| Benedict | ||
|---|---|---|
| Summary: All the pieces fall in place as a war is fought against Benedict. Who: Bahamut, Benedict, Dragonmaster_Cale, Gold_Iczelion, Jack_Karrde, Johnny_C, John-117, Kawatta, Kibi, Latran, MRCS, Raiden, Rock, Sai_Faoh, Samantha, Sun, Terry_Bogard, Trinune, Xue When: June 8th, 2004 Where: Metropolis |
The Huge warehouse has been converted to a kind of mall. This long hardwood floored hallway extends straight north directly to broad exit labeled 'Valet Parking'. Benches and lockers line the walls with a tiny notice posted that states the prices for locker rentals With prices for lockers to the north of the red line on the floor nearly twice that of those within MPD jurisdiction. You can't help but notice how heavily armed and 'POLITE' people are in the north end of the hall. Two doors lead off to the west wall, one, in the south end, labeled 'hiring hall' . In the north end, the double 'old west' tavern gates see lots of traffic while the 'thud thud thud' of loud music reverberates through the wall. That entrance is labeled with a lovingly painted image of a heavy looking precurser to the modern assualt rifle and the letters "B.A.R." Finally there is a broad double door on the eastern side of the hall straddling the red 'borderline'. Above these industrial doors that appear to have been stolen from a hospital somewhere is a simple handlettered sign that says "Warehousing and Supplies". Xue Qian sits nearby, legs crossed in indian style, hands in an odd hand sign, eyes closed, cold, blue light emitting from her, and magical runes floating around her. She actually, on closer inspection, is floating a few inches off the ground. Her sword is horozontal before her on the ground, in its sheath *re for sam* Latran flips into a hand stand as his blades whiz through where he was standing. Springs off his palm, lands casually upon the ball of his right foot. Pivots to grab a sword in each hand, and assumes an odd crane stance. He is facing the source of the Ki energy, eyes still closed, one sword poised above his head, other behind his back. Small round plates of ice form in the air around Xue, slowly circling her as she meditates. Spikes form on the outer sides of them, then on the inside parts of them, then detatch and float an inch or two away from the outside. As Latran reacts to the Ki burst, she reacts to HIS reaction, eyes opening to reveal pale blue lights, and the spiked plates shifting to point spike-first in the direction of the disturbance. Samantha blinks as she strides into the main hall of the Exchange right behind another unleashed ball of magic and ki, making her way straight through a shimmering heat haze left behind by the attack. Her blink is quickly followed by a bright smile as she registers Xue's prescence, and she lifts a slender hand to wave, a few blue-white tendrils working off her fingers as they shift through the air. "Hey.." it's a low murmur, but likely still audible to the half-elf... she starts to make her way across, then spots Latran and blinks again, sliding to a halt and leaning back on her heels... just watching for the moment. Latran is standing there still as a statue, as electricity begins to course from his sword and engulf him, and still he does not move. Xue Qian continues to manipulate her spell, weaving the Essence she draws from... somewhere... with more skill than usual. The plates start circling one way arond her, and the spikes in front of them the other, in a completely opposite direction, in a unique, abstract, and ultimately deadly spin of sharp ice, hear expression as cold as the substance she's controlling. Samantha glances slowly between the two. Her gaze lingers a little longer on Latran, however - while she's interested in learning more about her own magical abilities, she's had far fewer opportunities to observe the kobold and given her purpose in coming to the Exchange today she wants to see more. She remains silent as she watches, her own energies rising in reponse to the two displays, but not physically manifesting. There seems to be a flow of energies between Latran and Xue, as if they share an aura, while still seperated. In otherwords, energy is flowing between them. Latran resumes a blade form, electrical energies and blades dancing about him as if extensions of his own body. It seems odd to see such a large creature move in such a graceful danse like manner, but its predatory grace does fit him. Xue Qian makes another odd motion with her hands, sending a few of the ice spikes at Latran, one at a time, but each moving to come from a different direction, the plates however, continuing to spin around her Samantha feels.. something... she can't place it too well, her senses only being partially trained over a few short years. But a curious frown cuts into her brow, the girl tilting her head as she continues to watch, sapphire gaze moving to follow the path of those spikes as they move towards Latran. Latran leaps and spins about the spikes, and