Lugubrious

World of Light

The hero shtick is kind of the driving force behind the plot of the RP. I would be happier if nobody struck out on their own, since that would mean I don't have to write out another scenario just for him. He could go down the mountain and join the reserve at Tostarena Town no problem, but if he essentially quits the party things could get dicier.

World of Light

Tora, Poppi, and Big Band

Location: Sandswept Sky - Graveyard of the Peaks
Level 9 Tora (135/90) Level 9 Poppi (135/90) Level 5 Big Band (73/50)
Midna’s @DracoLunaris, Fox’s @Dawnrider, Sectonia’s @Archmage MC, Primrose and Therion’s @Yankee, Laharl’s @Dark Cloud, Raz’s @TruthHurts22, the Phantom Thieves, Braum, and the Scout
Word Count: 1847

As if the snowy slope dotted with weathered gravestones as far as the eye could see wasn’t bleak enough in and of itself, a certain someone -or perhaps more accurately, something- just had to drift into view. For the few among the gathered Seekers who shared the misfortune of meeting Master Hand prior, its appearance had been less a question of ‘if’ than ‘when’, but that hardly lessened the tension of this encounter. Even as the snow scraped their faces and the wind whipped at their hair, Tora and Poppi Alpha reacted instantaneously, readying their Drill Shield and spectral claymore for a brawl. As much as the Nopon would have liked to crack Master Hand’s knuckles with a Boom Biter, however, Tora did not open fire. He and his companion knew what the Phantom Thieves and the Scout with their firearms quickly found out; a bubble shield flared to life around the entity before them to protect it from incoming fire, and it showed no sign of damage. “Don’t waste ammunition!” the artificial blade warned them. As infuriating as it was, the heroes could do little but try to endure the battery of both otherworldly voice and buffeting snowstorm, dreading what Galeem’s servant had in store for them this time.

Master Hand’s brief speech managed to take Tora and Poppi by surprise as much as it did Big band. Not only did the entity offer them congratulations, but it even dropped a hint at what their teammates were up to all the way across the continent. A handful of faces flashed through Tora’s mind, most of them vivid as the moment when the two teams parted ways. It had been a minute since he thought about Sakura, Link, Geralt, the intrepid Hat Kid, or even Bowser and Blazermate, who’d been right there from the very beginning. He hadn’t been afraid for them, necessarily, but who wouldn’t worry about friends half a world away, who must surely be on a quest as dangerous as this? The knowledge that the others weren’t just okay, but actually at least half a day ahead of Yellow Team on their quest to eliminate the boss of the Deep Blue Seaside, fanned the sputtering flames in his heart.

Of course, the enemy that loomed before them seemed determined to extinguish any such hope. It proclaimed that this final stretch of the mountain would be the Seekers’ undoing, a statement that it made with such conviction that it saw fit to manifest no additional opponents to bar the way. Then, after urging the climbers to soldier on, it disappeared as unceremoniously as it came.

To say that a moment passed in silence would be inaccurate, given the howl of the wind across the peak and into the heroes’ ears, but a few seconds went by while those who stood before the gate took in what Master Hand told them. Midna averted her eyes from the path ahead, and in her search for alternatives discovered an edifice in the distance that looked promisingly like the abbey that poor Gemino in his arrow-studded husk of iron described. It took a few moments for Big Band to follow her gaze, and when he did spot the place she described, he shook his head in disbelief. “That’s a hell of a long way off!” he practically shouted, fighting to be heard over the ambient weather. The detective extended a pneumatic arm to point out a potential route with his finger. “‘Less you can fly straight there, we’d have to go up a ways, then backtrack farther down than we are now! If we turn up empty-handed, we’ll be even worse off for a longer climb than we already got” He wasn’t going to argue that a brute force solution seemed unlikely at best, but the whole team couldn’t possibly go that far out of their way and still hope to proceed, unless the place ‘where the frozen and the burning embrace in communion’ could offer them a king’s ransom of rest and warmth.

Optimistic even in the face of a brutal ordeal, Raz dispensed some ideas for how the struggle upwards might be made less severe. His suggestions, unfortunately, met with enthusiasm from neither Braum nor Mona. As much as the very big man appreciated the very small man’s willingness to help, he was forgetting a crucial factor. “I am sorry, little Raz, but I don’t think that would work!” he told the Psychonaut, kneeling behind his shield for protection from the wind. “The bigger the surface, the more the wind can push against it. That quickly becomes a problem even for one as mighty as me!”

