RoflsMazoy

Royal Rumble!

"We've been handed an opportunity to use St. Laurel's self righteousness against them." Clara replied.

Indeed, St. Laurel had seen fit to keep their mistakes quiet, which is an understandable position. It's not impossible to keep a secret forever, as long as you can eliminate every factor which would let it come to light. But St. Laurel's didn't have the drive to bring about such a thing. They didn't have the courage to commit to the road they had taken a half-step onto.

Alto would likely come along later. They had a good chance of destroying him as well. There wouldn't be a better chance to try it anytime soon.

"We'll make them realize the extent of their foolishness."

@Gentlemanvaultboy @KillamriX88 @Taytay @Hammerman @HeroicSociopath

Royal Rumble!

"Glad you asked!" King exclaimed, bringing out an odd weapon from behind the altar.

It was a beautiful silver Claymore, but with a rather strange addition to the pommel.

"This is the Bing Bong sword." He said, placing a weird emphasis on the Bing Bong.

There was a small, ornate bell attached to the end of the pommel. It seemed to sway slightly even though there was no wind.

"96% consecrated silver, this thing can take out ghosts in one or two hits!" Now it was an ad from the shopping channel? "I don't know which one of you can use it best so I'll just give it to... Brutus!"

He placed the sword in the other boy's hands. Now that it was closer to them, they could actually feel the power coming off of the sword. This wasn't some random silver sword with a bell strapped onto it... Well it was, but it sure felt like something else.

"I know I called it the Bing Bong sword but it doesn't really Bong, it mostly just Bings," He said. "You should probably be worried if it Bongs . Anyway, that's all from me. Hope you all have fun!"

With that, King lifted through the air and out of the open window, carrying his sizable stack of cat posters.

@rawkhawk64 @Burger @Zardoric @Scarifar @jynmi88 @Bartimaeus

Royal Rumble!

"Not getting caught isn't enough. We cannot be suspected." Clara chimed in. "It would be easy to guess who would try such a thing, and they hardly need a reason to band against us."

Assassinating Alto was a great idea and all, except even if the crime didn't make it obvious, there was only a handful of people in the entire city who'd do such a thing. Mind you it wasn't impossible to perpetrate such a thing without the ability to be suspected. Just that they couldn't do it now. The easiest way would be to kill him when there was no possible way they would be able to, but there were a multitude of ways they could be somewhere they couldn't be to begin with.

Suddenly a beholder flew in. A black bat with a single large eye, these were Clara's reconnaissance drones.

"Well now... it looks like we've spied something interesting." She said.

@KillamriX88 @Taytay @Dezuel @Gentlemanvaultboy @Hammerman

Royal Rumble!

Vanishers 1

To many parents in the city of Rhea, St. Laurel's was an ideal. A shining example which set the bar for other schools in the city of Rhea. And to some extent, it really was, but as to all things, St. Laurel's has a darker side. Not a dark side mind you, the light's just somewhat dim.

It was something Alto was reminded about every so often.

Now as he read the latest in the large line of duties he was assigned, he wondered.

How the f*** is this in my pay grade?

You may think this is uncharacteristic of Alto, and you'd be right, but there was a pretty good reason for it. St. Laurel's was almost allergic to bad reputation. They tend to cover up incidents a lot, not even just bad ones, almost everything. Someone got expelled? They did everything they could do. Promising student under-performs? Certainly not the pressure. It usually fell to the Student Council to take care of it, although it seems like they really dropped the ball on this one.

8 students went missing at an abandoned apartment building. Similar people. Perhaps they were targeted, perhaps they were just kindred spirits. Whatever the case, they were traced to the same apartment building, and then the preliminary report came back to say it was haunted.

At that point, the task had been slid over to Alto.

It was… An interesting situation to say the least, but as Student Council President it was his duty to take care of it. Some would say it was high time St. Laurel's management had a talking to, but doing that wasn't going to get those missing students back. He would've liked a bit more time as well, but any longer and their disappearance would be noticed and that was not a situation St. Laurel's wanted yet.

