@KoL@The 42nd Gecko@Banana@Lmpkio@Lucius Cypher



Shields flashed into being as bees swarmed into them. The high intensity bursts of photons, electromagnetic energy and magic frying insects as they got too close. Unfortunately for the soldiers this was also draining their first layer of defense. High intensity lasers sliced out through the swarms, hardlight blades sliced and open hands swept at superhuman speeds. Unfortunately none of those weapons had been intended to fight swarms of tiny enemies.

The bees weren't doing any harm aside from draining the shields and even if the energy buffers were completely depleted there was no way for the swarms to get through the Falias designed armor. The pests would be dealt with eventually, it would just take longer than anyone wanted. They worked as wonderful distractions though. The front ranks of the ice golems were able to move in quite close before automated proximity alarms blared in helmets.

The augmented solders did their best to ignore the buzzing annoyances and turned towards the real threats. The small Goblins were fast but so were the men they were facing. Holy blades of unnatural sharpness sliced out at Demonic ice. Any that got past the first few were met by a hail of blessed laser fire, each bolt of which could melt through a solid foot of high carbon steel.

Saef meanwhile was directing the rest of his men to converge on the attackers from multiple directions. The new troops appearing from the surrounding tunnels and taking the Mages and Warriors from rear and side passages. IF/F beacons and careful positioning preventing any friendly fire.

Ice now covered the floor of the tunnels a short distance around the portal. A few men slipped, others decided to hover just off the ground with their jetpacks. Most simply stomped firmly through the thin layer of frozen water and continued on with solid footing. Holy light suddenly shot through the earthen walls. The paladins locked in combat were abruptly fighting just a little bit better and the bees were somewhat less annoying.

That's when the Captain himself arrived on the scene. He had been moving while giving orders to his men and now stood with some of the troops in a side passage. Thaumaturge eyes ran over the Vampiric portal. His rather unique mind tracking the twists and turns of the magical energy that made it up. Given enough time he was sure he could close it. He did have prior experience at such feats after all.

But right now there was a Demonic figure standing before it. One that looked much different from the others. Perhaps the commander of this small force. Saef pointed his scepter at Ghelgath and let loose a bolt of Divine energy. He opted for speed over power but seeing as the target was a Demon the strike would still hurt.

As Apia flew back to cover, she began to feel... depressed. She returned to the scene to see hordes and hordes of dead bees along the ground, some twitching in place and others... unmoving. Apia ducked around the corner and fell into a sitting position, clutching her head tightly. "W-what have I done? All of her sweeties. Dead. Because of her.

Because of her they died in vain, but if she stayed put where she was... she'd truly make their deaths vain. She didn't want that. Apia rose off the ground, no longer flying, and instead ran. Ran through the halls of the catacombs, leaving her sweeties behind as she ran in order to deter any who'd try to follow in pursuit. Some returned to the current fight, while others took cover in order to sneak attack. "Gotta get away, gotta get away, gotta get away..."

---

"... um... thanks?" Eve was confused, and even moreso after she was caught off guard by the flashbang. She closed her eyes at the last second, but somehow, she managed to get hit with the full blast in only her left eye. She could see completely fine in her right, but her vision was being thrown incredibly off. While staggering around, Eve looked for what she could imagine was Atarah, and finally got a sight on a red blur. Eve ignited her feathers as she shot off towards the blur, aiming directly at Marie. Things might not end well for either person involved, in this case.

---

"I respect the oar. I used t'throw bottles at people. It was... slightly effective fer healing, but they did wind up with glass in 'em more often than not." Lillian calmly watched the scene, fairly certain that Miyu had everything under control. Unsurprisingly, she did, and Lillian was happy that the kid didn't start crying extremely hard.

Although, the sight of the gold nuggets did make Lillian think about something. "... d'you have any money here? I sure don't."

What was the standard based off of anyway? It wasn't based off of gold, that was sure, because that man said he didn't accept LITERAL GOLD NUGGETS! For crying out loud, Lillian couldn't make that without a ton of shit, and even then it was always boiling her arm. She couldn't get an MRI because of that.

This place had a weird economy.

Utada skimmed the message Maceroy sent and frowned, taking prisoners was much harder than taking corpses. He owed her for this. Atarah rushed in front of Eve and took the bullets head on, they simply pinged off of her as she claimed that was her target. She closed her eyes to stop the flashbang and Utada smirked, quickly loading an incendiary grenade into the underbarrel of her rifle. Unfortunately it was not to be as she heard several grenades being fired at her from above. "Tch, stealing my act huh? Rude." She muttered as she began backpedaling away from the grenades target.

