Banjo and Kazooie’s rebounding midair tumble wasn’t the usual result of Beak Bomb impact. With zero delay between contact and detonation the crystal exploded quicker than they could bounce off of it. Given a moment’s pause of confusion as to why they were going end over end in freefall, Banjo reflexively reached out for the obsidian spire. He had missed the ledge by this point, but managed to jam a claw’s worth of digits into the pillar’s side for a loosening handhold. Before he lost his grip, he looked over his shoulder to see Kazooie hanging limply out of his pack, unconscious. When his hold gave out, he made sure to direct his fall to hit face down so as to spare his partner the throe of gravity. The impact was reduced from the stalled height Banjo bought them, but still enough to bounce him once against the ground. Getting back to his feet, he took the Chicken Thigh from his inventory and stripped it of meat in one pulling bite, expecting the health gain to transfer to Kazooie as it normally did (while also trying not to think about the technically cannibalistic implication of directly feeding chicken to his avian friend, had he done that instead). He waited a moment to see if she returned to consciousness before doing anything else.

The duo’s proximity and position relative to the tower saved them dealing with the turbulent gale force that wrapped around the Dragon on its return. Fox and Hat Kid didn’t share their luck. Fox, having landed in the middle of the field inside the spires, made a run for cover the second he picked his head up to see the Dragon rushing headlong downlane. He missed its form this time, but the winds carried him from his feet for a couple hundred yards, past the island’s edge. He managed to slow his arc to a near stop with the inexplicable ‘stalling’ effect generated by pulsing his Reflector before he could be sent too far to recover, and followed by shooting himself back toward land in a blanket of powerful, propulsive flame.

Hat Kid, still in tow with Jr, was left at the mercy of disorienting inertia, equal parts unable and unwilling to detach from the tumbling kart for fear of which way (and how fast) it might send her. She paid for it by face planting against the same black stone as Jr when she was swung directly over him by the length of her line. She was brought to the ground almost as quickly when the kart fell and dragged her down with it. She sat up, rubbing her head with a grumble of pain and annoyance alike, and proceeded to pop a Honeycomb in her mouth like a butterscotch candy for a quick pick me up. Slightly reinvigorated, she stood up, detaching her Hookshot to let it reel back in, and scanned the field to look out for any remaining crystals before heading into the thick of the action. Though a good distance behind her, Fox would be quick to catch up, as would the duo (depending on Kazooie).

The Ender Dragon's mighty claw fell upon Bowser with brutal force, but the Koopa King did not give so much as an inch. A gleaming blue coating surrounded him, rendering him totally impervious to damage. Confused, the dragon raised her other forelimb to rip the turtle apart. Her talons raked across his metallic exterior without leaving even a single scratch, and that plus the look of glee in Bowser's glowing yellow eyes made her blood boil. With her full weight the dragon leaned down, trying to crush her foe where he stood. The fragile end stone buckled beneath him, causing him to sink, and for a few seconds Bowser was on the verge of being driven into the ground. Then the magic of Kamek, echoed by Mimikyu, washed over him, and he began to grow. Snarling, the Ender Dragon found herself pushed off her would-be victim and onto her hind legs as Bowser grew to a height that rivaled her own—and a weight that exceeded it. A barrage of missiles and arrows hit her in the back, preventing her from getting a footing as the ordnance ripped into her wings.

Then, abruptly as it came, the ubercharge blinked out. The healing beams of the two remaining crystals locked onto the Ender Dragon as her claws tightened around Bowser's, proving that he was vincible once again. If she could have given him a devilish smile, she would have. Instead her jaws opened wide, the angry sizzling and vile purple light from within heralding the arrival of a tide of acid to the face.

At that moment the Cadet clambered down, the blades of his clutch claw lodged in the Ender Dragon's brow, and fired a chunk of stone into the leviathan's eye. The sudden pain drove her sideways as the acid poured forth, giving Bowser a faceful but not a sustained spray. She staggered sideways on her hind legs, out of the enlarged Koopa King's grip and into one of the obsidian towers. With an impact that shook the island she slammed into it and fell on her side. Geralt's silver blade and more missiles rained havoc as she writhed for a moment, trying to regain her footing. Then, just as she did, the Courier's borrowed rifle hammered her torso with devastating anti-material rounds. An outraged roar split the air, and she sprang upward, invigorated by the pain. As much as the sniper shots hurt, they didn't seem to do as much damage as one might expect. Still, the Ender Dragon intended on making her assailant pay dearly. She thrashed her tail in Bowser and Geralt's direction, aiming to club at least one of them, then launched off a nearby tower at the Courier.

Far more quickly than he expected, death arrived. Using a flap of her wings to propel herself forward, the Ender Dragon descended on 6 with one giant claw extended. Thinking quickly, and only of her master, Gaige-tron spun around and shoved the Courier hard. He flew out of the way, and the next instant the Dragon's foot came down on the machine with terrible force.

Thinking nothing of it, the beast pumped her wings and took to the sky again. Behind her she left a crater where Gaige-tron stood a moment ago, but instead of a sparking wreck any onlookers saw the robot completely intact, lying upon a stretcher carried by diminutive cats. How they came or where from nobody -not even the Ace Cadet- could rightfully say, but they disappeared not long after, and they took Gaige-tron with them.

Of course, nobody could waste much time thinking about that. The Ender Dragon coasted over the island at a low-medium altitude, belching out acid bomb after acid bomb to fry both those on their feet and those yet to recover. Her bombing run came to a premature end when she suddenly swooped down and upward in a back loop, trying to send her ground-bound enemies flying.

After narrowly avoiding an acid bomb, Tora decided to change tactics. “Poppi, only two crystals left! Pick me up!” Happy to oblige, the artificial blade grabbed her masterpon and flew toward one of the beam's sources. This tower happened to be one of the two protected by iron bars. She flew him close so he could start waling on them, but the Nopon protested. “Nonono, take me right above!” After she complied, he carefully extracted a handful of spare parts from his pouch and dropped them. Enough fell through the openings between the bars to strike the crystal and trigger its detonation, and the pair zoomed away scot-free.

Peach, meanwhile, had been slowly descending from the great height where the dragon's attack left her. She witnessed the chaos unfolding down below, and reasoned that if the crystals were important enough for her allies to go after them, then she ought to help wipe them out. With a little force on her parasol she guided herself above the last crystal-adorned tower and dropped a grenaduck. Its explosion spelled the end for the leviathan's healing; the true battle could begin.

With nobody able to stop the Ender Dragon just flying around, she banked back toward the island's center and began her descent. The destruction of the last end crystal did not appear to register for her, and the impunity with which she arrived suggested she took their support for granted. Once over the island's highest point she let her head droop and started to gush out acid. An immense quantity flooded forth, threatening to spread over the island like syrup over a pancake.



Ryu's Shinku Hadoken changed the pace of the fight, perhaps irreparably. When the final clash began, he felt laser-focused, honed to a fine edge. Barely any worse for wear on the surface, Sakura sped his way with her characteristic boundless energy, and Ryu was ready. He launched a quick standing kick, narrowly missing Sakura as she slid in for a low sweep. The world warrior's legs went out from under him, but even as he fell he instinctively understood that this wasn't a serious loss. A sweep he could afford to take without complaint, but not a full combo, so he covered the more important option. Getting to his feet again, Ryu kept his focus on Sakura as she leaped into the air. She jumped too close, he knew, to land a typical jumping attack. She wanted to cross him up.

Pivoting on his heels hard enough to tear the grass from his dirt, Ryu spun his block around to intercept Sakura's two-handed strike. He was already swinging when she touched down. His one-two punch struck home, but instead of linking into a followup, he purposefully dropped the combo. Then, with his foe unprepared to start attacking again but able to block, he lashed out again with another few punches. One-two-three... He crouched again, forcing a low block. Kick...kick. His powerful legs propelled him into the air. Ryu raised one arm, preparing to chop as he fell. With Sakura guarding low, a jumping attack would not just hit her, but initiate the combo that would take the match.

And he knew she knew it.

He dropped without performing an attack, straight into a crouch. Empty jump, low! A crouching jab, one of the fastest moves in his arsenal, zipped forward. This trick came out very rarely, but constituted a devious psych-out. By almost fully committing to an overhead but performing no attack, he could bait out a high guard from his opponent and then land without any recovery and take advantage. From there he belted out crouching light kick, standing medium upset punch, then spinning heavy kick, which put him into the perfect position. “Shoryuken!” No firecracker imitation, Ryu's true uppercut punctuated the combination in decisive fashion, sending Sakura end over end. When he landed, however, Ryu stood at the ready. Even if Sakura couldn't get up, she would try. The red in her eyes...that color didn't run.



As the heroes moved in, Minos raised his fist and slammed it down to the left, aiming for V. The mysterious one recalled Shadow to scoot out of harm's way. Nadia, Nero, and the Slayer moved in, the latter two firing their weapons. Without picking his arm up off the ground, Minos swept it across the courtroom. Spotting the incoming limb in time, Nadia used her catlike reflexes to spring into the air and over it, but Nero took the hit and was knocked aside, and the same would hold true for the Slayer if he didn't evade in time. After being sent sprawling Nero jumped to his feet again. Minos raised an arm in front of his head to block the incoming shotgun and Griffon fire, and attempted to keep track of his scattered opponents. With a grunt he swung both arms, trying to pancake both Nadia and the Slayer -his closest enemies- at once. The double impact shook the courthouse and sent dust flying, but when he raised his arms, however, the feral was nowhere to be seen.

“Where did you go?” he snarled, looking around. A series of tentacles arose from the ground around V, keeping him too busy dodging to mount a counterattack. Minos did not notice the lithe woman clinging to the bottom of his arm until she dug in her claws and dropped.

“Hey, ugly!”

Using her momentum and jets of blood, she swung a circle around the arm and launched forward. “What?!” Minos bellowed as Nadia struck him with a double kick to the jaw, then dropped straight down while rotating her lower half. Like the blades of a propeller her legs cut a furrow all the way down his chest, and by the time she reached the ground Nero had arrived. He shot upward in with a rising slash, cutting deeper into the gash his ally left behind. At the peak of his ascent the devil hunter unleashed a slash, slash, high roller combo, slicing deep into the judge's chest. A moment before Minos' fists slammed together Nero kicked off, and as he sailed away he rode the Red Queen like a snowboard.

A noise from the left prompted the feral to look over, and she caught the last of the judge's mini-tentacles cleft from its stump by Shadow's scythe-tail. “Nyahaha!” Nadia grinned up at the monster. “How d'ya like us nyaow?”

Minos wiped blood from his eyes, his ghastly face a mask of pure rage at the heroes' impunity. “You cannot hide your sins!” He made a rising motion with his hand. Spots on the floor turned to lava, and from the puddles burst a quintet of shrieking abominations that staggered forward to eviscerate the heroes with their bladed arms. “Damnation will be your final reward!”

Nadia flinched, horrified. “Ew! I am so not biting one of those things.”

