Virgin Victory teleport room Top of the Split mountain Outside the Convent of Our Lady of the Charred Visage Tostarena Town S.O.U. Building Seiran Clinic Underground Roadway (Seiran Rebel Base Outskirts) Sector 05-06 plate divide maintenance corridor
While there were a couple of introductions and talk, ultimately the first offered plan, Blazermate’s was the one they went with. Not that that got the princess out of having to use up some of her limited portal energy, as her own suggestion of getting a change of clothes prompted a suggestion that they should get them from the main base. Still, one charge used was better than two, that was for sure, so she’d come out ahead in a way
”Just give me a second and I’ll find somewhere to put it” the princess said, before slipping into the shadows and then scaling down the side of the trench separating the plate they wanted into from the one next door till she found a maintenance tunnel of some kind.
In there, nicely out of sight if rather inconvenient if they ever tried to use this for something other than a clothing run, she popped down a portal, and then used it to go to and from the SOU headquarters.
She then scooted up top side again, and presented the team with a pile of button-ups of various sizes, having taken most of the stock to supply the others with disguises. She herself was not, however, wearing one, as her already inhuman proportions combined with various fusions meant that none of them really fit, and she’d apparently already burned through the supply of squid-kid sized outfits that had done so (both of which where not only dirty, but ruined as far as blending in went by various bits of battle damage).
It was a good thing she’d be spending most of her time hiding in the shadows then, as she’d returned to the classic nothing but a helmet look, augmented only by the cut in half psycho mask (currently sitting around her neck instead of deployed over her face), single shoulder guard, rosary, mimic tooth necklace, and overpriced watch. She’d simply decided that being entirely combat ready was worth giving up on being able to come on out in polite society without drawing attention, as she did not think the ancient stone helmet of unimaginable dark power would really fit in. Nor would the oversized lance she wanted to test out.
”Good luck to you all with getting in. If you need me to store anything in the twilight realm as part of blending in, just let me know” she told them, before slipping into Goldlewis’s shadow. From there she watched the entire proceeding ‘infiltration’ with interest.
Oh and also occasionally provided uncontrolled comments that came from nowhere such as telling the robot ”Looks like you're hearing things. Might want to get that checked out” or complaining that the city was ”Much to bright” and ”Like a rotten apple polished to a mirror sheen”
The dimmer hues of purples and blues of the bay they arrived at were much more her speed. They certainly weren't threatening to blind her the way light glancing off the glass buildings would have had she stepped out of the shadows.
The people’s style however, she did not respect very much, and it seemed the feeling was mutual, at least when it came to the garb of the people she was riding along with in the shadows of.
Speaking of them, that group soon got a fair bit bigger as they eventually found a spot for the teleporter in an out of the way public restroom, and used it to bring in everyone else. That was not the end of their travel woes however, as though they were now in the city, they still needed to get across it without getting all eyes on them.
Shame they couldn’t just drive again, as the city was a closed system, where only those who could afford a registered vehicle to use purely within its walls were able to make use of its roads. Which made the entirely unregistered bikes and warthog Midna had stashed away rather useless, nor could she simply bring Goldlewis’s car in as it did not have the right kind of license either.
”Goddesses, what a bureaucratic nightmare. They really want to keep the peasants out I guess” she said, which given she was royalty did not contain quite as much disdain as it might have coming from one of said peasants.
So they had to be smart about this.
”I could shadow hop all the way around to the other side and bring a teleporter with me, but that’d take a while, especially as I can’t just claim a restroom like we just did all on my own, so finding a spot to put it down would be even harder” she commented from the shadows, offering that as an option of last resort.
The boat idea did seem like a good one, though finding someone willing to take on a band of strangers and give them a ride for free (or for cheap) seemed unlikely. At least not without being very curious as to why this interesting bunch wanted to get across the lake in a hurry.
”I could put on a disguise and “borrow” a sail to get across, then just escape via the shadows once I am on the other side and set up the teleporter. Would cause a lot of noise, but they wouldn't know it was related to us if I pull it off right” she suggested as an alternative to relying on the kindness of strangers ”or could you, Goldlewis, just ‘requisition’ one using the credentials of your, former, position of … secretary of defense was it?”
Those were also tools to keep lower on the priority list in her mind however. She did not particularly like the idea of theft from random blameless individuals, even if they would only be using the vehicle for a short while. There was a reason she did not, say, offer to shadow sneak into a clothing store and simply portal away outfits for the group when no one was looking, for example. Part of that was her medieval presumption that said stores would be owned and operated by individuals, and not massive corporations who could easily foot the bill of their city/world/multiverse saving operations, however, so she could likely be convinced to do so in the name of the greater good.
Ultimately, she was along for the ride for much of this one unless things got spicy, and most certainly would not be the one going face to face with boat owners to try and talk them into things.
Virgin Victory teleport room Top of the Split mountain Outside the Convent of Our Lady of the Charred Visage Tostarena Town S.O.U. Building Seiran Clinic Underground Roadway (Seiran Rebel Base Outskirts)
Midna managed to steal a touch of downtime before they headed out. First thing’s first, she crushed a bunch of the Other spirits they had acquired from the tunnels (but not the exploding ones as Raz requested them as she was piling them all out). The thought that these might once have been people offering only a moment's pause and whispered memorial before their spirits were put to use in fueling her new quest for justice in their name.
You have acquired fromMissin Pound, Winery Chinery, Slippy Chinery, Saliva Santas: Smoke Grenade x2 The J4-M35 Smoke Grenade has helped many soldiers out of dire situations. Simply throw the grenade wait for the smoke to spread and change firing positions when the enemy can’t see you Active Camo An equipment module that can be activated and then attached to one's gear. Doing so will blanket the wearer in a cloaking coating for 45 seconds. The quality of this invisibility depends on the wearer's movement speed; moving while crouched confers almost perfect invisibility, but there's barely any effect on someone running or flying Treespear Golden spear with tree-like design. Hits are infused with yellow lightning, their strength dependent on the wielder's Faith. Requiring superior dexterity to wield, this greatspear can perform consecutive thrust attacks despite its larger size. Spit A sticker that, when applied, allows the user to spit damaging projectiles that fly in a slow arc. They deal damage of whatever single element most closely matches the wearer Jester cap A comical item of headwear with colors in two disparate halves, conjoined
This gave some interesting results, some of which she offered up (spit, the active camo module and smoke grenades) incase others found more use for them, while she kept the oversized spear for herself, Urbosa’s proficiency make it work smoothly in her hands (although unbeknownst to her, it would prove to be rather harmless in said hands, as her concrete knowledge that the golden goddesses and the lesser gods and deities of her world where real resulted in her having very little in the way of what could be considered faith).
She had no idea what to do with the silly looking hat.
There was also enough to tend to her menagerie of minions. Or rather, for the most part, to have Blazermate do that for her, as most simply required the bots healing, but there were two slightly more involved operations with decidedly opposite outcomes.
The first was she brought out her mechabear, and after a bit of observation of its state in a non-urgent environment, determined that the metal bits were not working, lacking some kind of energy. A touch of talk with Blazermate and a dig around her horde of collected items found a solution to that, an “energy spike” which had some convenient instructions on it explaining its operation written on it in very small text.
One connection of cybernetic armor with the repowering source, and her semi-mechanical steed was back in operation, though the spike was spent in the process.
The other side of the coin, however, was an offer by Blazermate to enhance her undead Darknut using her mawed shield. Apparently it had been very effective on the monsters it had reanimated, but when she took the bot up on the offer, they learned that applying a random mutation to a carefully constructed creation did not have the best result, as the bones of the dead creature grew twisting branches that clogged up the armor and made it more resilient, yes, but rendered near incapable of movement.
”Well, that’s ironic I guess” she noted, having traded one crippled minion for another. At least she knew how to fix this one, though it would involve a bunch of time with a bonesaw that she did not have at the moment, as they had an appointment to catch.
