tales of farside city: the awakening.

[chukklehed]

Angelica watched the smoke intently as it made it's way downtown. she needed to figure out what was causing it, and how to stop it. she was running possible hiding places through her head, trying to figure out who was controlling it and from where, but as she kept following it, she realized the only place it could be controlled from was either along the rooftops with her, or from inside it. she had come to this conclusion when a new smoke appeared, this one a poisonous green. she was distracted by the new development for just a second, and only realized too late that she had run out of rooftops to jump to. thinking quickly, she reached her right hand down to catch the ledge, and swung down over the roof. she perched there for a second, judging the distance to the ground and the projected integrity of her chassis if she dropped, and found them within acceptable margins. she did not drop yet though, attempting not to attract any more unwanted attention at the moment.

[Grandsword]

upon seeing the approaching cloud of poison, darkness slowed his approach. though it was unnecessary, he formed a mouth out of the smoke, devouring the other cloud. he then spoke out of it. "poison? how theatrical. well, i suppose i can play at that as well.." he said. the smoky maw inverted, so that it was facing the sky. it began to billow out the poison haze that it had eaten. once a nice cover of green mist was coating the area around him, darkness began to shift his cloud form. at first, vortexes of the smoke began to form, before shooting out of the cloud as pillars of black matter. the pillars slowly but surely began to form the shape of a pentagram. and upon the formation of the final point darkness's demonic form clawed it's way out of the center. red eyes blazing through the mix of black and green haze.

[RedxXxDawn]

Now there's something you don't see everyday, Pan mused in awkward confusion. She certainly was not expecting her smoke to be eaten by a giant mouth, but as strange as it was she could not help being slightly impressed. That was not an ordinary spell. That black cloud was a living thing of its own. A summoning spell, perhaps? But how its controller was able to retain its form even after nearly falling off a roof was what impressed Pan even more. She had not yet delved into summoning spells, but from what she heard so far they worked the same way as other spells; al requiring at least some form of consistent focus. A creature that could form itself from a black cloud into a mouth like that, and then into a devilish-looking being on its own had to have required quite the effort on her part. But then again Pan had not read into summonings very much, so she may have been wrong.

Or was that thing even being controlled at all? It seemed to act independently, and she had the feeling that girl on that ledge was not the one in charge. Did that dark thing even know she was there? Or did it just not care?
And what business did that thing have being there? Was it a part of the rebellion, or did it rise to quell it? Was it even targeting Pan's shop at all when she first saw it? It could have simply blown her mist right back at her, too. But perhaps the creature was already familiar with that spell, and knew it would have no effect on its caster.

For the sake of her own safety, Pan began to wonder if the thing even knew where her poison mist came from. Perhaps it saw her, perhaps not. At any time she could decide to make the spell vanish just by willing it away, but she wanted to see what the dark being would do with it next. It was not like her own mist was a threat to her or anything.

And for the sake of her identity, Pan decided to change it. While still in hiding, still allowing her poison cloud to exist withan effort as simple as remembering it is still there, she cast another spell. A simple illusion spell used to change her appearance. Her hair darkened, her eyes changed color, her chest shrunk down, and her clothes became that of an ordinary teenage girl. Only a second was all it took to complete the transformation. In her new form, she peeked out the window from below to see what would happen next. She looked at the red-eyed demon through large chocolate brown eyes. If he were to harm the people with her vapors, she would just let him have his fun. She would not bother making it dissipate, for she did not care enough to. Especially knowing the trouble one of them had just caused to her shoppe.

[chukklehed]

Angelica watched as the mist changed. she didn't like what was happening at all, and it looked like something was about to happen. she couldn't tell if it was talking or not, so she climbed back onto the roof. looking around, she saw a satellite dish. figuring it would have to do, she ripped it from the roof and started messing with it, turning it into a makeshift long distance receiver. connecting the wires to a panel on her arm, she pointed it at the figure and activated it, waiting for something to happen.

[Grandsword]

seeing the thugs trembling at his entrance, darkness gave a predatory look. "i must admit..i've been most displeased with you mortal monkeys. i bring you together under my banner.. i give you a chance to prove your worth, most importantly..i give you a chance to live. and you insects squandered it." he declared, his voice chillingly calm, like a parent scolding a group of children. "did you believe that i'd abide such idiotic destruction? this city is MY domain. and i don't take kindly to insects defiling it with foolishness. in fact, you lot disgust me enough that i feel it prudent to rain down my punishment." at those words, he allowed his arms to melt and reform into an array of laser cannons. with a sick and deep laugh, he unleashed a volley of blasts upon the ground below, indescrimately blasting both thugs and civilians with a grim satifaction. though he took care to avoid property damage of any kind.

[RedxXxDawn]

Pan was not surprised at the arrogance that dripped from the demon-thing's tone, given anything as powerful as that would have every right to be. Pan herself would display arrogance at times when smiting others, but just who (or better what) was this monster to call an entire city his domain? If this really was his city, then why would he allow them to even dream of such thing like rebellion let alone make the attempt? Obviously it was not, but given what he was capable of he could probably take over and claim it as his own anyway.

But given his course of action, it seemed that was probably already his intent. She had already seen the slaughter coming, but Pan still waited before casting the spell. As soon as the blasts rained down, a new Death Bomb spell had been cast over her shoppe, but it also covered several other buildings as well with her own shoppe not being at its center. Protecting that one shoppe would give her away, so better to protect the area it is in and leave him guessing. And better for it to be a specific area that was well-known to the public, making it look like whoever cast the Death Bomb wanted to defend that particular district. Another way it could leave leave the demonic fiend guessing. Confident in the strength of the surface of her Death Bomb, Pan's concern was not so much the risk of collateral damage on her shoppe, but the discovery of it. After all, why would the fiend think that it was all just a single mage who only wanted to protect her own shoppe?

Pan also noticed that the dark devil seemed to ignore and have no use for her poison fog, so she decided to release her hold on it. Not that simply maintaining the spell would consume any mana worth noting on her part. And even if she found the thugs worth killing, the fog was not even worth maintaining. Especially seems to how a slaughter had already began anyway. Whoever this devil of a man was, he was getting revenge for her. The man who had broken her window was now dead from those beams. Good. It was a rather quick death, but it would do.