Mona shook his giant head, his eyes sad. “Uh huh. I probably don’t even have the tire grip to push through the wind and snow uphill, let alone the horsepower.”

As for his other observation, Poppi couldn’t shell out much hope. “You may be on to something, but then again, it might just be here. Lots of stuff in World of Light not there for any good reason.” Having heard about if not experienced firsthand the random weekly generation of the Land of Adventure, ostensibly manmade structures and all, she could corroborate Primrose’s suspicions about things just being places.

“Fox!” Joker called all of a sudden. His masked friend turned to him quizzically, but for once the Phantom Thief wasn’t referring to him. Instead Joker was calling out toward the back of the pilot who even now drew farther and farther away from the group, proceeding alone and without a word up the slope. “Fox!” the teen called again, but there came no answer. “Ugh…” he groaned, releasing the hands cupped around his mouth to pull the parka from Deportes Bienes around his shoulders. “This is bad.”

Panther shivered despite her winter coat, its hood pulled so tight around her head that only her red mask could be seen. “W-what about our fire?” she asked. “Carmen and Lamia can keep us warm as-as-as long as we have the energy!”

“There ain’t anythin’ ‘round here we c-could light!” Big Band bemoaned. “And even if we did have torches or s-somethin’, they’d get blown out in an instant!”

As best he could, Skull put his thinking cap on. “Well, what about castin’ fire on each other? I know it ain’t a great idea, but it’s better than freezin’ to d-d-death…right!?”

At that, the Scout spoke up. “Whoa, bad idea, mate! That’s liable to c-cause thermal shock, if ya don’t burn our damn clothes off first, so unless agonizin’ death sounds like a jolly g-good time, I’d say think o’ somethin’ else!” Skull sagged down with a hang of his head, his curses lost to the wind.

In the midst of the team’s deliberation, Tora took his eyes off the radiant cleft in the mountain above to face and address his teammates. “F-f-friends! Why all doomy and gloomy, meh? Don’t you see? It not so far at all!” He pointed a wing finger up to where the radiance of Split Mountain’s summit shone through the snowstorm, a beacon of hope that not even this cruel blizzard could quench.

It definitely looked close–tantalizingly so. Yet Poppi’s optics told her otherwise. A combination of size, distance, weather, and wishful thinking conspired to warp perception, creating a mirage that only empirical hardware could pierce. As always Poppi’s first impulse was to correct her Masterpon, but as she looked out over the faces of the Seekers, she fell silent. Things were not looking good. Nobody wanted to trudge upward through this frozen hell. They didn’t think they could make it.

They needed a guiding light far closer than the mountain peak.

“Jerkypon hand taunt us saying we don’t have what it takes to be heroes,” her Masterpon was saying. “Tora say meh to that! It b-b-being here mean that we close to boss! If friends j-just huddle together and push onward, we can make it!”

A handful of wry laughs and groans steamed out with the team’s breath. For his part, Big Band looked incredulous. “Look kid, I like seein’ a hero beat impossible odds all the time. See it every Saturday on Peacock’s cartoons. But this is life or death, we’ve gotta be realistic!”

Tora gave a solemn nod. “Yes. That why if things go wrong, we can slide down with wind at back and glide all way to T-t-toasty Town. But we cannot turn tail just yet because this look tough, meh! I-I-It job of heroes to try very, very best! And just as Primrose friend say and Fox-Fox show us, there no time to lose, meh-meh!” He looked to his companion for support. “R-right, Poppi!?”

After a brief moment, Poppi nodded her head. “That what Poppi believe.”

Braum gave a booming laugh. “Ahaha, well spoken! I could not have said it better myself!” He stood to his full height and regaled everyone with a heartwarming smile. “I believe it too. I believe we can all make it! And if you should fall…” the Freljordan flexed his muscles. “I will carry you!”

“Ugh. Too much TV is bad for ya,” Band groaned, rolling his eyes before he gave a windy sigh of resignation. “But if you’re doin’ this, I sure ain’t gonna let ya do it alone. H-here, we’ll go with your idea,” he told Therion. “And I got an idea who oughta be pole p-position.”

