Raineh Daze

Final Fantasy: Lightseekers

Miina Malina

Miina's preparations for entry were fairly straightforward, so far as these things went: put just enough effort into dying her hair (and tail) that they were no longer a vivid red, change out of her nice clothes again… and more or less just go in through the normal entrances. Isolde had no information about her background and, once split up from the group, Miina was just one more tribal girl headed to Brightlam for some reason or another.

… she even gave a mostly true reason! There was way better drink available here than out home.

Once inside, the first port of call was to find enough funding for the rest of her mission. In that regard, Brightlam wasn't amazingly different from Costa del Sol… all you had to do was keep an eye out for someone looking well enough off and not incredibly attentive. After that… Miina had a sharp knife and near-invisibility, plus plenty of manual dexterity; it wasn't too hard to be a cutpurse with an advantage like that.

Drinking money Mission funding acquired, that meant it was time for the fun part: finding off-duty guards and seeing if she could ferret out information. Normally, she would be looking for where someone wasn't to know where it was safe to break in, but hey, it worked just as well if you did it the other way round, right? Not that she was sure why she seemed to have such luck with getting them to big themselves up and let information slip; even with practice at this Miina couldn't ever sound confident… but that worked in her favour? She didn't understand guards.

Well, she understood that a lot of the more manly ones liked it when a girl was happy to drink and pay for drinks. Shame for them that Miina could just surreptitiously cure most of her own inebriation. And if, if someone kept pushing… ah, Mr. Guard must've overdone his own drinking, he just fell asleep. That was a shame, wasn't it?

Of course, anything too close to the cathedral itself would be… too pricey, too nice, but this was where the practice really came in. It couldn't be too seedy, after all, but it still needed to be out of the way enough that nobody would rope a poor, unfortunate off-duty guard into doing their job once they were free. And if Miina got to enjoy herself sampling along the way, what was the harm in that? It was just building cover or… something like that.

Lack of professionalism or not, Miina's approach to information gathering was still enough to find out some basic things. Knowing when the changing of the guard was? Helpful for slipping in. The information that each of the Grovemasters had their own personal guards? Well, not the sort of tidbit that would usually interest her, but it might be useful here…

A notable clump coming in not at the aforementioned changing, glad to be off and grumbling? Ah, why don't they come join the friends she was already making, get it off their shoulders? She could even afford to get them drinks, after all… really, she could! Hey, just because she was an uncivilised wildcat didn't mean she couldn't make money here in the city, she had talents…

And what an interesting find it was! Alambert had let his guards go early? That was awful! The Grovemasters were so strong, but they weren't invincible… were they at least getting paid the same? Yes, doing something like that sounded terrible… oh, Miina would go get them another round to make up for it, don't you worry.

So their boss was moving about on his own at night? Ah, that was a scary thought, she wouldn't want to do that… she could understand that there were some things that an important public figure might want to do without an entire entourage watching, unless that made it more interesting, but surely that didn't need him to be the one go—

Oh, she had the wrong idea? Sorry, sorry, her mind was in the gutter… so he wasn't meeting someone? Were they really sure it wasn't a potential lover? Well, no, but why would he go off to the north like that, etc…

The annoying part was having to make small talk about other things rather than bouncing straight away, but at least she got another drink out of it, and… well, maybe slipping away wasn't the easiest thing, but if Miina had one talent, it was extricating herself from situations. And someone that drunk probably wouldn't think too much of not remembering doing anything interesting before falling asleep…

She even had some of her drinks money left, this was great. Everyone liked a present, right? So, there was a bottle to share, and… another one for the road.

So, Alambert was creeping out to meet someone at the north? Time to join them. Somewhat stealthily… just enough to get close. It would be hard to actually talk if the Grovemaster ran away before she got there…

Final Fantasy: Lightseekers

Miina Malina

"C-C-Couldn't we… um…" Miina trailed off, looking sheepishly away. She was going to propose just… getting Isolde out of the way for a little bit, even if Esben was staunchly against killing her, but really, how would they go about doing that? Now that she thought about it, that would only make the negotiating position worse than just disappearing her… "O-Oh, w-won't she run off if C-Cid's location is revealed…?"

Rather than using the priest as a bargaining chip, couldn't they just use him as bait? If they got the unreasonable one out of the way, they could persuade the other two, and then avoid dealing with Isolde until it was okay to get back at her in future!

…

Ah, she should have eaten her stew slower, it would've let her keep busy and just stay out of the conversation. Or would they just have started later…?

The Elder Scrolls IV: Cyrodiil

"You have a talent," Lanessa muses, "Not only a willingness to risk yourself for fortune, but to do it for the sake of others. Most in your situation would be entirely focused on the money."

Throughout the course of the afternoon, you follow the Red Ring Road steadily westwards, finally coming to a halt near what seems an unremarkable pile of white, cut stone jutting from the foliage, the same as many others you've passed today. "We should stop here for tonight. The old core of Sercen lies just off the road, and so long as we don't go too deep, it's easy shelter."

