HereComesTheSnow

Final Fantasy: Lightseekers

Rudolf Shilage

"... Never the plan, Miina." Rudolf replied carefully, after an uncomfortable pause. The stress on "questions" in that lead nowhere good, in his experience— through the rush of it all, he'd almost forgotten how many things he still tried to keep in the dark.

Well, hey, that could mean anything. I wouldn't worry.

He cleared his throat, turning his focus back to the table at large, scanning the field with somewhat fresh eyes even as his regimented, soldierly demeanor began to fill him anew.

"Anyway... No real objections here, this is very similar to the ideas I had been building towards when we spoke earlier." he began his piece with a nod, albeit one colored by a stiff look at the Grovemaster, hardly amused despite his approval. Old coot, if they weren't already all making an effort to play nice given the unspoken repartee between him and Izayoi...¹ "Just a few points I want to touch on:"

He leaned forward, setting the visual mockup he'd made the night before off to the side. It depicted the concept in a simplfied flow of arrows, chevrons, and boxes upon the field of a treetop, for any who cared to look, but with the full map before them it seemed largely moot to the discussion. Instead, he reached forward, letting afinger hover over the boughs.

"First, a key operational strength necessary for most mobile defenses is immediacy of maneuver and communication. I understand that as the striking force, we're leaving the shaping operations and staged retreats to you guys on the ground, but I think it'd be prudent to establish a quick overview of how you plan to cue your rolling retreats, your holding patterns, and so forth, if only to get everyone on the same page for the broader context of the battle. Typically it's either a horn or a flag, or in some cases radio, stuff like that— perhaps it's only my curiosity this satisfies, but your plan thus far is too structured for me to think you plan on playing it by ear. I'd appreciate it for the sake of maintaining awareness of the broader picture of the field, if possible."

Next, to Cid.

"Secondly, I had meant to ask about Eve last night. I'm glad she's with us, but I'd warn that it'd be good to keep an eye on her, to make sure she doesn't overextend herself. Maybe her time under your tutelage has calmed her down a little, but the Eve I knew was prone to get zealous about burning Valheim, or any of her obstacles, to ash regardless of where it might leave her."

A furrowed brow, a glance back towards the board, the assembly of the pieces laid out. "It might be a good call to pair her with Neve, if she isn't already accounted for. Somebody we can trust, and somebody Eve knows." he explained, sliding his half-mug of the coffee Eliane had procured them in the night over to Esben, still in predictably rough shape after getting only half a night's rest. Rudolf would make it on what he had— setting his brain to work like this woke him up well enough to make up the difference, in many cases.

Really, it had taken the veneration of his blades to clear his mind enough to brave the still waters of sleep in his own measure last night.

"Next is scheme of maneuver. With them only an hour away and not already sighted, the question of their approach pattern seems more or less answered— A straight shot in from their ports in Osprey to the northeast. These being airships, points of assembly are essentially rolling right under them at all junctures, which leads me to my lone concern here— as the Grovemaster made sure to point out, the white magic the garrison can leverage will be instrumental at shaping the battlefield and determining the flow of Valheim's penetration into the understory, funneling them into hostile terrain," his hand shifted from a dense cluster of foliage to a collection of figures, depicted with bows, "and then into even more hostile terrain. But on our way to the country, we ran afoul of a Valheimr frigate full of men who, for lack of a better term, seemed to be 'pseudo-dragoons'— utilizing devices on their backs to extend their ability to move vertically, while being commanded by a turncoat from Edren. If they're fielded, those men are going to be much more capable of navigating the branches than a conventional landing force. If their backs are spewing fire, I'd be sure to mark them as priority targets."

He leaned back, finally, and breathed in deep. All these points raised notwithstanding, he did largely agree with Izayoi. Zacharias had covered his bases well, for the lateness of his notice and solitude of his command. It wasn't perfect, nothing was— but with the scant reconnaissance afforded them by their situation, friction was going to be an inevitability, and wargaming more than one or two layers deep would lead you into tactical paralysis as the number of Possible Things That Could Go Wrong spiralled out exponentially.

He looked around the room, at the rest of the team.

"Finally, Miina raises an important point for us as the strike team. This 'Loki' person has already proven a skilled infiltrator capable of wearing faces not their own, and pulling the wool over the eyes of even those familiar with the false identity in life. It's not terribly likely that Valheim would commit a saboteur and intelligence asset to the front of a battlefield, but in case that person lingers around to see their handiwork, we should establish a failsafe for verifying we're speaking to the real us, in case the battle splits us up once we're topside. These things are messy, it could happen. I'm thinking... maybe a passphrase."

He looked over to Esben. Not only did he clearly have prior experience in dealing with Loki before she turned, but these things were also a spy's wheelhouse. It'd be like asking Galahad to identify the different breeds of dragon around Midgar— Rudi absolutely knew a few, but why waste the presence of an expert?

---

---

• _{1. Oh, he's really annoyed about that. I forgot this kid was like this, one more push and he'd have started grilling Zacharias over how exactly some pacifist pulls out the exact same plan the "Edreni War Machine" he hates so much could divine from reading the map for a minute and a half. I say do it: ask the uncomfortable question, call him out on it, have this guy tell the class why his hatred of the Edren-Osprey conflict is rooted in thinking both sides just didn't do War good enough. Bring up the Clausewitz guy you keep mentioning!}

Falling Skies

LTJG ROY KILMER, CALLSIGN "COMMIE"

---

"h-choo."

Not far away at all, Roy Kilmer realized someone must have been talking about him as he reached below the seat for a spare packet of rip-gel, tearing it open with his teeth even as he moved the Shrike's maneuver surfaces through their range of motion, a small corps of technicians milling about around him and his half-opened cockpit. The ailerons responded in time, he could tell by the feel, and his eyes were thusly kept busy by the video feed populating a small, cordoned-off section of the Shrike's visual suite. The fruity, caffeinated nectar of battlefield gods slid down his gullet easily, keeping the edges of his alertness and focus sharp. When the familiar voice of his crew chief piped into his right ear, he had no fear of nodding off now that he'd sat down and given his body a little time to get done aching.

"Alright, Man in the Box. How's she looking?"