She shot down 3 grenades and rolled behind a tree to avoid the rest, raising her shield to block some shrapnel that had been heading straight for her throat. She leaned out from behind the tree and aimed at Marie, who was still looking a little shaky from the flashbang, until the Harpy in the crop top tackled her from below. "Huh. Neat." Well that was one problem taken care of, now for the dodo. Utada shifted her focus from Marie and Eve to Atarah, doing some quick math in her head to calculate a good trajectory for her grenade. She fired the incendiary grenade at Atarah, if it hit it would explode in a burst of napalm, covering her and then immediately igniting due to the spark given off by the exploding grenade.

Maen stepped tentatively through the portal, hesitating only slightly at the strange magic. He arrived and staggered as vertigo caused the world to skew in his vision. He steadied himself and looked around. The weird little not-human was talking with another... he was hesitant to call it a human. It had the same general shape, but it reminded him more of the girl he had just met.

Not in their forms but in the way they carried themselves. Both stood self assured like they owned the ground they walked on, and they looked like they had the power to back up the claim. The other demon was bleeding slightly, and he dodged aside as flaming hounds roared fire. He did something and a different portal opened up which shot dangerous looking flames to cancel out the dog's torrent of fire.

Maen had nearly forgotten why the little lady had invited him here, when he remembered the promise to destroy one of the human's powerful allies. Maybe the man in front of him was human after all. Either way, he needed to die. If for nothing else than to get Maen his best friend back.

Shadows rolled off Maen's body in waves. Thousands of shards of silent glass appeared from nowhere around him, arrayed like the setting sun. The light before the dark. The shards twisted and moved erratically, glinting in the light, and leaving the strange black scars in the air. Maen thrust his hands to the side and summoned the Dark.

It bubbled out from his palms like oil and coated his hands completely before dripping up his arms like viscous snakes. They coiled all the way to his elbow before stopping.

"Human, can you sing?" The hints of a smile curling his lips.


@Kol @floodtalon

“Ooh, looks like you’ve never met mister Grim Reaper,” she was saying, as if it were a valid point. Apparently, this woman was also uneducated; the scythe in the hands of the Grim Reaper was derived from the actual use of scythes as a metaphor for harvesting the dead, and the fact that fools like her managed to warp the image into “scythes are a great weapon” was annoying to the raven-like harpy. Helpful when facing off against such idiots, but ever so annoying.

Of course, the woman’s attempt at a backflip kick toward Maceroy’s hand was somewhat ruined by various factors, but it didn’t stop her from using his own magic-imbued talon as a point from which to flip away - albeit at the cost of destroying one of her shoes’ heels, which he figured would vastly reduce her mobility. Or maybe not, if most of the mechanism wasn’t based in the heel…?

In the meantime, it seemed the other harpy had for some reason saved Eve from taking too much harm from Utada’s projectiles, and subsequently avoided blinding by any form of flashbang attack. In turn, as Marie rocketed into the sky via the systems in her shoes- wait, when had she gotten a lance? There was nowhere for her to hide that… unless she had some ability to warp weapons in and away, the way HR-513 did? Or an extra-dimensional space to store them in… yes, either way, maybe his reality anchor would see more use than expected this day… the point was, he needed to go for her now, whilst she was distracted.

As she fired her grenades toward Utada, Maceroy took to the sky, the drill-body of the shock lance whirling at full speed and aimed in Marie’s direction as he sped towards her. Unfortunately, he was not fast enough to stop her from transforming her weapon and turning it in his direction. Fortunately, he also wasn’t fast enough to keep Eve from charging at the rocket-propelled human at full speed, and surely that’d do some damage on impact, not to mention hurling the demonically-aligned fighter bodily through the air and totally throwing off her aim - both the point of the lance itself, and whatever weapon she’d transformed it into to try and kill him.

That’s my girl.

With a brief moment of recalculation, another message rapidly sent to Utada - Darken your vision if you can. - and a powerful flapping of all four wings, Maceroy closed the gap between him and his foe, zig-zagging to try and avoid her shots, only to abruptly light up like an insanely bright flare for a fraction of a second once within five meters of her. Marie, and likely everybody else within fifty meters other than himself, would be utterly blinded by his release of light, and whilst it’d be very obvious to anybody else who so much as looked in that direction, the light would also be nearly as blinding for a good distance beyond its “effective” range, for obvious reasons; within the effective range proper, even covering one’s eyes would be useless, as the light would pass through or around any solid surfaces within that fifty meter radius to reach them regardless, exactly as it was designed to do. In theory, there was no plausible way for Marie to stop that, let alone shut it down, and whilst that wasn’t exactly great for Utada or Eve either- Eve especially, who was far less likely to have anything to protect her vision with- he didn’t want to risk the mercenary getting to aim toward him again. It'd take at least a moment for her vision to recover, and by then, it’d be too late.

