that he didn't want to become the kind of person who resorts to violence first. It all feels so, so very distant right now...
She feels like she's staring at her own body do things.
(Did this happen before? I can't remember... I vaguely feel like it might've happened, but I can't remember...)
Leo tells her that he knows, and her heart wrenches further-- but her body won't respond. The forcefield holding Lucia's body breaks, and Hiro scoops her up; at about this time, she witnesses Magilou's collapse, something so horrendous happening to her on some level she can't perceive -- but Master?
Ruby dramatically comes to the rescue, in her human form that she's seen once, telling them that she's secured them an exit.
>> tactical level cleared... returning to strategic layer
>> proceeding to next objective for self-survival
(I want to help them... I want to help Mister Leo, Miss Magilou... Miss ayna and Mister Lanval are still fighting...! But... I can't...)
Yet, despite her own protests, she starts to gravitate in the direction of away. "Ghh..." Rixia groans, still in peak veiny villainess mode. The errant strains of magic are wisping off off her, as she stumbles in the direction of the teleporter Cirea creates. A slight, raspy static accompanies her voice. "I must... survive..."
<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.
Shige's lantern shides, and that light holds the light of Harmaus back from Talia. She is grateful for that, being so close to him.
Her eyes widen. It's not a surprise, what Harmaus says -- he'd all but said it before -- but it's shocking to hear. "You're mad," she repeats, though her voice is a whisper. The Hellion's blade explodes with red light. It brings a sheer blast of Malevolent force around, which slams into Talia.
She is hurled bodily into a pillar -- the stone cracks, and she grunts, nearly crumbling to her feet. She slams her blade, point first, into the ground, and looks at Harmaus.
Talia only half-sees what happens to Magilou. She hears it, though -- her head snaps in that direction and her eyes widen. She looks to Hiro, then; she sees he has Lucia, and that they're starting to run.
She glances at her brother, seeing him flee as well -- and with a golden barrier up.
She looks at Layna, Lanval, Shige, and then Gwen. "We need to go!" she shouts. "He will stop at nothing!"
She turns, and sprints away -- but not before throwing up a wall of ice, the shards of the stuff erupting from the ground between her and the Hellion. Then, she sprints away from it.
As Talia darts down the hallway, she looks at Ruby and grins. "Good job, Ruby!" she says. "I'm relieved to see you again! And--"
She spots the teleporter pad. Oh, thank the Goddess, she thinks. "--you brought a friend!"
She darts for the teleportation pad, as Cirea ducks back down.
GS: Talia has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Gwen Whitlock takes a solid hit from Seraph Harmaus's Iosis for 240 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Gwen Whitlock gains 1 additional Combo! GS: FP up! Guard bonus activated!
<Pose Tracker> Margaret has posed.
She knows that. That is a thing which Lemina knows. "Oh, well," Margaret says, momentarily blank at this news. "That's good then." She elaborates, mostly to Magilou. The Ausa bloodline is what? It can do what? She can do what?
You can DO that?? Margaret thinks, brow knitting again.
Magilou reaches outwards and Lemina is already - Margaret spins round on her heel in a shower of sparks, raising up her blade and bracing it with her right arm even if the hand isn't working. The flame rushes forwards as it bursts against her; she forces into the flame, narrowing her eyes as she guards her face.
The flame licks at her neck, her chest, her arms, but it parts - weakens - loses intensity. She strides forwards a step and cries out, "WHAT ARE --"
The crack is like the glacier at the start of the world. Or perhaps its end.
Margaret's eyes wobble for a moment but she can hear screaming for a moment. Magilou's voice. Jean - Jean is -
The Malevolence nearby might incline in another direction for a moment. But thankfully a pawsie is given. Margaret's ears twitch again, then fold against her head. She takes a deep breath and
SCREAMS
and a few things happen pretty quickly for her. The light in the room gets rather strange. Margaret pivots around and looks at Lemina for a moment as she bulls through pudding thick air. She glances at her last burning Rune Blade. Then she hurls it towards the ground - not Lemina itself, because she knows magic enough, but the ground perhaps a yard and a half in front of her. It flies.
