Eisenhorn

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Knight RP

Whatever Rolan was expecting, being shouted at about orders was not one of them. The grumpy, irritable woman who swung the door open loosely matched the description he was given. What had not been mentioned was the scarring and signs of learning, the hard way, how alchemy can be dangerous to one's own wellbeing as well as those who are not so willingly exposed to it. That, if anything, was a sign that she was exactly the kind of teacher he was looking for, one who had learned well the harder lessons. The goggles spoke of experience in protecting vital sight and...what was that about not getting it up?!

"Hang on now, I'm not..."

Rolan moved to at least intercept the door long enough to get a word in edgewise, hopefully making it clear he was just trying to get a word in before the door was slammed in his face. This was clearly a case of mistaken identity and he was quick to try and state as much. He had been caught off guard by the crassness of her apparent frustration with recent visitors trying to get help with their impotence.

"I didn't come here to seek manhood enhancements! I am trying to find an alchemist to learn from, at least hear me out before slamming the door in my face, please?"

@Raineh Daze

Fate/Illuminate Histoire

Assassin

"Jekyll. Jekyll. Jeeeeekyll. Hey, asshole!"

Assassin was pointedly ignoring his lesser half as he scanned the surroundings, discreetly moving along the paths towards the church. A woman had stood out before departing for the main route, though he had not had the time to seriously analyze her, especially if he wanted to avoid drawing unwelcome gazes and attention so soon into the goings on. He had been lingering around the edges of the church, watching for both his Master, as well as others that stood out as such, one figure that stood out had otherwise concealed himself decently well. Scarification had stood out on his hands, something that was just not normal as far as he had gathered. He recognized a sign of magecraft when he saw it, even if the good Doctor himself had been far from what one might consider a practitioner in any formal regard. For his part, Hyde seemed to notice that Jekyll had finally clued in and mouthed off, mentally, once again.

"About time you perked up to him Doc, you make for a real poor lapdog. Got mages both outside and inside, sure I can't take over for a few to clean things up early?"

"And let you defile not just the concept of this war, but who knows how many innocents along the way? Absolutely not, furthermore..."

Jekyll's intent to lecture his lesser half was interrupted by the mental signal of his Master, who bid him return, ideally sane. An annoyed feeling emanated from Hyde, though the general calmness and lack of true danger made it unlikely for the man, and Jekyll used that term very sparingly, to get a solid grasp on the control of their shared form. Assassin began making their way back to intercept and reunite with Rumi, falling in step beside her before speaking on the mental wavelength they shared. No sense letting eavesdroppers of any sort catch wind of what might be passed along in terms of information. Assassin was just physically far away enough to not be easy to peg as a companion of Rumi's, while still being present enough to act on a moment's notice and allow his Master to be keenly aware of his arrival.

<"Master, fortunately for us both it is far too civil for my lesser half to even care to reach for control. There are Masters already present in the Church itself, and one likely one along his way as well. No overt signs of Servants outside the church as of yet, it seems the others intend to maintain civility until this War formally begins.">

<"Yeah, Doc here was opposed to getting the drop on anyone so soon and break that civility. Came trotting back along like a good little bitch to the Master's beck and call.">

Much to Jekyll's annoyance, exposure to modern slang and media, brief as it was, was having a stark influence on Hyde's vocabulary. At least in the Victorian era he was at least well spoken, now he was little better than some poor soul living in destitution and poverty. Still, while Jekyll maintained a firm grip on the control of their shared body, there was little to be done for keeping the mental presence of Hyde, ever present and ever crass, from mouthing off and manifesting himself. A small mercy that he was content to just run his metaphorical mouth. Still, it was a downside of this particular Assassin, though not being one of the classical ones had its strengths as well, at least one would hope.

@Psyker Landshark

Qlippoth Shift: A Supernatural Action RP About Combating Otherworldy Anomalies

Even without the logic of the center of the delapedated manor holding the source of the problem, the sensation alone would be enough to announce it. Offering a nod to the other group as the two prongs reunited, it was short lived as things went from bad to worse. Yūma was near the rear of the pack of recombined agents, given his position with the original frontal assault team, and he had a good view of what was happening. Spearwall up, even manifesting swords capable of catching Agent Murakami's sword, and a mass even slowing down A-188. What was revealed was, unlike the black ooze ashigaru, was a samurai of some variety reforming and issuing warnings against the trespassers. A-188 wasted no time trying to bear down on the sword wielder, which Yūma suspected was not going to be nearly as effective as one would expect, which meant he was going to move to provide supporting fire with his remaining ammunition.

