@KoL@floodtalon@Ryonara



The Demon was tough. That massive outpouring of firepower simply seemed to annoy it even with Farris' help. Although...yes it had summoned or materialized a skull faced set or armor. It was hard to tell which from this distance and with all the magic being flung around.

As one the highly trained company ceased fire when the fiery forms of multiple Angels rose to engage their target. Saef could only guess that the flame based Angel had created elemental copies of himself or summoned help through an unknown power. The problem was an intellectual one and rendered moot moments later when alarms rang from every suit in his command. Somebody had just scanned them with a very powerful radar.

The computer's estimated guess pegged it as some kind of fast moving aircraft heading right for him and his men. Doppler analyses of the signal put time of arrival a little over a minute. Not a whole lot of time to prepare.

"Incoming Machina aerial assault. Huddle up and adjust anti-airborn fire. I will provide cover."

Not wasting anymore time he lifted his scepter for the first time in the fight. The glowing white crystal at the end shone even brighter as it collected and augmented the energy he was surging through it. Arcane symbols flashed through his mind for half a second before a bright white and semitranslucent barrier rose into being around the suddenly much closer company of soldiers. He honestly should have ordered them into a series of individual evasive maneuvers. It was a miracle that the oncoming aircraft hadn't fired on them already.

They took the aircraft under fire at fifteen kilometers, well within visual range. Without the added damage from the holy weapons it was unlikely they would do much at extreme range. Letting the eager pilot get closer first allowed for the full strength of their lasers to impact. Oddly enough despite assumedly seeing what they were capable of when they fired on the Demon the overeager pilot flew at them at a respectible but oddly slow mach 2. That bit surprised Saef, either the pilot was underestimating him and his men or Machina technology was somewhat behind in fighter propulsion.

They had poured a lot of fire downrange by the time Farris turned away from the massive battle at the center of the field. Deflecting the vehicle mounted laser with surprising ease considering how quickly the crystalline wall had been erected. As the fighter plane swept around for another pass the outgoing fire turned with it. The super fast reflexes of the soldiers allowing them to follow the wide turn of the mach 2 aircraft.

Henry was buffeted by a wave of intense heat, likely meant to cook him inside his suit of armor. But it only fed him, more mana to sustain his eyes and more mana to convert into raw physical power. Of course this also made it kind of hard to look directly at Zak, but after a few on the spot modifications here and there in the eyes of the suit he now had selective tinting so he could look directly at Zak. The rain was finally starting to die down too, Zak's raw heat just evaporating all the water too fast for it to even hit them anymore. He kept the pike wielder off his back for a bit, but it soon led the heat seeking missile back to him. Henry rolled his eyes and flapped his wings as hard as he could, sending the missile backwards and halting all momentum it had previously had. It fell into the lava below with a dull splat and Henry sighed.

The Zak above was still shooting flame spears, so when Henry ran out of lasers to intercept he just kept the Gates open and let the spears fly into that instead. Give him some ammo for later. "At least Zeruel had something to say while I kicked his ass. All it takes is one little torture session and now you have nothing to say." Henry mumbled to himself as the sword wielding Zak attempted to crawl onto him. "Ok wow, clingy much?" Henry just moved backwards, his Gate moving along with him to make sure those pesky spears didn't blow him up, and let the flames try to grab at him. He didn't even chuckle as he watched Mjolnir halt its momentum about 10 yards away, then suddenly reverse as it attempted to get back to its owner. With Zak directly in it's path. As for the pike wielding one that split in half, well they would soon find themselves trapped in airtight crystal cubes. Courtesy of some magical Silver Eyes.

---

Not Too Long Ago

Eve walked through the halls of Celestia's palace, wearing a bathrobe over her typical ensemble. She was clearly doing something that not a ton of people thought to do. Syphax was great and all, but every time he took the dominant position in their relationship. It was time for a change, and he was currently sweaty and training recruits. There was still one person in Heaven that she could go to in attempts of dominance. She knew where they were, and she knew vaguely what she was going to do to them. Granted, it wasn't difficult at all to find Ruxen. The Beastkin was either sleeping the day away near the Imperator's throne or wandering the palace aimlessly.

It was to be the latter for this day, Ruxen as irritable and annoyed as ever. It was a good day to bite someone's hand off and frankly any Angel would have gotten the same treatment. It just so happened that on this day, she'd be passing by some bimbo bird in a towel. Glaring, she sifted past on all fours, not paying Eve any mind. "Couldn't find your fuck toy today bitch?" she said once a good distance was put between them. Because everyone knew Eve and Syphax's antics and how they wouldn't or couldn't just shut the hell up for a day.

"Nope. She's right here," Eve said as she picked up Ruxen whilst mid-flight, lifting up the wolf lady with her bird feet and carrying her off to a room she knew was empty. Eve had a good hold of Ruxen's collar, and she wasn't going to go anywhere as long as she was in the air, and away from any surfaces that could give her leverage. "Took a bit to find you, glad I finally did."

"Motherfuck! Fucking get off and let go you cock sucking piece of shit-stained bird flitting fuck wat!" Ruxen let loose the slew of profanity she was actively known for, swinging paws about as Eve carried her off like a literal bird of prey. Tail swishing this way and that, she attempted to even reach up and bite at the avian with her jaws. But the collar managed her weight to be focused donwards and there wasn't much she could do but embrace the ride. Deva's collars weren't coming off so slipping out wasn't really an option.

"One of those isn't true. That's gross." Eve kept flying like a vulture, approaching an empty room down the hall and tossing Ruxen in. She wasn't going to have the backtalk in this, but she'd let Ruxen have this moment. It would only be one after all. After Ruxen was in the room, Eve walked in and closed the door, the main light coming from a lamp in the corner and the high-up window. A small bag was placed to the side as Eve smirked at Ruxen, her eyes narrowing into a dark gaze.

"Fuck, make a softer landing next time asshat!" Ruxen said once she had been deposited. Landing on her rump in Eve's bedroom was annoying enough but it was clear the bird-brain wanted to have fun of the body and pleasures. "Sorry fuck wit, but I don't intend on playing with you today. You can either let me go or I break both the door and then your fucking face," Ruxen snarled, stomping her paws on the ground in iridescent and obvious rage. Evidently she was not being a happy camper at the moment.