They could not dally two long before heading out after all, as there was a not insignificant car ride between where they were in Seiran and over to the Hublink, despite them only being a plate away from each other. That left the princess with plenty of time to think. Think, and be annoyed about how it seemed like every one of the organizations that were on the surface meant to stop their crisis was instead perpetuating it.
”Or I guess we only know that someone in Seiran is making Others, and also that they did something else with the psyfish. Making more of those, only to kill them as well. Then releasing them into the under-city … I wonder if that was used as another purge of dissidents like the one we just witnessed” she pondered, but, unaware of the existence of life light clocks, all she could think was they wanted strong spirits for something.
Then there were the other two groups. Neuron blatantly wielded their foes as weapons, which honestly led Midna to give them the biggest benefit of the doubt, while DespoRHado somehow resisted the virus that seemed to be driving their own enemies. Given what Riden had said before he went off on his own, there was 100% something suspicious about that.
”Maybe they made the virus? To build their own power and influence, especially of this Armstrong person? If they can control their enemy somewhat, while anyone else who fights them has to face the full force, that would be a way to make themselves a linchpin of the city’s survival” she suggested, but that was just a guess.
She was certainly a lot more interested in this debate all of a sudden, given that both of the people talking seemed to be at the head of conspiracies perpetuating the ever crisis. That and disgusted by the state of the city’s politics for the exact same reasons.
Either way, a little while later, they were rolling up to the gates of sector six’s upper plate, and meeting back up with the others. She wasn’t exactly really familiar with most of them, it had to be said, which made Poppie’s absence stab her heart even harder, a pain that found her giving Torra a sympathy hug and assurance that they’d get her back, whatever it took.
Step 1 for that, getting into the city housing the corporation that was apparently suspect of holding the key to doing so. There were, naturally, obstacles preventing them from just getting in, as they only had legal access for 6 people.
Or rather ”Seven” she corrected, because ”I can shadow you when you get in” That still left a whole lot of them on the outside, but Midna did have some suggestions for that.
”I could also set up portals to get the others in once the first six get past the barrier, but that won’t help us if they stop us again inside” she offered in tandem with Blazermate's suggestion, before having a little bit more of a think, and adding ”Best way to not be stopped, I think, would be to make sure we look like we belong there. Confidence is important for that, but so would looking the part and, well, we don’t exactly give off a high society look. Especially after fighting through ruins and over stagnant reservoirs”
She knew she could really do with another change of clothes, as cleaning herself up in the clinic’s bathroom had only done so much.
Virgin Victory teleport room Top of the Split mountain Outside the Convent of Our Lady of the Charred Visage Tostarena Town S.O.U. Building Seiran Clinic
As the truck rumbled away the two stowaways strained to listen in to the conversation going on between the people who had stolen away the transformed Princess Peach, a task made slightly hard by the rumbling of the machine itself. Midna certainly had a better time of it, able to stow away inside the truck in its occupant’s shadows (although she had to spend the entire journey biting her own hand to avoid offering comment on the things being said), while unbeknownst to her (and vice versa) Raz clung to the underside of the vehicle, concrete wheezing by mere inches below.
Still, be they in or under, both spies got some very, very juicy details from the free flowing talk between what turned out to be some kind of revolutionary group seeking to cut out the rot infesting Suoh, which Midna would have found heartening, had she not found out about them right when they had just felt the boot of the system crush down on them, hard.
Though Midna had an easy time eavesdropping, it was unsurprisingly much harder to pick up quiet conversation inside of an armored truck when you’re clinging to its underside. Luckily, Raz was able to reach out with his ~psychic senses~ to remotely pick up what was being said. ”Metamorphose? Extermination..?” A bad feeling crept into Raz’s stomach, not helped by the precarious spot he chose to hide. It was a testament of his will that he didn’t puke right over the road. This was definitely juicy intel, though what it exactly meant, and if he could entirely trust Crenshaw and the others, he wasn’t too confident.
Midna, too, wasn’t so sure if she could really trust these people. After the ‘resistance’ of al-mamon turned out to be a front for some nefarious mind control plot, she was not going to jump into this organization's arms without more info, even if she managed to remain hopeful that said info would turn out possitive. The flow of that came to an end, however, as they approached some kind of rally point for the group.
The vehicle finally stopped, and the passengers started to move out. Minda, naturally, went to follow via slipping into one of their shadows. When she did, however, her low to the ground position, or rather functionality in it, let her see what the people she was tailing could not. Namely that she was not the only one who had stowed away.
She immediately switched priorities, and shadows, to link up with Raz. She had names of people in the organization. She had the name of what was probably their base, and most likely where Peach had been sent. It was enough. Making sure the boy did not get caught was more important.
Raz didn’t share that priority, of course. He thought he was undertaking a solo stealth operation to suss out a possible coup or alternate sect of rebellion within the Psych-OSF. In other words, the exact thing he spent most of his life dreaming of. He was a little held up from continuing from not having thought ahead, though. ”Okaaaay, now how do I get out of here? Do I go invisible again and jump into some kind of storage crate? Do they have any around here? It’s hard to see…”
”I wouldn’t recommend it, who knows where you’d end up delivered too” a voice coming from the ground interjected into his mutterings to himself
”I guess so, but it’s better than staying- huh?!” Raz, in surprise, slipped off the various car bits he was clinging to, falling a good three inches onto the hard concrete. ”Who’s there?” he snapped, trying his best to whisper.
”A whoops. Sorry about that scare. Its Midna” the princess of twilight clarified from the dark, only to curse wordlessly at the sound of footsteps approaching. One of the psychics seemed to overhear the thump of him impacting the ground, though their pace seemed to indicate curiosity rather than urgent concern.
Flipping around onto his stomach, Raz peered out around them at the approaching footsteps. ”You came too? Whaddya think, should we take these guys on? Get them to hand Peach back over to us?”
”They might be able to help so let’s not-” Midna started, before pivoting the conversation to dealing with the current problem instead of arguing strategy ”-let’s not stick around here to get found out. Can you invisible yourself and get to that tunnel to the right? I’ll meet you there and we can plan”
”What? But we’re right here, we can’t just leave!” Raz tried to convince Midna, though really he was starting to get cold feet himself. Wouldn’t be a very good stealth operation if he got caught on step one, after all. ”Fine, yes, I’ll meet you there,” he muttered, a little peeved at his moment of coolness needing to cut short. A quick pop out of the visible spectrum later, Raz rolled out from under the truck, jumping back onto his feet to make a break for the tunnel. He had to be quick since his un-amplified Invisibility wouldn’t last long.
Midna, after taking a moment to be impressed by the invisibility trick, and make sure that the psychic coming to investigate did not think anything was suspicious (they did not) simply hopped through a few shadows, and into the tunnel. Her eyes, adapted to the dark, had spied a runed van up the tunnel and popped out behind it to wait for Raz to show.
Soon enough the goggle-headed kid came up around the van, nearly jumping out of his boots in surprise. ”Gyah! Jeez, you’re really good at sneaking up on people…”
Minda could not help but have a short impish giggle at his expense now that they were somewhat clear, before taking it as a compliment ”Why thank you. It’s not that impressive though, I hardly even have to try” and being smug about it for good measure.
”Now get behind here, before someone spots you” she told him after, patting a spot so he could sit next to her with their backs to the van (and the outpost) behind them.
”Shouldn’t we get back to the others? They might be wondering where we went. Plus, we gotta tell them what we know as soon as possible, in case something happens.”
”Sounds like a good plan to me” Midna agreed, glad that the mad dash had apparently put the other one, namely to fight all of the people in the base, into the grave where it belonged.
”I can make these gates, which we can use to travel right back to the hideout, so we won’t have to walk either” she added, before pointing a little ways up the tunnel to where a light was glowing, and a the wall seemed to curve in a bit, and suggested ”and I think there might be a side path up there? I would rather not put the gateway in sight of the base, so how about we check that out?”
Raz nodded, working his shoulders to ease the post-riding-under-a-car cramps. ”Hey, you’re the expert on interspatial transport portals. I never got to that course yet.”
