HereComesTheSnow

Advance on Distant Proxima (Mecha RPG)

i'll kill you

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Fantasy Knight RP

Gerard Segremors

@VitaVitaAR

Bone scattered with a swing, steel biting deep against the structure of magic holding the calcium together.

No blessing meant no permanence to his strikes. No holy light meant no way to push them back. No sacred oath meant no way to strike fear into the hearts of the undead. Not good. For all his faith, Gerard was no Paladin. Not even a squire to one, like Fleuri. In the face of such an unnatural, ungodly opponent, he was nothing more than a normal man, clad in cold iron.

That said.

The skeleton that had stood in his path moments ago was out of the way, offering a clear shot at the armored man accosting his captain. Halting their advance. In the moments it would take for the forces of unearthly arcana to pull the bones together, giving them form anew, Gerard was already moving. They had no time for being held here. The man in full harness was priority. Kill him, and the skeletons could be dealt with in the advance.

There was a silver flash in his peripheral. He threw his head to the side, twisting his trunk. Almost enough. Flame. Burning. Skin torn across cheekbone. Got him. Blood below the eye... did not hinder vision. Superficial.

He swung, rebounding the twist he took. It loaded his hips anyway. His sword smashed through a ribcage. He set off. His tunnel vision had gotten him hurt, but it also illuminated why he had every reason to help the small Captain take this man down— if he didn't, she'd be surrounded. Pincushioned. Skeletons were not terribly strong. They would not need to be, if a target was distracted.

Most of the man's body was covered in full harness. Hard to penetrate with a longsword in the best of circumstances. Here was almost right out. The best thing to do would honestly be to ground him with either wrestling or some other method, then slip a knife into his throat or armpit. He wasn't in the ideal circumstance for it. Too much going on, too close to the captain. First priority was freeing her from this deadlock against a larger, stronger opponent.

Let him face somebody his own size, maybe.

"Ma'am."

The grunt came from Fanilly's left side, heralding an oberhau plummeting squarely for the armored man's skull. He was a rich sellsword to afford all that armor, forgone helm aside— this wouldn't end the engagement. He more than likely earned it through battlefield experience within this mercenary group. So saying, he could handle another attack coming in at him during a bind. There was no chance he'd not seen it before— Gerard could name dozens himself.

But once Fanilly was free to act, how long could he fend off two blades working in concert?

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Fantasy Knight RP

Sorry, had trouble finding my muse over the past couple of weeks. A lot going on off-site (nothing bad, just time-absorbing) and trouble figuring out what I wanna do here. I think I'll be over it soon, though. Writing's starting to come back to me.

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Fantasy Knight RP

That would mean she's moving back up, as they're still on the entry level.

By my read of it, the hooded gentleman that they've engaged was leading the contingent that came up through the right stairwell (assumedly in the wake of Mari shredding the initial wave that came up), and forced Fanilly down the left. Gerard being a few seconds ahead of her group on that path, I can only imagine he's running into the skeletons as well, so I'll be looking to engage the fella in full harness when I next post. I think that would mean we're (Gerard, Fanilly, whomever's with her) on that same lower level as Tyaethe and the Barukstaedian, albeit on the far side of the lower chamber.

I think that's everyone accounted for, save maybe Mari if she hasn't continued to to that second chamber. It's definitely gotten pretty touch-and-go to keep track of.

Lostman Graffiti

Iwao - Sharehouse

The thudding of footsteps and the slamming of a door were, to even the most oblivious of inhabitants, pretty damn hard to ignore in a cramped, thin-walled sharehouse like this. For Iwao, straining his ears against his common sense for anything out of the ordinary, it had been like staring down rolling thunder.

He swallowed a quartet of orange caplets, having nearly had a minor drowning incident once the radio flickered back to life and began to describe a missing person report destined for, impossibly, the day to come. Black hair, square-framed glasses... fit Mochi. The problem was that, unlike his habitual standout scalp, those two descriptors described just about seventy-five percent of the young men that lived in Tenoroshi. As had as it spooked him, that could be anyone either missing already or bound to be.

Maybe it was him rushing through the entrance right now, scared of missing dinner and in no more danger than that.

His knuckles had faded, despite only seconds passing since he'd swallowed the pills. The mind was a powerful thing indeed. Unwilling to let this uncertainty eat at him, given that and all, Arizawa ambled out of his room to greet the new arrivals and (hopefully [for once]) face the music for his destructive tendencies.