Maceroy’s intent, speculative as it was, was not to spear the human straight-on, but instead to move to whichever side of the mercenary she was not flailing her weapon on- or at least whichever side Eve wasn’t ramming into- and so to pass his own weapon through Marie’s body diagonally sideways - with but one hand holding it, since in this case, his own momentum would keep it relatively steady, and the other was necessary to perform a second action as it dug through his pockets. In theory, the noise of the drill itself would make it seem as though his body was still directly ahead of her, such that even if she managed to aim toward him again, she’d still miss him completely; the angle of the weapon ought to minimise the chances of her parrying his strike, if she could muster herself to try and do so; and the speed at which it was spinning would make tearing her in half, or at least mostly in half, all too easy, not to mention the surge of searing electrical energy that would simultaneously pass through her body as he hit the switch on the lance. At worst, she’d be paralysed and helpless, able to be killed with contemptuous ease; if he was lucky, she’d instead be finished off by the attack almost immediately.

That is, if all went well. If not, he had a backup plan - given the chance, he'd draw his free hand from his robes and try to slap something on the small of her back, in a position that would make it very difficult to reach with her bare hands, never mind any objects of the wrong length. A fist-sized spherical object made of metal, with a bright blue LED glowing on its topside; if it made contact, it would extend a large number of mechanical tendrils out across Marie’s back, each covered in maniple hooked suckers to try to cling firmly to her clothing and body, like those of a mechanical colossal squid. She'd also experience a severe pain in her spine, like something drilling into it (beyond any actual drilling sensations, rather) - though the sensation would be indicative not of a physical drill, but a spiritual probe tying her to the physical world, negating her Hammerspace completely.

If everything went according to plan, the enemy would be dead or disabled shortly after the Flare went off, bisected and/or unable to pull forth new weaponry from the nether-regions of thin air by Maceroy's attack. If not, his new position would depend on what else had happened there. It'd only be a couple of moments until then, though... but who knew what could happen in that time?

@Lmpkio@Banana@The 42nd Gecko@floodtalon

Wolf didn’t get far before Henry jumped on the coms and informed him that he had taken care of Zak and that he should prioritize Victoire’s roses. Great. It was bad enough another demon had joined their ranks, but now he was telling Wolf what to do? An undisciplined soldier would have disobeyed out of spite, or try to fight the demon. But Wolf was able to keep his composure and after checking again, he could feel the aura of the roses was in fact much larger than previously thought.

Turning back to the Machina base Wolf once again used the coms to communicate his new intentions. “Confirmed. Changing course to the roses. I’ll drive this scourge back to hell where it came.”

---

Before he could close the gap between him and his targets, Balrog suddenly found himself teleported to a new area in the graveyard. It was a bit disorienting for the mecha demon who briefly considered stopping to get his new bearing, but the sight of a large mechanical being in front of him quickly changed his mind. He continued his charge full force ready to topple this iron giant.

Unfortunately for Balrog, the teleportation mishaps would continue as Harvester teleported him to the side and into a large burst of plasma. Disengaging his thrusters he attempted to halt himself but ultimately slammed right into the solar mass. Though Harvester had calculated enough energy to kill a regular soldier, he would soon find this mass was only enough to partially burn Balrog; and fully piss him off.

Emerging from the plasma, Balrog let out an earth shaking roar before pointing his cannon at Harvester and firing several rockets followed by a stream of plasma orbs. Keeping up his barrage, Balrog slowly advanced toward his foe. If he was allowed to get close enough, he would attempt to impale the Machina with his claw.

@BCTheEntity

"CURSE YOU SKY! YOU WIN THIS DAY, BUT MY VENGEANCE WILL BE SWIFT AND TERRIBLE!" Atarah proclaimed to her age old enemy, as her prey escaped her and the battle took to the skies she could not follow. Regardless of the flare, Atarah still had a perfect picture of the battle, and it wasn't shaping up great. "CRIMSON, STRAIGHT DOWN OR YOU'RE FIGHTING ALONE!" Atarah smashed a fist straight down into the ground, shattering through it and unveiling a way down into the catacombs, the spray of rock and Atarah falling through the hole shielding her from the napalm.

If Marie followed Atarah's instruction (even if it wasn't perfectly 100% straight down), the ground would open up beneath her just before impact to allow her access into the catacombs, courtesy of Serah, complete with rock spray to dissuade any attacks from the side as she fell. But if Marie was confident she could win 3v1, she was welcome to stay alone in a battlefield Atarah could not influence.

@Banana@Lmpkio@BCTheEntity@floodtalon



Was the deads. Mass bee stings were not fun, especially not giant ice bees.






"Yeahh... I can see how that could go poorly. At least it's better than this one guy I knew who had a healing sword. That was just.. The dumbest. The only time it was worth using was when a stab wound was less bad that whatever else was hurting you.." Miyu grimaced a bit at the thought.

