Though smaller and perhaps less imposing like this, the Gravemind’s new form was in almost all aspects a straight upgrade. Being able to move, and at not insignificant speeds, made it a harder target by default, and as Zenkichi quickly found out when he spent big on Agneyastra, it was much, much hardier than it looked. Those meteors made an impact on his target, but not nearly as much as they should have. In fact, the Gravemind’s new body -a hyper dense composite of all the strongest materials from its constituent biomass- reduced all incoming damage by a whopping seventy percent. It barely flinched from the detective’s Ragnell blasts, and his bullets only scratched it. With the Gravemind stomping around, blanketing large swathes of the arena with toxic smog as it swung its scythe to and fro, this would be a tedious war of attrition if he couldn’t figure out a better way to fight it.

Fortunately, that was what Sandalphon was for. When called, the archangel answered immediately, though she seemed to be raising her voice over background noise that sounded rather like her using her gunstaff. “It’s not just the heads themselves. I have identified one point of interest on each. Look for pink glowing light. Enough damage to one may eliminate one head entirely. Accomplishing this would take more focus and ammunition than you can spare, though. I recommend targeting a leg. With the weight distribution of its new form spread over only three legs, it will drop if it loses even one.”

Not everyone needed to sweat the details, however. For Grimm, the plan was the same as ever. As dangerous as the Consuls were, the Troupe Master was well aware of the team’s real objective, so despite their reduced effectiveness he continued his hit-and-run tactics. Grimm launched firebats from afar, warped in to ignite the Gravemind’s legs with claw slashes, and speared those limbs from below, covered by supporting fire from his Grimmchild. With his natural constitution and the regular heals from Fire Enthusiast, he did not recoil from the Gravemind’s toxic clouds; if anything, they made it harder for the Guardian to lash out at him.

Ganondorf needed no such tactics, though. After startling both enemy and ally alike with his intense, resounding bellow, he transformed into Ganon to turn the scramble against the Gravemind into a clash of the titans. The great beast poured his fury into an onslaught against the nearest head, the one with lateral tentacles and a boxy shape. Only with the help of its damage reduction could the Gravemind withstand his outrage. The pounding, slashing, maiming assault, followed by a cascade of Dark Breath, proved enough to destroy the targeted head, but after reeling the Gravemind struck back. Given plenty of time to take aim, the head to the left swung its massive scythe just beneath Ganon’s collarbone, hard enough to pierce deep into the monstrous warlord’s body. Then, with its target impaled and unable to move, the Gravemind used both its third head and the stump of its first to launch a bombardment of spore grenades that pummeled Ganon like a cluster bomb. Blazermate would find her impressive single-target healing pushed to its limits by such a vicious response. As the bombardment concluded, however, Grimm appeared on Ganon’s shoulder and threw open his cape to help out with a firebat salvo to the Gravemind’s stump. ”Hear its swan song,” he rasped as the undead voices wailed. ”The curtain calls. Fight on!”

On the other side of the arena, after their scramble to get past O’s attractions, Junior and Rika made an entrance by busting into the Command Center’s reinforced dome with a mighty swing from the crane ride’s submersible pod. With a tremendous crash, they fell through a shower of glass into the jungle enclosure of the Tyrannosaurus that Juri had escaped a few seconds prior, triggering the beast’s fight or flight instinct. While the kids might not escape the T-rez as easily as she did, Juri at least was free to hunt O down–a fact that did not go unnoticed by the incredulous Consul himself.

Back toward the hollow’s front, Consul D scowled at the sight of Roxas and his split keyblade toss. He curled his wings around to shield himself from both sides. The weapons bounced off, but after he’d taken so many light-infused shots from Pit already, the extra bursts jolted his wings enough that he couldn’t use them to take flight for a moment. “Insolent whelp!” He unleashed a tunnel of flame from within his cape. Once it destroyed the boy’s charge shot, he dragged the infernal torrent around to target the whole team, blasting Nadia on the way. What he did not notice, however, was the raw slab of meat that plopped down at his feet.

“Meat your match!” Nadia shouted with a wink.

When a huge tiger popped into being, D’s first thought was to back up. Instead he backed into the cubes placed by Roxas, and in that moment of stoppage the tiger’s claws mitt raked across his left forearm. “Damn you!” He sliced at the beast with his scythe, ducked around another slash, then opened its chest from hip to shoulder to banish the tiger from existence.

At that moment, though, another steak smacked him, and another tiger appeared. Nadia was spawning them as fast as she could, gleefully chortling as she burned through her limited ammo. “Watch out–these aren’t miss-steaks!” With D still losing ground, he couldn’t dispatch the feral’s tigers faster than she could summon them, so as the blood rain petered out and his other foes pushed in, he performed an evasive mist step backward.

He reappeared at the remains of his throne, his breathing labored. Though he managed to make his opponents pay for every inch, he could not deny the fact that the Seekers were gaining ground, much to his chagrin. The two hunters possessed both skill and power, the two boys wielded his weakness alongside their dual blades, and the two thieves imaginatively and mercilessly exploited every opportunity. Now that they were working together, bringing their varied abilities to bear two or three at a time, the six were proving to be troublesome. Not more than he could handle, he didn’t think, but perhaps more trouble than the Guardian was worth.

D looked around for a moment, alerted to the distinct lack of widespread chaos. While he could see plenty of stuff that O left behind, his fellow Consul’s disembodied eyes were nowhere to be seen. Had O already been defeated? Forced to retreat? Or to focus on saving himself? With how strong the Seekers must be to challenge him to this extent, D would not be surprised to learn that O had been beaten, that old fool. Meanwhile the Gravemind had lost or consolidated enough mass to go mobile. The Brother Moon descended from the skies above, which would almost certainly wipe the heroes out once it arrived, but while D could feel a terrible power -even by his standards- emanating from A, it did not seem like the Consul could escalate any further. Meanwhile, the Seekers still swarmed the place like gnats. Far too many remained at this point, given how many Consuls happened to be backing the Guardian up, himself amongst them!

“...Vermin!” D spat. Even if things weren’t going to plan, he would not relent so long as the Guardian lived. To that end, it was time for him to follow in A’s footsteps. “Consider yourselves honored,” he announced, the Moebius core in his chest spinning up. “Today, you will have the privilege of witnessing my true, perfect form!” In a surge of purple light D transformed, entering his twelve-foot tall Moebius form, his enormous wing-like arms spread wide as he leered down at the Seekers. “Grovel before me, and your deaths will be mercifully swift!”

Nadia looked up as she retrieved her daggers, then slipped them back into her belt with a sigh. Her burns and other wounds were regenerating well enough, and the feral knew she could keep fighting, but even she was starting to lose steam. “Sheesh. You bozos don’t know when to quit!”

For a moment Moebius A’s attention had remained on the majestic nightmare unfolding far above him, eyes wide as if in admiration of the cataclysmic horror soon to be unleashed upon the unsuspecting Seekers, if not the World of Light itself. Once he came under fire, however, he returned his focus to his enemies. It looked like a new batch of would-be heroes had subbed in for those left dazed and reeling from his stresscasting, lest they succumb to a breakdown like that tactician did. A smart move on Seekers’ part, but ultimately a futile one. These fools would fall like all the rest–one way or another. ”Ringing ears. Blurred vision. The end approaches!”

A soon realized, though, that his new challengers were every bit as tenacious as his last. Fresh from their respective fights, these courageous few hit the ground running, piling on a lot of damage in a short time. Though Midna, hit hard, few hit harder than her colossal thrall’s greatsword, which cleaved away a whole chunk of A’s vitality in one blow. Roland followed up with an even more spectacular feat that had to be seen to be believed. And while he might resist Primrose’s sorcery to begin with, every spell she landed made him more susceptible, and Luna pierced his defenses. Perhaps the loss of their comrades or the dreadful sight of that aberrant moon spurred them to new heights, forcing them to make the most of what little time they had left.

Of course, A struck back with a vengeance. He wielded his formidable Moebius body to unleash a slew of brutal attacks targeting the Seekers with the lowest resistances. Dissolution could leave foes stunned and blighted by the awful sensation of flesh-eating bacteria, while the wounds left by Puncture bled exorbitantly. He could even target the mind with Know This, ravaging the Seekers’ sanity instead of their bodies. All the same, his attackers did not relent, and as his own vitality continued to drain, A's anger rose. These imbeciles still did not understand what they were doing–and it was time to show them.

His eye and core gleamed with vivid crimson light as A spread his arms wide. “Moebius gave every one of you life!” he cried. “And Moebius can take it away! Come, unto your maker!”

Immediately, the whole battlefield seemed to shift around the Seekers. Their vision swam, heavily distorted, and the darkness closed in. When their surroundings finally resolved themselves, they seemed to be in a dark, dome-shaped room with walls of moving, amorphous flesh, lined with eyes and fangs. Those walls shifted and well, slowly closing in on the trapped heroes. Their will and ability to fight had deserted them, leaving them paralyzed by something akin to fear as they stood before a floating Moebius A, his hand extended downward as if to accept one of his enemies’.

”Choose.”

Nadia shrank away from the monstrous thing’s hand, her ears flattened and her teeth bared. What was happening? Why couldn’t she fight back? She willed her claws to sharpen, and her muscles to tense, but her body didn’t obey. Instead her heart pounded, and her nerves trembled. None of this made any sense! It sounded like A was forcing one of her teammates to offer themselves up. For what sinister purpose, she could only imagine, but it wasn’t hard to grasp the dreadful implication within A’s words. She knew only one thing: that she refused to play along. She couldn’t die here. She wouldn’t! Not after everything she’d lost to get this far. Not before everything she stood to gain! “Sorry, A-hole. I’ve got too much to live for to die here!” And with that, the buck was passed.

”I’m… Not coming back from that. The me that is here is the only one that will ever be me, and so you can’t have me back” Rika replied in turn. The girl’s entire being was entirely a product of the world of light, of this one life in it. She was only a step behind the lost numbers in that regard, because without the events of the past few weeks, she would be nothing but a nameless pawn of the abyssal fleet. There was little to no chance the coincidence that had freed her, created her, would ever happen if she was respawned, and so she declared ”and you’ll never make another me again!”

Roland got ready himself for this incoming attack. He was a survivor, he wouldn’t just give himself up to some monster, only the foolish do that. No matter the trial, no matter the opponent, he’d fight for his survival and this wasn’t any different. ”I don’t listen to lunatics. You're not the first, and you won't be the last.”

Edelgard bristled, her eyes blazing with fury. ”I have too much to do to falter here. The people of Adrestia still need their Empress, monster.”

Next up was Juri. ”Not it!” She said, teeth clenched.

Though Grimm’s eyes burned with scarlet flame, the gaze that fell on Moebius A was cold. ”If you are not my nightmare’s heart, my flames will not stoke you.”

Geralt simply sighed. “Not happening.”

Zenkichi, on the other hand, slumped his shoulders. It felt like the weight of the world was resting on him. But he took a deep breath, and stood to his full height. ”No. We stand together. We live together.”

Though unable to move, Primrose's eyes flashed with deadly anger. So this was what Sandalphon had warned them about, how A had overcome other parties of would be world saviors in the past. It was quite cruel - she could easily imagine the selfless people that would have given themselves over to him to save their friends.

But that wasn't her.

"You won't have me," she said. "I won't be stopped, not until I have my vengeance."

Therion did not have any grand reason for wanting to stay alive, and figured he didn't really need one. When A's gaze passed over him he tensed and only said, "I don't think so."

"As if any one of us is gonna give in to the likes of you!" Pit added, a defiant stare turned up at the Moebius.

”Yeah you're not going to get the team medic to agree to that. Or anyone.” Blazermate said, staring darts at A as she wanted to just ubersaw him to make her allies finish him faster.

At some point, the walls of this extra-dimensional meat-space had gotten too close to ignore. They shifted and changed in a most horrifically fascinating way, an endless churn of new winking eyes, new gnashing teeth, and new covetous claws. Those eldritch boundaries rose up beneath the Seekers, lifting them higher, descended toward them, and closed in around them. The walls quivered, like a dam about to burst. All the while A’s rictus grin of metal and bone seemed to grow wider and wider as the entity recorded the responses. ”Ahh! Moebius is strong within you! We are your trembling limbs, your chattering teeth, your muttered excuses, your averted eyes! By all means, then, stay! Abide with us, within our Endless Now!”

As the walls closed in, and the certainty that something terrible was going to happen began to set in, Jr glanced at his sister then and began to say something, only to be immediately cut off by the masked figure to his side.

”Come and take me then, as if it will help you!” Midna declared. Her expression was hidden, but her nails were pressed so hard into her hands she was drawing blood as she steeled herself for the end. But then, after all ”What’s one more death in this world?”

A stared at her for a moment, silent. The walls of this aberrant realm stilled, the gleeful hunger of Consul and cosmos alike quelled, as if the feast set before them had been replaced by a mere morsel. Then his chest shifted, and an amorphous tentacle extended. It stretched through the air, its barbed tip aglow with an awful crimson light, and sank into Midna’s chest. She jolted sharply, then relaxed. Her eyes slid closed, and as her body turned to light, her sigh echoed through the eldritch space. Then there was a flash, and everything had returned to how it had been before A cast his fell magic. That nightmare, at least, was over, but the Twilight Princess was gone.

The next second, though, the eighteen who remained experienced a surge of nauseating existential terror. Between the Brother Moon on its way, Midna’s all-too-sudden end, and the fact that all four foes stood stronger than ever, it was a lot to bear. For those subjected to arcane physical and psychological torment by A, however, it proved to be entirely too much to bear. The extra stress pushed Goldlewis, Ganondorf, Captain Falcon, and Therion over the edge, and their bodies rebelled like Edward’s had. Goldlewis sank to his knees with a hollow, guttural groan, clutching his chest in the throes of a heart attack. Pain, fatigue, lightheadedness, dizziness, nausea, cold sweat–it all hit the man like a freight train as he suffered a meltdown. For once in the veteran’s life his strength, honed by bearing countless heavy burdens, proved insufficient to shoulder the weight of what he’d experienced.