The Blue Rose rang out again and again, plugging a necromorph full of holes. Nero's demonic bullets wriggled around inside the abhorrent thing's body, carving tunnels of agony, but the monster barely slowed down. “Okay, these things don't care,” he reported, reaching for his sword again.

A moment later, Griffon toasted one with a column of lightning. It shambled onward, but only another step; Shadow's head reshaped into a spike that rammed straight through it, carrying the necromorph onward until the demon pinned it to Minos' belly. “Ya say somethin', buddy boy?” Griffon cackled.

While Nero sighed, Nadia dislocated her leg to extend a hook kick into the legs of her incoming assailant. The necromorph toppled, and she moved in to start carving it up. “Its limbs are nice and spindly. Just stop it attacking while we deal with six-eyes!” Obligingly the devil hunter rolled out of the way of his necromorph before chopping off its arms. Using a rev of the Red Queen, he separated its legs a second later.

That left two necromorphs for the Slayer, both of which rushed him viciously. Minos, meanwhile, prepared to strike again.

”GAHHHH, MY EYES” Bowser roared as he stumbled backwards into one of the towers as a result of having been showered, lightly, in the face with acid, crying with pain like someone who’d had jalapeño juice thrown into their eyeballs. Suffice to say was not pleasant. Fortunately for him, the combined assault by the team (which had saved him from having his face melted off in the first place) waylaid the dragon as well, who stumbled over into a tower, fell to the ground and proceeded to get shot and stabbed a whole bunch.

This provided the koopa king with enough time to summon Heel into one hand. He then proceeded to use the Rabbid supporter’s healing power as an eyedropper, holding the rather upset bunny over each eye in turn and giving him a squeeze to force a blast of healing energy out of his backpack and directly into the affected area. His nose and lips still stung from places where acid droplets had struck him, but at least the king could see again. This was right in time for him to block a powerful tail swipe from the dragon with the energy buckler on his mecha-mit, the orange shield defecting the blow from striking either the king and Geralt. Unfortunately the hit shattered the process of deflecting the attack, rendering both its offensive and defensive abilities unusable for the time being.

Gaige-tron was not so lucky to have Bowser there to tank the dragon’s blows and ended up being crushed while saving the courier from that vary same fate. Bowser barely noticed her being taken out of the fight (and in-fact was something of a danger himself to the team in a very similar manner due to his obviousness to the location of their tiny forms as he stomped about) while the other three members of the troop visibly winced when the bot was trampled, and then where relieved when the cats evacuated her wholly intact body to safety. It was, to the trio, very nice to know there was a way to survive trampling what with two giant dragons roaming around the increasingly cramped feeling island.

The Ender Dragon took wing again and proceeded to flap around at a low-ish altitude to spit loogies down on the team as they recovered from her wind blast. Bowser blocked a few of these with a scaly arm and hands, practicing batting them out of the air, to protect himself, his family and his allies. The acid bit into his scales, stinging and itching wherever it touched, but was unable to truly wound his armored and scaled form when it hit where he wanted it to and Blazermate’s lingering overheal quickly patched over any minor inconveniences it managed to cause. In retaliation he spat out numerous fireballs and, while most of these now equally enlarged flaming projectiles ended up simply slowly sailing past their intended target, a couple struck true, mostly against her massive wingspan, washing their impact sites with fire.

Jr meanwhile could mainly only watch as the others took shots at their foe while being frustrated at his lack of long ranged firepower. Still. He got to watch his father go to town kaiju style, which was, to jr, always cool to watch. Passive observation ended however when the dragon dive bombed them with another air blast. Fortunately for the trio Jr was prepared this time, having retrieved a fishing spear (that he’d meant to use for its intended purpose but never got round to practicing) from his duffel bag and jammed it into the spongy stone with a few smacks of the necro-smasher ahead of time. He grabbed Mimikyu with one hand, Kamek in the other and then bit the spear horizontally, gripping it with his jaw to prevent them all from being blown away just in the nick of time. The light trio where lifted off of their feet, but Jrs fangs held true and kept them all from smashing into something or being tossed into the void

As the trio blew in the wind Bowser’s enhancement flickered, the king losing some size as he completely shrugged off the air blast and simultaneously lessened its impact for those blocked by his bulk.

”Kamek! Keep it together down there!” the king yelled at his head minion as his form wobbled from the disruption in consecration caused by his powerup's power sources being waved around like a pair of windsocks.

”Yes sire! Sorry sire!” Kamek called back after the blast passed them and he and Mimikue were put back down by a panting jr. The boy’s trials were not over however, as the Ender Dragon then hovered up and over the top of the island, either completely oblivious or unfazed by the loss of its final healing crystals to an exploding rubber ducky, and started barfing up acid.

”Eww. ok. We should move” jr said as the flood of acid started to drain down from the summit of the island, threatening to make the entire area a deeply unpleasant foot corroding wet floor hazard.

”That’s it. I’ve had enough of you flying around like you’re all that. Get down here!” Bowser roared up at the Ender Dragon as she did this, thundering up the side of the hill and leaping upwards in a very floaty looking jump, hand outstretched to grab her tail and drag her down to the ground. Hard.

”or not.” Jr corrected himself as Bowser began his run, while the mage and Pokemon both eyed the incoming wash with concern. Rather than grab them to run away and disrupt their magic, jr stepped forwards and began drawing on the ground in front of them with the green goo he now secreted from his wrists and new pompadour like horn. As he did he summoned a small team of koopa troopas and commanded them to ”get my car!” to which the Koopa replied with a “yes your majesty” before hurrying around the back of the pillar to do just that.

After they left the goo started exploding, blowing a shallow trench-line in the soft end stone following jr’s drawing . When the koopas came back, carrying the car between them like a bunch of Pikmin, jr got them to toss him it. The much stronger jr caught the lips of the car in one hand and quickly dismissed his troops. Then he grabbed Kamek with the other hand and pulled him close while using the foot on the opposite side to scoot Mimikyu underneath him. Then, right as the acid was about to hit, jr pulled the clown car down over the three of them, turning it into a little bunker rimmed by a drainage ditch. The acid sloshed down from the island summit, and then down into the ditch, and then along its route to lower ground behind them, causing it to drain to either side of where the trio were hiding under the clown car. Splashes of acid leaping up from their fall into the ditch that might still have harmed them instead struck the hardy shell of the clown car, burning off its paintwork but leaving those hiding inside safe to keep Bowser big enough to wrestle with the dragon. Or, in Jr’s case, free to drink several bottles of water to quench the thirst his goop drawing had created.

@Lugubrious

Doom Slayer

Level 1 Doom Slayer

Location: Dead Zone

Word Count: 275

The Slayer kept firing at the massive creature; he thought for just a moment his shotgun and pistol was not doing enough damage. Jumping out of the way of the mini-bosses large hand coming down to squish him; Landing on his back but quickly getting up onto his feet. Firing back at it with a few shots form his pistol. Watching his comrades fighting off it's attacks; trying to help V by shooting off the tentacles that were coming towards him. Keeping his pace rushing towards the large creature; making sure to bob and weave out of it's attacks. He was honestly getting tired of the figure talking about their sins and damnation; he didn't know one damn thing about him.

Rushing towards the figure that summoned the mini-boss; however his path was blocked by a group of shambling creatures. This would be a piece of cake for him; moving towards. Easily tearing though them with his weapons and fists. The last two Necromorphs were a bit more of a issue. Trying their best to pierce though his armor some of them trying to hit him with their fists; which mostly seemed to do minimal damage to his armor. Turning his head towards them; the expression on his face that of annoyance.

Punching a hole though the head of one of the creatures; turning his head towards the other demon smiling underneath his helmet. Quickly moving to snap his neck like a twig. Setting his sights on Mino; jogging towards him firing his shotgun at him.

At first, Sakura didn't realise the severity of the situation. As she felt her cross-up connect only against his block, she landed and quickly turned around to block his counter strike and once again begin her offence. But she missed. He was too fast. Her head jerked back twice as the impacts hit, and she braced herself to take whatever combo he was going to do next. Only he paused, and she managed to deflect the strikes, and she predicted that he was going to go down low.

Oh, no! I get it! He's going to try and take the fight right now! In a few moments, he's going to chain a jumping strike into a devastating combo. I gotta block it, or else!

Ryu jumped! Sakura prepared herself looking up to meet his strike, to deflect it away with her forearms and return the favor with a knee to his noggin. But nothing happened. She looked down through her own raised arms at her opponent who now could now paint his martial art on the stretched canvas of her midriff.

What followed was a thorough pummel that saw Ryu work his way up her body, slam his foot into her head and rocket upward with a flaming uppercut. Hardly had a chance to feel it, her teeth her grit and her eyes were closed the entire time as he pummeled her like a punching bag. The fight was over, of course, and Sakura knew it. Unlike the previous time she had been thrown into the air by one of his moves, her limbs flailed wildly and she landed rough and unco-ordinated on the ground. Everything was topsy turvy and her vision was unfocused. "Aaah!" Someone cried out in pain and surprise, only for the young woman to realise it was her as she slammed into the ground. Getting beat was always discombobulating. True warriors don't get humiliated by or disrespect their opponents for losing their composure when getting dazed by strikes. That's how it should be, and Sakura has gotten used to this by now. On her quest to become better, losing happened just as much as winning.

Breathing heavily, she opened one eye and stared up at the sky, one hand on her belly, the other digging into the dirt.

What could she have done better? Differently? It was an excellent fight, and already she felt better. Satisfied.

At this point, though, describing Sakura's thoughts and internal monologue would be difficult. She wouldn't remember this moment, and there wasn't much thinking being done. At least not by her.

Ryu had fought Sakura before. At this point, she would concede she had lost. Were two street fighters of such caliber to go at it until the bitter end, it would indeed end bitterly. Sakura knew it. A threshold had been crossed and Ryu had dealt the winning blow. Right about now, she should be excitedly giggling and gathering her composure on the ground. Indeed, it looked like she was about to do just that. But of course, Ryu knew different. Of course the Sakura he knew wasn't quite there. Not all the way. Her eyes were supposed to be brown, but no, they were red.

So Sakura clambered to her feet, eyebrows slightly furrowed, sweat on her forehead, and continued the fight. Running at him full speed, when she was a few feet away she tossed dirt and grass into his face. When she was on the ground she had gathered it up with this intent. Lunging forward she gathered energy into her knuckles and threw a nasty sucker punch towards Ryu's neck, and prepared to drive her knee into his groin. Sakura always fought to win, but now, it seemed, she was fighting to win. Permanently.

Thanks to her efforts, Bowser wasn't crushed by the ender dragon, and instead got a face full of acid alongside a few other injuries that one would get trying to tank such a large dragon. Still though, Blazermate was pretty happy with herself as Bowser tried is best to tyrannize the ender dragon with... less than satisfactory results. Although Sectonia was amused at how Bowser summoned a rabbit only to squeeze it like eyedrops and gave a laugh. It was also amusing that the cup boy, the one who looked the most fragile of the group, dodged the dragon in his own way, by flipping over it.