Nodded in response, and then slipped into the shadows again, appearing over at the inlet. Within, like she had hopped, was a door, one that, with a bit of magical trickery and brute force, she got open, revealing a dusty unused maintenance room.
She declared it ”Perfect” and immediately set up the portal, a crack in space forming just below the ceiling, before it opened wide, perfectly black squares unfolding across surface of the stone, and then a lattice of teal lines of power forming on those, twisting in on themselves till they had formed a tunnel into the space between the light world, and the twilight realm. Far away in Seiran, the portal she had set up there opened in the same way, both heralding and awaiting their arrival.
”There we go, ready to go” she declared, before holding out a crooked arm and telling to ”Hold on to me while we go, unless you want to find out what kind of animal my home will turn you into I’m sure”
Raz looked into the portal, then up at Midna’s hand. For a brief moment, he just thought. ”...maybe another time,” Raz finally said in full seriousness, taking the imp’s hand, ready to traverse the twilight.
The princes quirked a smile, assuming it was still actually a joke, before, without ceremony, they both were sucked up into the portal. They skimmed through the dark, getting glimpses of an endless eternally sunset (or was it sunrise?) lit void filled with floating islands and cities of gray stone and glowing lines of magic, so close, yet so far away, and then they arrived at their destination.
Upon said arrival, the princess gave an uncharacteristically wistful sigh and a ”someday” before she released his hand and loudly informed him, and everyone in the building: ”and we’re back”
”Miss us?” Raz added, very quietly following it with, ”I always wanted to say that,” under his breath.
Central hub: Smash City Alcamoth Accessible locations: Peach’s castle Limsa Lominscuttle Town Lumbridge Twilight Town Kosm’s Beach
A severed limb splatted to the ground in front of the troop, causing all to start like a cat presented with a cucumber before they realized who it belonged to. Well. except Rika who crouched down, picked up and called out ”I think someone dropped this” with nary a thought of how weird this was behind her eyes.
The rest of them did actually get the message and once they had caught Rika up, they headed inside. They traded a brief hello with the pair, and then popped over to the counter to place some orders from the two baristas, Maddy and Clemence.
The menu consisted of fresh coffee, tinned coffee, milk, expresso, and so forth as expected, as well as cookies, muffins, scones, and, for some reason, Pear Fusilli. Even more out of place than the pasta however, was Clemence’s side hustle of selling blank tapes and rewinds for said tapes.
Upon seeing those Jr inevitably asked ”Hey, so, what’s the deal with the ‘tape’ things?”, the young prince was not even familiar with the antiquated audio storage format.
"Oh, zese?" Clémence seemed to perk up when the young prince voiced an interest in a very particular subset of her inventory. Though she spoke with a notable French accent, Junior could parse her speech pretty well thanks the time he'd spent around the Seaplane Tender, Bella, back in the Deep Blue Seaside. "Zey are cassette tapes. Nothing strange about zem, how zey work or what zey're made of, but with a cassette player and microphone you can use zem to record any monsters you meet out in ze field, and make zeir power your own." She held up two different tapes, one an ordinary dull black, the other metallic and shiny. "Two hundred for ze normal ones, seven hundred fifty for ze chrome, which are much better at recording. If you're new and you wish to know more about cassette beasts..." After looking around, Clémence zeroed in on one customer in particular. "You should ask him," she said, nodding at the Skelevangelist.
Sectonia wasn’t interested in the tapes as she figured there was a catch with them. Instead only grabbing another coffee to stay awake. Something more flavorful than what she had at the hotel, which was very, very basic and bland.
Jr, never one to turn down the possibility of acquiring new toys, was very much the opposite, and eagerly followed up on that suggestion, proceeding to go bother the indicated gentleman with little regard as to if that might be rude or not.
”Hey you, the lady at the counter said you knew stuff about these tape things. Lay it on me. I wanna know all the details. Like, can it be any monster? Or only specific ones? And are they any good if so? Or would this just let me turn into stuff less awesome than I already am” the little monster climbed up onto a chair opposite the man to ask.
At the mention of tapes, the other undead at the table Junior joined raised a collective eyebrow, and the Skelevangelist near-instantly went into panic mode. "Wuh...he-hey, hold your horses just a, just a hot second there, little guy." Leaning on the table in an exaggerated casual manner, he turned toward Skelly and the others. "He's, uh, heheh, obviously just a little confused. Mistaking me for someone else, I bet!" He floated up from his chair and patted Junior on the head, subtly tugging on his arm with the other hand. "Give me a second, will you, fellas? I'll get him sorted out, be back in a minute!" Then, in a barely-audible whisper, he hissed in Junior's ear. "Can't tell you here. Follow me?"
He led the way to a more secluded nook of the Terminal, then wiped the back of a bony hand across his skull. "Uh, sorry about that, kid. Look, I'll tell you whatever you want to know, as long as you don't go blabbing to anyone I know about cassette tapes or turning into monsters, okay? Deal?
”Uhhh, deal? But you might wanna tell the lady selling them that as well then?” Jr replied, very confused, but happy enough to roll with it. If it was meant to be a secret, then he assumed it had to be good. As was Kamek, who was observing this whole thing via a wisps he had sent to keep an eye on the boy when he started to wander off.
The Skelevangelist shifted uncomfortably. "Well, the tapes aren't very popular, so most people don't ask, and she doesn't tell. In a city that's ninety-nine percent monster, tapes that let you turn into one don't have much use. Except...well." Suddenly the Skelevangelist's body dissolved into what looked like TV static, fluctuating and reforming into the shape of a man. He looked to be in his early twenties, unkept and unshaven, rail-thin and gaunt. He held a cassette player, and as Junior watched he lowered his headphones down to hang around his neck. "I'm not really a Skelevangelist," he admitted, his eyes melancholic. "I just wanted to fit in, you know? I'm not the only person 'blending in', either. Humans d-don't...have a great reputation around here. Monsters don't tr-trust us. If my monster friends found out I was some loser human and not a cool skeleton, they wouldn't want anything to do with me! So please, k-k-keep it to yourself! It's my social life on the line!"
He tugged at his beard uncomfortably. "A-anyway, you wanted to know about the tapes? Well, they can record lots of different m-monsters. If you've got a player, put the tape in, point the microphone at 'em, a-and press this." He indicated a button on his player with a circle. "It's up to chance, but if a friend of yours beats on 'em it'll go up, and if you get hit it'll go down. When transformed, you can't do anything you did before, but you can use everything the monster c-can, and it's HP gets stacked on top of yours. The tape'll...uh, well, break if it takes too much damage, and you'll turn back, but you can re-re-re-wind the tapes to fix 'em up." He showed Junior the tape in his possession, emblazoned with a drawing of a skeleton's head. Then he slipped it back into the player and closed it, his finger hovering over the play button. "Uh...I guess it wouldn't hurt to mention, there's...one other thing the player can do, b-but most people can't use it. If two people have players and their hearts act as one, they might be able to fuse their monster forms together. A fusion's got the stats and p-p-powers of both combined, so they're crazy strong, but you gotta stock up power first." He carefully put his headphones back on. "Uh, b-but I don't know anyone who can, so don't get your hopes up. T-that's everything I know..." He pressed play on his device, and in a shimmer of static he turned back into a Skelevangelist. Instantly he seemed more confident, animated, and personable, with no trace of his stutter. "So keep it on the down low, will ya kid?"
”Yeah, yeah, sure, don’t worry about it” Jr replied, still not really getting the whole not wanting to be seen as human thing. Kamek meanwhile wondered if those who slither in the dark’s double lives had had any influence on the ‘humans being seen as mistrustful’ thing the man had talked about.
The boy left him after that, (or rather he left, then went back and said ”and, uh, thanks” after some rather blatant prompting from Kamek) giving the tapes thing a mull over as he and headed back to rejoin the others.
After the rest of the party had placed their orders, they had returned and took a seat with the two ladies, the king shrinking himself down to fit properly, while Rika had been busy drinking in all the neat sights to cause much of a ruckus.
Then getting to talk about her and Jr’s little adventure distracted her more than enough to prevent any shenanigans.