From the perspective of Moebius D, the Seekers had vanished for a moment, then reappeared none the worse for wear, only for half of his challengers to falter the next moment. With only Geralt, Roxas, and Pit still standing before his new form, his victory seemed all but certain. A nasty grin spread across his demonic face. “Ah, so even heroes can be made to kneel! A wise choice!” He lifted his scythe, enlarged to suit his bigger body. ”In that case, I shall make good on my word!”

A beam of bright blue light descended from the sky, its holy radiance brilliant enough to give the vampiric Consul pause. When it ended Sandalphon stood there in the glow of her three-ring halo, her face hard as she clutched her gunstaff with both hands. It was true that she’d lacked the skill charge to help out so far, but that was before she requested the aid of Sectonia’s Antlers to use as batteries. “Seekers of Light, do not despair! Stand strong, in Illia’s name!” she called out as she cast Angelic Wings. Circuits of light spread along the Qliphoth floor around her in intricate circular patterns as holy screens picked up speed, then spread outward. Her miraculous skill not only fully healed all nearby allies, but thanks to Coordination Protocol, boosted their maximum health by twenty percent if they had any status afflictions to purge. Then Sandalphon brought down her staff to leave behind a healing circle, and with every ounce of strength left in her hoarse voice cried, “Onward, to victory!”

“Gah!” D snarled, having shielded his eyes from the archangel’s light. He watched as Goldlewis, Falcon, and Therion got back up, then snorted. “Very well. Slow and painful it is!” He drew in magic power, then spread his limbs. “Destruction Ray!” From each and every claw -including those on his wings- flew a beam of purple dark magic that arced through the air. Unlike Dominus Hatred, these rays would seek their targets, and three sought out Sandalphon in particular. They shot down at her with blistering speed, but before the beams could make contact, the archangel disappeared once more.

@Lugubrious

Word Count: 416
Level: Lv: 6 EXP: (3/60)
Location: Dead Zone Hinterlands - Martira, Old Castle Town

Harry took his time sightseeing the town. He took particular interest in the little shops peppered around the city. He was used to the standoffish nature of the townspeople. He was used to such attitudes while he was in Revachol. He found himself staring at the residents and how different everyone looked. He touched his pale ears, wondering how he would look with pointy ears.

“Well you would look alot better then you do currently.” Perception chimed in to which Harry shook his head.

“I think i look good.” Harry replied while walking down the street.

“Yeah Your Detective, Love, after all. You always look good." Suggestion said, making Harry feel a little better. The added confidence made Harry wink and give some finger guns to a passing woman. The woman looked at him in disgust and shook her head. Harry wondered what the world “Elda” meant.

“Elda means outsider or freak, considering you look much different than people here.” Encyclopedia said.

“I don’t blame them. You look like shit Harry.” Volition added, sounding quite disappointed.

“Elda must mean you are one sexy beast.” Suggestion said, trying to correct Encyclopedia.

Harry finds himself in many different places, disappointed that this is not where Bardon is. But he was glad when he finally found the right place. He stopped a guard telling him he was looking for Bardon. He even showed them his badge to show them he was a detective. And was fit for the search for the missing children. The guard looked unsure if he should allow Harry to see Bardon but decided to do so.

After following the guard to Bardon, Harry was impressed by how impressive he looked. Again, Harry was drawn to Bardon’s ears and outfit. “Maybe I should see where I can get some armour and a weapon like that,” Harry thought before bowing toward Bardon.

“Hello sir, my name is Detective Harry Dubois. I was told you were looking for someone to investigate the missing kids.” He walked over so he was a bit closer to Bardon. “When did the kids start going missing? How long has Heismay been in Curien Mansion? Have people seen him wandering the area where the kids have gone missing?” He wished he had his ledger and a pen to write notes. “Yes actually i will need a pen, and a note book.” He said nodding his head.

“HELL YA DETECTIVE LOVE IS BACK IN ACTION!!” A voice screamed in his head.

The dome of O’s base that had been cracked by the impact of the pod smashed open, and the duo of royal sprogs smashed through, spooking the rex inside that Juri had simply walked around. It roared at them and began to advance, but was then briefly confused by the pair of intruders vanishing before they even hit the ground. They reappeared a moment later, and proceeded to hit said ground badly, Rika and Jr both sent sprawling, the transition away alone enough to foul up their landing, let alone what had occurred while they were away.

Rika recovered fastest, skipping the process of getting up via clicking on her cassette player, static engulfing her as she took on the 8 meter long form of the Beast, one which cared a lot less about being flat down on its belly than her own did. Still, as she swiftly pushed herself up onto her many feet, she came face to face with the fact that hitting play wasn’t going to be nearly as much of an easy win button as it had against the others animals, mainly because unlike them, the changing 4 meter tall and 13 meter long prehistoric monstrosity was bigger than her.

She swerved her head out of the way of being guillotined by its humongous jaws, only for its clawed foot to crunch down onto the rear of her long body before she could nip in and try and bite it back, eliciting a pained shriek.

The dinosaur swerved around, turning to try and catch her head as Rika tried to round it as well. In so doing whipped its tail towards Jr, but it was so tall that it sailed right over the top of the teary eyed boy head before he hit play and transformed as well.

”Get away from my sister!” he roared with Undyne’s voice, hurling a spear after the dinosaur, only for this to do little to nothing to its thick hide. It retaliated by glancing back and intentionally flicking its tail back towards the prince, forcing him to duck.

It clipped the crest on Undyne’s helm despite this, causing him to stagger and fall to one knee.

”Peeka!”/ he called out, intending to have his minion confuse the foe, only for the command to turn into a scream as the t-rex flowed with the momentum of the tail whip to turn on the prince again, jaws lunging forwards and snapping shut around him.

Jr just barely managed to raise Undyne’s spear such that it stabbed into the roof of the beast’s mouth, with the butt to the tongue. It cleaved through a little flesh till it hit bone, stopping the bite from simply shearing him in half, but fangs still crushed and scythed, cleaving and lacerating Undyne’s form, pinning a hand and leg.

Having been unable to heal this form himself, its already sapped life force began to rapidly drain away from all the wounds, as teeth dug in deeper. Yet, deep in the memory of the spirit it was a recording of, there was a burning feeling that wouldn’t let it die. It was a feeling the prince reached for and stole just a part of, performing a ritual that meant that, when Udnyne’s life came to an end a moment later, instead of breaking, her form seemed to melt and then rapidly reform into that of Undyne the Undying

It bought him maybe five more seconds of life.

Rika pivoted to use them, throwing her bulk at the tyrant king but with her back legs crippled she stumbled on the charge. In the time it took her to recover, the dinosaur crushing her brother completed the 360 spin, and then stamped a clawed foot down into Rika’s front half, just barely missing her head but still pinning her Beast form to the ground, pushing its weight down atop her.

Peeka, instructionless, blasted the towering dino, but it wasn’t anywhere near enough to dissuade the grip it had on the two children.

Colossal fangs pierced armor and magical flesh as the t-rex tried to devour the prince it had grasped in its jaws, as the spear stabbed between its jaws stopped it crushing Jr began to bend and buckle. A hand, trapped between fangs and inches from being severed, reached blindly down towards where a pinned Rika futility scrabbled and clawed at the limb pinning the Beast’s neck to the floor, entirely unable to reach up in turn.

And yet, where bodies were failing them, and the screaming pain drowned out any thought of clever escapes, their souls reached out to, clasped hold of, and drew strength from each other, and, when presented with the possibility of their end, as one heart declared: I REFUSE!

Static surrounded them once more, but rather than the Cassette Beast forms falling away and leaving their true selves in the deadly situations they were pinned, Undyne’s body melted through the grip of the tyrant’s jaws like water, streaming towards that of the Beast, fusing into it and, together, the two of them becoming something entirely new.

Where the Beast’s scrabbling claws had failed, a freshly forged armored fist lashed out into the leg of the beast not holding its body down, toppling the tyrant king. Then, when the pair of beasts then rose to face each other, they found that the children’s now stood the taller of the two.

A few moments later an explosion rocked the dome, and then the body of the t-rex came careening through the spot in the wall that the koopa kids had entered into, stone and dust flying everywhere as it smashed through the weakened structure and crashed to the floor below.

As the dust cleared a towering figure appeared at the hole they had smashed using the ancient beast. It was neither Rika nor Jr, nor was it one of their cassette beasts. Instead it was a six meter (19 foot) tall figure, its body covered in red chitten modeled around their form like plate-mail. A kite shield, positioned such that its point pointed back towards the elbow, and which sported two massive forward protruding horn-like spikes on top was held by the right hand, while the left brandished a two pronged trident of glowing white metal. The head appeared to be wearing a crested helm, one sporting glowing white eyes sat behind the visor slits and a fang like grill over the mouth. That illusion that was broken a moment later when the grill opened wide and revealed itself to be a true maw, one filled with row upon row of t-rex blood slicked shark teeth, and one with which it unleashed a screeching insectile battlecry that resounded throughout the arena.

Having announced its presence, the fusion of Undyne and the Beast that would be known as the Monster leapt from its perch in response to the perfectly in sync will of the two royal siblings, drawing the spiked shield back, beastial energy building and roiling around the not at all defensive armament, and slamming it down on the cripled form of the T-rex. The Berzerk Blast, a move unique to this fusion, careened into the ancient animal’s skull, smashing it downward into the ground, cratering it on impact as the brains within where turned to paste.

The Monster drank of the destruction it had wrought as it stood, having gained yet another stack of melee attack-up from simply delivering its signature move. It joined the 2 sets of buffs the kids had had that had been piled on-top of eachother, which were empowering their attacks to a monstrous degree.

Two sets of Tailwind and four sets of dragon dances were put to use a moments later, as the Monster set its white hot gaze of rage upon A. Then in the blink of an eye it was on him, having closed the distance at a clip far faster than anything that large deserved, delivering a mountain smash via shield bash to lower the Consul’s melee defence.

The (still wounded despite its bloody feast) Monster then comboed this into a thrust of Desperation with its spear, using the weapon to leaver itself back from A faster than a simple step would manage. Then with the resulting space it wound back the spiked shield back in a manner incredibly reminiscent of the children's father, power gathering around it as they did so, a barely contained haze of tooth and claw building and building, just waiting to be unleashed.

A heartbeat later, the Berzerk Blast roared forwards towards A, alongside the Monster’s screamed demand that he, quite simply, “DIE!”

“Ach, of course, we’ll get those right away.” Bardon looked around until he spotted one of the guards from his patrol who had yet to disperse, primarily due to the Recruitment Center’s resident beagle who’d made a beeline for him in search of attention. He was a young, clean-shaven man whose kettle helm hung down over his eyes, and though unremarkable at first blush, he seemed eager and pleasant enough if the dog’s favoritism was anything to go by. After a moment spent trying to catch the guardsman’s attention, Bardon cleared his throat. “Ahem!”

The young man perked up right away, a sheepish look on his face. “Oh! Right away, sir!” He patted the beagle’s head twice and then took off at a jog, though naturally his companion followed on his heels, floppy ears streaming behind her.

Suppressing a smile, Bardon refocused on Harry. “Beg your pardon. As for your other questions, er. I’m afraid wee ones have been goin’ missin’ for a while now, at least a month. We thought it was the Dead Zone monsters at first, so…we looked to our defenses from the outside, never guessin’ that it was someone sneakin’ in. We don’t know when Heismay started lurkin’ around, but we’ve seen him, aye. My second-in-command, Morris, saw the blackguard himself, skulkin’ around the lower districts in the dead of night. Just about caught him red-handed, too, but he slipped away, and he’s gotten more careful–none of my men have seen him since.” The knight balled his fist, his jaw clenched and his brow furrowed. “It’s a right sorry state of affairs.”

Just then, the Gatekeeper returned with a notepad, quill, and bottle of ink, which he promptly offered to Harry while the beagle snuffled at his shoes. “Here you are, sir! If you need anything else, let me know!” After tossing a scrap of jerky to distract the dog, he hoofed it in the other direction, eager to resume his customary post.

“Right then.” Bardon stood up from his table and extended his hand to shake Harry’s. “I should get goin’. I’ll let the boys know to make you comfortable ‘round town. If you’re lookin’ for somewhere to start, Morris might have some clues about Heismay. He’s off-duty in the mornin’, so I expect you’ll find him at the Friendly Arm. Can’t miss it, it’s the biggest inn around. Best place to catch up on the latest rumors, too. Could be a speck of truth in ‘em somewhere we missed. Best of luck to ye.”

With that, Bardon was off. When Harry stepped back out into the late morning sunlight, he no longer saw some sleepy backwater hamlet, but a dozen deviating pathways spiralling outward into a hidden web of secrets. A lot hung in the balance for how little he had to go on, but already he could see the pieces arranged on this board, and no problem worth solving was easy. The game was on.

In front of him lay the town plaza, with its central fountain dutifully splashing away. Most of the town’s established businesses inhabited buildings around this plaza or along the upward hillside road to the old keep, but a few itinerant merchants had planted stalls along the mossy cobblestones here. They kept a sharp eye out for both danger and potential customers; the general atmosphere here seemed to indicate that nobody could be too careful. The most well-to-do among them was a portly, bespectacled fellow who seemed be selling premium cooking ingredients, which had garnered the interest of a round, orange-furred creature and a young, red-haired lady in expensive-looking attire. Aside from the handful of vendors, though, this public space harbored only a scant few residents whiling away the time. Between here and the Friendly Arm, only a couple people stood out: a bard in a distinctive bear-skin cowl livening things up a little, a dapper man with long sky-blue hair beneath a black bowler hat taking in the scenery with strange, sapphire-bright eyes, and a random gunslinger seated in a corner who seemed to be crafting potions with herbs, mushrooms, and honey. If there were any children left around here, they were locked up tight indoors.

Just when Juri had been sneaking in, she had been yoinked up into some nightmare scenario where, apparently, one of the Seekers had to choose to die. Considering she thought she was running with selfless hero types, it took way longer than she thought for someone else to cave. Eventually, Princess Midna did and it dropped Juri right back where she was before, like it was all in her head. Taking a moment to regain her composure, Juri turned her eyes upward through the glass dome at the encroaching moon, her mouth falling open.