Blazermate did have to ubercharge Bowser and save him, but there were others who were injured and she needed to get to them. Looking over everyone as Bowser wasn't getting damaged as the ender dragon disengaged from him and it would take a long time to overheal the king. Knowing that, Blazermate flew up and made her way to the animal duo who had crashed themselves into a crystal earlier, the pair the msot hurt out of everyone. Or rather, they would've been, had Gaugetron not been oneshotted by the kaiju battle going on between bowser and the Ender dragon. But there was nothing Blazermate could do about death, even if there wasn't any... corpse? That was weird. Well, she didn't really have time to think about that as she found the duo and healed them up.

Sectonia meanwhile, having no one to save as Bowser blocked the wind the Ender dragon was making with his bulk and having not seen Gaugetron die unlike Blazermate, noticed that all the crystals were down. With the final crystal destroyed, rather humorously with junk and a rubber ducky, the dragon could no longer heal or be supported by their magic. Even so, this dragon didn't seem to even care that they were gone, almost as if they were unaware of what they did. Sectonia laughed at how fragile these things were, her crystals were far, far more beautiful and durable. With nothing else to do, she began to summon more of her Light rings to throw at the dragon. Seeing as it was so big, she would use the big ones as they had a very low chance of missing.

This also registered for Blazermate, and with its support crystals gone, Blazermate could see the weak point of the Ender dragon with her Scan ability. "Hey guys, the Ender Dragon's weak point is its head! Aim there!" Sectonia heard this as she was preparing to fire her rings. while she was going to just aim at the dragon, Blazermate's information forced Sectonia to change how she attacked and she aimed for the dragon's head, although her first ring just went for the dragon itself.

Although you could argue that the ender dragon didn't notice or care about its crystals, that didn't stop the fact that the Ender Dragon was essentially making the floor acid by less breathing acid, more vomiting it out as a goop. Sectonia and Blazermate weren't really worried about this, Blazermate perching herself on top of one of the obsidian pillars and summoning Dell to construct a sentry gun, and Sectonia just buzzing above the whole thing like she did. Still, with a sigh noticing the others who couldn't fly, after firing off her rings, she swooped down and picked up two of the lighter ones who couldn't fly. She debated grabbing the cowboy, until she got a whiff of him as she passed by and vehemently shook her head as she grabbed the other person nearby him. She'd place these two on one of the thicker pillars, before going back to throwing rings at the dragon.

Geralt let up on his attacks as Bowser took a moment to heal himself, choosing to move a bit closer to the group's self-proclaimed leader. He didn't really understand how taking a humanoid rabbit and squeezing it was fixing his eye problems, but the Witcher didn't question it. Things were strange in this place, after all. Satisfied that Bowser would be alright, Geralt started to move just as the dragon lashed out with its tail.

For once, luck was on Geralt's side, and Bowser materialized a massive shield to protect the two from harm, though it was completely and utterly shattered by the impact. "Damn! Thanks, boss." Geralt called as he rushed back in to the fray, wincing as he saw the Courier's own metal golem take a lethal blow for its master. Rather than being left a heap of broken metal, however, as soon as the dragon was gone, a group of cat-like creatures were carrying it on a makeshift stretcher. Confused beyond belief, Geralt chose to ignore this. It worked. That was good enough for a Witcher.

Deciding to stick close to Bowser even as he took a few nasty hits from the blasts of acid, dodging whenever some of the substance came too close for comfort. The acid was starting to spread, on the ground, however, and after a particularly bad hit that he wasn't quite able to fully dodge, Geralt's Quen shield shattered, energy exploding out from him and blasting whatever acid might have remained on him away. "Oh damnit!" He cursed. He could probably survive a few burns, but his armor getting damaged would be an absolute nightmare.

The dragon refused to let up, spinning in the air and unleashing another gust of wind that Geralt had to hide behind Bowser to not be bowled over by. As he tried to maintain his balance, the oversized turtle monster made a dash for one of the towers, climbing the surface and jumping to grab at the dragon's tail.

As Bowser took his course of action, so too did Geralt. Looking up at the closest tower, Geralt willed himself up, ignoring the crawling feeling that he got when Sectonia flew over and offered a lift. His spine was tingling and he wanted to just...leave the fight and not come back. Trying to shake the feeling off as he took in his new surroundings atop the pillar, Geralt stowed his sword and grabbed his blaster once more. He managed to hear Blazermate calling out that the thing's head was its weak spot, which...made sense? Most things didn't like getting hit in the head. Still, better to have a specific target than just to make assumptions. Quickly re-casting the Sign of Quen just in case, Geralt opened fire once more on the dragon, this time aiming for its head specifically.

The Cadet hadn't expected any company since Tora and Poppi had been blown off the beast earlier, and yet here he was, the little guy they'd picked up from that hellish casino back in Lumbridge... or Blue-Something, technically? The specifics wouldn't change the fact that Cadet was glad to see him, surprising as it was, and the red head took the time to flash Cuphead a grin.

"Just hold on, it's about to get bumpy!" Ace Cadet was mid-swing with the scythe-like longsword when the dragon careened into the tower and began to topple over. With one cut across her face for good measure, Cadet hastily sheathed the weapon and prepared to jump. Choosing to get off of the massive creature and control his own fall would be much better than being flung off on her descent and risk being crushed, and when she eventually righted herself she no doubt would be thrashing, leading to the same problem. Best to bail sooner than later.

"Aaand now's the time to make our exit," He said, and held his hand out towards Cuphead, trusting the adolescent to take his advice without explanation. He'd be glad to help the Cuphead out, cradle the fragile guy close just in case as he jumped, but either way he was getting off this dragon before it threw him off. Just before she crashed completely to the ground, the Cadet tensed himself for a moment before he leaped as far from the scaly body as his legs could manage. He hit the ground hard, tumbling, and by the time he reoriented himself and stood upright the enderdragon bellowed out and was back on her feet and attacking. Stubborn monster! But I guess I can't expect less of a black dragon! With that thought Cadet pulled his pouch around and jammed a hand inside of it, searching for the lifepowders he still had left. Blazermate was no doubt doing a fine job of keeping everyone up, but a little extra help in the healing department never hurt.

The dragon pounced and the Cadet fished the powder out a hair's breadth too late. He felt his heart leap into his throat, not quite ready to lose a companion yet - oh, wait, actually the Courier was fine. And so his robotic sidekick. In fact she was being carried off by some extremely familiar creatures. Now the felynes really caught him off guard. Though the felynes were commonplace back in his own world, seeing something so familiar in a decidedly unfamiliar place was strange. It was different than the polluted ancient steppe, and his pondering gave just enough pause for the dragon to take advantage of, even unintentionally. She spit acid up all over the area, and the strong stench stinging his nostrils brought him quickly back to the battle at hand. The acid splashed the stone at his feet, sending large droplets up to bite at his skin and armor. It burned. A lot.

With gritted teeth Cadet wiped the acid off. Before his hands suffered even more he shook the lifepowder held in them and waved it over his head, letting the healing spores fly. The effect was immediate and soothing, and the powder reached an even wider area when the wind from the dragon's wings picked them up and spread them out to heal any ally they touched. Speaking of wind, the Cadet had experience dealing with the merciless currents of the Kushala Daora - and compared to that tempest, a little wind pressure was nothing. He ducked behind one of the obsidian spires, letting the sturdy stone block the brunt of the wind. He sucked in a deep breath before jumping out from behind the stone intending to get back into battle, only to be faced with the dragon's new play: cover the entire island in acid.

"Of course," the Cadet muttered to himself, though the corners of his mouth twitched upward. Of course she was making this play. Though, truthfully, the sight of the felynes carrying off Gaigetron just a bit earlier eased Cadet. If they were around, this was a lot more like a normal hunt, right? So he let himself enjoy it a little despite - or perhaps because of - the danger. He armed the slinger's grappling hook again and fired it halfway up the spire he'd just come from. He hung low towards the spire's base for a few moments and offered his hand to any that needed to escape the flow of acid but had little means to do so, calling out, "Here!" before ascending.

Having been rejuvenated by osmosis, Kazooie woke with two quick headshakes to dispel her daze, then gave Banjo an affirmative nod before they took off to join the others in swarming the Dragon. The great drake bore down on the fortified, gigantified Koopa King, who held mostly even ground with the leviathan thanks to the enhancements provided by their allies. The clench between them was broken after a moment, with some significant damage on both sides to follow, and just no sooner than they left cover, the duo would have to seek it once more to clear themselves of the caustic bombardment. The ever nimble Hat Kid was able to dodge the corrosive clusters with relatively little issue, and Fox had his Reflector handy as always to deal with it in the usual manner most convenient to him, allowing him to continue his advance unimpeded.

The rebounded bomb missed the Dragon, however, as she entered into a sweeping loop to generate another forceful windwall aimed at scattering the fighters yet again. The Ender’s repeat strategy would yield little of anything for her this time against the centered fighters who were ready for it. Kid simply hooked onto one of Bowser’s tail spikes to anchor herself to the nearest, heaviest thing she could find on a second’s notice. Fox Jet boosted off to the side at a low, rising angle--parallel to the gale--to exploit the wind’s force so that it might expedite his ascent to one of the taller spires on his flight path. His landing was slightly unsteady on account of his method, but nonetheless manageable, successfully perching him atop the obsidian column.

The Dragon then centered herself over the island’s shallow peak and began spilling forth physically impossible quantities of acid from her maw like an open valve, threatening to flood the land’s surface and presenting a new hazard for everyone on the ground. Hat Kid immediately sought higher ground on the giant shelled back of Bowser, who likely wouldn’t feel or otherwise notice her due to their insurmountable size disparity. On the other end, Banjo and Kazooie were making their way to the top of the highest pillar they could reach, irrespective of the acid flow, using a series of extended jumps and Shock Springs to reach a suitable vantage point from which to take off in Flight. Just as soon as they went airborne the duo lined themselves up with the Dragon and burned a Red Feather to charge forward with another Beak Bomb aimed at the side of its head. Should the impact prove heavy enough, the Dragon would (hopefully) be concussed out of sustaining the acidic downpour, ‘shutting off the faucet’, so to speak. In any case, the bear and bird would use the divebomb’s recoil to disengage so they could be ready to move, evade or attack once more.

After traversing enough spires to close in while staying off the ground, Fox moved to capitalize in short order, dashing onto its head, planting the muzzle of his blaster flush against its skull, and opening fire. Weak as the individual shots were, they came out in rapid succession to pile on damage in a hurry, so he would see if he couldn’t bore a small hole into the drake’s head this way before inevitably being forced to dismount, using one of its horns as a handhold to maintain his ground for as long as he could before then. To follow, an explosive vial came soaring over Bowser’s head at the Ender, with Hat Kid coming up behind it in stride. She swapped out her hats mid-run, leapt from Bowser’s head, and crashed down onto that of the Dragon with a tiny, flaming, Power wreathed fist...

