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[img]https://i.imgur.com/kNmO8zV.png[/img] [img]https://i.imgur.com/ziR5Pse.png[/img]
[b][color=DarkOrange]wordcount: [/color][/b] 1,175 (+2) (Ammy +2) (Jr +3 +3 +3 +2 +3) (Rika +4 +3 +3 +3 +4)
[b][color=DarkOrange]Location:[/color][/b] Forbidden Kingdom - Esaka’s High Tier
[b][color=DarkOrange]Amaterasu: level 9 (1 level up stored) [/color][/b] EXP: [color=DarkOrange]/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////[/color]////////// (79/90)
[b][color=SpringGreen]Bowser Jr: Level 15 [/color][/b] EXP: [color=SpringGreen]//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////[/color](353/150)
[b][color=Aqua]Rika: Level 12 [/color][/b] EXP:  [color=Aqua]/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////[/color](192/110)
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The trip down to the village was uneventful, for the most part. For Amaterasu, the only action had been running off to fetch the twins in-order to get them up to date on the Consul info. Other than that she’d mostly just listened in with one ear on whatever was discussed, while enjoying being out in the countryside as much as the cloudy skies would allow.

Once they arrived at the village, however, she spotted the two koopa children who had already arrived, and recalled that there was other info that they needed to know.  

As always, she wasn’t exactly the right person to deliver that information however. Which was why when padded up to them she simply barked for attention, wrote “interlinks break flame clocks” on the dirt of the ground for them to read, and then promptly ran off back towards where the twins were just arriving in the village.

[color=SpringGreen]”Hey wait what!? What do you mean they can do that?! How’d you find that out! Hey come back!”[/color] Jr called out after her, before he and his sister came running after her, and thus right up to the twins next to which she’d sat herself down and pointedly looked at.

Jr for his part continued to indignantly badger her, but Rika got the message, or maybe just wasn’t above asking, and so turned to the other children to ask [color=Aqua]”Do you know what this is about?”[/color]

Having not seen what Amaterasu scrawled upon the earth, the twins did not know what Rika referred to and needed to make an inference. “You mean, why we’re here?” Marg asked.

“I think we’re hoping to wipe out a Consul,” Bart answered. For the moment his focus lay on Ashwat Village, since the teens seldom happened to deploy to rural communities like this one. The sights, sounds, and especially smells -whether good or bad- were all quite novel.

[color=Aqua]“I mean about-”[/color] Rika began to reply, before a bark and a pawing at the ground interrupted her, and brought their attention to the scrawling of “Interlink” on the dirt between them all, and then concluding [color=Aqua]“-that.”[/color]

“Oh!” After realizing, Marg lowered her tone. “Well, we’re not exactly the best people to ask. Stratagems isn’t technically an interlink. But Ammy here said you kids might pull it off?” Since Both Rika and Junior were younger (at least in appearance) than them, the twins seemed to feel pretty confident about calling them ‘kids’. “If you do, just be careful. Interlinks are, like, public enemy number one for Moebius.”

Bart kept his voice down as he explained, “Because interlinks can destroy Flame Clocks. Supposedly we can, too, but the last time we tried…things didn’t go so hot.” His expression looked grim. “If we can help win this tournament, it’ll be proof that we’ve gained the strength we need. Then it’s time for a clock-busting road trip.”

“Within reason,” Marg added. “Can’t bring too much attention down on our heads, especially the Avenger. Or it’s game over.”

[color=SpringGreen]“They can what?![/color] ” Jr replied after a moment of silence, tossing his arms up in the air, before adding [color=SpringGreen]“you lot knew this the whole time?”[/color] accusatorially.

When his sister asked him [color=Aqua]“I mean, did anyone ever ask?”[/color] rhetorically however, he calmed down a little bit, but still puffed his cheeks out in frustration.

[color=SpringGreen]“Still, I mean, this is a big deal, right? Should be, like, super important gotta tell every info, shouldn't it?”[/color]  He said after, still clearly a little techy about it, but calm enough that he wasn't shouting any more. 

As Marg scratched her head, Bart shrugged, his uncertainty clear. “I’m kind of surprised you’re hearing it from us first. Then again…maybe none of the other Seekers forged strong bonds yet?”

“It’s not something you can force,” Marg added. “We saw what happens when Moebius does that, heh.”

[color=SpringGreen]“I mean, I guess? Been what, a few weeks, n none of them have hung out all the time like me and sis I don’t think?”[/color] Jr said, glancing at Rika, who shrugged, and pointed out that [color=Aqua]“people come and go a lot. Or decommission themselves”[/color] 

[color=SpringGreen]“Huh?”[/color]

[color=Aqua]“You know, like how Tora’s n Poppi not doing mission stuff any more”[/color] she clarified.