”Tch,” Juri sneered and kept moving through the outside of the enclosure. ”Course it had to be the blue chick who vacuumed up my bike to bite the bullet. Where the hell is my cycle, now?” Juri complained to herself.

Not long after Juri slipped through the Cretaceous enclosure’s electric fence with the help of her hacking ability, a familiar crimson light shone down through the glass dome of O’s Command Center. When the martial artist looked up, she saw the Consul’s giant, disembodied eyes phase through the glass and descend toward her, narrowed in frustrated incredulity around his glowing lemniscate pupils. “What!? How in the world did you…?” They squeezed closed, then shook from side to side. Without the rest of O’s head there to gesticulate, the motion looked a little odd, but Juri got the memo.

Juri couldn’t help but laugh, looking up at the eyes. Her artificial eye glowed as she prepared to use another hack, expecting O to try something.

“Bah, nevermind that. Look, let’s talk this over.” O lowered his tone insistently, his voice a conspiratorial, projected whisper. “Why are you even fighting us? I know you’re not like the others. I’ve got an eye for these things, see. You don’t play by their rules. So why are you dancing on their strings?” His eyes swerved around her, their gaze bemused. “Don’t you know they’ve sent you on a suicide mission? Even if you do ‘save the world’, your existence ends with the Endless Now!”

Juri narrowed her eyes at the accusation she was dancing on anyone’s strings. But she didn’t let this conversation stop her from searching around the perimeter of the glass dome. When O mentioned the suicide mission, she did slow, her eyes unfocusing for a moment with interiority, before she kept moving forward.

”You must be worried if you’re tryin’ to turn me. Talk about a pie in the sky. How ‘bout you show me where you are and we speak in person?” She said with a grin. Juri was fairly immediacy oriented these days, and the pleasure of murdering some desperately bargaining overlord was high on her priority list.

As Juri snooped around the various consoles and rooms that ringed the Command Center’s upper levels, which seemed to be mostly full of large, blinking machines with no discernible purpose, O’s entreaty grew subtly more urgent. “Of course I’m worried,” he hissed as if through gritted teeth. “After all, this world is all that any of us have. If -and that’s a big if- you all actually do destroy the World of Light, it’s not like you’ll wake up with everything back to normal. Maybe some semblance of us will continue on out there, but the ‘we’ who live now will be really, truly dead! Don’t ‘we’ deserve to live!? Better to reincarnate again and again in the World of Light–or better yet, become Moebius! Moebius is immortality. Don’t you see, that could be you!”

His eyes widened as he spoke, and as if to underscore his point, he began to create all sorts of things around Juri. Grass, plants, trees, furniture, vehicles, animals, workers, and more all showed up for a moment, then disappeared. Only a rather expensive-looking motorcycle remained; evidently O had been listening to Juri’s mutters. “The whole world, your very own playbox. Power? Prestige? Revenge? Entertainment? Whatever you crave, it could be yours! Why sacrifice your very existence for them, when you could rule over such fools instead, bend them to your every whim!” Judging by the speed and intensity of his monologued appeal, Juri must be getting close to his hiding spot.

Juri’s stance widened, gripping her Ghoulsaw tightly as she moved forward, surveying the changing objects until her eyes landed on the motorcycle. Consul O could make objects and creatures appear out of thin air, she wasn’t trying to be caught off guard. More than her eyes, she relied on her ears. Her heart began to race, and some deep-seated anger began to boil under the surface. This guy and all his ‘points’ were really rubbing her the wrong way.

Still. She couldn’t pretend O didn’t have her attention. ”You ever heard of a guy named M. Bison? Sometimes he goes by Vega. Big guy in a stupid hat, white eyes and shit-eating grin. Leader of Shadaloo. World dominating type.” She asked.

The Consul paused long enough for it to be conspicuous. “...And what if I have?”

Juri chuckled breathily, now certain that he had. ”Do the math, genius. You offered me revenge. I could even kill someone like him, right?” She asked, though she felt like she already knew the answer and was already out of patience.

“As many times as you could ever want,” O replied, his voice a little too eager. In the pause that followed, there happened to be a brief lull in the battle outside, and Juri heard a metallic clank a couple doors down.

That took her by surprise, and Juri’s eyes widened. As many times as she wanted. At the clank, she turned over her shoulder, and her face soured. Her knuckles whitened. ”Because he’d never really die.” She growled. She wanted him to suffer. But more than that, she wanted to kill him. Really kill him.

Her hands shook. ”He’d come back like he always does. I could torture him for eternity and he’d forget it every ten years. I’d have to start over forever until I ended up like you, trying to bargain my way out of a fight as some new batch of fucking dickheads tries to kill me!” Juri sped forward with a Drive Rush, looking to search as much ground as possible now that her temper had suddenly boiled over. She couldn’t believe she let this arrogant prick slow her down for even a second! Play her for a fool?! God damn it!

”So come on out, asshole! I think you’re the only one between the two of us here that can really die!” Juri called out.

After a moment of stunned surprise, O gave a raspy snarl. “Argh! Vitriolic brat. Would you spite the air for having to breathe it? Your mother for having birthed you?” He paused for a moment, then snickered. “Ah, that must be it! What use is eternity for one for whom existence itself is ennui? What you really crave, then, must be death!”

When Juri burst through the door with a Drive Rush-boosted strike, she finally spotted him. A Consul, armored and masked like all the rest, but wizened and wheelchair-bound. On either side of him stood six zookeepers with randomized appearances but uniformly dead eyes, tranquilizer rifles at the ready. Between them and the door lay an obstacle course of waist-high metal food troughs full of meat, water, and vegetables. O’s Moebius eyes reappeared in front of his helmet, flaring up with red light. “Fire!”

”Shitty geezer!” Juri spat. If she was one thing, it was vitriolic. She lit up with blue Drive Parry energy, and swatted the six darts out of the air with a broad-sided swipe of her Ghoulsaw, letting it swing out wide. She launched herself forward with another Drive Rush. Her feet left the ground as she span nearly sideways through the air over the first few obstacles, saw blade extended. Then her Ghoulsaw slammed into the ground and she planted her feet on top of it. She would let it carry her with a horrifying metallic yowl as it carved through floor and trough alike, only made more manic by the speed increase and streak of energy from her rush and the spray of debris and detritus as she barrelled towards Consul O. At this rate she was looking to carve him and his wheelchair up the middle.

As she closed in, however, an electric fence shot up to protect O from the front. A prehistoric -themed concession stand then popped up around him to shield him from all other angles, its walls of solid stone. With all O’s efforts focused on defense, however, only his zookeepers remained to actually attack Juri. They kept shooting at her, even if their aim left something to be desired; from a physical standpoint, they seemed to be completely normal humans.

Juri reared back, stopping suddenly and hooking her foot on a lever of the Ghoulsaw. She leaned all the way back and tapped her prosthetic eye as her shoulder blades hit the floor, darts sailing through the space she had just occupied. A moment passed and the electric fence turned off. She span on the floor in a break-dance like maneuver and then lunged through the gap in the fence towards O, taking her Ghoulsaw with her to dive inside and slice into his thighs before she even hit the ground.

O howled, his body wrenching in agony as his wordless cry resounded within the echo chamber he’d boxed himself into. While his legs didn’t do him much good, as indicated by his wheelchair, he was still unfortunate enough to have feeling in them. When his concentration was broken and his body moved, his ocular apparition melted away, and the Consul was nothing but a defenseless old man. He had only one card left to play: an attempted to teleport away in a flare of purple Moebius energy, but that would take precious seconds he didn’t have.

Juri let the Ghoulsaw fall where it lay after she landed on the ground, and skittered forward like a spider after its prey. ”C’mere!” She growled, twisting her body to slam her heel into his face to interrupt whatever spell he was casting, knocking him onto his side.

”Wuh oh!” She crowed. Then her plan was simple: stomp his neck and twist. With only the feeblest manner of opposition at his disposal, O could do nothing to stop her. He could only gasp in terrified desperation. “Wait-!” Then came a terrible crack, and the Consul’s body went limp.

Juri stood in silence for a moment, exhaling. She gave the body an extra kick to make sure he started turning to ash. Instead, she quickened his disintegration into glowing purple particles that left not the slightest trace behind, not even a spirit. Juri frowned. The Consuls were different than everyone else in this fake-ass candyland world, she thought. She guessed they didn’t ash.

”’...Wait-!’” She repeated mockingly. ”Heard that one before. Not so eternal now, huh?” Juri asked, picking up her Ghoulsaw. She gave it a wipe, brushing some of the fruit chunks off of it with a frown.

”...Tch” Juri grit her teeth. ”Ennui. What a loser.” She mumbled. She slipped out of the gate and dealt with the remaining guards in a manner-of-fact way.

Juri tipped her head skyward through the dome and to the encroaching monster moon, and listened to the battle outside. ”Uuugh. Alright. Where’s that turtle brat and his toy boat sister?” She asked, before moving to leave the room to find them. She'd find the dome completely empty.

It hit him all at once. Just like Goldlewis, Ganondorf, and Therion - Captain Falcon was doubled over and overwhelmed with sensations of nausea and sickness. The same Captain who for most everything could keep a straight face and roll with the punches, now looked like he was on the verge of a full-blown panic attack with how much his heart was racing and beating inside of his chest. All of this because of the attacks he suffered at the hands of Moebius A. And losing Midna out of nowhere certainly didn’t help matters, either. He wanted to move a muscle. To get back on his feet and keep fighting. But they just wouldn’t move. He was locked, frozen firmly in place as dread and panic threatened to overwhelm him.

Therion wasn't in a much better place. His body rebelled against him as pure stress took over. His knees buckled, his hands shook, his vision swam, his head pounded and his heart thundered against his ribs. His fur stood on end, puffed up to an extent that would be comical if the situation wasn't so dire. It was hard to tell if it was actually getting more difficult to breathe or if his brain was sending his body into further panic. He hadn't felt like this for a long, long time.

The thief didn't struggle against the stress. Rather, he tensed, inching backward and preparing to flee. If it had gone on any longer he would have deserted.

But just as quickly as it came? It was gone. Like a literal miracle from on high, Sandalphon appeared among the group. She spoke words of encouragement and cast one of her spells. The miracle healed them all completely, and that seemed to also include the stress that afflicted Therion and the Captain. They’d finally be able to get back on their feet and back into the fight, just as Moebius D had transformed and brandished his scythe once again.

Though not to the point of a meltdown like some of her allies, Nadia had been hit hard by what happened. Midna was gone, and not in the sense that Toni and Ace were gone, but gone gone. That, plus the sight of half her allies brought to her knees before yet another intimidating power-up from D, had been a potent enough combination to leave even her in a momentary stupor. How were they supposed to win against foes like these, who could snuff out lives like candles? In that moment of darkness among the Seekers, Sandalphon’s arrival was a godsend. Her miracle brought several allies back from the brink they’d been teetering on, and paved the way for a rally. Though she knew the pain of loss all too well, Nadia had been through worse. With someone to avenge, the Seekers would fight that much harder. “We can still do this! For Midna!”

Geralt, back in his normal form, was healed but mentally reeling. While the Seekers who had been carted away weren’t lost, their absence still made the group more vulnerable as a whole. But then Midna went and sacrificed herself. He didn’t understand. His eyes refocused on Moebius D, now in his ‘true’ form. A giant monster. How fitting. Rising to his full height, Geralt took a deep breath. His hand came up to draw the Sign of Quen, shielding him from the incoming rays of dark energy even as he ducked and weaved by instinct to avoid them. And then he screamed, anger and agony and hate and pain all radiating from his voice, as lightning did the same.

He rushed over to the Hateful Flesh, picking the severed cleaver off the ground and charging Moebius D, Monsoon and the Judicator called to join him. The former hurled barrages of sai, while the latter sent spectral fire at the vampire as Geralt’s weapon lashed out. “No hesitation!” He called out to the others. “Or we die here!” Energy thrummed through his veins, and though he didn’t quite know what it was, he knew it could help turn the tides of this battle.

When Geralt moved, so did D. He ground his scythe’s head in a clockwise arc across the ground in front of him, and the sparks that flew became a wall of flame that snuffed out the incoming projectiles. D then swung his scythe the opposite way, his huge reach allowing him to reach Geralt well before the Witcher could close the distance. Their heavy blades clashed with a tremendous, noisy impact that pushed Geralt back in a spray of sparks that quickly exploded like firecrackers. However, the clash dealt a surprising amount of knockback to D as well, and the vampire took an extra moment to recover. Flame smoldered in his wing-hands as he held them up, then began to toss meteors like fastballs, aimed at the incoming Seekers. He threw four, one apiece at Geralt, Falcon, and Roxas.

Roxas was quick enough after the timely healing from Sandalphon that he easily dodge-rolled out of the way of the meteor that came toward him, but he didn’t immediately go on the attack. Instead he went to work reapplying Tailwind buffs to everyone. And Captain Falcon simply stood his ground and smashed the one coming to him with his fist. ”Falcon… PUNCH!” He too was now back to being fighting fit thanks to Sandalphon’s intervention.

The fourth he held a moment as he spotted Nadia sprinting in from the side, surrounded in a watery aura. “I see you!” He hurled the meteor at her and scored a direct hit, vaporizing her on the spot in a burst of steam. Though alight for a split second with triumph, D’s eyes quickly narrowed. Steam? Then the cloud cleared to reveal the real Nadia farther back, just now dismissing her Oceanid striker while her towering Harbor Demon striker took form beside her, a head taller than D’s new form even on her knees. “Water you aiming at?” Nadia taunted as the crane atop the Harbor Demon’s ordnance platform hoisted her up. “You think you’re a big shot–but I’ve got some of my own!”

Her striker’s huge cannons opened fire, forcing D to shield himself with his wings as the shells detonated against him. After a second or so of high-artillery pounding, he vanished with a snarl, then reappeared right in front of the Harbor Demon. “Idiot girl! I know just how to deal with assists!” In one deft motion, he places his scythe around the Harbor Demon’s pale, slender neck. “Off with your head!” In one cruel twist, he parted the Abyssal’s head from her shoulders, and the next instant the same fate befell Nadia, as well.