Eve disrobed as she calmly walked over to Ruxen and grabbed her collar, raising it into the air as high as she could, which actually raised Ruxen off of the ground a few inches. The hand around the collar ignited in flames, in case Ruxen was tempted to bite the hand that kept her restrained. "Listen here. I will not take your profanity. If you expect to use the profanity, you will be thrown against the wall. Understand?"

"Pfft, yeah? Piss off douche wagon. Your little fire shit is nothing to the fucking bullshit I've been through," Ruxen snided, fangs pristine and pointed in a grin. Granted the fire hand holding her collar made her twitch by the heat but her paws were more inclined to kick out at Eve than anything else. "Yeah, sure. Throw me on a wall. Bash my brains out. I fucking dare you shit head cause trust me, it's nothing fucking new."

A flaming fist was flung towards Ruxen's face as Eve held her up, leaving a smoldering fist mark on her nose. Another punch was thrown as Eve's entire arm was ignited, keeping her prey raised up in the air. "You heard what I said." One more punch, directly into Ruxen's eye, was thrown as Eve lowered her arm back down, still keeping Ruxen up in the air. "I promise you. I will make this worse."

Of course, each blow had hurt like hell. It was a flaming arm, so of course it hurt like hell. Ruxen's fur singed at the spots Eve had marked and she coughed a little. But it only made the Beastkin snarl angrier.

"What the fuck did I just say? Bitch, this is nothing to what I'm used to," she said, tail swishing behind her. "If you're just going to have a hissy fit and not real sex, then get the hell out of my face you egg sucking feather brain. Or are you just gonna take your boyfriend issues out on me? Huh? That it? What, that harpy dropped your ass for someone nice? Fucking loser."

Eve was fully on fire, the heat definitely coming off onto Ruxen's body. She threw Ruxen down onto the bed and walked to her bag. Her feet left ashen marks on the ground as she took each step. "You're going to pay for that," she said in a monotone voice.

The pair of archangels captured in boxes observed their prisons silently, subdued for the moment before each placed a finger to the inside walls of the crystalline structures. Sparks shot out from the bottom of the cubes as white hot fire spewed from the tips of their index fingers to cut through like blow torches. Meanwhile in the sky above, Zachariah's spears hastily changed course. Those that filled into the gates of Tartarus exploded instantly as soon as they reached the other side, spilling holy fire into the endless bounds of the infinite dimension in an effort to consume everything material within via ever growing divine inferno. The rest of the spears defied gravity as they spun around the demon in a brimming fury, forming a tornado of fiery lances before shooting inward toward the demon from every conceivable direction.

The supply of spears continued to flow out in a endless barrage as the archangel remained unrelenting in his assault from above. The accuracy of each divine projectile was not to be underestimated as they all aimed directly for their target with the tenacity of bloodhounds. Should another gate appear before them, they would alter course again to find a path around. Hundreds upon hundreds of the precise lances maneuvered around, shooting toward the demon at staggering speeds. They aimed for his joints, limbs, spine, skull, and torso consistently coming after and perusing Henry.

Zachariah with the saber gave no quarter, continuing to ruthlessly slash out at Henry with his blade of arcane fire, each strike launched with calculated precision to dismember or disembowel. Should the demon let himself be distracted or look away even for a moment, the archangel was ready to capitalize with a severe response. In spite of his seething rage, the archangel's movements were fluid and tactical. Raw angelic combat capability manifested as instinct. In this state Zachariah had nothing witty to say. He had no lavish goals of going grocery shopping behind enemy lines for the fun of it. He had no escape plans peppered with hidden booby traps or elaborate chases. In this state, the personality that made Zak an arcane fool to be easily dismissed were all burned away in the place of a pure and ancient warrior tried and true, born in heaven for the sake of retribution and war. Zachariah didn't just fight anymore for revenge. That feeling was a small one in place of the driving force he normally suppressed to try and lazily enjoy the universe. The primal divine will to smite evil and corruption and strike it back down into the infernal pits from whence it came.

The ground began to quake, trembling as magma and flames churned below the surface. Massive shifts in the landscape continued to rend across the graveyard. Buildings and gravestones sunk into the lake of molten rock, melting away as a fiery chasm slowly began to form at the heart of the battlefield. Miles of catacombs and cave systems directly below the battle between Henry and Zachariah had begun to collapse as the ancient foundations were filled with lava and melted away. The extra archangel swimming through the sea of fire as if it was water spawned several circles of runic symbols which trailed behind him along his path. He cut through the underground, traveling on tides of magma that bent to his will. Heavy stirring motion churned out of the circles and beings of fire began to form. Monstrous shapes swam beneath the coalescent wasteland, breaching the surface with large glowing talons as they slowly emerged. Titanic wings made of holy flames tore their way up from the scorching soil, displacing mounds of charred dirt and lava as they reached up into the sky. With a massive wing beat, a cyclone of sweltering winds swept over the land as the large winged beast of incandescent flames ripped out of the molten chasm in a massive explosion of debris and smoke.

A deafening roar bellowed out, rumbling through the air as the titanic dragon of pure white holy flames was summoned into existence. The creature spat plumes of fire into the air aimlessly from its massive dagger filled jaws until it fixed its sights on Henry with a burning stare. Opening its giant maw, the dragon let loose a geyser of bright flames which shot directly toward Henry from below. The flames rapidly rose in temperature, glowing brightly until the fire became a radiant blue, burning so inconceivably hot it became radioactive. Now 5000 kelvin and increasing. The hundred meter radius of heat and geographical changes slowly grew, expanding for dozens of feet every minute, gradually terraforming this area of the graveyard into a slowly expanding volcanic desert littered with fiery crypts.

The pair inside the crystals would find their efforts fruitless, the crystal automatically regenrating what they managed to cut through while at the same time actually expanding and getting thicker, leaving them to suffocate within their airtight crystalline prison. As for the spears within the Gates, Zak would find that once they entered he could no longer feel his constructs as they were literally seperated by the fabric of reality. Only the strongest of connections could be felt once something has entered the Gates of Tartarus, such as Juno's impossibly strong bond with her sword when she managed to break the Gates so long ago at the forge. But the spears that began to go around the Gates was another thing entirely, Henry had to work to avoid those. Which wasn't saying much. The pure heat he had absorbed was immense at this point, with Henry converting most of it into energy for himself to do ridiculous things such as flashstepping. Henry would disappear, reappear in some lounged pose a few yards away, disappear again, and so on. Every furious strike Zak let loose Henry would parry with a bored air about him, this fight has somehow been one of the toughest of his life yet without any banter or conversation between the two it just felt stale.