A wall of spears was potent, sure, but spears didn't block bullets. Stepping to the side, the former officer took careful aim and waited for a clear opening to harry the sword wielding source of the black ooze ashigaru. He intended to harry the sword wielding anomaly first and foremost, creating openings for the other Agents to exploit. Be it going for the legs to reduce the capability of moving out of attacks, or interfere with the weapon arms of the sword wielding source. Yūma would leave dealing with the spears and rising ashigaru to the other agents, he could at least focus on using the remainder of his ammunition trying to put an end to this decisively. He didn't call out his intent this time, used to watching other agents to avoid hitting them with his shots, and not wanting to warn the source of his intent.

@Raineh Daze@Izurich@OwO@Rune_Alchemist@PKMNB0Y@Psyker Landshark@VitaVitaAR

Qlippoth Shift: A Supernatural Action RP About Combating Otherworldy Anomalies

Yūma caught the marching orders that A-188 had issued to it by Agent Murakami, and his efforts at keeping the resurrecting flanking gunners down seemed effective. The plan was simple and to the point, follow A-188's path into the heart of the mansion and put an end to this unending tide of relics of the past. Suited him fine, the novelty of fighting ooze made specters of the past had begun to wear thin, especially since beyond one interesting threat, it had all been fairly rank and file troops. After putting down several more gunners, a wall of murky, brackish water, providing both barrier against attacks and further openings to exploit. Yūma took up a rearguard position now, keeping himself between harrying attacks and the like towards those more vulnerable to direct offensive actions, commenting offhand in response to a request to being carried.

"All hands seem already full I'm afraid, even A-188 and their abundance of legs."

Moving deftly backwards, which helped keep the more sluggish moving at a brisk pace, Yūma did a quick ammo check while reloading. Running low, not ideal, made things interesting again at least. He had brought enough ammunition for skirmishing, not full blown combat, and thinking back he kind of wished he had brought his heavier duty combat armor, it had more room for ammo and protection and was better suited for handling proper weapons in close quarters. But if he could look at the future and prepare accordingly life would be far different, and a damn sight more boring, so he refocused himself, keeping any Ashigaru at bay with a combination of pistol fire and close quarters strikes, refusing to let himself get drawn off at any given time. Unlike A-188, he didn't have the luxury of being able to shift into a new form and take out an army on his own. He would need significantly heavier firepower to take out an entire army on his own, and a lot more time to plan.

"Bringing up the rear, keeping hostiles at bay."

@Rune_Alchemist@Izurich@VitaVitaAR@Raineh Daze@OwO

Qlippoth Shift: A Supernatural Action RP About Combating Otherworldy Anomalies

A-188 had support in the form of Numako, and that suited Yūma just fine then. As long as none of them stood alone, they would be in far better shape than not. Obvious thoughts aside, it seemed that the continued, combined efforts and shifting tactics had forced the Ashigaru on the backfoot again, the return of A-188 and Numako being very helpful for the cohesion of their assault. The problem was they were not making good headway, and unlike the others, his ammo supplies would be exhausted eventually. A-188 slammed into the Ashigaru while Agent Murakami tapped further into the pyrokinetics and bladeplay to smash the ranks further. Yūma kept in the center of the ad-hoc formation that had formed, pacing his shots more carefully, saving them to either prevent unseen attacks, or keep ashigaru gunners from employing their methods. The black puddles reforming into enemies, the ones that had not fled into the dark, was just plain unsporting. It did at least make the fight interesting again, since the anomalies bullying ashigaru would get old eventually.

The sudden surge of incense, smoke, and ash coming down announced that Agent Mae had, in fact, doubled down on the use of incense. That should turn the attempts by the ashigaru to surround them on its head, given the sudden falling cloud of the material. Agent Mae's announcement was very much in line with his own ammunition supply situation, he could only keep shooting for so long before he ran out of bullets. Punching ashigaru back into the black goo they came from was fun, but compared to the speed of elimination that the anomalous could provide? A waste of time if he had better options at hand, as much fun as it would be to get stuck in again. Glancing back to evaluate, Yūma spotted the arquebus ashigaru reform and begin to take aim, he barked a warning as he opened fire to interrupt it.

"Gunner behind!"