[color=SpringGreen] “Oh” Jr replied, before pointing out “you mean like, retire, right?”[/color] 

[color=Aqua]“Oh is that what it is for not-boats? Sure, that.”[/color] 

[color=SpringGreen]“Alright. Anyway. uh…”[/color] Jr said, getting back on track by saying/asking [color=SpringGreen] “Ok, so we’ve, like, seen an interlink. Cool armor thing. Really tough fight. So what goes wrong with the Consuls ones?”[/color]

Bart snickered. “Well, real interlinks are like a harmony, y’know? In order to pull off the most perfect dance, someone needs to lead, and someone needs to follow. The leader can change, but ultimately it’s that trust in one another that makes it possible.”

“Sadly, ‘trusting’ and ‘following’ aren’t really in the Moebius playbook,” Marg continued. “Moebius never trust one another, all of them want to lead, and the results aren’t pretty. When they interlink, their combined forms have two heads, each thinking and working for itself. Powerful, and unpredictable, but unstable.”

The twins grinned, crossing their arms. “Just goes to show who [i]is[/i] worthy of power, and who isn’t.”

[color=Aqua] “Yeah that sounds messy. But also strong? Good thing we won't have to deal with that in this seeing as it is just one”[/color] Rika said, causing Amaterasu to groan intenraly as the shipgirl jinxed them all.

[color=SpringGreen]“Oh, huh, yeah didn't know the leading bit. When we do these fusions with these cassette monster transformations it's more like it's both of us. Or something entirely new?”[/color] Jr replied, scratching the back of his neck as he thought it through, before grinning and declaring that [color=SpringGreen]“so now we know that we can definitely do it!”[/color]

[color=Aqua]“I can't dance though”[/color]

[color=SpringGreen]“I think it's a, what are they called, one of those things that means another thing or whatever. So like not actually dancing. Clover’s parents just touched and then boom, Interlinked”[/color] Jr reassured her, fumbling over the word metaphor as he did.

“A euphemism,” Bart supplied helpfully.

His sister gave him a disdainful look. “No, dummy. He means an epithet.”

[color=SpringGreen]“No it's like, an Oxymoron or something”[/color] Jr retorted, because that was the funny one that had stuck with him.

There was a little more back and forth on this topic, much to Amaterasu’s dismay, that was ended by Rika. Having no horse in this race however, she did so not by answering the question by instead by just changing the topic to something more important. 

“So, uh, I checked ahead with a scout plane” she explained, pointing up at one of her RC plane sized drones hovering in the sky some way off “and it looks like there's basically no road. So we can’t use the bikes or anything to go that way”

[color=SpringGreen]“So we can just use your whale then”[/color] Jr replied, but as Rika pointed out [color=Aqua]“it won't fit everyone”[/color]

Which certainly presented a bit of a conundrum for everyone involved.

[hr]

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[img]https://i.imgur.com/C7nwoGY.png[/img]
[b]Words:[/b] 1,151 (+2)
[b][color=ea590c]Edward Portsmith: Level 10 (28 cells)[/color] [/b][color=ea590c]/////////////////////////////////[/color]/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// (36/100)
[b]Location[/b] Frozen highlands - The Midnight Walk - Moon Mountain
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Above a plain of putrid purple flesh and writhing tendrils [url=https://cdn.imgchest.com/files/ee2050cd8dd2.png]Lithyl Nightweaver[/url] hovered on insectile wings. She had cast Edward into the astral sea, and willingly become the avatar of Urrath, the being who had twisted the Dreadnaught's mind to its own dark ends.

Now she unleashed the hordes of the umbral abyss, sending grotesque demons made out of the twisted forms of mortal kind charging across the wretched gloom of their home, and towards both Edward’s forces, and a gateway back to the world that had opened behind them. 

From it echoed cries for help, cries of blame, anything that could dig into Edward’s mind and trap him in the illusion.

It worked well enough. Well enough that he drew his sword, pointed it at the enemy and ordered his troops to [color=ea590c]”Open fire!”[/color]

It was an order his ironclad obeyed at the speed of the man’s own thoughts, its tripled barreled cannon raising up at an angle and then unleading the last of the special munitions not expended during the charge up the hill. Thrice it hundred, and thirst burning payloads rained down into the oncoming horde, spreading fire across a wide area, burning and igniting the foes.

Hordes of [url=https://minionsart.github.io/aow4db/PreviewsAvif/splitterling.avif]spiterlings[/url] where roasted in a flash, while fragile [url=https://minionsart.github.io/aow4db/PreviewsAvif/fleshling.avif]fleshling’s[/url] detonated prematurely, needle thin spines scything through nearby allies. Hulking [url=https://minionsart.github.io/aow4db/PreviewsAvif/flesh_abomination.avif]Flesh abominations[/url] and spindily [url=https://minionsart.github.io/aow4db/PreviewsAvif/willthief.avif]will theifs[/url] charged on through the flames, heedless of the flames licking at feet or skin. 