He could only choose certain students. Ones that were smart enough to run, but ones who would do the job. Alto would follow, but he had to complete his duties first. This haunting shouldn’t be too major of an issue, but Alto could only hope he wasn't the students into the maw of hell itself.

Unbeknownst to all, a small flying black creature peeled off of the Student Council room's window and flew away into the sky.

@6slyboy6 @Bartimaeus @Crowvette @Inertia @Ebil Bunny @Dezuel

Royal Rumble!

@KillamriX88 @HeroicSociopath "He has a... useful ability." Clara says with clear disdain. "And he's here to keep me on my toes."

Members for the Student Committee were chosen by Mephisto, of course. Why Rurik was chosen wasn't a reason that escaped Clara, she just didn't appreciate his presence awfully much. To be led by committee meant no one person could make a decision. On such a committee, it was important to have a diverse range of people, and people who with contradicting views.

"Nevertheless, winning legitimately is not a strategy I can place 100% faith in." She continued. "There are people stronger than us, and there could be variables we can't forsee. If we want to win, our task is to make sure these variables never become an issue."

On the subject of Mephisto, most of the Committee who would've ever thought about it would think Mephisto had pretty good chances of making it out unscathed.

"The Principal told me to take it as a challenge." Clara said, referring to Gilliam's question about Mephisto. "But in this school, we rule by committee. If the committee decrees it, then we will free Mephisto. If they do not, then we will not."

Royal Rumble!

His name is… Mephisto

In investigating anything to do with Mephisto's School for the Wickedly Inclined, of course, there was always one name you would run into. Mephisto Erdrigan. Besides being the Principal of Mephisto's School for the Wickedly Inclined, he was a business man. A particularly cunning business man, he's been suspected in any number of crimes but there has never been enough evidence to convict him. Until now. And yet, he is only behind bars for a single crime out of many, and there's no telling how long he'll stay.

Yet for all that he is, for William Ascot he should not be someone of concern. The task of the Ascot family is to record and watch over history, and occasionally, steer humanity towards a happy ending if required. Mephisto Erdrigan, for all his evil, is only a businessman. But what if there was reason to believe he was more?

Let it be known that Humanity has a betrayer.
He cast down the blessings bestowed upon him by the gods,
and instead made a contract with the Great Evil.

In front of William was an old journal. It was recently excavated from a mass grave, the skeleton it belonged to held it under its body, in the remains of its tattered clothes as if to hide it from the world.

Yet as they sought to consume him, he consumed
them instead. We were able to strike him down, but at too
great a cost.

It was secretly handed over to the Ascot Family as it lay in their area of expertise. It was summarily handed to William.

Let it never be forgotten. His name is Mephisto.

@Letter Bee

Royal Rumble!

Alright everyone, the IC is finally starting. The Discord has some details for each faction, but if you want me to send them to you then just ask.

St. Laurel's will take a little time, and there's a cross-faction storyline which'll be coming in a little bit from now.

Royal Rumble!

@jynmi88 I messed up the tag, post for the Vigilantes is up!

Royal Rumble!

[??????????], Prelude

The small chapel the Vigilantes happen to be based out of is known as the Church of Candles. It stays open throughout the night, candles lit all the time. It gained a reputation of being a warm, and welcoming place for whoever needed it, although the amount of candles really was bizarre. Still, it was quiet place and the Vigilantes try and keep it that way. They were mostly online nowadays anyway, but Vigilantes often swung by to pick up requests.

Fulfilling requests did raise their ranking. There was a bit of extra admin work on King's end, but it seemed to work out most of the time.

Requests were usually finished at a leisurely pace. It usually takes a while to find cats, it might take all day for any normal Vigilante, but as you might expect in that area King, is, well, King. He seems to do quite a number of requests, mostly because he has the time, it seems, but sometimes he goes about things with a bit more purpose.

Today was one of those days.

King cleared his voice as he stepped up to address the Vigilantes present. A few hand-picked individuals, notified by text-message, or in Rio Köhler's case, picked up from St. Laurel's at the gate. This wasn't a common occurrence, so this was probably something important.