Zak summoned some sort of Lava Dragon, or perhaps he himself was the dragon. Who cares. Henry stared down the dragon as it breathed it's impossibly hot fire, practically a laser at this point really. Henry sighed and opened the Gates of Tartarus below him, time for his trump card. Time seemed to freeze for a moment as the Gate actually bulged, the sheer power of what Henry was about to release struggling to fit through the small hole in reality that the Gate was comprised of. But it came out, a laser made of collapsed particles and radiation created by the Vassal of Space herself, Juno the World Snake. It cut straight through the fire, and it would likely cut straight through the dragon as well. All would bow before the might of infinity, it's why Henry had saved the laser for a special occasion such as this. As Henry let Juno's might clash with Zak's he wondered to himself where the hell everyone was? This was probably the biggest event happening on this planet let alone this battlefield, yet nobody else had even tried to get in on the action. It wasn't like they were the highest level combatants here, there was probably somebody around here who could match Zak and Henry in terms of sheer power. Hell even if they were there was probably some Machina or Demon that could just sneak attack the two of them and fuck them over royally while they weren't paying attention.

"Are you gonna keep up the temper tantrum for long? Because I have better people I could be fighting. People who would actually talk to me and make things interesting. If anyone should be mad here it's me, you blew up my dogs yet you don't see me flying into a blind rage upon seeing you." Henry calmly lifted up his hand as Mjolnir finally returned to him, catching it with one hand. It's return course had it flying straight through saber Zak from behind as it returned to it's master of course. Whether he had dodged it or it tore through him like a bullet through wet paper was entirely up to his reaction speed. Meanwhile Henry's other hand was lazily twirling the Cheater's Blade at ridiculous speeds, cutting through the very magic that bound together each spear that tried to hit him, ceasing any possible explosion before it could even happen.

Sure enough, it may seem as if Marie may be concentrating way more on the battle that's raging then her own surroundings. Sure she looked around to see if anyone was nearby but she didn't really see anybody. However, being trained as a highly skilled bounty hunter does teach you a thing or two, maybe slightly tricking your senses to be a bit more enhanced than they regularly are. With a tick of her mind, her senses instinctively blare in her head, warning her that she's in great danger...

And it's going to come toppling right on top of her!

With a surprised gasp and having just enough time, she leaps out of the watchtower to see an angel pummeling down through the roof and onto the old stone building. Within her rushed effort to get-outta dodge, she fires her armor-piercing round straight at the figure coming down. The slight panic in her shot made her aim the gun a little low, yet considering how fast the Angel was pummeling down, it might just be a happy accident. Who knows what a special armor-piercing bullet can do to an angel's wing, but regardless of the outcome, whether it pierces the wing or skin, or in fact gets blocked, the chances of it hitting are pretty close.

Oh and then came a Harpy doing a 9/11 on the tower.

With a slow flip, she softly lands on the ground with her heels crunching against the soft snow. It looks like the action has found her a bit early on schedule. Looks like it’s time for her to return the favor.

”Well aren’t you the sneaky type?” the bounty hunter responds mockingly as her rifle barrel begins to smoke lightly, ”Yet, you’re gonna have to do better than that to catch me.”

With that, she quickly throws the dark blue and grey rifle into the air with one hand. Several more flares of steam escape from the gun’s opening parts as it begins to transform. Within seconds, the gun has transformed into two desert eagles! Marie jumps into the air and catches the two pistols while quickly reloading them with armor piercing bullets. Then she begins to fire upon the angel, trying to be as precise as she can with them. She better make these shots count as not to waste them so willy-nilly.

Just as she begins firing, Victorie suddenly telepathically contacted her. She notifies her that she has located a Harpy scout and that she can teleport them to their location. Of course, it looks like Marie is just where the action is taking place, and a harpy having crashed into the watchtower. She also hears her wondering where Henry is and quickly replies.

”Henry is fighting one of the Angels... Zak I believe.” she responds as she gets ready to face Marceroy, "But don't take my word for it, honey... Just follow the sounds of chaos and you'll see him.”

---

The demon trio continues to walk briskly through the dark and spooky catacombs, as they try to find their way back to the surface. As they turn a corner, Apia suddenly launches a bee straight over the dod as it hits a zombie in the head with dead accuracy. The dark-red bird then realizes that she was standing in the corpse that Ghelgath decapitated and began squealing as she struggled to shake it off. The ice demon simply watched her coldly as his resting bitch face became a little more prominent than before until she was finished.

”This is bad comedy...

Then the bird began to finally introduce herself as she began with a little jig and then introduced herself as Atarah. Even her little googly-eyed rock has a name… Serah. The Lich simply sighed as he issues a soft facepalm and shakes his head. This birb might just be a little bit annoying. Just a lil’ bit.

”Well…” he answers slowly with a slightly annoyed tone, ”I guess if we’re all doing names here… you can call me Ghelgath. Or Ghel, if you so want to. Now c’mon. We need to~”

But before the Ice Lich can finish, the three suddenly hear Victorie telepathically communicating with them. She notifies them that she has located a Harpy scout and that she can teleport them to their location, and if anyone knows where Henry is. Indeed, that's a good question. He hasn't seen him for a while. He'll make sure to keep an eye out for him. Meanwhile, Atarah was the first to respond to the harpy incident and instantly gets teleported to the battle at hand. However, Ghelgath refuses, for he has other ideas for his plan of action. If Apia is to ask their plan in motion, the Ice Lich simply gives a smug grin.

”Oh I got a nice ole’ plan,” he says with a hinting grin sneering on his face, ”The exit should be down the hall. Follow me and I’ll let ya in.”

After traversing through the last stretch of the catacombs, killing a few zombies here and there, the two finally made it back to the cold, snowy surface. Gusts of wind howl through the graveyard as they take a look around at their surroundings. So signs of any enemy forces nearby. Things were already looking up for Ghelgath. He turns around to Apia as the snow begins to slowly twirl in small tornado-shaped fashions, almost if they were creating something.

