[center][h3]The Ruins - Dripstone Cave[/h3]
Koopa Troop’s [@DracoLunaris], Primrose’s [@Yankee], Rubick’s [@Scarifar], Teemo’s [@Bugman][/center]

Working together, Rubick and the Koopa Troop managed to put a quick end to what might have otherwise been a horrific outbreak. Though small enough to be on the more difficult side to hit, the Lightseeds possessed no survivability to speak of, and all popped into squirts of lambent orange juice with just one hit. Kamek’s quick thinking and magical prowess secured the foolish Migospel out of harm’s way as well, ensuring that the carriers couldn’t spread their infectious payloads. Without a living host or a thick membrane to keep it safe, the plague died out soon after its vectors did. The Ruins would be safe from infection a little longer.

“By the Queen, that was close!” With a sigh of relief Barnabee seated himself on a nearby rock, laying his splendid saw-toothed sword across his lap. “I must commend thou for acting in such haste despite thy ignorance. Any slower and the Infection would have surely spread.” The Hive Knight shook his head, his fuzzy face solemn. “It is a most virulent sickness. It creeps through the mind and body, radiant and alluring. Bugs seduced by its warm glow become mere mindless husks, puppeted by the corruption inside. All with their wits about them fear that orange luster, and guard closely against its spread. That light is nothing compared to the majesty of Her Majesty, of course!” He scratched his head, eyes narrowed. “Still. That a carrier would appear so close to the surface…I fear it bodes ill.”

He, Bowser, Junior, Kamek, Rika, and Rubick split into three teams of two for a careful look around the Dripstone Cave. Teemo lent his exploratory talents to the cause as well, perhaps as thanks for the rescue. If any other morsels of Infection managed to make their way here, they too needed to be extinguished. Fortunately, it seemed as if the plague-ridden Migospel had been a strange anomaly. Though the heroes circumnavigated the poisonous pools and skirted around the dangerously industrious Goams, no more traces of that infamous malady presented themselves. After a little over five minutes Primrose returned from her expedition to the Ancestral Mound, subtly foul-smelling but none the worse for wear. The others gathered around and received her news: despite this cavern looking like massive dead end for anyone not suicidal enough to brave the Goam burrows, there [i]was[/i] a way out, invisible to the naked eye.

At the dancer’s prompting the team headed for the chamber’s [url=https://i.imgur.com/cpEm5P8.png]swampy southern reaches[/url]. Even with the local mega-mosquito population culled, this subterranean mire was plenty inhospitable, being positively festooned with fungus, lily pads, and twisted tree roots. In one corner, however, lay the trunk of an enormous tree that in all likelihood extended from well beneath the floor to high above the ceiling, and one of its roots bent down into the swamp like a big, curved ramp. Flight, agility, or plain-old gumption would see the team to the root, which brought them to a slight promontory against the trunk where they found a patch of bark lighter brown than its surroundings. This, according to the Snail Shaman, was the secret passage the Seekers sought. Anyone who tried to touch it would instead put their hands straight through the bark as if it wasn’t there, dispelling the illusory wall in the process. Beyond lay a tunnel, dark but short, and at the end lay a chest.

Within the chest any prospective looter would find a bundle of rare [url=https://i.imgur.com/JwbMdSa.png]Gorajian Mushrooms[/url], which despite looking dangerous would heal ten percent of one’s maximum life when eaten, but that did little to distract the heroes from the fact that this dead-end tunnel didn’t exactly seem like a secret passage. Once the cleverest amongst them realized that the wall behind the chest looked just like the wall they dispelled earlier, however, an experimental touch would reveal that it was indeed another illusory wall, and behind this one lay the [url=https://i.imgur.com/DqPgKkT.png]Great Hollow[/url].

