Though Henry could only see the Marine for a moment, he became instantly aware of the soldier's manner. He moved heedlessly, like a bull or warthog, with no regard whatsoever for the well-being, considerations, or values of others. One could easily picture him breaking through a door as a cavalry charge might break through a line of sword-wielding infantry, the wood smashed like matchsticks. The dark mage made no attempt to move out of the way, either not recognizing or not caring about the danger to his being. The next instant he was on his back, his vision swimming slightly and his mouth agape from the impact. At the same time, his tome had fallen on the floor, a small burst of dark energy discharging as it did. A rendezvous with the floor didn't really hurt Henry, given his tolerance for pain, but he could tell when someone meant him harm. Further still, he could also tell when someone meant no harm but acted in such a selfish and idiotic manner that he couldn't help but hurt everyone he came across. Henry's smile then changed.

Without much urgency he picked himself up, making sure to snag the tome on the way. A couple of odd phrases coming from a previously-unnoticed parrot distracted him for a moment, but the new wave of foul pressure coming off him did not wane. An astute individual with keen senses might become aware of the sound of crowing coming from outside, which signaled the arrival of several ravens to the building. Henry saw that the weird woman had left, and that Denys stood near him with a weapon drawn. If he knows how to do a dual attack, this'll be even easier and messier. ”Aha, good day to you, too!” He addressed the Marine. ”You might not have guessed, but you're just the man I wanted to see. To see pooling around my shoes, to be precise. Nyeheheh! I'm gonna cook you in your own armor!” Once this dark mage decided that he wanted to fight someone, nothing would get in his way. The tome in his hand levitated, opening as it did so, and a malignant purple aura surrounded it. Yellow-orange arcane geometries appeared around Henry, and the next instant, a mote of unholy light surrounded the Marine. Though it seemed like a waste to use this move when he felt pretty much perfect, Henry did not think that he'd have to use another spell. In his experience, armor-wearing knights exhibited high physical defense, but very poor resistance against magic. An entire platoon of heavily-armored knights, a nigh-unbreakable defense to enemy fighters, would be lambs to the slaughter for Henry, Tharja, or a similar mage.

He looked forward to seeing rivulets of blood leaking out of that unique, curved plate.

As Doomguy continues to look for any strain of ammunition or some new weapon, he can hear all sorts of chatter coming from behind him. He can hear the sound of a squawking parrot screaming "Don't forget DL-6!" and "The World is wrong! from the opposite corner of the shop. He can also hear the words coming out of the knight person demanding that he was to apologize to the man he simply pushed aside, which he also ignored, as well as a voice coming from a girl asking "So, doing some daylight robbing are we Mr thief?".

This was hardly a robbery though. It wasn't like this was their shack anyways. But whether it is or isn't Doomguy doesn't care. He checks the upper cabinets for some supplies, only to see nothing of use to him. He then checks a few of the lower ones, only to see rotten cans of food, fishing lines, and that's about it. The marine was already getting a bit annoyed. While he still had ammunition with him in all of his available weapons, he was rather low on all of them. His combat shotgun has only 8 shots left, with his assault rifle only carrying 15, barely any fuel left in his chainsaw, and only 3 frags in his suit's compartments. While he could use his plasma pistol, since it basically has unlimited ammo, it was a very weak weapon, and wasn't the fastest weapon to fire. Oh what he will kill to have his beloved BFG to be with him at this very moment.

Doomguy then searches a long vertical box in the next corner and as he opens it... he finally sees a new weapon. But just before he could inspect it closely, he failed to hear the terms coming from the man behind him who he pushed out of the way, issue a magic spell upon him. The marine suddenly finds himself to feel like he's on fire, cooking from the inside out. It was like he was back in hell again, as he gets very quick and spastic flashbacks of various sites in Hell, the minions he fought like the Imps and Hellknights, the crucible, Kadingir Sanctum, and others, all in just seconds.

The marine would be fried to death by now if he were simply just a regular man, but this is the Doom Marine. This is the man who has made the realm of Hell his personal bitch, where he took the blazing heat headfirst, and slaughtered hundreds and thousands, if not millions, of demons from within it. He turns around slowly, glaring straight into Henry's eyes as the heat reveals two eyes from under his mask, a glance that shows that Henry was messing with the wrong guy. With a burst of adrenaline, Doomguy clenches his fist and tackles at the mage, literally making a hole as he bursts out of the shack. As soon as they were out, he would finish by issuing a powerful punch to his head, which should knock him back a good deal into a tree 3 meters away.

He cracks both of his knuckles as approaches the mage with his hands ready to RIP and TEAR. Now there's definitely gonna be hell to pay for poor poor Henry...

At first Birdie didn't know what to make of the request, but as he thought about it he became more inclined to oblige it. He couldn't think of a good reason to refuse, even if he was a little winded. Plus, ingratiating himself to some of the weirdos around here might help him out in the long run. Then again, the really tall woman seemed rather like the type who would just use him as long as it was convenient and then never again give him the time of day. In his meager experience, tall women tended to be more domineering and callous—especially Chun-Li. The thought made him frown. Well, whatever. Standing up, Birdie revolved a chain like a lasso before hurling it down in the general direction of the women below. With nothing to wrap around, it fell limp on the dirt. In order to be pulled up, either Red or Bayonetta would have to grab it and wait for him to haul them up. Birdie knew he could do it, and felt that such a masculine display might earn him a little long-awaited respect.



Though Henry could not be said to look very intimidating, his reaction to the killer intent surging from the Marine was telling: his grin did not waver, and he made no attempt to move out of the way. His practically-closed eyes betrayed nothing even as the armored brute charged forward, throwing his weight into the dark mage. Again, Henry didn't quite know what was happening until it was done. A soft cracking noise could be heard as he was stunned, crushed against, and then abruptly smashed through the wall. Pieces of it scattered across the dirt and young man fell among them, disengaged from his enemy for a split second. The next instant a vicious blow struck him, knocking his head to a truly agonizing angle but not transmitting the force to send someone flying. After all, a strike to a non-static area far removed from his center of gravity couldn't possibly move him. All the same, anyone could see that his jaw had been broken, but against a blow that would have knocked unconscious a professional wrestler the dark mage did not faint.

The Marine approached, ready to finish what he'd started. Henry couldn't quite close his mouth, but to the best of his ability he giggled and whispered, ”It hurts...so nice. But...checkmate!” Unwittingly, the overzealous soldier had played right into his hands.

Henry snapped his fingers.

By coming so close, the Marine triggered both of the wounded dark mage's passive abilities—Hex and Anathema. Combined, the two served as a double-pronged arcane focus system, attuning Henry to his opponent and significantly increasing the likelihood that his various magics would succeed. The same malefic shower of dark energy rained down on the Marine again. Despite how much it hurt him previously, it would not kill him. Instead, the vampiric damage dealt to him would soothe Nero's wounds, magically healing his back, neck, and jaw. If Henry had estimated his health to be about a third of normal, it now definitely lay above half. This comprised only the first part of his plan, however.