"Hmm, yeah, I don't have any money. Solid gold isn't valid? Weird, I thought it had intrinsic use in computer parts. Or has tech moved past that?" Miyu gave the gold a tiny little lift, a milimeter or two, just to test it's weight to see it was in fact gold. But apparently she had just missed or misinterpreted the expressions of the person selling them. "Still, there's always a need for doctors right, so, you should be fine? Unless they've already immunized their plane against physical ailment. Hmm. I wonder if there's a God for that? With the power of changing the rules of a plane about people being able to be harmed or something. That'd be pretty hella nifty of a power." Miyu mused as she kept walking along her way, going no place in particular, and making sure to keep an eye out for anything she or Daimyo might knock over. Might as well make sure there weren't any repeats of earlier.

@KoL

Fran stopped where she was going when she noticed all the chaos going on around her. She sighed and went back into the catacombs. She honestly saw no point in this battle, and whatever purpose it served, she didn't think that she could contribute meaningfully. Her mind was distracted and she simply had no desire to fight or do anything really. Once inside the safety of the demon-controlled catacombs, Fran simply left the battlefield behind.

Perplexing, thought the angel, having observed the words and movements of Mephillus and his green companion. The demon was unfazed that the larger angel was able to unshackle himself from the chains that bound him, though he was aware that he was in a territory that he was unfamiliar with. He knew that "Rufus" would be an obstacle, and that the "Ladies" would likely be the same.

But he wasn't an idiot. He knew the cycle too well, and he noticed that beside some distant screams coming from the dungeons, the volume of noise in general had decreased. The cycle must continue. Another battle, another slaughter, another day in the meat grinder, except Flos was in a different position, and it was one he wanted to take.

Final Gaze was in his hand, and with one large slash, the gates of his cell and the chained demons among the same corridor was shatter, with a loud boom emitting when the slash found it's end point.

The towering angel approached each chained demon one by one, calling The Sisters to unbind each one of the them. He whispered to each one of them, calming them and placing them under his trance, and upon looking towards the exit, commanded them to rush the exit.

His head hurt, and his wings were strained, but he was in Hell, and would make good use of that time. He followed the thralls out, with his loyal weapon by his side.

As Marie prepares to gore the vulnerable Marceoy with her giant lance, she would suddenly hear a ball of flame coming straight towards her. Another harpy is on the way, and she's coming in at a collision course with her! With only a second to spare, the bounty hunter wields the lance and quickly turns it to her right to whack the flying harpy right from the sky. Yet the lance's trajectory didn't stop there as it immediately whacks the male harpy with a more powerful strike due to the stronger forward momentum. The hit would send Marceoy flying out of control as he begins plummeting down to the ground and crashing into the ground below. The bounty hunter lands softly on her two feet with the rocket boots slowing her descent.

But the harpy seems far from finished. He rises from the ground and glares at the bounty hunter ruthlessly. With a quick heave of his body, he tries to go for another run at Marie, trying to gore her with his drill lance at a diagonal angle. However, Marie's weapon isn't just an ordinary lance. It's a gunlance. And she's respectively much faster than the winged angel. Quickly she turns the weapon towards the incoming harpy and fires three rapid-firing explosive shots, with one near his feet, one straight in his chest, and one in the right wing. The blast would ripple through Marceoy's feet, forcing him to loose his balance once again, while the chest shot would halt his momentum and the wing shot will have him loose the ability to fly out of there. Out of control and with nowhere to go, there was only one place for Marceoy to end up...

At the tip of Marie's lance.

The next thing he knows, he finds himself impaled by the black shaft of sharp metal. Blood can be seen trailing behind him as the tip of the lance is covered in red scarlet blood. Yet it wasn't the only thing he received, as once he stops sliding down the lance, he receives a kiss on the cheek out of pure pity. Marceoy was a seemingly tough opponent, one that had enough potential to possibly beat the infamous "Red Lady", but bravado was his unfortunate downfall. Just after the kiss of death, the harpy's eyes roll back and his body slides off Marie's lance. He lies on the ground motionless, dead as he breathes one last sigh of defeat. The bounty hunter simply chuckles as she puts away her weapon, exchanging for her classical Blunderlass weapon and fires at his head, spilling the floor with red mist and brain pieces. The harpy was no more.

"Such fine potential..." Marie sighs as she looks back at wherever Eve may have landed before attempting to dart back into the trees, "Wasted."

---

The ice floor seemed to do little to halt the advancing army as they simply hovered with their mounted jetpacks. So much for putting them on ice it seems. His army seemed to be doing a fair amount of work as they sliced or froze some of Saef's soldiers, but even then they were putting up a good defense. Once Captain Saef showed up, he pinpoints his eyes towards the commander and fires a bolt of divine energy straight at him. Ghelgath was quick to jump backwards to avoid the blast, but it was only by barely. He grunts as he lands on the floor and prepares to attack.

