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Izurich
MULTI_MEDIA_MAN
Yankee
Rezod92
kapuchu
Elite Minor
Dark Cloud
Tim the Yeti
XandryaKnight Sylvestre
Location: Neighborhood Market
Cyril did not wish to dwell beneath that hollow gaze for long. Muscles slack from the exertion, and flesh burning from the pain his adrenaline had dulled, he rummaged around beneath his gambeson for the heart-shaped device borne by every entrant into this wretched Crucible. After his fingers closed around its familiar shape, he pulled it free and held it in front of his face. With his other hand, sore though it was, he pried open his visor to reveal features stained by sweat and grime. A small chip of wood was stuck in the bridge of his nose, though it fell out when the vanguard went to wipe his eyes. Into his phylactery he spoke.
“Oren, I am ready to make my requests.”
For the first time he became aware of the whir of that mysterious metal device; he assumed that he'd been tuning it out this whole time. Would that he could so easily ignore the grating voice that issued from it. “Hehey, short time no speak, tin can. Looks like ya've done a real number on miss martial arts here, huh? Gotta say, I've never seen such a crazy fight in a market of all places-”
“My first request is that you shut your blasted mouth around me unless I talk to you first, and if I do, you answer me in a completely straightforward manner, with no prevarication or moronic chatter. Understand?”
There was a moment of stung quiet before Oren piped up weakly. “That was three things.”
“That was a three-parter.”
A growling noise issued through the microphone, somewhat muddled by the static. Evidently the announcer had to honor this request. “...'Kay.”
The semblance of a bitter smile formed on Cyril's face. “Number two. How do I take the girl's soul without killing her? Explain fully.”
There came through the drone a creak, followed by a barely-audible whisper: ”called it”. A moment later Oren's voice reappeared loud and clear. “Okay, take your phylactery. Needle on the bottom. Stick it into hers. It'll hurt like hell as the link is undone, but it won't kill her. Good?”
Clonk was Oren's answer—the sound of the butt of Cyril's halberd smacking Juniper in the temple. Aware of her toughness even in defeat, he leveraged enough force to put her out cold. In a matter of a few seconds he recovered her phylactery, but instead of immediately siphoning it he laid it aside. Wishing he had access to fire, he ripped up Juniper's white kimono to tightly bandage her legs, staunching the flow of blood. Only then did he carry out the announcer's instructions. The God Hand's body convulsed every few seconds during the transfer, but she did not otherwise stir, and the task was done before too long.
Cyril stared at the side of the device. At a leisurely pace came three lights interspersed by three little tones. He was about to let the pendant dangle when a fourth alit, this one brighter than the previous for a brief moment. Huh? Oh. Of course, Juniper's phylactery contained an extra soul of its own.
The Knight Sylvestre now owned four. He wasn't an eighth of the way to his wish, and already he felt like death. At the very least there would be no more fighting today, so he had leave to figure some things out.
First and foremost was his opponent. After a brief moment of reflection, Cyril felt sure that he hated her. He hated her for what she did more than what she said: she'd made him doubt himself. Going into the battle, she'd derided his dream as the ravings of a madman, too obsessed with his misguided vision to consider the path he'd have to walk or the consequences of his actions. That's not true. He would have been very, very happy to not have to hurt a fly, and even if they were in pursuit of a noble cause he regretted the bad things he'd done. I feel remorse for ensuring the self-destruction of the inventor from yesterday, though he had been a true lunatic, and surely that means I'm not a monster? Yet who could look at me now and not say what I've done to this girl is monstrous?
To deny that punishing her for standing in his way, full of scorn and mockery, hadn't been a little gratifying would be to lie. It was easy to thrust a blade into the heart of a demon since it was a horrific creature of evil, guaranteed to cause untold suffering if left to run amok. It was only a little harder to put down an unrepentant murderer, who was like a demon in all but form. Cyril had been numbed to cutting down rebels, starving bandits, and petty thieves whose backs were against the wall, but he felt none of the gratification from destroying them. This duel had been the second battle in a war he was fighting for himself, for what he believed in. Was it appropriate to delight in the fair defeat of a foe who opposed his ideals, not those of someone who ordered him around? He'd never done it before.
Cyril stood to his feet. He retrieved his fallen shield and replaced it on his shoulder, then leaned his halberd against the wall. As gingerly as he could, he reached down and lifted Juniper up onto his back. He could spite her by leaving her here to bleed out...or he could spite her by proving that he was no madman. Besides, what would the chivalrous knights of old say if he left a poor maiden, who had only one functional limb, to die of blood loss or thirst on some floor? The vanguard almost chuckled to think of it, though it was as much of an acerbic sob. Wincing with every step, he grabbed his weapon and carried his burden outside.