”Mmm, hmm. There’s this place called the crumbling caverns that’s made entirely of cheese!” Rika replied to the question, before going on an extended ramble about their experiences ”and there were these rat and mouse people who mined it, and we got a job to run some of it back, and got attacked by more rat people and some like, living cheese or something while doing that. They had jetpack knights armed with forks, it was silly. Anyway we killed some of them and they killed some guy who was with us. Then they ran off and we delivered the cheese but got paid basically nothing and learned that jobs are bad and you should just kill tings and crush spirits or steal to get money”
”Ah, no, maybe you should not have learned that specific lesson from that Rika … or rather young mistress” Kamek replied, realizing that he now functionally had two royal scoins he needed to help raise right.
”Young mistress? Oh, like how you call jr young master... Why do you do that anyway?” Riak asked, entirely skipping over the advisor’s attempt to adjust her learning, to which Kamek explained that, as daughter of a king, she was now royalty
”Soooo, does that make me a princess?” Rika asked, and then replying ”neat” once she got confirmation of that being the case. After all ”I mean I already have one in me anyway, but I didn’t know if that counted or not? Guess it doesn’t matter either way now”
While the matter of his lineage was clarified Bowser was pouring over the map and had gotten himself confused, pointing at the tall blurred out right section and saying ”Hey, shouldn't that bit to the side be filled in? We went down it right? Kamek check our map”
”Sire I … yes here” the mage unfurled his own (miniaturized) map, which matched Nadia’s entirely, as instructed, before correcting his king’s confusion
”I believe this up here” he tapped the ash lake ”Was where we came down. Most of our journey seems to have been pipe, at least compared to those who went through the ah, ‘womb’ structure”
”Oh. Right. I was just checking you know that” he insisted.
”Hm… Which area had that ‘clock’ you were talking about? Perhaps if its easy to get to, I could inspect that first. That pig boy did mention something about stealing lifelight, perhaps that clock is related?” Sectonia mused as she looked over the map. Really this was a guise to her agenda to see if she could make a regent out of the previous king here, but learning about the consul’s powers or potential about them could be useful.
”Oh? Ah yes, the clock. That would be here” Kamek pointed at the ash lake ”and can be accessed via a warp pipe found in the water under Gallo tower’s bridge. Should take you all the way back up”
”As for what the clock is, and what life light is, well, it appears that the red glow in the galeeming’s eyes suffuses their body, and keeps them alive somehow. Or maybe more accurately a lack of it kills them” Kamek explained what he remembered ”either way, the clock fills with lifelight whether when things die nearby, or when lifelight is put into it willingly, which is what Asgore does. Then people like those in the city take lifelight out to live.”
”Which I guess makes them sound like a good thing, but didn’t Asgore also think it would be good if they were destroyed?” Rika asked, having not quite gotten that part
”I. Yes. I suppose”
”I got real big and punched it and it still didn’t break, so they are straight up indestructible” Bowser added with a matter of fact rather than egotistical tone, despite egotistical being exactly what the statement was.
”Magic must often defeat magic. Nothing is indestructible.” Sectonia said flatly.
”Right. Well. One flaw I do know about the clocks is that the Conuls can take flame out of them, to either heal or … hmmm. You know, I do not recall, are they Galeeming or not?” he asked, which got some shrugs from the others in the troop.
”Considering upon his death he leaked red motes of energy instead of a spirit, perhaps this clock is meant to keep the consuls alive and all powerful, instead of what this ‘Asgore’ thinks it does? I wouldn’t know without seeing it though.” Sectonia said.
”Well, whatever the case, the clocks require conflict to keep the people alive, but breaking them would free people from that need. Perhaps from galeem’s influence?” he theorized, but he really did not know for sure (it was a rather academic question anyway, as breaking the clocks was currently out of the question) so he simply shrugged and left it there.
As they were mulling over the implications of the map, and considering where to go, the orders they had made on their way in arrived.
Decaf coffees for the two older koopas, warm milk for the young ones (which professed to calcium enriched for extra healthy bones on the menu) along with a small pile of cookies and muffins which Kamek, who had worried it might spoil their appetite for dinner, had been outvoted 3 to one on getting. So he’d gotten himself some pasta. Sectonia had gotten a fancy late.
That paused any real potential for strategizing, leaving plenty of time for others to catch up.
Once they did, and got their own orders if they wanted them, and Jr got back to nab his drink before it got cold and talk a bit about how neat the whole monster transformation and fusion thing sounded, the strategizing could begin.
”So, as the young mistress, Rika, has mentioned, she and the young master have had little trip over here” Kamek indicated to a section of the map to the right ”and found it not particularly dangerous, comparably”
”Yup, we went pretty far and only got attacked one whole time!” Rika agreed , before outlining what kind of progress could be made ”There was some kind of factory further on I think, but we didn’t get much of a good look. Also this town fairly close to that which would make an ok staging or rallying point for before we go hit that place”
”Which leads into my suggestion that we head out tomorrow rather than try and squeeze an expedition into the unknown into the evening. A proper night’s rest will do us much better than the cat naps we’ve most likely had. Plus it lets us stock up on and offload equipment at a more leisurely pace” Kamek popped his still not quite empty cup down to suggest ”We hardly want to be hauling P’s treasures with us when we set out, I shouldn’t think”
”Indeed. Some beauty rest for everyone would be best. As for what areas to go to, it really doesn’t matter in the end. It seems we will need to go get more mask fragments from all over the Under. ” Sectonia said. ”Speaking of all that loot. How should we go about dealing with that… Hm… There is quite a lot of it to move.”
”Best we sell it off before we leave.The sooner the better, so we can put those funds to work. Perhaps after this little meeting is over, you would be able to give us a touch of your time to aid in that endeavor?” the royal advisor asked the queen.
”The faster it gets done, the faster we can all get some proper sleep.” Sectonia said. ”I still need to go see this ‘Asgore’ to see if he can take the reagent position here for me as well. The citizens here would love their former king to return if he was ousted by that… pig.” Sectonia then thought about how to go about that, and had the thought of one of the buildings she had passed prior. ”There is that pawn shop, and the auction house not that far away as well that could expedite this perhaps.” She also thought a bit before saying. ”And if this isn’t that valuable, as none of it seemed to be magical, just giving it back could pay dividends more than gold should we come back perhaps. hm…”
”I do not believe he will be interested. He has charged himself with refilling the clock all on his own, which is not something he can do at the same time as ruling a city,” Kamek explained, skipping over the self esteem issues the former king had, before pivoting back to the loot issue and pointing out that ”Well, a fair amount of it is art and such things, which I would think would sell quite well at an auction house, would it not?”
”Perhaps. Art is a weird one to sell. It could be valuable or not at all. I suppose we will have to see. The toys however I don’t think will sell well at all, best to return those.” Sectonia said, giving her opinion on that.
”Awww, but I just got to play with those game console things for the first time” Rika bemoaned, and Jr too was a little miffed, but both were easily placated by promises of going shopping for their own toys, and so there was no further dissent on the part of the troop when it came to giving the children back their things.
Having said their parts, the turtles, bee and ship leaned back in their chairs and opened the floor to the other’s points of view on what they should be doing.
wordcount: 1425 (+3) (+16) (+13 for B&R, +7 for J&K) Bowser: Level 12 EXP: ////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// (195/120) Bowser Jr: Level 12 EXP: /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// (85/120) 59 Kamek: Level 12 EXP: //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// (68/120) 42 Rika: Level 7 EXP: ////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// (81/70) Location: The Under - Home of Tears
Central hub: Smash City Alcamoth Accessible locations: Peach’s castle Limsa Lominscuttle Town Lumbridge Twilight Town Kosm’s Beach
The party of the depths slogged their way back out of them, a slow but ultimately event-less journey, the mass of flesh that had distracted them on the way down not making another appearance.
There was no light to emerge into, of course, only rain, but there was still warmth to be found in the form of friends and kin. Friends and kin who had not had Jr’s presence to cure them of their ills, and who had just finished rooting around in a dumpster.