@Yankee@Dawnrider@Archmage MC

---

Linkle's and her birds mad dash back to the center of the island wasn't fast enough to reach the dragon before it disengaged with Bowser and launched its deadly counterattack. She almost screamed in rage as the dragon brought its claw down on six, who was only saved by the sacrifice of his new mechanical friend. That scream dies in her throat as instead of mangled remain, the dragons foot lifted up to show the robot was perfectly fine. Well, not fine. Laid out on a stretcher borne by a bunch of weird cats, then vanished away just as quickly. She didn't really have time to think about one of their comrades getting kidnapped by weird cats, though, as the dragon flew around lobbing acid at them. Linkle whistled and dove to the side as one of them rained down near her, her birds mirroring her movements like baby chicks following their mother. Drops of the acid sprayed out of the impact site, looking to splatter on the group, and on impulse Linkle extended her hand. A clean sheet of ice sprang up in an instant to shield the quartet from the spray, the acid carving deep trenches in its surface before the wall melted away.

It wasn't long before the dragon swooped in again, looping in the air to create another of those wind gusts. Linkle stamped her feet onto the spongy ground, ice growing across the spongy rock from the pint of impact. It wrapped around her boots, coiled up her legs like ivy, while at the same time spreading down and forcing its way into every available hole in the rock. As the gust swept over Linkle she bent over and braced herself, the ice holding her even if it did throw her cucco's to the far edge of the island again. Linkle looked back at them as the wind subsided, seeing them land amid the cluster of dark shapes they'd just left behind.

She considered calling the back over, but at that point the dragon started hovering over the island and letting loose with an unending stream of acid. Linkle decided that it may be a good idea to let the girls hand out at the edge for a bit.

---

Link, for his part, had down with pure grip strength what Linkle had used psychic powers for. After jumping around to avoid falling acid he had just dropped to his knees and grabbed onto the stone when he saw the dragon go into some kind of break neck turn. He's fluttered like a flag in a storm, slamming over and over into the ground, but but he'd held on before pulling himself up with a pained sign.

Harder to deal with was the sea of acid he saw steadily encroaching on him. He hopped backwards away from it a few time, wondering how exactly he was going to avoid this, when Sectonia helpfully swooped in and lifted him up from behind and carried him up to the top of a spire. He bowed gratefully to the bee queen before walking to the edge and again pulling out the bow. He'd heard what one of the metallic girls had shouted earlier about the head and from this height he had a good chance of hitting that target. He drew back, aimed, and released another arrow at the low flying dragons head.

---

Linkle had panicked for a moment, thinking that her great plan for dealing with the wind was going to get her burned by acid. She made ready for a herculean struggle to free her legs from the ice that now held them, but to her surprise when she tried to move the ice crumbled away all on its own. Now she just had to figure out where she was going.

She was close enough now to hear her comrades, in particular Blazermate calling out that the dragons weak point was its head. She knew what to attack, the problem was it was all the way up there. She could always teleport up there, but being dizzy on the head of a dragon seemed like a good way to get thrown off a dragon. Luckily for her, someone called out to lend a helping hand.

Linkle ran over to the Cadet's outstretched hand, shouting a frazzled "don'tlookatmedon'tlookatmedon'tlookatme," as she took it and was pulled up to the top of the spire. "Thank's for the lift." She said, careful to stand behind the cadet to avoid his eyes as she looked toward the dragon. Many people were assaulting the monsters head now thanks to Blazermate, though Bowser had taken a different tactic and was trying to rip the creature from the sky. That was smart, that was how Linkle had beat her dragon. This one was quite a bit bigger and smarter than that one, though. It might need a little more than a tail grab to disorient.

Luckily she had a move with a good history of stunning giant monsters.

"I'm going to need some more help, though. I've got something I've been saving for a monster like this. Just stand right there, don't turn around." Linkle said, taking a few steps back from the Cadet. She pulled out her crossbows and took a deep breath, closing her eyes as she felt power welling up in her not unlike when she used her musou attack. This power, though, didn't get unleashed in one big burst. She held on to it, feeling warm energy begin to flow throughout her body. Magic began to swirl visibly around her, red and hot, and the very air seemed to be filled with a warm pressure. The compass hanging around her neck suddenly flashed a white light as she opened her eyes, surrounded by a red aura.

Magic. Oh magic! With all of the ice she had been using she'd nearly forgotten what it was like to be in her true element. White hot power burned in her like a bomb just on the cusp of exploding. You couldn't hold on to it forever, but when you had it you were unstoppable.

"All right, team jump!" She shouted, running at double speed toward the Cadet's back. She leaped up on his shoulders and then was send soaring through the air toward the dragons snout. At the apex of her ascent she warped once, moving just far enough to land on the dragons snout.

She wasn't the only one up here. The Kid and Mr. Fox had both moved up her as well, and Linkle began to feel that panicked feeling again as the two laid eyes on her. This time, though, she chose fight instead of flight. After all, soon there would be too much explosion for anyone to see her.

There was something like a shockwave that spread out in front of Linkle, not enough to move anyone. A pressure, just enough to be felt, as though Linkle's body was warning everyone in front of it about what was about to happen. The red aura around her disappeared as Linkle aimed both of her crossbows in front of her and pulled the triggers. What came out was an impossibility.

It was a bomb arrow. Not two bomb arrows, one. One big one. Bigger than crossbows that fired it. Bigger than her. A massive boulder sized bomb, encircled with a ring of magic light, with the tiny insignificant arrow part sticking pathetically out of the side. It soured in a low arc that should have carried it over the dragons head had Linkle not jumped after it. Leg wreathed entirely in flame she lashed out with a kick, striking the bomb and knocking it down to hopefully explode right between the dragon's eyes.

And as the last crystal fell and Vivi disappeared, Donnie watched as his allies piled on top of the dragon. Donnie had an idea of what he was going to do.

Xuen’s teachings, ever since his loss to and imprisonment by the Mogu Emperor, ever since he had learned patience, were on when violence should be applied and when alternative methods should be sought. And one of those teachings dictated the removal of an opponent’s advantages.

If, it was said, violence cannot be avoided, an enemy may be willing to yield after being weakened, especially if their strengths are removed. And allowing an opponent to surrender was always the honorable choice.

The Ender Dragon, unfortunately, posed a threat merely by being one of Galeem’s Guardians. By the very fact that it drew breath, it enslaved the minds of the people. Its body was a localized nexus for Galeem’s power to flow through, to be distributed upon the inhabitants of the Land of Adventure.

The same principle, however, applied. Rather than seek to eliminate a foe as quickly as possible, support one’s allies and remove the opponent’s advantage.

And what was the key advantage a dragon had over their enemies? It wasn’t size, nor strength, nor claw or fang or magic.

It was flight.

Flight allowed a dragon to fry their enemies from the skies, dive from the heavens whenever they pleased, increase their speed such that they could avoid ranged attacks through sheer velocity.

Against an aerial opponent, always seek to bring them crashing down to the earth, even if you yourself could fly. If you could not fly, you were equal. If you could fly and no-one else could, then flight became your advantage over the enemy.

And so, Donnie flew above the Dragon, gripping the stick tightly even as it dropped a sea of acid on the island below.

This would be a difficult shot. His eyes narrowed. His breath stopped. He focused intently, like a marksman attempting to assassinate a tyrant.

He knew how fast these Boom Biters moved: Slightly slower than the average cannonball. It was no machine-gun, but it was fast enough for what he needed. As the dragon dashed forward, he lined up the arc not with where it was, but where it was going to be.

He squeezed the trigger ten times, rock-solid piloting skills and nerves of steel from a long career making sure the recoil didn’t make him miss.

The ten Boom Biters sailed through the air in a parallel series of arcs, moving from left to right across the dragon’s body.

The first shot would hit the dragon at the end of its left wing. The second in the center of its left wing. The third in where the left wing met the body. The fourth, fifth, and sixth across its back, near its kidneys and spine. The seventh where the right wing met the body. The eighth in the center of the right wing. The ninth at the tip of the right wing. And the tenth...well, screw it, that one was aimed for the back of its neck. Linkle had the head covered.

The Boom Biters were launched within milliseconds of each other. The system could barely keep up with how fast Donnie was firing.

When it was done, he let out the breath he’d been holding.

Please, dear Light let this work, he thought.

With her varied attack patterns the ruthless Ender Dragon assaulted the island, forcing the heroes on the defensive. A smattering of ranged attacks barely registered with her as she bombarded the heroes with massive globules of caustic purple acid, leaving behind puddles that quickly drained into the porous end stone below. Her acid barrage plus the constant threat of endermen made for a direly hazardous battlefield, and those unable to keep abreast of the danger suffered the consequences. Nobody took a direct -and more than likely, lethal- hit from an acid bomb, but there were enough close calls to inflict searing, painful burns on almost every fighter present. When she suddenly transitioned into a flip, the Courier and his faithful Drumstick -unlucky enough to be in the way- got sent sailing into the fuzzy, infinite sky. All the while, the Ender Dragon's excellent air mobility allowed her to avoid the slow rings of Sectonia, no matter how large they were. Only two struck her: one as she performed the flip, and the other as she cruised down to unleash the acid fountain.

The wave of ender acid washed across the island from its center point, swiftly covering the vast majority of the tiered, flat land. Though not as deadly as the dragon's pulverizing jaws or flesh-ripping talons, it provided a danger that could not be ignored. Everyone still on the ground was forced to use either their mobility or ingenuity to escape the cruel tide. Peach wasted no time jumping into the air with her parasol once more. While she could wait out the acid bath by floating, she couldn't unload her scatterboom into the dragon at the same time. The sight made Euden wish he packed an umbrella, but the young prince made do. He sprinted at full tilt for the Ace Cadet, hoping to catch a ride, but Linkle made it there first. Changing courses and narrowly staying ahead of the raging acid wave that bit at his heels, he made for Junior's clown car. At the last moment he leaped onto the contraption and scrambled on top. While Euden got one leg singed as the acid splashed against the obsidian, he grit his teeth and reasoned that it could have been a lot worse. He then watched, powerless, as a triggered enderman decked Jak and Daxter from their hoverboard as they tried to outspeed the wave. If the duo couldn't pull off an emergency escape, it'd surely be a one-way trip to Lumbridge on the Palico Express.

Tora and Poppi, meanwhile, watched the chaos from atop one of the obsidian towers. Though they went up there to bide their time while seeking an avenue of attack, they happened to be in a good spot to evade the flood, and a number of other heroes made their way up top as well. Geralt appeared, and Tora remembered not to look at him only about one second too late. “Sorry, meh!” He watched Cuphead and Link arrive courtesy of the giant bee queen, safe and sound.

With everyone as safe as they were going to get, it was time to turn the tables on the dragon. Patient and cautious as ever, which was to say 'not at all', Bowser escaped the flood by leaping for the dragon herself. His giant mitts clamped down on her ebon hide, prompting a wet shriek as she ejected the last of her purple fizz and attempted to stage her escape. The Koopa King pulled her toward the soaked ground, and while his feet burned viciously, he held firm. The Ender Dragon pumped her wings but could not break free. A moment later, Blazermate's diagnostic formed the foundation of the heroes' counterattack. Blaster fire, both in sky blue from Geralt's and ruby red from Fox's at close range, pummeled her head. Both dealt damage, but the space animal's concentrated barrage left a cauterized crater amid the scales before her thrashing shook him off, creating a weak point few could miss. Link, loosing arrow after arrow, certainly didn't; when he sent a shaft zipped into the Fox-hole, the leviathan's roar shook the island.