"Peachy keen," the pilot intoned, wiggling the Shrike's fins twice in demonstration. "She's all smoothed out. I told you we wouldn't need to source new metamaterial bullshit or whatever the rep was trying to sell. All that's left is a little visual occlusion towards my port side— I don't think the screens liked having to render out the Coalie's afterimage bit."

"Hell, try rebooting it."

"Might. Other than that, it's all just the usual. Buff out my dings and scrapes and then mosey on over to the research teams for your turn with the sword. Hail me if you need me for anything else, I'll be in here."

"Yeah, we thought so. Still, next time up keep an eye on how hot your frame is running, and do us a favor— mark down strafing the plasma beams as something to cut the hell out."

Of course, as if it'd be anything else, the video playback he'd been poring over incessantly was his own handiwork— the black box recordings of his most recent combat sorties. Film study, by any other name; Commie always made a habit of reviewing how he'd flown as close to the aftermath as possible, while the impressions were still fresh. Regardless of how he'd performed relatively spotlessly in both the orbital and city assaults, he still needed to find improvement where he could— it meant little to come home only with token scuffing after seeing the same combat that had the Sparrowhawk go into a nosedive, or the Venator run so wildly out of position. He'd not really pushed too much of the envelope with his maneuvering or ingress into enemy lines today—

His formation flying, though, needed to be tidier, no doubt about it. So there he would sit, reliving the skirmishes, finding the gaps the man he was then had left for the man he was now to close.

Final Fantasy: Lightseekers

Rudolf Shilage

&

Grovemaster Zacharias

---

Ever the night owl for half a decade and counting, Rudolf separated himself from the growing collection of Kirins that were electing to take their hard-earned rest where they could, still milling about on his feet and running his hands through the supplies they had to leverage. In one part, it was an attempt to utilize his old favorite trick of calming the nerves via menial taskwork and maintenance of gear, to settle after the eventful day. On the other, though…

Hey. From the sounds of it, the old fogey’s got a war table going in the other room. I’m gonna sit in on it and see what I can do for organizing the defense. You coming with?”

“You made your understanding of sieges quite clear in Kugane. Don’t disappoint me.”

The ghost of a smile.

“...You got it.”

With the threat of Valheim’s invasion only hours away, even if he listened to the tightness around the corners of his eyes, so used to ignoring them getting heavy now, he doubted he’d get much rest at all. Even putting aside that his dreams were strange and harrowing in the days since he had begun to rely so much on his passenger’s boons, the embattled young swordsman had always been the type that put off his meals until every task was off the plate in front of him— until he was sure he had it all squared away. So he worked, noting down everything they could reasonably bring to the table.

Of particular import, after a brief period of tense negotiation, was the box and ammo belt for Eliane’s favorite toy, going through the length and verifying the round count for the siege ahead. The fire control mechanism had been pretty easily set in place once he’d gotten the all-clear from the guardswoman, one of many elements of her crash course from the night before still thankfully intact within his skull. The mount, however, they’d need to save until they determined emplacement, swapping the gun over once they were at the point of fixture.

He glanced back over, where she, Esben, and the rest of their motley crew napped, whatever conversations they’d been winding down with at pause for the minute. The chamber was quiet, the only voices those leaking in from further away— Cid and Eve, albeit softly, deep in prayer in the main hall. He had wanted to try and catch a quiet moment to make a couple inquiries before he set off to the chambers Zacharias was using to scrape together a plan for his whole city… But as luck had it, Neve had caught him drifting towards the archway, and gently shooed him back off.

The last thing they really needed was any form of disturbance, and though his passenger had already passed the threshold of “there are way too many powerful white mages around here, bye” and gone back to shutting the hell up, one look at Neve’s strained, somber expression told him that he’d be felt even if he kept quiet and just patiently waited off to the side.

So instead, once he’d verified everything Team Kirin had to work with, he marched his way over to the haggard old Grovemaster, hastily jotted lines of shorthand adorning a sheet of parchment. Reference points, for the event that he needed to do a little math with the whole thing, and as always… room to sketch. Brightlam, such as it was, was an intensely vertical city— even if Zacharias had a better grasp of siegecraft than he could ever give an old pacifist tree-hugger credit for prior to witnessing it firsthand, he needed a proper visualization of the topography to get the most out of their big point defense armament.

But that, too, seemed a pretty big “if”.

”I want apprentices embedded with each squadron manning the branches,” Zacharias commanded to a runner, handing him a sealed roll of orders. ”The fighting will be heaviest once the Valheimr penetrate the treetops, and we can’t risk a stray bombardment strafing the treetops. Now go, man!” Said runner raised a hand in salute before dashing off to deliver said orders, the sage who issued them given a rare reprieve to take a breath.

At least, he did until he spied Rudolf in the corner of his eye. Biting back a sigh, Zacharias turned to face the Sagramore hunter, his expression weary.

”Yes, boy? Has something of import occurred with your group? I’m rather…preoccupied at the moment ensuring that my home does not fall.”

Alright, that was already a good start. Better than the absolute worst case scenario he could have walked in on by leagues— that of a man whose pacifism left him panicked and disorganized when forced to shelve it.

Nodding, Rudolf stepped forward, his back a little straighter, his tone growing regimented, clipped, direct— slipping into a mantle he’d never truly earned his chance to wear, no matter the training for it.

“A goal we share, Grovemaster Zacharias,” he began, unfazed by the prickly response. “In spite of what some of the more vocal elements of our cohort have intimated or outright saber-rattled about during prior negotiations. I’d like to dig into what you’ve drawn up for the defensive operation, to see how our party and resources would be best integrated towards retaining the city. As well,”

He smirked. There was a black humor in it, but not enough to pull him off course.

“I’d sleep a lot better knowing I lent whatever learning and experience I could to organizing this whole thing. At the very least, we could compare notes; I imagine Neve’s got you mostly caught up on what’s headed your way, but we can’t be too careful.”

Zacharias didn’t deign to respond with words, instead backing away from the war table in order to let Rudolf have a view of it.

Alright… let’s see what we’re working with. the would-be young officer grimly thought, letting his gilded eyes, flecked with black and growing reddened with the deepening hour, glide over the outlaid field, drinking in detail.