Margaret bulls forwards, ducking downwards. She makes herself breathe in. It feels like sweet relief. Why does the air taste so good when it's this thick, she thinks as she ducks down and scoops up Magilou like a sack of dry leaves, clasping her to her chest and baring her teeth. She turns towards where she heard Ruby's voice. A couple of steps later the Rune Blade hits the tiles of the floor, bursting in a harmless but brilliant flame whose sound doesn't really reach Margaret.
The air wobbles like gelatin as she streaks through it and she can feel herself waver; the light seems to get more normal as she comes to a halt, heart jackhammering in her chest as she throws her left hand against the opposite wall in the teleportation nook. Or not quite on it. She staggers onto the space with the others, and she says nothing before they disappear.
<Pose Tracker> Lemina Ausa has posed.
"There's nothing to talk about!" Lemina cries to Jean, even as the backlash of Magilou's absorption courses through her in turn. She's fighting a losing battle here, despite having crushed Magilou's will to fight.
It's Ivan that gets the meat of her attention. "This is what I want! Lucia needs this! You don't know her -- only the Goddess knows the real her! I won't believe for a second she's a false Goddess -- listen to yourself! 'What if she's a fake.' What if the Blue Star was made of cheese?!" She doesn't even acknowledge getting what she wants, this time -- she's reached the stage of critical insult. "You're a mega-idiot."
Jean makes great use of that distraction, though -- puts magic to use that Lemina's not expecting at all. The gravity weighs her down even more this time -- she tries to move forward, to give chase to the retreating mages, but that rune blade hits squarely in front of her and arrests her limited momentum.
"What --" she starts, raising her arm to her face to shield herself. She's still a little too cautious -- this gives everyone plenty of time to retreat as the opportunity at last arises.
And when at last she gets oriented again -- they're leaving... with Lucia? No, no, no --
It wasn't enough. It wasn't enough...
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.
Lanval keeps low to the ground as a matter of trying to avoid some of the other power flying around the space, and it unfortunately gives him an eyeful of some frightful things - like watching Magilou lapse into emotions he hasn't seen in her (and he has full trust in Bienfu to help her through that, with his hands being full right now).
To watch and even hear in Rixia's voice how discordance is starting to weigh in on her, with what she's sacrificing and throwing away in how she helped Layna and himself through to this point, and...
...to say nothing of the White Knight, or the newfound Blue Magus where some greater (or lesser?) ugly truth is yet to be reared.
There's that small joy for a moment when Hiro is able to see to Lucia's safety, and then... Ruby and Cirea provide a way out. (He even waves a hand to Cirea when the dragonfly-winged fairy is trying to get everyone's attention.)
'We need to go! He will stop at nothing!' Lanval hears Talia call.
"Yep." He agrees, rolling back and forth to sit up, right himself up, and--
That brighter, deadlier light, with black blood all over the place. (Some nearly spatter on Lanval.)
"Layna, ya heard 'em, we better--" There's that exploding prism of a blade going for Layna, and by the time Lanval is upright in full, the blade explodes in golden light - Lanval, for whatever reason, appears to have had bad experiences with colors on the wavelength of that shade of orange and yellow and the reasons why will remain arcane as they are nonsensical - whirls and pivots with the displaced forces, stumbling and rolling along rubble and ruin with the help of Shige's shadowy sentries blunting some of the golden light as he's taken out of the reach of the violet-red light that engulfs so many others in flesh-searing heat he can feel a lick of from over there.
"Mmmm." Lanval staggers upright as he shakes off the dreariness of Malevolence that beckons its attempts to enter him, to try and enthrall him into seeking those same pressing answers and truths about the Goddess and the world around them, appealing to the hubris of a life that can live thousands of years outside of tragedy and circumstance (or Malevolence, which is at play here).
They're going to find their truths together, he holds.
"We gotta get movin'," lanval signals, and with a wet whistling sound...