"I see the Captain has finally showed his white ass," the lich says mockingly as his fists began producing a blue aura of intensifying cold, "Alright Apia, looks like it's time to~"

But as Ghelgath turns his head to talk to his partner, he notices that the Queen Bee was gone. Looking around quickly, he looks back to see Apia running away from the battlefield like a coward. The Lich's eyes began to twitch uncontrollably in rage as steam can be seen steaming from his ears.

"COWARD!" he roars back angrily at the fleeing Queen, "GET YOUR STINGY ASS BACK HERE!"

But by that time it seemed to be too late. Apia abandoned him as quickly as they just met. He quickly sees the rest of her bees die and drop dead on the floor. Now alone, he must face Saef on his own in a 1v1 match between armies. He sighs as he eyes the captain coldly.

"Ugh... fine. I'll do this battle myself." he retorts disgustingly towards him.

With that said, the rest of the giant ice golems and Ice Serpants began to finally emerge from the portals as they began to produce more powerful ice attacks on Saef's army. Ghelgath wastes no time as he leaps onto the top of an ice Golem and plunges his hands into the exposed ice parts. With that, he has control of a massive ice golem as he pounds his fists together before smashing a fist to the ground, releasing a line of frozen spikes to pierce the line of angelic soldiers ahead.

Apia halted for a second and turned back, hearing the faint sounds of an angry man shouting "COWARD!" to her. What was she thinking?! She was just going to leave her kids behind and let them die? Hell no! What good was a queen that didn't die with her subjects?!

Well... a sane queen, but Ira'd probably be pissed if she heard that Apia ran.

That was something Apia didn't want to happen.

Apia flew back towards Ghelgath, grabbing a hold of her own stinger and pulling it out with an audible grunt. It was a makeshift weapon, but it was damn good as a throwing item. She had a lot of practice with hive darts, so tossing this thing like a spear would be easy.

"..._{^{aaaaaaAAAAAAA}}AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!" Apia darted past Ghelgath as she hurled her stinger towards the commander of the opposition, another stinger protruding out of her abdomen like nothing had happened.

---

Eve collapsed into the dirt and snow as she was hit with the lance's side, her body lying still for a few seconds. Her head was aching from the flashbang, and even moreso when that one familiar harpy flashed into a light as bright as the sun. If she wasn't blinded before, she was now.

Eve felt the cold slowly surround her, encompassing her with the feeling of dread and death's slow kiss bringing her ever so close to the next side. She was barely able to see Marie's rocket shoes blast before Eve's body gave in and fell down to the ground...

... but not before completely igniting.

Eve's body flared up, rising from her old position and hovering over the ground. What was once a burgundy colored harpy now rested a golden phoenix, eyes blaring red as it noticed the smoky trail of Marie's boots. She wasn't getting out of here THAT easily.

"CEASE," Evelyn beckoned as her body rocketed behind Marie, leaving an ever clear trail of embers behind her.

---

"Well, I know one way t'find out if 'yer right 'bout th'pain." Lillian pulled a green bottle out of Epsilon as she rolled up her sleeve, revealing scars upon scars, all caused by chemical burns. She looked like an amalgamation of monsters with how the skin was different colors everywhere. Some was light and some was dark.

Lillian calmly poured the bottle onto her arm, the liquid clearly bubbling as it slowly seared her flesh. The green liquid slowly turned brown as the alchemist grabbed another bottle of liquid, red this time, out of her mech, along with a bottle of water. Lillian first poured the bottle of water on her arm, diluting the acidic mixture and stopping it's corrosive effects, then followed up with the red liquid, which seemed to... 'heal' the arm up. A new patch of skin was formed over the arm, much darker than the rest, as Lillian put her sleeve down.

"Yup. There's pain."

@KoL@Banana@Lmpkio



Shields were starting to fizzle out now. Golden sparks floating through the air as shield buffers depleted. Frozen claws screeched across metallic/composite armor plates when the golems were able to score a hit. Here and there the softer under suit was breached, most often on a soldier that had been frozen into immobility. Being hit by a summoned ice mage wasn't instant death. Duban armor was designed to operate in space with minimal augmentation. Being frozen in a block of ice still made it hard to dodge though

Even so it wasn't what one would call an even fight. The Demons were outnumbered more than three to one and were frankly outclassed. The Dinasian solders were pouring hundreds of blessed laser bolts into a foe that primarily needed to close to melee range to deal damage. When they did get close enough they faced holy blades capable of removing limbs with a single stroke wielded by people stronger and/or faster than them.

