[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/6W7bqko.png[/img] [h2][color=FD0000]The Koopa Troop[/color][/h2] [b][color=FD0000]wordcount:[/color][/b] 5,261 (+6) [b][color=FD0000]Bowser: Level 12 [/color][/b] EXP: [color=FD0000]//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////[/color] (222/120) [b][color=SpringGreen]Bowser Jr: Level 12 [/color][/b] EXP: [color=SpringGreen]/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////[/color]////////////////// (103/120) [b][color=DeepSkyBlue]Kamek: Level 12 [/color][/b] EXP: [color=DeepSkyBlue]//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////[/color]////////////////////////// (97/120) [b][color=Aqua]Rika: Level 8 [/color][/b] EXP: [color=Aqua]/////////////////////////////[/color]////////////////////////////////////////////////// (29/80) [b][color=FD0000]Location:[/color][/b] The Under - Home of Tears [hider=warp locations] [s] Central hub: Smash City Alcamoth Accessible locations: Peach’s castle Limsa Lominscuttle Town Lumbridge Twilight Town Kosm’s Beach [/s] [/hider] [/center] The troop kept running. Climbing. Ascending. Towards the pizza tower. It was a silly sounding place, and surly, even with Purse’s warning, how bad could it be, they thought. Well, the gabaghouls floating through the air as they got closer certainly were an early warning sign, the possessed pizza mass swooping down to try and impale them with sharpened protruding ribs or fangs. While not the most deadly of foes they, along with the other unfriendly denizens of the caverns, were slowing the troop down, and with the grinding pace they were already taking, that in and of itself might prove lethal. It was Bowser of all people who was the main thing holding them back. Weighed down by all the extra bits and bobs fusion had shoved in his shell, the late night gauntlet after an already exhausting day had finally caused the king’s stamina to falter. His limbs burned with lactic acid, his breathing was heavy, and his pace was labored. He soldiered on, a relentless stomp stomp stomp, but it was barely above walking pace. Kamek was only doing a little better, as both his general age and use of the enlargement spell had taken their toll atop the day’s fatigue. Had Mimi not taken over the duty of keeping their former transport enlarged, he too, would have been entirely out of it. As it was he hovered alongside his king, offering the exhausted koopa what assistance and words of encouragement would be accepted by the stubborn royal. Meanwhile the energy of youth was keeping the two royal scions going, that and a combination of magical and mechanical assistance, with jr’s flying machine and Rika’s levitation rune letting them make the platforming a breeze, but it also left them as the ones running around smacking down the local hostels when they came to try and pick off the haggard heroes. At least, thanks to Purse, they knew the locals were not under any kind of spell, and so there was little remorse to be had for those who attacked them of their own free will, resulting in several packs of vengeful rattling bandits and cheese slime revolutionaries falling to gunfire and good old fashioned grit. [color=FD0000]”Urrgh, what I’d give to have the Koopa Chase right now”[/color] The king gasped, after summiting a crumbling hill of cheddar, before groaning as he looked onward towards the final climb leading to the tower, one still oh so painfully far away. [color=DeepSkyBlue]”Keep going, sire, it's not that far, and once inside, I’m sure we can barricade the entrance. Then we can rest, and presumably eat all the pizza we can manage”[/color] Kamek hovered up to his side to tell him encouragingly. [color=Aqua]”and if we don’t keep moving we’re gonna get sunk and turned into fish food!”[/color] Rika added as she landed next to them and before she pushed forwards and leaping up into the air once more. Once at the top of her arch she fired her grappling hook down behind a pile of cheese wheels and smashing down among a series of ambushers who had been hiding behind it, filling the air with the shrieking of death delivered at the tip of her chainsaw bayonet. While she could deal with foes ahead, none of them wanted to deal with the one behind. Unfortunately, the giant flying idol that was [url=https://imgur.com/D1Sx2cu]SAYU[/url], and the captain of the guard, [url=https://i.imgur.com/M4UUWKr.jpg]Undyne[/url], who she was carrying in her free hand had other ideas. While up until now the pair had been spreading out their fire, bombarding heroes whenever one of them did a particularly tricky bit of platforming, they now caught onto the weakness of the troop, and began to rapidly close in on their position. [color=SpringGreen]”More rain incoming!”