Here comes that horrible BOUYANT STEED, that awful hollow flat-bodied, air-filled legless... horse... thing, coasting on a wave of water that moves to help sweep up Lanval and whomever else might be lagging behind towards that escape pad.
He waves one hand back at Harmaus dismissively while signaling the rest onward.
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
Layna moves to pile on. They can't let up, even for an instant - not when he's fighting with such fervor. He's looking hurt... but Layna knows what happens when one such as he feels cornered.
With a roar, Harmaus's blade is swung. Layna dodges out of the way of the swing - and is subsequently surprised by the resulting rainbow arc and the way it explodes outward toward her. She's flung back violently, reorienting herself in the air to land on her feet, skidding back as she does. She nearly stumbles, but maintains her balance - and then looks at Talia, as she calls out to them. Layna hesitates, but eventually...
"...Aye, lass." She agrees reluctantly, glancing toward the teleporter. They only have a moment. "You heard her, me hearties! Time to shove off! Can't move on your own, grab onto me, aye!?"
She turns to face Harmaus, wind gathering in her hands. She recites in an incantation and then releases it forward. The wind rushes out at him with the force of a tornado, to blow him back as far as she can manage. Between that and all the other measures everyone's put into place... maybe that'll be enough.
That accomplished, Layna takes a leap - and lands right behind Lanval on his horrible, horrible mount. She has no intention of being left behind.
<Pose Tracker> Jean has posed.
Jean understands the signifigance of Magilou crying out, all right. She hears it. She sees her drop. And she understands, even as she's already moving.
Margaret, screaming, has Magilou. Ivan's words sting, because they seem almost to be true. But Jean won't believe that, not that she's seen hope. "There's a lot to talk about. And one time, you'll see."
So, as Jean's spell takes effect, and Hiro grabs Lucia...
Jean does what the Fiends have always done best. She turns on her heel and runs for the exit, looking in surprise to Cirea for only a moment before she leaps into... wherever.
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
And just like in a one gella novel, Hiro, the faithful rogue knight, rescues the fair blue-haired maiden Lucia from her trapped slumber, and the two confess whatever feelings of connection they have, and the Fiends all ride off into the sunset, with rainbows and flowers.
No, it's not that. It's Hiro freeing Lucia, and being aghast over her condition, gathering her up to escape away, as two Guard members, one former and one current, deal with the loss of their innocence in one way or another. For Rixia, sudden, for Leo, a painful gradation
They came in like bandits, and like bandits, the Fiends and their allies must take their leave.
Violet-red light might as well be the color of Gwen's pain; the courier wasn't distracted enough by Lucia being freed for that to be the reason Harmaus's unceasing attacks managed to catch her this time.
She just wants to get out of this damn place. "... no need t'tell me twice," Gwen wheezes, gathering her ragged self out of the impression her body made against the wall. Her energy is already back to meager levels, but Lanval's aquatic promenade gives the courier the boost she needs to make it to the teleporter, and Ruby.
The courier, dripping wet and panting, manages a grin just before the pink dragon cat goes through the portal. "Ruby, I owe you _tuna_. Or whatever good fish stuff you want!!" Cirea too, if she likes fish, but she's already disappeared.
<Pose Tracker> Shige Kiwako has posed.
Shige's not having a good time with that red light. Dancing back away from it, light on her feet, but not fast enough. It stings. More than that. She's trying to convince herself it stings. The rest point out that now's not the time to let up. They're still standing. They're a bit battered, but it could be worse. Right?
It's the end of their stay and she has no intention of staying around anyway. The light on her lantern briefly goes out though. Those shadows drawing in close before creeping towards Harmaus. Writhing figures, figments of Shige's memories. The location's memories. Maybe borrowed from a few nearby even. She's never fully sure where they all come from.
They try to drag Harmaus down. To cling, to claw and drain what's there. And while all of that's happening. She's getting on that goofy.. "What IS that?" she shakes her head, pushing the errant thought down and leaves Harmaus to his own misery for now. Not the time or place to try and do anything about it. Which in itself, nags at her. Can't do your job if you're dead though.
Usually.