Even Hat Kid leaped courageously forth, and while Tora wasn't planning to let the others do all the work for him, the sight of the kid flinging herself into battle lit a fire under the Nopon's bum. “Let's go, let's go!” He ran for the edge of the tower and jumped, trusting in Poppi fully, and like clockwork his partner boosted into him to carry him forward. The wind of the dragon's flapping wing buffeted them back, but Poppi adjusted her course. She strafed through the air until she was flying directly behind the dragon, then carried Tora forward toward the spot where the wings met the back. Tora, either disoriented or just excited, starting swinging well before he was close enough, and when he finally got in punching range he drove the Mech Arms home with gusto. “Meh-meh-meh-meh-meh-meh-meh!” he cried, bashing the pitch-black scales over and over again. While the two looked stupid for not targeting the dragon's head, they knew that the others' much higher damage output would serve them better, so instead of jockeying for position Tora planned to build up as much power as he could.

The dragon continued to struggle, but as long as Bowser heroically withstood the agonizing acid frying his feet, and Donnie kept hammering her with Boom Biters, she could do nothing to a Nopon beating her in a blind spot. Tora Tora took a direct hit in the back from one of Donnie's projectiles, and reeled for a moment as he tried to get his bearings before continuing the barrage. After a good few seconds of all-out walloping, the opening came to an abrupt end. Up above, the leviathan took Hat Kid's explosive vial and even more explosive fist in the chin, then got absolutely creamed by Linkle's giant bomb. The explosion nearly dropped Tora, but he managed to hold on even as the wounded Ender Dragon wrenched free of Bowser's grip. A look down confirmed that the acid had cleared up, too. Now was Tora's chance. “Okay Poppi!” he yelled, pulling out of the Mech Arms. “Level two!” He pushed off of the dragon and allowed himself to be flung away by her windblast.

Trusting her masterpon to take care of himself, Poppi received the Mech Arms and jetted around the Ender Dragon Dragon to face her as she lifted upward. “Poppiiiii.....” After a moment of buildup she overclocked her thrusters to boost into the dragon's battered and dizzied head at high speed. “Crushing blow!” She blew apart a handful of the leviathan's blast-loosened fangs with a spinning punch before an explosive uppercut slammed the jaw shut. With a furious snarl she thrashed around, and her claw took off Poppi's lower right leg as she staged her getaway. “Ah!” Poppi cried out, down one booster and careering off course.

Tora, having bounced off the damp end stone unhurt, ran after her as fast as his teeny legs could take him. “Poppiiiii! Tora comiiiiiing!” With thoughts of his companion's safety override everything else, he didn't stop to think that Poppi had indeed successfully landed a level two Blade Combo.

The dragon, meanwhile, twisted sideways. Though afflicted with heavy wounds, and reduced to around half her overall vitality, she would be putting up no less of a fight. She span with intense centripetal force, lashing her tail and its accompanying wind wall at all those standing on top of the towers. Her tail tore through the iron bars atop two of the towers, and while she didn't hit the shorter towers, the airblast almost certainly would. Faced with the dragon's wheeling strike, Blazermate and Donnie in particular were in considerable peril of getting smashed.



Ryu watched, muscles tensed and spirit focused, as Sakura rallied herself. Both knew that it should end here, but neither thought that it would. The girl picked herself up and charged, the change in her mood as evident in her moves as it was on her face. With his opponent in this state the world warrior did not feel confident in being able to read her, since the relentlessness of those under Galeem's influence could not be equated to rage. His prior dealings told him as much, and his body featured a few stubborn scars and bruises to prove it. Instead his foe would both enjoy a second wind and maintain her full mental faculties, with just one critical difference: now, morals no longer factored into her fighting style.

So Ryu prepared himself for anything, but without protective equipment he couldn't defend himself against the handful of soil Sakura flung his way. She slapped him with the dust, stinging and blinding him, but even with eyes screwed shut the martial artist was far from helpless. With the proper fight over with, his win condition changed as well. He needed land only one technique. To do that while blind, however, he needed Sakura to be close, and he needed to withstand her onslaught while making it appear as though she had the upper hand, and without actually falling beneath it.

Steeling himself, Ryu let the wave wash over him. As dirty blow after dirty blow hit him, the pain making stars blossom in his closed eyes, he concentrated on the palm of his hand. Agony lanced through him, threatening to make him crumble, but a lifetime of pain and punishment allowed the formidable man to keep his focus. With a cry, he thrust his palm toward Sakura, his fingers opening to reveal the gregarious pink luster of a Friend Heart. Luckily for him, it didn't matter if she blocked it or not. The moment it made contact, the heart blooped right into her, and purged the lingering will of the Lord of Light.

Though Ryu couldn't see it, he could sense the change. Relief flooded through him, albeit suffused by pain, and he fell to he knees as he tried to mitigate it.



Though nightmarish fiends in their own right, and capable of slaughtering uncountable civilians, the necromorphs fared poorly against elite fighters out in the open. The Doom Slayer dispatched a pair with brutal efficiency, putting down the wretched undead faster even than Nero or Nadia did. Their demise left King Minos alone once more, scarred and bleeding from dozens of bullet and slash wounds. His arsenal of tentacles, so useful for delving underground and spearing unwitting enemies from below, had been reduced to a gruesome seafood dish scattered around the courthouse floor. Grinding his teeth, Minos slammed both arms into the ground again and again. “Gaaaagh! Your treachery will not go unpunished!”

The impacts shook the building, and chunks of ceiling began to fall. While Nadia scrambled around and V shrank back toward the walls to avoid the worst of it, Nero took a single step out of the way of some falling rubble before sitting on it, totally nonchalant. “So, what do you think, Mr. Judge? Don't be stingy now, you can cough up a perfect ten, right?”

“Your crimes are unpardonable!” the king announced. “You'll go screaming into the pit!”

Nero smirked. “You sure? You just keep doing the same attacks, and it's really not working out for you.”

Minos' hand came down to smash him, but Nero rolled backward across the rubble and out of the way. The judge's fingers closed around the block of masonry, and he picked it up to throw Nero's way. With surprising speed the chunk crashed across the ground and clipped Nero as he tried to dodge, bloodying his shoulder. A leering grin spread across Minos' ghastly face, and he grabbed another slab to hurl at the Slayer, then again at Nadia.

While the heroes were otherwise engaged, Minos hurried to call forth more minions. This time he dug deeper, and from burning pits in the ground he summoned two necromorphs and a grotesque, gray-skinned abomination formed of multiple corpses joined together by vile fungal growth.

V watched as the monsters appeared and Minos sank back, hoping to catch his breath while his minions occupied the heroes. Well, why not let him. He tapped his cane on the ground for attention. “You, with the armor! Keep them busy, but don't slay them all immediately. The rest of you, come here.”

After a moment Nadia dashed up and slid to a stop, and Nero swung in using his wire. “Nyaow what do you want?” the feral asked, incredulous. She made no bones about her disbelief that her team needed to hold a meeting right now. When Pandemonica arrived a couple seconds after, she barely even got a glance.

“We've been doing well enough individually,” V explained, his voice low and urgent. “But we can end this in a flash if we really work together. His breath aside his arms are the his only remaining offense and defense. If we can snare them, I can use Nightmare to throw Nero at him. Make an entry, work his torso, and Domination will take it. Our friend can mop up whatever's left.”

“I can hold his arms,” Nadia assured the others, her hands on her hips. “We'll just need to get him pissed.”

At that point Pandemonica spoke up. “I can see the cafe now that the building's breaking apart. Mind if I step out and get some coffee? ”

Nero looked back at the action, considering both the plan and how much the demonic customer service representative had contributed so far. “Might as well. Let's go.” The trio moved in and fanned out. Provided the Doom Slayer dealt with the undead, the battle would resume immediately. Once Fortune saw her chance to grab the judge's attention, the scheme could be put into motion. First, however Minos needed to be even angrier.

@Lugubrious

Doom Slayer

Level 1 Doom Slayer

Location: Dead Zone

Word Count: 310

The Slayer was watched Mino summoning his minions; a futile effort on his part since he was just delaying the enviable. Turning around to face the large creature that was still attacking his comrades; focusing his attention on him firing his shotgun making sure the large creature was turning his attention to him. Trying his best to avoid the rubble and tentacles coming towards him; Making sure to aim for the creature's eyes to try and blind it. Firing at the tentacles once again to try and disable him while the other's finish him off.

Focusing on the newly summoned minions that was coming towards the others. Intercepting them by jogging towards them; kicking one of the strange creature in the chest to knock him over. Noticing the rubble coming towards him; rolling out of the way and letting the slab slamming into the other creature. The creature that was knocked down quickly getting back up trying to attack him; lunging forwards toward him. Which was meet with a hard slam of the butt of his shotgun to the creature's face.

"Play time is over" He thought to himself; moving towards Mino wanting to end his life before he could summon anything else. Firing his shotgun at him; making sure he was focused on him then Nero, V and Nadina. Noticing the two other creatures the judge had summoned. "Piece of cake" He smirked underneath his helmet. Making his way towards the summon freshly summoned things.

Not even bothering using his weapons against them; slamming his fist into one of their torso. In a effort to try and rip out his spine. And when that was finished he turned to the other; moving quickly to snap his neck like a twig.

Sakura was blindly determined to kill one her role model. Her face was serious, grim, joyless, and so were her strikes. There were no answers in this battle, not anymore. Just grim violence. But as quickly as it began, it was over. She looked down, confused, as Ryu prepared some kind of technique. He went in to touch her heart, and she deflected it with her forearm. There was a flash of light, though, the attack had gone through anyway. Sakura blinked in surprise. During the brief moment where her eyes were closed, they went from red to brown. The vivid color of her outfit returned. With a little gasp and a little headache, Sakura relented her attacks, stumbled backwards, and fell onto her bottom with a grunt, one leg crossed beneath her raised knee. Things were fuzzy. Her head hurt. Her mind was all jumbled up, trying to make sense of things. Grass beneath her, sun at her back, breeze on her shoulders.

I'm tired, and hurt. Someone hit me. My knuckles and legs hurt. I hit someone.

She stared at Ryu. Battered, beaten, in pain, like someone had brutally ambushed him. That person wasn't nearby, apparently. It was just the two of them.

What, huh? Ryu? What happened? How did he get here? How did I get get here? Who attacked him? Huh? What?

She remembered. Or rather, she recontextualized. The last few months of her life. Wandering. Looking for Ryu. Battling in the Forbidden Kingdom.

Why? Huh? Why was I doing that? Wasn't there somewhere I was supposed to be? Wasn't I...

Then the memories came flooding back. After school with Kei. Talking about the future. Making jokes. In that little transitional period between school life and home life where it was just...life. Then, a blinding light. An attack, coming right for Kei. Sakura went to push her out of the way. A new place, a new strange place. And then...