So saying, Band turned to face the wind. He breathed deep of the frigid air and began to play. A simple but strident tune blazed forth, loud enough to be heard over the wind for a decent distance. He pushed forward into the snow, propelled by sonic energy that trailed behind him in bands like sheet music. The detective made for the memorial obelisks, and after reaching them deployed both giant mechanical arms to wrench two free from the snow-covered earth to use like skis. “Sorry to disturb your rest, but we’ll be carryin’ your memory with us,” he told the frozen ashes before raising his voice for the others. “F-form up on either side of me! Half on one side, half on the other. I’ll be your anchor and your center, so if s-somethin’ goes wrong, make sure you f-follow the sound o’ my sweet, sweet jazz.”

Tora jumped to it, although Poppi beat him there. The artificial blade positioned herself on Big Band’s left, a hand affixed to one of the caps on his coat, and Tora took hold of her shoulder on her left. Braum took the lead on the detective’s right to start the other branch of Therion’s proposed v-formation. Wherever the Phantom Thieves ended up all four of the teens would invariably be in sequence, while Mona rode on Braum’s shoulder. Though the storm had already laid waste to Fox’s footprints, everyone kept an eye out as best they could as they set off, hoping to induct the pilot into their ranks. Heart in heart and hand in hand, the Seekers with the will to push forward began the final climb.

World of Light

Hopefully my incoming Yellow Team update will help the block pass.

Infactorium: A New 4Xpansion (Overlord RP) [DISCONTINUED]

As the subject of Anzelgard's fate continued to spark deliberation among her leader-turned-compatriot and her Overseer compatriots, the fact that Canology Mae of the Gorging Trough had been elevated to a lofty position among them still didn't get any easier to believe. Like the diver who ascended from the watery deep too quickly, Mae felt like she had decompression sickness. The whole thing happened so fast, fast enough to leave her way in over her head--metaphorically, of course. What could a humble chef, ignorant of the world beyond the walls of her oft-forgotten and only situationally useful corner of the guild, possibly offer a council of war whose arbitration could define centuries of history to come? How could such a grotesque, low-down creature possibly fill the seat of her lord Sugi the Hammer, at least in a metaphoric sense, when all she really knew of her creator was what he liked best to eat?

Yet to fall prey to such thinking was self-indulgent, and Mae indulged herself enough in the Gorging Trough. Had she not just accepted the responsibility of playing a greater role in Infactorium? That she was here meant that Lady Faetalis of the Supreme Beings trusted in her faculties and judgment, even if Mae herself doubted her own qualifications. That meant that the headless horror shouldn't put herself through the wringer with all sorts of sophistry and logic, trying to find and then justify the right answer; she'd been inducted into this illustrious Raid Council to offer her answer, whatever that might be. She needed only the courage to give it.

That was, naturally, easier said than done. To someone without the benefit of particular experience or perspective, Gammaton and Levia's answers both seemed totally and completely sound. Mae could find no fault in them, try as she might. And yet she did try, for while they made sense, their proposed plan of action left a bad taste in Mae's mouth. As the Queen of Breakage wound down, the headless chef realized that must mean her own opinion ran contrary. That was kind of intimidating in and of itself, since while Mae didn't think for one second that disagreement would result in punishment, she didn't want to kick off her fellowship with her amazing compatriots by being stupid. Still, if she was going to say anything, it would have to be now. If one or more of those yet to speak chimed in supporting the consensus so far, it would only get harder to go against the flow. Canology Mae cleared her throat.

"Well," she began, rocking her immense weight back and forth on her heels ever so slightly. "I ain't one much for economics, or politics, or populations, or anythin' of the sort, really. All I can really say is what does and doesn't sit right with me. And maybe I'm just a big softie 'cause I've never gone out from the home front, but..." Mae rallied all the determination she could muster, and since a resolute crossing her arms was a physical impossibility, she put her hands on her doughy hips. "I reckon that goin' all scorched-earth with Anzelgard right from the get-go would end up bein' a waste. I mean, we could always fall back to it if other plans don't shake out, but there's gotta be more we can make of 'em alive than dead. If Cormac's been yuckin' it up among 'em, maybe we could take it a li’l further. If we somehow got Anzelgard to do our interactin' for us, we could stay hidden ‘til the time’s right." Mae shrugged. "I dunno. Not knowin' in general's kinda the problem. Even after grillin' Riny and that other poor sucker, we got next to nothin' on this world, really. Anythin' could be out there, maybe even other Supreme Bein's, so if we commit to puttin' all our cards on the table right now and tell everyone ‘hey, we’re here an’ we’re a threat!’ we might end up in some real hot water.”