”Hell ought’ to be lucky that I’m in my element here,” he continues as large boulders of snow and ice began forming humanoid-esque figures, ”If ya hadn’t caught on, Bee-Queen, I’m making my own army of ice warriors. Once we have enough troops, I can send them into battle and floor the entire two factions. I mean with all this snow I might as well being producing an almost infinite amount of warriors at this rate!”

Small goblin-esque snow creatures were the first to form as they cackle in glee, followed by regular human-sized soldiers with ice weaponry including swords, axes, and even bows. Giant hulking golems also began to form as they growled in anticipation and hunger for the heat of battle. In some time, these soldiers will be ready to join the rest of Hell and crush the competition!

"Apia. Queen Bee. Pleased to meet the two of you," Apia said with a grin as she followed behind Ghelgath, silently noting the environment. A telepathic message with Victoire rang in her ear as she mentioned multiple different things, including a familiar name. Avarita. "Avarita? I knew an Avarita... slightly. Fought one of them a forever ago. Real tough customers. Will keep an eye out." Apia thought as she followed behind Ghelgath, occasionally swarming her loyal sweeties at some unwanted guests while the two walked to the exit of the catacombs.

Apia flew out of the catacombs, watching Ghelgath summon his frost army to fight for his purpose. Apia was impressed at the sight of this man raising his own troops out of the environment. Not a ton of people she knew could do that with anything, and she wondered why he didn't have an impressive track record. At least, she thought he didn't, as she never heard any stories of his accomplishments. The Honey Rod was gripped tightly in her hand as it 'opened', releasing more bees that slowly swarmed around Apia and flew around her, making her seem like she was embedded in a cloud. "I like your idea, Ghelgath, but would you mind if I helped to sweeten this deal? My babies are itching to fight, and why not have an army of both my sweeties and yours?" Her voice sounded regal and mature, despite all of the buzzing in the air as she spoke.

Maen stretched his arms languidly, like a cat, and stepped away from the mound of eviscerated undead. The dark scars in the air slowly closed behind him, and he quickly scrambled on top of a nearby tombstone. From his vantage point he scanned around for more undead 'humans' to kill, and quickly noticed the lights that he saw earlier were flaring even brighter. He swore he could even feel the heat from where he stood far away.

He decided that he definitely didn't want to go there, and was that a dragon? Whether or not that was indeed a dragon, it didn't change his decision to stick with the enjoyable wholesale slaughter of undead. Though he had to admit to slight dissatisfaction, none of the 'humans' he had slain even put up a real fight. Maybe he should go towards the burning lights, if only t-

The lights flared again and a heat wave blasted by him. His skin tingled and he nodded. Not worth. Maybe some other time.

Maen set off in a different direction, his eyes peeled for any more enemies. The landscape shifted slightly and more barren trees surrounded him. Crypts and tombstones littered the ground like so much refuse, and still he hadn't seen a single undead. Movement made him turn his head. Something dark and low to the ground had shot from one tree to another.

Maen smiled, this was new. It would definitely be more interesting to fight dirty 'humans' when they actually put up a fight. And whatever these were, they were taking the initiative. He remarked on the shame that they weren't sneaky enough. Maen condensed the winds behind him and rocketed towards where he saw the movement.

He burst past a small copse of leafless trees and barreled directly into a pack of things. They were definitely not human. Maen took a moment to pass through his stolen memories and search for whatever they were. Dogs? No. These were more dangerous than mere hounds. More like wolves. But from the memories, wolves most definitely did not have glowing red eyes.

There were four of the wolves, and while Maen had been standing still and dumb, they had arrayed themselves around him. He was surrounded. Maen held no hatred for wolves, strange looking or not, and he quickly tried to extricate himself from the situation. He put his hands in front of him, as he had seen the first humans he had killed do, it was supposed to mean surrender.

One wolf cocked it's head at him curiously at first. But the moment Maen turned to leave the way he had come, it growled deeply and menacingly. The sound echoed unnaturally well in the open air. Maen thought quickly about how to leave, there was no need to kill the hounds, and he would rather not do so unnecessarily.

Maybe the music that calmed him would work on them as well. He opened his mouth and sung the wordless music that the moon had sung for him what felt like years ago. It was lilting and strange, with no seeming melody or reason for the notes. He felt some of the tension in his shoulders melt away, and he assumed it was working for the wolves as well.

At least until they pounced. Whether they just don't care for the song, or if magical hounds are just immune to magical music, he didn't know. What he did know was that all of them flew through the air unerringly, and crashed in a whirl of biting fangs and tearing claws. Any normal man would have been shredded to bits, but for a thing like Maen, the wolves landed on him and passed through in a puff of smoke.

His body disintegrated and released a formless black mist. The smoke rose into the air quickly and hovered above the wolves below. The wolves scrambled and disengaged their tangled limbs before looking around for the missing man. Maen scowled internally and shot down towards one of the wolves.

He shrunk slightly and poured himself into the beasts mouth and nose. The wolf shook it's head trying to remove the unwanted intruder when a blade shot out from its skull. The blade was black as the space between the stars, and it cut through the hound like paper. The blade spun once, twice, three times, and separated the skull into segments.

Without waiting another moment, the shadow mist entered one wolf after another, and soon the pack lay motionless on the ground. Maen left the last slumping body and stretched himself back to his human shape, waiting a bit as skin and hair layered them self over his gaseous form. The bodies of the wolves melted to blood and slowly flaked away.

He stretched lightly and flexed his toes in the snow. He smiled a small smile and lay down against a tree. The dark blade had taken tiny fragments of the hounds, and he was slowly consuming them. They were too small to give him anything, no matter how long he spent refining the pieces and integrating them into himself. But the warm feeling where his gut should be lulled him into a light daze.

He closed his eyes and waited for the feeling to disappear. Or for something interesting to happen, maybe some humans would come. Maybe they would even put up a fight.

Explaining to Alexi what elevators were and how they worked took much longer than Wolf expected, and thus his arrival was later than most of the other Machina. Finally setting foot in the graveyard, Wolf immediately noticed the huge spike of holy magic coming from the center. Had someone already gone all out this early into the battle? What would cause someone to...Oh...Henry was over there. Never mind.

