[center][h3]Road to Ruin[/h3]
Level 12 Tora (46/120) Level 12 Poppi (56/120)
Giovanna, Roxas’ [@Double], Pit’s [@Yankee], Susie’s [@Archmage MC], Zenkichi’s [@Multi_Media_Man], Partitio’s [@Dark Cloud]
[b]Word Count:[/b] 1635[/center]

First things first. “Poppi?” Tora called, as much to get her attention as to make absolutely sure she was by his side. “Need focus on defense, meh. Please switch Alpha!”

“Roger roger.” Sparks flew in the rain as the artificial blade reconfigured. The sheer mechanical power of her Masterpon’s original design, combined with the heavy metal plating from Poppi’s fusions with the Armor and Chemtrail would provide the strength and durability the pair needed for a knock-down, drag-out battle of attrition. After a moment the gear shift finished with a hiss and a burst of steam, Poppi’s red cape flapping in the wind as she hefted her claymore onto her shoulder. “Alpha by name, alpha by nature!”

Tora pulled out his new hammer, and once Poppi constructed a Drill Shield for him, he hefted that in his off-wing as well. “Meh-meh,” the Nopon laughed, only a little nervous. A true heropon knew no fear, after all. “Time to begin!”

With Poppi at his back he started to move, advancing toward the horde of machines still a little ways off. He began to beat his hammer against his shield, the repeated slams satisfyingly loud. The racket bolstered his courage, even as the baleful red eyes of machine lifeforms locked onto him by the hundreds. The role Tora accepted and strove to fill was that of the protector, the ironclad tank who drew the enemies’ ire away from his allies and withstood whatever punishment they could heap upon him. Sure enough, his clamor did its job. After just a couple moments, the machines -moving at a steady march down the desolate avenue- broke off in twos and threes to sprint in his direction, their metal feet splashing through the puddles. A Legpower Goliath charged out at the head of the pack thanks to its huge, long gait, the terrific slams of its footfalls enough to make just about any heart quail.

But not Tora’s. He tightened his grip. “First one in fight…”

“...And last one left standing!” Poppi replied.

The Legpower closed in with terrifying speed and lifted its huge leg to bring down on Tora with a massive stomp. Its immense limb landed dead-center, but rather than squash the Nopon flat it stopped short, the pancake-making wallop blocked by a combination of Tora’s upheld Drill Shield and a channeled ether barrier from Poppi. As the barrier faded Tora engaged the thrusters to push back against the immense force crushing down on him, holding it just long enough for Poppi to slide beneath the titanic foot and put her shoulder against its weight. With a mighty push she and Tora threw the foot off, sending the Legpower off-balance, and a moment later Tora followed up with a Boom Biter fired from his shield to take a chunk out of its torso. Enraged, the Legpower aimed a giant kick at the pair, but they split to either side to let that death sentence pass them by. Noting a matching robot head on the Legpower’s underside, Tora got into position as Poppi hacked at the big machine’s leg joints with her sword. He deployed his shield’s drill and put its thrusters to full burn to fly straight upward, digging into the head. “Uppies!” he cried, and Poppi dropped her claymore to oblige. As the Legpower stomped around, she used her thrusters to buoy Tora up from beneath, allowing him to carve straight up through the Legpower’s innards and finally burst up through its top head in a fountain of oil, sparking circuits, and scrap metal.

“Meh-heh-heeeeeh!” he cheered as he landed in Poppi’s waiting arms, watching as the Legpower crashed to the earth. Of course, the minute it did it got stomped underfoot by the mob of Bipeds only just now catching up to the opposition, so Poppi put her Masterpon down and hefted her sword back up. The first Large Biped used the fallen Legpower’s leg as a springboard to launch itself at Tora with a double overhead slam. It pounded his guard two more times before he deflected its blow, opening it up for a massive horizontal slice from Poppi that breezed over Tora’s head to carve through the machine like butter.

As its upper and lower halves fell, two Medium Bipeds attacked. Tora ducked lower and hammered his assailant in the side of the knee, caving it in sideways, but the Biped replied with a blow to the head. It barely left a bruise, and armed with that knowledge Tora happily took a second minor inconvenience to finish what he started and knock the Biped’s legs out from under it. A second later he cracked its head like a watermelon, and that was that. Meanwhile, Poppi lopped off her attacker’s right arm as it went to punch her, then neatly transitioned into a horizontal cut. Without enough momentum, it lodged halfway through, so Poppi put her other hand against the embedded blade and began to rotate her torso. She dragged the machine around her in two full loops before bifurcating it with a final heave, which sent its halves flying off toward the rest.