She fell silent then, hoping that she hadn’t just spouted off a bunch of unsubstantiated nonsense, and that what her heart told her was what Faetalis wanted to hear. All she knew was that when she wanted to make a dish, she couldn’t make do with unknowns. She needed to know which ingredients to use and how much to add. No matter how skilled the chef or how quality the ingredients, one couldn’t just wing it and expect to brute force a success. Perhaps the bigger picture worked the same way.

Infactorium: A New 4Xpansion (Overlord RP) [DISCONTINUED]

Yep, I'll do that within an hour or two.

World of Light

@Lugubrious So one time use correct? (I wonder if Laharl's skin would have become crystalline if he'd taken it's strength?)

@Dark Cloud

Correct.

World of Light

@Lugubrious So I'll crush Kelvin's spirit instead.

@Dark Cloud

I realized that's what you wanted from your first post, I just didn't happen to do it in that one hour. Here:

You have acquired:
Whispering Ice
A grenade that lays down several mines which burst into large icicles when an enemy comes close, or after a set amount of time.

World of Light

I don't think anyone else has claimed him, and since you wrote your previous action mistakenly, it can be edited to claim Kelvin's if you like.

World of Light

@Lugubrious Laharl also went to smash a Wendigo spirit fyi.

@Dark Cloud

They didn't drop spirits. Killing a Wendigo's body just frees the ghost to lurk around the mountain, waiting to possess and mutate a human who consumes another's flesh. So, the only actionable spirit gained from that fight is Kelvin's. In order to truly destroy a Wendigo and get its spirit you'd need something that can destroy ghosts.

World of Light

Tora, Poppi, and Big Band

Location: Sandswept Sky - Inner-Mountain
Level 9 Tora (132/90) Level 9 Poppi (132/90) Level 5 Big Band (70/50)
Midna’s @DracoLunaris, Fox’s @Dawnrider, Sectonia’s @Archmage MC, Primrose and Therion’s @Yankee, Yoshitsune and Sora’s @Rockin Strings, Laharl’s @Dark Cloud, Raz’s @TruthHurts22
Word Count: 1984

While Tora stumbled for a moment over Midna’s word choice, not knowing what she referred to as ‘bat-things’ and wondering if she ran into her own monster problem up on the frozen ship, he spared no effort in his complaints about the Wendigo. “Meh, meh, meh! That freakypon was absolute menace!” he confirmed. “Ridiculous speed, claws sharp enough to slice ether-alloy like butter, and even though it butt naked, it stupid hard to damage!”

“It very lucky we discover fire weakness so fast,” Poppi murmured, her tone suggesting that she’d given thorough consideration to what might have happened had they not made such an expedient breakthrough.

Primrose brought up the creatures’ abnormal deaths as well, which out of everything probably sat with Tora the worst. Since coming to the World of Light, the longest-serving team members had grown accustomed to its laws, relying on little they knew to make sense of everything else. Like the spirits that still puzzled Therion, for instance. The fact that some enemies disobeyed those laws was a profoundly worrisome one, and if Sectonia’s theory held water, it would take a lot more work to put the Wendigo down for good.

“Man,” Mona groaned. “It just had to happen right when half of us split off, too. Either we’ve got majorly bad luck, or this world is actually conspiring against us.” Poppi couldn’t help but agree; out of everyone who got hurt, Therion wasn’t among them, so the team couldn’t even free his gleaming heart.

“Damn flares,” the Scout cursed, eager to deflect any blame that might be headed his way. “Deep Rock seriously needs to invest in some better equipment.”

The thought of his allies getting assassinated while he’d been powerless to help shook even the typically stolid Fox. “We must be more careful about when we split up.”