And then...I did nothing. I just messed around. I've been messing around for months! Doing nothing but fighting! Looking for...Ryu!? Acting like nothing was wrong. My family? Where's my brother? Where's Kei? Are they okay? Why haven't I been doing anything!? Who attacked Ryu? Was it me? Was it me!? Where's my little Tsukushi!? Where's Mom, where's Dad!? Why didn't I do anything!? Oh no, oh no! I wanna go home!

At this point, Kasugano Sakura was on the verge of panic from this brief moment of consideration. She still wasn't exactly sure where she was or what was going on in this current moment. If there was any small benefit to that, it was that she could focus on getting her current bearings before spiralling into an existential crisis. Huffing and puffing, she stared into the middle distance with a look of numb shock on her face.

Normally this side of Sakura didn't come out. She was brave, unflappable, energetic. But now, her hands were shaking and her heart was pounding. Now, she was trying hard not to feel like anything more than a street fighter wannabe high school student, trapped in a horror of cosmic proportions. Right now, she was just trying to focus on helping her hurt friend. But she was closer then probably anyone had ever seen her in her life to her courage breaking into a vision of a fearful girl not even out of high school. Sakura tried to refocuse her mental energy on what was important, on what was infront of her. Rising to her hands and knees from her sitting position, she shakily crawled closer to Ryu.

Attempting to focus on the minutia, Sakura came to a stop on all fours about four feet away from Ryu, looking at the man on his knees with concern in her big brown eyes. Sakura has always been a person who wore her heart on her sleeve. Sincere and earnest to the very end, in her joys and in her fears. Even if she was currently walking the razor's edge, she made time to have concern for Ryu. If there was any small comfort in her confusion, it was that trying to piece these answers together would be easier than trying to put together everything that had happened to her.

"...R-Ryu-san? Are...are you okay...?" She asked with a voice threatening to break, reaching a trembling, gloved hand toward his shoulder. At the very least, it was a change of pace from the cold, murderous intent she had posessed (or rather, had possessed her) just moments ago.

Bowser roared in pain as the acid lapped around his cat feet, before biting down on the Ender Dragon’s tail with his massive fang filled maw to silence his weakness. Gripping onto her harder with one hand and his jaw he used a hand to rip the Luck Bell off of his collar, reverting his form back to normal in which he still wore his (rather disheveled at this point) wedding outfit, complete with steel soled boots. The shoes started hissing and fizzing as the acid tried to gnaw through the massive set of dress shoes the king was wearing, saving his scaly feet from more damage.

In the meantime he pocketed the bell and then grabbed one of her legs with his hand and then deployed the boxing gloves on his hat. Two massive mechanical arms popped out from either side and began to rapidly bat away at the dragon’s hide with a series of jabs and hooks.

As the king held fast as the dragon was assailed by those who had gotten clear from the acid, with some of them, like the hat kid, even using the king himself as a launching point to rain down blows on the boss. Arrows flew. Lasers pewed. Explosives exploded. Fists pummeled. Hell was rained down on the dragon as she struggled to escape. She writhed, bucked and kicked bowser in the face and hands repeatedly like a mad horse, taring her own body as she sought to escape his clawed and fanged grip. With one final jerk and kick she managed to escape from the king’s three fold grip, booting him in the face as she went for good measure and taking one of his teeth with her in the process.

She didn’t get away without more punishment however, as Poppi came in to deliver a mighty series of blows, though the heroic robot lost a leg in the process and ended up spiraling away with Tora hot on her heels. Or one of her heels anyway. The other was scooped up by Kamek’s sole remaining clone, a white mage, who flew after the bot to return the lost pot to her.

Bowser wasn't going to let her leave easily either, and unleashed a torrent of fire from his mouth that licked at the dragoness as she took off again. Despite being half dead the fire, or acid, burning inside her had not dimmed and she continued to aggressively attack her enemies. She aimed for the ones on the towers, tail swiping at them, creating another shockwave attack in the process that threatened to blast anyone standing atop them back off.

Further down the island's incline Bowser Jr ever so carefully lifted up his clown car to make sure that his ears were correct and that the acid flood had finally finished flowing past. He sighed in relief to see this was the case and then took in how the battle was going, taking particular notice of Bowser’s inaccurate fireball hucking that the kin had returned to once the Ender Dragon got airborne and mobile again.

The boy scratched his chin for a moment while his two allies kept up their enlargement of the king and then had an idea.

”Bytans roll out!” he called out, summoning a gaggle of ball shaped Bytan strikers, the madly grinning, one eyed, self replicating minions of the subspace army, on the other side of his mini trenchline.

”Go over there,” the prince ordered, directing the spheres away from both himself and the rest of the team. The balls obeyed, beginning to replicate themselves as soon as they rolled around by popping more of themselves out of their eyeballs.

”PAPA! PAPA!” he called up to his titanic father, before pointing to the mob of Bytans and telling the King his plan. Bowser was briefly skeptical, but then nodded and went along with his son’s plan. He turned towards the Bytans and opened his mouth wide, before inhaling a massive torrent of air using his vacuum breath ability. The Bytans, being much smaller than the super sized king and lacking any kind of surface grip thanks to their ball shape, were swept up along with this wind and up into Bowser’s mouth, which they got stored like seeds in a hamster’s cheeks rather than being swallowed. With them continuing to replicate inside his mouth, Bowser turned back to the Ender Dragon and then used a gout of flame breath to launch the Bytans at her like a fiery shotgun blast,sending dozens of burning Bytans blasting up into the air towards the Ender Dragon in a spray wide enough that even Bowser’s poor aim and worse target leading abilities didn’t matter in the slightest.

Part of hail of burning balls hammered the dragon, while the rest flew onward out into the void, or, in some cases, rained down on the far side of the island. There was fortunately none of the team that far from the fight, but there was a number of Endermen, some of which got clipped but the shower of Bytans. Those not killed by the falling beach ball sized creatures (all of which dissipated a few moments after impacting the ground) were enraged, and tuned their ire towards the being that had dared attack them. It was in this way that Bowser ended up with a swarm of angry lanky monsters suddenly appearing around him which began wailing on his feet with a vengeance.

”WHAT! HAY! GET LOST! OW! STOP THAT! STAY STILL SO I CAN STOMP YOU!” the king complained, attempting to stamp the monsters out of existence to no avail due to the slow speed of his attacks giving the Endermen to teleport or just walk out of the way.

”I’M COMING PAPA!” Jr cried out upon seeing his father’s predicament, grabbing his oversized magic paintbrush and running towards the mini mob of Endermen.

”Be careful young master” “kyu kyu” Kamek and Mimikyu cried in concern after the boy as he recklessly ran to a fight he could actually get involved in.

”Leave papa alone” he yelled at them, before splashing ink at the offending Endermen with his Gadbrush. The splash of goop splattered two of the Endermen (and the ground between them) who vanished in a rage as the toxic fluid began to slowly chew at their vitality. ”Haha! Now for the rest of you,” Jr taunted, right before the two Endermen reappeared and attacked him instead of the king.

”Ah!,” jr cried out in surprise, blocking one’s swipe with the brush’s length while the other slashed at his armored back, causing him to stumble forwards towards the first monster, who broke past his fumbled guard and slashed his eyelid with a claw. Doing the best he could with this momentum, jr headbutted the leg of the first Enderman with his horn, splodging a large glob of green slime onto the Enderman’s leg in the process while the impact itself caused it to teleport away. A distant explosion heralded its subsequent end.

The other was still on him however, slashing at his back. Jr pivoted, jabbing at its lanky talons with his Gadbrush as it towered over him, warding off its swipes and staining its void black skin with extra goop in the process. It vanished again, and this time jr used the time it was away to spin round, painting a zone of ink around himself with his brush so that when it reappeared the Enderman landed atop this hazardous zone, forcing it to jump away again out of the goop. Its life running low it came at Jr one last time, only to receive a Swoopin Stu, which was a cross between dumbo octopus and a water balloon, to the face when jr grabbed the freshly spawned slime based lifeform by its head fronds and tossed it at his attacker. The stu exploded into a shower of ink, coating most of the Enderman and draining the last of its vitality, causing it to spasm once and then keel over dead.

”These things. Are the worst,” Jr complained as he rubbed his scratched eyelid. The entire fight had lasted only a dozen heartbeats, and there were still a number of the lanky foes assailing Bowser’s feet. He might need some help with he rest, the boy silently admitted to himself.

The situation was becoming quite dire. While they could wail on the dragon with impunity now that the healing crystals had all been taken out, the fact remained that it was still a freaking dragon and unleashed a barrage of acid breath as well as had the physical strength to create localized typhoons. The rest of them, or most of them at least, just felt so small and insignificant compared to something like that!

Cuphead recognized the situation he was in and took the Ace cadet’s offered hand, bailing on the ride before things got too dicey. Still, it wasn’t entirely enough to keep the little guy from flying away once the Ender dragon unleashed her might and he had to be saved yet again, this time by the giant bee Sectonia. ”Gosh, what a swell rescue! Ya know, I’ve got a friend back in Inkwell Isle you might get along with! Her name is Rumor Honeybottoms!.” With that in mind he adjusted his straw, mimed pulling up his sleeve, and charged in with a determined grimace all the while firing off his peashooter at the dragon.

The Courier was not so lucky. Having dealt such large wounds to the dragon, it seemed to have it out for him and he couldn’t blame the thing. Her swooping created a tailwind that sent him and his chocobo flying and there was nothing he could do about it. They wildly tumbled through the air out of control, about to crash into the hard ground! Reacting as quick as he could, he let loose one of the two pokeballs attached to his belt, and in a flash of light Ivories appeared on the ground, between puddles of acid.

“Don! Phan!” it cried, ready for battle.

”Soft landing!” the Courier hollered, as Drumstick thrashed wildly beneath him.

“Donphan!” Ivories acknowledged the order and immediately stomped the ground, using Bulldoze to turn out the earth. Packed dirt loosened, rocks cracked into sand, and much of the acid got absorbed up. The Courier and Drumstick landed in the dirt for a softer, but still painful landing with a loud crack!

“CAAAAAW!” the chocobo cried, wailing in pain.

The Courier jumped up, wincing a bit as he felt he had dislocated his knee. A quick adjustment, and small yelp, and it was back in place, but his trusted mount wouldn’t be so lucky. ”Good job, Ivories. Return.” As the donphan warped back into her pokeball, the Courier looked over Drumstick. Her leg was broken. She wouldn’t be of any more use in this fight. With a sigh he jabbed a stimpack into her and helped her back up. The chem would speed up the healing process and mend the wound, but her bone still needed to be set and that wasn’t an option right now.

”Git on outta here, hide behind one o’ them pillars far off. Git!” With a low coo, the chocobo acknowledged her master’s orders. Even if the animals couldn’t understand his words, somehow the meaning always made it through. She began a slow trot, more of a limping hop, off the distance.

The Courier adjusted his rawhide hat and glared at the dragon. ”Now you done pissed me off.”