Not even the ranged ice golems were safe. With light being poured in from every side there weren't many safe places to take cover. Certainly none that would hold up under sustained fire. It was unlikely that this battle would last long even with the recent reinforcements. The addition of a few larger monsters just made for easier targets.

Saef wasn't worried about his troops failing to whipe out their foes. No, he was more concerned with the Demon who had just lept atop a large ice golem. That one was the most dangerous of the group. His magical aura was much stronger than the other ice Demons. If Saef wanted to minimize losses he need to take that one out.

With superhuman speed and a rush of quantum particles the armored Thaumaturge flashed forward. Neatly dodging the large stinger tossed at him in doing so. It slammed into a nearby wall. Cracking a stone and drawing the attention of the soldiers in that tunnel. Half a dozen laser rifles switched target to the new threat and let loose a flurry of holy light from no more than fifteen meters.

The speeding commander took two bounding steps and dropped. A thought to his scepter caused it to change as he slip on the frozen floor. The weapon shifting forms and the ultra sharp blade extending as he slid between the large legs of the ice golem. As he did so Saef held the blade up, the holy light extending till it reached the top of the tunnel. At the speed he was sliding there was very little chance for the golem to avoids being bisected. Ghelgath would have to doing a very quick job of unentangling himself from his mount and jumping away if he wanted to avoid the same fate.

Soldiers lept or flew out of the way of the line of raising ice spikes. They were for the most part successful. One man had been busy dealing with a Warrior however and was shoved aside with a grunt as a spike erupted from the ground and scoured a deep gash across his cuirass.

Utada darkened her vision for just a moment as Maceroy lit up, but quickly returned to normal as he was impaled and killed. She cursed under her artificial breath and fired at Atarah, but it was too late as she had retreated and left Marie on her own. The napalm she had fired splattered harmlessly on the ground, lighting up far away from the remaining combatants. Eve fell to the ground soon afterwards, it would appear as if she had gotten hurt more than expected from both the flashbang, Maceroy's Flare, and various attacks from the Demons. "It's a good thing I never said yes to that dumb bird..." Utada smirked and took aim at Eve, preparing to elimanate her and then move on to Marie. Until she lit herself on fire that is.

"Woah!" Utada jumped back a few feet as Eve lit herself on fire and propelled herself towards Marie, apparently looking to take her out of the fight as soon as possible. Utada didn't waste anytime, reloading her assault rifle with their custom armor piercing rounds and firing at Marie. With Eve on one end attempting to slam into her like a comet and Utada on the other trying to fill Marie full of holes, it would be a tough dodge to say the least.

"Aren't the two of you forgetting that they aren't your only opponents?" Farris called the Demons who ignored her straight to go for Saef's men. But not before she raised her sword towards the sky above the catacombs, "Who do you think you are, Hell spawns? We fight for the glory of the one and only Imperator of the Heavens. We fight for the cause of Celestia, don't you dare stand in our way!" She yelled with a commanding voice that shattered the earth around them, opening another massive hole in the catacombs. That was Farris' warcry, blasting her enemies with its holy power as well as bolstering her allies.

Following her call, Farris swung her sword through the air, shooting a volley of crystal spikes at Apia. More than one could play this throwing spike game, after all.

---

"Ugh..." Victoire sighed deeply, massaging her temples. Henry's foolishness truly didn't know any bounds. "How do you suppose I should do that now, Avaritia?" she replied to his question about tea parties with an exasperated voice. "If there's one being in the whole Nexus that the Machina would never trust this one is me. Actually, I'm surprised they let you in the first place, or that lowlife, indecisive parasite who doesn't know what expertise means —Marrow Edge, is how I think they call him, right?"

Victoire backed away from Henry, hissing, once he attempted to blast her hounds with those curse holy flames. "Are you insane, Avaritia? If that fire starts burning this place, you are as dead as I'm. Where did you even get that?" Victoire commanded her familiars to come back to her, leaving Maen between them and Henry. "I know that you are hurt and likely cannot use your Eyes anymore. Otherwise, you would have done so already. If you leave this battlefield, I swear I'll not allow any harm to come to you. Consider it a farewell token, for our former allegiance. If you do not, I guess I'll finally find how does that blood of yours taste," Victoire sighed once more before summoning a trio of soccer-ball-sized orbs of blood, hovering around her on standby.

"Such a shame I can never give you that reward from Arcadia. You really do look tasty in more ways than one... Alas, such is the way of the Nexus. Make your choice, Avaritia, do you take my kindness, or fight and die for your beloved new High Queen's glory?"