Except the feral leaped from the disappearing crane into the air to catch her severed head in her hands. “I’m a-head of the curve!” Powered up by Fluffy Soft, she passed her cranium under her leg, then brought it down onto D’s in an overhead slam. “Geeeet DUNKED ON!”

The smack didn’t do all that much damage, but it did piss D off, enough to make him forget about the others. He lifted his wing-arms to swat Nadia like a fly, and managed to clap her between them before she could airdash away. Only her head escaped, falling toward the ground. Flames blossomed between D’s palms as he prepared to blow his captive to kingdom come.

Despite the earlier miracle, Therion had remained apprehensive - especially after losing an ally for real. With his BP recharging and a sneak attack not currently in the cards, he once more let the heavier hitters take their shots at D. His own hit and run was focused purely on wearing Moebius down with as many debuffs as he could stack. Tag - a quick tap during the exchange with Geralt with Shackle Foe, weakening D's attack strength. Tag - Armor Corrosive to reduce D's defense while he flung meteors. And tag - Therion reached out to tap D and slow him down with Abate as he trapped Ms. Fortune. As Therion moved he swiped Nadia's head from free fall to keep it out of the danger zone, intending to chuck it back at her body once it was freed. “Nice cat-ch!” she chirped with a smile despite her current predicament. Saving the rest of Nadia would have to fall to someone else.

One person that stepped up to the attempt was Pit. After Midna's sacrifice he was bordering on distraught. He and the Twilight Princess hadn't been close, but she was a friend all the same - and he could hardly just sit back and shoot in safety after losing her, especially when everyone else was putting themselves on the line. The new aspects of his personality demanded he take a pound of flesh in return, and he would have pivoted to battling A if that same feeling hadn't also driven a need to prevent another loss.

Pit darted inside of the scythe's range, trading his bow for the Breaking Palm. Up until now he'd only used Lightstrike to imbue his arrows with elemental light. It just made sense doing it that way. Now he pushed the light through the glowing tattoos that circled his arm, changing their color from shifting rainbow to the warm gold of pure light.

"Let her go!" he said, brandishing his open hand at D and letting the light loose. At close range the power would be amplified, the barrages of light like unending shotgun blasts that would continue to crash against Moebius for as long as he committed to trying to destroy the feral.

With his normal arms still wielding his scythe, D was more ready for a pivot than it might seem, but Pit was fast even by his standards. Closing the distance put the angel too close for D to wield his enormous polearm, forcing him to lash out with the butt of his scythe’s shaft. Pit offered something much stronger: a point-blank fusillade of holy light, weaponized into withering firepower. “GAH!” he roared, recoiling. He retreated to try and catch Pit on the inner blade of his scythe, but his attacker stayed dangerously close. Snarling, D changed tactics, pulling Nadia’s body apart into burning halves that he chucked down at Pit.

“Owwwwwwwww!” Nadia’s head squirmed. “Hurts like a bitch!”

It definitely looked like it did, but Therion replied with a quick, "just be glad it's not worse."

He circled back around to the other two pieces of Nadia. Pit had been caught off guard by the unorthodox attack, bowled over by the halves of her body. He scrambled out from under them so he could stand to fend off whatever D might have in store next until Nadia could pull herself back together, his Orbitars making an appearance as Therion tossed the feral's head towards the rest of her to complete the set.

Thankfully, Pit wasn’t forced to fend off the Moebius alone. Geralt took the opening to rush in, opening with a Demon Fang followed by a pair of swings of the Hateful Flesh. After taking the Demon Fang to his leg, D brought around his left wing-arm to block the follow-up slashes, then stepped forward with an upward slash to launch him. Stepping back and aside, Geralt quickly drew the Sign of Igni to try and drop D’s defenses before lashing out with another slice, horizontal this time. That energy was still bubbling beneath the surface, but he didn’t tap into it just yet. Not concerned with the Witcher’s flames, D snorted and lashed out with a heavy kick which forced Geralt back a few feet.

Charging in at D while he was wielding that big scythe of his was not a good idea. But unfortunately, Captain Falcon had nothing in the way of weapons. So taking D on in close quarters was literally his only option. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t bide his time for what looked like a solid opening. And watched the exchange between D and Geralt, hoping the Witcher might give the Captain a window he could use to get a good shot in. And when he saw their weapons clash in a brief deadlock? It was a small window, but Cap decided he needed to take his shot. With the Tailwind from Roxas pushing him forward, Captain circled around to try and flank D. And hoped that this would work out better than it did last time. But instead of a Falcon Punch, Cap wreathed his arm in flames and dived at Moebius D with a ”Raptor Boost!” That he then tried to follow up with a blinding barrage of kicks in the form of a ”Gen’ei Kyaku!”

At about the same time, Nadia finally pulled herself together. After sticking her halves back together at the midriff, she plopped her severed head back down on her shoulders and turned it both ways as if to tighten it. “This thing screwed on right?” She pulled out her Ripened Heart only to remember that it had been used up already, and put it away with a groan. Nadia watched as the Captain unleashed a flurry of fiery strikes. If she’d been able she would have joined in already to keep D’s attention off Falcon, but with Roxas applying buffs, Geralt pushed back, and Therion lurking, it was just him against the Consul. With a click of her tongue Nadia rushed in, but she was too late.

After blocking most of Falcon’s assault, D grabbed Falcon with his left wing-arm in the recovery of Gen’ei Kyaku, then tossed him into the air so that he could spike him back down with an overhead scythe swing. A harsh cracking noise rang out as Falcon got slammed into the ground–hopefully that was the Qliphoth bark beneath him and not his bones. D immediately rounded on Nadia, who slid to a stop while crouch-blocking. Her flinch earned her a smirk, which instantly rubbed the feral the wrong way. “Together!” she hissed. “Gotta hit him together!”

“You may try!” D stood his ground as both Nadia and Roxas pushed in at two and ten o’ clock. Both went low beneath a horizontal scythe swing, then attacked in rapid succession, Nadia with her claws and Roxas with Oblivion and Oathkeeper. D was obliged to bring both wing-arms up across his body, fingers splayed to form a defensive cage around his head. His scythe vanished as he charged up Demonic Megiddo in both his actual hands, and after a moment he slammed the sorcerous orbs together to create a large blast. Luckily both Seekers cottoned on in time and fell back using their natural agility.

Amidst the explosion D teleported a hundred feet away, his arms spread wide as dark magic circles manifested. “Vermin, heed me!” The next moment he unleashed an enormous pillar of giant bats, packed tight into one fanged, serpentine mass that curved and cut through the air, the red light of their countless eyes streaming behind them in a dark procession that Roxas might find familiar. Nadia, who used Charge to try and close the distance while D cast his spell, took a direct hit from the batstream and went flying, freshly bruised and bleeding. Nevertheless, the feral landed on her feet, then wiped blood from her lip with the back of her hand as she scrutinized D’s latest atrocity. “Guess it’s time to bat-ten down the hatches.” The batstream descended for another strafing run, tearing up the ground as it bore down on the Seekers, and Nadia dove out of the way with a handspring afterward for good measure.

Geralt charged in after Nadia, Quen shimmering around his body, dodging with a dive similar to the feral’s. Quickly pushing himself to his feet, he rushed for the Consul with his enhanced speed, each stride carrying him further than would be expected from his size. The Hateful Flesh was still in hand, and his pupils were narrow slits as he approached D, but he did not close the distance, instead grabbing and tossing a Dimeritium bomb to try and prevent D from using any more magic until the others approached. And one of those others was Roxas, who had barely managed to stop himself from being caught up in the batstream by generating a last-second wall of virtual cubes that shielded him long enough to put some distance between himself and D. Except now, he noticed his MP had finally returned. And with Geralt nearby and Moebius D still giving them trouble, he decided he’d better use it now while he could.

”Let’s show ‘em why he’s our prey!” Said Roxas with a glance toward Geralt before he then shouted, ”Light!” Roxas shared his Light with the Witcher to channel a Holy Lance spell, conjuring five lances of holy light around D as well as a sixth lance directly above him. The five lances began crashing into the Consul in rapid succession before Roxas used his StepSword to teleport to where the sixth lance hovered. He aimed his Keyblade and fired a beam of light into the shaft of the lance as it made its descent, causing it to not only strike with its usual tremendous force, but in a way that also generated a shockwave of holy light upon impact as well.

The sensation of Roxas’s light was…strange, but he could feel the power enhance his spell significantly. As soon as the final lance dropped, he rushed forward, leaping in to take advantage of the situation and landing with an overhead swing of his cleaver.

Though he prepared to launch a counterattack when Roxas and Geralt made their move, D did not anticipate the form their team-up would take–nor the intensity of their combined power. Incorporating his elemental weakness, each lustrous lance left him reeling for a moment longer than it would have otherwise, meaning he couldn’t put up an adequate defense. The final luminous ray pierced the vampire’s body in a dazzling display of synergy, and as the holy shockwave spread around him he sank to one knee, only kept upright by the shaft of the scythe he recalled to his hand. D was hardly beaten, though, and the moment of weakness he presented to Geralt was as much a trap as it was an opportunity.

With a sudden snarl, D reached out, his arm lunging like a serpent. Geralt’s cleaver sliced to the bone, but the enraged Consul’s grip still closed around his neck. When his talons pierced the skin, blood began to drain from the Witcher’s body, but not for long.

Even with D’s wing-arms in play, his lowered posture meant that the team's rogues had a clear shot at his back. After circling around, Nadia slid to a stop next to Therion, who was naturally in position already. “Let’s cut to the chase,” she grinned, leaning forward with her legs tensed beneath her.

Catching her drift, Therion nodded once and swapped out his weapons quickly. With nary a moment to lose before their opening was gone, they prepared to move. "Let's go."

The two launched forward swiftly even by this team’s standards, Nadia with her twin Athame daggers, and Therion with his Last Laugh sickles. Little more than blurs of blue and purple streaked by white, they slashed again and again and again, targeting joints and gaps in the Moebius armor. An unhealthy dose of Armor Corrosive plus Fluffy Soft and Athame’s Dagger Seven shredded D’s physical defense, and after a moment, the flurry ended with the feral sinking both blades beneath the shoulderblades of D’s wing-arms – or rather, it was only the feral’s upper half. “‘Rear’ its ugly head!” she called gleefully upward.

Overhead, Therion had springboarded off of D and leaped into the air. Thanks to a lucky proc of Excitatory Gland, he had enough BP to enhance his arm power, both to lift Nadia’s lower half up and powerbomb it down toward D as a living projectile, further enhanced by Silver Bolt, Precision, and his Basilisk Boots. For once he begrudgingly indulged Nadia, saying hollowly. “...Butt out!”

Clad in a white-silver glow Nadia’s bottom half crashed down on D’s noggin from above, delivering a butt slam and a Mantread all stomp at once in a tremendous impact. “Thick-ass Thieves!” Nadia sang, calling out the tag-team’s name. When Therion landed safely on the ground a moment later his tail twitched at the feral's inflection. "Why do you have to say it like that...?!"

D roared as Geralt and his scythe flew from his grasp. The two team-ups left Roxas, Geralt, Therion, and Nadia winded enough that they had to relent when D’s batstream circled around to whirl around him in a black cyclone, but if D expected a moment of respite, it would only be because he counted Pit and Falcon out too early. The latter, despite the heavy hit he took from D’s scythe earlier, managed to recover enough to get back into the fight. Those cracks earlier had indeed been the Qliphoth’s bark, it seemed. After using his shield technique to protect himself from the batstream, the bounty hunter apparently decided it was time to stop pulling his punches.

Between this fight and his earlier exchanges with A’s doppelgangers, the Captain had built up a couple of Power Gauge stocks he could now use. He spent one, not only triggering his Vesicle boon restoring some of the damage he suffered, but also making his body flash blue for a split second before he lunged for the now-disarmed Consul. ”Shift into high gear!” He exclaimed as his fist collided with D, leading into a high-speed flurry of punches and kicks that culminated in a spiraling uppercut that launched D straight upwards, ”Ryuuko Ranbu!” And just for good measure, Cap spent his remaining Power Gauge stock to leap up in pursuit and juggle the Consul further upward with a trio of backward somersault kicks, ”Kuzuryusen!”

Pit initially had the same idea, piercing the dark whirlwind with his Orbitars. Being a beat behind the bounty hunter meant the man's combo was already well underway, but it didn't stop Pit from diving in to help out. He followed D and Falcon up, bouncing off of the wall of bats and beating his wings to take him higher. His Orbitars disappeared, replaced by his bow as he shot arrows at Moebius that added insult to injury until he could catch up.

"I got him, Cap!" Pit called once Captain Falcon had reached the apex of his height with D. In one more push Pit was above the both of them, his wings spread out wide. The air wasn't truly his domain despite how much he wanted it to be, but thanks to the mysterious boons they'd received in the Qliphoth he was still about to get a huge damage boost from his Mid-Air Strike and Arrow Shades Bow. It wasn't his actual bow that he had in his hand anymore though - the Upperdash Arm encased his limb, the red-blue head spinning so viciously that the weapon trembled, and its colors blurred into glowing golden light. "It's game over for you!"

Pit brought the Arm down hard, cracking against D's head. The weighty blow ended the Captain’s combo with a bang and sent the Moebius vampire flying. He smashed clean through the batstream behind him and tumbled back down to the ground with a loud crash, still trailing cinders. With its summoner’s focus broken the batstream soon dissipated, and for a moment as the five weary Seekers regrouped, the transformed Consul did not rise.

@Lugubrious

Word Count: 447
Level: Lv: 6 EXP: (3/60)
Location: Dead Zone Hinterlands - Martira, Old Castle Town

Harry was listening to Bardon’s answer with some intensity. His hand was placed on his dimpled chin, rubbing it. He was taking in what clues Bardon was giving him. He wondered how the kids were being kidnapped even though they were secured behind the wall. However, perhaps Heismay had breached the wall somehow to sneak inside. “Could there be a hole or breach in the wall where Heismay could sneak into the city?” He asked as the young knight came back with his request.