The snap of Henry's fingers triggered one of his curses, one seldom cast in combat but undeniably useful. Pieces of wall lying on the grass suddenly lifted up and flew at high speed straight toward the Marine. While blades were useless against armor, blunt impacts were more effective by far, and even if individual pieces of wall wouldn't hurt the Marine much, a hail of them headed straight for him would at least carry him back. In fact, Henry expected that they wouldn't hurt him at all, even after taking a pair of Nosferatus, but as the wall raced to reconstruct itself thanks to his curse, he thought that the wave of wall would carry his magic-afflicted enemy back with it and into the shack from whence he came. Then, Henry and the Marine would be standing on opposite sides of the wall again, both worse for wear but the latter more so. The young man smiled widely, wiping a trickle of blood from his lip. ”All according to plan.” That said, he knew how much danger faced him, and hoped that Denys inside the shack would be able to help.

At that moment, Henry realized that he'd left one important part out of his scheme. Wait...that meathead had an ally! How could he be so careless? Henry glanced around for any sign of the Spy.

"I don't you seem to understand, I am NOT you! I don't hurt people the way you do, and certainly not my own family!"

A muffled voice filled a young woman's head.

"This is my ESCAPE! This is my world, not the old one!"

Who was speaking? What was this voice? The young woman's eyes suddenly shot awake. Her breath was ragged and she felt as though she was covered in a cold sweat. For a brief moment, it was simply white noise. Nothing came to mind, nothing was thought of. Then, suddenly, everything came rushing back to her in an instant. Her memories, her senses, her thoughts, all came crashing into her head. This woman now knew, or at least, somewhat knew who she was and why she was here. Her name is Katrin, and she's a Hunter of the Healing Church.

Katrin strained to hold onto those voices she had heard earlier. Where they from someone she once knew? Someone from her clouded past? She shook her head, slapping her face. "Come on, get it together, let's figure out where the hell we are, then we'll go from there." Katrin thought, now finally observing her surroundings. She was sitting on the shore of some sort of....

"Oh my god... IS THAT THE SUN!?" Katrin exclaimed aloud. Indeed, she had somehow left the blood moon that had hung over the city of Yharnam and now found herself sitting on the relatively sunny shore of a lake. Frantically glancing around, she was on her feet in an instant, blade drawn. Yet not a single living thing seem to stir. Sighing, she sheathed her blade and began to walk along the shore. Many questions plagued her mind, but, as per usual, she found the only way to truly solve any mystery in her experience, was to explore her surroundings. As she did though, she thought.

"Am I in another 'Hunter's Nightmare' of sorts? Perhaps when I warped from the Hunter's Dream, something went wrong? Hmnnn...."

After some time had passed, she came across a shack that sat on a dock. Detecting movement she quickly hid in among one of the many trees and observed. Suddenly the wall of the shack crashed open, revealing a very.... odd sight. A man dressed in the attire of... well... Katrin didn't really recognize the garb, however, she had only met fellow hunters, mad or otherwise, in her brief experience in the waking world, so perhaps this was just normal civilian attire. Anyway, the man was getting dragged down by what Katrin could only assume to be some sort of humanoid, however, she refrained from referring to the figure as either human nor beast. Clad in all metal and with a bloodlust to rival any crazed beast, this creature almost terrified Katrin down to her core.

Being an experienced hunter, one learns quickly how to gauge both her own and other's bloodlust. A natural sense is built within the Hunter's mind for this, and it was because of this made the Hunter scared. She had faced down countless abominations, beasts, and real Lovecraftian horrors, but this creature before here was unlike any other. For he gave off an horrid, yet in intoxicating stench. He was dangerous not because of the bloodlust she sensed in him, no. He was dangerous because of how it radiated off of him, nearly driving Katrin herself to leap out of cover and just start swinging her blades madly at whatever moved.

Yet her famed self control prevailed and Katrin was able to get her Old Blood under control. For now, she was determined to wait and watch, hoping to gain some sort of insight as to what exactly was unfolding before her.

The Kaiser's resolve wavered a tad bit as he heard the cawing of ravens outside and saw the expression on Henry's face. In truth, Denys didn't want this to escalate to violence, but he would stand by Henry, at least for now. The mage reminded him so much of his late allies, he couldn't help but defend him. Even when he was directly threatening people he had just met.

As the dark mage flung a spell at the knight, one could see blood leak from the interlocking plates of his armor, and a dark flame seemed to consume him. But he did not falter, he did not die. He calmly turned around, before tackling Henry through the shack back to the lake clearing. The Kaiser quickly turned around to face the two, now seeing the thing with inhuman strength again approaching Henry. For just a second, Denys hesitated on what to do. Henry was probably the only one who could harm the man, and casting Westwind would make his ally useless. He decided to just try and get the attention of the marine, take some of the edge off of Henry.

But as he got close, suddenly the debris from the destroyed wall started floating in the air, levitating seemingly on their own, before flying back towards the wall, both at Doomguy and Denys. The Kaiser was stunned for a second. Had Henry the power of the Exorcist? But it didn't matter, this was the perfect chance. He hopped back into the shack, and cast Westwind. Now the knight's high defence would become high resistance, and vice versa. Denys's blade would cut through him like butter. As the knight was carried back through the wall, Denys would attempt to pierce his hide with a straight stab, hopefully somewhere nonlethal. The Kaiser did not want to kill so uselessly, so if he could knock the man into unconsciousness with shock, that would be much better.

---

Red frowned at Bayonetta as she tried to manipulate the large british man into helping them. For two reasons actually, firstly that was quite rude, but also Red had no want to get near the odd man. In fact, if Bayonetta wasn't so nice, she'd probably not want to be around her either. But, she shrugged, it wasn't horrible, and this was probably going to be the only way to get inside, so she gritted her teeth and went with it.

The british man agreed, luckily, throwing down the limp chain so he could pull the two women up. She wasn't entirely sure he could lift two women up on his own, but the Transistor itself was weightless, and he did look like he had a lot of mass on him. Red grabbed a hold of the chain, also gripping the Transistor tightly in her hands. It seemed Mr. Nobody had nothing to say though.

Gaige started talking at five miles a minute though Terra could keep up with her speech most of what she said made little to no sense. What was Greek? She'd never heard of such a place though she'd never heard of this Pandora either so perhaps it wasn't that surprising. Gaige brought up an idea that Terra had been hesitant to voice, that they each came from different worlds.

"Where I come from the source of magic is the powers of three gods that collectively we call the Warring Triad. At the dawn of the world they turned themselves to stone in a perfect alignment to keep their powers from destroying everything. The last thing I remember before ending up here was confronting a crazed Magitek Elite at the base of the Triad. He pushed them out of alignment unleashing their powers on the continent. That much concentrated magical energy unleashed at a gateway between two realms it's possible their power shattered the walls of reality."