[/color] Jr called out in warning, as he was first to track the new vector, and sure enough, as the aquatic duo proceeded to give the troop one last taste of rain, courtesy of the home of tears. “In the name of love, we’ll punish you!” the flying idol cried out, before stabbing her usb symbol styled trident skywards, launching a beam of light into the air. What came down in stead was a flurry of bright red 2d fountain pen nibs with triangle fish tails the size of human torsos showered down like rain of arrows “In the name of Justice, you mean!” Undyne called out, before jabbing her spear skywards in a similar motion, one that caused a shower of bright blue spears neatly contrasting the red pens to strike down as well. [color=SpringGreen]”Here we go again”[/color] Jr groaned, readying his staff and starting to weave to and fro to avoid the red and green rainfall. Rika had basically no issue in avoiding the rain, the mere act of looking at projectiles heading her way slowing said shots enough for her to block them, or grappled, or boost away. Kamek’s flight meant he too could mostly avoid the shots just as well as Jr could. The problem, ultimately, was Bowser. The king was a big slow target, and had to stick to the ground for the most part, meaning he took the brunt of the shots, which jr had to heal back up. They’d managed to endure previous probing barrages, but this time was different. “First we’ll deal with you, then the rest! So Stop running and fight me so I can move on already!” Undyne called out, putting words to the sinking feeling in Jr’s gutt, before he found himself groaning at SAYU’s addition of “I can sea that you’re tired. Wouldn’t it be just fin to stop running and sleep with the fishes instead?” Once over the pun the prince had a thought however, and a look at his papa’s pained and embarrassed face confirmed it: that Bowser wight well turn and fight if it meant he wouldn’t be slowing be slowing the rest of them down any more. Jr mulled this over, for but a second, and then saw the only way to stop that. He had to do it first. [color=SpringGreen]”Keep going, I’ll hold them off!”[/color] Jr called out, and then turned his flying machine around, taking to the skies. [color=DeepSkyBlue]”Wait, young master!”[/color] Kamek called out, while Bowser took one look back, and then kept going, trusting that they’d both be ok. [color=SpringGreen]”I’ve got this Kamek, you don’t need to babysit me for it”[/color] the prince insisted as he rose up to the same altitude as their pursuers. [color=DeepSkyBlue]”We have this, young master”[/color] the mage retorted, as he flew at the prince’s side, the two becoming a pair of dots daring storm and titan both. “Finally one of you shows some guts!” Undyne cheered, before beckoning them closer with her spear and commanded them to “now, come at me, if you dare!” before tilting the flow of the spear storm 90 degrees so that the pair were flying into it rather than through it, transforming the game of dodging falling rocks into a true bullet hell. [center][youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzPzZL62kYw[/youtube][/center] [color=SpringGreen]”Then look out, because here we come!”[/color] Jr called back, before putting pedal to the metal, and sending his clown car charging forward, weaving between the flying spears as he closed in. “Wait, don’t come too close though! No tapping on the glass!” SAYU added in quite the opposite desire of Undyne, and as she was the one with control over their movements, the absurd sight of the titanic mermaid fleeing the comparatively minuscule prince graced all those who deigned to look up. She did not do so passively however, and instead thrust her fork forwards, not to physically jab at the prince, but to instead blasted an energy beam forwards, one that the prince narrowly managed to veer to the side to avoid. [color=SpringGreen]”You’ll have to do better than that to keep me away!”[/color] Jr shouted, delighted that all he had to do was fly at her to get their foe to give up ground. “Stop running away! Fly me closer so I can hit him with my spear!” Undyne demanded “I wasn’t made for physical interaction! ” SAYU replied, before contouring with “Besides, we’re reeling them in towards the city!” [color=DeepSkyBlue]”She’s right Jr, don’t get too far away!”