Yūma put several shots into the ashigaru, aiming to prevent it getting its shot off before shifting his stance again. Slipping a brass knuckle onto his left hand, he prepared to engage in close quarters shooting against any of the ashigaru that advanced on either himself or the incense wielding Mae, while hopefully conserving ammunition in the process. Agent Murakami, A-188, and Numako had proven that being surrounded only improved their lethality, and they were not exactly in need of as focused defense. Given the sudden ability of the ashigaru to form from their remains, someone had to keep their head on a swivel to watch for gunners materializing out of the woodwork, and Yūma took up that position while continuing to cover the anomalies and agents present.

@Rune_Alchemist@Izurich@VitaVitaAR@Raineh Daze@OwO

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Knight RP

Lady Silenna.

That was the name Rolan had been given after asking around (and clarifying he wasn't looking for a cooking instructor, which had led to some disappointment) as well as a direction to head. Back to Talderia, he would be able to find her there. A woman of gold hair, golden eyes, and enough skill in alchemy to be considered a master in her craft already. Suited him fine, anything to give him an edge in the coming days. The other knights were training, he had seen them working while trying to find enough information to go on, honing conventional fighting skills and capabilities. Following that route would be chasing after the others, he wouldn't catch up in martial prowess anytime soon, especially with them lengthening their strides as well. He made sure that word was left for the Captain once she finished training or had time to review progress that he was heading back to Talderia, to find additional training there.

Rolan moved with a sense of purpose, and asking around he realized how much of a needle in a haystack situation he had going on here. Yes, he had a name and a general description, but that didn't mean a lot to most of the people he spoke with. He spent more time than he would have cared to simply trying to find anyone who knew the name at all, and even then it took some doing to convince them he was just looking to learn, and narrow down where he was going. After that, he was able to start getting better answers, even more so once he started getting closer to where Lady Silenna was staying. Before long he was approaching the abode where he was told he could find the woman, and approaching the door he raised his hand up and gave the door two short, firm knocks. Hopefully tracking down this woman would be the hard part, and she would be willing to help...

Qlippoth Shift: A Supernatural Action RP About Combating Otherworldy Anomalies

"A-188 is getting split off!"

Yūma barked out the warning to the other agents present with the frontal assault team, a weaving step evading another spear thrust, using his momentum to move into his reach to slam a brass knuckle upwards, sending another one of the ghost ashigaru down for the count. With the core of the assault drawn away, the flanking action had turned into an isolated attack. Switching back to his pistol, the former officer moved to regroup with Agent Murakami, supporting her with his service pistol to keep her flanks clear. He knew better than to stand alone and continue pressing the, albeit far more appealing, brawling advance. Divided they would get torn apart, no matter how good they were individually. The blackpowder wielders were getting smart, which meant he had to focus more on countering their incoming fire, moving erratically between what concealment and cover he could find, pacing shots between them.

"Whatever you did, Agent Mae, keep it up, I'll provide cover."

Yūma had positioned himself in a spot that could keep a broad eye on everything occurring. A-188 was beyond his ability to reach currently, not with the combination of gun wielding Ashigaru and the sword forces engaging to keep the frontline from falling apart completely. Agent Mae's efforts had not gone unnoticed, the remains being driven away and seemingly reacting poorly to the incense sticks being thrown. His current efforts were focused on preventing any of the phantom ashigaru from either flanking the remaining agents, or firing on them from covered positions. He couldn't afford the luxury of conserving ammunition with A-188 being lured off the war path, and if he could prevent an allied agent from getting hit, all the better.

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Knight RP

Rolan had hit a rather frustrating, and in retrospect obvious, roadblock after some time spent drilling his technique. Quite simply put, he had reached the mechanical limit on the speed he could span his crossbow. Short of significant modifications, there was only so fast he could fire a shot, lower the crossbow and brace it while fetching his wippe lever, draw the string back, stow the lever, load a bolt, all to take aim and fire again. While he could hold the shot far longer than any archer could, he would never match the speed without some significant leaps forward on his crossbow's design. Something to consider, certainly, but no amount of skill or training would fix it. He was wasting his time, essentially, beyond breaking the habit of tracking shots to their mark before beginning the process of making ready for his next shot. Which meant changing his approach to training, which meant considering where he was deficient, and that was something he thought on while getting everything packed back up to return to the training yard.

Rolan always prided himself on accuracy, something he could claim to have been refining from the moment he was handed the crossbow, but that hit a limit, and just not improving wasn't an option. He had originally hoped there was more room to improve in speed, but he had underestimated how fast he was already moving, or perhaps how little room there was to improve. His technique wasn't going to change much more, so that left adding more tools to his options. Which left him with very few options, at least among those that he could come up with. Of course everyone heard stories of archers firing multiple arrows, sending arrows curving around barricades or deflecting off one target to hit a true foe, but not only would Rolan not know where to begin, he doubted how much of that was compatible with his preferred fighting style.

