The bird head glared intently at Cal as it stormed towards the girl. Surprise attacks wouldn't work a second time. When Cal jumped again, it was ready. It shuffled a few steps back, getting in prime position to smack its opponent out of the air once again. However, speed was not its strong suit. The bird head's swing missed by a few feet, allowing Cal to reach the hippo head and slash at its throat. The hippo head ducked to protect its most vulnerable area, taking the girl's slash on the snout instead. This head seemed to take pain better than its partner as it only let out a low grunt in response to the wound. Some of the monster's blood splashed onto Cal, hissing and burning her skin like acid. Vivid red rashes emerged on the skin where the drops of blood landed, itching and burning all over. The bird head madly pecked at Cal as soon as she landed back on her feet. The motion made its eye wound spatter its caustic blood all over the dirt. Its beak rammed potholes in the ground as it continued trying to spear the girl.
The fishmen had gotten a bit closer to the action by now. As they passed the mound of rubble, a guttural roar sounded from beneath the rocks. They jumped back and tripped over themeselves again in their startled state. A brief exchange of panicked yips could be heard before they were startled yet another time by the beetle man's enraged moans. The fishmen got to work and began to loosen the rubble to release their superior officer. They nudged the rocks around with their heads, making incredibly slow progress. The beetle man continued berating its poor subordinates as they did their best to remove the bits of debris one by one.
Meanwhile, the squirrels enjoyed a few brief moments feasting on their latest kill. Their gluttonous bliss was unfortunately interrupted by Lily's magic. The squirrel without the gash on its chest screeched in agony, clutching its left eye with tiny, blood-stained hands. It stumbled around, half-blind, before receiving a club to the head from Grant. Its skull was completely bludgeoned in and the squirrel collapsed with a dull thud. Its companion, the one with the chest wound, hissed in alarm and backed towards the truck to ready an attack. The creature seemed unaware of Siena's presence, too busy keeping its eyes on Grant and its freshly cudgelled partner. However it wouldn't matter long as Marcus let loose a shot that nailed the remaining squirrel in the shoulder. It was thrown back and lay prone on the ground, squealing and completely vulnerable.
@Baklava: Blood rashes, ouchies. Big Bertha is super pissed now and is actively attacking Cal, dripping blood wherever it moves its bird head. How unsanitary. Blood is caustic enough to harm even Cal. @Deathmyster and @PapiTan: Autokill clearance for remaining squirrel. Go wild, y'all. @Chasers115 and @Kyrisse: Nothing engaging you at the moment.
Notes:
Eyeball scorpion from red group is starting a big cast. Large green circles lighting up the night sky. Other teams can see it.
Big white ball also brightening the field from Ethan's team. No effect on player characters, just very bright and noticeable.
Enemies remaining:
1x bigass quadruped (Blinded in one eye, cut snout, spattering spicy blood all over. Very pissed and attempting to spear Cal with beak.)
1x beetle man (Immobile, pinned under rubble a fair distance from the truck. Yelling at fishmen.)
2x fishmen (Unearthing beetle man and enduring verbal(?) abuse.)
1x squirrel-rat baby (Wounded and curled up on the ground. Two major injuries on torso. Autokill clearance is granted.)
Aight, read thoroughly through the first OOC post and the character sheets to get a sense of the RP then PM the GMs with ideas for character backstory and power. The PMs can be done through either Discord or Guild.
In your CS could you change the "Jeral" in the Appearance section to "Gregory"? Also, "Stigma" is spelt wrong in the last paragraph of your Personality section.
When you're done feel free to hop on over to the Discord channel if you have any questions.
Cal sailed through the air, letting out a war cry that caught the attention of the quadruped mere moments before impact. The bird head barely whipped around in time to viciously bat the girl out of the air but the damage was already done. The surprise of the attack had caught it off guard. Calβs sword slashed across the left side of the avian headβs face, cleanly bisecting its right eye and destroying its vision on that side of the face. An ear-splitting screech of agony was heard all across the battlefield. The hippo head did a much milder roar in return as an afterthought. Bleeding profusely, a steady stream of crimson stained the monsterβs feathers and made a slight hissing noise as the droplets hit the ground. It was definitely pissed off now. The bird head turned to the perpetrator, ready to punish the girl who had wounded it so. The rest of its body followed. Its stomps shook the earth around it as it stampeded towards Cal.
Meanwhile, Grantβs massive projectile was hurled towards the beetle man with surprising accuracy. It seemed to be unaware of the chunk of earth until the very last moment, right before it landed. Luckily for the creature it managed to throw up a boxer-like guard before the chunkβs touchdown, protecting its head. The entirety of the earthen missile smashed into the beetle man, shattering on impact. It was pinned by the rubble, immobile and dazed but not quite dead yet.