“Ask him about his ears.” Inquired Suggestion.

“Also, why do you have pointy ears? Are you some sort of cosplayer?” Harry asked.

Although it wasn't what he requested, it would do for now. He took the items and placed the notebook and quill on a nearby table. Quickly jotting down what Bardon had said about the investigation.

“But it looks like you're not quick enough; your handwriting is just chicken scratch. How the hell are you supposed to read this?” Hand/Eye Coordination said, sounding confused while trying to read Harry’s handwriting.

“Thank you for helping with the investigation. I will speak to Morris and see what he knows,” Harry said, putting away the notebook, quill, and inkwell in his plastic bag. The thought of getting some alcohol at the Friendly Arm sounded quite interesting.

“A good drink or two would loosen you up a little, and help lubricate your mind.” Electro-Chemistry said while Harry made his way out of the guard’s barracks.

Harry kept an eye on everyone in the plaza, wondering if he should question them. However, questioning everyone couldn’t hurt. Someone might know something. But perhaps he could ask them after he spoke to Morris. Walking to the Friendly Arm but not before giving the red haired woman a wink and a smile. He stopped momentarily to search the garbage for money or anything he could sell for cash. Whatever he could find, he would either put in his plastic bag or stuff into his pockets.

At the Friendly Arm, he made his way toward the bartender. “Hello, barkeep, my name is Detective Harry Dubois. I am investigating the missing children, and I am looking for Morris. Do you know where he is?” He leaned on the bar table. “And what is your cheapest drink?” He added, feeling his hands starting to shake.

“You do have that bottle in your coat pocket. See if there’s any liquor.” Electro-Chemistry suggested that Harry fish for the wine bottle. Pulling out the bottle and being disappointed there was a little bit inside. Harry opened the top and downed the pitiful morsel inside the bottle. Putting the cap back on before placing it inside his jacket pocket.

\Well... Whatever A did seemed to go away when Midna gave herself up to him? Whatever that was, it was bad and Roland couldn't let him do that again. Unlike some of the others, Roland had seen his allies perish countless times before and had been hardened in battle making A's stress abilities much, much less effective on him. That still didn't mean he wasn't worried at all, he very much was, but he wasn't going to let that overtake him as it would mean doom for everyone. And if dealing with A was the plan, he'd have to spend everything on A so he didn't become that giant again. With that in mind, Roland used Emerald, one of his EGO pages, on A sealing one of his abilities from being used again. He then went in, clashing with Puncture using Furioso; canceling the attack and hitting A with the mana blade powered Furioso he had wanted to use previously and sealing another ability of A's thanks to Rake.

Although due to the random nature of his sealing abilities, Roland could only hope that he managed to get rid of that very problematic ability, but so far A had stopped using whatever attack seemed to cause people the most stress. He'd need to really keep up the pressure though regardless so that he didn't use that ability again.

Blazermate meanwhile had moved over to the people dealing with the Gravemind. Much like Sectonia, the other royal was having issues with it and needed healing. Also like Sectonia, Ganondorf did hit really, really hard when given the opportunity... Well Blazermate found her uber target! Putting her healing beam on him, Blazermate said "Tell me what and when!" to inform him that she could either kritz or uber him to let him deal lots of damage. She herself using her projectile shield for its damage regardless.

Once released from A's ability, Primrose glanced quickly around the arena. Everyone else was about where they had been, except... she didn't see any sign of Midna. The princess was actually gone.

Primrose clenched her fists. If she ever saw Midna again, somewhere out there in the World of Light, she was going to let the woman have it even if she wouldn't remember anything. As upset as she was at Midna sacrificing herself, the blame lay squarely on A, and the dancer knew that. She turned her livid gaze back to A, her green eyes dark with want to put the Moebius out of his misery permanently.

While Roland clashed with A, she put her first steps into action. Naturally, she danced.

She performed for herself alone this time, empowering her magic and her strength. Her movements were quick and precise, chained one into another thanks to the stamina benefit her dances now provided. She didn't miss a beat, and as soon as she was finished she whirled back into action with a harsh storm of magic aimed at A. Darkness crashed against him as she conjured her single target spells, followed by flashes of fire. Her devout beads flashed too, firing rapidly around her at A for all they were worth.

She was not slowed down by the Monster's appearance, as it quickly proved that it was on the Seekers' side. As it barreled toward A, Primrose used her Ravaging Confession to get out of its way and behind the Moebius, driving her dagger into the eldritch figure. As she'd left her polearm behind she didn't benefit from the critical increase, but she was in a good position to make sure the others fighting A could.

Her body began to glow and her aura flared - white, then gold, then a powerful blue-green. Energy shifted and flowed widely around her as she pushed her Battle Boost to its limit. With three Boosts stacked on top of her dancing buffs, she guaranteed that her next attack would be a brutal one. Good, she wanted it to hurt.

She slashed out at A again, and with Rites of Termination when the lateral swipe was completed another dark lance crystalized in the air above the Moebius. Though it wasn't as large as what she and Midna had pulled off together earlier, it seethed with power and deadly intent. It was only fitting, too, to pierce through A like he'd done to the Twilight Princess.

As the Monster had bid A to die, Primrose added a request of her own. "After you suffer!"

The lance dropped, cleaving into A alongside an explosion of shadow and flames. At the same time it spread its beneficial effect to Roland and the Monster, making them all the stronger as they worked to bring Moebius down.

Aymr hurtled through the air, carving a deep wound into the Flood Tank’s arm and leaving behind a half-attached, smoldering limb. It roared, pain beyond its senses, and trudged forward, scorch marks up and down its body and covered in deep axe wounds. Edelgard shook her head at the pathetic creature, quickly casting Nosferatu to put it out of its misery and regain some more of her lost vitality. As it crumbled to ash, she quickly scooped up the Spirit it left behind and rushed towards the Guardian, careful to avoid the lingering clouds of poison.

Zenkichi sighed when Sandalphon replied: the way forward was the most obvious, and quite possibly the biggest pain in the ass. ”I was worried you’d say that…” he complained in response. Thankfully, Ganondorf, freshly transformed and on full aggro, charged the Guardian and took out one of its heads in the process. Now that was more like it! Even with the vicious counter-attack he suffered, Ganon was still going, and Zenkichi had an idea. He was damn near running on fumes, but who better to give a Heat Riser than that guy? ”Valjean! One last time! Heat Riser!” He cried, the last of his energy going to grant Ganon the coveted omniboost. He would be stronger, hardier, and even faster now, and for a whole minute to boot.

Zenkichi’s shoulders slumped even as Edelgard ran by, his breath coming in deep and heavy. ”I will cover you! Take a step back to recoup yourself!” She called, rushing headlong to attack the Gravemind, a Fire spell flying at one of its remaining heads before ricocheting off into the other remaining head. Her aim with the spell wasn’t sufficient to target the weak points, but it was still damage. No, she was focused on the legs as prescribed by Sandalphon. She’d not wasted Flickering Flower on the Flood Tank, so she unleashed the skill on one of the Gravemind’s legs, her Crest of Seiros glowing as she did. The Gravemind did not take kindly to this attack, turning to crash down on her with its scythe. Knowing she could not evade, she hunkered behind her shield even as the colossal blow landed. The momentum crushed her utterly, and Edelgard felt the bark of the Qliphoth crack and splinter beneath her as her armored form smashed into it, leaving a crater nearly two inches deep in the hardened bark of the demon tree. Groaning, she struggled to move, let alone stand.

Seeing an ally in danger, Zenkichi forced himself forward, swinging Ragnell at the limb Edelgard had attacked, dodging and diving away from toxic grenades and starting to take the long way around clouds of gas that were being placed to form a defensive blockade between the Seekers and the Gravemind’s legs. It seemed the Gravemind had already cottoned on to their ideas, but Zenkichi didn’t back down. He still had a little bit of time left on his last buff from Sandalphon’s covenant, and he planned to use it. Taking a deep breath, he ran straight through a cloud, acid and poison lingering to him and slowly leeching away at his life.

Despite the stinging pain, Zenkichi barreled ahead, slashing into the leg before him with Ragnell. He could feel the hyper-dense flesh resisting each of his blows, and groaned. This would take forever. He had no more energy to call on Valjean, though he did have one thing he could do without his Persona. Lifting the holy blade up and charging, he felt the flames growing around him and his blade, intensifying every second. Even as the leg kicked out and slammed into his body, Zenkichi stood firm as the fire around him grew. Ragnell glowed as the blue flames intensified around him, and finally Zenkichi unleashed Eruption, a series of explosions ringing out around him and consuming the Gravemind’s leg.

Before the dust from the explosions even settled, a great creaking noise could be heard as the Gravemind slowly tried to maintain its balance with one leg missing a good chunk of its lower quarter. Eruption had dealt the finishing blow, removing a solid four feet and change of the limb. Gas and toxin grenades exploded in random bursts around the battlefield as the Gravemind seemed to panic, using its scythe to try and keep its balance, but the sudden loss of a limb was too much, and the Gravemind slowly fell, its long limbs splayed out awkwardly as it crashed into the ground. ”HELL YEAH!” Zenkichi shouted, before running over to Edelgard and offering her a hand up, which she took with a sigh. ”You good there?” He asked with concern.

”Hardly.” She replied with a harsh scoff. ”But slaying this monster shall do wonders for my mood, even if I fear my bones will ache for a year after this. Let us dispose of this ‘Guardian’ and be out of this goddess-forsaken place.”

What… what was this? Just as he was unleashing fury upon Gravemind, Ganon found himself unable to move - even when he tried to force himself. He was overcome with something, nausea? Sickness? Was that simply the poison he’d been subjected to while attacking Gravemind. No, there was more to it than that. What was this feeling? It couldn’t… No it couldn’t be… fear? Was he, the mighty Ganon, actually feeling dread and terror? Why? It wasn’t possible! He was the King of Evil! He had no fear! His mind was filled with a mix of confusion and rage. In his current state, Ganon could not recall his earlier actions as Ganondorf, and the severe stress damage he had taken from Consul A. Ganon’s body trembled - a combination of his confusion, sickness, and fury. And all the while, his marked enemy was not resting idly. The scythe wound Gravemind’s severed head inflicted still bled and the other severed head of the Gravemind was releasing spore grenades from the stump. And as tough as he was, the Demon King had already been severely damaged before taking on this transformation. Was he truly about to be felled by this… vermin?

Not so. The archangel Sandalphon appeared before the severely damaged Ganon and cast her miracle. The Angelic Wings washed over the Demon King’s battered and sickened body, healing him completely alongside other Seekers who were within its range. But more importantly, it healed Ganon of the stress damage he had suffered from as well. And finally, he was able to think more clearly and remember how it was he got to this current state as well as Sandalphon’s earlier counsel about looking for a glowing spot to destroy the heads. And then? He fixed his furious gaze once again on his chosen quarry - the Gravemind.

Ganon let loose another furious roar as he brandished his massive swords in a short series of sweeping swings at Gravemind’s severed head. After about four or five swings, the Demon King spewed forth another Dark Breath beam, unwilling to accept anything less than the Guardian’s total destruction. And his attacks were certainly doing their job. Oddly enough, the monstrous Ganon could feel something healing him almost constantly, even as Gravemind’s head was swinging its scythe and continuing to bombard him with spore grenades. It took him a moment to realize where that healing was coming from - Blazermate, focusing her medi-beam on him. This became clear when Ganon heard her voice telling him to tell her which buff he needed and when. To which he only had one reply right now, ”Power! Let me destroy him faster!”

This prompted Blazermate to use her Kritzkrieg on him, which resulted in his attacks now dealing triple damage to Gravemind.

As for Gravemind’s head? It continued wildly swinging its scythe and spewing spores. "WHOLE OR IN PIECES, I AM THE SAME! I AM YOUR END!" And unfortunately, Blazermate’s healing beam couldn’t keep up with mitigating all the damage done to Ganon’s body. There was also the issue of the ticking clock. His transformation’s duration was roughly half over by now, and if he didn’t manage to kill this thing before then? Well, he just wouldn’t let that happen. Which is why it was such fortuitous timing that another Seeker chose this moment to cast a spell of their own on him.

Ganon had no grasp on what Personas were or what Heat Riser actually was. But he did understand the unbridled boost of power it gave him. Suddenly his attacks were faster, stronger, his body much more hardy. And as far he was concerned? That may well have been the death sentence for this Guardian. Ganon renewed his assault on Gravemind, his swords swinging more quickly as if he were his normal size again. After another flurry of five or six slashes, Ganon charged up on a large sphere of dark lightning in his blades that he then hurled at the Guardian. Not one to let up, Ganon followed that up with another Dark Breath beam as well.

”AND I AM POWER PERSONIFIED!” Ganon retorted against Gravemind, ”THE ONLY END THAT IS COMING... IS YOURS!”

Rummaging through waste on the way to the Friendly Arm turned up little in terms of value for Harry. His search turned up what one might expect: food waste (whether spoiled or inedible like peels and stems), broken or used-up objects, bits of excess building materials, and so forth. A broken bottle could conceivably be used as a weapon, and certain discarded items might still have a few uses left in them, but he didn’t find any spare change or refuse worth selling. In a village used to hard times, it seemed that people lived sparingly, and got their money’s worth out of every last cent. Taking the disturbed expressions of nearby onlookers into account, Harry’s efforts probably came to a deficit in terms of social value. The red-haired noblewoman, in particular, did not seem impressed by his self-assuredness; the look she gave him was rather pitying, the sort one might give a lame horse as its owner came to put it out of its misery.

On the ground floor of the Friendly Arm, Harry found a bar just as expected. The bartender, whose name tag read ‘Gillian’ was a young-looking man with scruffy dark hair and a patchy goatee. Not seemingly very outgoing, he focused on his duties with a serious, taciturn expression until the newcomer spoke up first. When asked about Morris, he took a quick look around, then -with the second of the two questions being a little easier to answer’ decided to tackle Harry’s queries in reverse order. Notably, he did not give Harry’s somewhat desperate attempt to nurse his empty wine bottle a second glance; no doubt this place had seen its fair share of boozers.