As they emerged, however, icy projectiles crashed into them, Edward having deployed his hulking snoruyo and the frigid aura’d Reindrix into the battle. Then came a swiftly tossed bomb and a rain of firecrackers as Scrumpy dumped his entire mana reserve into a hail of minor explosives, frost-sparkling fire k. 

Little could have survived such an onslaught, but a [url=https://minionsart.github.io/aow4db/PreviewsAvif/umbral_juggernaut.avif]Umbral Juggernaut[/url] came charging through anyway, trailing a sicking trail of umbral taint behind it.

By loona’s will, it first suffered temperature shock, and then froze solid, as she cast Cryo-Heal on it twice, only to be shocked when it cleared the status effect and seemed to gain vitality from the act.

[color=ea590c]”Curse eaters! Keep them burning!”[/color] Edward called out in warning before their ears were all set ringing by the Ironclad unloading all three barrels into the juggernaut, slamming it back. 

The SomnaDrix charged it a moment later, its freezing antlers colliding with its plated skull, harming both in the process, though momentum was on the impossible creature’s side. As was the battle of limbs, as the creature reached up its long clawed hands and dug into the foe’s twisted flesh, ripping and rending till the shadow spit apart. Split apart, and burst into dozens of the wretched little spiterlings.

They fell upon the SomnaDrix, which thrashed and bellowed, sending them flying as they dug their claws into it. As it did so, rocks formed out of seemingly thin air whenever it tossed one, and it also began devouring these rocks just as fast, revitalizing and armoring itself with stony skin as it did.

It was a bit absurd really. There was also no time to pay attention to it as the battle continued. 

Edward’s own focus had not been on the chargers, he had to rely on his forces to hold them back. No he had been firing non stop at the bigger threats that had been following the horde. [url=https://minionsart.github.io/aow4db/PreviewsAvif/umbral_mistress.avif]Umberal mistresses[/url] (a vision which the tome of the tome of corruption had attempted to tempt Sectonia with) strode forwards with insectile grace, ready to enchain the minds of his forces. Alongside them came [url=https://minionsart.github.io/aow4db/PreviewsAvif/direcaster.avif]Direcasters[/url] waddled with the exact opposite of grace, and yet this wretched kin of the dire penguin was no less dangerous than the stalking mistress.

Finally Lithyl Nightweaver floated behind them all, having shrugged off enough gunfire that Edward had turned his attention to thinning those the umbral demons around her. Several were alight with arc-fire from a shot from his smiting bishop, and he was certainly getting a lot of practice with the new triple shot pistol, but it wasn’t enough to stop them.

As they got into range they began to open fire, the direcasters fired freezing bolts that crushed the isolated most of all, while the mistresses fired singular blasts of foul corrupt magic.

It harmed and wounded, but did not, to Loona, seem to be enough for Edward to call for them to [color=ea590c]”Fall back twenty paces before they can channel!”[/color] resulting in an impressively orderly retreat, with only Scrumpy, Loona and the reindrix having to panickedly adapt while the Ironclad and Impossible Creatures obeyed without question or concern. As they did, however, and the gateway out of this place grew closer, so too did the demands from it grow louder. Screams of fear, accusations of cowardice, demands for salvation.

They grew even louder when the second command to fall back was called, and they were pushed right to the border of it. It seemed to overwhelm the man, who commanded that [color=ea590c]”We hold them here! Steel your wills! Do not let them take your minds!”[/color] 

The hordes came on, seemingly no smaller than they had begun, but now the casters had a chance to plant their feet call upon the magics. Chains lashed out from the mistresses to ensnare minds, while the direcasters made distorted penguin cries to the skies and brought down a storm upon the defenders.

Flesh was ripped from bodies by spiked chains, lightning jolted them, and yet at the end of the onslaught, Edward had the audacity to glance around in confusion and say that [color=ea590c]”That… isn’t what those do”[/color] 

For, indeed, if the shadows could cause madness and insanity like that which the casters of the umbral abyss could call down, it would have no need for illusions or trickery. As that was what it had, however, it intensified them even further, the cries for protection and accusations of failure from the way out of this hellscape reaching a crescendo that drowned out all else with sheer volume. 

In the face of this onslaught, Edward gripped his weapon, raising it towards the form of Lithyl Nightweaver hovering behind the umbral forces, still committed to this lost cause despite everything. Then he froze solid. A moment later Loona collided with the ice cube, setting it skidding backwards out of the gateway, forcing Edward out of this place.

She then turned to his forces, eyes shining with brilliant intelligence, and with great effort gave a distorted command for them to “Come!” along with a waved paw, before racing after the Dreadnaught’s form. The impossible creatures obeyed her will, and a moment later Scrumpy and the Reindrix raced after her out of pure survival instinct.

They left behind the inert and commandless Ironclad, into which the umbral forces crashed and began to tear apart, giving the living just enough time cross the barrier and re-enter the waking world.