“For real…”

Other than that brief spark of conversation, the ascent was a muted one, as if the weight of the mountain and settled upon them and brokered a solemn silence. The lift raised the band of heroes to dizzying heights, albeit slowly, and while the team’s gliders meant that a fall wouldn’t be fatal, nobody wanted this ordeal to last a second longer than it had to. While Sectonia’s aura continued to balm their wounds, it was hard for anyone to feel good about the skirmish in the dark, even the chipper and optimistic ones. At the very least they could appreciate the total lack of allied casualties, since the more experienced and jaded among their number knew just how quickly death could take the unprepared, and even the likes of Tora had known the loss of a companion. Even without permanent losses, however, the encounter left its mark, and not just in the blood of comrades forced to retreat.

For the greatest foe that stood between the Seekers and their objective was no frosty giant or slavering ghoul; it was the mountain itself. Every minute that passed, the cold burrowed a little deeper into their bodies. It crept a little closer to their cores, the mountain’s icy grip tightening its grip, little by little. The heroes shivered as the elevator brought them onward and upward, really feeling the cavern’s terrible chill now that the blood-pumping action was over. If it hadn’t been obvious before, it was dawning on them now: this trek had become a battle of attrition, against a foe they could not fight.

Tora’s teeth chattered as he tried to snuggle closer to his companion for warmth, but the roasty-toastiness he sought was not forthcoming. “Poppi, what gives? Why turn down heat, meh?”

It was a moment before the artificial blade replied, her expression serious. “At previous heat level, energy usage outpace ether intake by unsustainable margin,” she murmured. “Ether furnace not operating at full capacity in such extreme conditions. Unless lift drop us off right in front of boss, it only get worse, too. Poppi need conserve ether.”

“O-oh,” Tora fretted. “W-well, we at least in holding pattern, yes?”

Rather than look at him, Poppi stared upward. She watched Big Band’s rocket peter out as he came to a stop over a stone ledge high above, which he proceeded to land on safely. Then, in a low voice, she said, “Unfortunately, Poppi still currently operating at loss.”

A few minutes later, the lift came to a stop at the top of the immense cavern. It came to a rest in the middle of a web of wooden platforms and scaffolding, which also housed the suitably gigantic pulley mechanism for the lift, but the main point of interest was the way out. Two very heavy wooden doors sat at the end of a carved stone passage, the way dark thanks to lightless braziers but otherwise featureless.

Big Band did not look happy. As the brass behemoth shivered, his components let out a subdued symphony of clicks, creaks, and honks. “My regulators ain’t built for this crap,” he informed the others. “An’ the part of me that’s still human’s fixin’ to freeze solid. ‘Course, I don’t suppose any a you bunch are doin’ any better.” When he respired, his instruments gave voice to his uneven gasps, letting off puffs of steamy breath.

“Oxygen’s definitely thinner up here,” Necronomicon warned, before making a quick pivot into a positive spin on the situation. “On the plus side, that means we made a lot of progress.”

Standing near Poppi for whatever heat he could glean, the Scout grumbled, “I’d ‘ope so. We were roidin’ that thing for a bloody long time.”

“Then our mission is nearly complete!” Braum laughed, though even the impressively cold-resistant Freljordan had begun to shiver. He stepped forward to clap a hand on Band’s shoulder. “Come, friend, let us get this door open for everyone!” The detective joined him, and the two put their strength to the task.

It proved to be no easy feat however, as a pressure on the other side of the doors demanded more than a little strength. The reason why became clear as soon as Braum and Band succeeded, for as they finally threw open the doors a mass of bitterly cold wind struck the heroes like a giant, invisible bludgeon. They stepped out into the elements to find themselves near the top of a lesser peak, joined to the main mountain it grew from like a tumor by a snow-covered stone bridge that led between high walls.

Try as he might to get a good view from the bridge, and find encouragement in seeing just how far he’d come, Tora could see nothing through the wintry haze that enveloped the mountain. Only dark stone and white powder awaited him no matter where he looked, although some of the outcrops looked very much like giant faces or even full figures, and way off to one side, across a vast span of emptiness, he thought he saw the outline of a distant structure a bit lower down. Unwilling to give up any progress for the sake of curiosity-driven exploration, Tora hopped down from Poppi’s arms to help lead the team on the path laid out before them, across the bridge and toward the opening between the walls Theoretically the existence of man-made structures offered some comfort, a hint of control amidst the chaos, but practically it was just more frozen rock. They could only hope to find shelter in whatever structure lay beyond them. At least nobody had to worry about the possibility of the wind blowing them off the bridge, since it came at a fortuitous angle. In a silent, focused procession, like pilgrims bound for sanctuary the Seekers marched up the stairs. In like manner they passed through the grand gateway, to where the last leg of their journey began.