Parked out in front of the neighborhood market was one of those strange, carriage-like machines, this one being larger than any he'd seen before. Beside it stood a hulking man who kept his face downturned. Stopping a safe distance away, Cyril wondered who he was. There were no civilians in this city. He glanced at the open back of the vehicle and spotted a variety of surgical tools, bandages, and other medical knickknacks, including several bags of what appeared to be blood. “Are you a healer?”
The quiet giant nodded.
“With the College?”
Another nod.
“Then I have someone you ought to look at.”
Sand, littered with beach umbrellas and towels disturbed by the previous night's rain, gave way to a stretch of grass, then street. For one accustomed to nature, the transition from shorefront to storefront was sudden indeed. From there lay a maze of squat, colorful buildings, none more that two stories high, both houses and places of business. So prized was real estate near a beach in the City of Echoes that almost every structure here, well removed of the industrious aesthetic and fishy smell of the port on the Amusement Mile's opposite side, exhibited a high degree of attractiveness. Along those pristine roads the lone skeleton strolled, armed and ready for whatever lay in his way.
The low buildings afforded him a decent glance into the distance, and the much taller edifices that loomed there. Bonesword could make out great towers of steel and glass that stretched skyward, and the rotating disc shapes of clown tents that hovered between them like clouds of cotton candy. At the very least, the freaky creeps were a long way off, affording the undead warrior time to explore and prepare.
Had Bonesword a nose, he might have been able to detect an unpleasant smell wafting from behind an overlarge wall of white stone that ran along one of the widewalks. Along its length were windows that permitted glimpses into a variety of different habitats, some sporting various animals. Following the wall led to the complex's main entrance, where empty ticket booths and rotating metal contraptions lay below a large yellow sign with red letters that spelled Roarke Zoo.
The sound of scratching hair could be heard through the faulty drone's mic before Oren responded. “Cactus? Huh? Well, I couldn't really tell ya who this mission would help, but by the same token it could mean life or death for everyone in the City for all I know. I'll just give ya the run-down...”
Kzzt.
The defunct drone sparked and died, now no more than a pile of scrap. It wasn't a minute, however, before the familiar whir of a second could be heard on the approach, and before long the fresh drone appeared from around a corner. It floated up toward Lily, and Oren directed it to give a salute toward its fallen comrade before it fixated upon the kitsune and projected an image of the announcer for her to see.
Oren hadn't changed much since Lily saw him last, other than he appeared to be wearing a purple cape, and about an inch away from his left hand was what appeared to be a golden arrow. He took a breath before, speaking quickly, he began to deliver all he knew of the situation. “The other duel in the East Side -which is the zone of the City you're in- ended just a few moments ago. Captain James Teller and Smiley the Demon duked it out across a subway station and onto a train, which started rolling. Teller was just about to clinch the match when the train flew shot out of its tunnel into a massive pit—the pit that a couple of grade-A bombs blew into the Commercial District last night. The weight of the thing broke through the last layer of rock holding up all the debris, and down they went into a deep, dark hole. I sent a drone down and...well...”
The screen changed to show a different image. It displayed a city in darkness, rather than a stormy sky or starry night, overhead loomed a ceiling of stone. Purple lights interrupted the gloom—purple lights and a single spotlight of sun, beaming down through a hole in the earthen roof that looked to be, in comparison, rather small.
“Boggles the mind, doesn't it? A hidden city, far below the City of Echoes, with such a strange, old-fashioned architecture. That's not all, though. Ever sine the pit's opened up all the way, some other factions have started to move. The unknown choppers that were already in the area have either landed nearby or descended through the hole. The giant crow sighted above the Park is moving in that general direction. Admins are saying this might be bigger than the tournament...an answer to what happened to this place, which is the reason why the College was founded here in the first place. Search team's in the works, but any info ya get if ya go down would be great.”
Oren's face replaced the subterranean city, and this time he was smiling. “Neheh. Then again, aren't we forgetting something? Right now we can't tell who won the fight, but this much is clear: your next opponent is down there somewhere. So you don't really have much say in the matter. 'Nothing so quaint as volition at play here', I guess!”
Pain, to the likes an immortal vampire who unwound the very fibers of his being to deliver the most visceral of attacks, was nothing; yet, this agony was something altogether new and exquisite. Moments after the blast of Runch's decidedly unhealthy Hellberry surprise, Crue's face was already healing, but by then it was too late. The sensation of tearing filled him, concentrated in his head, and he wasn't alone. Heavy Fuel poured from his mouth, manifesting in its full form amidst a series of terrible spasms. Although seemingly impossible for an ethereal being, cracks began to form across its oily surface, spreading and actually pulling the Stand apart. The breakup worsened quickly until it reached a certain level, at which it grew no worse until the pain subsided. Heavy Fuel's tears closed together as the Stand faded away, and the catacombs were quiet once more.