Though the large amount of holy magic would no doubt require his attention, he still needed to get an idea of the battlefield. Holding his position for a moment, Wolf closed his eyes and let reached out to every inch of the area. There were a few other holy essences next to the initial spike, and seeing as Henry was there, it was safe to assume his fellow Machina were not far behind. As for the demons, they all seemed to be hiding underground, probably hoping for everyone above to weaken each other then let the roses that were crawling across the field to finish off who’s left. Cowardice but clever. Last but not least were the dozens of faint essences that dotted the graveyard coming from the undead. Not an immediate threat but something to consider still.

Opening his eyes Wolf began moving toward the center. Switching on his comms he informed his allies of his intentions. “This is Inquisitor Wolf. I am advancing on the angel forces now. Once in range I will try to disrupt whatever that massive source of magic is.”

---

Stepping through the hell portal, Balrog took a deep breath of the chilled air around him. It had been too long since the colossal demon had done battle, and it was time to remedy that. Seeing the trail of roses leading down into the catacombs, Balrog assumed his allies had gone below. While he would normally follow, he was too large to fit in the narrow halls. No matter, he prefered the direct route anyway.

After hearing what sounded like a dragon roar, Balrog knew he had to get in on whatever was going on in the middle. Turning his thrusters on full blast, Balrog charged straight toward the main battle smashing a number of tombstones along the way. It would be hard for anyone to miss the giant mesh of flesh and metal barreling down on those already fighting.

@Silvan Haven@KoL@floodtalon@Ryonara@Inner Demon

"Eh. He's a demon. We're all up to something." Fran waited patiently for a teleportation, but when it seemed like there was only silence Fran signed and tried to remember the lay out of the catacombs. And when she failed to do that, she tried to remember the general direction of northeast. "What a bother. At least give me a beacon to know when I'm close or something." Fran grumbled as she produced her wings and started flying through the catacombs to the location of the enemy. She was moving fairly fast, but the winding halls and the occasional dead end would extend the journey to wherever Fran is suppose to be. Along the way she did make multiple illusions for non-demonic entities. Most of these illusions were fairly simple, basically just her hiding trap holes or spike walls by making them look like solid ground or a open hallway. She hopes to later hear how angelic or machina soldiers end up impaled on spikes because they didn't realize the hallway was an illusion.

While Fran was here she did wonder if she could possibly get her hands on some powerful undead warrior. Her research on a mythical creature from Suparna's book was interesting, but required some things that Fran couldn't regularly achieve as a demon. Namely she heard of some powerful lupine creature known as "Fenrir", but being divine in origins a demon like Fran wouldn't have an easy time getting to him. She debated if she should defect to Heaven, considering her loose loyalties to Hell, but Fran shook this thought off. "No. If I did that, she'd think I was just chasing after her. I need to move on." Still Fenrir's power wasn't something Fran could ignore, and she hasn't heard of anyone who had powers similar to it. A beast that could consume anything would be helpful considering all the reality-defying warriors around this place, and it isn't as if Fran had all the time in the world to train up and become just as powerful by the next battle. She'd just have to take power where she could find it.

"Fuck. Another dead end. I don't suppose they could make it easy for me and just come find me?" Fran said as she layered another illusion over a a dart trap. Just for good measure she made herself invisible too, in case they did find her and they're just waiting for Fran.

@KoL

Overwhelming energy cascaded down from the gates of Henry as the might of Juno was summoned. The fiery dragon of flames and magma stood no chance against as its laser of nuclear flames were easily pushed back into its maw and the massive serpentine beast was pierced in two. The fire that made up the creatures two halves diminished, fading from a brilliant glowing mass of flames into smoke and ash. In spite of the overflowing energy that pulsated through the forms of Zachariah, the output of energy was beginning to ware on him. The dragon was the first and the last he would be bringing forth. The energy to summon such a beast was great, even for the emperor of the inferno. Yet it was torn asunder in an instant.

With their efforts proven fruitless, the pair of pike wielding Zachariahs were reduced to nothingness as the holy flames that made up their bodies ran out of air and energy to sustain themselves leaving the pair of crystal boxes empty. Zachariah wielding a saber was ripping into fiery pieces that burned out as Mjolnir tore through his back, which didn't split apart this time to avoid the weapon, as it returned to Henry. The constant barrage of spears ceased, as the ocean of thousands that had raged toward the demon from every direction were dispelled by his fittingly named sword. There was one Zachariah left now, not counting the one still submerged into the lava scarred earth. The fiery archangel finally halted, hovering in the air above Henry silently, observing as his other forms, attacks, and summons were all dealt with before they could even manage to a single scrape on the somehow impervious demon.

This was the limit. The furthest Zachariah had ever come. Spending eons neglecting his powers and his true purpose made him reckless with his abilities. In this state he only knew brute force. Constant onslaught. A tactic that appeared not to be doing very well against what appeared to be the ultimate defense. Zachariah felt himself burning. Not just from the flames that made up his body, but his very essence was burning away. The demons words were truer than he knew. The brighter the flame, the faster it burns away. In spite of it all, the archangel was steadfast. He watched calmly through a blazing gaze as his enemy shook off everything he could muster. Finally, as the demon went on about having better things to do, a sovereign voice resounded from Zachariah.

The spear in the fiery archangels hand disappeared.

Zachariah drifted through the air, the heat emanating from his body diminishing into thousands of degrees instead of temperatures comparable with stars, as it was clearly having just as futile effect as every other attack.

Lowering down from above, the archangel was at eye level with Henry now, just a few yards away.

Smoke and flames spilled into the tepid air from the corners of his jagged maw as he spoke.

Disinterest bled through in the roiling tone of his seething voice.

A bluff considering everything so far has been deflected or diffused, but you wouldn't be able to tell by looking at the archangels fiery visage or through listening to his imposing voice.

It almost seemed like a grin stretched across Zachariah's face, though it was hard to tell since his form was made up of dancing flames.

Zachariah rose his fists, poising to attack without weapons or projectiles. None were working anyway, and all that was left to try was raw strength and speed.

He rose a hand slowly into the air, and beckoned toward Henry.

"Hmm.. Someone's coming to visit? I wonder who it'll be! Will they be tall, will they be small, will they wanna talk, will they wanna fight?" Pink sang to herself, kicking her legs on the side of her floating nimbus of pink energy, as she noticed Fran's energy signal coming closer. All Fran's traps would be for vain, at least if the battle stayed as it currently was. With none of the Angels or the Machina taking to the catacombs currently, save the lazily flying Pink, they would have little effect. But perhaps someone would flee underground later from the carnage up above. Between the traps and the flowers, they'd likely have a very bad time.