Specifically, Jr and Kamek found Rika sitting on the ground next to a pile of ammo while Bowser tried his best to try and reconnect the cable from the gauntlet P had stolen into a port in her back.
Spark ”Ow!” ”sorry” Spark
His best wasn’t very good.
Thus the king was doubly relieved when his son and royal advisor hurried over to join them, both because, well, they were alive and well, but also because he could hand over the technical stuff over to Jr, feeling nothing but pride when the boy sorted out the issue in only a few seconds.
”aaaand up we go again” Rika declared as she got back on her own two feet ”phew. Feels good to be able to walk again.” before hunching over in a bit of pain and holding her stomach, the after effects of the poison still with her ”That kid was a real big jerk, i can still feel my skin itching yech”
As Jr set about fixing up the two of them with his white mage magics, Bowser asked ”Oh right, yeah, where is the kid anyway?” with blissfully ignorance of what had occurred down in the tower’s depths
”Ah, well, you see, things did not go … quite according to plan” Kamek told him, tapping his forefingers together tepidly as he tried to think about he could explain things
”Huh, what do you mean?”
”The spells wouldn’t make him stop, and we couldn't just grab the big energy monster thing he turned into so they … well .. they killed him” Jr explained with a mix of frustration and gloom in the mages place, to which Kamek swiftly added ”It was that or let him run off and drain the city’s clock dry, so they, and I, did what we had to do” in explanation of the action.
The king visibly slumped in response to the news, and neither of the other koopas really knew what to say, which left plenty of room for Rika to come in and comment with ”Well that’s a shame. I reeeeeeally wanted to punch him in the mouth over and over for everything he did, the frustrating little jerk” with all the care of a bull in a china shop, the ship girl coming at this from an entire different emotional wavelength than the rest of them.
”I … Rika … he was a kid” Bowser attempted to explain, but only got a blank look before she went on ”But he made food hurt! Who does that! And made me itchy, and stole my things, and he was just, you know, really annoying”
”He did also threaten to functionally kill everyone in the city, and apparently regularly went out and did the same kinds of awful things that he did to us to other people sire” Kamek pointed out the boy’s more serious crimes, namely violently tormenting, belittling and harassing the populace.
”Yeah, and that stuff’s probably bad too!” Rika agreed with a nod, before pivoting the entire conversation around to what she cared about which was ”But you know what’s good? I’m adopted!”
There was a moment of confused silence as the koopas suffered yet more emotional whiplash.
”I …” Jr started, very confused
”By Bowser! Right? Adoption is, like, becoming part of a family right? Which I am now? Right? Or always was? You didn’t really explain that bit” she tried to clarify, glancing repeatedly at Bowser as she did so.
”I … Yeah?” Bowser agreed, mind still trying to catch up, before adding a more enthusiastic ”Yeah!” once it caught up.
”Yeah!” Rika echoed, before turning to Jr and saying ”Which means that I’m your sister now. At least I think that is how that works?”
”Oh …” jr replied, not really knowing how to respond to that, but eventually settling on ”Neat”
”I know right” Rika agreed, having thought exactly the same when she found ot.
While he did this Bowser was giving Kamek a ‘have I messed up’ look that he hoped no one would see, while the mage in question was holding his melting heart in one hand, and then gave a thumbs up and an agreeing nod with the other, which left Bowser much more relieved than he would admit.
”Alright, tonight, or this morning, or whatever it is, has been way too long and hard. So…. Family hug time!” the king declared, scooping up both his kids in his arms, much to both of their delight (though Rika’s was much more audible than Jr’s), and then declared ”So let’s go get some shut eye” which jr at least was a little less delighted with.
”Aw, but I don’t wanna go to bed. I mean rest, sure, but it's only just the afternoon!” he complained, before spying something over his dad’s shoulder and asking ”Hey, where’d you get that papa?”
”Oh that? I might have grabbed some of the stuff a bunch of robots where using” Bowser replied, explaining the little pile of games and dvds and devices for playing them that P’s robots had no more use for (seeing as they had all exploded)
”Oh cool. We took some stuff too, but queeny bee’s holding all of it” jr explained, before glancing over and saying ”Hey uh Rika ... sis? ... wanna play some video games instead of sleeping?” only to gasp incredulously when she responded by asking ”What’s a videogame?” and then insisting she play them with him at once
”Alright, games, rest” Bower declared, before his stomach rumbled and demanded his notice, causing him to add ”and room service too for lunch. Sound good?”
”An excellent plan sire” Kamek agreed, as he waved some toadies forwards to pick up the loot Bowser had acquired for him, while the kids both gave ”mmmm”s of agreement.
Thus the time passed, with Bowser and Kamek actually getting some shut eye, while jr introduced his new sister to the wonderful world of videogames. It was, admittedly, a bit of a janky one. The prince had absolutely no idea what any of the stuff they had acquired was like, the mess of consoles and games from several worlds being both a combination of an archivist’s treasure trove and scrapheap with a few jewels in it for anyone actually looking for fun.
The pig and monster entertainment systems for example, looked almost identical, and contained a library of games which were all weird alternate spins on the other’s. There was also a weird disk that they had 0 luck in getting to work (probably for the best). The Funmachine had a game where you boxed with snakes, another one that tried to teach math via fighting ninjas ontop of a few others. Meanwhile the GamePig, entirely unrelated to the PEN, featured a bunch more pig themed games such as Corporate Swine, Golf, OverWorld Zero, Swine Hunter, Swinekeeper, Street Hog, and Tic-Tac-Triop.
A lot of them were pretty simplistic, basically just a minigame, and so they ended up rolling back around to the MES console, and playing a bunch of monster kart on it for a few hours (Rika with her 0 experience with games came last most of the time, baring one particularity contentious item driven win, but she still had a blast regardless), before taking power naps of their own.
They all woke up a bit later when Bowser got hungry again because they were approaching dinner time. At that point they packed up and trooped out, running into Sectonia on their way out, and inviting her (and anyone else who might be about) to come get dinner with them. That, and suggesting that they should take a look into somewhere they could sell the treasures they had acquired, Kamek pointing out that it would most likely be good to send the artwork, fancy furniture and other shiny objects to some kind of auction house or other high class goods selling establishment rather than trying to pawn if off at, well, a pawn shop.
Either way, that could wait till after food, and so the troop set out to find a restaurant, inevitably hitting the downtown and passing by Nadia’s lookout spot on their way there.
Virgin Victory teleport room Top of the Split mountain Outside the Convent of Our Lady of the Charred Visage Tostarena Town S.O.U. Building Seiran Clinic
Things didn't really go well for Midna, or her plans. First of all, before getting yelled at to shut up, she ended up arguing with Benedict about what they should do about Peach’s Otherfication.
”We are not abandoning our own, and we are not going to give up on her as long as there is hope we can save her” she retorted, angry both at him for suggesting it, and at a past version of herself who would have reacted just as callously to this situation.
”Besides, I can just gate-way us out if we get trapped in!” before having a thought and adding ”In fact that’s probably a better idea anyway, so thank you for that” as passive aggressively as she could manage. She was being honest however, despite the tone, as she had realized it would be a lot easier to seal the Peach-Other in with them (or just her) than it would be to retreat and trap it separately.
Not that she would have a chance to implement that plan mind, as things went from interpersonal relationships bad to just straight up bad right after that.
First her repetition of the darknut summoning was both predictable, and lacked the support it had the first time around, resulting in the Other pivoting from its spike attack to smash down onto the undead titan as it rose. The knight naturally raised its shield to guard itself, but the titanic blunt blow was more than enough to smash that down and into its own head. Metal buckled, bones cracked, and the only thing preventing the darknut from being turned to paste was the fact that the magic pulling it up was also overpowered, letting the Peach-Other whack-a-mole it right back to where it came from, but also causing said magic to act as suspension to soften the blow in the process.
Either way, the knight was sent packing, and was not coming back till anytime soon.
The only consolation was that to do that attack the Peach-Other had had to stop its spike attack, and that in focusing on her minion it left Midna with free rain to make her own strike, yelling ”I just made that you jerk!” as she drove the slap into its side.
