[center][h3]Outbreak Contained[/h3]
[color=BFBFBF]Zenkichi Hasegawa[/color] & [color=gold]Roxas[/color]
[b]Word count:[/b] 4,045
[b]Exp:[/b] +5[/center]

Zenkichi nodded at Roxas’s comment, shrugging. [color=BFBFBF]”History doesn’t repeat, but it rhymes.”[/color] He quipped back, pointing at the hideous form of Nyx, which was in the process of absorbing a Flood combat form. [color=BFBFBF]”Whatever that thing is, it’s bad news. Eating the smaller guys. Dunno if it’s just eliminating the competition or if it’s getting something out of that, but I’d rather not find out the hard way.”[/color] Summoning Ragnell, he started forward. [color=BFBFBF]”Let’s make this quick.”[/color] He decided to keep Preservation Protocol as the active protocol from Sandalphon's covenant for now.

[color=gold]”I got your back!”[/color] Roxas said, agreeing with the detective’s assessment that they were better off getting this over with. Before he got too far away from him, Roxas gave Zenkichi a temporary speed buff with Tailwind. It seemed pretty obvious that the big devouring one was the main threat here. But even just getting close meant hacking and slashing his way through the demons and undead that surrounded it. And also, well, it was literally eating things that got close, so… did Roxas even want to take that risk? Even so, he had to at least try to eliminate some of the smaller fry before they could be devoured, just in case the nasty one actually was getting something out of it like Zenkichi theorized.

[color=gold]”Thunder!”[/color] Roxas cried after using his StepSword to instantly move himself in the center of a group. The lightning was called down after the slash from his energy blade allowing for a solid bit of opening area of effect damage on the group. After that he went on the defensive, using his Keyblades to block an incoming strike and then retaliate with Dual Counter, allowing for a wipe-sweeping circular slash to enable some extra crowd clearing.

Zenkichi, having given a quick “thanks” for the speed boost from Roxas, proceeded to harass the edge of a group of demons, swatting Empusas from the sky with Ragnell’s energy blasts. From within the group fighting off the floodfestation came a few blasts of hell energy, Hell Razers turning to fight off the attack from the Phantom Thief, who quickly dodge rolled out of the way, calling on Valjean to attack the group before it could scatter. [color=BFBFBF]”Triple Down!”[/color] He wasn't as concerned with each of the three area shots hitting as he was with softening up the group before going in, though a few Empusa and Hell Razers took the full brunt of the attack, the Empusa bursting and the Hell Razers roaring in anger before doubling down and turning even more attention his way. The defense boost from Preservation Protocol would probably come in handy as he dodged and tanked even more attacks from the demon swarm.

The Flood and Infested that the demons had been fighting took advantage of this, charging in and overwhelming the group as Zenkichi continued to fire explosive blasts of holy energy from Ragnell, but following not far behind them was Nyx, now sporting a Hell Razer's energy weapon from feasting on a weakened one before the others could kill it. [color=BFBFBF]”Roxas, we got a problem! This thing is absorbing them and now it has a laser gun!”[/color] He called out to his teenage companion, breaking off from his attack and moving to regroup with him.

So [i]that’s[/i] what the monster got when it devoured things? It could gain their abilities? Well that… certainly complicated things. With another quick Thundaga he gave himself enough space to disengage and then regroup with Zenkichi. Roxas put up a medium-sized wall of virtual blocks between them and Nyx, hoping it could take at least a few shots without breaking so they could formulate some kind of strategy. [color=gold]”Should we focus on the big one instead?”[/color] He asked, taking a moment to use his RockGun to fire a charged shot at Nyx, a potshot more than anything else. [color=gold]”What do you think happens if it eats one of [i]us[/i]?”[/color]

[color=BFBFBF]”Do you want the serious answer or the hopeful answer? Because I’m pretty sure if it gets one of us, the other one is dead basically right away.”[/color] Zenkichi sighed as the B.O.W.’s attention turned away from the wall of blocks and back onto the hordes of demons and undead around it. [color=BFBFBF]”And frankly, I think we divide and conquer. One of us gets its attention and keeps it distracted, while the other mops up the hordes and keeps it from getting stronger. You’ve got some pretty smooth maneuverability, and dealing with groups of weak enemies is sort of my specialty. But if you have any other ideas, I’m open to hearing them.”[/color]