As the battle raged, the fishmen continued lumbering towards their comrades. The blue marks above their heads, and the heads of their little group, had dissipated now. Their pace was comically slow as they wandered around and occasionally tripped over their own limbs. It would be a while before they got to the main fight.
The main brunt of the blue monstersβ forces was the vanguard of squirrel babies. They scurried swiftly towards the students, fangs bared and ready to tear into whatever they could pounce on. A sudden flare of purple magic shone from Sienaβs direction, prompting the pack to prioritise her as the primary target. However, they would run into some major difficulties in their path. Marcusβ first shot harmlessly kicked up the dirt in front of the squirrel pack, barely fazing them in their charge. His second shot was significantly more successful, nailing the squirrel to the right of the central pack leader in the torso. One down, four to go.
Despite the loss of one of their siblings, the rodents continued as if nothing happened, making incredible distance with their agility. They would reach the truck within seconds. Lilyβs grenade would explode before that.
Although the petite girl possessed the determination of a pro, her grenade technique was far from it. In order to lessen the chance of accidentally blowing up oneself, the user must keep a firm thumb on the safety lever as they release the pin. Contrary to popular belief, it is the safety lever rather than the pin which keeps the delay mechanism from beginning its countdown. Lilianna had neglected to check this fact with the supervising officer and the Blue Team would pay dearly for it.
The time it took for Lilianna to aim while the pin was pulled would eat into the grenade's airtime. The squirrel pack moved incredibly quickly, forcing Lily to compensate by aiming her grenade a few metres in front of them. Unfortunately, that meant that its trajectory would be between Marcus and the squirrel pack. The M67 grenade, the standard fragmentation hand grenade used by the US military, has a fatality radius of five metres and an casualty radius of 15 metres. The flight distance of the frag grenade's shrapnel is indefinite, the highest recorded distance being 250 metres. The grenade exploded a metre above its expected landing spot, devastating anything or anyone nearby with a deafening 'boom' of white smoke. Two squirrel creatures were within the fatality radius, torn apart by a combination of concussive force and white-hot shards of metal. They were the stragglers of the group, the slowest runners. The remaining two were shaken of course, miraculously untouched by the debris, but nonetheless continued speeding towards their target. Marcus was right in the middle of the casualty radius while Lily was lucky enough to stand just outside the edge of it. However, she did get injured by some stray pieces of shrapnel.
The remaining two squirrels successfully reached Grant, Padma and Siena. As soon as they were in range, they pounced. Padma brandished a bowie knife to fend them off, stepping forward to shield an exhausted Grant and a still-preparing Siena with her body. The lead squirrel obliged the Indian girl's challenge, launching itself straight at her. Its trajectory was cut off with a quick swing of Padma's knife, and the squirral was thrown back with an open gash on its chest. It squealed in pain but once it landed back on its feet it signalled its companion to attack simultaneously. The leader jumped once again at Padma while its partner aimed for Grant. She didn't think. There was no time to think. Instinctively, Padma's arm shot out to protect her roommate and got severely bitten in his place. She let out a horrible cry and dropped her knife. This hesitation was enough for the leader to lunge at Padma's throat with significantly less resistance than its first attack. Its fangs hit home and Padma collapsed to the ground still screaming, with the two monsters tearing away at her. Her pained voice cut off abruptly as a fountain of blood sprung from her neck. Grant and Siena could watch on in horror as the two remaining squirrels continued chomping down on their teammate.
@Baklava: Cal just got thwacked in midair. Should be a little dazed but no major injuries. Unless that's what you want. You do you, buddy. @Chasers115: Lol good luck with that grenade, mate. @Kyrisse: Two bits of shrapnel got jammed into your flesh prison. Feel free to choose where they entered but remember that flaming hot pieces of metal travelling at "blink and you'll miss it" speeds hurt. A lot. @Deathmyster and @PapiTan: RIP Padma. Uh, yeah. Squirrels. Real bummer. Better clear 'em up before they start snacking on you guys too.
Notes:
Blue markers are now gone from all enemies.
Big flashy attack from Ethan's team. No effect on team, just very noticeable.
Enemies remaining:
1x bigass quadruped (Blinded in one eye, very pissed and gunning for Cal)
1x beetle man (Immobile, pinned under rubble a fair distance from the truck)
2x fishmen (Still slowly making their way to main fight)
2x squirrel-rat babies (Currently feasting on Padma a few metres from Grant and Siena, momentarily distracted by the free food. Very, very bloody. One of them is quite wounded by a large gash on its chest)
George beamed at the strange boy as he created a light show for his impromptu concert. Finally, a busking partner who knew how to rock a crowd as well as George did! He could scarcely think through his excitement. Dozens of potential acts and tricks streamed through his headspace. They were going to be awesome together. As long as the guy abstained from rapping cos holy smokes, that could have gone better. George Ellington was a performance artist, not some crooner square.