for each one dodged a bolt of lightning arcs from his body, flying towards Xue. Zig zagging motions and forking making the attacks difficult to follow. Xue's plates of ice remain spinning, but the ice solidifies in areas, blocking each bolt as it comes. Faster and faster they spin, yet still they perfectly deflect each bolt, until none are left to come, at which point the plates come together into 4 quarter spheres, continuing their orbit, but much more slowly this time, seemingly more like a warmdown than anything Samantha's pupils quiver in her eyes as she tries to follow the motions, liekly doing better than most would but still barely able to see exactly what's occurring... she nods her head slowly, smiling a bit as the action slows. "Pretty good..." she murmurs appreciatively, smile then widening as she reaches up to arrange a few stray strands of hair. As she does this her gaze slides from Xue to Latran, seeing if he has anything more to offer... Latran lowers his swoeds to his sides, with a flourish flips them together into one sword, and sheaths it on his back. He opens his eyes and glances over to Xue. "You're pulling is getting clumsy, you drew more than you needed to, in order to do what you did." Xue Qian's eyes lose the light blue glow, and the quadrents of ice slow, then dissolve into the air. She sweatdrops "I haven't drawn from you in a LONG time, if youve forgotten. I don't think i did THAT badly" -_-; Latran taps his foot. "The quantities should still b second nature to you. You know what drawing too much can do to me." Samantha strolls up a little closer, stopping a short distance away and offering another small, almost nervous wave.. to the two of you this time. She smiles and lowers her hand then, falling silent and just idly scuffing one foot on the floor as she listens in to the conversation while half-pretending not to. (I wonder how I should put this...?) Xue Qian sweatdrops "i know, i know. I didnt overdraw THAT much". She sideglances as Sam scruffs her foot, and raises an eyebrow "Oh, hey Sam" Latran clicks his tongue, "That is not the point..." He blinks and glances over to Sam. "Oh, hello." Samantha inclines her head in a small bow of sorts, to Xue.. and then again to Latran. "Hiya! Um.. I'm not interruptin' am I?" She folds her arms across her chest sheepishly. Xue Qian sweatdrops at Latran "My apologies for lacking your Kobold perfection" -.-; then looks back at Sam "Not really. Needed a break anyway" c_c; Latran sighs, "You know it's part of my job to get on your case about it.." He grumbles and shakes his head at Sam. "Indeed, I need to regain the energies. So a break is welcome." Samantha breathes a soft sigh of relief, though it's barely audible to say the least. "Great! You guys're pretty good, by the way...um." She hesitates again, lifting one hand to rub at the back of her neck, "Soooo... had any good jobs lately? Coz if not.. I... might know where to get one..." she glances off to the side, whistling silently, whilst mentally berating herself. (Great start.. what a really great idea -that- was...) Xue Qian gives Latran the lina-ish cutesy grin "and you know its my job to give you headaches about it" ^-^ before looking back to Sam "Jobs? Been kinda quiet, actually. So no. This an under-the-table contractor your talkin about? No one else declines going through the guild to its members otherwise, to my knowledge" c.c; Latran shrugs, "Not my decision to make, ask my wizard." Samantha nods slowly, her gaze slipping first to Latran.. where she raises an eyebrow. (His wizard..?) Shaking off the question she looks back to Xue, then pauses before smiling brightly, "Well, this wouldn't be a job from the Exchange or anythin'! It's more like.. a paid favour, I guess!" She makes a face as she says that, and rubs some more at the back of ner neck. "Kinda..." Xue Qian shrugs "Hhmm... how much, and a favor to whom, may i ask?" o_o? Latran sits down on the floor and assumes a meditative position. Samantha wrinkles her nose and looks down, "A favour to me, I guess... as for how much, I dunno... I don't have much really. But.." she takes a deep breath and looks up, trying to appear as confident as possible. (Why can't I just ask? This is dumb...) "Y'can have full profit from anythin' that gets found! I just gotta get revenge on someone, is all..." Xue Qian asks, "oh, so YOUR the one hiring. Well, since its in-unit work, all ill ask is first crack at salvage for myself an my body guard here, and rights to anything he or i find out there. As for revenge, who's this against? What kind of opponent, and what can you tell us about him?" Sai Faoh strides in, looking incredibally laid-back. Upon spotting his sister, he smiles a bit, offering to her an enthusiastic wave. "Hey, sis!" Samantha starts to grin.. though it falters as the last registers. She clears her throat with a cute 'ahem'. "Well.." she begins, rubbing yet more at the back of her neck, "It's kinda hard to say... I guess... he's a god.... and, er-ah!" She