[color=gold]”Get its attention and keep it distracted. Got it!”[/color] Roxas repeated with a nod of confirmation. [color=gold]”I think I’ve got just the thing for that.”[/color] Then he ignited the energy blade of his StepSword and dispelled the wall of blocks. He vanished on the spot after that, only to reappear directly behind Nyx and slashing it with his StepSword. It wasn’t a decisive blow, but it wasn’t meant to be either. It was just a means of repositioning Roxas to a spot where he could cleanly get the creature’s attention. He followed that by summoning Poltergeist, and thanks to the fight having gone on for a bit the bedsheet ghost girl was able to use The Sun Isn’t Kind to endow Roxas with a number of buffs that would last for 10 seconds. The most pertinent of these was Taunt and Stealth. Taunt would clearly draw the aggro of Nyx toward Roxas, while Stealth would help keep him out of the line of fire of that laser gun weapon.

Roxas had to make sure he didn’t waste the 10 seconds he was given by Poltergeist. He darted to the side and got himself on the move. Thanks to Stealth, Nyx had a hard time finding him to attack in spite of being Taunted. When precise shots from the laser weapon failed it, the Nyx then resorted instead to swinging and flailing its arms and tentacles. These were wilder and less predictable attacks, but was able to manage for the time being. During these 10 seconds, Roxas took whatever pot shot he could, whether that took the form of a charged shot from the RockGun or an instant movement with StepSword to position himself behind the Nyx for a back attack. Of course he knew his attacks on their own wouldn’t bring this thing down any time soon, but it was better to start wearing it down as he could for the time being until it was time to coordinate an actual attack alongside Zenkichi later.

Once the buffs from Poltergeist wore off, Roxas had to get a little more creative with his strategy. No longer under Stealth, this meant that Nyx could start better focusing attacks on the Nobody. In response to this, Roxas had to make more use of his virtual blocks. He could put up small walls to help defend against shots from the laser weapon or just generate floating platforms he could launch himself from with Flow Motion as a means of maintaining his momentum and helping to avoid incoming physical attacks. Of course, this wasn’t always successful, case and point one of the tentacles managed to barely catch him in its swing and sent him sprawling to the floor. Thankfully Roxas wasn’t hurt too much and was able to get back into the swing of things in mere moments, but he knew couldn’t afford to let too many attacks like that slip through or else this thing would end up wearing him down.

While Roxas was doing a damn good job of keeping Nyx distracted, Zenkichi focused on dealing with the hordes of demons and floodfested. At least this one wasn’t nearly as massive as the previous group, and their numbers were actually a lot more fair, though he’d given the undead an advantage over the demons with his initial strike. To that end, he charged the floodfested horde, casting Tarukaja on himself to trigger Preservation Protocol and stack a defense boost on as well. As he reached the undead group, Zenkichi leapt in, Ragnell carving down an Infested runner. A reddish-looking volatile runner took the distraction for what it was, charging at Zenkichi with reckless abandon. The Phantom Thief didn’t quite catch the difference in time, pulling Ragnell up to cut it down a touch too slow to avoid the explosion. 

Staggered, Zenkichi took a few moments to recover, giving an opportunistic crawler time to latch onto his leg and start wailing on him. Once he regained his composure, he kicked the infested creature in the head. This knocked it onto the ground, letting him stab Ragnell into it and the floor, groaning. [color=BFBFBF]”Let ‘em catch me off guard. Can’t do that again.”[/color] Despite the successful combo, Zenkichi wasn’t terribly wounded, thanks to Preservation Protocol and Ragnell’s own defense boost. To these monsters, he was a one-man army, and it was time to start acting like it. Hefting Ragnell again, he went to work as Roxas dodged and ran around. Infested, Flood, and demons fell to blows from Ragnell, the holy energy burning the creatures into light. 

As he made his way through the hordes, Zenkichi called on his new Striker, Sosha, for what felt like the first time. The Dragoon appeared, stepping back before thrusting forward with her spear and impaling a runner, whipping the spear to toss the decaying Infested off before sweeping it along a line of Flood combat forms. She then changed up her attacks, thrusting her spear in rapid succession as Zenkichi dodged a Charger’s rushing attack to carve at its flank. As the Charger stumbled, Sosha jumped in to finish it off before despawning, leaving Zenkichi in the midst of the horde. [color=BFBFBF]”Alright, Valjean, let’s Triple Down!”[/color] He called, another trio of gunshots peppering the horde around him and finishing off a good portion of already-wounded undead. By now, about half the original amount of undead and demons remained. Good progress.