That was the only hit she got before it pivoted to target her, and she might well have become paste had Luka not blinked in to deliver a hammer blow to a weirdly distorting limb. He attempted to insist he be allowed to handle things on his own, only to be struck before he could even make that heroic demand.
”For all of two seconds, so no” found herself retorting very unfairly given that he may have just saved her life.
Then her demand that they try and solve this with cleverness instead of killing truly fell apart when Geralt charged in in a mindless rage.
”Goddesses preserve us, what is wrong with you!? You're going to get both of you killed!” she cried out in alarm from her position hovering above as the witcher demonstrated the downside of strikers in full, because with only the fish looking one really being agile enough to avoid becoming collateral damage to the hulking Peach-Other, the rest would inevitably be hit and harm their summoner in the process.
She seethed for a moment, and then dove in, buzzing around the thing the other princess had been turned into like a gnat. ”I’m telling you, you maniac, back off!” she demanded of the Witcher, even as she took a leg out of Luka’s book, and aimed for the legs and arms, delivering jabs with her shadowhand to try and throw off its attacks, while her better reach and two sets of senses kept her clear of suffering his same fate.
Time passed in a hyper focused haze of disrupt, evade, disrupt until an age and a moment went by, and the icy hammer struck down the Other-Peach, sending it crashing to the floor.
It was only then that she could focus again on something other than keeping the other’s alive, and her mind flashed back to keeping Peach the same. But before she could move to try and put herself at Sina’s side in a show of support, the Peach’s transformed form was trapped and stolen away to a vehicle that had seemingly slipped in while they were blinded and/or distracted.
”Oh no you don’t” she practically growled, and then, before explanation could arrive in a green flash, she was gone. The princess’s vibrava dived down into a portal, while the princess herself shadow hopped after the kidnapper’s truck.
It was not, like Gralt, in a blind rage that she raced after them however, or at least not by the time she slunk around to find an ambush spot. She was outnumbered, out gunned (literally) and even if she could reliably take down all the soldiers and whoever the powerful psychic was, all that would do was unleash the Peach-Other once again, if they did not try and put her down while fighting.
Then there were the questions of who were these people? How had they known this would happen, as they must have to have had this truck and teleporter psychic prepared? Had they done this? If they had, did they know how to undo it?
That last question was what really stayed her hand, and so instead of lashing out, the princess of twilight lurked in the shadows, waiting to be delivered to the secrets that lurked in ones far far deeper, in the dark heart of this shining city.
Virgin Victory teleport room Top of the Split mountain Outside the Convent of Our Lady of the Charred Visage Tostarena Town S.O.U. Building Seiran Clinic
”that’s it, roll over doggy” the princess barked at the Other as her and Raz’s concussive blows knocked it off its feet and onto its back, only to swiftly add ”wait no, I mean, sorry Peach” when she realized just how insensitive what her mouth had said was.
In what felt like karma to Midna, the flipping over the thing that had been (or still was? She was having difficulty processing that) somehow made the situation worse, as it picked itself and started operating upside down, with heads hanging under it, and proved to somehow be even more dangerous in this form.
”I said I’m sorry!” Minda yelled as she fled from the spikes striking up from the ground, the first of them having clipped her wolf’s back leg while she was storing her clubba club, resulting in that being a very narrow chase.
”Red shift was the chimeras! I didn’t know Otherfication was a thing!” Midna called over to Blazermate’s question about what was the cause of this, before demanding to know from the PSYCH-OFF personnel ”Is this a thing? How did it happen? Can it be undone?” in a fruitless hope that they knew more about what had happened than she did.
As for what they should do, well, Goldlewis seemed to think that keeping up the attack was the right thing to do, the giant of a man hammering into the Other, knocking it back and ending its borrowing spike attack. For a moment. Then it screamed and filled the air with dust and debris, obscuring itself from view much the same way the smoke clouds had done for some of the other Other earlier.
Then the spikes began again.
”Oh for the goddess’s love, again with the smokescreen!?” the princess complained, while also once more being thankful for her mask as it prevented her from choking on the dust. Rather than go on the run from the spikes again however, she instead leapt off of her wolfos, sending it home to lick its wound, and summoned her vibrava in its place. The dragonfly looking pokemon grabbed her back with now well practiced ease, and combining both its flight and her levitation, the pair took to the air to be well out of range of the ground based spike attacks.
That gave her time to think and speak while she swooped across the battlefield seeking out the towering form of the transformed Peach.
”Maybe we should fall back? It’s,- Peach is- whatever it is is huge, we could easily trap it in these tunnels. Collapse a ceiling, seal it somewhere. Then we’d have the time to work out how we can- if we can save her, without worrying about anyone getting hurt while we do” she called out a suggestion as she flew.
Despite her suggestion of a non-violent solution, if/when she found the Peach-Other, she would still attack. Luka had a point after all, she knew: every moment the other was allowed to keep spear striking was one where someone might stumble in the dust cloud, and get impaled. Having learned from Goldlewis she knew enough blunt force could end the impalement attack, and she had plenty of that. So that was her plan.
She would swoop down, and land on the shoulder of a summoned darknut, the towering undead rising out of a portal right next to the Peach-Other once again, and once again after it had fully arisen it delivered a shield bash to its side. At the same time Midna drove a mighty palm strike with her shadow hand from her shoulder perch, hoping the combined blunt force strikes would knock the Peach-Other off balance again and disrupt its attack.
While it felt a little cliche to rely on the same spell twice, if it worked it worked. Though she really would prefer if the Peach-Other would ”Stay down this time!”
Then she’d take off once more while her shadow darknut sank back into the twilight realm, and then calling out ”It’s over here!” to try and inform anyone who wasn’t yet in the know of the Other-Peach’s location.
Virgin Victory teleport room Top of the Split mountain Outside the Convent of Our Lady of the Charred Visage Tostarena Town S.O.U. Building Seiran Clinic
Midna’s grand slam worked like a charm, the massive explosive knocking the incoming Cleanser back a country mile, though not quite enough to send it back into the abyss from which it came
”You not like that huh? Well too bad, there’s more where it came from, and it’s all me!” Midna taunted the monstrosity, already preparing to charge up another titanic explosive to finish the job. That proved unnecessary however, as the lack of immediate threats from the front had freed Blazermate up to take down the camera with a massive laserbeam.
Reality warped again, and then returned back to normal, leaving them facing down a now inert camera, one with a strange black box now at its feet
”We, glad that’s over. Nice shot at the end there Blazermate” the princess praised the bot girl, before floating forwards to look at, but not touch, the source of the entire situation.
”So … does anyone know what these are? I guess it kind of looks like those weird machines they had all over the top side city now that I look at it more” she said, referencing the multitude of security cameras that infested Suoh, which she didn’t know what they where either.
She’d leave it to the others if they wanted to try and use the two devices, but if no one else did, she’d shove both into a sealed off spot in the twilight realm (a process that did not involve touching them), unintentionally emulating the OoP’s former jailers with her improvised containment unit.
After that they caught up with Karin again, who Midna was more than happy to fill in on what she had missed ”You would not believe the nonsense that we just went through-” as they rode through a few more tunnels.
After hanging back and keeping her mouth shut though their brief run in with the Seto’s Psych-OSF squad (and dithering upon and then deciding against informing them of the fallen squad they’d run across the remains of for the sake of moral) they rushed off to catch up with Peach, Sakura and Raz’s squad.
It was a good thing they did, as in the time between Seto having last seen them and their arrival, Raz and co had managed to run into some hulking titan of an Other that somehow managed to be even freakier than all the ones they had seen before.
Also, worse, Midna could not find, at a glance, any hint of the presence of her fellow princess among the squad. She would have asked about that, but Benedict’s first move was to launch right into commander mode and start ordering them about. The princess did not exactly appreciate that, but given that the beast was bearing down on Raz, and his idea seemed sound, she did not waste time complaining.
”Good plan, on it!” she called in agreement, before pointing a finger at the monster and commanding ”Initiates, root that thing!”