[/color] Kamek called, having himself fallen behind the daring prince. [color=SpringGreen]”Gahhh, fine!”[/color] jr called back in frustration, seeing the logic, and reversing his pace and falling back away, flying with the flow of the rain of arrows. He was determined to not leave empty handed however, and so left a parting gift, deploying his splatter blaster from his car and firing off a short burst of shocking goop right as SAYU switched to pursuing them again, causing her to fly straight into it. “Ewwww! He-ey-ey-ey! Rud-u-u-u-de!” the giant mermaid complained as the electrical sparks buzzed at her lower torso, and her voice seemed to glitch out in response to the shock. She did not seem to actually be hurt though, but the prince would take her being deliberated. He got to take that for about five seconds, before SAYU, who had failed to shake off the goop, declared “let the sea’s of change wash this away” before spinning around glowing with light that dissipated after a few moments, revealing the mermaid now wearing armor mimicking that of some of the guards, but done up with pastel hues of pink white and blue, and love heart decals “With a whole new look!” With the shocking goop cleared away by the costume change, and Jr on the retreat again, SAYU went back on the offensive (as did Undyne, once she recovered from the nausea of being spun around). “In this fight I’m the cute face and you're the ugly eel, so let's give you some company!” She called out as a shoal of blocky electric eels launched out from behind her and raced ahead of the prince, where they started swimming too and fro in his path of retreat, creating shocking barriers that he had to dodge around while also avoiding the other projectiles. To make things worse, she also started summoning fish shaped pen nibs around him in a ring that would follow him for a few moments and then jab them at him all at once. [color=SpringGreen]”Hey, that’s not fair, you can’t just make stuff next to me!”[/color] Jr complained before diving down to avoid being skewered from all sides, getting away with a cut on the cheek and one cat ear, as well as a trimmed ponytail “Oooooh, are my oceanic strikes making you salty?” she retorted with a giggling laugh [color=DeepSkyBlue]”That is quite enough banter from you young lady”[/color] Kamek called back, before adding [color=DeepSkyBlue]”Now dodge this!”[/color] before he started sending a slow stream of his multicolored shape shots at the flying titan. “You’re dougongna have to try harder than that” the mermaid replied as she effortlessly weaved from side to side to avoid the projectiles, though it did lower her focus on attacking to do so, much as Kamek had intended. “No, he had a point, stop playing around and hold them still so I can finish them off” Undyn told her, to which SAYU replied with a huffy “Awww, but that attack’s so not on theme yet. We need to reskin it to be squids or something” “Do it!” “Fine fine” she conceded, before pointing one of her fingers at the prince (while still holding the trident with the rest) and thinking a moment before going “oh!” and calling out “time to get caught on the net!” For a moment nothing happened, and then jr suddenly lurched to a halt as something grabbed his clown car. He looked over the side as he started to get hammered by spears, and found a 2d white gloved hand holding on tight. [color=SpringGreen]”Hey! Get off!”[/color] he shouted at it, swatting at it with his paintbrush and knocking it away, only for it to turn into an arrow as it flow away, and then quickly shifting to a distinctive pointing finger when it caught its own flight, and started coming in to try and grab him again. [color=SpringGreen]”Wait, what the heck, is that a mouse cursor?”[/color] Jr shouted in confusion as he tried to swat the thing, only for Kamek to nail it instead with a magic blast that went much faster than the ones he was using to ward off SAYU. The prince called out thanks, and then, after a moment's thought, came upon a realization: [color=SpringGreen]”Wait. The way she sorta got made out of thin air at the start. The glitching out. The whole artsy pen theme that just does not fit. The mouse. How she keeps getting like, design changes …. she’s not real!”