Finding Pink would be both very hard, and very easy. First, Fran would have to cross roughly 65 km of winding passageways. But once she got within 4 KM, there would be telltale pink wisps guiding Fran to Pink, so vast was her wide collection radius now.

~~Undead "Smooched": 1 Ghost, 1 Skeleton, a Couple Zombies, and .7% of the Catacombs Undead~~





Miyu took the hand with a smile. Two people. Interacting without eating each others faces off. Talking about their lives. Aaaah, this place did live up to the hype. If just, everyone could travel back and forth between here and the nexus, that'd be perfect. There were still a lot of people back there who Miyu felt like they deserved better. But still, the here and now, Miyu had a friend to make, and she was giddy with the attempt.

"A Doctor, huh? Did the have much call for that back in Hyperion? I mean, you could just replace your arm with a robo arm, or download your body to a whole new clone body. With how mass produced those things must be, was it cost efficient to bother with healing?" Miyu waved at the other girl.

Not only did Marie dodge, off the tower no less, but her first shot indeed met its mark, piercing a hole through Maceroy's lower-left wing and digging a good way into his stomach with the leftover kinetic energy. A loud hiss escaped him as he continued to fall, though the damage was not so severe that he couldn't slow his fall back to reasonable speeds. Even through the tower. Even as the tower collapsed… hold on, had something else hit it? He hadn’t been able to spot anything else, but nonetheless...

As the place began falling into itself, Maceroy propelled himself out of the collapsing brickwork, using a finger to forcibly dig out the bullet lodged in his side in the meantime, complete with additional bleeding, before his own nanites healed over it. That’d just make things awkward later on. As it stood, neither hole was too severe even to slow down his flight, and he estimated that they’d both heal over within the minute. With that done, he let himself hover down toward the ground before the bounty hunter, partially cloaked in brickdust as he landed before her smoking barrel.

Admittedly, he ought not to have been distracted from her words by the yelling of a rather angry female voice. But to him, it sounded… mildly familiar. Like a voice he’d once known, altered almost but not quite beyond recognition. He couldn’t help but look over to see what the fuss was about; two harpies presented themselves, both with red-coloured feathers, and... wait... the feathers, the face... surely not...

‘Evie?’ he whispered to himself. It couldn’t be. The last time he’d seen her was-

He was distracted from his thought process by the sound of a weapon loudly transforming. A glance over showed that the former sniper rifle was quickly turning into two pistols, and the gunwoman leaping up to catch them in mid-air. Bringing his lance to bear in both hands, he span it up again, taking to the air and flying toward Marie on his upper set of wings whilst angling the lower set around much of his body. No doubt, he’d realised, any projectiles those guns fired would be as armour-piercing as the full-size variant; however, they’d surely be comparatively slower too, maybe a smaller caliber, and certainly less damaging. Therefore, by angling his wings appropriately, each projectile could be deflected rather handily, causing minimal damage that would then be easily repaired by the nanites in his body… and she was muttering to herself. Or to somebody else. No wonder.

As he drew close, not willing to waste his attention on forming a sentence for the moment, Maceroy first attempted to buffet her with one wing to disorient her, and then lashed out with a heavy two-handed swing of his lance at full spin, one that would force her in the direction of the harpies if she avoided it as he planned. Of course, there was always the possibility she’d do something otherwise, but he was counting on either the wing impact or the attempt to avoid it to leave her with minimal time to consider her options - and more importantly, minimal time to take advantage of the inevitable corresponding gap in his feathered shield, lowered as it was to allow him to swing the lance in the first place. If he could get more bodies into the fight, he could distract the human’s attentions, and perhaps get in the lethal hit against her as a result.

@Banana@The 42nd Gecko@Lmpkio

---

(actions taken by order of @Spiffy)

As HR-513 watched his would-be partner’s actions, simply to make sure the harpy didn’t take any serious damage, so too did he keep watch over the rest of the battlefield, in particular the intense combat raging between the demon and angel at the battlefield’s center - and moreover, of the fairly massed support the one was receiving compared to the other. It was not that the Machina lacked such troops, of course, merely that most had yet to engage with any foe, angelic or demonic, and would likely perish quite quickly for how they focused on horde tactics. And yet, it seemed to him that a few stray shots from that far-distant army may well lead to far-ranging damage - perhaps even striking himself or Maceroy in the process.

Besides which, he pondered, it wouldn’t do for him to simply sit by and do nothing to support his faction. Not as future High Cartographer.

Aiming his weapon arm in the direction of that angelic support, and noting the white wall that seemed to manifest about them as he did, the Harvester charged his first attack for several seconds before finally firing, sending an immense wave of bright-blue warp energy surging toward the army rapidly. Everything solid in its path seemed to vanish as it made contact, though in truth, it was merely transported to the Harvester’s side, only to vanish again as the detritus was warped a second time into the main body of mass making up the Harvester’s true body and compressed to so much neutronium. For the power of the warp blast, this minimal input barely affected it, though for the distance covered, many kilometers in a shockingly short span of time, the actual amount of energy it lost was likely significant.

HR-513 had already calculated that the leftover energy would be needed to overwhelm the defenses that had been set up and warp any angels in the area into his own vicinity - since it was also likely that additional defenses would be set up by those who had produced the initial barrier, he had further charged it to overwhelm reasonably strong defenses beyond that. Much as he detested unknowns, sometimes one had to figure out their optimal result as best they could.

If all went as expected, the warp energy would likely reach the targeted area twenty-point-two-four seconds after it was fired. It would likely be noticed ten-point three-eight seconds before impact, and on impact, it would likely expend a large proportion of itself to warp away the defensive barriers set up to stop it, either shattering them completely as their seals were forcibly torn away, or simply trapping any excess energy within the remnants. Not that HR-513 expected much excess to remain after the fact.

Any troops caught in this warp energy would also be warped to HR-513’s side immediately, where they would consequently be subjected to personal-scale, warped-in bursts of solar mass, hot enough to essentially fry each soldier as they were caught in them- either by cooking their entire bodies or by simply destroying their fragile brain tissue if possible- and killing them as quickly as possible. But only just. Too much energy used in that affair would be wasteful; not enough would of course mean additional energy was needed to end them properly, a waste in itself, though it may be inevitable that some would have the strength to survive that initial blast anyway. Once again, unknown variables conspired to mock his efforts at precision. It was a risk he would have to take, for now.