Overhead, two Small Fliers and a Medium Flier began to circle, shooting down iridescent pink orbs at a middling pace. While moving to avoid them Tora came under attack by a Large Biped that windmilled its arms in a constant onslaught, forcing him to block until he came to a sudden realization. He positioned the edge of the shield in the arm’s path and watched with glee as the Biped rammed its arms down on its serrated edges. From there a good wrench was enough to part its forearms from its body, and when Tora twisted back he buried the shield into the machine’s lower torso, knocking it to the ground. An overhead hammer swing drove the shield the rest of the way to finish it off, though Tora quickly retrieved the shield to block the Fliers’ shots. Poppi boosted up to get them off her Masterpon’s back, extending her blade to stab through its rotors and into its body. After taking aim she hurled it from the sword into one of the Medium Flier’s four turbines, sending it spiraling to the ground, then boosted toward the last one to wreck it beneath her weight as she descended to earth like a meteorite.

As she came down with a bang, Tora bashed a sword-wielding Medium Biped’s head sideways with its hammer, then as it spun jumped into the air to come down with a front flip shield crush that crumpled the machine’s head into its still-standing body. He rolled off and right into a block against a Multileg Cutter. It sliced left, then right, then angled its blades downward for a double stab over Tora’s block. He angled his defense up just in time, only to be thrown for a loop as the Multileg then began a rapid spin attack. It blew open his guard as the sparks flew and began to smack him, only for Poppi’s sword to fly in and pierce straight through its torso. It ground to a halt as a trio of Bipeds closed in, so Tora tossed Poppi the shield to unleash a Blade Art–Noponic Axiom. Her Electric Core flared to life as the whirling Drill Shield sent forth a rippling cone of chain lightning, frying all four machines until they blew up in an impressive chain explosion. A Quadruped circled around the blast, but with the weapon in her hands the Artificial Blade could fire off Riot Guns, and it took just two to blow the Quadruped to bits. As Tora felled a Medium Biped with a solid battering from his hammer, Poppi noticed the Medium Flier about to take off again and got an idea. “Boost me!” Poppi passed the shield back to Tora, pulled her claymore out, and springboarded off him in a mighty somersault slash to finish off the quadrotor.

More machines charged in. Poppi charged through a Reverse-joint’s gunfire to challenge it head on, stopping its pounce with a terrific left hook to floor it before hacking away with her swordblade. Tora fired off Boom Biter after Boom Biter, blowing two or three Bipeds up at a time, but his third only staggered a Large Biped with a glancing blow while a Quadruped leaped over the blast. It ran him down and pivoted around for a nasty double leg kick, but Tora’s low profile meant he could sweep underneath the blow and then fly up with a rocket-propelled drill. It dug in as he flew in a short arc, flipping the Quadruped onto its back. Once they landed the drill bit stuck fast and the shield itself began to spin, Tora with it. “Meeeh-eeeeeh-eeeeeh!” he cried as he whirled around, holding on with a single wing with the hammer in the other. The Bipeds that closed in hoping for an easy kill instead took a brutal pounding and hit the dirt as smoking, dented wrecks. Only when a new flier shot Tora off did his wild ride come to an end, but as the Nopon rolled along the ground Poppi yanked the busted-up shield from the Quadruped’s body to hurl at the airborne machine like a flying sawblade.

The flier hurtled to the ground and blew up on impact. As the flame and smoke cleared, a Goliath closing in on the pair looked up from the wreckage to stare the dynamic duo down, then resumed its approach, surrounded by Bipeds and a handful of small, bug-shaped [url=https://i.imgur.com/yLMmOwj.png]Drones[/url] neither remembered seeing before. They seemed different, but nothing the two couldn’t handle. “Not done yet, right Masterpon?” Poppi helped Tora to his feet and passed him a newly-constructed Drill Shield, which he accepted with a grin.

“Tora only just get started!”

[center][i]Tally:
Medium Biped x 13, Large Biped x 5, Legpower x1, Multileg x1, Reverse-joint x1, Quadruped x2, Small Flier x3, Medium Flier x1
Total: 27[/i][/center]

[center][h3]Edinburgh MagicaPolis[/h3]
Level 8 Big Band (74/80)
Ace Cadet’s [@Yankee], Red’s [@TruthHurts22], Mewtwo’s [@Double]
[b]Word Count:[/b] 1339[/center]

While a seven-foot-seven, five thousand pound detective in a tan trench coat couldn’t be called inconspicuous with a straight face, Band did what he could not to stand out, or to stand in front of any Edinburgh civilians and block their view. A few more feet wouldn’t make a difference if his person of interest descended on that artificial island across the water. When L finally made her appearance, though, Band watched and listened to her with bated breath. [i]So this is the woman I’ve heard so much about,[/i] he mused, his eyes on the tall, slender figure’s strangely ceremonial cherry-red armor and helmet. [i]I feel like I know you already.[/i] Even if that headwear blocked her features, Band felt like he could safely say that [i]this[/i] was the face of the enemy.