Though only a few dozen yards in diameter, this secret area extended a remarkable distance both upward and downward. The sight of what appeared to be daylight illuminating the whole area might draw the eye upward, but that dappled light filtered through an impenetrable mass of undisturbed thorny branches, so the only possible path taken by their allies had to be downward. Yet that route looked almost as treacherous, composed entirely of winding and in some cases very thin branches. To make matters worse, a number of [url=https://i.imgur.com/V4Aurdm.png]mushroom people[/url] and reptilian [url=https://i.imgur.com/9ccHtW0.png]basilisks[/url]. Even for those possessed of flight, it would be slow and tricky going to reach the exit at the very bottom. At the very least, there seemed to be the telltale glint of a handful of items along the way, ripe for the taking.

[center][h3]Edinburgh MagicaPolis - Noumenon[/h3]
Level 8 Big Band (46/80)
Ace Cadet’s [@Yankee], Frisk’s [@Majoras End], Red’s [@TruthHurts22]
[b]Word Count:[/b] 621[/center]

As crisis befell the grand library’s twenty-seventh floor, and the threat of the floor falling out beneath the heroes slipped closer and closer to a guarantee, Red made a split-second decision. The squat superhero took the trapped civilians he’d been attempting to evacuate into his own hands, or more accurately, sword. One and all were pulled into the relative safety of his Unite Morph, then immediately turned to face the luminous pink laser Artemis swept across the battlefield, a dangerous gambit in mind. His teammates scrambled to react, with Ace whipping out his handy clutch claw to grapple out of harm’s way. Frisk didn’t manage quite so well, however, and took a blast that sent her flying toward the edge. Stunned and smoking, it was all she could do to seize a broken railing and hold on for dear life as she dangled over a twenty-seven story drop.

“Frisk!” Sore and aching but still in the fight, Band dragged himself out of the bookcase he’d been slammed into, covered with dust and scraps of paper. He shook himself off and booked it back towards the heavily-damaged floor’s suspended central area. The bridge he slid across, already groaning under twice the burden it would usually be asked to bear, shuddered under his weight, but the detective had no choice. He clenched his teeth and soldiered on.

At the same time, Red made his stand. Though the destructive power of the demon’s brilliant beam turned chairs to splinters in an instant, annihilated candelabras, and burned books to cinders, Red’s giant swordblade managed to not just deflect it, but shine a light on Artemis herself. The reflected beam cut her swath of destruction short, and she reeled back with a shrill cry. Before she could compose herself, Ace lent some fireworks of his own to the mix. [i]Flash bomb?[/i] As the projectile hurtled toward Artemis, Band averted his eyes just a fraction of a second too late, The bomb burst against the demon’s body, and as one might expect, an eye-searing coruscation ensued, and though Band felt like his retinas were on fire, Artemis got the worst of it by far. The flash bombs used by Monster Hunters were no mere parlor tricks; their agonizing radiance could send even fearsome dragons on the wing into helpless free fall. With or without the wings and voice of an angel, this demon was no different.

With a harrowing scream Artemis dropped like a brick. She hurtled downward, striking one of the bridges on the twenty-sixth floor one story down, and proceeded to plummet all the way to the bottom.

“Music to my ears,” Band chuckled with a shake of his head, still in disbelief that the flash bomb worked so well. He extended a mechanical arm and pulled Frisk up as if she weighed nothing at all. The detective then doffed his hat to the Cadet. “Hell of a light show, Ace! I bet that thing ain’t feelin’ too hot after a fall like that. Whaddya say we head on down and finish the job, folks?” So saying, he put a pincer on his head to keep his hat from flying off and leaped from his rickety precipice. Between his rockets and his shock absorbers he didn’t need to worry about fall damage, which meant he could focus on dealing this demon a reckoning from on high. As he hurtled after Artemis he deployed both brass knuckles so he’d come down on the fallen angel with a colossal double-fisted slam.

Surprisingly, Albedo followed right behind him, jumping out into empty space to descend at terminal velocity. For someone who could reset fall speed with a plunging attack, of course, no height was too high.