Roxas had to hand it to the detective. He wasn’t kidding about specializing in taking on large numbers. That was mostly based on glimpses the Keybearer caught of Zenkichi fighting while he himself was seemingly zipping and flying around. So far he managed to avoid another hit from the tentacles. And one of the main reasons for that was because Roxas realized that there was nothing stopping him from using Tailwind on [i]himself[/i]. Once he figured out he could do that, Roxas was practically buzzing around Nyx like a fly that refused to be swatted. And with the speed buff from Tailwind, Roxas could afford to be a little bolder in how and where he got in his shots. In one instance he switched to his Keyblades immediately after using a teleport-slash with StepSword to get off a follow up flurry of three strikes before he quickly moved on his way to avoid the inevitable retaliation.

All the while, Roxas was using his silver jackal mask to keep track of the cooldown for Poltergeist. As soon as it wound down, he summoned the bedsheet ghost again and allowed her to once more give him the benefits of Stealth, Taunt, Defense Up, and Healing Up. Once again, Taunt and Stealth were the most pertinent buffs, although Defense Up would certainly be helpful in the event Roxas slipped up and got struck down again. And now with that combined with the boon of Tailwind, Roxas could afford to be that much more bold in how he got his occasional shots in. This involved setting up a set of scattered virtual blocks that surrounded Nyx from multiple sides, off of which Roxas then launched himself between them in order to get off a few hit-and-run Keyblade slashes while zipping by Nyx. He’d just gone from being an annoying fly, to a full blown hornet.

But at one point, Roxas’ more risky maneuvers got the better of him when one of Nyx’s tentacles managed to catch him again and swat him away through the air - good thing he had Defense Up or this would have hurt him a lot more. Thinking fast, Roxas managed to generate a small wall of virtual blocks to catch him in his trajectory, so he could then kick himself off of it to go right back on the attack against Nyx. Just as Poltergeist’s buff was wearing off, Roxas seemingly transformed into a streak of light that zig-zagged toward Nyx only for Roxas to re-emerge and unleash a frontal Cross Slash on the B.O.W.. After that he had to let himself land back on the ground so he could touch a non-virtual surface, which would let him instantiate a new set of virtual blocks if needed.

Zenkichi could barely catch any glimpses of Roxas flying around Nyx and harassing it, but that was a good thing- if he couldn’t track the kid, it meant Roxas was doing a good job of keeping himself out of harm’s way. Which, in turn, gave Zenkichi plenty of time to focus on his enemies. With Sosha’s quick cooldown, she was fairly safe to call in often, though he was careful to keep her on the periphery of enemy groups so she wouldn’t get bogged down. With his own self-healing from each enemy he hit, Zenkichi was tough to bog down, especially for the many weaker demons and undead that fought on the battlefield. As the lesser enemies fell, though, Zenkichi was left with some harder threats: a carnis slithered out from behind a group of undead and swiped at him with its clawed limbs. 

Zenkichi had to endure the hit, but he brought Ragnell up for a counterstrike before jumping back to put a little room between him and the giant centipede monster. It pursued and took a swipe as it ran, using the momentum to increase the power of its attack, but Zenkichi blocked the attack and kicked at one of the carnis’s primary legs to knock it off balance before stabbing the holy blade into its body and pulling it out through the side. Ichor and infection poured out of the monster, which chittered angrily and limped forward, sagging to its injured side. Zenkichi almost felt bad, but whatever this thing used to be, it was just host to a horrible infection now. Even as it tried to swipe at him, he dodged back and swung Ragnell, a beam of energy exploding in its face and stunning the carnis for Sossha to appear and finish off. 

With the horde slowly abating and the tougher enemies dwindling with it, Zenkichi was satisfied that the mutant Nyx wouldn’t be able to get much else out of the remaining undead and demons. Looking over to Roxas, he called out, [color=BFBFBF]”Alright, man, I think we can do this from here!”[/color] As he did, he made his way over to the B.O.W., swinging Ragnell to fire blasts of holy energy at it all the while. 