After a moment's hesitation, the elf seems to read something in your expression, "Once, there were many Ayleid cities and settlements around Cyrodiil, particularly the Nibenay. Common knowledge, no? Some have been built over, some have been buried entirely, but some… the largest and most famous are still naught but ruins, but if you see this stone…"

Lanessa taps the tilting stone for emphasis, "You can be sure that you're within what were once settlement boundaries. We've been seeing this so often today because Sercen was once one of the great towns that ringed Lake Rumare. It has a particularly… dark history, and its destruction was subsequently thorough. Yet, some of its ancient halls have survived, and can provide succour to a weary traveller."

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Knight RP

Tyaethe

"It's going to be too easy if you don't remember your opponent," the vampire snarled, cheery demeanour dropping as Rozenalt turned his attention to the aerial interruption. Idiots, idiots, idiots. She had an idea what she was getting into by getting the Bloody Lord focused on her! She could handle it! She wanted to handle it!

And, more importantly, she needed him to stay obsessively focused on the annoying girl taunting him. The last thing Tyaethe needed was Rozenalt taking time to gather his thoughts and have some idea of what she was planning. Or for him to stop hurting her. There was already plenty of blood shed, but… not enough.

But she could still take advantage of this lapse of concentration and force him back to her. Rozenalt was overwhelmingly powerful and skilled to boot, but he wasn't 'focus all his attention on attacking a third party and defend from her unrelenting assault' strong. He'd avoided being bogged down in fighting any two of them in the past, after all, relying on the rest of the Midnight Hunt and the shifting battlefield to keep them from pinning him down.

And now it was evidenced in the sloppiness of his defence, the lack of pushback. Wasting magic on going for her allies? He thought she was arrogant? Focus on what was in front of you!

So what if his armour was unnaturally thickened, a product of black magic and fey enchantment both? It couldn't, wouldn't be as hard as Volkstraad's scales. If she could cut into those, then this might as well not be there. Not if she threw everything into it.

Even so, even distracted, Rozenalt was too guarded to cut through. But the line tracing its way down across his torso was unmistakeable.

If he didn't focus back on Tyaethe, she would be getting through.

Another Life in a Fantasy World (Invite Only)

Abe Hikari

Hikari elected to do the cutting – it was, after all, quite exciting to see what the inside looked like after spending so much time on the prepwork! Nicolas's serving idea grated at… something within her, it might be easier for them, but it felt like an abdication of duty. Like she should do more for the serving process then just slicing and carefully portioning the centrepiece.

Maybe it was those same instincts that had her hold back from taking anything herself until everyone was happily tucking in.

Hmm, these new skills had quite an annoying attitude accompanying them, didn't they?

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Knight RP

Tyaethe Radistirin

"Ahahah, but don't you know how this story goes, Rozenalt?" Tyaethe kept attacking even as the first blows got through, scratches torn open into unsightly gashes – only for shadow to flow out after the blood, replacing it with smooth skin like nothing had ever happened. "You always lose. It doesn't matter who tells it or who your enemy is, how it goes down. All anyone really needs to know about you is that the hero triumphs. What does it matter if you got some fairy backup? So did we."

When they got here.

Despite the thorns, Tyaethe initially kept swinging, but – well, even leading with one arm and sacrificing even more control to swing the sword with only her left hand, it wasn't like she was in a position to stop Rozenalt from backing off behind his screen of thorns, leaving her with one shredded arm and blood everywhere. Ah, she really would have to push this until it came to that, then? He wasn't going to just stay in melee until she finally got a blow in.

That was a pity, but the vampire had always known that would be the case.

"Oh, speaking of when I win… can I have your blood?" She lifted her still-bleeding arm, giving it a lick. Ah, almost tasteless, it was a shame. She could hear Rozenalt's. Hear it too clearly… what was he like, under that armour? Was he really playing vampire? Oh, how she wanted to find out. Would it be as vile as he was, or would the magic and fae influence elevate it into something else? Bitter foods could still be savoured. "I promised Reon I wouldn't take it, even from monsters, but you won't be needing it after, will you?"

Rushing him while he was preparing that spell would be suicide. She would just be running straight into it when he swung. But as Rozenalt's arm came down, the vampire lunged backwards, freshly-healed arm heaving one of the Hunt's knights out of position from its current fight and into the path of the spell—

It wouldn't be enough, the wave would still chew right threw it and her. But she didn't need a barrier, she just wanted a convenient springboard to jump and kick off… and force Rozenalt right back on the defensive, using his own magic and ally as a screen long enough to get back into position.

Final Fantasy: Lightseekers

Miina Malina

And with everyone else throwing attacks at Adrammelech, of course it went for her. How dare she be bold enough to stop everyone from getting electrocuted! Didn't it know how annoying it was to heal internal burns? Miina did; practising trying to control lightning always had its downsides.