“Oily Oaf, or Squeck Juice?” he replied succinctly, reciting the names of the inn’s cheapest ails but nothing else about them. Depending on which one he chose, Harry would be in for a very different experience; Oily Oaf was light, but with a rich, buttery aftertaste, while Squeck Juice was inky, salty, and hoppy, liable to get him more inebriated but guaranteed to give him hiccups. Once Harry had officially patronized the establishment and received his beverage of choice, Gillian went ahead and addressed his other question. “You’ll find Morris at the card tables in the back,” he reported.

When Harry followed the barman’s directions, he found not one but several tables where customers were playing cards. The most notable one sported a quartet of anthropomorphic animals stressing out and accusing one another over some sort of simple but high-stakes card game, while others harbored more customary sorts like the typical long-eared Roussaintes, doglike Paripus, and angel-winged Ishkia. After a minute or so Harry could identify one man in the trappings of a guard, though. He was a dour-looking Clemar with violet eyes and brown hair tied back in a bun, and if the distribution of chips at his table was anything to go by, he seemed to be doing poorly. His opponents -a bushy-tailed witch, a big man with a bird head, an even bigger man with long ears, grayish skin, and crystalline protrusions- all seemed to be doing much better. Just as Harry walked up, the bird man reached out and scooped a big pile of chips toward him with his arms, chirping uproariously–and in a thick Russian accent. “Hah! Another round like that, Mister Morris, and you’ll have to take out another loan! Hahahaha!”

The big conductor shrugged it off and the witch took a sip of her drink, but Morris put his head in his hands. “Damn it!” he growled, even more Scottish than Bardon had been. “Why me?”



Though she typically pre-furred to be optimistic, for the others’ sakes if not her own, Nadia got the sneaking suspicion that what appeared to be D’s defeat was a little too good to be true. Considering the fight he put up as a mere Consul, she would have expected D to get more mileage out of his fearsome Moebius form than this. Nevertheless, she tried to hope for the best as she gathered up alongside Roxas, Geralt, Falcon, and Therion, taking deep breaths in through her nose and out through her mouth. By now, fatigue and injury were taking a toll on all of them. She herself needed healing, or at least a while to regenerate while her Life Gem did its thing, and the others probably weren’t much better off. Maybe they were trying to look on the bright side too, but with O’s fate unknown, and the battles against the Gravemind and A raging on elsewhere, it was hard to feel like the fight was over. Still…the Seekers had to be getting close!

After another moment, D’s eyes flickered open. Instantly he burst into a swarm of bats that surged upward like water from a geyser, quickly distancing themselves from the melee-oriented team. “I’ve toyed with you miserable cretins enough,” his disembodied voice snarled. Only once about a hundred feet in the air did the bats coalesce into the Consul once more, and with the aid of his magic D hung in the air, scythe at the ready, glaring down at the Seekers imperiously. “I had thought to honor your reckless courage with a personal death at my own hand.” Sophisticated purple and red magic circles inscribed themselves in the air around him, layered and turning. “But now, you will suffer the dispassionate indignity of bombardment from afar, without the faintest hope of fighting back!”

So saying, the Consul began to cast. D conjured a roving deluge of boiling blood, a rain of meteors, spinning sickles, batstreams that spiraled down to crash against the floor with crushing force, and Destruction Rays one after another. From his lofty -and mobile- vantage point he could abuse his seemingly infinite reserves of mana while none of his challengers could even hope to reach him, let alone hurt him. Some of the five had appreciable aerial mobility, but all ultimately fell short, especially with D’s smorgasbord of sorcery coming the opposite way. True his word, this was no longer a real fight; it was a hellstorm in which it took everything the enervated Seekers had just to survive. “Yes! Run, run!” D taunted from above. “Draw your deaths out as long as you like! I am Moebius - I have all the time in the world!”

One side-effect of the havoc wreaked by Moebius D was its potential for interfering in other fights, at least one of which could really use the help. Though dauntingly hardy at first blush once it went mobile, the Gravemind quickly found staunch opposition in the form of Ganon. Mostly ignoring the other Seekers’ efforts, the two giants traded blows, Ganon faster than his foe but obliged to work harder to pierce the Gravemind’s tougher defenses. Thanks to Sandalphon’s Angel Wings and Blazermate’s continuous restoration, though, the Gravemind’s toxic biological countermeasures were not as great a concern for him, and with the bestial warlord taking point the heroes made good progress. After one head fell the spore grenades spouted from its severed stump complicated things, but the heroes did not relent. Edelgard strove to put Sandalphon’s advice into action by targeting one of the giant horror’s three mammoth legs, Once she softened it up with Flickering Flower, Zenkichi braved the Gravemind’s fumes and fury to shatter the wounded limb with a fully-charged Eruption, its raw force and explosive flame proving equal to the task. Once its leg was crippled, the ungainly amalgamate’s own weight did the rest, and as a thousand twisted voices wailed the Gravemind crashed to the floor.

That was just the opportunity that Blazermate had been waiting for. Sensing victory, the dutiful medabot gave Ganon the second wind he needed to push toward the battle’s finale. Strengthened by the Kritzkrieg, Zenkichi’s Heat Riser, and more, the behemoth went whole hog against the downed Gravemind in a terrific physical and magical onslaught. He chewed through his foe’s innate damage reduction and demolished it one big chunk at a time. Its agonized roar shook the Qliphoth, as if the demon tree itself were screaming. ”I HAVE SPENT EONS WAITING, WATCHING, PLANNING! WILL NOT AGAIN BE TORN ASUNDER! NOT NOW THAT I'M FREE, NOT NOW THAT I’M WHOLE!” Even if the Kritzkrieg’s ubercharge lasted only eight seconds, it was enough to turn the tide irreversibly in Ganon’s favor. Within fifteen seconds, a second head had been destroyed: the Ancient Infested head, responsible for the manipulation of the Gravemind’s colossal scythe. Immobilized and robbed of two heads, the Gravemind could do little but spew its infectious vapors if Ganon remained on the opposite side. Even the tentacles of the Brother Moon overhead, stretching ever closer to the Qliphoth, seemed to writhe in shared pain.

As its biomass was reduced, it was losing its intelligence–its very sense of self. The Gravemind had only one card left to play. As the Seekers’ assault continued, somewhat less than before, it began one final, large-scale transformation. Its body shifted and reshaped itself, splitting into five pieces. Two were formed from its other legs, and the other two had the bulk from its remaining head. Once separated they attacked, one each for Zenkichi and Edelgard with two to try and occupy Ganon. From the wreckage of the Gravemind’s body, however, rose its core in the form of a bloated mish-mash somewhere between a Bomber Form and a Genetrix. Jettisoning non-essential tissue as spore grenades, the Gravecore floated upward, as if to reunite with the Brother Moon far above.

Following Midna’s death, A resumed the fight against Primrose and Roland with a cold nonchalance, as if nothing at all had happened. By its logic, perhaps, an eventuality had merely come to pass, and more were soon to come. For the Seekers, though, things were different now. They had somebody to avenge, and something they could not allow to transpire again. Intensified and razor-sharp, the dancer and the fixer went to work, and a moment later they found their efforts joined by those of Goldlewis Dickinson. The veteran belted out his fury as he attacked, alternating between Behemoth Typhoons and shotgun fisticuffs.

Tactically speaking, A was a risk that could no longer be tolerated, but Goldlewis would be lying if he said there wasn’t a personal element to his wild assault, too. He kept up the pressure on A while Roland sealed him with Emerald and Primrose tempered herself with a well-timed dance. As soon as her performance concluded, a maelstrom of savage shadows and deadly flames befell the Consul, each smoldering burn converted into a single incinerating burst. After another few seconds, even more backup arrived in a form that none of the other Seekers recognized: a huge, arthropod juggernaut, whose startling screech had reverberated around the hollow moments before. The sight of it threw Goldlewis off, but since it didn’t fit the opposition’s aesthetic he held off making judgements, and the sight of the Monster bulling into A the next moment dispelled all doubt.

The combined koopa kids crashed into A like a landslide, the mighty impact actually doubling A over and leaving it vulnerable. They pressed their advantage without hesitation, and the rest of their team followed their example. Berzerk Blast paved the way for Rites of Termination, Furioso’s finale, and finally, a brutal Down With the System from Goldlewis. It was a staggering beatdown, leaving A unable to fight back for more reasons than one, and yet…

Moebius A still clung to life. ”Self-deceiving figments!” Its voice was frayed by its fury, rendered by ruptured organs that railed and refused to give in. ”I WILL HAVE MY DUE!” Before the Seekers could destroy it, the thing they all feared came to pass–a second, terrible invocation of its eldritch power, Undo. The hollow around them melted into a that loathsome chamber surrounded on all sides by nightmarish masses of meat. ”CHOOSE!”

“Damn it!” Goldlewis growled between haggard, panting breaths. Even after Sandalphon’s healing, he was on his last legs, his mind and body under a great deal of strain, and now he was going to lose another ally. He’d only spent a short time with Midna, but he could see her face in his mind’s eye, clear as day. Her voice and her visage haunted him, joined to the ethereal chorus that had hounded him all his years. How many more men and women were going to die under his command!?

Goldlewis clenched his jaw, steadying himself. It was wrong to give into hysteria; if all the blood on his hands hadn’t broken him before, one more corpse on the pile wouldn’t break him now. Nevertheless, the loss of her life weighed on him, and after a moment something dawned on him. It didn’t seem right that he, a tired and sad old man, a soldier of a dozen campaigns, ought to keep living while the young ones with bright futures ahead of them went away. For a long time, Goldlewis had considered the possibility of giving his life for his country -for its people- the highest honor. Freedom wasn’t free, after all; somebody always had to pay the price. The last time A used this dreadful dark art, the other Seekers had quailed from his proffered grasp. He had quailed. He hadn’t said anything, but a dozen thoughts had rushed through his head, a dozen reasons why it should be somebody else, anybody but him. If nothing changed, though, these walls of flesh would come crashing in, and destroy the whole team where they stood.

”What now, you who remain?” A crowed as the unfathomably maw closed in around the Seekers. ”Moebius fills you. Moebius IS you. Return, from whence you came!”

Goldlewis blinked. “Ohhh…” he murmured, scratching his beard with a wry smile. “So that’s it. I see. Well.” He took a deep breath. They did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death. Then he opened his eyes. “Fine.”

Aboard the Avenger, Sandalphon widened her eyes, her pupils no more than empty rings. “Goldlewis!”

For a moment A gnashed its teeth, but it obliged him all the same. A tentacle shot forward, twisting toward Goldlewis. His face tightened as his breath billowed across his whiskers from his nose, and with nothing else to his name, he raised a fist in defiance. “I’m ready!” he barked, leaping up in order to airdash toward him. Time seemed to slow as the arrowhead tentacle veered toward him. With his left hand he extended two fingers toward the Consul, like a baseballer calling a home run. Veins bulged and glasses shattered as Goldlewis then threw his right punch. “How ‘bout you!?”

The next moment, it was done. Roland, Primrose, and the Monster stood alone in the Final Hollow before Moebius A, the monster slumped over and on its last legs. The heart in its back pounded, its terrible powers were mostly exhausted or sealed, and it had only a few eyes left with which to stare balefully at its lessers. Nevertheless, it lived. ”Even the aged oak will fall to the tempest's winds.” it remarked, lifting its arms for the final round. ”More dust. More ashes. More disappointment.”

”NO!” the Monster began to bellow in rage filled alarm as A spoke the words the children had wished to silence forever. A moment later their souls were ripped from their shared form and plunged into the icy abyss of fear that was the realm of A’s Mobius ability.

The whiplash of emotion itself was disorientating enough, but having been forcibly made two where they had a breath before being one felt like their very selves had been cleaved in twain. This only added to the dread and disorientation, both of them focusing more on trying and failing to re-bridge the connection that they had had, rather than what was going on.

And. Maybe. They just really did not want to think about it.

As such, the children had barely come to terms with what was occurring before it was over, and Goldlewis was gone. At which point they were thrust right back into the rolling furnace of fury that was the Monster.

The entire experience was like being tossed from a sauna into an icy lake, and then hurled straight into the sauna again, each rapid transition of emotion intensifying the one that came next. So while A had left them shivering in dread upon sealing them away from the fusion, now that they were back in that furious beast, the rage inside became overwhelmingly hot.

Strategy was thrown entirely out of the window. The Monster saw A standing before it, saw the source of its fury, fell upon him, its strikes further empowered by its burning desire for Retribution.

A hand reached forwards, grabbing A by the shoulder, holding him as the other rose up, spear in hand, and delivered a Wallop straight to the Consul’s face. Then another and another and another, the Monster ignoring how it kept catching stray shots from D due to its massive size in its fervor to keep on attacking, till the spear shattered from misuse and the beating came to an end. The Monster didn’t let this stop it, as it grabbed A with the now freed hand, blindly enduring any and all retaliation as it hauled its foe around and smashed his back into the Drop in the Ocean’s crane.

The stone tower groaned under the strain as the Monster held A there with one hand, pulling the other back and then delivering a Berserker Blast that smashed the Consul through the contraption, and sent him plunging into the icy water alongside a shower of stone and metal scrap that where all that remained of the ruined amusement park ride.

Consul and wreckage hit the water all at once, sending a great splash of freezing cold water surging up as it was displaced, and which fell back down like rain. For a moment there was stillness, and then the rubble at the bottom of the pit stirred, as A’s hand reached out of it, grabbed hold of the stone wall, and began to haul himself out of the wreckage.

The Beast moved to stop the Consul from climbing out of the deep steep pit it had hurled him into, or quite possibly hurled itself down into it after, but the recklessness of its assault finally caught up with it before it could do so as A retaliated against the source of his present predicament. Tendrils skewered up from the pit and towards the Monster, many harmlessly grazing off of armor, but one stabbed straight and true into the mouth of the Monster, with which it had been screaming bloody murder with this entire time.