straightens on hearing Sai's voice, tensing up and she stops speaking, just giving Xue an embarassed half-smile. Xue Qian hhmm's, sideglancing at Sai, smirking a bit, knowing him from an... EARLIER encounter, before looking back to Sam "C'mon. spill it, allready. Your holding out on me, and if we're " she points a thumb at latran "doing some kind of job, we need all the info we can go on" Latran says, "Oh facing a god, real scary. Like we don't have to deal with that sort of insane stuff back home." He makes an exaggerated roll of his eyes. Xue Qian snerks "this is true... " Sai Faoh strides over to Samantha, ears perked. "Who is this god you speak of, dear sister?" he asks, attempting to drape an arm loosely over her head in a big-brother fashion, rubbing in the fact that he's so tall. n.n Samantha glances at Sai and offers a rather forced grin, "Heeey... brooo... heh... um.." she shifts the hand from her neck to wave vaguely, then blinks twice and darts a glance between Xue and Latran, "You've fought that kinda thing bef-erk!" She sighs theatrically as an arm is heaped upon her head.. though actually her good mood is incredibly forced, she's tense as anything right now... those two black-bladed daggers strapped to her lower back seeming to throb silently. "An'.. it's nothin'.." she murmurs, with a shrug and a glance sidelong at Sai, "Just somethin' I gotta do, don't worry..." Xue Qian says, "fight with, no. DEAL with, yes" -.-; "don't ask. long story" Latran arches a brow at Sai, not having met this strange person before. "We do have to fight incarnations of goddesses every so often. Which makes me grateful a certain five have yet to show up here.. c.c" Xue Qian sweatdrops "THIS is true, too..." c_c;; Samantha glances between Xue and Latran again, cocking an eyebrow, "So, er.. it wouldn't bother y'then? I think he's kinda beaten already, it's just.. finishing him.... but.. then there's the reason I wanted to hire ya, see..." she clears her throat again, and shoots a nervous glance to Sai. "An' the reason -you- weren't meant to hear about this.. or anyone else, I kinda wanted..." she tosses Xue a crooked grin, "People who weren't gonna go worryin' about me, y'know?" Sai Faoh arches a brow, removing his arm from his sister's head, his gaze becoming serious. "You're hiding something. You shouldn't hide stuff from your brother." he mumbles, crossing his arms. Xue Qian snerks to herself a bit at that one "That comes with fighting and... living a long time, it seems" she gives Latran a knowing glance, then shrugs "Ah, what the heck. Why not. For first crack at salvage for us, you can count both of us in" c_c Samantha nods quickly, "'Course.. not just first crack, y'can have whatever you want. I don't want any money outta this... it's.. personal. The one I'm after.. Benedict.. he made me kill Johnny..." she winces a bit and then glances to Sai, nodding again but more slowly. "An' of course I am, I don't wanna be worried about... I could handle this myself if it wasn't for the fact the guy's got a whole army...." she glances at Latran and Xue. Latran opens his eyes, looking considering. "A whole army, hmm?" He starts to chuckle darkly. Xue Qian says, "a whole army...". she, too, starts that same dark chuckle, eyeing latran, appearently both finding something funny Rock walks up, "Sorry I'm late...had to punch a hole in a wall." Sai Faoh's eyes soften, and he smirks. "You can ask for my help, sis, and not worry about me...I've faced that guy who was possessing Johnny already, and I know what his abilities are like...and you don't have to worry about me. You know how I am...if I get wounded, I usually try and go off to heal before I can sustain any more damage..." Samantha raises her eyebrows, staring at the two friends as they begin to chuckle. "Okay... so.. that'd be a 'yes' then, huh?" She grins a bit, then looks at Sai and shakes her head, "No.. you haven't fought him, that was just the power he gave Johnny... that was just a part of him. I know, coz.. there's another one just as strong, an' the same... the first time Cassandra fought inside me," she winces as she says the name, but it quickly passes, "We fought him. An' there's others like him, I asked... an'... yeah." She tails off with a shrug, looking towards Rock and smiling softly, "Hey.. yer not late, just... seein' about getting some help after I talked to that person I was tellin' you about..." Sai Faoh arches a brow. "Well...I -want- to help...if you would accept my help..." Rock says, "No problem." looks between the two, "Look kids, no more trouble in paradise." Latran nods to Xue, and stands up. "Then the berserkang shall go to war. True I'm the only one here, but, it's better than nothing." Xue Qian gives Rock a smirk, the dark chuckle still present "Hows the arm". She then looks to Latran, and winks "Reminds me of that old old war from back home. What was it... knew i shoulda listened better in history class. Two armies fighting, and in the end, something wiped BOTH