Terra hadn't wanted to consider this possibility though it had been nagging at her because it meant that her world, the focal point of the disturbance very likely wouldn't have survived. She'd be lucky if the other three members of her party had been sent spiraling into other realms as she had and not been killed by the blast.

Not wanting to dwell on such things Terra listened to Hildibrand in his apparently normal manner praise her ability to ask simple questions about there surroundings. He did remind her that she'd neglected to give everyone her name. "My name is Terra Branford."

When Hildibrand produced his transceiver Terra jumped at the name. "Magitek?" she asked to no on in particular and wrenching her hand from his grasp snatched the object from his hand. Though she had never seen a device like it Terra could say with certainty that it was the same type of technology as that of the various magitek device developed under Kefka's watch. She turned on Hildibrand suddenly. "Where do you come from?" she asked brusquely completely ignoring Scout's bragging about his own achievements.
@ProPro@Happy Go Lucky@Scarifar

Despite Doomguy having seemingly broke the mage's neck, spine, and possibly other body parts, his magic was able to heal him back up to snuff. So he was indeed quite a powerful magician to issue such a heal factor into himself, while also having a slightly weakening affect to Doom himself. Yet Doomguy was not intimidated by it in the least. As he tries to make his next move, Henry issues another move at him, this time using telekinesis on the shack's bricks and throwing them at the marine himself. As the first one flies towards him, he simply dodges casually, while happening to block the next one with his left arm, though it did push him off a foot back. Perhaps the spell he issued happened to make him slightly weaker than before, but only by a bit.

However, he then sees the mage issue a wall of bricks as it quickly rushes towards him! Doomguy had to act quick, as he takes out his heavy assault rifle and fires three micro-missiles at the wall, breaking a hole through the wall as he begins to rush at him again. However, as he runs, one of his allies attempts to swipe his sword to his side. At almost the last second, Doomguy made a quick leap forward until rolling on the ground and getting back up. By that time, he was very close to the mage as he attempts to fire his Assault rifle at point blank range.

---

---

The lard ass seemed to have taken a minute to think about the decision, whether it was due to the fact that he was either dumb or was secretly plotting something. Regardless, he obligued as he throws the chain down to them, lying limp as it reached the bottom. Bayonetta smiles faintly as she walks towards it, while helping Red get her hands on it.

"Now you hang on and start climbing," she says to them, "I actually have my own way to get up there."

And so she did. Using almost all of the strength in her long, lucious legs, she takes a running start towards the castle and makes an incredible leap, safely landing quietly on the wall like a majestic butterfly. It may sound mean that she didn't do so before, but she felt like the strength she had in this world wasn't enough to carry both Red and Nobody at the same time. At least they got help from fat man, so that's all good. She turns her head at the man with her hands on her hips.

"Thanks for helping my little friend." she simply mentions with a bit of a teasing wink while also nudging him with her elbow, "I take it you're not so native to these lands as well hm?"

Yup, she was just too cool and too casual with all sorts of people to just be repulsed. Afterall, she saw uglier people... or Angels in that matter. He is much fatter and hella bigger than Renzo though...

While the Marine's besuited ally did not turn up, Henry was acutely aware that his efforts to keep his enemy away and get the others to join in the fight did not turn out to be as fruitful as he hoped. Before five seconds had passed, the wall blew apart again, this time in a plume of fire and a blast of concussive force. On reflex Henry recast the curse that turned back time for an object in an attempt to repair the wall again, but nothing happened. The dark mage chuckled dryly to himself, remembering the time that he used the same curse to fix bowls broken by Sumia's in a moment of clumsiness. When they fell to pieces the next day, his spell had been ineffective. Though Henry couldn't count himself as someone inclined to overthink magic -like Miriel- he guessed that the reversal curse couldn't be recast on something destroyed again. Aww, that's no fun.

Pressing matters lay at hand, however, so Henry put those thoughts on the backburner. The Marine had made it through, rolled to preserve momentum, and was just now getting close. Henry could honestly not decide between using his Elfire tome or casting another Nosferatu. Casting the same spells over and over again started to feel boring, after all. Plus, using Elfire at this range would blow him up as well, and while he wouldn't say no to a couple of burns, he wouldn't be long for the world if he happened to get a critical hit. Then again...

Well, it didn't matter. Henry could turn back time, inflict several illnesses, create illusions, make the Marine's movements slow as mud, or even instant-kill him, but all that took preparation and Henry didn't have seconds, let alone days. He'd underestimated this enemy, and it would cost him. All the same, fear didn't make him take leave of his senses. Though he didn't recognize the weapon being pointed at him, the Marine held it like a crossbow, so Henry would go with that. He, like every dark mage he'd ever met, hated arrows. Wizards of all kinds could wreck shop from far away, but they needed to stand still to do so, and their utter lack of armor meant that arrows had little trouble piercing vital organs. With that in mind, Henry knew what he needed to do.

Adrenaline fueled him as he reached out and grabbed the end of his foe's gun, and with all the strange he could muster he skewed it toward the side. The next instant a deafening noise and a cruel pain lambasted him. He couldn't hear a thing, but he could see that his hand, which he thought would be pierced with an arrow at worse, had been blown to small, bloody chunks. The pain threatened to overwhelm him and send him into shock, but this dark mage was made of sterner stuff. His face contorted in an agonized leer, he laughed maniacally. A blazing fireball appeared in the palm of his other hand, swirling like a tiny star between his fingers, and Henry took advantage of close range to jam the explosive spell into his enemy's helmet.

The force of the fire threw both of them back a short ways, but Henry, who could barely remain conscious and on his feet, instantly knew that something was wrong. A fireball at close range would have killed pretty much anyone, especially someone with armor, but the Marine did not seem very bothered at all. Henry's smile turned to surprise and disbelief. ”Aww? You shoulda been...toast.” He stared at the bloody stump that had been his hand. Death seemed inevitable now. ”Well, shucks, Olivia.” Though still standing, the dark mage was slumped over. A stiff breeze might knock him down.

Too late, a thought struck him. Nosferatu...if I use it, I'll be back in action. He reached with his remaining hand into his robe for the tome, but at far too leisurely a pace.



Without further ado, Birdie dug in his feet as best he could to prevent himself from slipping and began to pull. A large hand would close around the metal length of chain and reel it in by about a foot each time before the other would grab hold farther down. The weight of Red on his chain did cause him some strain, but all the same he hauled her up onto the battlements of Castle Town's gate in surprisingly short order.