Blood spilled from the pierced flesh, flooding into the Monster’s throat and lungs, and sapping the last life from the towering behemoth had failed to preserve.

“Monstrous size has no intrinsic merit... Unless, inordinate exsanguination be considered a virtue” the hypocrite spoke as the tendrils retracted and he continued climbing his way out of the pit.

Above static covered the form of the Monster as it collapsed to its knees and then fell. Its makers, however, had not fallen with it. The static split into the vague shapes of Undyne and the Beast, and then fell away entirely and revealed the children within.

Perfectly fine.

Physically fine, at least.

Mentally the pair were anything but, as both from the Monster’s overwhelming rage, and the stress and grief that A himself was piling on, meant that the siblings were left shocked and hyperventilating from potent cocktail of chemicals coursing through their veins and brains.

Despite this, they did not fall as the Monster had, clinging to each other for support both physically and psychologically, with Rika gripping her brother’s arm in her gauntleted hand, and the Jr’s in turn holding fast to one of her gauntlet's fingers. That was, however, as much as they could manage at that moment.

As such, they were in no state to do anything about the Consul setting foot on the edge of the pit and beginning to rise, his body broken but not beaten as he declared this “A setback, but not the end of things!” his eldritch flesh still clinging spitefully to life as it towered over the children.

@Lugubrious

Word Count: 348
Level: Lv: 6 EXP: (3/60)
Location: Dead Zone Hinterlands - Martira, Old Castle Town

Harry had found money; it would be enough to buy supplies or a drink or two. The items he did find were some discarded clothing, old weapons, and bottles of alcohol. Putting these items into his plastic bag. He could sell the clothes and bottles for money. He knew he would need the cash, so any income was welcome. After some dumpster diving, he slowly got out of the dumpster. He turned his attention towards the red-haired woman. He gave her another wink and some finger guns.

Walking away and towards the Friendly Arm. Finding a seat on the bar stool. Getting some looks from the other patrons. Most of them were covering their nose. Harry’s smell was the same as before he went dumpster diving. Pulling out some loose coins before ordering a Squeck Juice. Taking the mug, he studied the drink and even smelled the contents. Taking a small chug, feeling the burning liquor run down his throat.

“It feels so good to get a drink in you eh, Harry.” Electro-Chemistry commented.

Harry took his time finishing his drink before heading to find Morris. Walking to the back of the bar. This section of the bar was smoky and smelt like alcohol. Or perhaps that was just him. Eyeing the different tables, deducing which one Morris would be seated in. Noticing him since he was dressed like a town guard.

“With all of these weirdo’s around, I must be on drugs or going through a psychotic hallucination.” Harry thought to himself.

“A man bun, he must be a pansy fuck boy.” Endurance said with disdain in his voice.

“Never seen a man bun on a cop before. Must be some sort of fashion statement It currently wouldn’t be allowed in the RCM." Esprit de Corps injected, sounding confused.

“Hello my name is Detective Harry Dubois. I am investigating the missing children in town. And i was told by Bardon you could help me with my investigation. So, what do you know is going on lately? And can you tell me more about Heismay and Curien Mansion.”

Though all four players saw Harry approach, none really noticed him until he boldly announced his presence, both the somewhat brazen interruption and his stated career choice earning him a bumper crop of wary, suspicious, or downright unpleasant looks from just about everyone in his immediate vicinity. While it seemed like the somewhat shady denizens of this particular corner of the Friendly Arm could stomach Morris -maybe due to his apparent gambling debts?- the strident arrival of a true-blue cop in their midst was a definite buzz killer. “Detective?” The bird-headed man questioned, shifting in his seat uncomfortably. He fixed Morris with an unfriendly stare. “Friend of yours?”

“No,” Morris grunted through gritted teeth, either aggravated or embarrassed by the association, or both. After a second, though, he switched gears and tried to play off the annoyance casually. “Never seen ‘him before in me life.”

The tense atmosphere loosened a little once everyone realized what Harry’s concern was. Word of Martira’s crisis had reached even the most transient ears here, and few were truly cold-hearted enough to brush off the childrens’ plight. Still, even if a wolf happened to be chasing deer today, a hungry one might still snap at a rabbit, so Harry wouldn’t find much hospitality here. Once he started firing off questions, the crowd’s attention shifted back to Morris, who seemed to shrivel beneath the spotlight. “Uhh…”

After a second or so, the burly conductor sighed. “Well, don’t keep your buddy waitin’ on our account, Morris. Go ahead, your wallet could use the break anyway.” A wide grin spread across his face, and various onlookers snickered. The other players were all waiting to see his answer to what seemed like a test–to see where the guardsman’s priorities lay, and if he was still one of them or not.

Morris pursed his lips. “C’mon guys, I’m still in the game, yeah?” he insisted, not wanting to lose face. Turning toward Harry, he gave an exaggerated shrug. “Ach, can’t ye see I’m busy here, mate? It en’t even noon yet, so we got a while before any more wee ones go missin’. Go have yourself another round, will-!”

At that moment, however, the pot that had been boiling deep within Harry’s gut boiled over. Ever since he downed that Squeck Juice, his nagging symptoms of withdrawal had been relieved by the brain-numbing buzz, but the aftertaste of that ink-black brew had proven rather stubborn. No matter how many times he swallowed, that hoppy, saline flavor stuck to his throat, and after a minute or so it began to swell. There was a stirring, a squirming in his stomach, getting stronger by the second until finally, the detective couldn’t hold it back any longer.

With shocking suddenness, he doubled over the players’ table, throwing up a phlegmy, gelatinous wad of squano, which was even less pleasant than it sounded. It splattered across the wood, leaving Harry dizzy and one of the players’ winnings covered in gunk that reeked like a tide pool. The bird-headed man burst out in uproarious laughter, while Morris turned away, a pained expression on his face. The pink-haired woman, meanwhile, turned up her nose. “Are people really still falling for that?” She rolled her eyes.

Some bystanders joined in the fun, a couple friends even starting a chant. “Get squecked, get squecked!” they sang. Their merriment proved short-lived, however, when the conductor’s chair scraped backward across the floor, and the man rose to his feet. Everyone fell silent; it was his winnings that Harry had puked on, and judging by his face, he was not amused. He stood a head taller than the detective did, and twice as wide, not even accounting for the glowing green crystals that protruded from his shoulders. Standing before him felt like standing before a hurricane, earthquake, or tsunami–as if the full brunt of a natural disaster were about to descend on Harry at any moment.

Morris gulped, his eyes widening. “H-hey, Stein, let’s just-”

“Now, why’d you have to go and do that?” Stein’s voice had hardened considerably.

At that moment, though, the floor shook ever-so-slightly, then again, and again. Though Stein’s sunglasses shielded his eyes, his head tilted toward something above and behind Harry, at which point it became apparent that the miniature tremors possessed the cadence of heavy footfalls. The next moment, a huge, bell-shaped figure, seven and a half feet high, came to a stop. “We gonna have a problem here, fellas?” came a rich baritone underlaid by a smooth metallic echo.

Stein didn’t seem to flinch at the newcomer’s arrival, though. “Dunno.” He looked back down at Harry, raising an eyebrow. “Are we?”

“Daddy!” At the sound of a little girl’s voice, Stein immediately turned his head. A much gentler smile spread across his face as a little blue-haired girl in a white winged dress ran over. Just like that, the imminent disaster was gone, replaced by fatherly love at the drop of a hat. “Um, it’s almost lunchtime,” the girl informed him, her manner timid. “Can we go get lunch?”

“Heh. Yeah, I could eat.” Having crouched down to pick her up, Stein walked off without a second glance at Harry, his money, or anything else.

In the moment of silence that followed, Morris shrugged, throwing up his hands. “Well, guess that’s the game, anyway!” He tugged at his color, glancing over at the two newcomers. “Fine, fine, I’ll take your damn questions, but gimme a minute, will ya? Wait for me outside.”

“Works for me.” Keeping his arms hidden beneath his massive trench coat, the big man used his head and fedora to point Harry toward the door. “C’mon, slick.”

A few moments later, both were back in the sunlit town square. A spindly mechanical limb slid out from beneath the stranger's coat in order to tip his hat. “You a detective too, huh? Hard not to notice you beltin’ it out like that, heh. I figure subtlety ain’t your strong suit. Well, seein’ as we’re in the same boat with the missin’ kids case, I just figured I’d lend you a hand.” When Harry’s new acquaintance removed his face from his respirator, he looked a lot less scary. “They call me Big Band, and I’m all there is of the most real. How ‘bout you?”

Blazermate's kritz did its work, with her buff and many others Ganondorf raged and raged and tore the Gravemind apart, literally. Although it wasn't dead, instead it had separated itself into 5 different pieces. 4 pieces that were trying to distract everyone as the biggest piece turned into some kind of balloon and started to fly up towards that giant flesh moon in the sky. Well, uh... hopefully if they beat the Consuls in time that thing would go away, but if the Guardian grabbed it, that might not be the case at all and that would be REALLY hard to fight.

Being basically the only flyer left in the fight, and being highly resistant to the spore attacks of the Gravemind, it was up to her to bring that big balloon down. Granted she didn't have super high attack power, she could at least do something on this thing. Maybe she could drag it down enough that Ganondorf could finish it off. Heck, since her attacks generated Uber for her, she could even just tank whatever big hit Ganondorf wanted to do with an Uber to really set him up.

With a plan in mind, Blazermate flew up to attack the flying core of the Gravemind. The spore grenades were annoying to fly around, but thanks to her Scan ability, she could track it through the spore clouds and find its main body. Holding onto it with her suffering arm shield, the shield biting into it, Blazermate tried to push it down as she smacked it over and over with her Ubersaw, attempting to punch it down to the ground and gain uber while doing it. And if it wanted to defend itself, it'd have to stop using its spore grenades to propel itself and instead use them to rocket itself down towards the ground.

Roland meanwhile had enough of A. A wasn't looking good, so it was clear he was taking damage, but it was a shame that his ability seal didn't seal that... horrible attack. And with Furioso spent, Roland would have to build up his combo again. He did have a couple hard hitting attacks left though, but rebuilding his momentum could be tricky if he spent them all at once. Although if A could do that sacrifice thing again, there wasn't much time to worry about things.

The two kids Roland had chatted with earlier had managed to fuse together into something new... using the tapes they had possibly? They were trying their hardest after seeing another ally be taken away and were going into A with everything they had Much Like Roland was about to do. Although A managed to outlast their transformation and began to rear his fury upon the two kids.

Well, now it was Roland's turn. He intercepted A, starting by throwing his specter and a wave of black ink at A, he then moved to use Harvest. A, not being as strong as D, or as martially skilled, and having most of his attacks sealed, wasn't able to block the eldritch barb Roland fired at him. A barb that allowed Roland to fly towards A wearing a bloody scarecrow outfit with a horrible, large rake which he used to slash at A to deal a hefty blow.

Being next to A, Roland then followed up with his last EGO, Forgotten Memories. Wearing a forgotten, almost decaying beautiful dress, Roland unleashed a heavy mist that smelled of cinnamon, showing A that he wasn't the only one that could attack the mind. Although unlike A, Roland just caused damage instead of stress. One could mistake the attacks Roland was using as being from A's world in a sense, as his EGO often looked eldritch in nature itself sometimes. This mist would also slightly empower any allies that inhaled it for a few seconds, and one of those allies was approaching A. Using his brush again, he gave Primrose Ink Swell as she approached. This would be Roland's last attack on A for a time though, as A took Roland's distraction to hit him with one of the few attacks he could.

While the loss of Goldweis and Midna didn't outwardly seem to affect Roland, It still affected him mentally. That and with A's attacks that attacked the mind, Roland's fighting stance broke and he was Staggered, pushed away from A and unable to defend himself.

Geralt could not even spare the energy to cast First Aid on anybody as they watched D’s supine form, laid low by Pit and Captain Falcon’s combo attack. As long as the Consul didn’t dissipate into light like Y had, he knew the vampire still lived. His suspicions were proven moments later as D rose once more, flying into the air. So, he truly had been toying with them? So confident in his success, and for once, Geralt wondered if this was where he would die. If this was to be it, then he would not go easily. He transformed into Ardor Blossom, hurling fireballs at the Consul, but there was not even the slightest shred of hope to deal damage- bats took many of the blows, and those they didn’t D simply dodged, while Geralt and the other Seekers were forced to dodge much more from the Consul. Where before he fought a battle, now D was carrying out an extermination. His spells scattered about the battlefield, blasts of energy and swarms of bats edging into the other fights, which until now had been rather self-contained.

Goldlewis’s sacrifice stopped Zenkichi dead in his tracks, even as the Gravemind’s body retreated to the hideous meteoroid above them. The Secretary of Absolute Defense himself…gone. Taken. No. Not taken. Sacrificed. Zenkichi closed his eyes and sighed, almost all the fight leaving his body. He took a deep breath, a single tear running down his cheek, as a voice within spoke to him. Is this the end of your rebellion, then? Will you give in to despair? Invisibly, within his own mindscape, chains constricted Zenkichi and Valjean, dragging them down. Was your will truly so conquerable, oh detective? This is hardly the first defeat you have faced. Outside his mindscape, Zenkichi dropped to his knees, prompting a scornful look from Edelgard.

”Get up, damn it! You can fall to pieces later, after this fight! And did the girl mean so little to you?! Ugh, fine. Wallow in self-pity for all I care.” Standing between Zenkichi and the two pieces of Gravemind, she slammed the flat of Aynr’s blade into her shield, relying on the symbol of her Imperial authority to try to draw their attention. She then hurled Aymr through the air with Returning Axe, following up with her last bouncing Fire spell, catching her axe and rushing in to clash with the Floodfested remnants as her spell launched off into the air, missing the rising chunk of Gravemind as it escaped the battlefield. ”Somebody attack that last piece!” Thankfully, Blazermate was already on it.

