Knight Sylvestre
Location: Oldtown
Few words were spoken as the three, battered and exhausted, filed through the bar & grill's door one by one. With nobody around to seat them, they piled whatever equipment they carried on the welcome desk before installing themselves at a fully-furnished table. Souta mentioned drinks, which Cyril approved of, but for now a few moments to just sit and give their aches some relief seemed good enough. He sat there for some time in silence, looking around the building while the others stewed over their inconceivable fight. This restaurant had all the personal touches he might expect from a city tavern back home, from knickknacks gathered far and wide to portraits of what he supposed were this world's famous people. The whole place featured a theme he didn't quite understand; all along the shelves were various balls and pieces of equipment that vaguely resembled weapons and armor, but did not at all seem suitable for warfare. Several of the strange, rectangular devices that resembled solid tapestries of glass and plastic littered the joint, newer and sleeker—looking than the one he found in the house last night. Cyril craned his neck a little too far to try to figure out what was scrawled in a loopy hand on one of the portraits, and the resulting pain made him grimace. He settled down to stay as still as possible, leaving him with either conversation or boredom as his only options.
Five minutes passed before Souta, the least injured of the trio, rose from the table. He said nothing, but the direction he took indicated that he'd be returning with something to eat or drink in a moment. As the smith went, Cyril wondered if he'd burden himself trying to get victuals for him and Juniper. Though the man might have just as well been family after the ordeal they went through together, his rather surly manner indicated that he might not. These thoughts slid into contemplation about Souta himself, then Juniper. Who were they really? How much of their depth did this tournament demand quashed, for the sake of its bloody competition? Cyril couldn't count himself as a gregarious man, but he wanted to get to know them better. It seemed the human thing to do, and as far as he could tell, everyone in this accursed place needed a reminder that they were human.
Although, if I remember correctly, there's a few nonhumans among the tournament roster. A wonder I haven't found any yet.He didn't realize that Souta had returned until a tray plopped down on the table. Taken by surprise but too rattled already to be startled, Cyril silently chided himself for his assumptions about Souta's character as he surveyed the tray's contents. Three bottles, undoubtedly full of alcohol, and three plates of simple, unprepared food lay before them. “Thank you,” the vanguard told Souta, his politeness a trained reflex. Juniper echoed the remark of gratitude, and after the smith sat down the three began to pick at their portions.
I should have expected that we would all be more civil than our battle manner would imply. He sampled the food, a cold, triangular length of hard bread topped with cheese and some sort of tomato sauce, but decided against eating. Instead, he took a swig of the beer before glancing at the others. Neither Juniper nor Souta displayed much interest in eating, either. “So...” he began in a low, serious tone, “Tournament's over, College is after us. We didn't have a choice, but now that we've killed one of 'em...” He let the statement hang in the air, its implication clear. Things would only get harder from here.
“Bet the Wishing Machine hasn't moved.”
Cyril stared at Juniper for a moment. He hadn't suspected that the urge to fight might remain in her heart. A pointed look entered his eyes...did she want him to continue? And if so, why? “...Maybe.”
For a moment, the martial artist didn't continue. It was Souta who filled the gap. “If you're thinking of fighting on, and trying to get your wish, there is something you should know. You're not the first tournament people I've met. Yesterday night, there was a creepy guy who approached me. Dressed all in black, with black hair. I sized him up best I could without getting nosy. He had fangs, and this weird spirit aura coming off him. He might be the guy you gotta fight next.”
Without much in the way of surprise, Cyril mulled over the information. He realized before long that the others were looking at him expectantly, which made him frown. Though neither had voiced a question, the choice had been laid out for him. He could back out of the tournament and survive, returning to his world via cooperation with the College, or he could press on and find out of the Wishing Machine really did exist. He ruminated about the possibility of College duplicity, but after a few second he closed his eyes and bowed his head.
What am I thinking? No matter the foe, his mission was most important. For even the possibility of ending all evil -all suffering- he should be unafraid to put his life on the line. That, said the stories, was what a knight should do. Cyril opened his eyes. “Yeah. Good to know. I'll keep an eye out as I look for my next opponent, though I don't know where I'll find him.” A strange question occurred to him, given the circumstances. In a way he'd been taking something for granted, but he needed to know for sure. Clasping his hands and putting his elbows on the table, he asked the others, “Either of you coming with me?”
Juniper's solemn face did not change, but the vanguard could see the spark of resolution in her eyes. “I will not forget what you did to me, Cyril. But...I am used to pain, and losing things. Today was the first time I got back something I lost, and I will not lose my chance to get my wish. I am also concerned about it falling into the wrong hands. The annoying man said we were both heroes, and that us fighting did not make sense. I will come with you.”
After he swallowed the bit of pizza he'd been chewing, Souta shook his head. “I'd like to help, but I serve...er, let's say a 'higher authority.' I'm looking for a way out of this mess, and it isn't my fight to begin with. You need anything made or mended, you come back to me, but I'm not gonna risk my neck.”
Cyril gave a nod. “So be it. I hate to put you to work, but my armor needs drastic repairs. Do you know how long it might take?”
“Even for a whiz like me, a couple hours. I saw the state it was in,” Souta shrugged.
A few more words were exchanged, and all was settled. It was at that time that a drone appeared, and Nero's announcement came to them. The next match would occur when one contestant's drone led the way to his or her opponent. Though somewhat alarming, the news assured Juniper and Cyril that they had some time to recover, and to prepare for the next battle.