Stage Four - Graveyard of the Peaks

Tora blinked, stupefied. No haven or structure of any kind stood before him. Only snow. A breathtaking field of snow at a very appreciable incline, unbroken except for an untold number of small stone rods, chewed up by the biting wind. The horrible thought struck him that those meager stakes, devoid of inscription or ornamentation, must be tombstones–all that remained to mark the final resting places of climbers that came before. He couldn’t tell how many were scattered about, for they extended as far as his vision did into the snowstorm that blanketed the mountainside, obscuring all but the radiance that shone through the split peak, still so heart-rendingly far away. And though no buildings stood beyond these walls, they served the purpose of protection nonetheless–protecting the Seekers from the true force of the mountain’s headwind, until right now. It rolled down across the field and into the heroes with staggering force, enough to send anyone who didn’t hunker down in the snow right back through the gateway.

Appalled, Poppi strained her optics for any sign of shelter that could shield her friends from this cruel wind. Instead, she discovered certain woeful shapes beside a few of the stone memorials, frosted over and still as statues. She spotted a naked man in a black iron pot, a sledgehammer clutched tight against his chest, and she saw a little girl curled up behind a drift of snow, where the wind wasn’t quite so punishing. Then Poppi stopped searching.

It would take anyone a few moments to come to grips with such a sight, but the Seekers failed to receive even that. As they took in the Graveyard of the Peaks before them, squinting against the wind and the flurries of snow driven before it, one patch of shadowy whiteness separated itself from the rest. It grew closer and more distinct, until its recognition could fill a number of the onlookers with anger or dread. Tora bristled with anger at the sight of the floating nemesis that appeared before him twice before, the first to set Poppi against him as an enemy and the second to instigate the binary sniper duel that threatened his mission quite unlike any challenge before or sense. It was, without ceremony, Master Hand.

Its voice, a toneless distortion, thrummed through the air. Its every word sent vibrations through the heroes’ bodies, producing the sound that a grimacing Big Band quickly came to loathe as much as Tora and Poppi.

“Seekers of restoration, bravers of extremity. You have traveled far, and but few steps remain. While last night your compatriots trawled the depths of the sea, you now gaze upon the apex of the world, where the end of the land marks the origin of the sky. And though you have done well to come so far, the prize you seek lies beyond your grasp. For the summit stands above all things. By no power of yours will you attain it.”

Master Hand held itself out, palm upward, as if sharing something of vital import. “At this hour, I bring you neither misfortune nor hardship. No enemies to block your path. For none are needed. The cold, the wind, and the mountain are all that you require. Turn back, lest your last breath be drawn among these countless monuments, raising the peak yet higher with your ashen corpse preserved in ice, as with so many before you. And yet, I know you will not. For is it not the mark of a hero to never surrender, but push forever onward, even unto the end?”

The entity snapped, then turned upward, its fingers closing, and without another word disappeared into the storm, leaving the heroes with its ultimatum, the cold, the wind, and the mountain.

Ms Fortune

Location: Carcass Isle - Where All Things Must Come
Level 7 Nadia (61/70)
Koopa Troop’s @DracoLunaris, Blazermate’s @Archmage MC, Hat Kid’s @Dawnrider, Geralt’s @MULTI_MEDIA_MAN, Ace Cadet’s @Yankee, Sakura's @Zoey Boey, Link’s @Gentlemanvaultboy
Word Count: 1904

Stunlocked and muscle-impaired by the lightning that coursed through her vital fluid to the point of steam rising from her electro-charged body, Nadia was in no position to see the fate that befell an overconfident Delsin. Shocked mentally as much as physically by the elemental reaction, in fact, she could barely even hear it, but every one of the feral’s comrades still on his or her feet received the full brunt of the horror. The screams of man and monster alike resounded across the beach, their cries intermingled for a brief but awful instant before Delsin fell silent, and only the stomach-churning sound of the Orphan turning its victim to mulch remained.