The three strikers stepped out of the aether around her and then bent down to press hands to the earth, summoning up a swarm of psychic roots that lashed out to try and grapple one of the hulking Other’s legs.
As they did that, the princess flicked a hand and summoned her clubba-club from the twilight realm. She gripped the massively oversized mace with her shadow hand and then, empowered by Benedict’s magic, rode into the fray atop her trusty wolfos steed, dragging the weapon behind her. Once close, she would swing the wrecking ball of a blunt instrument at the limb their tactician had ordered frozen in an attempt to shatter it.
At the same moment she swung, she summoned her undead Darknut, the super sized knight (who gave the Other a run for its money in the hight department) stepping out of the twilight realm and delivering a shield bash to its side to try and knock it off balance at the same time as its legs were under attack.
wordcount: 1473 (+3) (+11 for B&R, +5 for J&K) Bowser: Level 12 EXP: ////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// (163/120) Bowser Jr: Level 12 EXP: /////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// (59/120) Kamek: Level 12 EXP: //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// (42/120) Rika: Level 7 EXP: ////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// (49/70) Location: The Under - Home of Tears
Central hub: Smash City Alcamoth Accessible locations: Peach’s castle Limsa Lominscuttle Town Lumbridge Twilight Town Kosm’s Beach
Worries about their assassinations (and one kidnapping) attracting the attention of the city’s fishy guards proved entirely unfounded as each and every team successfully regrouped just outside of the clocktower without a hint of what they had just done getting out.
The troop’s first business was regrouping within the growing assembly of heroes, and once they were sure everyone was ok, started trading tales of their exploits. Bowser was just in the middle of telling the others about how he punched a giant golem in the face when Nadia poked her nose in and requested the use of the Snaktivator.
Kamek, naturally, obliged her request, and they all took a moment to admire her ”Cool triple tail” as Jr put it.
That promptly reminded Rika that she had gotten quite the plethora of spirits from her and Bowser’s adventure, the fetching of which from her pockets attracted the attention of Queen Sectonia, who conveniently preempted her request to borrow her item enhancing hat.
Knowledge Potion Takes 3 seconds to drink fully, which adds 2 bonus uses/charges/stocks to all abilities with uses/charges/stocks Uncommon Stone Gauntlet An item equippable by mages. It can cause an eruption of fast-moving earth along the ground, damaging all opponents it passes through. Damage falls off between 25 m - 40 m. Travels down slopes easier. Must be grounded to cast. Can also be used to magic into existence and throw a boulder, once every 13 seconds Featherfall Rune Can be squeezed to launch high up into the air, then slowly descend down for a duration. Squeezing it during the descent cancels it 2-10x42 Rifle Scope Made from extremely durable aircraft-grade aluminium alloy and features multi-coated optics for super sharp vision. Shock proof, fog proof and waterproof for those extreme hunting conditions where a good scope makes all the difference. Can be affixed to a precision weapon to provide 2x-10x magnification Berserker's Barrage Equal parts instrument of punishment and implement of execution, this axe is wielded to mete out bloody justice amid the insanity of the battlefield. Thus, to grip its haft is to surrender oneself to the iron madness of blood lust. Only usable by axe masters. Its special attack, Savage Surge, can both deal heavy elemental damage and temporarily increase allies' attack by 40% Agastya Alternate Costume An Alternate Costume that can fit anyone who puts it on, encasing them in a fine suit of black armor with pale gold trim and a collar of burgundy feathers, leaving only the head exposed
Not all the spirits were crushed however, as Rika instead requested to be able to use a few of them for herself
Strikers gained: War Cleric An axe-wielding priestess with a medium cooldown, able to be summoned for up to two seconds at a time to perform a single action. The actions she can perform are a quick advancing chop, a slow overhead slam, and Heal, which restores 25% hp Knight An heavily armored knight with a claymore a medium cooldown, able to be summoned for up to two seconds at a time to perform a single action. The actions he can perform are an armored sword thrust, a slow overhead slam, an advancing shield bash, and block
Spirit absorbed: Rider and Beast The host has gotten a little taller. Her upper half has become more human, while her lower half has become more reptilian, with patches of scales on her legs and saurian feet. Metal armor plates have appeared primarily on her arms, although she's also gained wyvern-wing earwear. Her personality is more quiet. This spirit confers the Strength Lancefaire, which imparts skill with polearms and a slight damage increase while using them. This spirit also confers the Weakness Axebane, increasing the amount of damage taken by axes by 50%
The result was first of all, the ship girl having to kick off her heeled shoes due to them becoming rather uncomfortable all of a sudden, and then being quite confused for a moment by her new lizard shaped feet. Then even more confused when she rolled down and removed a stocking and found she had scale patched legs and entirely scaly and spread toed feet, ones like those of a dragon or dinosaur.
”huh. Weird. I didn’t realize they were lizard people under all that armor” she said, mostly to herself, before raising a foot up and presenting it to the royal koopas and noting cheerfully that ”Hey look, now we match. Kind of” which they found rather neat.
The actual benefit the spirit had brought failed to be immediately obvious to her, and it was only clarified later when she mounted up and felt the distinct urge to have a lance in hand. The downside however immediately presented itself when she accidentally cut herself while handling the ax they had received, which resulted in quite the unexpectedly nasty gash that had to be healed by Jr.
Fiddling around with the other items they had gotten let them discover a few things:
That the ax seemed to be intentionally making itself unwieldy to, well, wield,, as if Bowser, who tried to test swing it, was entirely unworthy of its use.
That though the stone glove proved to have quite the handy set of spells, it was rather useless for their flying mage, which resulted in Kamek asking ”Gandorf, Rubick, Primrose, would any of you be interested in this tremor causing magic gauntlet?”, which would result in a small fee for the other king, and none at all for their spider battling and tree climbing comrades.
That, though the scope would attach to Rika’s rifle it was more or less impossible for her to line her eye up with it to use it properly.
That the rune’s ability to launch someone airborn was both incredibly funny when done unexpectedly, and that it synergised rather well with Rika’s existing antigravity, as well as her grappling hook and maneuvering thrusters, and finally with the fact that her hands could actually hold the run while still using her forearm affixed gauntlets.
That they had no idea what ‘uses/charges/stocks’ meant on the label of the potions and that they had to ask about that (and would hand them off to whoever might find them useful).
And, finally, that if Rika took off her helmet before donning the Agastya Alternate Costume, and then re-applied it afterwards, she could give a half decent impersonation of one who slithered in the dark, even if between the cat ears, wyvern wing ears and two mismatching horns sticking out of it said helmet was getting rather busy details wise.
That led to a little plan of her leading the way and trying to bluff them any extra time she could via impersonating one of the slitherer’s members here to deliver a message, or something along those lines. A bit more talk also got them an idea of how they were going to handle P, and so after that, the team split back up into the same duos they had just been in.
With the plan settled, the shorter duo of the troop approached Iguana Gallo Valetto to set about seeing it through. And filling him in on it.
”Hi. We’re going with you to do the sneaky ambush thing. This P kid won’t know what’s hit him” Jr declared as he rolled on up with Kamek in tow
”Indeed,” the mage agreed, before cutting to the chase and informing P’s traitorous minion that ”Though I should note that we very much intend to take the boy alive. I hope that won’t be a problem?”
Gallo sniffed, displeased by the idea. "If you think him a mere misguided youth, you are woefully naïve. That brat deserves to suffer, and not just for what he's done to me, as your allies will see once they reach his lair. If he's allowed any leeway, he will reach the Absolutely Safe Capsule in his hideout, and that's that. Mission failed. Our only chance is my Clock Lancet, and to finish him off whilst he remains under his spell." He waved his hand dismissively. "But what do I know, P's destruction being a mere lifelong obsession of mine."
”Eh, we caught one jerk already today, no sweatm so another should be a piece of cake” Jr insisted, while Kamek inquired ”And what, may I ask, is this Absolutely Safe Capsule? Could we not simply disable it and then have more leeway to handle the situation?”