The defense of Brightlam would be widespread, squads of soldiers, priests, and mages in loose formations across the city’s boughs and branches so as to avoid the worst of airship bombardments. Notably, defense in the leaves and treetops themselves were but a token effort: it seemed Zacharias aimed to cede Brightlam’s first layer in order to have the Valheimr lost and confused in the bramble up above.

Most of all, though…it seemed there were no provisions made for the Kirins within these plans. At least, not that Rudolf could see. Zacharias raised an eyebrow at the boy, waiting for the inevitable question.

He was met with a furrowed brow and pensive, contemplating frown within the silence that stood between them, that of a mind grappling with a problem, turning it over, trying to find the kernels of familiarity within. Immediately, he’d been struck by the gap between his schooling and the reality they’d been walked into— as the second son of a long line of proud Edreni cavalrymen, the bulk of what he knew in the operational scale existed in two primary dimensions— breadth and depth.

Were they planning a ground offensive it’d be right in his wheelhouse, without question. But, just as he’d begun to consider regarding the question of Elly’s gun, Brightlam, and it’s projected avenues of defense, were a wholly different beast to the fields, hills, and even mountains he had studied before everything went to ruin.

He wargamed on boards, not branches. Still, even with that said, the more he studied the placements and differentiations of canopy Zacharias had come up with, the more he began to grasp at the underlying logic.

“Looks like you’re expecting them to punch through the top layers of the canopy before they land, to try and disrupt your terrain screening,” he noted, a finger hovering over the depicted treetop before flowing down. “And then tie them down in the understory with multiple skirmishes before they touch down onto the city proper. Are these shaping actions, or is this where you plan on conducting the bulk of the fighting?”

It looked, albeit in a dimension and terrain he had only a week’s worth of experience in dealing with, like the initial phase of a mobile defense operation, where those upper squads of knife fighters and their embedded apprentices were tasked with the harassment and delaying of enemy force penetration until cued for a staged withdrawal, slowly roping their foes into a predetermined counteroffensive. Key to that concept was determining the cues between the defenders’ fixing and striking forces; the latter knowing when the time was right to commit to crashing into the outstretched enemy, and the former knowing where they would need to turn and hold ground instead of continually reeling the attackers in through the depth of the battle area.

Designation of your kill zone was paramount here, as was timing, and upwind of that, communication and maneuver. Brightlam was good for that, most likely holding the advantage in navigating the labyrinthine branches that shadowed the city, even with concessions made for the pseudo-dragoons Valon had been busy training. While they would be better equipped than most invaders to negotiate the descent through the branches, Brightlam’s defenders had been built up through their entire careers to navigate them as second nature. The terrain advantage was squarely in their corner— thus why it seemed bombardment from on high would be a likely opening move from Valheim’s airships.

But still, Rudolf couldn’t shake the sense that he needed to uncover more parts to the picture than he saw right away.

“As well, I’d like to be sure we’re on the same page regarding the forces you have available to muster. After the events of this whole day, I imagine you’d be hurting for reserve fighters, if not worse.”

Zacharias couldn’t help but look impressed, despite himself.

”You’ve had instruction in these arts, then. Noble?” That was where any praise he had ended, though. ”Regardless, you commit the same errors as most outsiders. The same ones the Valheimr will make as well. Recall that we have magic. We have the ability to spark life. At our magi’s command, the boughs of Brightlam will do more than provide cover and hindrance. To say nothing of the Eidolons willing to come to the tree’s defense.” He finished with a slight huff, frowning at the subject. It seemed that despite his skill in the field, open warfare was still something that sat poorly with the Grovemaster.

”We will speak further on this subject in a few hours once the remainder of your party are present, but know that you have been factored into the battle plan. I would advise preparing for an offensive strike on your part. As Cid tells me, the majority of your talents would be wasted in a static defense.”

A pause heralded a cock of the head.

“Well, you’ve neatly pre-empted my following question regarding shaping the terrain to our benefit. I trust you’ll be canalizing them towards the majority of your strength, leveraging the Eidolons’ attacks for counter-bombardment of the funneled landing forces, and already have a pretty good idea of their most likely points of entry in terms of ‘viable landing zones’ according to what intelligence the False Alambert and the other saboteurs presumably passed along.” he nodded while pushing through the rest of what seemed mutually understood, appearing for a moment to rise to neither praise, nor critique, nor the all-too-common deduction of his background.

At this point, it was easier to point to people that didn’t seem to sniff it out immediately— and in this particular instance, he had mentally prepared to reveal his exact pedigree if it meant making the point towards how deep in that reviled “Edreni War Machine” the young soldier had truly been steeped.

“And mind you, we did have to contend with our share of the magic you command firsthand to even reach this point of discussion, Grovemaster.”

Alright, maybe he was a little annoyed. He had taken an explosion straight to the face today as the result of the confluence of poor timing and inability to establish communication, he had reason to be sore about the subject of mistakes. But no matter. Fine. They were all on the same side.

“We’re a crafty bunch. I’d hardly call us quite so specialized as to be “wasted”— but nominally, Cid’s correct. The majority of our ensemble is better equipped to serve as either a mobile strike force or, as we’ve lately needed to prove, covert operation cell— both keen on piercing hostile territory and acting from within. I’ll be sure to pass that along before I retire. The primary reason I stopped by was actually our largest outlier in that summation: Dame-Commander Laruelle, and her looted rotary gun.” He turned back to the available maps, poring over the topography, trying to square away distances, sightlines, trending north and east— towards Osprey, where what he knew of their foe had them projecting their forces from. “I’m pretty sure it’d be best served in the original role we encountered it within, in this instance: a fixed defensive firing point. Originally, we were of the belief that we would use it to try and attack the airships or landing parties on their descent.”

He glanced over his shoulder, not to the Grovemaster, but to the direction of the main hall, Cid and Eve’s prayers now beyond the reach of his ears.

“To tell the truth, I was toying with the beginnings of an idea that would utilize it in tandem with Eve, if she was fit to fight alongside us one more time— we would have potentially been able to cast a net that would screen the advance of their ships. Especially given that I’ve seen her muster the power to shoot one of them down outright in Osprey.”

His eyes narrowed, seeing the billowing flame in his mind once more, before shrugging and looking back to the table.