How many Consuls was this, now? He’d heard about N but couldn’t attach an appearance to the name, and he’d both seen and heard the Consul of the Metro, but missed out on his name. Then the one reported by the contingent who reached Twilight Town by boat, S. Two alphabetical aliases might have been a coincidence, but three was a pattern. Did that indicate the existence of twenty-six Consuls, all endowed with clear authority over some section of the World of Light or another? Their presence and purpose intrigued Band to no end. Virtually everywhere had someone or another in a position of power, but this felt different. With so many worlds involved, what were the odds that the same caste of people reigned in such different places, and so far apart? That smacked of something intentional. [i]Galeem’s intentions?[/i] he wondered. If it possesses such faculties, instating stewards to keep a chokehold over the World of Light -and to quell any opposition- made sense. That meant getting rid of them made sense too.

Unfortunately he, Ace, and Red were in a bad spot to think about challenging her. From here, the Aether Foundation’s headquarters looked less like a paradise and more like a citadel, ringed by a gigantic, ice-cold moat. Band might be able to rocket across the freezing water to reach the island, maybe even with Red hitching a ride, but his power of transportation ended there. But even if all three managed to face L, with Lucia -currently attending to personal matters elsewhere in the city- and Frisk plus Albedo -cooped up in Grammeowster’s Kitchen with Sierra to avoid L recognizing them- thrown in for good measure, that might not be enough. Sure, L looked tired and wounded from her battle, but to Band’s world-weary eyes that looked too good to be true. If he were a betting man, he’d put his chips down on Edinburgh’s other Consul being nearby. Rushing in half-cocked at the smell of blood sounded like an easy way to spring a trap and get killed.

In the midst of Band’s musings, an unexpected guest appeared out of the blue. Mewtwo blinked in, gasped an urgent plea straight into the Seekers’ minds, and collapsed. Ace seemed to recognize him, his surprised exclamation letting the others -and bystanders- hear the creature’s name. The detective blinked -in the traditional sense- a couple times himself, then got to action. Already the crowd’s attention in their immediate vicinity lay squarely on Mewtwo. A warp like that would’ve gotten their attention even if he hadn’t been a legendary Pokemon, but thanks to that all eyes lay on him, and excited whispers filled the air. Eager trainers began to rummage through their bags for Pokeballs. The Monster Hunter quickly explained Mewtwo’s origin, and Band gave an urgent nod of understanding. He needed to control this chaos. “Scuse us, folks,” he began, turning to stand in front of Mewtwo as Ace began to carry him off. “Our friend here’s been travelin’ all day, poor guy’s all tuckered out.”

“Oh, it’s your Pokemon?” one of the nearby trainers asked, sounding disappointed. “Well, Mewtwos are very rare, you all should take better care of it!” She crossed her arms, looking indignant for Mewtwo’s sake. “Take a page out of the Aether Foundation’s book!”

“...Right.” Seeing that Ace had cleared the crowd with Mewtwo and was on his way back to base, Band looked around to make sure he wasn’t missing anyone. “Red? Hey Red, where’d you…?”

A voice from behind him got his attention, and the detective whirled around to see the superhero as he shouted at the top of his lungs across the lake. Balancing on the railing there was no mean feat considering his disproportionately large head, but Band found his audacity a lot more impressive. For a moment the stunned detective thought that Red was trying to confront L about her evildoing directly to bring her to justice, but Red opted for the thinnest veneer of subterfuge possible rather than none at all. While he managed to outstrip the volume of the crowd, which by now had died down thanks to their increasing dispersal, his voice had a long way to travel to get all the way to L on top of the Aether Resort. Band doubted she heard it, but he wasn’t about to let Red try again. He zoomed over, sliding across the snow-dusted stone brick, and snatched Red right off the railing with Take the A Train. Of course, he didn’t perform the percussive follow-up he usually did when landing this grab, and just rumbled back the way he came with his captive in tow.

“Ain’t no way you just tried to pull a stunt like that,” Band chided as he hustled to catch up with Ace and Mewtwo. “You wanna blow our cover or somethin’? That back there was a trap, one hundred percent. I betcha ten to one N was lurkin’ around there somewhere too. The last thing we need right now is the Consuls’ attention., and even if they didn’t suss us out, ya think she’d make time answerin’ questions for random nobodies?” After a couple dozen seconds the group got a safe distance away, so Band let Red out. “Look, I wanna know just as bad as you,” he admitted to the superhero. “But let’s look after Mewtwo here first. Chances are we can get the story from him.”