[D. Rose Radius: 7680/1920/1920/960/960 meters] [Catacombs/Underground Coverage: 12.8/6.4/3.2 %]

---

Utada would have one critical sign that something very bad was about to happen, as she reloaded, she would hear the shrieking crack of breaking stone. She'd have a moment to react before Atarah's lance burst out of the ground at what was hopefully no longer her position. But then a moment later, Atarah herself would burst out at a different location. She would be sensing Utada's position from below, expecting Utada to dodge upon hearing the stone cracking, and herself aiming to burst from the ground behind Utada as Utada dodged away from the more obvious attack. A fairly simply trick with some weaknesses, but not necessarily a bad one. And hey, if Utada didn't dodge, she'd be impaled. Regardless of whether it worked, Utada might have more important things to do than sustain fire at Marie.

@Banana@Lmpkio@floodtalon






"Well..." Miyu's eyebrows raised at Lillian's handiwork. "That is a very direct and scientific way to go about things. I doubt you'll have much trouble figuring stuff out."

"So, anything you want to see or look for before you try to find a location to settle down? Or you looking to keep wandering?" Miyu resumed walking, using her oar as a walking stick. "I myself wouldn't mind finding a place by a sea or river. Hopefully such land won't all be already claimed."

@KoL

Another Demon appeared besides Victoire, this one controlling thousands of shards of glass along with what appeared to be liquid Darkness. A strong one at first glance, but not a very smart one if he thought Henry was a Human. "I'm afraid I don't sing. But the melody of my blade cutting through flesh is quite beautiful."

"How do you suppose I should do that now, Avaritia? If there's one being in the whole Nexus that the Machina would never trust this one is me. Actually, I'm surprised they let you in the first place, or that lowlife, indecisive parasite who doesn't know what expertise means —Marrow Edge, is how I think they call him, right?" Henry nodded and chuckled.

"It was a joke Victoire. You'll get it one of these days I'm sure." Victoire backed away hissing once he released the holy flames of Zak, quite panicked it would appear. "Are you insane, Avaritia? If that fire starts burning this place, you are as dead as I am. Where did you even get that?" Henry's grin widened and he laughed once more.

"Are you trying to scare me with the prospect of Death? You should know that was stupid, I'll just respawn in Hyperion if I die, just like you'll respawn in Hell! As for where I got them, you must have missed the massive battle about ten minutes ago. I killed the shit out of this Angel specialising in fire." At this point Henry was merely stalling for time, hoping that his Eyes would heal and that the potion he drank could heal up his hand.

"I know that you are hurt and likely cannot use your Eyes anymore. Otherwise, you would have done so already. If you leave this battlefield, I swear I'll not allow any harm to come to you. Consider it a farewell token, for our former allegiance. If you do not, I guess I'll finally find how does that blood of yours taste." She summoned several orbs of blood and prepared for battle. "Such a shame I can never give you that reward from Arcadia. You really do look tasty in more ways than one... Alas, such is the way of the Nexus. Make your choice, Avaritia, do you take my kindness, or fight and die for your beloved new High Queen's glory?" Henry's eyes widened as he began laughing once more, his head dropping as he doubled over from how hard his laughter shook him. Suddenly his head snapped up, a manic look in his eyes as he used his burnt hand to brush his hair out of his face.

"You think I fight for the glory of another!? If that was the case I would've never left Hell! I fight because I love to fight and I left because I hate being treated like some shit stain on the ground!" A pressure began to roll off of Henry, just like in the Oblivion Dungeon an aura of terror formed around him as he prepared for battle. He was a cornered animal with nothing to lose and everything to gain. "I WILL NOT BE LOOKED DOWN UPON, NOT EVEN BY YOU BORDEAUX!" A Gate of Tartarus formed above him and let loose with an uncontrolled wave of holy flames, lighting the trees around them on fire as they rolled towards Victoire and Maen.

The thralls emerged from within the dungeons and leapt upon the first creature they saw. It was only a mere guard point that separated the dungeons from the rest of hell, but considering the combat going on elsewhere, it's safe to assume that the numbers are focused away from the home base. With that knowledge, Flos emerged from the archway, and the three demons not engulfed by the thralls set their sights on them.

"The prisoner! Alert the oth--", the voice of one of them was cut off by the sharp tip of one of the sisters.

Flos approached the other two with the Final Gaze in one hand and the other sister in the other, positioned to engage. One of them ran forward to strike, but foolishly focused on the bastard blade, allow Flos to command the sister to impale their head. The other tried to strike while their friend was bleeding out on the floor, but the sister held their weapon up high as one slash split the demon in half.

"Demon cretins," he muttered out, taking into account that his opponents in the area fell to the thralls, who were now simply beating their corpses to bloody pulps. They were occupied, and no longer needed. Flos had is way out. He sliced the doors in half, and emerged in what he presumed is Hell proper.

"You'll never get it, do you, Avaritia —not, Henry— I'm not looking down on you..." Victoire said as Henry unleashed his rage, or better, Zac's rage upon them. It was now or never for Victoire as well, if she ran away now, it would place everything she did in jeopardy. With a flourish of her hands, Victoire commanded the blood orbs to dart at Henry's direction, changing directions with a sharp midflight turn to attack him from the front, left and right as each of them split into three Bloody Javelins. She didn't attack him from behind intentionally.