“I’d meant to ask Cid about Eve’s condition before I came to pick your brain like this, but Neve cautioned me away from disturbing them and you’ve already delineated other defensive measures in depth. To that end, I’d simply like to make note of Laruelle and the gun’s availability for static emplacement— she’d be a powerful asset for cutting through what masses of Valheimr landing personnel might pass through those causeways towards your deeper lines. Could free up an Eidolon for the aforementioned air defense, for instance.”

His finger tapped the hardwood beneath, as though putting a pin in it by hand. He could read the room well enough, even with all the detail beginning to boil over as he tried to crack into the subject of warfare. In a way, perhaps his fervor came from the feeling of slipping on an old hat after a long time. Maybe if they were just one day removed from the fighting, he’d get the chance to really dust off all the gears, but…

His hands lifted, before steepling before him. “In any event, that’s just a consideration I’d be remiss to leave unmentioned— given we’re on short time, we obviously wouldn’t want to edit the doctrinal outline any more than we need to. Given your embedded tasks for us in the existing structure, that renders the point moot. She’s not likely to want anyone manning it beyond her, Esben, and potentially myself, cutting our strike team down by a third at least. What do you intend to leverage us against, then?”

”Your consideration has been noted.” Zacharias bristled dismissively. Even if they were setting aside previous arguments, it seemed his distaste for the Edrenian war machine and those scions it produced remained.

”Regardless, as I said: we’ll be deploying you and yours to proactively counterattack their leadership once the assault begins. I don’t care to repeat myself, so if you could be so kind as to take a rest, young man?” Just the slightest tinge of grandfatherly concern entered his voice as he beheld Rudolf’s state and comparative youth before his expression hardened again as he returned to considering the war map.

“We’re in a very deep hole, sir.”

His reply was quiet, but the firm part of his gaze within the tight red corners of his eyes held steady. Something beyond him was pushing this, too.

“We stop pulling ourselves up when we’re out.”

He followed the old man’s gaze one final time, letting the silence hang as he scrutinized the operational areas, the flow of battle in his mind’s eye, then… raised his arms, the white flag of defeat flying.

“But I know when I’m being ushered out of the room. I’ll say a prayer to Himstus for you and trust your judgement. The Lord of War might be the only God left with any love to spare for me, after all— Just one more question, and then I’ll go.”

His eyes drifted up, leaving the central chapel on the map to rest at the rafters, coiled in shadow.

”When this is over, and we’ve routed them— what’s going to become of Isolde? Of her remains, her remembrance?”

She was a traitor, in the end. She had seen fit to tear into them, and her fellow Grovemaster, to further the ends of the invaders. She had been whipped into a high frenzy, and her death was likely the only reason they had a chance to sit here and organize this defensive.

She, much like him, had lost her way. What was made of that, with all the harm her misguided judgements had caused? Surely, there were limits to forgiveness even with the absolution that was death itself— and yet…

A deep, shuddering breath was Zacharias’s only response for a long moment, the old man raising a hand to massage his brow. Eventually, he forced himself to respond.

”...The people can ill afford to know of how deep the rot ran. Suffice to say, they will only know that she lost her way and was killed for it.” His expression solidified into a hard line. ”Perhaps those who know the truth will disapprove. But the chaos that would erupt from knowing one of the Grovemasters was manipulated by outside forces and another was replaced entirely would be unspeakable. Drama Asnaeu would lose all trust in its institutions should that occur. It cannot come to pass. Now leave me. I find my tolerance for questions used up in this moment.”

“…I see. Himstus guide your command.”

There was nothing left to say after that.

Rudolf turned on his heel, and left as he was bid. He would return to the chamber in the silence he had left it— spending a few moments to chart a rough diagram that would outline the primary thrusts of Zacharias’s gambit for the rest of the recuperating Kirins, before falling back upon his favored rituals of war— anointing his blades anew with oil and steel, bidding they cut true as any man had forged.

The Kirins, and the nation, would need no less come morning.

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Knight RP

Gerard Segremors

It was always something, wasn't it?

Much like Renar a pace and a half ahead, Gerard felt his blood pressure spike and kept his face in a heroically placid cast, stuffing the urge to hold his brow. It was always something with these expeditions, wasn't it? Never minding Gertrude's tempting of fate— well, with this particular fae, her desire to forge a contract seemed less like tempting and more like outright hiking her skirt up, but either way— she was a grown woman, and could make her decisions for herself. It wasn't like she had any less an upbringing steeped in cautionary folklore as he, and atop it she was a talented mage.

Whatever she got herself into, she knew about as much as any of them.

But nonetheless, from the sounds of things one of their three choices in trophy had been pilfered beneath the Moonlit Queen's nose, turning their cleanly won bet into a bogged down mire that sounded like it was bound to end with them trying to hunt down a thief. Given that The Queen's attention was likely centered around watching the battle play out, now seemed, in hindsight, quite the opportune time for any interested third parties to invade her realm and swipe something out from beneath her nose.

His eyes narrowed, just barely. Of all this, he found he just really didn't want to be made into a liar, after that confident yarn he'd spun in front of the lady of the forest.

"A thief beneath all our noses. They must have used the clamor of the fighting. Likely wasn't the nithyr, seeing as they were too stuck in on the battle. Who else might be interested in taking whatever this third thing was?"

Well, he knew of one or two, but he doubted those so close to The Moonlit Queen herself would be so hard for her to notice.

And he'd be disappointed to learn they didn't at least give him a chance to back the big talk up.

Final Fantasy: Lightseekers

Rudolf Sagramore

Being effectively right in Famfrit's face after their two-pronged disarmament measure, Rudolf hardly had a moment's rest, let alone room to celebrate, as the ringing snaps of Eliane's gunfire was drowned out by the thunderous bell-tone of splitting bronze filling the chamber and his ears alike. He had hoped to only serve as a stopper for the flood of projectiles with that Shield, but damaging the urn with the rebound of its own attack was even better—

And yet, as a fetid, putrescent¹ mist began to swirl around the enraged golem, their success brought little comfort.

"-DEVOURING DARKNESS. VOID UNENDING, CORRODING!"