Before getting too far away from the Aether Resort, however, the group happened upon one of Edinburgh’s many Pokemon Centers. The boxy white building, roofed in red, before the trademark Pokeball symbol that identified anything and everything Pokemon. Mewtwo had fainted after using the last of his strength to reach Ace, but his red-haired acquaintance had the means to ease his pain: Lifepowder. A dose left Mewtwo lucid enough to recognize the Pokemon Center when he saw it, and while he couldn’t be healed by its machine as a free Pokemon, Band didn’t mind forking over some of the money earned from yesterday’s show to buy him a Revive.

Once administered the yellow crystal, Mewtwo would awaken on a red chair in the [url=https://i.imgur.com/SpOE0J0.png]Pokemon Center[/url], with the others standing by as the nurse’s kindly [url=https://i.imgur.com/VAndUtI.png]Audino[/url] took care of him with Heal Pulse. He’d still be tired, his PP painfully low, but his health was fully restored in no time. Once the Audino took her leave, Band stepped in. “You feelin’ alright?” he asked. “The name’s Big Band. We’re all Seekers.” He paused for a moment, swallowed, then continued more tentatively. “Don’t mean to rush ya, so take your time an’ all, but before we do anythin’ we’re itchin’ to hear whatever you’ve got to say about Alcamoth. Ain’t seen it myself, but it sounded important.” He narrowed his eyes. Red had mentioned Nelson evacuating people with the Virgin Victory, but last Band heard that airship was still undergoing repairs in that oasis outside of Gerudo Town. That meant that the inhabitants of Alcamoth might not have been able to evacuate during an attack. 

“What happened?”

[center][h3]Underground Nexus[/h3]
Sakura’s [@Zoey Boey], Peach, Luka, Dexio, Sina, Raz[/center]

The sight of so many Vase Paws shook Peach, but only for a moment. Even in a big pack, these Others weren’t anything she hadn’t seen before. Four of them charged her way, led by a swift-footed frontrunner that zigged and zagged from side to side. Peach white-knuckled her Scatterboom, tracing the monster’s path with the barrel of her weapon, but only after the Vase Paws lunged for her did she make the final, critical adjustment and fire. A thunderous report echoed through the collapsed nexus as her point-blank blast sent the shotgun flying back in a burst of blood-red flower petals, its smoldering corpse tumbling along the ground until it burned away.

Its fellows hopped over its body and closed in, the clack of their heels and the jingle of their tails an intimidating cacophony. The first one jumped at her, flying through the air as it lashed out with both legs in a double kick. Peach dodged to the side and let it fly past her to focus on the second one, following close on the other’s heels. It unleashed a grounded, straightforward door-buster kick, and Peach span past it, staying close. With an adrenaline-fueled heave she bashed the Other’s narrow waist with a melee from her shotgun, then as it stumbled ditched the Scatterboom for her parasol. The princess deftly flipped it in her hand and grabbed it in a reverse grip to reach out with its J-shaped holt and hook the off-kilter Other’s leg out from under it, dropping it to the ground. By that time the third Vase Paws reached her, and with her teeth clenched she managed to block its high roundhouse with the furled parasol. After two quick strikes to the body with the hilt she took hold of the handle with her other hand and jabbed it point-first into the Other’s center of mass to then pop it open, flinging the Vase Paws away.

The move took just a hair too long, however, and as Peach turned to face it the last one delivered a tail lash right to her cheek that left her seeing stars as her jaw stung. Peach leaned into the spin to avoid stumbling, however, and recovered just in time to lean back away from the Vase Paw’s backflip tail lash. “Whoa!” she yelped, almost falling over backward. On instinct she manifested Grimm’s revolver, and the moment the Other landed a screaming wraith slammed into it, instantly flooring it in a shower of petals and ceramic fragments. The first Vase Paws ran up and came around with a mighty spin kick that Peach just barely rolled under, but by the time she came to rest on her back she’d already taken aim with the revolver again. With a hideous cry the Vase Paws fell, one leg blown clean off, but its second-fiddle kindred took revenge as Peach tried to rise with a swift kick in the guts. “Oof!” she grunted, tumbling backward only to activate Levitation and spring into the air. Out of the Vase Paws’ range, the princess pulled out her launcher, and a rocket aimed at her attacker’s feet knocked it down. As she fell the third Other charged in to intercept her, but Peach paused her fall mid-air with her float ability and nailed its head with repeated kicks instead. Her barrage ended with a point-blank inferno from her re-manifested Scatterboom. That left just the second Other, discombobulated by her rocket’s splash damage, and when it ran at her Peach got a spark of inspiration. Borrowing Sina’s Cryokinesis, she froze a patch of the floor, watched the Vase Paws slip and fall. Peach sidled up and beat it down with her parasol until a bulb popped up from its body. With a grin, she manifested a golf club and lifted it up. “Fore!” [i]Crash![/i]