During this time, though, he did pause once to witness with mouth agape Bayonetta's feat of leaping straight up to the wall. This feat, though remarkable, combined with her extravagant height to further cement the idea was she was some sort of freak to Birdie. When he was finished, the strange woman stood close to him -closer than any other human female might ever care to get- and even sank her elbow an inch or so into his flab in a teasing manner. Though somewhat baffled, he shrugged. [color=yellow]”Nah. Ain't seen this place before.” He took a glance at the town, at which his vantage point atop the town wall afforded him a good view. Something seemed off about the place, though he couldn't quite put his finger on it. Still, if no skeletons prowled the streets, and there was any chance of a snack at this hour, he wouldn't say no. ”You birds ain't locals? Hum.” Rubbing his scalp, he spied a wooden ramp down to ground level and began to move toward it. ”'Ell of a weird place, this is. Like some kinda fairy tale land.”

Gourd Lake:

The red headed punk watched as Henry and the armoured person go at it, boys were being boys. She generally thought boys were idiots and these two were just being that. She did not get involved either as one had magic and the other had guns, armour and shit. What could her electric guitar do to the man in armour, it could hurt Henry but she had no reason to attack him. The punk would turn away from the fight between the two time to time as this was mindless violence. If they were wrestling, she would more likely watch them but no, it was more like a blood sport. "You guys are being totally stupid," she yelled. She did not care if they heard her or even reacted, she just needed to say it. Candy Cane was actually getting rather mad but she could not do anything to stop the foolish fighters, they were beyond human or so it seemed.

However, things got a little too real when she saw Henry's hand missing, it was clear as day. It was totally sick making the punk want to vomit, she was close to as she tried to calm herself. The cloud of red from when Henry lost his hand was all that was needed to know something went very wrong. "What the fuck, is everyone here suddenly become a psycho. Just stop already, we should not be fighting each other, let alone let someone gets killed over nothing important," she yelled once more. For some reasons she was being the voice of reason which was totally a weird feeling to have. She hoped they would stop, the armoured guy was clearly god like so hopefully he knew to stop before someone actually died. However, Henry had no hand so maybe he would bleed to death. 'What are we going to do with that hand, I mean he will bleed out if no one does anything,' she thought to herself.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, what the hell am I seeing?" she asked herself. She paused for a moment before saying something. "Let's think for a moment, clearly, we are all from different places yet here we are. Maybe we should focus on that instead, who knows what dangers are waiting for us if we linger here too long," she said. Candy Cane had no idea if she was helping or making it worse but she thought to would try, she did not want to get in-between a gunshot and a magical spell. Where were her super powers, she could sure use them as she tried to defuse the situation. She hoped someone else would agree with her, surely she was not the only non-psychotic one here? She hoped no one would tell her to shut up or things would certainly get a lot worse for her. She was not one to take things laying even if it meant certain death, in her anger she would do stupid shit.

The Kaiser cursed openly as the soldier used his rifle to cast some fire spell, or fire off an explosive device, destroying the wall being sent back into place. Only the most skilled of exorcists could reverse time for more than five seconds, so Denys quickly lunged at the armored man, only to have him roll, barely avoiding the Kaiser's wrath. This allowed the armored man to get close, his rifle aimed at the mage's head. Thinking fast the mage threw his hand at the gun's barrel, managing to get his hand blown off. It was very obvious Henry was on death's door, but still, he cast Fira spell at point blank range, a fruitless effort now that Denys had cast Westwind.

The two of them would not survive like this. He refused to lose more allies, he'd rather die than do that. As the knight was blown back, Denys quickly made an attempt to get in front of the man and Henry, before casting Spring Awakening with a flick of his wrist. "You fight me now, Knight." Said The Kaiser, blade drawn and ready to buy time. With how roughed up Henry was, it would take at least 15 seconds for him to be able to fight again. While that was happening, the knight would also be healed, so the Kaiser had to strike fast and strong, but if he were to use Noble Eagle, there was a chance even a stray bullet could end Henry, so he would not do so. He had to win this fight himself.

But then, a woman's voice caught his attention. The girl the two had seen before, yes. She seemed almost panicked, but still, she was being a voice of reason. This was no reason to murder, in fact, it was Henry who had made the first move, attempting to cook the knight. The Kaiser shook his head in disappointment. This was not what he fought for. The Kaiser stuck his claymore into the ground, and decreed "Yes, there is no reason to fight. I am deeply sorry for my associate's actions, and my own. I will heal your wounds." Then, the first wave of Spring Awakening triggered, healing both the knight and the mage. Hopefully, they would both stop fighting. If not, the Kaiser was ready to draw his blade again. His first impression of the armored man was one of a man who would not stop fighting so easy.

---

As Red climbed the chain, Transistor held tightly, she mimicked the british man in astoundment as Cereza leapt quite high, almost over the castle wall. Mr. Nobody even let a 'woah' escape his mouth. Still, the two got up to the ramparts in a short amount of time and joined the two. Apparently, the large british punk wasn't a local either, an odd revelation considering this seemed like an old english hamlet. Looking over the city put a pit into both Red and Blu's stomachs. It was barren, but seemed to have been de- and re-constructed countless times. "You don't think the process..." The man in the Transistor trailed off. Red shook her head. Hopefully not.

Still, they could see an armored man down there, so it was probably still safer than being outside with the skeletons. The punk began to make his way towards a ramp that seemed to lead down into the main city's streets. She followed him wordlessly. Hopefully once they were down there,m they could find some answers.

Gaige hadn't bothered stopping when the rest of the people around her had continued to talk amongst themselves. In fact, she barely even listened beyond the communications equipment they had brought to her attention. While they worked out their own differences, Gaige preferred to be a woman of action! Her mind raced with how to best interface her ECHO with Scout's headset and Hildy's transceiver as she approached the horses, skipping along the way. Once at the corral, she noticed the others hadn't actually been following and gave a little "Huff!" and a pout, crossing her arms. Her pouting was short lived however, and she took hold of the reigns of four horses, then began guidingthem to the others.

"I brought the horses, guys! Thanks for toootally backing me up, too! You were a great help!" The sarcasm in Gaige's voice was as thick as could only be mustered by a teenage girl. She stopped near them, and gave a slight bow. "Ladies and gentlemen, badasses and bitch asses, I present to you, our horses. Naturally I get first pick, and I want this red one."

Gaige pat a red female horse on the side. It had an especially decorative saddle that no doubt signified it was important in some way. The horse seemed to be distrustful of the people around it, but Gaige didn't bother ti too much. Maybe she reminded the horse of someone by being the same age and hair color? Who could say?

"So anyway, I've already scanned your communication devices and analyzed their frequency, so Scout and Hildy, I should be able to reach you through the comms link on my ECHO. Here, let's give it a little test." Gaige cleared her throat, then spoke again. Both Scout and Hildebrand could hear the younf woman's voice emanate both from her mouth, and from their own communication devices. "This statement is false. We good? Cool. Ok, so nobody's equipment blew up, that's a good sign."