So, then, you choose surrender? To lay low down your sword and allow despair to take you? The voice asked, disappointment heavy in its voice. Is this what a man of justice does? Lays down and gives up when the battle grows difficult? Zenkichi grabbed his head with both hands, groaning in anguish. Remember your vow, Phantom Thief. You know what you have to do. Rising, Zenkichi stumbled, regaining his balance quickly as Valjean manifested behind him, largely transparent. ”Condemn the evil, and hunt them down!” He cried, hurling Ragnell into the air. He leapt forward, catching the holy blade before slamming down onto one of the Gravemind fragments, kicking off the ground in a backflip and slicing a deep furrow into it in retreat.

As Geralt dodged another pillar of light from D, he groaned in frustration. “We can’t do anything to this guy. But if we split off, he’s free to kill the others.” He grumbled quietly. His arrows and crossbow bolts were, like his fireballs as Ardor Blossom, simply blocked or dodged. There was nothing he could do to attack D, not enough time to cast a spell, and the Consul was too high up and too agile to attack through other means. Even if he could get a Grapeshot that high, it’d barely do anything, and Dimeritium would buy them a few seconds at most. He didn’t dare transform into the much more sluggish LCCB Assistant Manager, even if the weak pistol shots might be able to deal some light damage to the Consul. No, Geralt was well and truly out of ideas. All he could do was survive. Quen shimmered around him to shield him from blows, but it was taking all his focus and effort to avoid the onslaught of magic and summons that D was producing. “If anybody’s got any bright ideas, now’s the time!”

Edelgard slammed Aymr onto one of the Gravemind fragments, chopping into it with a series of slashes that left the abomination aflame. She slammed it with her shield, stepping around to give Zenkichi an opening, and he took it. Blocking an attack from the fragment he was fighting, he kicked off it, summoning Sosha to leap up and impale the thing from above, giving him time to relieve Edelgard and swap foes with her. He lashed out with Ragnell’s blasts of energy and she charged the one he’d been fighting, bowling it over with sheer momentum before jumping onto it and repeating Sosha’s maneuver from much closer, slamming Aymr’s blade into the thing over and over, leaving scorch marks and a deep axe wound which desperately tried to use biomass to close itself.

Zenkichi carved another line into the fragment he was attacking, the Hitch triggered by Hera’s boon further wounding the fragment Edelgard was now fighting. That boon was pretty useful now that he had more than one thing to fight at once. Feeling relatively tough thanks to all the healing he’d been getting and the re-established buff from Sandalphon’s Covenant, he activated Fury again, bathing himself in Almighty energy and cutting through the animated chunk of Guardian even more brutally. A crimson blade fell on the fragment Edelgard was carving to pieces, further destabilizing it and finally rendering it too unstable to maintain its form, and her next blow tore off a huge chunk of biomass. ”Finally!” Edelgard cried triumphantly, stomping off a chunk of flesh with her boot and chopping off yet another with a blow from Aymr, leaving behind an eviscerated, burning pile of rotting flesh as she joined Zenkichi. Between his enhanced attacks with Fury and Edelgard’s help, they made short work of the other one, destroying it as well.

It seemed that the life or death encounter had truly reached its apex. Everyone was nearly on their last legs or already there, but that had to include the Guardian and Moebius. For the most part the Seekers kept to their own battlefields, but after being pulled into another separate realm by A and witnessing yet another sacrifice, once they were dropped back into the real world the heroes fought even harder. Despair wasn't going to take any of them, at least not in the heat of battle.

Now if only Moebius D would come down and face the end just like everyone else was!

"You cheater!" Pit shouted up at D. "You're just scared! You know if you kept fighting fair, you'd lose!"

And the thing was, Pit could reach D, he knew he could. He could slip light arrows around D's barrage, and the arrows gained speed over distance besides. Maybe even through the storm entirely with his Shadow-Piercing Shots. If he swapped back to the Breaking Palm he might be able to even match D in sheer output, so long as his stamina kept up with his willpower. If he had been going one-on-one with Moebius, there were a bunch of things he could try. However, he had a team that he was worried about.

Pit's Guardian Orbitars were equipped, reflecting everything they could back at D. Almost none of it reached him, just crashing against whatever other spells he flung. It wasn't the reflect that Pit had drawn these weapons out for though. Whenever he could, as often as he could, he charged the Orbitars and produced a huge, shimmery energy shield.

The winged shield covered a decently large area, especially when cast upward. It slowly rose after coming into existence, creating an angled umbrella for a precious few seconds that protected anyone and everyone behind it. D's magic could not break through the divine construct, but neither could it reached the vampire before it disintegrated, after which Pit had to charge and summon it again.

During the shield's downtime, Pit was in much the same boat as the others fighting -or rather, fleeing- D. He did attempt swapping to his bow and shooting one or twice, elemental light arrows twisting around the barrage and zipping towards D, but largely stuck with his Orbitars. He chose to fight, continuing to fire with his regular shots and bouncing back whatever he could at D. But without sticking to evading or defending alone, it meant that Pit was taking a lot more punishment than he was dishing out. As the angel's injuries really began to pile up he was finally starting to flag, but if his actions would help everyone else, give them the few seconds of a breather they needed, then it was worth it.

He summoned another energy shield, the winged construct casting its glow and protection over part of the area.

Therion was all too glad to duck under the divine umbrellas whenever they appeared. The thief had a good arm, and good aim. One hundred feet up was still within his range if he was inclined to try and challenge Moebius D at a distance. But he wasn't. D was not a stationary target, and the barrage of magic he conjured to cast down at them meant that if he didn't commit completely to avoidance he'd take more than one direct hit while counter attacking. Even if he'd had the BP to use his divine skill, it would mostly likely get caught up in D's magic and they'd just trade blows. After Midna and Goldlewis' deaths, and the group's death preventions used up... well, Therion usually had no qualms about making sure the next person to end up dead wasn't going to be him. If he felt bad about that now, it didn't show at all on his face.

He simply abandoned the battle with D, leaving the other five to take his attention and aggression if they chose to. He didn't even leave any of his strikers behind, figuring their abilities were either too slow or not able to reach D, and not wanting to risk the damage transfer to himself on the slim chance they might make a difference. Therion weaved through the bombardment of magic, making good use of the breaks in the flow Pit provided, and though clipped and singed by the time he'd cleared the worst of the concentration he was still in one piece. If had been safe to do so, he might have brushed by Roxas or Geralt, shared his mana with them - but with all of them moving about as their very lives depended on it, there was no opening to do so.

He disappeared into another section of the battlefield, nearer to A.

Even more than the physical stress inflicted, the battle with A was wearing on Primrose - as every battle in the hollow, the Qliphoth, the Dead Zone itself had been. The Seekers had had only the one moment of rest, and though their wounds healed over and over due to their allies' magic, the toll the day was taking grew larger and larger. The dancer had eaten through so much of her mana that her regeneration simply couldn't keep up. She, Roland, the Monster... Edward, Therion, Captain Falcon, Ganondorf, and Goldlewis... they had all put everything they had into killing Moebius A. And yet, he did not die.

It was as infuriating as it was terrifying. Primrose hadn't known Goldlewis as well as she had Midna, but he'd proven himself a good, dependable man during the short times they'd been together. They'd let A take two of their number - were they really going to let him take more?

Primrose hissed out a breath, then gathered herself and followed after the fight. The Monster had taken A to a new arena, one that would hopefully be his last. She sent her Makami ahead of her, the wispy wolf spirit flying forward to bite into A with its Life Drain while Moebius and Monster battled. As she moved she felt a gentle touch on her back, and her mana being restored. As driven as she was to put A down, she hadn't seen or sensed her fellow Orsterran's approach, but she knew the feel of his Share Energy. Though she didn't look back at Therion, he spurred her on.

When Primrose arrived before A, there were inky lines of energy flowing around her form. She had regained her magic and at least one BP. The murderous glint in her eye had not disappeared since Midna's demise, if anything it had grown in intensity. She put herself between Moebius and her allies, shielding Rika, Junior, and Roland with her body.

Then, she gathered what was left of her power in her hands.

Determined to live on, A lashed out at the dancer. She made no effort to dodge his attack, keeping her focus on her spell. Her Baldur Shell had already broken, and the eldritch tendril pierced clean through Primrose. She staggered, coughed and tasted blood, but remained stubbornly on her feet. As the Moebius' tendril withdrew her Thorns of Agony grew out, sticking into A and holding the limb before it got too far.

Primrose did not die. Her consciousness may have left the stage for a moment, but now it was time for her Encore. Shadowy magic burned dark in her grasp, and the ink swell Roland had bestowed on her was joined by her Boosted aura, flowing white.

She reached out and put her hands on A. She did not smile, gloat or grimace. "This is the end," she told him flatly.

From one hand a fiery Black Serpent traced up A's limb moments before the Ink Swell went off, blowing the tendril to pieces. The pyromancy raced to Primrose's target, A's heart, to deliver the spell she'd conjured in her other hand. The empowered Moonlight Waltz erupted, sparking flames swiftly engulfed in darkness, along with the A himself.

---

Juri didn’t even have a chance to turn down the next offer before that big guy put himself up. That was more the reaction speed she was anticipating. While she had no particular attachment to this guy, Consul A was the smuggest most arrogance piece of shit in the room, so Juri would be very pleased if a Seeker managed to snuff him out.

Once she was back where she was and outside, Juri went to the whole that Rika and Jr. had left. The battle was raging fiercely. D still seemed strong, but A was trying not to throw a tantrum now that he was going to lose even with his bullshit power going off twice.

”I killed Consul O!” Juri informed everyone of what had happened with a boast. ”Let’s finish these freaks off already!” Juri flexed her leg up, down, and brought it around, recharging her Fuha energy.

Consul D was high in the air, raining down hell on the Seekers. Unfortunately like many of the others she was lacking in long ranged firepower.

”I need a god damn rocket launcher,” Juri mused aloud. Regardless, Juri didn’t engage yet and instead observed from afar to see how things panned out before choosing where to intervene. She didn’t want to get caught up in some suicide attack from a nearly defeated foe if she didn’t have to be. It looked like Consul A and the Gravemind were being given the boot, and Juri couldn't do much against D so why subject herself to the barrage? No, Juri decided to play herself in reserve for now.

D wasn’t done yet. That much was clear. Captain Falcon had a moment of brief celebration, but Roxas didn’t. Unlike the Captain, he’d seen what it looked like when Consuls were actually defeated. And since D wasn’t dissolving or disappearing? It meant he was still able to keep going. And then, as if to prove the Keybearer right, D rose and took off into the air. And after that, all Hell broke loose.

As soon as the Consul flew up, Roxas instinctively conjured a roof of virtual cubes to shield himself from the projectiles he knew were incoming. The cubes wouldn’t hold for long, but they would shelter him and nearby Seekers long enough for Roxas to renew all their Tailwind buffs, including his own. But after that? Even the notion of actually reaching D became a puzzle in and of itself. Falcon tried summoning his Striker Bianca to fire an elemental arrow at the Vampire, but a conjured storm of bats prevented the shot from getting through. And Roxas had no such luck of his with the RockGun, the shots eliciting the same result as the bounty hunter’s striker.

Between that and all the movement to dodge the hailstorm of projectiles D was sending down? There really didn’t seem to be a chance for them. Roxas could use his StepSword to teleport to D for a strike, but would that even succeed? Or would he just get caught by D’s scythe or wings and then sent hurtling down for a painful crash into the ground. But soon it became apparent that D was not their only problem.

Nearby, Ganon’s onslaught against Gravemind actually caused the Guardian to break apart into more individual pieces. And while the transformed Warlord was continuing his assault on as many of those pieces as he could keep within reach, some of them still managed to scatter to other parts of the battlefield. One of them was flying up toward the moon object, and Blazermate was the only one able to pursue it. Two stray pieces also wandered closer to the fight against D.

”Great! That’s all we needed!” Falcon exclaimed as he dodge rolled away from being struck by a pillar of light. Reluctantly he shifted his focus and engaged one of the stray pieces of Gravemind. At least this was something his attacks could actually reach. ”Ryuugeki Ken!” The bounty hunter scrambled as he slammed a close range blast of fiery chi against the Gravemind piece before following that with a blur of kicks. ”Gen’ei Kyaku!”

Nearby, Roxas had also reluctantly shifted his gears. He used the StepSword and vanished just before a sickle from D could slice him and then reappeared to strike the other stray Gravemind piece from behind with his ignited energy blade. ”This is getting on my last nerves!” The Nobody admitted as he began to hack and slash at the piece with his Keyblades. He was still out of MP so he couldn’t even use any of his spells or other techniques right now. But when he saw that Falcon had his target stunned and was charging up a punch, Roxas thought fast and hooked the Gravemind piece with his Keyblades and managed to fling it into the other one just in time.

”Falcon PUNCH!”

Cap’s fiery fist exploded into the Gravemind piece, managing to catch them both and finish them off at the same time. ”Well that’s that solved. But what are we supposed to do about D?”

Meanwhile, Ganon was still hacking away at the remaining larger pieces of Gravemind. He wanted to stop the one that flew upward but it was currently out of reach. He had no choice but to rely on Blazermate to find a way to force it back down. As for himself, he kept the large pieces at bay and even managed to destroy one with a charged Lightning Strike from his weapons. The power granted by Heat Riser was certainly doing its job. But the warlord knew his time as Ganon was running dangerously short. He had to end these pieces and the Guardian before he reverted or finishing this battle off would become a lot more difficult.

Ganon rammed his massive swords into one of the remaining pieces, impaling it completely. Then with a snarl and a roar he hefted the impaled piece up and over himself before crashing it back down onto the third Gravemind piece he was engaged with. It was at this time that Ganon saw the results of Blazermate’s efforts. Somehow she’d forced the flying piece of Gravemind into rocketing back downward. And with only seconds remaining on the clock, Ganon made his move.

With a deep breath, the warlord spat out what would be his final Dark Breath. The beam of dark power spewed from his mouth and lanced forward toward the downed pieces before he swept it upward in order to strike the aerial piece as well. But as the Dark Breath’s attack came to its end, so too did Ganon’s transformation. His body and strength waned as he gradually began reverting to his original Gerudo form. Now considerably more exhausted after all the exertion he had been putting himself through to fight in his transformed state.