Ten minutes later the good captain pulled a lever in light of his luminescent berries, and a secret door slid open to admit the sunlight. Floating outside, in a scene very reminiscent of last night, was one of the drones belonging to Oren the Announcer. Beside him stood a newer face: the Bashibozuk, arms crossed and face arranged into a sneer.
He opened his mouth to speak, but the flying machine beat him to it. “Well well well, look who's continuing to expand his posse! How in the name of Zentopia did you survive?” Oren's surprise, odd for such a disingenuous individual, appeared legitimate.
Serhen jumped in when he had the chance. “So you didn't get yourself killed. You know, while you were off fighting I had an interesting conversation with this thing. He told me that those defeated but not killed in this tournament are not, in fact, forced to do whatever the winner says. They are only kept from attacking. 'Aggression suppression', he calls it. The rest, a 'placebo effect'.” His dark eyes were as hard and sharp as glass as he sighed. “With that said, I will be leaving you. I have no interest in joining your 'posse' as the construct puts it.”
“The construct has a name, ya know.”
With a curt inclination of his head, which encapsulated all the respect Runch had managed to earn from him in the short time they'd been allied, Serhan turned to depart. For once Oren was quiet, and the purple optic of his drone was fixated upon the trio before him expectantly.
The flames licking at the grass, trees, and buildings coalesced into a roaring wildfire, the second to rage through the Park. From the area the mists cleared away, leaving the place once shrouded in a remote sort of mystique to go up in smoke. Bit by bit the inferno engulfed the campgrounds, consuming the cabins within half an hour, and the still body of the Seraphim way before that. By that time, however, the victor of Settlement's final deadly bout had vacated the premises, spoils of war in hand.
You got:
28. Egg
It is better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all
Messily consumes a loved one of the owner to grant the owner's one wish
28. Egg
It is better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all
Messily consumes a loved one of the owner to grant the owner's one wish
It was a little while before Oren's drone appeared among the trees, homing in on Jin's location. No doubt the announcer had been busy attending to other matters, and his voice rang with a touch of irritation as he spoke. “Another brutal kill from our assassin. Everyone's been wrong to underestimatecha, huh? Usin' the hole to penetrate Sophia's armor...if I had to wax poetic, I'd say a true killer instinct lies behind that douchey attitude. Neheh...” He paused for a moment, collecting his thoughts. The flying machine was not, at the moment, projecting a holographic image of the Crucible's announcer, but it was still a simple matter to tell that he wasn't all there. In fact, a semblance of fear tinged his tone, but it couldn't be -as his words might imply- for Jin, could it?
“Guess your work's done for the day. If you're hankering for some civilization, heading due east for long enough oughta do it.” He leaned away from the mike, muttering to himself. “Jeez, whole forest's toast. That and we've lost our lead on the crow fortress. Still, shouldn't be much of a problem-” The feed blinked off abruptly, leaving Jin alone in the forest with his loot and his thoughts.
This neck of the woods wasn't, however, devoid of features. In the direction Jin had gone, the trees had yet to be touched by fire, and ahead the terrain grew more wild still. The earth rose before him, though split by a river-carved chasm. On one side of the grassy rise, hidden in the shadows of the canopy, lay a hard-to-spot cabin.
Later that day
“Uuugh...who knew double crossing could take so much out of ya? I haven't even done anything yet.”
Squish, squish. Once his palms had rubbed his tired, frazzled eyes to a sufficient degree, the young man replaced his glasses and waited for the blurriness to fade. He didn't need to see to know which buttons to press to deactivate the surveillance system, but he didn't feel particularly rushed. Oren stood up from his chair, moved a couple steps away, yanked the window shade off, and began to perform a couple of stretches to work out the stiffness. Once his bones stopped popping, he declared the routine good enough and set to looking out the window while he adjusted his cape. Without a mirror he couldn't know for certain, but Oren was pretty certain he looked mighty fresh. “Soon enough,” he muttered aloud before pulling off the cape and stuffing it in a box beneath his desk. With the air of a salaryman grabbing his keys to head off to work, the Crucible's wisecracking announcer snatched the arrow from the desk and started down the stairs.
It was a long climb down, and a boring one. All the nasties had been eliminated by the College escort that established him here in the first place, after all. Not for the first time, Oren was glad that the cocksure sniper hadn't tried to climb any higher than where he'd spent the night. Without much in the way of dungeonesque traps, he would have had to set Mountain straight himself, and there was just no telling how many problems that would have caused. Once he reached the ground floor, Oren leveraged his measly strength to barge open the heavy wood door, and out into the warm afternoon light he sauntered. “Ah, the outdoors. Truly, I have not missed thee.” He put his hands in his pockets and set off.