[/color] That prompted a little hurt gasp and a retort of “But I am real! As real as Undyne and Alphey’s love for each other” from SAYU, who looked genuinely offended rather than, well confused at the accusation, which was in and of itself telling. “Hey! No telling the criminals about my love life you lot!” Undyne retaliated, which got a gleeful “I knew it!” from SAYU [color=DeepSkyBlue]”I’m not sure what you mean by all this, young master?”[/color] Kamek asked, while jr pressed on, now entirely convinced. [color=SpringGreen]”She’s like a VTuber”[/color] he tried to explain, taking the entirely wrong angle when it came to clarification, and earning himself an [color=DeepSkyBlue]”A what?”[/color] from Kamek and a “Hey, I am way more sophisticated than one of those!” from the mermaid in question Jr groaned at his out of touch caretaker, and then put it in words the old koopa would understand [color=SpringGreen]”It means she’s not a real person. She’s a puppet, like one of your magic minions, which means …”[/color] [color=DeepSkyBlue]”Ahhh, which means we can destroy her without consequence!”[/color] the mage replied, finally catching on to where this was going. “Wait what?” SAYU started, and then cried out in alarm as what had been warning shots turned into targeted strikes, though ones pointedly aimed at not striking down her real living monster passenger. Jr opened fire with his Flaming Balloon cannon, before deploying and cranking the handle of his mulcher machine gun, while Kamek gave the mermaid a taste of her own medicine by summoning spinning card suit shapes right around her, and hammering her with massive blue magic fists as well. “Ouch. Hey. Stop that!” she demanded as the shots chipped away at her exterior, and revealed her [url=https://i.imgur.com/REvS4gR.png]digital nature[/url] in full, particularly as damage started to accumulate and she began glitching out more, both in voice and in movement, actions repeating and beckoning much more jerky “That’s i-i-i-it. I’m fed-ed-ed-ed up! This isn’t a per-form-orm-orm-mance any more! Enou-gh-gh of you” “Hold it together you lot!” Undyne demanded, but it was no use, it looked like she was going to fall apart at the seams. Until she didn’t. Bright light engulfed her once more, but instead of a costume change this time her entire body started to warp, shift, invert, until the koopas where left facing the fully revitalized horrors of a [url=https://i.imgur.com/dz8fa30.png]reverse mermaid[/url] [color=SpringGreen]”Gah! What the heck did they do to the cute mermaid idol!”[/color] Jr called out with genuine horror as to what they had done. “You made us resort to this. Now you're going to pay! Right Undyne?” she cried out before getting a confused look and repeating “Undyne?” and then suddenly realizing the issue. They’d replaced the arm she’d been holding the guard captain with with a stubby fin. “Down here you dolts!” the fish woman in question called out from where she was hanging from an ankle warmer. “Oops” she replied, and then “ah! Hey!” as the captain used her impressive strength to haul herself up the leg, fins, and then on top of SAYU in a few seconds, where she grabbed the mermaid’s hair antenna with one hand and used it as a steering control to force the giant fish to surge forwards towards them, the captain declaring “now we do things my way!” [color=SpringGreen]”Ach, what do we do!”[/color] Jr called out, as the fish started to rapidly gain on both them and the struggling Bowser, who had just made it to the bottom of the not undaunting climb to hill atop which the base of the pizza tower sat. [color=DeepSkyBlue]”Cover me!”[/color] the mage called out, before summoning 4 clones of himself [color=DeepSkyBlue]”Or rather us!”[/color] and then starting to charge up a massive [url=https://i.imgur.com/qoHvA1O.png]energy ball[/url] using all of their combined power [color=DeepSkyBlue]”We need to strike her down in one shot!”[/color] [color=SpringGreen]”Alright, here goes nothing!”[/color] jr replied, as he switched from dodging to blocking, the prince wielding his paintbrush like a tennis racket or bat and using it to swat spears and pen nibs out of the sky, suffering mightily from each missed parry. The sphere grew bigger, and the fish surged closer until it was big as her and she was right on top of them to have that comparison made plainly clear. “Swat them from the sky!” Undyne commanded, and so SAYU tried to do just that, swinging a mighty kick forwards to try and give the boot to the mage, only to strike the prince instead as he rushed in to block one more strike. The prince went sailing off into the distance like a football, while his mentor cried out [color=SpringGreen]”Young master!”