@Happy Go Lucky@Prince of Seraphs@Scarifar

Spy's initial plan with the event was to start off friendly and non-threatening. At first, it seemed to work, at least sort of, when the girl began asking him something. Unfortunately, the plan was ruined almost immediately by Doomguy's rude shoving as he began searching the shack for whatever it was he was looking for. Spy hoped that nothing horrible would happen afterwards, answering Candy Cane's second question with, "Neither. Merely an acquaintance." Even more unfortunately, Spy's hopes were dashed as there was retaliation from the one Doomguy had knocked down.

"Oohhh... mon dieu..." Spy groaned as the fighting began to escalate. Quite frankly, he wanted nothing to do with the sudden turn of events. With hardly a second thought, Spy activated his Invis-Watch and walked away. It didn't take a genius to figure out that the people here were just as dissociated in this place as he was, but it seemed unlikely that any of them would be of much help. By the time the fighting stopped, Spy would have already been long gone, taking the only path that hadn't been taken yet, towards the food stalls.

---

Scout was already used to having girls looking like they ignored him, convinced they were just playing hard to get or something, so he didn't mind Terra ignoring him at all. He was also really liking Hildibrand. The guy was fun and quirky, definitely an interesting guy to hang around with. Better than Soldier, at any rate.

While Hildibrand and Terra were having their conversation with Scout being the third wheel, Gaige had gone off and obtained the horses for them. "Heh-hey, uh... good job there!" Scout said while pointing finger guns at her in an attempt to still stay in Gaige's good books. Fortunately, it didn't seem like she cared too much about the issue.

Of course, Scout wanted second pick of the horses, and immediately ran up to the biggest horse of the bunch. "I'll take this one," Scout said, placing a hand on its flank. "You know, back where I come from, people call me the horse master. There ain't no horse that I can't ride." Scout was spewing out a pack of lies, but to Scout, as long as it got him the girls, he didn't care.

Scout then began to climb up onto his choice of horse, throwing over one of his legs onto the other side and landing on the saddle nicely. "Nothin' to it!" Scout said triumphantly. Scout then pointed forward and yelled, "Mush!" in an attempt to get the horse to go forward. Naturally, the horse stood still, making Scout begin to feel a little awkward about the situation.

As Doomguy aimed his assault rifle at the mage, preparing to fire, his opponent seemed to get hasty as he grabs the barrel of his gun and attempts to skew it to the side. That would be a big mistake for the wizard to do, as the marine pushes upon the trigger and fires several shots into Henry's hand. What was left of his hand were small, bloody, chunks, ripped apart by the gun's bullets. Either he was stupid in failing to realize that the barrel was there the bullets popped out of, or the man simply had no idea on what a gun even looks like. One could say that Hell didn't know of a gun, but alas, even they had their own twisted technology, with some demons using arm plasma cannons to fire rapid shots of energy to their opponent.

As he pushes the mage back a foot or two, he then realizes that the man wasn't exactly crying of anger or pain... rather he began to laugh manically. For a second, the doom marine was confused at the situation, wondering what kind of sick bastard laughs at such pain. He even hears the girl complaining about the situation. He wouldn't truly blame her though, considering her lack of guts towards such situation. But as he looks around the area, he unfortunately failed to realize the fireball that Henry formed as it chucks into his face. The force provided by the blast sent the two back, having the marine be knocked to the ground. His visor formed a few cracks in it from the incoming blast and will definitely need to be repaired. This already seems to make him even more pissed off. Despite his "rude intrusion", being a less-talk-more-action kind of guy that he is, he didn't hurt anyone gravely enough to deserve this. Well, maybe he does regardless, but he was simply looking for supplies and nothing more. But that didn't matter now...

Doomguy slowly stands up, gripping the assault rifle in his right hand. It only has seven more bullets left, meaning that he wasted eight in mutilating the mage's hand. He doesn't care about it though. In fact, he wouldn't need to use his gun to kill Henry... his bare hands will do just fine. But today, he feels like giving him a quick death. The mage was still standing, but rather slumped over, to the point where a simple tap may simply push him over.

”Aww? You shoulda been...toast.” He stared at the bloody stump that had been his hand ”Well, shucks, Olivia.”

But before he could get close enough to pull the trigger, the knight from earlier came in front of him.

"You fight me now, Knight."

Doomguy simply looks at the knight, almost eye to eye. Saying to word after a quick pause, he aims his assault rifle at Kaiser, almost opening fire until the girl happened to say something say something.

"Let's think for a moment, clearly, we are all from different places yet here we are. Maybe we should focus on that instead, who knows what dangers are waiting for us if we linger here too long,"

This caught Doomguy's attention as he looks at the girl. His eyes from behind the helmet were still quite tense, the urge to kill still imprinted within them. But the longer the pause went, the loosened his expression came to be. Despite he having killed hundreds and thousands of demons from both hell and the UAC facility, he wasn't all crazy and hyped up on blood and gore. He still had logic deep beneath him... a sense of right, if slightly twisted. In fact, he remembers saving the AI, Vega, from the UAC facility after he was ordered to issue his meltdown so that he can go back to hell for one last time. Instead of letting him perish, he secretly saved a backup of him in a flash drive, thus saving his memories, data, and so on. Why did he do so? He doesn't know for sure... but it could help him in the future... as well as maybe getting him back home.

The Kaiser stuck his claymore into the ground, and decreed "Yes, there is no reason to fight. I am deeply sorry for my associate's actions, and my own. I will heal your wounds." Then, the first wave of Spring Awakening triggered, healing both the knight and the mage.

The burns that he suffered earlier had healed, along with some of his previous scars and wounds, as well as even his visor. He actually felt relaxed, at peace, his burning rage that his eyes once presented simply reverting back to reason. As his breathing began to pulse back to normal, he looks at the knight in front of him, being faintly reminded of the Knight Sentinels that he once lead back before he was trapped and worked for Dr. Hayden.

The marine lowers his gun, putting it on his back slowly. Despite what Henry did to him, the others did little to hold him off, only recognizing Kaizer and Candy's motives to stop the fighting. Normally he would flat out ignore them, like with Samuel Hayden, but they weren't anything like the robot CEO. However he won't hesitate to pull the trigger if it happens again. Doomguy then pats him on the shoulder, letting his actions speak as his forgiveness, as he slowly approaches back to the shack.

---

---

”Nah. Ain't seen this place before.” the man replied as he pulls Red and Nobody up from his chain, ”You birds ain't locals? Hum.” Rubbing his scalp, he spied a wooden ramp down to ground level and began to move toward it. ”'Ell of a weird place, this is. Like some kinda fairy tale land.”

Bayonetta agreed to this statement, despite having recently gone back in time to Vigrid, to hell, and the majestic mountain known as Fimbulvetr fairly recently. This land some what gave her a bit of a deja vu, but thought nothing much of it.

