An oni's face shattered, skull coming apart, pale, shimmering ooze erupting into the air as it collapsed. In almost the same motion, Hoshiko spun and used her momentum, catching a club-arm from one of the larger oni in both hands.

The concrete cracked and split beneath her. She could feel the impact, the shock spreading up her arms to her shoulders.

But she'd stopped the oni's attack.

Gritting her teeth, she squeezed tightly, the rockets spurting to life on her gauntlets. She poured power into her arms, clenching her jaw as the oni raised its other arm. She was going to do this, and clear as many of the warped around her out as possible by doing so!

Her arms tingled, but in moments she had lifted the creature entirely off the ground by its club. With a shout, the pilot spun, twisting her body and swinging the oni as she did, boosters on her limbs roaring as she turned. The oni's bulky, heavy body slammed into the others, its exoskeleton-like skin splitting as smaller oni broke apart in the wake of its impact.

An entire space cleared around her in a moment, broken Warped falling to the ground.

Targeting the next nearest of the large oni, Hoshiko released the oozing wreck of the first warped and sent it slamming into her target, bowling it over and pinning it under its fellow's corpse.

No sooner then the body left her hands, then Hoshiko's boosters blazed to life once more with an explosive roar ripping across the battlefield. The pilot was sent hurtling forwards, outstretched fist shattering one, two, three of the smaller oni. At this pace, they weren't going to stop her, and she wasn't going to stop either! As long as it meant more people were saved, she'd fight as hard as she could!

Another of the large oni was dead ahead. She felt each of the smaller ones breaking apart on her fist as she approached. She'd take it down in one blow, and-

A column of black-red light vaporized it and tore right towards her.

"Ah-!"

She felt the heat searing past her. She could see it tearing a burning scar in the concrete, the oni struck by the beam boiling in their skin and evaporating in an instant.

Hoshiko had only barely managed to dodge.

Something that strong was a grade far beyond the oni they were fighting.

Hoshiko took a deep breath. Her heart was pounding.

That didn't mean they weren't going to take it down. With Whittemore-san in the sky, they were sure to do it!

They wouldn't let it hurt anybody else!

"Whittemore-san!" she called, "Let's take it out together!"

[@PKMNB0Y][@King Cosmos][@Raineh Daze]

[hr]

Things seemed to be going well on the other side of the battlefield, for the moment. While the oni were resilient and relentless foes to most opponents, not even their sturdy, glossy skin could stand up to the Frame Pilots' onslaught.

But now it wasn't just the oni.

From a long-damaged, crumbled building, something else was stirring.

It emerged on long, spindly legs, ten ending in sharp points, its skin shiny and pitch black. Each of these limbs were attached to a dish-shaped base, from the center of which emerged a single slender neck. On the end of this neck was a perfectly circular head, covered in bright blue, jewel-like eyes.

Though it was called a Jorogumo-pattern Warped, it only had the barest suggestion of a spider in its anatomy. It was more than three times the height of a grown man, and moments after its emergence it was followed by four more of its kin.

The blue eyes flashed, and with a sound almost like the fire of a machine gun a hail of blue bolts of energy was suddenly directed towards the frame pilots. Little care was paid towards the oni, who had holes burned through their bodies by the bolts of light, falling to the ground and smoking as they were cut down.

[@SaltSight][@PKMNB0Y]