[/color] in alarm, before slamming the super sized magic right into the idol’s underside. “Nooooo!” SAYU screamed out, before her final words distorted and then came to a sharp end as she fell from the skies and crashed down onto the dirt, flopping like a grounded fish for a few moments before going still. Kamek did not wait to guarantee the strike had worked, the mage turning at once and calling out [color=SpringGreen]”Don’t worry young master, I’m coming!”[/color] as he flew after the blasted away prince. Which meant he was not there to see as Undyne pushed a flipper off of her body and slipped down from her fallen steed. Iron boots struck cheesy soil. She breathed deep to steady herself from what she thought had been a near death encounter, and then the chase continued. [hr] [color=Aqua]”No no no, go away! Just leave! Go home!”[/color] Rika called down at Undyne, as the guard captain ignored her pleas and stepped a foot upon the bottom of the hill, and began to climb after them step by step, mouth grinning wide “Not gonna happen, I always catch the crook, and you lot aren't gonna be any kind of exception!” In response to that, the ship girl grit her teeth and then, as the captain raised her spear to unleash another hail, made the same choice Jr had, despise her having seen how that had gone for him [color=Aqua]”Keep going dad, I’ll be right behind you”[/color] [color=FD0000]”Rika wait!”[/color] Bowser hoarsely tried to call after her, but it was too late, as the aquatic armored woman started running back down the hill towards the one who was ascending it. [center][youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y21UNUo7Wn8[/youtube][/center] “Finally, a proper fight!” Undyne replied, taking half a moment to appreciate the look of the ship girl storming towards her with the feathered cape trailing behind her, before she opened fire, directing her spear forwards and heralding a flurry of mirrors of the weapon to surge forwards once again. Yet just as before, as they got close to the ship girl, the shots slowed, as if becoming submerged in water, allowing her to weave between them with relative ease. She came closer, and closer, barreling down the hill with the clear intent to slam into the guard captain like a horseless knight. Her lack of knowledge of what to her was archaic military tactics prevented her from seeing just how bad of an idea this was to do vs someone armed with a spear. Coming in with a gauntlet reeled back ready to strike, the ship girl attempted to deliver a slamming punch to her foe, only for Undyne to neatly step to the side and drive her longer weapon forwards, jabbing it straight towards her heart. An electrical sound fizzled, an alarm rang in Rika’s ear, as her energy shield absorbed much of the jab and left the resulting dampened blow merely scraping off her armor. Undyne’s one eye widened in surprise and then narrowed with resolution in an instant, as in her other hand a second spear formed, which she planted right in the jaw of the gauntlet slamming towards her. With a grunt she resisted the power of the blow, skidding down the cheese hill a half step yet staying on her feet, and halted the strike a foot from her face. Which left the barrel of Rika’s rifle pointed right at her forehead. The ship girl hesitated for half a second to pull the trigger, unable to assess if this situation counted as an “unless you have to” moment, and that was far more than Undyn needed to take away the choice. The captain wrenched the spear to one side to pull Rika off balance, and at the same time slammed a kick into her side, sending her sprawling to the side of the hill. Then she raised a spear to hurl at the ship girl, only for Rika to be suddenly launch into the air as she squeezed the featherfall rune. Undyne reacted quickly, tracking the ship’s accent and hurling the spear up instead, yet again, Rika rapidly changed momentum as she grappled to the ground once again, feet touching down once again. “Impressive move” Undyne offered in compliment, before letting out a wordless warcry and charging forwards. Rika counter changed, yet lacking the momentum of her downhill run, and with Undyne knowing about her energy shield, there’d be no repeat of their first clash. With swift strikes Undyne jabbed and probed at the shipgirl’s defenses while dancing just out of punch range, while Rika blocked with her gauntlets and hull blades and tried and failed to knock her foe down. While some might have mentally cursed about