"Yo, shit."

...Seemed the only music he was facing was something punky. Rather than the still very much missing unaccounted for Mochizuki, he was met with the ragged breaths and wild eyes of Fumiko and Otoya. These two weren't lazy by any means, but he knew them well enough to know that neither looked at a dead sprint as their example of a lark.

"You guys alright?" He asked after a moment, eyes narrowing as he glanced between the pair before settling upon the door. Shit, if this disappearance thing was a bunch of abductions they'd just dodged...

His right hand, acting just below the level of a conscious command, curled itself into a loose fist at his side. There were a million reasons why it didn't need to. They were on campus, it wasn't even completely dark yet, you name it— but nonetheless, he could feel the idea growing in his head and shaping the unknown on the other side of that door into its image. Like a good horror movie, it didn't matter that it wasn't real.

"You look fuckin' spooked, somebody chase you?"

By the way, Pot, we really need to talk about what you've been saying to Kettle.

@Crowvette@banjoanjo

Lostman Graffiti

Iwao - Sharehouse

He stared at the halves he held, split as though cut by some great knife, and numbly contemplated the pit sinking into his stomach. Like he was falling into the emptiness he'd been contemplating. Or a slow sink into something like tar mixed with quicksand, you could say it was that too.

Shit.

He knew that was a gift. A housewarmer from Mochi's kid sis, more important than just any random plate. It wasn't enough that he carelessly broke some porcelain— no, he'd done it to something that meant something to somebody. Wasn't enough to wallow in his own meaninglessness. Nope, he evidently had to spread it to other people's lives too.

Chase off a helping hand. Snap clean the sentiments of Mini-Mochi. Next he'd set the house on fire, or something.

Fuck, man. What are you doing?

"You just keep fucking up, huh?"

What did you even wake up for toda—

...He shut the water off, that having been the last dish to begin with. Setting the two halves to the side on the countertop, he found himself eyeing the radio as it spewed white noise, now finished with the log of a rotting world. He didn't want to trash the plate, couldn't bring himself to.

He had... heard that. Slipped right in the middle of his own interrogation, he'd heard a voice, not his own, right before the signal winked out and gave way to static.

Was it in his head?

Was it a spot he'd missed on the radio?

Was it something else?

Reaching to switch dial off, his eyes slid back to the former plate, and he wondered if it really made a difference. He'd have said the same shit anyway... either supernatural or simple serendipity, he was never gonna escape it either way.

His knuckles throbbed again, as if piling a little extra on top for the sake of it. He needed to get to his room and take something already. It was gonna drive him nuts.

Shoulders slouched, he studied the floor as he ambled out of the kitchen and towards his little corner of the sharehouse, unable to refrain from straining his ears in case another message came through the dormant radio.

Maybe he already was losing it.

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Fantasy Knight RP

It seems like everybody has a slightly different idea of where everyone is. I propose we sound off on positions— Gerard's descending down the left stairwell, at the tip of the spear and about to break into the next chamber (where I believe Tyaethe and our Norse friend are located)

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Fantasy Knight RP

See, now it's a two-man job. Things are looking up, Jarde!

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Fantasy Knight RP

Gerard Segremors

Their forces had indeed split between both stairwells, both Gerard and his Captain having their intuitions be rewarded by the clattering of swords and mail echoing up the leftward steps, a clanky herald to the stomping of feet and dull flickering glow of torchlight. Their intention was clear— pen the invading force between both ends of a crab's claw, and crush them much the same. With such an enclosed space to fight in, there simply did not exist room to meaningfully fend off a two-pronged attack. That fate was inevitable if they did not act against it.

Segremors, impetuous and intrepid Segremors, had other plans.

"You heard her, on me!"

Scant few seconds between now, with the Captain issuing directive, and contact with the enemy forces. Hopefully his plea, overstep or otherwise, reached the ears of those undecided above. The more that could quickly descend, the better their chances of quickly aiding their Paladin became. Tactically sound planning and the general understanding of such made it quite unlikely

But if nothing else, he was not unused to clearing a path from the front.

A trio of mercenaries, revealed by an orange glow, surged upwards towards the knights—

And just as they rounded the bend, a starved wolf fell upon them.