Roxas ran after Zenkichi to start fighting Nyx for real. The first thing he did was re-establish the Tailwind buff for Zenkichi, then did so for himself. He resumed his harassment strategy, at least first. Tailwind and Flow Motion gave him all the agility he needed, and summoning virtual blocks would give him platforms to vault or launch from even in midair. In the time since he’d left Twilight Town two weeks ago, he’d gotten quite good at carrying on fights without hardly ever needing to touch the ground save for an occasional moment or two, and this was no different.

Unlike earlier in the fight, Roxas let himself be more aggressive with his attacks now that Zenkichi was fighting alongside him. This meant he executed longer strings of combos that usually opened with a teleporting slash with his StepSword as a means of putting himself in a favorable position, then following that with 4-5 Keyblade strikes. He thought about using spells or his Keyblade techniques a bit more, but he wanted to save what was left of his MP in case he needed to cast an emergency Curaga.

So instead he let one of his strikers get in on the damage-dealing - Kayano. Not wanting to accidentally repeat what happened the last time he summoned her, Roxas made sure he backed off a bit before bringing her out. When white-dressed beauty appeared this time, she did not shift around everyone’s position. This time she cast some kind of sacred spell that summoned a spectral geyser of water that erupted from underneath Nyx’s position that dealt both dark and water elemental damage.

With the speed boost Roxas granted, Zenkichi reached Nyx in fairly short order. He stayed back a bit as he approached, drawing his revolvers and emptying both cylinders into the mutagenic B.O.W. The more solid portions, the ones that had absorbed some of the various undead and demons from across the battlefield, seemed to be taking damage more readily than the main body, more jelly-like in form and hidden behind bone plates and the consumed corpses of demons and whatever the Flood and Infestation had taken. Indeed, after only a few shots, the torso of a Flood combat form that Nyx had absorbed collapsed, falling off of Nyx’s body and dissolving into ash. 

[color=BFBFBF]”Roxas, focus on the stuff it’s absorbed! If we destroy that, it’ll be weaker and easier to hurt!”[/color] Zenkichi called out, stowing his guns and drawing Ragnell to fire a blast of energy at one of Nyx’s elongated arms, carving off an Infested runner’s oversized arm.

[color=gold]”Fire!”[/color] Roxas cried, aiming a Firaga spell at another of Nyx’s arms. And sure enough, a part of it that was absorbed from some other victim fell off in a flaming heap and turned to ash. [color=gold]”Looks like you called it. Thanks for the tip!”[/color] That allowed Roxas to re-adjust where he targeted his spells and attacks. And the Medabot spirit he had fused with back in Midgar made calculating his aim a quite simple task. So Roxas strung together attacks at specific parts of Nyx’s body now. An arm here, a leg there, all while still maintaining his current strategy of harassing the mutant rather than engage it directly.

He tried to keep an eye out for how Zenkichi was fairing, too. He wanted to be ready in case he needed to swoop and heal them both up with a Curaga. Then he also decided to test the waters to see how effective the RockGun was when its charged shots were aimed at actual weak spots. And it turned out to be a marked improvement, not enough to destroy the absorbed spots in one shot, but enough to soften them up for a follow up strike by either himself or Zenkichi.

Zenkichi rushed in as Roxas started using his RockGun, hitting Nyx from behind with Ragnell and catching its attention. As a beam of hell energy swept across the battlefield, he performed an acrobatic front flip over the laser and focused on the Hell Razer Nyx had absorbed, the holy blade slicing into the engorged tentacle-limb that the demon was part of. The main body of the demon was buried beneath a few others, floodfested and demon alike, which implied Nyx could manifest weapons and attacks wherever was most convenient, annoyingly enough. It would have been too easy for the laser blaster to be buried under a pile of flesh, though. 

As Nyx flailed and violently slammed its arm into Zenkichi, he brought up Ragnell in time to block the blow, but it had more momentum behind it than Zenkichi was expecting, sliding him back a good ten or so feet. [color=BFBFBF]”Damn, this thing’s tougher than it looks. You got any ideas other than just…keep doing the same thing?”[/color] he asked.