the limitation on her arsenal put upon her by the denial of lethal strikes, Rika’s order following mind had no such complaints. Instead she got increasingly annoyed about new parts of her mind helpfully analyzing the spear fighting technique of her opponent from a rather useless and detached perspective, while also inducing an empty dysphoria feeling about her lack of a weapon to allow her to meet this foe at her same level. But it was not like she could summon things from nothing to fill that lack, this she knew. Or had thought she knew, because that was, of course, a falsehood. It was a realization that made her falter for just a moment, stalling her motions enough for Undyne to slip past a guard, and as the shipgirl saw the tip of the spear coming straight for her eyes, and heard the blaring alarm of her shields being down in her ears, she rushed the thought she had to its conclusion. Pain stabbed her, but not in the head but in the heart, a familiar feeling as she called a belonging of the Pacific Princess into reality. Yet it was not the whale this time but “a spear?” Undyne blinked as seemingly from nowhere an arched spine caught the point of her spear, halting it an inch from the visor of Rika’s helmet. The captain’s eye also saw the point at one end of that spine, and then traced down to where the heft was awkwardly held by the shipgirl’s gauntleted hand. Then she grunted as Rika slammed a kick into her as repayment, knocking the captain down this time. She had no jumping trick like Rikas to save herself as she went rolling down the hill, but instead jammed a spear into the cheese to halt her fall, and send a volley of more forwards to ward off a follow up strike from Rika. Then she pulled herself up in time to see the shipgirl spinning the spear around her gauntlet, using a long strap attached to the weapon to keep it from escaping, the rotation battering the barrage of points away. She also saw one more thing: “Wait, does that thing have a cannon at the base of it?!” [hider=Rika level up] Captain Ahab (Pacific Princess): Rika can expend stamina to teleport the spear of the Pacific Princess to her person (stamina drain scaling with distance) or vitality to form/repair it should it be damaged or destroyed. It is about 4 meters long, and tipped with a double barreled ship gun at one end (used for ranged force or added force/propulsion), and an arched spine of sharpened vertebrae ending with a long thin point at the other (creating a rather unconventional halberd head). A band runs from one end to the other, which can be used to sling it over a person’s back or for particularly convoluted flourishes. Just like the whale that is its twin, only one spear can exist at a time. Comes with the secondary superpower of knowing how to use the rather unorthodox weapon effectively. [/hider] “That is sooooo cool. Like a gun sword out of an anime, only better!” Undyne marveled, before grinning and deciding “I’ll be seizing that as evidence” Rika planted the barrels of the twin cannons to the ground and tried to give a witty remark in response, only to instead cough up blood that splattered against her visor, a result of her summoning the dead princess’s possessions, a cost that had been undone by Jr a lot of the time, now having to be paid. Awkwardly, she pulled the helmet off and then tossed it aside. Now properly mirrored, the two armored helmet-less spear-women faced each other down for a dramatic moment. And then both rushed in and clashed once more. This time it was no close range brawl of speed vs power, but a more artful ranged duel, as each spear-wilder jabbed and parried, gave and took ground, seeking either to pierce their foe in Undyne’s case, or bluntly bash them in Rika’s as she used the butt of her own pole-arm. They went beyond mortal movements however, as Undyne summoned a second spear in and out of existence, switching between one and two handing her magical weapon, while Rika’s own spear flashed from hand to hand, into gauntlet jaws, or flipped orientation to bring point or cannon to the fore for the purpose of blocking or thrusting. As opposed to the taunting bout between the pop-star and arrogant princess, the two soldiers fought in silence, though by no means a grim one. The shipgirl found herself matching the captain’s daring pointed smile as the two of them showed the world that swords were not the only artful weapon of stylish duels. Not the only weapon of heroes. That the weapon of the common soldier could be