@floodtalon@Inner Demon@Silvan Haven

Waiting for @Ryonara until the weekend before I post with Farris again.
"Oh, what's is it now?" Victoire halted her chores once she noticed that some of the wolves she sent to prowl the area were killed by someone. Focusing her attention on her familiars, she ordered one a shadow bat to take a look at the area. "Well well, here we have a brazen one," Victoire smirked as she saw the smoky being consume her blood, unaware of what consequences it could have.

The battle was nearly granted at this point, with her first field rose field has close to a square kilometer already. By now, it was unlikely that anyone could stop her and, even if that happened, there's still the several other backups. Uphill battle didn't even begin to describe what the conceited beings that make the bulk of the Nexus forces had coming their way. It was no wonder that Victoire felt like being slightly mischievous wouldn't be that bad.

"What do you think you'll gain by consuming us, monster? Do you not realize that, now that you have done so, we hold power over you? Where we wish for you to become our slave, or die a thousand agonizing deaths, it would be as easy as counting to two. If you wish to avoid our retaliation, seek the truth hidden beneath the surface. Only darkness will save you from our wrath now," Victoire said telepathically to the smoke demon. She wished to see his reaction, to such words given that he already seemed quite deranged, to begin with. As to fulfill the ominous words she laid in a feral voice, borrowed from her beloved knight, Victoire commanded her shadow bats to fly by Maen's head, in a random path that would eventually lead him right to the Blood Countess' dark domains.

[D. Rose Radius: 480/120/120/60/60 meters] [Catacombs/Underground Coverage: 0.8/0.4/0.2 %]

---

Strange words echoed in Maen's mind. They voice was feminine and higher pitched, and it threatened him with pain and slavery. He answered the first part of her question.

"I was hoping for a good meal. Maybe a nap."

He flinched back slightly as a shadowy bat swooped into view. It flew in erratic patterns around his head. He wasn't all that worried about the enslavement, and the thousand agonizing deaths, he trusted in his power enough to believe consuming her blood couldn't be all that bad. Though he had no way to really tell.

"What do you want little buddy? You hungry?" Maen asked the bat, and reached out for it.

The bat dodged away and Maen followed after it. He jumped up towards it and swiped out with his hand to catch it, but the bat flitted away again. He giggled childishly and continued to chase after the fluttering creature like a boy chasing a butterfly. He pursued the bat doggedly, never using any real speed or strength, and the bat led him further away from the bloody splotches in the snow.

The bat picked up speed and so did he. It swooped between some branches and Maen careened after it, twisting his body unnaturally thin to fit between the boughs of the tree. He landed face first in the snow but his body twisted again, head became legs, and legs became head like some sort of twisted carnival contortionist.

Snow puffed out from under his feet as he ran, and he ignored several undead in the distance. He couldn't bring himself to care, this was just so fun. He decided he had to do this more often, chase things, even if they didn't fight back. There wasn't really any satisfaction in tearing apart the weak undead, especially when he destroyed them before they really had a chance to fight back.

Things that ran away, things that gave sport, were much, much more fun. He grinned widely as the bat soared through the entrance of one of the many tombs, or crypts, he couldn't remember what they were called. He dived into the pitch dankness of the stone structure and his eyes shifted to see in the dark. The pupils elongated sideways like a goat's, and the green shined lightly.

He saw the bat hovering in front of him as if waiting. "Thanks for waiting little buddy! Let's go." He ran forwards again and the bat turned and flapped away.

He liked his new friend, he hadn't ever really had one, and he only understood the concept from memories that weren't his. They played together, and the bat was waiting for him, so he must be having fun playing too. He though that meant this bat was his friend. His bare feet slapped against the stone and the sound echoed down the dark halls.

The bat flew further, and Maen chased. Not stopping until the bat alighted on the ground in front of a door leading off. It raised it's wing and pointed, as if telling him to enter. He saw no reason not to trust his greatest of pals, so he did.



@KoL

"Nnrr..!" Atarah scrubbed her head a little as she came too, blearily opening her eyes after the crash landing. Despite the jostling resulting in her confusion, there didn't seem to be a scratch on her.

As she realized her and Eve's relative position Atarah "gracefully" scooted backwards before rolling backwards into a standing position, "Uh, yeah! Uh.. You better.. Um. IT WAS ALL PART OF MY CUNNING PLAN! To catch you off guard! And stuff. Yes.. I am the fearsome Atarah, and I am here to stop the harpy scout! Which is.. probably.. One of you two?" Atarah after her proclamation with "grandiose" puffed up feathers, was a bit confused glancing between Maceroy and Eve. She kind of wanted to engage Maceroy.. Is that Syphax? It's a guy but it doesn't look very angelic. But Marie seemed to be already engaging him, which left Eve as the remaining un-engaged harpy.

"Feel my wrath, foolish person who definitely fell for my cunning ploy!" Atarah crackled with demonic energy, posing rather like she was trying to go super saiyan, before a pulse shot out omni-directionally. Marie and Eve, and anyone else who happened to be sneaking around relatively close (50 km was much longer than Atarah's range), would feel the unpleasant (or pleasant depending on your demonic/masochistic tendencies) tingle of that energy, as Atarah marked their positions. Maceroy, on the other hand, would feel a LOT worse, as errors started being reported to him en mass as his nanomachines started wigging out. Granted, when you have trillions of nanobots, a couple million of them going bad wasn't debilitating, but still, one did not want to catch the mechanical equivalent of a nasty cold mid battle.

@Banana@Lmpkio@BCTheEntity



Pink, meanwhile, had to wait for Fran to cross 65ish km of winding passageways. 6 km radius and counting.

~~Undead "Smooched": 1 Ghost, 1 Skeleton, a Couple Zombies, and 1.5% of the Catacombs Undead~~

Waiting for @Ryonara until the weekend before I post with Farris again.
Victoire grinned maliciously. The time had finally come to employ the greatest tactic in the arsenal of any self-respecting Demon: Terror. Knowing very well how everyone felts about the inexorable doom spelled by her beloved roses, the Blood Countess felt like growing bolder and finishing this battle in one fell swoop. It was impossible for anything short of a miracle to detain her by now. Why not have fun with her conquest?