A couple of minutes later he stood just inside the automatic glass doors of an office building. From there it was only a few seconds' meandering to the appointed conference room, and with gusto Oren pushed open the door. In an instant nine pairs of eyes were upon him. Oren regarded the mostly-unfriendly stares with a carefree grin as he entered and took his place leaning against the walls. At the far end of the room, the most baleful eyes belonged to a paradoxically friendly face, set in the middle of the well-trimmed red hair and admirable beard of Professor Edward Barnaby.
“What took you so long?”
Oren shrugged, unperturbed. “Gotta say my goodbyes, don't I? Anyone thinks I'm not acting like my usual gregarious self, they might start thinking something's...” With unrepentant dramatization he held a hand in front of his face. “Amiss!”
A roll of Barnaby's eyes greeted this nonsense. “Enough games. Do you have it?”
With a light sigh, Oren produced the arrow and tossed it toward the wooden conference table. Despite the unlikeliness of such an occurrence, it landed point-in and stuck there, quivering. Barnaby nodded, sagacious, and turned to the screen behind him. All eyes were on the television as footage of one of the day's battles appeared. The announcer recognizing it without delay as the brutal match between little Ryan and Tyrant. While those assembled stared at the destruction wrecked upon the amphitheater during the course of the fight, he scrutinized them. Having been given access to the employee database, he could rattle off each of their names. Doctor Howell Hallow. The twins, Davian and Aralynn Thule. Pieter LeGroning...'Noseless', he's called. Professor Margaret Fontain and her nephew Sylvester Baxter, not to be confused with our brave Knight Sylvestre. The big man, Professor Edward Barnaby, and his wife Raleigh. Even little Emilia Redsmith, their granddaughter. He glanced back at the screen, which now showed the Runch-Crue fight. The unhesitating use of their powers awed everyone present, save him and Edward, who froze it on a frame of the vampire electrocuting the pirate.
“What you've seen is only a glimpse of what's out there,” the portly man stated in a low voice. “We were amazed by the artifacts we discovered in this unnatural place, but now you know they were only the tip of the iceberg. Any of the contestants in this tournament could level a town, killing hundreds of people, even trained police forces. Magic, incredible technology, forces beyond our comprehension...we must wonder, how can this exist? How is it happening? But those are answers for another time. Rather, for those not present.”
Barnaby gazed with intense eyes at each attendee, one by one. “We must act before it's too late. Now, more than ever, I am sure that the wishing machine will what we have hypothesized it will. I am terrified to think that one of these lunatics might actually have a wish granted, whatever that may be. Could you imagine? We have no clue as to the extent of a 'wish', but would it be possible for someone to wish for world domination? Unfathomable power? The cessation of existence? No!”
His hands slammed upon the table. “We cannot allow this to happen. Director Wernicke was a shortsighted fool to enact this overgrown 'study', and we were fools for failing to see what it would unleash. We have to end this tournament. We have to destroy the machine.”
Silence filled the room, thicker than pea soup or peanut butter. It was only after fifteen full seconds that, from the back, Emilia piped up in a squeaky voice. “...H-how?”
Standing back up, Barnaby clasped his hands behind his back. “Excellent question, Em! The answer is here.” He turned to the screen, still showing the man known as Motley Crue. “His abilities were a mystery to us, made tougher to discern by their sheer quantity. In the end, we were able to deduce that many of his more natural feats can be attributes to his state of being. As best we can judge, the man is some sort of vampire with an exceptional degree of control over his body. That did not account, however, for his degradation abilities. You all saw how he's able to disintegrate the pirate's projectiles or constructions, and wither his body. This occurred separately from his body, but at a consistent range. Professor Fontain posited some sort of invisible barrier, and using a thermal scanner we turned up this.”
The screen progressed through a series of images, each showing an area of heightened temperature surrounding Motley in different ways. “Thanks to this, we have determined that he is assisted by some sort of entity with its own abilities...not unlike a certain pigeon that we discovered along with this arrow in this district's Art Gallery. To be sure, our conclusion involves some guesswork, but Oren tells me that he's put the nail in the coffin. Oren?”
Smiling the announcer spoke up. “Yeah, I used it to shank this crow I found. Blood everywhere, but the instant the arrow's gone, the wound closes. I let it go, and what does it do? First, when it flies past me, I get punched in the face by nothing. Then it flies right into a billboard screen. But uh, not smack-dab into the glass. Inside it. Like, it became pixels in the screen and disappeared behind a tree in the ad.”
Nobody knew what to think of the news, save Barnaby. “There you have it. The means, alongside what artifacts we have discreetly taken, to bring this calamity-in-the-making to a close.” He navigated around the table to the arrow, which he pulled free from the wood. In the bright daylight it shone as brilliant as a star. Its holder smiled as he turned to his left, then his right. “My friends, in every story, the heroes must accept their mantle in order to save the world. I ask you: are you ready for the power to do what's right?”