Elsewhere, Jak and Daxter were riding the jet board without any worries of the acid being dropped down on them. As long as they didn’t let it fall right on their heads, their jet board would simply hover above the danger even if the entire place completely flooded! But that overconfidence cost them as they forgot about the natives of this land: the Endermen. While doing a flip, Daxter accidentally locked eyes with one of the tall creatures blending into the black environment and it attacked. The impact knocked both heroes off the jet board as a wave of acid came washing over toward them!

”JAAAAAAAAAK!”

Jak grunted in response and made expert use of his acrobatics. He turned the impact roll on the ground into one of his iconic roll jumps, Daxter barely hanging on by the shoulders. He managed to grab the jet board, but there was no time to hop back on it to surf over the acid wave. Instead he once again became Light Jak and took to the air, but even that wasn’t enough to completely avoid the danger as the acid completely submerged his left foot.

Though mute in his Light form, Jak’s face communicated the pain quite well. He kept rising in order to find a better staging point for their counter attack, but ended up picking up another passenger along the way.

Cuphead saw the wave of acid coming and had little options. Another globule of the stuff was falling, but this one was different: it was pink! ”Hot dog!” he said, jumping up into the air, he flipped, parrying off the pink acid and nullifying it in the same process as giving himself a boost. With a mid-air dash, he landed right on Jak’s back.

”What’s the big idea, kitchen-ware? This is my spot!” Daxter grumbled.

Just then an enderman, the same that Daxter had already unwittingly antagonized, appeared from literal thin air, swiping at the ottsel. It got a blast of Cuphead’s peashooter EX for its trouble and blinked away, heavily injured.

Daxter blinked silently while Cuphead smugly smiled at him, and no more words were exchanged. Jak dropped them all off at the top of one of the obsidian spires as the dragon was making another assault.

”I’ve got an idea! It’s, well, a pretty gross idea, but it might end up swell!” Cuphead exclaimed. He backed up, then took a running start and leaped from the edge of the spire toward the ender dragon! He grabbed the handle of his own head and took it off, like one would lift any ordinary cup, and swung hard. A bright yellow liquid splashed out from the inside of his head toward the boss monster, a technique that Sectonia had become intimately familiar with. ”Cupate!” he cried out, sticking his head back in place where it belonged and changing direction with a mid-air dash to return to the spire.

Daxter gagged himself to prevent from throwing up on the spot.

Down on the lower levels, the Courier was checking his ammunition for the anti-material rifle. Only three bullets left. He would have to make them count. Blazermate had called out that the monster’s weak point was the head and he had to chuckle at such an obvious statement. Of course, most things were weak in the head. Still, he’d seen crazy things, so it was nice to have it confirmed. He took aim with the rifle but noted that the thing was moving around too much to get a good shot at its cranium, such a small target compared to the rest of its body. Plus at that distance… He didn’t have the stamina left to make use of VATS, not without another hit of jet, but there was another option. He still had 2 doses of turbo left in his GRX implant.

Dose one activated. Five seconds of super speed. The world slowed to a crawl from his point of view, while to others it looked like a colored wind was darting across the battlefield. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Time up. He crossed a great distance, the dragon was so much closer, but it still kept whipping around high in the air.

Dose two activated. Now it may as well have been a snail swimming slowly across the sky. He lined up the scope and trained it on the beast’s head. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! That was it. All the shots for the anti-material rifle were spent, shell casings fell to the ground as time sped back up.

Jak’s light dispersed as loud booms echoed across the End like a machinegun, that rifle being fired off incredibly fast. Not to be outdone, he glared at the dragon. ”Everyone! Get away!” His body changed again, rippling with muscle and turning dark purples and blacks. Dark eco surged across his body. Daxter took note of what this meant.

”He’s not kidding everyone, get away from that dragon if you don’t wanna die!” Daxter himself hopped off of Jak, taking shelter behind Cuphead of all people.

Jak charged forward toward the dragon and, with a mighty leap, crossed the distance until he was right above it, then dove straight down with his clawed fist outstretched. He channeled every last bit of dark eco in his body into the Dark Bomb. As soon as he made contact with something, whether it be the dragon’s body or the ground below if she somehow dodged, a huge wave of dark eco would explode outward, likely killing anything caught in its path.

---

Linkle took a few deep breaths as she felt the rush of magic fade, but she didn't have much time to get her bearing back. She was after all standing eye to eye with a creature the size of her entire village, a fact she felt keenly as there was a thrust of upward momentum that nearly sent her stumbling off its snout as the creature broke free of Bowser's grip and began rising into the sky again. All it would have to do was move it's head to send her spinning away into the void.

It wasn't the dragon that knocked her off though. At least, not directly. Linkle heard a familiar voice on the wind getting closer and closer, one word extended into a battle cry. It was the vocal equivalent of pulling back your foot for a particularly good kick.

"Poppiiiiii....."

Linkle never saw the Blade, but she definitely felt her. The shockwave of her impact traveled up the behemoths snout and crawled on skultula like legs all the way up to her thighs. She was going to turn around and give Poppi some praise but the second impact knocked the dragon's head up and sent Linkle careening forward, rolling over the top of its skull as it thrashed in pain and sending her sliding down its back. She tried to dig in her heels to arrest her fall as she plunged down the near vertical slide but there was nowhere to find purchase even among the bumps created by the creatures scales. She was just falling too fast.

Surrendering herself to gravity, Linkle made the best of her situation. "Woooooo-hooooooo!" She shouted, her voice mostly lost to the air rushing past her ears. Pointing her crossbows forward she peppered the dragons wings as she shot past them on what was possibly the greatest slide of her life. She slid and slid, down the back and onto the tail where the movement of the dragon finally caused her to slide off the edge and send her free falling toward the biggest splotch of white in this world of darkness and off-yellow.

Right before her impact with Bowser's hat she vanished, reappeared in the air about a stones throw straight up from her previous position, spun in the air firing her crossbows to break her momentum, and landed perfectly on her feet with a commanding view of the battlefield.

---

Link went from satisfaction at how precisely he had placed his shot to amazement at the wide array of attacks his companions let loose on the dragon's head. The dragon seemed to have enough, though, ripping itself from Bowser's clutches and pulling out a tooth in the process. Even as he winced he stared in awe as the Guardian girl hammered into the dragon, hammering it with a one-two punch that returned the favor by sending several of the beast's teeth spiraling to the ground. Link's eyes followed them down, making a note of where they landed out of habit, before looking back up just in time to catch the girl losing a leg and Linkle sliding down its back.

He didn't have the kind of time he needed to worry about that, though. He steeled himself as the dragon beat its wings and spun through the air. It's tail whipped like a scythe across the tops of the spires and he only had moments to think before it swept over his own spire, leaving nothing but a fading "HYAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaa!" on the wind in its wake.

---

Linkle had perhaps the best spot in the house to view the Koopa strategy, a blazing bombardment of minions that lit up the sky like miniature suns. She almost started laughing until she saw where the balls that didn't strike the dragon were going to touch down.

"Hey!" She shouted, running to the edge of Bowser's hat and jumping down to the brim where he had a better chance of hearing her. "You have to watch where you're aiming. Over there is-"

It was too late, though, as Bowser began stomping around trying to crush the swarm of monsters that were now converging around his feet. Linkle groaned. She had just started thinking these guys weren't all that bad. They had been a largely neutral force up till this moment. Now there was nothing for it, she was going to have to kill them. She had already seen first hand today that they would never stop now that battle had been joined. She jumped down to Bowser's shoulder. "If you cooked my cucco's too I'm going to be so mad!" She took the time to shout into his ear before leaping off to the side of Koopa King Jr and Kamek weren't on and leveling a flying kick at one of the creatures as she fell.

Her foot impacted for just a moment before the creature vanished, the momentum causing Linkle to skid forward a little ways before coming to a stop. In front of her stood the monster she had kicked, a strange expression on its ghastly face. It looked simultaneously sad and bewildered as it stared at her, the sort of look a kicked dog gives its owner afterwards. Betrayal, from a place where it wasn't considered possible.

Ender had struck ender.

"Don't give me that look." Linkle said in clear discomfort, pointing her bows at the thing. "I told you guys to leave."

The creature's expression changed as it recognized what was happening, it's mouth opening wide and vicious. Even if Galeem hadn't been compelling it to fight it still would have out of sheer anger. It warped again, showing up right in Linkle's face with its talons raised above its head. When it brought them down, though, she wasn't there anymore. The enderman heard the release of bowstring behind it as a piercing pain struck it in the back, causing it to warp again to a safer position.

The bolt that had stuck between what passes for the endermans shoulders hadn't been the only one Linkle had fired, however. She faced Bowser's shoe and waved the crossbows back and forth sending a stream of crossbow bolts at the Endermen she hadn't gotten the attention of yet. With every bolt that dug in or clipped an enderman they warped away, leaving her other bolts to plink harmlessly off Bowser's shoe.

They stood about the island now, in a crude half circle around her. All looking at her. All wearing that same mask of betrayal. She could feel their eyes boring into her. It didn't want to make her scream and run. It didn't make her want to kill them all. Nevertheless, there was a horrible pressure to it.

One of them suddenly warped, and Linkle's face was filled with Enderman. She ducked as it brought its claws around, dodging under its hug-like attack, only to be blocked as another appeared in her path. She warped again as its claws ripped the stone apart where she'd been standing, but had to jump back as another appeared in front of her. Then another, appearing mid jump, slashed at her in the air. She shot out her leg, kicking back off the creature as its talons ripped gashes in her shoulders. The attack wasn't as bad as she thought it would be, as the creature vanished as soon as her foot connected.

As she landed another appeared, and she did the smart thing and warped to a new location. Another followed her, but as soon as it appeared she lodged a bolt in its chest that sent it warping away. It was just as quickly replaced, and Linkle reflexively shot this one too. The bolt, though, struck the block of off-yellow stone the creature held in its talons. It dropped it and struck, Linkle catching a cut across the cheek as she dodged back only for another to appear inside the first one's reach and stab forward with its arm. Linkle was about to kick at this one when another appeared over the attackers shoulder, bringing its own claw down. Mid-kick Linkle warped away, right behind one of them. She slammed her boot into its back, but again the monster warped away before it could take the full brunt of the attack. It was immediately replaced by three more attackers, simultaneously warping in and slashing at her in a semi-circle, forcing her to warp again.

It went on like this. Warp, attack, warp, evade, attack, warp. It was a dance, just like any fight with multiple foes. Unfortunately, it was a dance the Enderman were much more experienced at than her. They piled on aggressively, not giving her even a moment to rest, and unlike her they seemed able to warp as many times as they liked with no ill effects. Every time Linkle reappeared it took her just a moment longer to orient herself, leaving her vulnerable to the relentless claws of the mad Endermen. If it wasn't for the fact that they seemed to attack exclusively head on she had no doubt the cuts that marked her body right now would be much deeper, but it wasn't as though she could land many substantial blows either. They vanished the moment they felt any pain, replaced with a new opponent. At least she thought it was a new one. Because of the disorienting nature of the fight she wasn't even sure how many enemies there were anymore, or which had taken the most damage. It was a war of attrition, a war that they would win if she couldn't figure out a way to deal some serious damage to them. She needed time to think, figure out where she was, and come up with some kind of plan.