Why not intensify his efforts in alchemy? Rolan paused as the thought crossed his mind. Sure, officially poisons and the like were frowned upon, if he was caught doing it, but nothing said he couldn't look for more overt combinations. With the amount of talent available to the Iron Roses, surely an alchemist could be found that he could train under. Hopefully they would not mind a more offensively focused preference, since as far as poisons went he had to mostly rely on paralyzing mixtures rather than lethal ones. But perhaps he could find recipes and mixtures that mimicked what those magically gifted could do, or at least a fraction of it. Or perhaps instead of relying on catching up, he could do things they couldn't. Having made mistakes learning reminded him of blinding mixtures of stinging fumes that had gotten him stern lectures, but perhaps weaponizing that was an option too. Either way, that meant finding an alchemist.

Moving back towards Candaeln with a sense of purpose again, Rolan would begin asking around for where he could find a skilled alchemist to learn from. He made no secret of his focus on improving his capabilities of employing alchemy in combat, ideally to augment his current capabilities. Whoever that turned out to be, well, remained to be seen but first things first was finding out who that was and tracking them down.

Qlippoth Shift: A Supernatural Action RP About Combating Otherworldy Anomalies

Yūma noted the Ashigaru were quick to come apart, yari wall not exactly holding up to the combined assault of anomaly, firepower, and the sheer force brought to bear against them. A-188 seemed hellbent to continue its rampage as it went barreling forward, another volley of arquebus fire opening up clearly as, unsurprisingly, the hail didn't do more than annoy the anomaly as it continued bearing down on the center of the ashigaru spirits. Ejecting the spent magazine into his hand, leaving one round chambered as he moved forward and swapped one of the full magazines in his pouches with the empty, he loaded and moved in rapidly after A-188, continuing to flank along to the left of the 'friendly' anomaly. A quick analysis of the situation wasn't ideal but there were far worse odds out there, after all the hostile Ashigaru still had to relaod.

"Rolling up their left flank, keeping A-188's left clear!"

Yūma opened fire again, though rather than hanging back and picking off targets of opportunity around A-188, he was advancing on the Ashigaru who were reloading, firing on the ones furthest away to bring them down. The more that were interrupted from ever getting another shot off, the better off they would be. He had brought plenty of ammo, of course, but didn't want to burn through so much of it so soon, and once he had spent his second magazine he made a fast swap, a grin on his face as the familiar, initially cold feeling of metal on his hands as he holstered his pistol and swapped to the brass knuckles in one smooth, practiced motion. He had picked off the shooters out of immediate melee reach, and now he was close enough to charge before the closest to him could finish reloading. The flashlight was tucked into its carry loop as well, still casting light but from a lower angle now, and one that moved with Yūma's body instead of where he pointed it.

The former officer's fighting style in melee became quickly apparent as the first he engaged tried to smash him in the side of the head with the blackpowder gun, a low swaying duck carried a heavy body shot, knuckles buckling the old armor and expending the momentum built by the dodge. Each evasion was transferred into a strike, wasting as little energy as possible as he started brawling through the ranks not immediately in melee reach of A-188 on the left. He lived for this moment, when he could justify getting stuck into a melee and start throwing punches. True to his call out, Yūma would keep fighting through the left flank, using the melee positioning to keep himself out of the immediate line of fire now that he was engaged in the melee. He could always reload later and take up an overwatch position again, for now, it was time to get some good old fashioned work in, one of the oldest ways still in use by humanity, two fists and building momentum.

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Knight RP

Damnation. If no one stayed dead, then the Roses would have to, realistically, best all obstacles to their escape in one outing, which put out the chance of wearing down the opposition nearly as much. Doubly so considering the capabilities of those who would be barring their progress. That also made the thought of more underhanded efforts...quite unhelpful, given the way such actions would no doubt sour the outlook of those present on the Roses, even by association alone. From the sounds of things, however, they were the first to have any real option beyond sort of idle about, and simply be. A shadow, strange given there were no clouds, distracted Rolan as his instincts started tracking for a threat, even in this apparently safe city. The shadow again, and a red-gold dragon of all damn things came crashing down.