βThatβs, uh, real swish, buddy!β George forced a grin and tried to go along with it. He had no idea what this guy was talking about. βHow βbout we hold off on the rapping for now, eh?β
Thankfully, the bell cut their conversation short before George could say anything heβd regret.
The assembly was straightforward enough for even George to understand. Adam was one of the coolest cats George knew so he could always count on him to get things done. The news of the βattackβ was fascinating enough. Strange things happened all the time in Academy City, right? It was only a matter of time before some strange happenings hit Kichijoji.
What really rattled George was the principalβs announcement of the new reward system. Namely the part about their studies. George groaned audibly and dropped his head into his hands, garnering a few weirded out looks from neighbouring seats. He wasnβt going to concentrate on his studies now of all times! Heβd scoped out a new performance spot only a week before and he couldnβt leave it so frequently unattended for school of all things. This was important stuff! George could already see Joujiβs stupid mug as he sniped Georgeβs new location.
Argh, but the reward would bring him so much glory. So much⦠fame. At least in the Kichijoji circles. Hell, maybe even outside those too.
George heard the chatter of some students behind him, discussing the merits of investigating the attack as an opportunity to earn that reward Adam spoke of. Yes, yes this would be perfect! An amazing claim to fame with absolutely zero studying involved? George grinned in his seat. Heβd be paying that crime scene a visit later.
The Blue Teamβs truck came to a stop a safe eighty metres from the bulk of the blue-marked monsters. As the students piled out under the harsh barking of their supervising soldier, they were able to observe their enemies as they prepared for battle. Even with the distance between the two groups, the monstersβ behaviours could be somewhat deduced.
The most notable of the enemy monsters was a large quadruped about the size of an African bush elephant, 3.3 metres tall. Its hefty, leathery torso stood upon four legs resembling those of a cassowary. With their thickness and texture, the legs seemed to look like tree trunks. The oddest feature of the monster had to be its two heads, one of a hippo and the other of an emu. It was quite clear that the bird head was the most authoritative of the pair. It clucked and bobbed its head around wildly while the hippo head remained stationary, most likely due to its lack of a neck. The creature seemed to be kicking at something in the dirt, shaking its legs every so often while the bird head pecked at its front feet. The hippo head merely yawned as this happened.
The second most formidable looking opponent was a beetle-like humanoid. It stood a confident two metres tall. For the most part, it looked like a heavily-built man in black beetle plate armour. It might have been able to pass for a human man if it werenβt for the horrid βmouthβ covering its entire face, including its eyes and chin. It resembled a carnivorous plant but a few of its mouth flaps were askew, making its faceβs silhouette look like a morbid model ship. It stood by the largest monster with its arms crossed and head cocked to the side, as if awaiting orders.
Accompanying the two largest creatures were three fishmen. They were had the torsos of large orange fish but the limbs of normal human men. They stood on all four appendages but moved quite clumsily, as if they hadnβt learned how to walk properly yet. They seemed a bit disconnected from the rest of the group, left to their own devices as they stumbled over each other.
The majority of the blue group consisted of five squirrel-rat hybrid humanoids. They were around the size of infants, only slightly taller than knee length. At present, they were play-fighting amongst themselves, which made it clear that they were extremely nimble fighters. They ran at the speed of greyhounds and primarily used their claws and fangs in their play fights. It was this pack of squirrel creatures that spotted the students in their preparation period, alerting the rest of the blue marks with their collective squealing.
The whole group started towards the mages, with the pack of squirrels easily taking the lead with their speed. The beetle-man was the second fastest of the blues followed by the large bird-hippo. Due to the sheer speed of the squirrel creatures, the distance between them rapidly increased. The pack of rodents would reach the students first by a large margin. The fishmen were still lumbering at the back. It would be a fair while before they reached their opponents.
All five of the squirrel-rat pack scurried in a crude V formation, no member splitting off or getting left behind. As they neared the USARILN backup, a gust of rainbow glitter from the direction of the red team hit both groups, inflicting miniscule cuts and injuries on all of them. The squirrel pack squealed in pain, but it didnβt seem to affect their speed as they bounded towards their human enemies. The beetle-man redirected his running path in response to the squealing, now heading in the general direction of the pack rather than the side. The pack would be the first to engage in battle.
You guys will still be near the truck getting your guns and Kindles and stuff. Prepare for squirrel-rat baby attack and many mini papercuts and stuff from the glitter dust. Git 'em gud, kids.
AlteredTundra
stone
Izurich
Little Bill