All four foes defeated, Peach straightened up and let out a heavy breath, then checked on the others. Sakura dealt with the lion’s share of the Vase Paws with ease, naturally. Sina had things a little harder -and positioned herself behind Sakura, somewhat- but had gotten a few kills of her own. Even before Peach had, she’d used an ice slick to topple an Other in order to line up an icicle kill shot from her arm cannon. As the princess watched, Sina managed to stop her last enemy in its tracks with a torrent of freezing spray. She then saunted her up and casually pushed it over to shatter messily on the ground.

Peach smiled. Another battle won. “Nice work, you two!”

In the wake of the action, Luka reached out through Brain Talk again, the connection a little fuzzy thanks to the blockage.. [i]”I’m not hearing anything. Everyone alright in there?”[/i]

[i]”Just took care of them,”[/i] Peach replied.

Dexio’s voice entered her mind next. [i]”Thank goodness. We’re gonna teleport in there in a second, I’m using my seismic sense to find a spot that’s clear. Need to be extra careful, so it’s gonna be another few seconds.[/i]”

Peach nodded. [i]”No rush, we’re-”[/i]

In the corner of her eye–a telltale glimmer. Maybe it was her experience fighting a protracted campaign against the Rabbids back in the day. Maybe it was the showdown with the sharpshooters at Spiral Mountain. Or maybe it stemmed from the traumatic stress pounded into her head during the Battle of Blackwater Bay. Regardless, Peach recognized the glint of a sniper scope when she saw it. She said not a word, but her body moved on its own; her Scatterboom manifested in her hands as she turned to take aim at the threat.

There was a muted sound, and something hit her, right in the stomach. For a moment, it didn’t even hurt. Then she felt a powerful twinge, like nausea, and her gun fell from her hands. Her eyes went wide, and she clutched her midsection, frozen as if in shock. “Peach? Peach!” Sina called, jogging over, but her voice sounded far away. Even Peach’s own ragged breathing sounded muffled, as if from the other side of a window. The princess looked up, but a red scar blossomed across in her vision, blocking everything out. She spasmed once and, spreading from the impact point, her body turned to glass, laced by a web of cracks like veins. Then the air around her turned to glass, riddled by fractures, leaving Peach’s image distorted. Looking like something inhuman.

Then the glass shattered. And an Other appeared.

It was massive. Its mannequin body, vaguely humanoid but sutured together and twisted backward at the waist, its weight on its tiptoes and elbows. Red ribbons tipped with golden spikes extended like tentacles from a hole in its belly. Its hands gripped the sides of its head, a little shed with a throat like interior, an empty chair recessed within with a bed of blue pinecone flowers at its feet, crowned by two veiled busts with black wrought-iron crowns and a pair of antlers. Swarms of fluttering butterflies clustered on its thighs and beneath the eaves of its head. The [url=https://bogleech.com/vgmonsters/scarlet-spoiler.png]Other[/url] towered above Sina, who stood stunned beneath a rain of glassy fragments, until the monster raised its atrocious head and slammed it down.

“Agh!” Sina cried as she got launched backward. She hit the ground hard and slid to a stop in the dust against some rubble, still conscious. 

At that moment a blue flash heralded the arrival of Luka, Dexio, and Raz. “Holy hell!” Dexio shouted the second he saw the thing, followed by, “Sina!” he took off running, and the Other lashed its ribbons at him. He shielded his head and slid to a stop in front of his partner.

Luka gritted his teeth and hefted his hammer. “Everyone who can move, lend a hand! Activate Brain Drive, now!” So saying, he grabbed the cord that dangled from the left side of his collar. When he pulled it, his hood flipped up and shrouded his face in darkness. Red streaks flashed through the pitch and formed his unique Brain Drive [url=https://i.imgur.com/8aXYXrC.png]pattern[/url] of two glowing triangles. This state of intense mental focus, charged up by all the combat thus far, would grant him greater speed, attack, and psionic power as he strove to face this new challenge head-on–before it killed them all.

[center][youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1Z0MrfMPLo&list=PLQdVYT2c2D81_7rxWYtg9XnOgiSD6-p2U&index=21&ab_channel=Qylex[/youtube][/center]