Rendered vulnerable by his heart-rending stint aboard the Maw, Link could not take it. An immensity of guilt and anguish fell upon him, and beneath its weight the hero crumbled, stricken by the cries that resounded in his mind. He sagged like a deflated balloon until the Orphan’s tide of lightning crashed into him on the rebound a second later, and though without enough Hydro on (or within) his being to share Nadia’s paralysis, he was brought to his knees by its electrifying power.

Given Link’s legendary reputation, it came as a miracle that the youngest and most inexperienced members of the team fared better. While Kamek flew to safety, weaving between the bolts that fell from heaven to strike the wave below at regular intervals, Junior and Rika risked their necks to save Peach’s, and together the three found refuge upon the rocks. The princess came to with fortuitous speed thanks to the white mages’ treatment, downed rather than knocked out by the Orphan’s brutal backhand, and Blazermate’s sudden arrival sped up her recovery even further. From their vantage point the cluster of survivors could watch Hatty dodge through the thunderstorm with expert precision, so much so that the agile child could even summon her Black Mage between storm fronts to plaster the Orphan with some Lighting of his own. Though the spell contributed but little to the nightmare’s demise, its damage continued to stack over time, while Hatty herself could stay on the move.

At the same time, the loss of both Delsin and Bowser spurred the others forward. Brushing off the jolt that gave him pause Geralt flowed across the black sand like a raging river, his fury tempered into wicked strength. The Orphan of Kos met him with a double-handed diagonal cleave, but the Witcher dodged to the right side, and a burst of flame seared the abomination’s stretched-thin flesh. Beside him Sakura’s flying kick struck home, but it would take more than that to overcome the Orphan’s posture. Burned but not broken, it took a follow-up swing and carried on with a second blow from the other side, a blow that demanded the sacrifice of Geralt’s shield. The meaty guillotine rose skyward for the third hit of the sequence, but its would-be victim wisely disengaged. His choice of caution over capitalization spared him a hit from behind from the resurgent wave of lightning, and enough hitstun to guarantee his enemy’s killer finale. Rather than blood, the fall of the Orphan’s blade exhumed a splash of muck from the briny beach.

When Geralt stepped back to bring out the Judicator, Sakura picked up where he left off. Her enemy wheeled around in a terrifyingly huge three-sixty slash, both strong and high enough to decapitate an entire crowd of civilians, but the Orphan’s height allowed the Street Fighter to roll beneath its outrageous swing. Empowered by Sakura Shenpu, she struck back with a brilliant twirling gale kick, then moved again to make sure her next attack didn’t come at a terrible cost. Fighting with a true hero’s courage and determination at a blistering pace, she danced around the Orphan as it launched into a series of wild side-to-side sweeps, able to land only one strike at a time as she struggled to stay one step ahead of the thing. When her number came up, Geralt was there to lend a hand, using his excellent range to thrust and slice at the horror’s winged back while the lash of the Judicator’s thurible provided emergency restoration.

Those who fought the Orphan in the ensuing moments quickly found it to be an entirely different beast. Whereas it fought like a madman before, it now no longer fought like a man at all, instead throwing itself around in immense lunges, pounds, and sweeps that brought it in and out of range. It made for a highly mobile -not to mention stressful- fight, and that posed a problem for Kamek’s mission to revive Delsin. The abomination just wouldn’t stay put, either in the fiery slime the Koopa Prince laid down or when fighting any particular opponent, no matter how much Junior or Rika shot it. Not, at least, until Ace’s arrow zipped down and lodged between its ribs. The Orphan paused a moment to stare at the projectile as its internal pressure forced it out, and when Ace’s shout reached it from the rocky cliffside he’d been climbing, the nightmare leered his way. As the Seekers surrounded it, the nightmare leaped into action.

With a scream it leaped into the air, soaring even higher and faster than it did to swat Junior from the sky before. As it neared the top of its arc, it wrenched a handful of flesh from its placenta and hurled it down at the beach below in a visceral bombing run. Nadia, only just now recovering from her untimely electrocution, stared upward in dismay. “Meatier shower!” she yowled, scrabbling uselessly at the sand with numb limbs in a vain attempt to get out of the way. In accordance with Ace’s shout, however, a familiar blacksteel tail wound around Nadia’s midsection and scooped her out of harm’s way. With the feral on her leviathan’s grasp Bella got clear of the bloody explosion, though the shockwave still knocked both on their rears.