Okay, what the hell?! he demanded, stowing the spent materia and ripping his rondel free from its' neighboring home on the bandolier, splitting an orb of corroding darkness that was inches from slamming right into him. Pointedly, he didn't even think to will his own blackflame into the steel. Darkness, Void, Corrosion; I thought we were differentiated, me and him! What happened to that?

NOT the same. came the hurried retort, even as a flood of information was being delegated behind impulses and instincts, helping Rudolf thread his way through what he could of the barrage, and carve through or endure the rest². You're going to need to trust me that these are separate and that this is markedly worse than what we do. Getting into the epistemology problem would distract you and we'd all be in a hell of a lot of trouble. Shorthand is calling it decomposition versus death itself.

Rudolf grit his teeth, wincing as he was forced to catch the brunt of a second orb along the flat of his accursed greatsword when Selene's haste faded, in time with the howling winds and coalescing stormcloud that Esben had called for. Part of him wished that maybe the corrosion of the twisted magic would have some sort of weakening effect on the curse that had been overlaid— the rest of him dashed the notion against all the good fortune he had burned already coming back to bite him in the ass. It'd sooner wreck the steel itself.

But the weight hadn't changed, and he could still move after it, the hair on his scalp standing on end as the all too familiar scent of ozone and feeling of fuzz permeated the air around him, as he leapt clear of his comarade's blade of light, charged with the divine lightning of Ramuh itself— that must have been what he was doing, Rudolf belatedly put together, when he was chatting with Cid and the Eidolon that evening before. Rudolf had caught him out of the corner of his eye, between his attempts at catching lightning.

Gods, Adrammelech had only been the evening before, hadn't it? Even getting nose flattened this morning felt like a lifetime ago by now— they'd never even given themselves enough time to fix it. By the time this siege was over, Rudolf foresaw the lot of them that weren't already hanging on by a thread like Eliane to just about keeling over and dying for the next day and a half.

Something to look forward to, then...³

His Gravity materia was somewhere on the tile behind. His Shield was spent. While Famfrit was cloaked in this aura, he was sure that whatever his pact had blunted of its corruption, it would see his flames checked in turn. He could not manage Gungnir without lance and haste both in hand, and Svalinn... honestly, he wasn't convinced he had it in him. What could he do, to drive this forward?

Truth be told, the impact of the dark magic he'd absorbed had knocked his balance loose, given that he'd been in the middle of what should have been a narrow dodge when he'd lost speed. "Getting out of the way" of Esben and Ramuh was really only in relative terms because of that— and because he was so close, he was far from clear of the stray arcs of lightning that spilled away from the SEED's blade. Most people could easily escape regardless, but...

One filament, guided by the whims of misfortune, perhaps Dhinas's anger, streaked towards a close length of grounded metal, colliding with its feathered tip as it trailed its wielder.

Raijingeki.

Who then whirled, as if automatic, and cast that comparatively meager spark into the wake of Esben's final slash, lending that extra bit more to the cause. Still far from perfect, but if there was a bright side to getting good at ignoring a growing pile of fatigue, it was that you stopped letting perfect be the enemy of workable.⁴

---

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• _{1. This is why I describe my boons as calcination. Putrefaction paints a much different picture of melanosis. Never you mind that this is still decompositive processes versus literal, actual, act of killing death.}
• _{2. I'll be perfectly honest. I'm not doing terribly much, not in the way any of the barspells their Red mage chucks around does. There are enough shared elements that I can work to take the edge off of these shots, but little more than that. It's a little like being used to furnaces when you're closer than you should be to a volcano. To keep these comparisons going, think on the difference between tenebrae and smoke, cooking and charring, submersion and drowning somebody, my comical exaggerations and Rudolf's ability to lie to himself, etc. , et cetera.}
• _{3. I love foreshadowing. Speaking of foreshadowing...}
• _{4. I love foreshadowing.}

Final Fantasy: Lightseekers

Rudolf Sagramore

The split-second imposition and reversal of light and dark upon Famfrit's field of view proved to be, for all he and Chisato had basically drawn it up on the fly, about as effective an opening salvo as they could have realistically hoped for given how these fights always seemed to go— Izayoi and Galahad's synchronized strikes to the golem's base and head connecting uninterrupted and undefended in those split seconds of total visual scramble. The water spirit stumbled and teetered away, only barely catching itself and forced to abandon the aether it had been swirling into a massive spell. They had the momentum. All it needed was just a little more help, and it'd topple completely...

Below, Rudolf reached for the pouch at his hip, intent on leveraging the materia within so that their foe would not only fall— but never rise again, either. Keeping it pinned for the crucial seconds they needed to deliver a coup de grace, bypassing what could otherwise be an energy-sucking, time-wasting affair with Valheim on the way—

"GRAVIGA!"

A wrenching feeling in his gut, markedly different from fear, closer to vertigo than anything else. His footing slipped inward rather than out, like you would expect from the slick surface of the grotto's stone floor, as if pulled by an unseen force. By now, with all the times he himself had leveraged his materia, familiar enough. Only... even when he put it into his attacks, he had never quite done so this directly.

It was less like his weight had tripled to pull him down, and more like the world had gripped him in an immense fist. Even as the spheres were beginning to visibly be drawn upon the space around the Kirins, Rudolf could already feel the squeeze. Ice ran through his veins, the spheres of raw gravity crumpling inward, inexorably, around them all, the arcane energy pressing them down from every angle, to close toward a single point— he felt like he was trapped in a pestle and mortar.

He grit his teeth, attempting to channel his blackened aether through the purple orb in his palm once he realized what was happening. Burning this resource here stung, but it beat trying to free himself the hard way. If he could just negate the point of attraction—

Maybe it was the fact that weight moved differently than he was used to, within the sphere of the Graviga.

Maybe it was the climate. Hot, humid, and in the midst of a tense battle— creating slick palms that he couldn't count on for manipulating a marble-smooth surface that resulted when you compressed and refined aether into structure.

Maybe it was simply the price of admission, for all that he'd burned to make it this far.¹

In the moment, it was impossible to say, impossible to know. There was only the concrete reality of the result— that Rudolf's heart all but stopped, as in the act of pulling free his gravity materia... he felt it slip through his fingers, and rocket along the swirling eddies of that selfsame gravity magic and dash itself along the stone, with a deafeningly quiet clatter. His words slipped out of his mouth unbidden, warped and strangely reverbed by the twisting of space around his body.