[color=gold]”Just one.”[/color] Roxas answered with a quick nod. Then he summoned Oathkeeper to his left hand and held it above his head, [color=gold]”Light!”[/color] It was the sign of his sharing his light with an ally, in this case - Zenkichi. The Phantom Thief would find himself empowered enough to immediately summon his Persona, Valjean, to perform a wide-reaching whip attack with his chains before disappearing again.

After that was a hail of gunfire and bullet spray as Zenkichi was able to unload a volley of explosive shots from his revolvers, which were instantly reloaded for the Limit attack. Meanwhile, Roxas hurled both Keyblades forward and the weapons proceeded to zip around Nyx’s body making numerous cuts and slashes while the Nobody himself charged up a finishing blast that he fired from the RockGun embedded in his right gauntlet.

[color=BFBFBF]”Oh [i]YEAH![/i]”[/color] Zenkichi whooped, immediately rushing forward with his Greatsword to attack the battered Nyx, which had lost a large portion of its accumulated biomass and was now almost fully exposed in its gelatinous form. [color=BFBFBF]”Oh yeah, this thing looks a lot different now. And…grosser. I regret everything.”[/color] Zenkichi joked, jumping back for another attack from Valjean. [color=BFBFBF]”Valjean, One-Shot Kill!”[/color] Before the B.O.W. even had time to react to the previous strike, a massive bullet summoned from Zenkichi’s persona crashed into it, sending it stumbling backwards.

[color=gold]”Ugh, you’re not kidding.”[/color] Roxas said. He had no more MP now, but it didn’t seem that would be an issue anymore. He also charged forward, managing to trap Nyx’s gelatinous form between an array of virtual blocks that surrounded it from different angles. Then the Nobody simply launched himself between those blocks and sliced and diced with his Keyblades as he passed by the B.O.W. until he was ready to put that momentum into one more downward thrust of his Keyblades from above.

[color=gold]”Yuck, please tell me it’s gone now.”[/color] Roxas said hopefully.

Watching Nyx stumble and fall, its slowly pulsating inner core slowly fading from Roxas’s thrust attack, Zenkichi sighed in relief. [color=BFBFBF]”Looks like it.”[/color] As the B.O.W. faded into ash, leaving its Spirit behind, Zenkichi’s vision began to tunnel as a trio of cards appeared, each showing an image and a block of text, like playing cards. [color=BFBFBF]”Huh?”[/color] He wondered, reading them over. The one that appealed to him most, though it was not an easy choice, earned his selection, and once he touched the card, his surroundings returned. [color=BFBFBF]”That was weird.”[/color]

[hider=For Zenkichi][b]Sworn Strike[/b] - increases the damage of basic melee attacks and causes them to apply Hitch for 8 seconds, which causes foes to take 30% of the damage taken by other foes with Hitch[/hider]

Roxas, meanwhile, had been having his own little experience. When his vision darkened and tunneled, he too had a trio of cards floating in front of them. They looked like they were granting some kind of power up, maybe as a reward for beating that nasty gelatin thing? All three of the powers seemed incredibly good to have, so choosing just one was tough. But Roxas did choose one in the end and touched the card in question. [i]”Brilliance without measure, talent without equal.”[/i]

And then his vision went completely back to normal. [color=gold]”So whoever’s behind this tree is trying to… help us… destroy the Guardian?”[/color] Roxas wondered, utterly confused now by the design and purpose of this place.

[hider=For Roxas]
[b]Super Nova:[/b] Your casts/spells increase in size up to 40% as they go on, until they expire.
[/hider]

[color=BFBFBF]”Might be. If this thing is alive, maybe the Guardian is the source of the infection. If that’s the case, let’s pop open another vein and get going. It ain’t gonna wait for us, after all!”[/color] Following his own advice, Zenkichi started making his way over to the edge of the battlefield, scooping up some Spirits to crush later along the way.

Roxas nodded in agreement and let a smile form on his lips. [color=gold]”Right behind you!”[/color] He replied as he followed after the Phantom Thief, stopping only to pick up Nyx’s spirit. He wasn’t about to fuse with something this disgusting, and making it a striker wasn’t appealing either. Could result in a useful item if he could hold onto it until they got back to the Avenger. After that he followed Zenkichi through one of the freshly unlocked veins, ready to put this hollow behind them.