"I'd like to beg for a moment of your attention, ladies, and gentlemen of the Triumvirate. From this moment forward, I, Victoire Bordeaux, announce that the Graveyard of the Lost belongs to the newly forged Demon Oligarchy. Demons, let us raise a toast in their name with the blood of our foes! Those who wish to escape the pain of death, leave this place now, for there's no more hope of your victory," Victoire broadcast her speech to all living beings through the battlefield using her telepathy. Naturally, if someone was immune to mental effects, or didn't have blood within themselves, wouldn't listen to her words, but this was their own fault. She left the information of whether her roses were about to overrun the landscape or not unmentioned for obvious reasons.

"I really hope that the others are smart enough to capitalize on the chaos that this will generate and take down their targets while they are guessing whether I bluffed or not. Attacking while your opponent is distracted is the least I expect of any Demon," Victoire thought. Even if the Blood Countess was the one that would pull the weight of this victory —just as always— the mere fact that she was the only being in the Demon army that used team based strategies placed her in a different class than the rest. As long as the others weren't stupid enough to doubt her support, instead of capitalizing on it, the Demons had absolutely no chance of losing.

A moment later, her part of attention changed to a being waiting on the door of the chamber she claimed as a temporary base of operations. Already expecting their presence, Victoire faced the smoke demon, flashing a fanged grin. "I see that you followed one of my children all the way to this place," she said, calling the shadow bat to her lap and petting it, "What do I owe for being graced with the presence of perhaps the only being in the Nexus that's brazen enough to consume my children of their own volition?" Victoire asked while eyeing the being from head to toe. Despite their difference in size, while she was sitting on her makeshift skull throne, and kept her cool confidence like this, Victoire was certain that she had everything under control.

And... if all else failed, she could just live up to her words and skewer the smoke demon from inside out by turning the blood he consumed into more Demon Roses.

[D. Rose Radius: 960/240/240/120/120 meters] [Catacombs/Underground Coverage: 1.6/0.8/0.4 %]

---

More long and tedious travel was in store for Fran as she continued to lay illusions behind for anyone unfortunate enough to come across them. As she traveled she thought about that book she read and the power it promised. That Fenrir character almost seemed too good to be true, with all that power just hidden away. But as Fran continued onwards and really put her mind to it, perhaps Fenrir was too good to be true. For starters she’d have to somehow get to Heaven without being found. Easier said than done, since Fran could easily use her illusions to go disguised among the machina, but less effective against Heaven’s wards. Not to mention anything that has been “sealed for thousands of years” is also probably not in the best shape to fight. Maybe Fran just chose a bad time to apply logic, but if she’s been lazing about in prison for a thousand hours, she wouldn’t be in any state to brawl even if she got freed right after.

And there was still issues about if this Fenrir creature did exist and was as powerful as the book said he was. Frankly all sorts of creatures from lore and elsewhere existed in the Nexus, but not all of them were like how the stories depicted. Sometimes this just took the form of having different powers, sometimes this was just completely inaccurate. Fenrir was supposedly a being powerful enough to eat the gods themselves, and so was sealed away a thousand years ago to prevent that from happening. But a lot has happened in a thousand years, so maybe “eating the gods” isn’t nearly as impressive as what the gods can do now, or perhaps they already figured out a way to survive that. Either way Fran came to a slow halt.

Fran’s own plan was about as pointless as this battle. They were only here to defend it because the angels and machina brought their armies to take it. Fran failed to see what exactly most of these dead spirits could provide them, since it’s not as if they need an infinite amount of foot soldiers. Landing on the ground Fran examined some of the tombs and wondered to herself. ”Well. Maybe one of these corpses knows something worth learning.” Fran had no stake in this battle and didn’t see its importance in the long run. Fran’s own loyalty to Hell was tenuous at best, since she’s only with Hell as she doubts other factions would want Fran. Fran has a reason to avoid hell and frankly she doesn’t trust the Machina not to just enslave demons despite their promises of cooperation. And unlike Henry, Fran didn’t have the same level of spite to betray the demons selfishly. Or at least she hasn't found a good reason to betray them selfishly.

”Since I’m here, I may as well try and learn something from it.” Fran continued northeast towards the angel Victoire mentioned, though this time Fran was also looking for any interesting undead spirits who might have something worth Fran’s time. Most shouldn’t be bothering the demons roaming about, but the few who are may be of use to the succubus. If nothing else she could use minions to throw into the path of some weapon or another. Or trigger the multitude of traps that fester these catacombs. ”And maybe one might actually know something important.”

As Fran flew through the catacombs she picked up another telepathic message from Victoire. Mostly boasting that the graveyard now belonged to the demons of hell, which Fran figured they already were. Either this was meant to demoralize the enemy or convince them that Victoire's secret weapon was ready and made them act rash. Either was fine for Fran, as she still needed to get to the enemy in the first place. Taking a detour to the surface Fran, while still maintaining her invisibility, took a more direct path towards the northeast that didn't involve winding passage ways. This ought to get her to her destination more quickly as well as let her see if anything more interesting then old traps and rocky walls. Maybe some actual undead or something.

The vampiress's words rung out in the dim underground room. Dusty bones littered the floor like refuse, and an ancient skull crumbled under Maen's foot as he stepped forwards. The shadow bat, his best friend, soared through the air and lay in the lap of the figure in front of him. She sat on a throne that brought her level, if not a bit higher, than Maen himself.

Maen frowned as he recognized her human like figure. She was smaller than many he had seen, perhaps still young, but her words were dark and powerful. She claimed to be the mother of the wolves he had consumed. He wondered if she thought him stupid, even he knew that humans could not birth wolves. It was ridiculous.

Maen's face took a harsh cast as he looked at the human in front of him. His lips were pulled down into a dark scowl, and his eyes squinted. He pointed at her and said. "Humans do not have wolves for children. You must think me a fool. You are a wretched thing, kin of the song-breaker, and now you will release my friend. He will come to me so we can go play, or I will find out how much blood humans bleed."

He crooked his finger harshly and took a step forward to snatch the shadow bat. It fluttered lightly away and landed on her shoulder. Maen growled inhumanly and looked about ready to pounce when she spoke.



@KoL