She'd still need to go heal Rudolf anyway, because he'd just… thrown himself into it. Maybe she shouldn't heal him too much so he might actually sit out a fight and stop going after more aggravated injuries? Not the time, Miina.

Maybe she could've dodged. Maybe. Part of her screamed to dodge towards the thing-that-was-not-a-goat, but what was "towards" when it was bearing down on you? Instead, she did the only sensible thing as a panicked response and resorted to her favourite element, perfect for staving off tropical midday heat: ice. Specifically, enough ice to huddle down beneath a nice, Esben-sized spike of chilly, pointy nastiness. It was neat what you could do in a hurry when you didn't care about it moving, or lasting, or really anything beyond having a big old block of whatever element on hand for a little bit.

…

She really hoped it wouldn't crash right through and smash her. Or just hammer away while she was stuck, it was really not comfortable being almost-encased.

Final Fantasy: Lightseekers

Miina

Okay, beasties defeated, and she'd done it with a minimum of magic usage on her end – you never knew when there might be some extra threat, and blighted or not… an animal was still an animal. It was the sort of thing that she had grown up being taught to deal with, even if using a sword for it still had some flashes of novelty.

…

"Oh, c-come on!" She hadn't even said anything and still they were fighting another giant reptilian monstrosity! And this one was throwing out lightning everywhere. Of all the… she liked using it sometimes because it was hard to dodge, but that was exactly what made this such a pain. Especially when everyone had bits of metal on them, which wasn't going to help. Fine, fine…

How nice of Leviathan to give her so much immediate hands-on practice with protecting against lightning. Oh, she had been focused on making it as strong and focused as possible, there, but the manipulation and casting was just a different application of the same thing. Concentrate, concentrate, and… ah, there it was, the faint light settling into her skin with an odd, slick feeling. Was it like that for everyone? Maybe she should ask one day. "Th-That should help. Still, try not to g-g-get hit…"

Another Life in a Fantasy World (Invite Only)

Abe Hikari

With the steps to give herself enough visibility, and a good chef's knife in hand, Hikari felt… confident. It was a strange feeling. In the context of a kitchen, she could only ever remember being very cautious handling a knife and making big, rough slices. Even just peeling the shallots would have been a challenge. Now? It felt like it was going to be easy, so easy that it was second nature.

She couldn't say that she had ever had that sort of confidence in anything. Oh, she had been good enough at business, but that always carried the undercurrent of imminent failure and long nights extra put in to prepare, especially with any presentation to give after. But long practice and experience didn't ever make her comfortable, merely… passable. Thinking back, she honestly couldn't say she remembered ever having this confidence maybe since she was a child?

Okay, first the meat – a few easy slices was all it took, although she had the idea that maybe they should have prepared this the day before, optimally. Now… ah, get another chopping board, she wouldn't have thought of that without this strange external knowledge worming into her brain. Hmm, she liked this knife, though, so go clean it, then… finely dicing the mushrooms!

If she had wanted proof that her cheat ability was either to do with her appearance, or maybe just knives for some bizarre reason, then this was it: before winding up here, every movement would have been made with extreme hesitancy to protect her fingers, leading to an even, roughly-chopped mess of mushroom after… well, who knew how long. Much, much longer than the easy work she was making of the mushrooms or the shallots after that.

Not that it wasn't still inconvenient being short, she had to pick up and move the steps – and the ingredients, carefully – to be in position to fry the mushrooms into a duxelle.

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Knight RP

Tyaethe

The vampire didn't stop at just the leg, following through with another swing, and another – one for the back legs, and then another through the neck. She wasn't going to have some three-limbed monstrosity pounce on her when trying to enjoy the real fight, oh no.

"Oh, don't go calling yourself a fool, Rozenalt. You're many things; stupid, arrogant, a blasphemer, tasteless…" Tyaethe said with a shake of her head, ticking them off on one finger, "Particularly the tasteless part. With the whole blood thing, I think you're just jealous of me for being a vampire.

"But I'll give you a break. It won't just be your blood I'll settle our debt with," she gave him a toothy grin, and closed the gap again, sword swinging. She didn't expect it to connect, would be disappointed if it did, but that was fine. Attack, attack, always attack! Her sword weighed nothing. Her strength came from magic rather than her barely existent muscles. In a fight like this, momentum was nothing, even if the ligaments and tendons tore and restored themselves at the instant reversal of direction.

Rozenalt would still be able to fight back through this. She remembered their previous bouts, interrupted and shared as they were. If she defended, that would let up all the pressure. If she disengaged entirely, that would be the same. Too much breathing room to give a mage like him from the start.

Dodge a little. Move just as much as she could without letting the tempo up. Barely avoid the retaliation as long as possible – no, keep cutting it too close. Let him get away with small cuts. She wanted the blood spread, too, and what would be more annoying than your opponent laughing off the injuries? They would heal, even with the magic, and he would be an idiot to try and use blood magic with her blood, unless he wanted it to go awry.

Besides: this made it more fun.