Even with the reassurance of dandelion parachutes, the fall for Bonesword and his basil-isk was a long and frightening one. Down, down, down they plummeted, away from the colorful confines of the clowns' tent-shaped ship. Without much room to maneuver, they landed at a nonlethal speed on the flat, gray-black roof of an office building. Overhead the Big Top sailed blithely onward, unaware of its skeletal discharge. None of its occupants popped out of the gash Bonesword carved, indicating that they were unwilling to risk the fall themselves. Strange and mysterious as a UFO, the Big Top hovered away into the distance, its bearing north-by-northeast.
Around Bonesword stood a well-developed, clean, organized portion of city. Everything sported a certain air of grandeur and officialism, indicating that this bloc might be used for administrative purposes. Only one thing marred this impression: an appalling trail of destruction clear across a nearby business park, as though a fiery sphere had rolled across the ground, leaving a distinct trail of char, and punched clean through several cars and a few other objects. More remarkable than this, though, was the group of individuals situated in that spot.
There were two of them, whose unique bodies befouled initial inspection. One could be described as a forest sprite, though in truth, it looked more like an angel made of twisting wooden branches and roots. Instead of arms, it had wispy fans of twigs for wings, knotted together in a rough approximation of feathers. All across the wings, tender shoots hung down as strings to hold windchimes and the effigies of hanged men. Little greenish-yellow lights, diluted as they were by the daylight, danced within its split husk of a chest, and its head was a thick clump of roots radiating outward as a crown. Torn into the left side of the face was a single hole, and from within it radiated a soothing light dimmed by the sun's glare.
The other fit the succinct summation of a mummified cowboy. With a poncho, a wide-brimmed hat, bandage wrappings all across his body, and pieces of antiquated armor made to look like bones, he cut quite the figure. This rustic undead appeared to be squatting over a smear in the pavement, staring at it intently. “'Ey, Frolic. Ah think this is 'er. Resurrection, if ya don' mind. Ah reckon 'er sisters'll be glad t'see 'er agin.”
Perking up, the sprite drifted over, and knelt over the smear. From the cavities in its head and body a stream of gentle light poured as though from a fountain. It suffused the smear entirely, and when it faded a minute later, a puddle of a rosy pink substance lay where the smear had been. The gunslinger stood up, saying, “That'll do 'er. Just a li'l while 'til she's right as rain.”
Meanwhile, a drone zoomed in from the distance to stop beside Bonesword. Quiet enough so that those below didn't hear, it relayed the message to the skeleton that all contestants heard a short time ago, telling him that the drone would point in the direction of his next opponent.
Any self-satisfaction Aralynn might have been feeling when she thought of the plan to drop a tower on Motley evaporated when she watched him, bug-eyed, as a tiny beam blasted from the vampire's eye to slice the chunk of building in half with almost laughable precision. The pieces splashed into the water to Motley's left and his right, sending a spray of droplets into the air along with loose masonry, and from that haze of water and rubble a second beam burst forth. So surprised was the woman that the sight of the liquid laser forced her to instinctively flinch, throwing up her arms and turning her face away in a useless attempt to protect herself. In an instant the beam pierced her, traveling through skin, flesh, and inner organs and out the other side, directly into one of the figments of her brother's stand.
When the laser struck the Boys of Summer, it froze in time, as though paused. Without delay it began to turn gray, become more distorted in the manner of the image on a faulty TV set. In less than two seconds the beam faded into static alongside the wounds it made and the entity it struck, as though it had never existed.
Aralynn blinked, shocked that -from her perspective- nothing had happened. She hadn't long to be thankful, however, for there appeared to be a pirate plummeting straight toward her. From Runch's outstretched hands a torrent of flaming cereal rained down, threatening to blow them to smithereens. The twins, overwhelmed at the moment, scattered. Davian dashed backward, shouldering his way through the door he'd come through a short time before just too slow to avoid the first barrage of Hellberries, but to Runch's perspective the resulting blasts seemed to just flicker and disappear. The other twin, meanwhile, jumped off the side of the balcony down into the water; she did not think to stand there and rely on Boys of Summer to take the hit for her. Behind her, the remainder of the bombardment obliterated the balcony, and the remaining Boys of Summer in the area were nowhere to be found.
Davian's voice sounded out from inside the hotel. “Our 'invincible strategy' does not appear to be working out, dear sister!” he yelled. “Backup plan, now!” Hoping that his twin could hear him, he rushed through the room and toward the upstairs hallway, headed for the back of the building.
By that time, Aralynn had submerged herself, and a new idea occurred to her. Remaining underwater, she unleashed volley after volley of medium missiles to travel through the water like torpedoes, totally unhindered by water resistance. Unseen thanks to the murk but able to seek thanks to their size, they split into two groups to target both enemies, beneath whom they would burst up from the depths to explode from below.
Jin's disfigured opponent smirked. “Got stung, did you?” He taunted from his hiding spot, ignoring the assassin's ultimatum. “Don't worry, that stuff's not poison. Woulda thought you'd figure out what it did already, genius. If not, just wait. It'll take soon enough.” For a few seconds, the swirling clouds of leaves hung in the air, as though in anticipation.
The skin on Jin's arm began to change. It turned white and dead at an alarming rate, then started to flake off. In a matter of seconds the epidermis on his entire arm, right to the top of his bicep, fell away in a shower of grayish-white slivers. Instead of landing on the ground, the flakes gained lives of their own, dancing through the air to join Pieter's swarm. Exposed to the air, the dermis gave him a steady, burning pain.
Still behind cover, Pieter called out, “Feeling it now? Get used to it, dickweed! Weird Autumn's gonna take you apart, layer by layer!” Large portions of the leaf storm began to separate from the main reservoir, condensing into giant lances poised to thrust down at Jin any second.
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