The reason for such would become evident just as a portal opened there. A pair of delicate arms crossed under one of Henry's armpits and around his neck before Victoire's petite, but strong, claw-like nails grabbed a hold of him. "I never did so," Victoire finished her previous declaration, "but you in my way. At least this won't hurt at all. Die, Avaritia..." she said right before going for a bite to Henry's neck. Her fangs met the invisible armor donned by him, but even so, Victoire didn't give up.

At this point, it was just a matter of which would break first the armor or her. And a thirsty vampire's fangs are not a joke either...

[D. Rose Radius: 15360/3840/3840/1920/1920 meters] [Catacombs/Underground Coverage: 25.6/12.8/6.4 %]

---

"You'll never get it, do you, Avaritia —not, Henry— I'm not looking down on you..." The flames continued to pour out of the gates towards Maen and Victoire, even as her orbs of blood shot towards him and zigzagged through the air. Henry could barely even hear Victoire through his mad rage, deflecting the blood javelin that came at him from the front with the Cheater's Blade, shutting off the flames and catching the left javelin with a Gate, but taking the right javelin straight through his ribs. "Gah!" He coughed up blood as the javelin pierced through his lung and Victoire teleported behind him, grabbing him from behind with a surprising strength. "I never did so, but you're in my way. At least this won't hurt at all. Die, Avaritia..." She bit straight through his shield and pierced his neck, a strange feeling immediately coming over Henry.

The pain from his lung vanished, replaced by this really weird feeling... that felt good. "Whaaaat... the... fuck..." Henry began breathing heavily as his voice came out in a moan. Normally he only felt like this when he was torturing an Angel, not when he was on the verge of death. "I swear to god... I'll fucking... shit." His eyes began to dilate, a small smile forming on Henry's face, this one not filled with his usual psychotic rage. Suddenly his burnt hand clenched tightly, his sharp nails digging into the burnt flesh drawing blood, and his eyes snapped back into focus as pain shot through his pleasure filled mind. "I'M GONNA FUCKING KILL YOU!" A Gate of Tartarus opened directly behind Victoire and Henry, a 6 foot cross with a sharpened spike at the end shot through both of them, impaling them in one go.

The pain and pleasure synchronised in strange harmony as Henry slumped over with a massive holy cross through his chest, a perverse smile on his face as his flesh sizzled. "Hah... hah... I wanna do that... again..." He panted as the light faded from his eyes, breathing his last breath which sounded suspiciously like a moan.

---

As Utada reloaded she heard a crack. Her brain went into overdrive as she pinpointed the exact location of the noise, the ground in front of her. "Shit." Utada dived to left as Atarah's lance pierced through her former location, she dropped her assault rifle and drew Vinyl Scratcher, swinging behind her just as Atarah emerged from the ground. A simple and underhanded tactic, exactly what she expected from a Demon.

“Nyahah! I see some fresh meat down there,” purred a low voice. It came from the trees above Miyu, Lillian, and the snake girl’s position; though the origin had placed themselves high enough to where she was certain they would be unable to hear. For indeed, it was a she, and much like most of this realities’ denizens, she was part-feline. While cats and monster people were all the norm, none were truly as magnificent or worth praise as Noire.

“But there’s been a whole lotsa new prey coming out from the sky. I wonder what the deal is with that <.<” she said, more to herself. Currently she was curled atop a tree branch, tail swiveling behind her form. Claws slightly dug into the bark, she directed her gaze up to the sky up high and wondered if more strange people would fall out. It wasn’t her problem, sure, but she would have liked to see if something or someone would be landing on her anytime soon.

That big pink snake for example could fit right in with the rest of this place’s populace. After all, monster girls like her and Noire were the normal standard in the Happy Verse. But whenever Noire looked at Ananta for too long, she felt a little shiver down her spine. That person definitely had power…in fact, most of everyone who came from the sky did.

“Whaah, crazy people from the sky! They must be aliens,” Noire gasped, a little louder than she intended. No doubt it would catch the attention of those around her; to those who knew her, they rolled their eyes. One cat did at least, flicking her gaze away from that moron over to one of Ananta’s accompanying kids. With a large, toothy grin, it casually walked up to strike conversation.

“Hey. Hey kid. Yeah, you, you. So, tell me, is it true. You people who came from the sky. Is it true you have all sorts of crazy powers,” the cat said, all grins. It was of a golden coloration of fur and by its voice, the cat was female; in fact, with how small it was, it was practically a kitten. What was most distinct of course were the red streaks along its fur and the way its teeth seemed to gleam in the light.