Crossing his arms, Gallo replied, "I've tried, believe me, but its construction predates me. Despite its mind-boggling simplicity it is completely immune to all forms of attack, technology, and magic that I've seen, and therefore, utterly foolproof. That's why we must be there to stop him before he can get inside."
”Second time we’ve encountered something like that down here. How annoying” Kamek noted. Or rather third, though they had not even bothered trying to physically break into the black egg.
”Couldn't we just, I dunno, barricade it shut or something then? He just has to be slowed down enough that I can put him to sleep after all” Jr suggested ”Close the door. Pile a bunch of furniture and minions in front of it, then when he tries to dig all of that up it's off to snooze land and we’re sorted”
Gallo cleared his throat. "Forgive me, I must have neglected to tell you. Consuls can warp space to travel long distances in an instant. I expect that is how he will reach the hideout in the first place, but he will only secure himself in the Capsule once he realizes that his hideout is no longer safe. You understand the problem that insinuates in your scheme, I trust?" The mage pinched the bridge of his nose, frustrated by the child's spitballing. "I understand your company possesses no small measure of power. I must urge you not to risk everything on cheap tricks, however. Even I must confess myself mystified by the exact nature of P's powers. I will leave his fate in your hands, just as I said I would, but please...do not allow all this to come to naught."
”Well that is worrying news, even if I am able to do the same in a sense” the teleport capable Kamek nodded, before partially conceding ”Perhaps it would be best we wait till we can have a look at this hideout in person, to see what kind of ambush we can set up and if live capture is viable or not”
At the same time as their more private talk was occurring, a much more public debate over how they were going to deal with kid Consul P started taking place. On one side, the newly joined Ichiban was rather concerned about the, well, ethics of that, and on the other side, the only slightly longer serving party king of all evil declaring that age mattered not at all when it came to your foes.
Into this stepped seeker veteran and one time child killer Bowser, to take a (minor) stand against repeated failed child killer Ganondorf’s position ”Look, you and me, we might be bad guys, but we still got to have standards. Like maybe trying to not kill kids when you can avoid it. Beat him up if he’s able to put up a fight, sure. But let's not end him, alright?”
On the heels of that assertion, a now drake riding (it just felt right) Rika leaned in and asked ”Are we going to capture and interrogate him then? Because knowing your enemy and their movements and stuff is important, so you should try and find out that kind of thing and report it to your superiors” seemingly quoting out of some order or doctrine she had been given while part of the abyssal fleet, before correcting herself with ”Or wait no I mean use it for ourselves”
”Hmmm.” Bowser furrowed his brows for a few moments, and then agreed ”Yeah. That’s probably a thing Ka- I mean I could do stuff with that kinda information”
Virgin Victory teleport room Top of the Split mountain Outside the Convent of Our Lady of the Charred Visage Tostarena Town S.O.U. Building Seiran Clinic
Midna’s shadowhand struck true for the dozenth time, sending a pair of Session Pounds sailing to the side, where their battered forms crashed into the wall of the endless tunnel. One detonated on impact, and then set off the other in a chain reaction while Midna held up one of arms to block the blinding flash of the detonation, while the other clung tight to her wolfos’s coat.
A good thing she did so too, for just as soon as the floating bombs were dead her steed lunged to the side in a daring leap, chasing the camera’s path to avoid some incoming signage, an action that would have caused her to fall off had she not been holding onto it for dear life.
”I really need to invest in stirrups” Midna muttered to herself as the leap came to an end, before squinting forwards through the lens of her mask and asking ”Alright who’s talking to the hand next huh?” only for her question to be answered with no more flashing lights, as the constant drip feed of floating bombs came to an unexpected end.
”That’s what I thought” she declared haughty to the dead, before addressing the camera: ”Out of disposable minions are you? Well to bad, because now I can give you my full attention”
Her method of doing so was to raise up a hand, opening a portal out of which singing sand started to pour. It fell behind them at first, only to take flight as per her will, and go streaming forwards, the sound of it rushing through the air adding wordless singing to the pulsing beats of the music being played.
The stream of sand rushed forwards, and then wrapped around the camera, coarse grains starting to slowly but surely weather away at it. ”Get sand tomb-ed! Your days are numbered now machines, because there’s no escaping this” the princess declared as the swirling sand started to bog the machine’s flight down and scratched its lens and paintwork. Or that is what it would have done, had something not burst out of one of the voids behind her platform.
”Huh?” the princess went as she glanced back at the noise, only to get a face full of high beam headlights from the utter monstrosity that had risen from the depths.
”Gah! Why why why why all this light!?” the glare blinded princess demanded to know as she turned away again, hand covering her face, only to have her own sand to blast past her as the glare robbed her of the ability to control it, which resulted in more cursing and questioning ”Son of a moblin, what in the goddess’s name is happening?!”
It took her a few moments to recover, and when she had her first act was to yell ”Alright that’s it you are going down, and I’m coming to do it myself!” at the camera. To do this she swapped out her wolfos for her vibrava, which she had grip her back so they could combine their flight. Yet when she pushed off the ground and activated her levitation the expected thrum of insectile wings did not meet her ears.
No, instead she began to fall rapidly behind, and towards the lumbering light blasting monstrosity pursuing them.
”What are you doing?! Fly you fool!” Midna demanded, as she reached out and grabbed the platform she had just been on with her shadow hand, halting her own ‘fall’ jarringly enough that her spirit transformed beast lost grip of her back and fell back from her as well.
She glanced after it, squinting through the light, and saw the vague shape of the virava skill-lessly flapping wings that would not lift it as it tumbled haplessly through the air. Then it fell past the highbeams cone of light, and suddenly caught itself as the power of flight returned without warning. Wings beat, letting it narrowly dodge a punch swung by the car monster, only for it to re-enter the yellow glare and its flight to falter once again, sending it crashing down onto the hood of the vehicle.
Before a hand could grab and crush it, a twilight portal opened up under it, and it was sent home by the princess, who then reeled herself back to the platform. Feet struck the solid(ish) ground once again, only to slip due to her maglev mod reducing the friction her feet had with the surface. Normally she would have popped dragon claws on her toes to stop this, but bathed in the yellow glow these failed to materialize, and the princess had to be saved from slipping back off the platform via a re-summoning of her wolfos.
The beast caught her by her jacket, then tossed her onto its back, and then swiftly moved to leap out of the way of an incoming sign. As it did, the princess focused on her non pelt grabbing hand, trying to form dragon claws on it as well, a thing she managed only when that leap took her out of the range of the bayful glow of the half man half machine.
”But I can still use my magic so what is it? Can it be…?” she asked herself, and then had to come to a conclusion she really did not like, which was ”Watch out, the thing behind us’s light suppresses spirit powers!”
That left her with a fair few less options she realized, especially because the safety from the light she had landed in was temporary, as signs coming from in front and additional pursuing monstrosities would inevitably force her back into the glare.
Still unable to strike forwards without her attacks being disrupted, the princess instead tried to deal with their pursuers and to at least slow down their pursuers if she could not take them down. While her wolfos focused on what was coming from the front, the princess kept half lidded eyes focused back, while her shadow hand was raised above her, gathering power.
”Here, catch this you rejected chariot!” she called out as she finished charging her attack, before yelling ”Twilight volley bomb!” as she hurled a massive turquoise runic covered magic orb at the proverbial feet of their pursuer.
Had she tried to throw these forwards, odds were very high she would miss the floating camera, as her projectile was slow and had to hit the ground to detonate, with a not insurmountable risk that a poor judgment of her toss would see it clip a platform instead, which would have been disastrous. Backwards however, even into the blinding light, was easy. Momentum was with her and the crawling cars were too massive to miss, letting her nail them with the huge explosions with relative ease.
Whether that would actually do anything was by no means guaranteed, and if it did not she’d instead try the sand tomb trick again whenever she could get herself out of the light, but if she could, hurt them, break the lamps or even just force the monsters back with the blasts, that was what she’d focus on.
Double
Lord Zee
Goldeagle1221
wintersoldier
Snowdrops
LG
Timemaster
Damycles
Izurich