out, leaving no trace or reasoning, nor evidence of what exactly did it... something like that". Samantha shifts her shoulders in a vague shrug as she glances at Sai, "Then sure.. but... don't try an' take my kill." Something flashes in her eyes then, and the dull clink of metal sounds from behind her. Whatever this darker intent is it passes and she looks back to the others, another shrug given. "Well, Xue.. I've fought both sides now, an'... I'd know who I'd put my money on..." she wrinkles her nose and adds, with a little grin, "If I had any..." Rock asks, "Alright, so we gonna get this done, or we gonna stand here all day?" Sai Faoh smirks. "Wasn't going to try and take your kill, sis." he replies, stretching in a graceful manner. Latran stands there waiting, like he has been.. n.n Xue Qian leans back, smirking at some long-ago memory, before looking at Sam "The Rock is right. If we're gonna do this, lets do so" Rock just looks over at Xue, "Great...your coming too?" Samantha blinks, cocking a brow once more at the half-elf. "Y'wanna go right now? I kinda assumed you guys'd want a break.. I've got some things to get ready. Wanna meet back here in a few hours or somethin'..?" She glances at Rock and grins, nodding just once, "Yeah.. I kinda hired Xue and Latran. See.... we're not just after one guy now, but a whole army of 'em..." Rock says, "....Great...just what I need." Xue Qian grins at Rock, winking, eyes filled with mischief "i DO hope your arm recovered by now" o_- then loosk to Sam "Doesn't take long. We didn't expend a lot, really" Rock says, "Yeah it did...." glare. Sai Faoh smirks at Xue. "You're not the only one who dislocated one of Terry's son's arms. Sam here did the same to me." He nudges Sam with his elbow, a playful grin playing across his face. Xue Qian says, "Glad to hear it. So did mine, luckily." also glares glare, but mischevious and humorous look in eyes, rather than angry Samantha blinks at Rock, "Um.. what happened to yer arm..?" Not waiting for a reply she shrugs and looks to Xue with a quick nod, "Well, either way I'll be a little bit.. half an hour or somethin'. Gotta make some purchases, an' pick up some gear from my locker..." she pats at a couple of concealed pockets, slight clinks sounding from each, "I'm runnin' low on some stuff." She winces faintly as she is nudged, another clink sounding as a pair of mild explosives bash together. "Well, y'did trip me up... it wasn't like I meant to...." Rock says, "Ice bitch dislocated it." he points with his thumb at Xue. Xue Qian just grins cutely ^-^ then looks to Latran "Guess we should go get ready, hm?" Latran nods, "I better go perform the proper ceremony since I have time.." Xue Qian nods "and i have to check the Essence-weaves of a few of my spells i haven't used in a while" Samantha raises an eyebrow at Rock, peering at him for a moment before, with a slow shake of her head, she turns her attention back to Xue and Latran. "Great! Take longer if y'want.. I can warm up while I'm waitin'..." Samantha raises an eyebrow at Rock, peering at him for a moment before, with a slow shake of her head, she turns her attention back to Xue and Latran. "Great! Take longer if y'want.. I can warm up while I'm waitin'..." she shrugs, "Then when yer ready, come out to the parkin' lot and we'll get going.. I know where we need to go." She wrinkles her nose and adds quietly, "I think..." Sai Faoh pops his neck. "And I will meditate until we are all ready to go." he murmurs, smiling a benevolent smile. Xue Qian sits on a nearby bench, and closes her eyes. Runes of magical energy start to appear and float around her, as she constructs and deconstructs spells, cehcking to make sure their patterns are clear in her mind. She starts floating a few inches off the ground after a few moments, and the outside world seems to fade from her consciousness for the time being. Rock says, "I'm ready now." Latran kneels on the ground, placing his sword before him. He begins a soft low chanting, in an odd gutteral tounge Sai Faoh nods quietly as Xue and Latran go about their preparations, and he himself sits upon the ground, folding his legs into a lotus position and beginning to meditate! n.n Samantha leads the long and weary way through the ruins of the Badlands... eventually, streets crowded with rubble and flanked on all sides by small buildings give way to large open areas and huge industrial complexes the like of which the mercenaries have explored before. Passing by the side of one particularly large and well preserved factory building, the sounds of battle become apparent.. steel ringing against steel, the hiss of arrows and the battle cries of thousands tearing through the twilight. And there, maybe two miles off to the north, can be glimpsed torchlight, faintly.. around the edge of a long row of old warehouses. "There..." the slender nekogirl murmurs, stepping up onto a low rise created by fallen rubble and reaching back to loosen her shortsword in its scabbard. Her daggers