GS: Shige Kiwako has attacked Seraph Harmaus with Eclipse! GS: Shige Kiwako has completed her action. ===== +health readout for Seraph Harmaus ======================================= _____________________________| Form The Catalyst |______________________________
GS: Seraph Harmaus takes a glancing hit from Shige Kiwako's Eclipse for 109 hit points! GS: Reaction switch bonus! Seraph Harmaus gains 1 additional Combo! GS: Seraph Harmaus's Weaken Ward may block the effect! GS: Delay and Weaken blocked!
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.
'You're mad.'
Many have made the same observation of the Seraph, but in this moment it has never been clearer that it -- or something very near to it -- is true. What Harmaus wants is out of alignment with consensus reality. It will only lead to his own destruction and, quite possibly, the destruction of many others en route to it. Have they not seen the power of Fell Dragons for themselves? As Lanval has noted, he is a particularly potent Seraph. Once he changes, will they be able to put him down?
And yet, they may not have any choice but to attempt as much. He will not release such contamination willingly from his being; a purification is not possible. And if he is beyond reason as well...
"Now... it dies, and troubles me no more," Harmaus tells her as it advances, blade blazing.
But it is grievously wounded. But it is taxing for the Seraph to maintain this form. And Talia is not without her own remaining tricks. Harmaus lunches for her and impacts a wall of ice as it erupts into the world. Even if it were to carve its way through such a barrier in time, it buys them the chance they need-- and with Shige's shades grappling at it, its ability to swing with enough force are dampened. The wall will last longer than it might otherwise.
And both of these factors give Layna the time to invoke her own magic and cast unto Harmaus the whirlwind. Caught midswing as it attempts to carve through the barrier, it is flung back to impact the far wall solidly; cracks spread in a spidersweb behind where its body remains slumped. It does not move.
After a handful of moments its form ripples, folding in on itself as so much of the Malevolence fueling its transformation is pulled back into the vessel where it has found such purchase. Harmaus, again in the form he has taken since his 'birth', shakes his head once. Then, with but a single baleful glance in the direction they all have fled, he departs himself.
He has a 'goddess' to find and slay.
<Pose Tracker> Zophar has posed.
There is a flash of light by Leo, just shortly after Harmaus's departure.
The Goddess appears again. Tall, with pale skin, and curly black hair; beautiful, but with severe eyes, which look around. Her eyes meet Lemina's for a moment. "Secure the Towers," she says. "If they flee there, make sure they cannot escape."
Then, she looks down to Leo. She hesitates a moment, before she holds a hand up. "Holy Litany!" she chants. There is a flash of white brilliance -- which infuses the White Knight.
"Leo," Althena says. "You are not yet done. Chase them down -- stop them. Such is the command of your Goddess."
BELOW
Harmaus goes down. Down and down, into the depths of the Earth, chasing a sense of where he has been driven to seek. He may think it is the Goddess he thought to slay.
But he does not find a Goddess. He does find something else.
The room that he enters is a natural cavern. It is far, far below the towers; below Pentagulia; below the earth. There is a distant rumble and a deep red glow of lava, about a huge piece of ugly red-brown stone that sticks out from it. There is also a massive sphere, which is titanic in size -- far larger than a Gear. It glows with a pale blue light.
Energy crackles across it; so do arcane Elw runes, which flicker and fade out of existence here and there. It is a barrier and it is constantly being tested.
Because, behind it, is a thing of purest darkness. An inky black void, highlighted only by billowing purple and flickering golden light, like a cloud. That rolls against the barrier, the occasional fork of arcane lightning striking the barrier. He may think it nothing...
...but then Harmaus feels attention upon him. The darkness shifts; it blinks as cloudstuff becomes fleshy dark eyelids, which open. Terrible, human-like eyes with red irises appear across it. With a jerk, they all turn, and look down at him.
A voice speaks to him -- directly into his mind. It is masculine, with a tone that is sardonic and almost playful. It is not friendly, but it is the voice that told him to seek.
Well, well, well... look what the cat dragged in.
It is not a Goddess that Harmaus found, but a God.