"Quite so..." she says to herself as she looks around.

She then looks down at the entrance, seeing an armored man walking down below. The punk began to make his way towards a ramp that seemed to lead down into the main city's streets.

"Now where do you think you're taking off too?" she asks curiously as she and Red follow in pursuit.

Any second now, Henry expected a lethal overdose of projectiles to fly his way and spell his premature end. He did not fear death, but to perish here would mean that his dream would be only partially fulfilled. How much better it would have been to kick the bucket fighting for the Shepherds, rather than against some nameless foe in an unknown land! The dark mage watched Denys appear, seemingly intent on distracting the Marine by engaging him in combat, but by now he felt positive that his adversary would ignore the other threat to mercilessly finish Henry off. However, the fact that the Marine had yet to pull the trigger was a ray of hope, after all. His teeth clenched together in smile which through pain seemed devilish, he closed his fingers around the tome Nosferatu, his ticket for victory. Candy Cane began to speak just as he began to slide the sorcerous book out of his robe.

Though he didn't know the words she employed, she certainly seemed annoyed. Henry, thinking that she might be one of those pacifist types, cast a look of pity and annoyance her way. Still, he produced his tome, and which fell open and came alive with pages turning of their own accord, wreathed in foul energies. As he chuckled at her comments, he winced from the waves of pain surging up from his annihilated hand. ”Nyeheh...you must not know me very well.” She made an extremely poor case for the two soldiers, wound up as they were, to not continue murdering one another. Reason was a seed that couldn't be planted in toxic soil. When the Kaiser concurred with her out of nowhere, Henry raised an eyebrow of disappointment his way. ”Ah? Weren't we all buddy-buddy a minute ago, and now you're leaving me out to dry?” All the same, the Marine hadn't attacked yet, and neither had Henry. Why might that be? Perhaps his wound troubled him so much that he had to make a concentrated effort to pull off this final spell.

Magic hit him a moment later. Henry, always attuned to the arcane arts, could sense it before it touched him and even tell from whom it came. That soothing, rejuvenating warmth corresponded to healing magic, but the dark mage was taken aback to see his enemy surrounded in the same life-giving glow. A sensation from his destroyed hand distracted him from immediately casting his dark magic, and a look confirmed that its regrowth. The sticky, sickly-sweet smell of vital fluids intoxicated Henry, coming close to satisfying his bloodlust against the Marine, but there was no question that he would not be happy until his enemy was a puddle of goo. Still..the atmosphere had calmed down somewhat. Perhaps it could wait.

A cawing noise caught his attention, and Henry beamed to see a raven swooping down to land on his shoulder. Just like that, the situation defused, with the sound of his tome snapping shut serving as aggression's death knell. Delightedly the dark mage stroked the black bird's lustrous plumage, and he said, ”Aw, I'm glad I didn't die, too. Well of course you're my friend, little guy!” The raven croaked in his face, and Henry seemingly replied, ”Yeah, right now's good. Call 'em over!” He turned his back on the others and walked toward a nearby bench. The sound of numerous wings beating the air became apparent, and a whole conspiracy of ravens flocked toward him. They surrounded him, constantly making noise, like a little black tornado.



Birdie didn't pay much attention to the two women as he left, though one did direct at him a somewhat inane question. ”Uh, the town?” he told Bayonetta before taking his leave with Red not far behind. The scaffolding-esque structure brought the trio down to ground level expediently, and from there they could go in any direction. Birdie set off down the street, hands jammed in his vest pockets.

Before long, Birdie quickly became aware that he might have made a bad choice. Sections of Castle Town seemed, for lack of a better term, wrong. An intact main street lured him into a false sense of security, but when he dodged into a sidestreet to set his nerves at ease, he was shocked to find himself on the brink of what looked to be a warzone. On the edge of normality there lay just about an inch of blurred fuzziness, and after that loomed a section of town completely destroyed. When Birdie turned his eyes on the sky, he was baffled to see the night sky directly above but an ominous purple haze through the distorted zone. Scared but curious, the huge man leaned over and grabbed a pot that stood on the cobblestones a few feet away before tossing it into the other world. It crashed against the ruined ground noisily but ordinarily, with no trace of any kind of trap or malignant effect. Furthermore, Birdie espied some sort of glinting green jewel in the wrecked shards of the pot. Grinning widely at his good fortune, he gingerly crossed the line and bent down. After snagging the gem, he quickly retreated back to the un-damaged zone to study his find.

As tall as his middle finger and about half as thick as it was tall, the precious stone gleamed beautifully. Figuring that it must be emerald or something similar, Birdie almost salivated to imagine how rich it would make him. With that kind of money, he fondly thought, he wouldn’t have to work for months! The truth that he was already unemployed didn’t concern him too much. Still, this bizarre divide and the somewhat nightmarish version of the town on the other side creeped him out, and Birdie left after only a few more moments. Luckily the main street seemed clear of skeletons, though a couple shattered bones lay here and there, and the freeloader made his way deeper into town.

Gourd Lake:

Candy Cane watched as the armoured figure walked away towards the shack, Henry went to the benches and the spy ran off somewhere. At least no one died though it was a close call. The punk could not just step in and take a fireball or a bullet, she would surely perish. All she could do is sigh, at least Henry and the armoured guy were healed from what she saw. Denys seemed to have a cool ability to do such a thing, it must have been somewhat draining but what did she know. The red head soon rubbed her forehead for a moment, she gave it a little scratch while she was at it. The young punk soon looked around where she stood to wonder what the next move could be, maybe Denys had an idea. All she could do is ask and so she approached him.

"So what should we do now, you seem to be the only other level-headed one here?" she asked in a calm tone. Her skirt moved a little in the gentle wind that rolled by. She brushed the lower left side of her face with her upper knuckles as something had started to tickle her face. With the question asked she wondered what Don't forget DL-6 meant. Somehow she retained that information in her head even after that violent fight. She did not dwell on the thought for long as she titled her head to the left somewhat. It did not mean anything but she was not sure what to do or if the armoured guy and Henry would even come along if they had a plan of some sort. Candy Cane kind of started to miss Miss Spencer at this time, she was smart and would probably have something in mind.

'How to make myself useful when several people can use magic, one being a super soldier and the other can go invisible and be anywhere at this time?' she thought to herself. Hell if she knew, but being the voice of reason was against the character she was so hopefully, it would not happen again. The punk was not amused in any way, in fact, she was somewhat disturbed. At least Denys looked OK, he looked fine from what she could see.

The Kaiser sighed in relief as the Marine aimed his rifle down, before slowly holstering it behind him. Turning back to Henry, the mage seemed disappointed, unwilling to stop fighting. Denys was unsure how the spell would be triggered, but if it did, he'd try to take the hit. The dark mage stood there, staring at Denys whom apparently, had betrayed him. Luckily, the immense pain in Henry's hand seemed to distract him from casting the spell long enough for Spring Awakening to hit him. Eventually, a crow came to his side, calming him enough to lower his tome. The situation was defused, for now.