Rolan shifted backwards, arm moving under his cloak towards his knife, which in the face of a dragon was quite the comedic thing to consider. The lack of arms, shouting, or the like quickly indicated that this one was not hostile, though Rolan shifted his stance back to a more relaxed one his arm remained under his cloak for the time being, out of habit now rather than anything else. He had gone from dealing with would be rebels, bandits and the like to legends and dragons in far too quick a span for his tastes. Let alone everything that had happened while he was on longer ranging taskings, he had frankly quite little time to effectively process anything. The uncomfortable warmth of dragon's breath and casual insult aside, Rolan took the chance to analyze as much of the dragon as he could. Weak points, old wounds, anything. Initial thoughts of 'go for the eyes, use as potent a toxin he could brew, and pray' were not exactly something he wanted to plan for.

They were going to leave, that much was certain. Legends, skilled warbands, dragons, all of them be damned. He had little else of value to add, and sure enough they were on the way back to Candaeln with a lot to think about.

---

Rolan had been almost silent on the march back, continuing to process everything going on. Fighting notoriously skilled warbands, still unknown trials, hunting down and slaying a dragon. All for the purposes of 'training' for whatever nebulous real world consequences remained waiting for them once they finished training in this rather peculiar manner. Part of him wondered if the other knights thought of any of this as sheer madness as he did, but he wasn't going to risk asking and potentially find himself to be the odd one out in the matter. No, that line of questioning would do nothing of value, right now he had to think on how he would improve to the point of being able to assist in slaying a dragon. The rest would fall in place, or would be something to improvise along the way. There was a lot he needed to do to even begin catching up, let alone competing, with the other knights usefulness. Upon returning to Candaeln, he would remark to those who he had visited the city with.

"Now that we have two thirds of our impossible tasks in mind, I have a lot to do to prepare. Whoever sees the Captain should let her know what we learned, now if you'll excuse me..."

Rolan excused himself from the returning members of the Roses to head to the training yard. Part of him had wanted to begin digging through the library for what natural reagents he could track down that would prove poisonous enough to significantly impact a dragon, but decided against it in the end. Preparing for problems was good, but he couldn't be certain foresight would always be available. Sure, knowing a dragon waits at the end of all this mess was one thing, that didn't mean he could always assume he would need something capable of slowing an overgrown lizard. Ideally killing it, but again, defeated the purpose of this little training exercise. No, they had to get better, and while tempting, Rolan suspected he was never going to compete with the others in terms of melee. He was good with a knife, and getting in close worked well most of the time, but it wasn't his forte. No, that was with his crossbow, which was why he was in the training yard long enough to gather up a number of targets.

He wasn't going to practice here, firing from one end of the yard to the other wouldn't do anything except pass time. He would find a patch of long, open ground outside Candaeln, though not out of sight of it, to set up a long range set of targets. From here, Rolan began drilling himself, and hit the first issue. It wasn't accuracy that was the problem, even when considering even the slightest deviation from his chosen marks as failures, it was the fact he wasn't putting more of the accurate shots down range. For a crossbow it was quick, sure, but compared to a proper archer with a bow, he was sluggish at best. Scowling, Rolan considered the problem, as he collected his bolts, a more involved process given the stretched out range he was deliberately operating at. Two problems came to mind, when it came to the speed of his shots, since he was confident in his accuracy.

One, and the one he had little recourse to resolve at the moment, was the inherent nature of a crossbow. It took time to prepare the lever, draw the string back, secure the lever and load the bolt. Assuming he worked up the raw strength to simply wrench the string back bare handed, which eliminated several steps, he could only work so fast. Second, was his method of shooting. He followed shots in before loading and making the next ready. Good for marksmanship, especially for the less accurate, but even under duress he was confident in his accuracy. He could hit his marks, though the memories of the gauntlet of enemies in the last dream sequence came to mind. Faster loading, not wasting precious moments watching his shots hit and deflect, might have given him more time to load and make that difficult shot. The eye slits of armor, joints exposed for moments as a weapon is raised or shield moved aside to facilitate an attack. The throat of a dragon as it reared back to attack, perhaps.

Muttering inaudibly to himself, Rolan walked back with a full quiver, and turned and took stock again. During the next drill, rather than watch his shots, he forced himself to begin preparing the next, not waiting to see where his shot ended up, instead focusing on volume of fire. He was mentally timing himself, and emptying his supply of bolts again he went to take stock of his shots. Still accurate, not as much as when he shot how he had always trained, but it hadn't taken as long as before. Not a significant improvement, something that would take long term practice to show significant change and improvement. First was improving how much time he had to work with between shots, then he could start getting trickier with what he did. A strong foundation first, or else everything above would collapse.