She warped again, but this time held her ground. She raised up her arms, her hair flashing blue even as her pursuers appeared. They struck, but all their claws found this time was the wall of clear ice that had sprung up in front of Linkle. As the monsters reeled back Linkle took a deep breath and got her bearings. Her eyes scanned the island, looking for anything that could help her deal with these monsters.

When she spotted it she wanted to kick herself it was so simple. As they stepped around the wall to try and claw her again she smiled, and warped. This time it was different, though. She didn't stop to attack, or evade, or try and change direction. She warped again and again toward her target in a straight line, a target so big and stark that even if she veered off course she could find it in an instant.

Finally she stopped and waited. Like before the monsters appeared before her in a squad of three, arms raised. Linkle was ready for them. As their claws descended on her she ducked, slammed her palms to the ground, and concentrated. Ice suddenly sprang up around the group of endermen, quickly growing and engulfing the monsters into solid ice crystals. Linkle was just as surprised as the enderman at how quickly the ice had entombed their bodies, but she didn't have long to admire her handiwork as she quickly warped out of the danger zone. Of course, the ice prison probably wouldn't hold them for long. Linkle hadn't tried trapping them in ice earlier because she figured they could just warp out of it and keep chasing her. There was no point in trapping them if it wouldn't kill them at the same time.

That's what Bowser was for.

A moment after she warped away the giant stomping foot she had lured them under came down like the wrath on an angry god, crushing the Endermen into nothing but ash and spirits. Linkle didn't stop to watch, not just because another group of Endermen were attacking but because she didn't want to think that the one that had helped her up on the island might have been underfoot. She warped again, dodging monstrous claws as she heard the sound of Bowser's foot lift up.

As she warped underfoot again the Endermen seemed more hesitant to follow her. That was fine. She compelled a few to come and get her with some crossbow bolts and repeated the process.

---

The wind and pressure dug into Link, trying to dislodge his iron grip from the dragon's tail as he was flung through the air at speeds he had never before experienced. His arms screamed at him, all his joints begging and pleading as they struggled not to pop out all at once; what in the world did he think he was doing!?!

He wanted to scream back that, like it or not, this was really the only way. He couldn't have climbed down the tower, it was too steep and smooth and with nothing to get a grip on the wind wall would have sent him flying regardless. In the best case someone would have to rush to catch him. In the worst he was sent flying over the edge to certain doom. Even the middle option, hitting the ground and then no doubt tumbling along it like a boulder rolling down a mountain, didn't appeal to him.

So as the dragon had attacked he'd done the only thing he could think of to save his life: grab the tail. As it had come rushing at him he'd pulled out the shield Linkle had given him and jumped to meet it. The impact had caused the shield to shatter into fragments of blue light, but he had been counting on that. The force from the shield shattering provided him with a cushion against the force of the dragons attack, a force that still made lights dance in front of his eyes.

His hands, though, had worked on instinct. Even though this dragon's hide looked like the strange stone it was far more easily grasped. His hands found the perfect places to dig in and hold on as the dragon flung him through the air. After that, it was just a matter of holding on until it tired just like any animal.

The dragon, being pummeled by attacks from all angles wasn't having any of it. Thanks to Blazermate calling out its weak point, everyone was targeting the head which, to her scanners meant they were doing more than triple the damage they'd do hitting the body. The dragon was losing health pretty fast, and in its retaliation attack, it swept its tail on the lower pillars where Blazermate was setting up a firing range with the engineer. He had only upgraded his sentry to level 2 before the tail came swinging in, destroying the sentry and dispenser and knocking the engineer off the pillar.

Blazermate having been looking at the dragon reacted quickly. She knew her suffering shield was damaged, so she only used it to try to deflect the tail a bit as she jumped off the pillar herself to dodge it. The tail clipped the top of her shield as she jumped off, causing her to spin in the air as she just barely dodged the tail itself, but still hit the ground without much grace. The Engineer, being injured but still alive, began to rebuild his base on the ground, although he wouldn't get beyond level 1 on his sentry or dispenser before he despawned.

"Owwww. I hate this dragon." Blazermate said, pulling herself up as she saw Bowser being swarmed by Endermen and a few others either getting hit by acid, attacking the dragon, or just being injured. She weighted healing herself or the others and decided she'd heal herself a bit while she moved to stay away from the dragon as she made her way to Jr, Courier, and Jak who were the most injured and healed them up. Or at least, as much as she could before Jak told everyone to move away from him and the dragon as he launched some strange attack.

Sectonia meanwhile flew higher in the air to dodge the tail swipe from the ender dragon, retaliating by blasting it with her lightning. This got her to drift away from Cuphead, who mentioned some name Sectonia didn't know. This was before he seemed to get a good idea, at least to him, and he took off his own head. This somewhat surprised Sectonia, seeing as his head was an actual cup in basically shape and form apparently, but this surprised turned to disgust as he tossed the same stuff that she had gotten hit with earlier, but this time at the dragon. "No, no. Ignoring that." She said shaking her head, trying to put the ordeal out of her mind. She then saw the horde of Enderman attacking Bowser and her allies helping that. She only gave this idea a passing thought, as she didn't know what magic she had, but she waved her hands above her head and to her surprise, her summoning portals appeared around that location.

Out of the two portals dropped a giant golden large bipedal ant-like creature with armor and a scepter that looked like a mace. They were a good 3 meters tall, not as large as Sectonia, but much, much heavier due to their armor. They were slow moving, but as they swung at the endermen, orbs of energy came out of their mace like staffs as they struck out, giving them two different types of damage and attack each swing, in an attempt to break up the enderman crowd with the others.

Surprised her plan worked, Sectonia then attacked the dragon again, keeping up her attack. She was looking pretty good all things considered unlike Blazermate who was getting battered around a bit this fight.

Geralt smirked as an absolutely staggering amount of damage was dealt to the dragon by the combined attacks of the group. They'd even managed to leave a bit of permanent damage on its head, scales peeled away and flesh cauterized by Fox's blaster fire. Geralt slightly adjusted his aim to focus their fire, but it wasn't long before the scene changed. Poppi, one of the metal golems, had her leg torn off by the Ender Dragon's struggles as she pummeled the creature. Her companion chased after her, the Witcher deciding to let the strange round engineer handle that situation.

The dragon escaped Bowser's grip shortly after, striking a hefty blow on him before taking to the skies and lashing her tail out at those who had taken refuge on high. Cursing, Geralt warped away from the tower he was atop, careful to avoid dropping himself inside a pool of acid, but otherwise uncaring of exactly where he ended up. He had to remain vigilant lest he step into the caustic solution, but he quickly made his way around to witness the result of Bowser's next attack. As clever as it might have been in concept, the results were markedly less spectacular: a horde of Endermen attacking the large turtle-king.

Sighing, the Witcher moved towards Bowser, careful to avoid the acid on the ground. Unfortunately, he wasn't able to get to the group without warping, and was forced to stay back from the action and formulate a new plan in part due to his aversion to doing so when it wasn't strictly necessary. He didn't want to fire into the melee lest he hit his allies, which was even more of a concern with the habit of the Endermen to teleport around seemingly at random.

What a pain in the ass, Geralt mused. Linkle, at least, had joined the combat and was whittling their numbers down. He didn't think she'd have any trouble with it, so Geralt decided to focus back on their main target: the damned dragon.

The sound of a trio of explosions, quickly followed by the elf-eared boy shouting to stay away, helped guide Geralt's eye to the enemy, and he aimed carefully with his blaster, taking a few more shots at the dragon, this time not focusing on any specific body part, and just hoping to land some hits due to the distance between them.

Donnie didn’t have much time to celebrate his shots hitting home (albeit at Tora’s expense) when he saw the dragon’s black tail swooping towards him out of his peripheral vision. He jammed the collective lever as hard is at would go, sending the Flying Machine up into the air...but he’d only managed to clear the dragon’s tail halfway when he heard a horrific tearing noise underneath him.

He looked down...and saw that he was only flying half a machine. The undercarriage had been ripped off completely, leaving no way to actually land the Flying Machine properly. And, to make matters worse, the fuel tank had been partially torn open, causing gasoline to rain from the bottom of the chassis.

The tail had struck diagonally upwards from the right, meaning that the Flying Machine was down its left engine too. Gravity began to take hold, sending the Flying Machine into a death spiral!

Donnie knew there was no way to save his autogyro. Without landing gear, in the middle of a fight, with the whole thing tilted downwards, it would only be good for salvage even if he tried his hardest to keep it aloft.

Thankfully, the remaining engine and the rotor on top were helping him maintain enough lift to slow his descent, giving him precious time to think. Risking a glance at the Dragon, he saw Jak going for a downwards slam of some kind. Hopefully that would ground the dragon, but it would complicate things.

He only had one shot at this, and he wanted to make the Dwarven Flying Machine’s swan song count for something before he bailed. It was already leaking fuel, and had a bunch of Boom Biters loaded in the chassis that thankfully hadn’t exploded. Two dangerous combustibles in one place.

And Tora might have given it a safety overhaul, but if there was one thing Donnie knew about Azerothian engineering, it was that if you knew a device well enough, you could always find a way to make it explode in a hurry.

He reached into the exposed wiring of the Flying Machine’s damaged components, thankful he was largely wearing leather armor with an insulated gambeson underneath, and quickly took the wire that led to the last remaining Drill Shield engine and hooked it up directly to the main battery, bypassing the resistors that would normally lower the current to something manageable.

Just as he suspected, he began to smell smoke as the wiring that led to the right engine began to fry under the increased current. Soon, an electrical fire broke out, and he knew he had to bail now..

“JAK!” he yelled. “GOT A SPECIAL DELIVERY! GET OUT OF THE WAY!” If Jak looked up, he would see a sparking, flaming Flying Machine spewing smoke, with one engine and its entire undercarriage outright ripped off, plummeting in a death spiral that would end in a collision course with the dragon’s head--and by extension, him. And Donnie had made sure that when it collided, true to most Azerothian technology, it would explode gloriously.

Donnie, for his part, wasn’t stupid. He’d packed a parachute just in case he had to bail. He was only about a hundred feet up, so there wasn’t enough time for the parachute to really slow his descent. The landing was a hard one. Not a lethal one, but he still yelled in pain as his right femur broke.

He couldn’t get a good look at the injury, what with the armor in the way, but casting Vivify once was enough to get the fracture to reset itself and mostly rejoin, and the torn muscle to heal, but he’d definitely still have some bruises left over and the bone wouldn’t be completely like new until at least another cast or two.

And he wouldn’t have that time, as the dragon would be feeling the impact of those attacks by now and it would be pissed. He got to his feet, ready to dodge whatever else the dragon had up its sleeve once it hit the ground, and respond in kind with a kick to the eye from his good leg. And with his new speed boost, dodging would hopefully be a cinch.