Everyone seemed to split up for now, a good idea in the Kaiser's mind. Whenever his troops got in a fight, time to be alone and cool off was verily appreciated. The marine went back into the odd shack, possibly to find more clues. Henry walked over to some benches, intent on interacting with his murder. The only one who hadn't left him was the skimpily dressed woman. She (frankly rightly) assumed he was the only other sane man here. She asked him what they ought to do, and the Kaiser thought the question over for a second. He had many a goal to accomplish, firstly to discover where he was. But that would be much harder without allies. "For now, I suggest we wind down. If you wish, we could try to find a local again, but the others should be left alone."

---

The odd trio trekked down the ramp into the town proper. Though the other two didn't seem to be very hesitant, Red was sure the process was here. Just at a glance she could see there was something odd about the city. It was too clean, too polished, too empty. The only living thing in the street was some sort of knight or guard.

As Birdie took off down a side street, Red travelled further down the main street until she reached a plaza, where her fears were all but confirmed. It was so off. Mixed and matched buildings, some all but gone, others brand new. This could only be the work of those dreaded robots. There were also corpses strewn about, victims of the process. It seemed some cells also inhabited the corpses, moving them around aimlessly. Red was shocked and stunned for a bit, but the calm voice of Mr. Nobody snapped her out of it. "Red, I think we need to find out what's going on. We should ask that man."

Quickly running back to the main street, she stopped in front of the man in armor and Blu began speaking. "Sir, do you know what happened to the town?" He asked, unsure how to bridge the question of the robots who had surely been the ones who had transfigured the fair town. It was odd he still stood here, but it seemed this area had already been cleared so the process must not have had any reason to return.

Phoenix Write: Ace Attorney
[[ Gourd Lake ]]

As those on the shores of Gourd Lake fought amongst themselves they were too caught up in their battle to notice the waters begin to boil. The center of the lake churned violently, bubbling and frothing as it sent small waves towards the shore. From the disturbance in the water five figures rose like demons from the deep. When their feet reached the surface the water froze below them leaving the figures a platform to stand on. If any not involved in the conflict on shore were watching they would notice right away the strangeness of these five even compared to all they had seen so far.

They were tall, no simply tall but abnormal in their height. They were perhaps only an inch or two short of seven feet tall, even having bracers along their legs to ensure the freakishly long things continued to operate properly as along with be of such a strange height each was also nearly skin and bones. The girls, for that was what they were, wore some sort of strange diving suit, a helmet with a porthole covering their faces with air tanks strapped to their backs and an airtight suit pressed to their skin. Even more shocking though was the enormous needle strapped to their left arm. It was nearly twice the length of the arm and seems to feed directly through the suit into their flesh. They looked monsters from a deranged imagination.

They all stood on the platform of ice for no more than a few seconds before exactly at the same time they all vanished in a swirl of purple haze before reappearing in the same instant on the shores of Gourd Lake a distance from the shack though still within view just as the Doom Marine and the Mage blew themselves up.

"Pathetic," one of them spoke, the sound echoing out of the helmet. Though distorted it was unmistakably the sound of a pubescent girl, no older than eighteen. "They behave no better than splicers yet they haven't the Adam to blame their foolish infighting on."

Another spoke up in response her voice nearly identical though much more level, with less disgust in the tone. "Why should that shock you sister? The people of Rapture came from the surface, the Adam only brought out in them what was already there. Senseless violence is a part of them. Sad but not surprising."

A third added her voice to the conversation. "Make them stop." She said it like a child would demand to be able to stay up an extra hour. The first turned towards the third, though their faces could no be seen something seemed to pass between the two. A moment later the third added in a much less sulky tone. "Please?"

A fourth choose this moment to speak. "Why bother? What is it to us? They will sort it out with bodies on the floor or they will find peace. As long as they don't challenge us why should I-I..." There was a brief moment of silence before the fourth corrected herself. "We, why should we get involved?"

"Could be fun." the fifth added. Though her face was obstructed anyone listening could swear she was grinning.

"Rapture was at the center where it belongs. This world is on the edge, it has not yet seen the aftershocks, it has not settled into it's place. Until it does we shall not leave unless the primitives force our hand. If we are separated I will guide you to the Spear Pillar. Remember, the Rapture Family lives in us, we have a right to everything in this an all worlds." After this speech One turned to Five. "You were looking for some fun? I believe it is waiting for you."

One inclined her head and Five leapt into the air. She landed on the dock next to the Boat Rental Shack and raised her hand. Four fireballs materialized. Five shoved her hand forward and the fireballs slammed into the shack sending charred wood splinters and drywall flying everywhere as the shack exploded.
@Lmpkio@Lugubrious@Royzooka@Kafka Komedy@Scarifar


As Red approached the Castle Town guard he turned to smile at her warmly. "Welcome to Hyrule Castle Town." He said brightly. His head twitched to the side like there was a crick in his neck. It happened twice more before he continued speaking. "We're normal-" his neck twitched again only now it seems his whole body was stiff at the joints. His arms so human a moment again were held in set positions like a doll. "peaceful town... peaceful town," His voice went up an octave them dramatically lowered almost comically. "happened at the castle... ...my job is to guard this spot." His face seemed to flake away in places, like someone was washing makeup off the guards face to reveal cracked, dry, brown, wrinkled, dead skin underneath. An entire eye peeled away leaving nothing but an empty hole. Part of his lips vanished leaving his teeth and gums showing. The same thing seemed to happen to his body. Armour and clothing seemed to flake away to reveal horrid decaying limbs underneath. The area between patches of dead and living soldier were blurred, almost like someone had taken an eraser to sections of the soldier's appearance. He looked more hideous than the actual corpses that shuffled through the plaza. "It's frustrating." he said with mild annoyance as though commenting on how it might rain later today. "It's frustrating." he said again as he started to walk towards Red. "It's frustrating... It's frustrating... It's frustrating... It's frustrating... It's frustrating... It's frustrating... It's frustrating..."
@Kafka Komedy@Lugubrious@Lmpkio


As Hildibrand spoke Terra's mind went racing. Demon, Goddess and Fiend, the three forms of the Warring Triad. How could he know of them if he was from another world. Many things when he spoke she recognized, chocobos among them but many things he said were also strange. She didn't recognize the names of any people he mentioned nor the name of the continent. Odd also was his description of the Warring Triad, covering in moss? When Terra had seen them they were shining and brilliant with the power they possessed, no moss would touch a surface like that without being scolded away. More disturbing was the news that that one of the triad, the Fiend apparently named Seriphot had at some point in the past escaped his imprisonment.