so much more than a faceless part of a spear-wall. Tips grazed off of armor or won thin cuts against dodging faces, butts bludgeoned and left bruises through metal, and sheer fatigue took their toll, yet on they danced the rest of the world forgotten. It was a song, a clash of spear tips, of magic and metal, one no less beautiful than SAYU’s. It was also a song that was rudely interrupted. A thunderous blast roared, causing both fighter’s gazes to snap to the side, and for Rika’s to catch and slow the cannonball whizzing towards them. Both spear-women leapt to the side as a gang of [url=https://imgur.com/OYr6Mx5]Ratlings[/url] took that moment to try and both take vengeance for their fallen king and take down the captain of the guards who had been a mighty thorn in their illegal operations. “We were having a moment there, criminal scum! Now lay down your arms, you’re all under arrest!” Undyne called out as she rushed in, and, in an ironic twist, tried to avoid killing where she could do so, while Rika flipped to the exact opposite. The captain parried a rapier thrust and then grabbed a ratling before hurling them down the hill, smacked another with the but of her spear, hammered a volley of spears around a third to create a cage of spear shafts around him, and then just booted a fourth in the gutt. Rika meanwhile used the cannons on her spear base for the first time, hoking the shaft under an armpit for support and then letting lose nailing the cannon fire-er the chest, before flipping the spear around and using its massive reach to skewer a rat bandit through the eye before it could even get close with its sword. “Hey, stop killing the people I am trying to arrest!” Undyn demanded after the second kill, and was then very confused when Rika offered an [color=Aqua]”Oh, sorry”[/color] of apology, and switched back to non lethal, bonking her third foe over the head with her spear’s shaft, and then catching several more in a whirlpool of water created by her Cloyster striker, which spun them around till they dizzily bumped together at its center, at which point it dissipated. A few dozen heartbeats passed, and by the end of them the surviving ratling bandits were all groaning on the ground. Which meant only one thing “Right, now where were we-” Undyne started to say as she pivoted around to face her main foe again, only for her eye to close half way through the movement and for her to tumble to the ground. [color=Aqua]”What?”[/color] Rika asked, barely able to hear herself over the sound of her blood pumping in her ears, before the cause revealed itself. An obsidian scaled wyvern swooped down, and upon its back were a tired looking Kamek and a beat up but smiling Jr holding his paintbrush, the latter having cast Repose upon the guard captain under the cover of the wyvern’s cave camouflage. [color=SpringGreen]”Cool spear, and cool fight”[/color] jr complimented her as he slipped before slipping off the wyvern and tossing her a tape, telling Rika to [color=SpringGreen]”Record her while she’s asleep … wow that sounds weird … do it anyway I wanna know if it works. Meanwhile I’m gonna prep a way to get her off our tails”[/color] [color=Aqua]”I, wah, ok?”[/color] the shipgirl replied, much too tired to question any of this, catching the tape, slotting it into her tape player and then crouching down to record the captain's loud snoring while Jr splashed some paint on the ground next to her. Ten seconds later and both were done and jr unceremoniously used a foot to roll Undyne onto the low detail painting of the city of tears he’d made, causing her to promptly explode into bubbles which raced into said painting, transporting the captain back to her city. [color=Aqua]”Oh. Huh. I guess that works”[/color] Rika said, before her gaze snapped up the hill as she started to ask [color=Aqua]”Is dad ok-”[/color] only to meet his eyes and receive an awkward wave from Bowser who still had a bunch of hill climbing to do, having been rather slowed down by being unable to tear his eyes away from the spear fight. Not that Rika knew that was why. Mainly she was just relieved everyone in the troop was ok. It was a mutual feeling. [color=DeepSkyBlue]”Let’s get moving before these ratfolk get up, shall we?”[/color] Kamek suggested, as he stared down at a ratling that promptly shut its eye and went back to pretending to be knocked out. The others agreed, and set off to catch up with Bowser for the, hopefully, safe from pursuers and full of friends Pizza Tower.