"You're shitting me."

Another ten kilos to the vicegrip upon him eked out a grunt², and his mind raced for a second solution. Ahead of him, Izayoi and Miina had already freed themselves; the latter by way of her training in White Magic, dispelling the effects of Famfrit's attack, and the former...

We can cut through it? he asked, tightening his grip on the blade in his right arm without waiting for confirmation. He had to try no matter the answer.

We can. came the reply, as a line of burning ink ran through the veins of his arm and into the steel of the sword, the voice already moving mana after feeling the spike of intent. That second you burned away fumbling with the Gravity Materia gave the magic enough time to coalesce into a sterner structure than you could break without me. No choice but to put this one on your tab.

The blaze burned to life, and the young swordsman wrenched its unreadable weight into the inner boundaries of his would-be prison. There was a moment of war in that contact, as the umbral flames clashed with the shifting of space, but in the end... the scourging dissolution burned its way through the bounds of the current, and the steel wedged through the gap as he forced it along. A gash, bordered by licking tongues of blackflame, was torn through the side, wide enough that he could just about force his body across.

He leapt through, a grimace on his face, and dashed to the side as a massive orb of water flew by, one that would have pulverized him if not for being Slowed just in the nick of time. Good old Miina, always there to crack open the tight spots they'd found themselves in, one way or another. Were they not so pressed by all this, he'd have found it remarkable how often the many magics she'd picked up made that crucial second's difference.

Invaluable versatility. Something to remember. Remembering could be done later, though— execution ruled the Now.

He thrust his palm into the materia pouch again, and raced forth, cutting through the gap between him and the statuesque cannoneer, even as he weaved past the net of projectiles from that massive gourd it carried. He would find the lost orb of purple before they were out of here, come hell or high water³, but those seconds it'd take were precious enough as it was.

When he had a way he could cut the attacks off at the source, scrambling for it was downright untenable. Grip full-palmed and white-knuckled this time, he channeled his aether again, into his most ill-conceived idea for disguising the abilities he had been so haphazardly flinging around at this point, cooking down his own connection to the god, to the world. Perhaps it was the dim light from when he'd last seen the orb of polished emerald, but... in the instant he held it aloft, he could swear it was more lustrous when he'd thrown it Arton's way.

Maybe... No, don't worry about it.⁴

He skidded to a stop, a mere ten feet from the hulking guardian, and projected his will along his gaze, into the mouth of that immense ewer. A new light cast itself upon the bronze that lined Famfrit and its weapon; the next shot it fired, if it didn't catch what he had done in time, would be surely plugged right at the mouth, as the impenetrable white-gold barrier of Shield placed a lid on the jug.

---

---

• _{1. You'll notice, dear reader, that there's nothing mutually exclusive about any of these. Fate abandons you all sorts of ways when the chips are down.}
• _{2. Don't be a baby, most of that's just explosion soreness.}
• _{3. Heh.}
• _{4. There are a few ideas that buzzed across my face in that pensive 'maybe', but I'll address one of them clearly. Rudolf's memory isn't failing him. Neither regarding the hue nor how materia tends to not concern itself with any Blight Infections the person who's been recently carrying it suffers from.}

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Knight RP

Gerard Segremors

Gerard, quite pleased with how safe he'd kept himself this go around compared to prior battles, shrugged off the First and Youngest's admonitions similarly— as far as he was concerned, none of it really applied. Armor was armor, and ensconsed within a clothen medium such as the (admittedly slapdash) sacks that were tied to the crooks of their three arms, he knew of no curse that could truly endanger the lot of them, especially if shards of Angoron itself didn't require much more in the way of insulation to handle.

Midnight Hunt or no, this thing Renar had felled surely couldn't despoil whole countrysides just by being out and about.

It was with this reassured poise that he stood in formation with the rest of his peers as Fionn had his repartee with the various fae he was evidently keen to collect, like a village child with beetles, and the Moonlit Queen made a show of keeping them all waiting to recieve their agreed-upon reward for victory. Although part of him, a substantial one at that, wanted to claim the trinket personally... he kept his mouth shut, at least until the selection of treasures was brought forth. Although he had made a promise, and intended to keep it in full measure... he was already negotiating from a disadvantage. For whatever reason, she'd proven to take umbrage with his words before already, and seemed much more intrinsically fond of Fanilly. Gone and decided to give him a rainbow for a hairstyle for a few minutes.

For all he knew, he'd spent too long in her sister's court, and the Queen had caught her scent on his armor, or something inscrutable like that.

Regardless, he had proof now that if he were to speak at all, it had best be judiciously, and only if the Captain couldn't say it herself. He leaned forward, voice sinking low with a slight nudge to Fanilly's ornate pauldron.

"These are to be symbolic of her own might," he mentioned, mindful not to mention the "but of little true value" portion of the assessment aloud. "Yet treasures she's willing to part with on a wager all the same. May as well be ready for anything, shouldn't we?"

Final Fantasy: Lightseekers

Rudolf Sagramore

Naturally, he was the first to advance, testing his work before any of his peanut gallery risked the sahuagin's fate.

"Well yeah," The youth flippantly snorted, offering a shrug's affectation to the dry, falsified anecdote from their lofty-minded spearman as the lot of them crept past their first obstacle. "As I said, ancient ruins, crypts, and grottoes. Good on the Caradocs for starting small— your mausoleum's still rather contemporary. Wouldn't want to dive off the deep end before you're ready."

He didn't turn back to press the issue after that, instead falling silent and stepping aside once they hit the minefield, giving Miina her room to work. He supposed it was a rare war hero that high in the social strata that had time, let alone means or cause, to get their knees dirty in the stripes of dungeons he'd been referencing to begin with— they had more important things to worry about.