"That can't be, the Warring Triad was so strong it absorbed all magic, Shadow burned his hands pushing the Goddess on top of Kefka, such things could never be covered in moss. If one of them awakened the alignment would be broken throwing the whole world into disarray. Such a thing is impossible. What you speak of bears a resemblance to my world but it is no place that I have ever set foot."

When Hildibrand took back his transceiver and mentioned who had constructed it Terra took three steps back, she raised her hand and fire formed in her palm. "Biggs and Wedge? No! They are dead, dead. I watched Valigarmanda freeze them and shatter their bodies. They are GONE!" she said with anger, the fireball in her hand flared and Terra had to fight to keep it from exploding all around them.

She was so busy with Hildibrand she didn't notice Gaige approaching with the horses or anything that Scout was doing, really since he'd first introduced himself.
@Scarifar@Happy Go Lucky@ProPro

Gaige returned Scout's gesture of finger guns, with an added "pew pew" for effect. It was all in good fun. Didn't mean she believed his blatantly obvious lies, especially when he tried to get the horses to move by shouting "Mush!" The teen girl just shook her head in response, giggling slightly. Then her attention was stolen by Terra, Green-Hair, freaking out over the things that Hildy had said. Gaige's eyes opened wide as Terra created fire and appeared to be getting paranoid, potentially violent. In an instant time slowed down as her incredible brain went to work. What would the others do in this situation?

Krieg would have lunged at Terra in an attempt to skin her face, probably yelling something about poop. Not helpful.

Salvador would want to get in on it. Not helpful.

Axton? He'd be laughing his ass off. Not helpful.

Zer0 would be... Actually, what would Zer0 do? That guy was a total mystery and made no sense whatsoever.

That just left Maya. She'd probably phaselock Terra to put her in time out until she cooled down. No good, Gaige wasn't a siren, so reality bending powers were off the table. Dammit, if only Deathtrap weren't offline, she could digistruct him between the two and force Terra to sit it out! Wait, there was some inspiration there. Not DT, but Maya. Gaige didn't have siren powers, but there was something she could do in the situation.

Bang!

A bullet hit the ground near Terra's foot, close enough to get the woman's attention, but not close enough to hurt her. Gaige held her Jakob's revolver in hand, then released the weapon, allowing it to be broken down into digital code and stored away again.

"Calm your tits, jeez. So he's saying things that sound familiar but don't make any sense, big whoop! I thought we already established that there's been some kind of time travel or parallel dimension shenanigans going on here, or did you miss that? If he makes sense but feels wrong, it's only because he's from a potential future, or a similar but not identical world. So get ahold of yourself and let's figure out just what the fuck is going on here and how we can get back home, alright?" She narrowed her eyes on Terra from atop the horse she had climbed up on. There wasn't any verbal threat, but the meaning was clear. Gaige may be young, but if anybody in the group proved to be a danger to the others, she would not hesitate to put a bullet between their eyes. God, how did I end up the voice of reason?

@Prince of Seraphs@Scarifar@Happy Go Lucky

At first the conspiracy of ravens wheeled wildly around Henry, a tiny hurricane of black feathers. Before half a minute passed the ruckus died down and left the dark mage statuesque; the ebony birds perched all over him as if he were a garden sculpture. One look at Henry's face revealed how elated this made him feel. Nothing in the world made the day sunnier for this Plegian than goofing around with friends, with the possible exception of wanton slaughter. He attempted different poses, for which the ravens obligingly shifted themselves, and all the while he spoke with them like they were people. Indeed, his new friends came across as far more genial than most humans, as the recently-carved memories of suffering could readily attest. Because of this, even if Henry could have heard or witnessed the arrival and ominous discussion of the five Big Sisters atop their raft of ice in the lake, he did not.

Sudden and violent destruction, however, always caught his attention. The shockwave of blistering heat and kinetic force disturbed the inquisitive conspiracy, and as one the ravens took off and made a birdline toward the nearest stand of trees for shelter. Only the original raven, nestled in Henry's stylish and expansive collar, did not retreat. The joy ebbed from Henry's expression, his childlike happiness replaced by a more subtle, wry grin, as if to mock the sudden explosion for being presumptuous enough to ruin the idyllic scene. His gaze turned upward slightly as a slab of drywall comparable to a hubcab flew toward his head, and boredly Henry swiped his fingers to the side as if erasing a mistake on a chalkboard. The piece of debris took a sudden detour to the side and lodged, mostly broken, in the ground. Poking it with his foot, the dark mage stared at the shack. Though it contained no friend of his, he hoped that Denys and that other girl hadn't just bitten the dust in so unentertaining a manner.

”Ooh.”

He found himself staring at the perpetrator of the blast, a bizarre, faceless creature that instantly fascinated him. Its rather monstrous bearing reminded him of an Entombed, with which he maintained a morbid curiosity ever since he first encountered one. The large, brutish undead fought with talons not unlike this firespitter's giant needle, and they always wore masks or bags over their heads to signify -or perhaps hide- their inhumanity. The prospect of creating Risen, and especially Entombed, always filled Henry with exhilaration. This one in particular outshone every undead he'd encountered, though. Obviously, this specimen could use magic. Perhaps it had something to do with its skintight garb, typically characteristic of dark mages?

Henry rested his chin on his hand, watching closely. The raven hopped up onto his head, peering at Five as well. Maybe it, like the Plegian, just needed to know more. More than anything else he wanted it to attack him so he could get an idea of abilities.



Birdie was unabashedly pleased of himself when he figured it out: the lumbering zombie-like creatures that initially capitalized on his terror of horror movies could not actually leave the areas of the town that appeared ruined. With this in mind, the large man set to having his fun with them. Tossing chunks of stone from outside their range to watch them plunk off their noggins and get them nodding like bobbleheads...jumping into a ruined zone to watch all of them become sentient and suddenly lunge for him only to forget all about him as soon as he hopped back out...snaring one with a chain from a pristine zone and throwing them into the scenery...all of it made Birdie bellow with laughter. One could say that he was having a whale of a good time getting over his fears of cinema's undead.

Since he began this exercise already tired, though, and it wore him out quickly, it only lasted a few minutes. He then casually sauntered off, making sure to stick to the less weird parts of Castle Town and feeling like a very big man indeed. The thought drifted through his head about how the ladies he met with might be getting on, but he figured anyone who could lift a giant sword or use guns for heels could handle themselves. Meanwhile, a new task awaited him, courtesy of his rumbling stomach: he needed food. Where could he find a snack in this place? Since the chances of running into a Ye Olde Burger Joint looked to be woefully abysmal, he figured that he'd have to look for an alternative. ”Blimey, wot's the medieval name fer a pub...? An inn, maybe? Wonder if this dump's got one.” He kept a sharp eye out despite the dark of night, not quite aware enough to be thankful for the moon's illumination.