He had the advantage of height, of gravity's inescapable pull downward adding to his momentum. While he did not have the element of surprise, his shout having alerted them to his presence on this path, neither did they— and he did have something nearly as useful. When one came down to brass tacks, it left the foe flustered and reactive much the same.

Vor.

The first, bearer of a torch and crossbow, was met with a boot to the sternum, heel digging into the solar plexus and driving away wind from his lungs. He staggered back, desperately raising the weapon and loosing a shot— but his foot, rather than bracing itself and catching his weight, found only the void. The bolt sailed high above the knight's charcoal locks as the sellsword fell, crashing into the second man behind him, overzealous in his want to assist. The force slammed both into the wall, knocking the back of the second's head into the stone with a dull thud.

Gerard had been there. It had earned him a scar just above his jungular. It earned the mercenary a blade through his—

Steel flashed: No time for sympathy.

Their third was savvy. He did not get caught in the groaning pile of limbs and metal before him, instead swinging his arming sword in a high arc as Gerard entered the space. Unable to stop that selfsame momentum, the knight's longsword rose to intercept the cut before it split his brow in two. In the realm of action and reaction, getting caught out of position like this ensured that the perfect move was exceedingly difficult to make as opposed to the soonest impulse.

Seeing both hands occupied with blocking, his opponent reached for a dagger, sheathed on his belt. Quick and practiced, he did indeed rip the blade free— only for his jaw to snap as Gerard's steel pommel crashed into the point of his chin. In that same moment, the knight had roughly shucked his intercepted sword to the side, off the center line, and brought his own longsword, grip first, back in a strike almost more at home in staff fighting than swordplay. If there was a knightly name for it, Gerard didn't know.

But it did what it needed to.

The mercenary let out a pained cry, his jaw momentarily loose as he likely saw stars, and Gerard struck again, grip changed to that of a miner as he brought the sword down. By contrast to before, a spur-of-the-moment reaction; everyone, even a man such as he, knew what the hell a Mordhau was.

The third mercenary fell. He would never rise.

His blood pumped ever hotter as he continued downward, carving a path for the knights in his wake. That little girl was all on her own down there. There would be hell to pay if they were too late to save her from harm. This group had made their choice in holding her hostage. Craven fiends. Despicable wretches. With the Roses now raiding the compound, they had to assume the worst.

A fourth, midway down. His mace, flanged and perfect for cracking skulls with or without helmets, drew a dull orange arc as it reflected the light of the torch above, intent on painting the wall red with brain. Wrenching the entirety of his torso down, the Reonite threw his head out of its path, bathed in sparks and dust as it smashed into the stone next to his shoulder. Following the motion of its wielder's body, sword became spear as its point buried itself into the man's femur. Stepping downward, he regained his base and ripped upwards. A growing stain of crimson became a torrent.

They would need to outpace news of their arrival to give Vosahnn's sister a good shot at living to see the sun again. They had made good on their word enough to convince Tili that she had no choice but to assassinate a member of the Royal family. There was no reason to believe she had lied about the stipulation placed upon failure— to say nothing at all of going turncoat.

As Tyaethe had said, this was a rescue mission. If he allowed them to get bogged down here, then all was for naught. Each second the knights were forced to engage these grunts was a direct threat to that Nem's life. That urgency weighed on them all. He forged on again, feeling the spiral seem to take forever as bedlam echoed around him.

A heat rose in his chest. Familiar, now, and driven. The world around him sharpened, the sounds of metal clashing in the chamber ahead cleared. He could not leave one man that stood in their path alive. The knights at his back needed them dealt with, the girl that lied ahead all but had each of their blades to her neck. His comrades simply could not afford being checked in their assault.

It flowed through him in waves, bolstering his muscles and seeping into his breath. While not quite yet the tar colored-fury that had so taken him in previous battles, not yet, he knew its beginnings well. It seemed inescapable in battle, from the moment it had truly become his craft. When he fought, it awoke in him a rushing frenzy, a ferocity that lay beyond the realm of simple skill at arms.

And he knew that meant he could crash into those obstacles like thunder itself. In this moment, it could be a welcome strength.

Let it come, then. When they reached whatever foe Paladin Tyaethe was fighting, he vowed it would serve their cause. There were worse things in the world than spirited reinforcement, when trying to break through. That much, he was certain he could do— even in combative trance.

Reon guide me.

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Fantasy Knight RP

copy that, thanks