And no less did the Kirins. Soon enough, the traps had been solved, shut down, or sorted out, and their motley crew was on the move once again. Only fitting that the repartee fell away, once Eliane had been chaperoned over the finish line¹ and they'd descended towards the chamber proper— he found his hands drifting to his knife, as the long and dark shadows that surrounded the torchlight guiding them drew themselves an uncomfortable, familiar path about the riverbanks. Darkness, ever malleable, ever dancing, seemed to almost mix with the rushing water. He knew this feeling. What lied ahead was... nothing good. For what felt like the hundredth time since nightfall, Rudolf found himself quietly thankful for being an old hand at skulking off to train in the dead of night. With the unease coaxing out his instincts, he felt no duller for the late hour.

A pale, dull blue glow greeted them, as the rapids coalesced into a pool ringing an ancient grotto of worn stone, the crystal suspended above tinged at the edges not with radiant azure, but rather... an almost sickly violet, like a day-old bone bruise. Rudolf still held no true command of magic, not the way Miina, Eve, or Neve had, but now that he was confronted with the corrupted orb up close and in person... the twisted aether that swirled about it struck him as the taste of blood and bile, at the back of his throat.²

Like he could feel the wrongness. He'd never known that to be on his table.

Is that what they sense off of me, with you here? He ventured, as the presence on his soul shifted contemplatively. Thinking back to every time it had been sniffed out, starting with Eve, it had always seemed like it had registered to the aether-attuned as a pervasive aura of disquiet.

...No. came the reply a moment later, as they began to cautiously approach. He could feel the flame begin coiling outward from where it sat, dripping through unseen pathways, towards his arms. It was not at his command. Had he not already heard the war drums begin to beat in his chest, he would have taken umbrage. This is different in nature to what our deal grants you. Death and corruption taint this crystal's light, they poison and warp the arrangement of its aether. I deal in the decomposition of such structure wholesale. Grinding, dissolution, putrefaction, and calcination, it's why your brother is likely to have bruised near as much as he burned. That is profane because it begets chaos in a world deemed Ordered by Light. Night, shadow, the void, the basest state of all— it is unknowable potential. Everything lurks within nothing, impossible to pin down. Impossible to—³ Esoterics later. Company now.

Even as the blur burst from below the waves, Rudolf drew his paired swords and stepped to the front of the line, feeling the hairs on his neck rise as the spirit, Famfrit, introduced itself— it too was tinted by that deathly violet, corrupted as the crystal it guarded. Miina's Libra came a moment later, the information it gleaned confirming that intuition even as the familiar feeling of her Nulfrost⁴ settling atop his frame, flanked moments later by Selene's haste and Eos's awakening.

So Hydroponic Adrammelech then, but corrupted and at what they could only assume had to be full-bore, rather than merely testing their valor. Great way to warm up for an imminent siege. A twelve meter statue, at the base of the city they were due to protect, turning all the animus that had been breathed into it onto protecting the crystal from them.

A grimace painted itself across Rudolf's face, as he assumed a fighting posture. Already at the fore, he listened carefully as Esben about-faced, peeling off and barking orders the moment he'd heard their foe was already beginning to channel the ambient aether of the massive grotto into some spell— all of them ideas he could get behind. He swung the Wings in a wide arc, aligning them with the two burnished dots that appeared as eyes on the golem, but stayed put otherwise— if the rest of them fanned out, as they all very well should've, the Kirins would still need a man up front.

The black blaze, when it billowed forth from the slash, seemed to drink in the gloom. It swelled and spread, losing concentration as it melted outward⁵, but even a curtain that barely reached, barely caught...

"That's wool over its eyes. I have you a window!" he called to the diminutive ninja, wherever in the chamber those opening seconds had seen her leap. With what had already come and what was still on the way, the two youngsters both knew damn well to shelve their mutual disdains— for now. Mostly. Most likely.

He needed to ready his materia next. The moment Izayoi and Galahad found their mark and toppled the giant, he would need it to ensure it couldn't get back up.

---

---

• _{1. Final Score is a Six out of Ten. Three or four of them coming in at the very, very end.}
• _{2. It hasn't quite come up yet, but this is part of "hearing a lot more from me". Before all this, I spoke in whispers and inklings of impressions, the dark and scared parts of the mind. It shouldn't be shocking.}
• _{3. Making a long story short here. A long story very, very short, as this all relates to fundamental truths of the two predominant schools of magic— wouldn't you know it, the one that emphasizes maintenance of structure and rigid ordering is given a "pass" where the one that focuses on reduction from composition to components to fundamental, closer to the prima materia, is reviled, shunned, and feared.}
• _{4. Barblizzard, we've been over this. For that matter, why the hell are we doing Barblizzard? Do they not teach Barwater any more? Is that one lost to time? What happened here?}
• _{5. Everything melts into the darkness. See?}

Final Fantasy: Lightseekers

Rudolf Sagramore

Well, whatever.

Despite the impression that he'd been getting ahead of himself, at the end of the day the lot of them still had no trouble carving through a raiding party as pedestrian as these fish, regardless of structure. In short order, the discrepancy in martial skill had sent their assailants packing, scrambling over themselves to get well clear of the flying blades, bolts, and bombs. It was with a click of the tongue that Rudolf wiped his blades clean of blood and Selene's haste left him once more, as the last of their hapless quarry ran itself headfirst into twinned gouts of flame, dragon's breath spewing from the walls at either side of the tight passage. The smell of charring flesh and black, oily smoke filled the stale air, but drew none of the characteristic flinches he often fought to suppress. Rather...

Oh, look at that, pressure plates, how familiar.¹ a ceaselessly opinionated voice sneered in his mind, wafting about the dark like the acrid cinders of the heap of flash-fried fishman. Striding forward, the young swordsman found himself flashing back to one of the places that had forged him. It, too, was a deep, dark place, where one wrong step meant you never came back out.

"Oh boy," he idly murmured, as a streak of purple light darted overhead on orders to survey as far down the passageway as they safely could. "I thought we'd miss out for a second. It's not a proper ancient site without a few traps to clear; I was beginning think Drana Asnaeu's forefathers weren't about the life."

If there was any bright side to skulking about Old Lunaris on his lonesome for as long as he had before everything went to hell, it was that the pretenses of archaeology left you familiar as any other brand of thief with the classical gauntlet of traps in the vein of what doubtless awaited.

"Alright, this ought to be pretty straightforward. Give me a minute. It's really not too different from the upper levels of Lunaris. Eos, if I could get some light here, please?"