"We are officially broke!" Were the words that came out of his mouth. Silence followed.

"I may have spent too much on candles, but that's the least we could do for the priest who's letting us use this place." He continued, nodding at the old man in question, who was sitting off in the corner with a warm smile. "We're probably set for candles for about three months, but anyway."

To enter the upcoming tournament they'd have to pay a fair amount of money. The larger your organization, the more you'd have to pay, and since the Vigilantes were small, they didn't have to pay that much. Still, missing cats don't give much income, and sometimes they didn't give income at all. The bulk of their actual money came from exorcisms. Speaking of which…

"This is our ticket to the tournament;" King said, holding up a sheet of paper in front of him. A printed e-mail request, it would seem. "Big haunted apartment, ghosts everywhere. They pay itself won't be quite enough, but I've also got a stack of missing cat posters."

King's words didn't tend to inspire confidence. He was certainly carefree, but the first things many Vigilantes noticed after joining is that King was never really wrong about things.

Anyway, a haunting usually occurred when low-level demons who couldn't open portals were stranded on Humanity's side, bunched up together and gathered a bunch of ghosts to try and attract the attention of a greater demon to whisk them away. If the greater demon hadn't come yet, then this would probably be fine if they could hit ghosts. But the ones here couldn't really hit ghosts.

"It's gonna be great fun," King assured. "Just don't die. Any questions?"

@rawkhawk64 @Burger @Zardoric @Scarifar @jynmi88

Royal Rumble!

Opportunity, it is I

"Well, now that everyone is here, we can begin." A girl said, placing her hands onto the long table in front of her.

Clara Deimos Erdrigan. Leader of the Student Committee, daughter of Mephisto. A past shrouded in mystery, a ferocity hidden behind calm. A terror to her enemies and her allies. The table at which she sat held 10 more seats. Each figure covered in shadow, with only a dim light in the center of the room providing illumination. Today, Clara seemed a little gloomier than usual.

This room, under the seemingly unordinary St. Lucifer's, contains the table of Mephisto's Student Committee. Mephisto could be called the reason for all of St. Lucifer's suffering. Perhaps if his gaze hadn't happened to fall on the school, they would have continued their simple, average existence, and maybe even risen to something greater. But of course, this was all just conjecture. There was no evidence of Mephisto's involvement, anyway.

Mephisto's School for the Wickedly Inclined however, is real. They would call their displays in the tournaments a mild taste of their true nature. Their reputation in the city of Rhea is already rock bottom, but according to Mephisto himself, the true extent of their wickedness is yet to be seen.

Speaking of which…

"Hey, where is Mephisto, anyway? Shouldn't he be here?" One of the members said. Mephisto didn't normally come for meetings, but he said he would because it was one month before the first tournament of the year. It wasn't exactly the most important tournament and the Student Committee had proven themselves quite capable, but if circumstances didn't dictate otherwise, Mephisto always came.

"Did he have a business deal? Or-," "He's in jail." Clara cut in. "For embezzlement."

"Oh…" Was the response.

That'd probably explain Clara's sour mood. Hmm? But Clara is legally Mephisto's daughter, wouldn't that cast suspicion on-

"I was the one that provided the information leading to his arrest, so don't worry about that." She said dismissively. "However, he did take most of our plans with him in that mind of his. In the meantime, we'll need to think of something else."

Mephisto's Student Committee does a lot of planning, goes hand in hand with being evil, really. To pull off the normal amount of shenanigans they did during a tournament took a lot of time to pool resources and prepare for. And that wasn't even including interfering with key players from other schools before the tournament, although most of that was done already.

However, there were still two more obstacles in their path to victory, ones that always stood in their way regardless of any tricks they used, and any technicalities they abused. Alto and King, they were her challenges. But they were not a burden she had to bear alone.

"St. Laurel's and the Vigilantes," Clara said. "How shall we crush them?"

@Gentlemanvaultboy @KillamriX88 @Taytay @Hammerman @HeroicSociopath