Heart racing from exhilaration and electrical stimulation alike, Nadia spent the first few seconds of her new lease on life panting. “Whoo…whoo…thanks a million, Bell.”

“Je t’en prie.” The Abyssal pushed herself back to her feet with her tail and extended her hand to help Nadia up, noting that the catgirl’s flowy hair was standing on end. “Are you alright?”

“Guess so, but man that lightning hertz.” Nadia pulled off a Nyawn to kickstart her regeneration, then cleared her head -as well as the leftover static- with a hearty shake. When she stood and opened her eyes she saw the full extent of the Orphan’s devastation. While Blazermate’s shield protected both herself and Peach, the bombardment had scattered both her allies and Delsin’s ashes across the black sand, turning Kamek’s already-difficult endeavor into a near impossibility, and now the freak was headed for Ace, all on its lonesome. “Dammit!” she hissed, and without a second’s delay she launched herself across the sand on all fours, running toward the monster hunter as the Orphan hurtled his way.

With that hideous face coming fast the string of his greatbow pulled taut to the max, Ace had one chance to make it count, and he bet the farm on it. His Power shot blazed forth, ripping through the air and into the gristle of the onrushing monstrosity. Unable to pierce through, it conferred its full force into the Orphan’s upper body, enough to throw off its flight pattern. With a wail the thing fell short, slamming into the rocks below. Even that stopped it for only a second, however, and though projectiles rained down upon it from the Koopa Troop, Sakura, and a recovered Peach from her vantage point not so far away, the creature began to climb. Not even a withering railgun shot from Bella managed to knock it down. Its unsettlingly rapid ascent forced Ace to scramble for his life, and though he evaded each blow the margin for error grew slimmer by the second. After the monster paused to hurl another handful of fleshbursters down at the beach, it took to the sky once more to dive down upon Ace from above. Yet even when backed into a corner, the monster hunter managed to escape with a little help, and when the Orphan’s guillotine fell upon salt-weathered stone it split a deep fissure into the cliffside.

It was then, as it stood over the crevice, that something seemed to occur to the Orphan of Kos. Even from her position at the foot of the cliffside where she’d been charging up water purr-essure for a superjump, Nadia could almost see the gears in its head turning. As she rocketed up into the air she watched the monster gouge a huge chunk of meat from its placental blade, but rather than lob it at the Seekers, it plunged the throbbing mass into the stone. “No freaking way,” she whispered, but sure enough, her worst fears came true.

The craggy cliffside exploded in a massive blast of bloodstained stone. Huge boulders flew in every direction, and along with them flew Nadia, Blazermate, Peach, and every other hero in the area, although none quite so high as Ace. It was luck of the draw that none happened to hit Nadia, but watching one breeze right by her made her realize something strange. Both the Seekers and the debris sailed through the air slower than it seemed like they should, and they didn’t fall nearly as fast. For a moment the flying cat burglar thought it was just adrenaline warping her perception, but as the seconds ticked by she became less sure. It was almost as if gravity itself had been turned down a notch or two. Why? Hell if she knew, but considering the impossible location of this beach, anything might as well go. Whatever the cause, she could see both the Orphan drifting down toward the beach through the chaos, and her allies tumbling through the air, and the sight sparked another crazy idea.

“Someone keep it busy!” she called. Airdashing toward one of the flying boulders, Nadia split off a copycat before she kicked off downward, headed toward the earth. At the same time Peach directed her fall toward the Orphan, during which she fired her scatterboom again and again as to scorch the earth where her enemy stood, halting her momentum each time she did. Thanks to that special trick, she managed to evade its retaliatory cleave, although it would take more than one hero’s efforts to keep the monster from wandering off.

Up above, Ace’s flight came to a stop in the arms of Nadia’s watery copycat. “A purr-fect plaything!” she laughed as she grabbed him out of the air and threw him down toward the earth. There, he found the real Nadia Fortune along with another one of her mimics, a net of sturdy muscle fibers pulled between them. It broke his fall, then stretched to its limit beneath the weight of the monster hunter plus all his equipment. Ace got a split second to see Nadia to his left, a kooky grin on her face. “Go get ‘em, tiger!” she decreed, just before her elastic sinews snapped back. Both Ms Fortunes yanked on the net with all they had, ejecting Ace in a high-speed arc toward the beleaguered Orphan of Kos.