I should shred your chances of ever finding your place in the world for that insinuation.

You should be glad you trained me for this. It gets us in and out of here quicker.

His flat, fangless sarcasm finished, he dropped to a knee before the offending tile, drawing a knife from one of the bandoliers that had survived this long on his person, and began to run his fingers carefully along its perimeter, certain not to let any pressure into the stone. It was disguised well among the worn, somewhat irregular grading of the pathway, but at the same time, he had to assume this plate, and thus the gaps that allowed it to move when stepped on at all, had been here for a good long while, and rarely, if ever, saw maintenance.

His hand slid off the face, into a divot before it could catch upon the next block of ragged stonework, and then—

That's room enough.

The blade of the knife was wedged into that little gap, deep as he dared to send it. With how wet this crawling descent was, what had no doubt once been a nigh-seamless installment had been worn away over time, by moisture, by wind, by the slow rot of whatever charred corpses had fallen over the boundary in the years this trap had warded away the unlucky or unworthy. Provided they were adequately sharp at the tips, with this Rudolf had proven that he could drive a wedge into that gap until it jammed the whole mechanism. Sure enough, a firm palm down on the carved stone saw it refuse to depress beyond a fraction of an inch— enough for any one of them to cross if they tread single file.

"Miina," he called tonelessly, now producing his trusty stick of charcoal and marking the immobilized tile with a four-lined symbol that evoked a horned beast's visage— as good a Kirin as you could hope for in the circumstances. "Those knives 'Loki' threw your way, could I have them? I'll get the plates taken care of and we can move further in."

One quick nod and handoff later, and Rudolf set to work, donating his waterskin to the cause— by tracking the flow of each stream he pured out the mouth, he could locate the seams further up directly instead of playing a guessing game with each ragged tile. Water would always find a more direct path down to seep through, after all— it begged the question of whether or not, given this was the Crystal of Water they were trying to reach, there would be anything related they needed to be ready for as obstacle. A flooded chamber, a path only accessible by swimming, things like that—

Soon enough, he was made to pause as Selene streaked back into view from the gloom up ahead. Their report revealed little of what he'd been concerned with, and none of the specific ideas he'd pictured. Instead, she told the awaiting Kirins of a field of arcane mines², swinging blades³, and a puzzle at the end— an assortment of sliding blocks⁴, each marked out to be arranged in a specific orientation to pass. From there, the fairy could forge no further.

Nodding to his tiny green assistant, Rudolf palmed the last throwing knife into a necessary space, and marked off the final pressure plate as she rejoined her purplescent sister. With how the path dropped off after this point, he was confident that the gouts of flame ended right around here— and by eliminating these specific plates, he'd ensured at least one corrected path they could take. All for the low cost of a few pilfered knives and a waterskin. Not a bad trade.

"Thanks," he said, softly tossing the Red Mage the trio of throwing knives he'd not needed back to her one by one. "If we stay single file, those blades should keep things jammed without snapping, and we can yank them free on the way back out."

It would make sense that they didn't intend to permanently damage any of these— no guarantee the people that came after them down the path had such savory intentions as theirs⁵.

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• _{1. Translator's Note: How boring. Every idiot thinks they've reinvented the wheel when they upgrade from wiring their pressure plates to firespitters instead of darts, but these are fundamentally all the same 'don't pay attention to where you step and then the sides start attacking you' obstacle. You may as well just have a big swinging blade. He'll figure this out in three seconds.}
• _{2. Oh Gods Above. Derivative bomb slop you could shove a sufficiently armored Skaellar through and clear, like that blight-stricken one that crawled under a log to go die this party had... what, half a week ago? He's the only one we never talked to, that guy.}
• _{3. Bullshit. Really? I was kidding. I was kidding, old fogeys. The joke was that being played out and uninspiring. you don't need to think, you just need to react. You make this for dummies?}
• _{4. A sliding block puzzle? Your only intellectual gating to the most sacred artifact of your entire slice of the continent is the single most brute-force friendly time waster? This is why I maintain that Constructionalists like White Mages should be banned from making traps, they don't know how easy anything is to subvert if you have half a brain. Not even a single light puzzle, or liquid scale, or use of quicksilver fulmination, or anything that demands the ability to think in abstraction. Unbelievable. Come up with a cipher! Enforce specific input sequencing! Flood the room! Apply yourselves!}
• _{5. Yeah, great call. As a matter of fact, have the last person through pull them while you go down. This wasn't even fun to watch you solve, I may as well see you try and reverse-engineer it from the opposite way later, if not us run into some fried Valheimr.}

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Knight RP

Gerard Segremors

For a moment, the veil of moonlight about her was lifted, and her eyes in turn seemed to pierce the shadows that veiled his, despite his visor still being very much closed. one last scraping of bone sounded, between the silence, her weapons stowed— a gesture he had after a moment returned, sliding steel back into leather, and stepping away, affording his erstwhile foe a chance to breathe.

Come to think of it... despite being doubtlessly spun thin and delicate, she wasn't quite so small as it had felt, during the exchange of blows. Not quite the waif he had been threatening to shred.

She nodded, barely enough to see, and graced him with a small smile before disappearing on the nighttime wind. Silent as ever, he couldn't claim to be sure of the emotion behind it, only that it felt like some rare privilege.

...

How strange that had been. Still, one thing was undeniable— it could have easily gone a whole hell of a lot worse. He'd take his victory. Who knew? Given someone like Fionn was around, Gerard felt himself entertaining the notion that either his mercy, or his skill in battle had just earned him some strange form of friend.

But, as ever with a victory they all shared, the silence such idle thoughts could fill was quickly cut through, by a friend that was certain.

He jogged over in short order. "New cloak," a wry edge crept in as he noted the taller man's trophy, eyebrow raised beneath the helmet. He began to gather the pieces together, only giving a cursory once-over to each— more for curiosity's sake than anything else. There was perhaps some idea that a once-routine scavenger of battles won could lend some preliminary insights as to everything's condition, but here he didn't see anything leaping right off the steel. Whatever details there were to find, they'd likely need Ardor's expert eye and no less. "Felt like time to upgrade?"

@Psyker Landshark@The Otter