remain untouched, though their black blades still pulse as if living. "I guess that'd be the place.. right where I thought it'd be." Rock follows after Samantha and nods at the indicated area, All right. SO what now? We just bust the gates in? Latran looks towards the sounds of battle, eyes taking in the scene, looking for paths, escape routes, and the like. Samantha shakes her head at Rock's words, "No.. they're... outside. I guess we have'ta go around...." she glances left and right along the row of warehouses. Here and there rents are torn in the side, though nothing can be glimpsed in the darkness beyond, at least from this distance. "Let's just get there..." she says hurriedly, shaking her head again and scrambling down the other side of the small slope she stands on, bandaged feet gripping the floor on the other side and bringing her to an abrupt halt before she strides onward. As she walks she reaches inside her body-warmer and hauls out a length of thin rope, with her to other hand dragging a kunai from another pocket and busily tethering the rope to its hilt. The warehouses give way on either side.. to the east, to a steep slope of rubble and to the west... seemingly this is the more obvious route, as most of the torchlight can be glimpsed from here, but once more from this distance not much more can be made out. To those with heightened hearing, it should be obvious the battle rages only beyond this point, but stretches for some distance back... maybe even for miles. Latran's ears twitch about, and he starts muttering number and distances, appearantly judging the sides based on the amount of noise they are making. Samantha continues to stride onward until she arrives at the edge of the centre-most warehouse. She runs the fingers of one hand down the corrugated iron wall, pursing her lips thoughtfully and sending a glance each way before she takes a step back and.. without looking behind her to check for her companions, she draws her other hand back and slings the dagger up into the air. With a hiss it soars heavenward, a little blue-white ki trailing off each sharp edge and the thin rope trailing on behind. Then.. it stops as it slams into the overhang of the building's roof, sparks thrown up as the blade lodges deep inside the old metal. "Perfect.." the nekogirl whispers, and turns now to check on the others as she gives the rope a sturdy yank. It's apparently stronger than it might seem at first glance. "Let's go, then.. anyone not like heights?" Rock asks, "I'm good on heights. Want me to go first, or do you want someone else to?" Samantha shrugs briefly at Rock, taking a deft step away, "Go ahead, bro... jus' be careful. Dunno who... or -what-, might be up there..." Latran blinks at the rope and shakes his head. "I might be too heavy." He instead sulls out his swords and drives them into the wall, one in each hand, and begins to use them like picks. Someone should teach him the meaning of restraint. Xue Qian casts a light wind spell, and flies up to the roof, cautious to check for enemies before landing. As the roof is reached, an awesome spectacle greets you. Beyond the row of warehouses is an expansive area, that does indeed seem to stretch for miles, filled with the seething bodies of warring creatures. Though in fact these 'creatures' barely qualify for such a title.. they look disarmingly human, though primitive - sharing some Neanderthal traits. It's the skin that really distinguishes them, being a shade of deep green and appearing much tougher, more calloused than that of most ordinary humans. Most are armoured in simple chain or leather, beaten and battered, and clearly having seen a lot of use.. with very few being an exception to this rule. The cries tearing from their collective throats are in a language unrecognisable, though any literati would spot a relationship to Latin among other well-known languages. Clearly they are not as primitive as they appear, something also described by the well-crafted and maintained weapons - shortswords, longswords, axes, flails and crossbows wielded by foot soldiers, and peppered throughout the battlefield are other, larger weapons. These apparently have been forged from what can be found in the Badlands, and there are ballistae and catapults made from various industrial machinery, and wrecked vehicles. Curious but seemingly functional to judge by the vast holes in the seething mass these devices continue to create as they are utilised. Other, larger and more forbidding creatures also roam the battlefield - which is not bare of features, hills of rubble rising in places and old buildings in various states of repair standing out also - these things can only be described as demons, black wings and dripping maws glimpsed, and their cries are.. cries from the very depths of hell, shrill and forbidding. From here the sounds from below are almost deafening as these demonic beings tear into the warring ranks, and the ranks tear equally large holes amongst themselves. The final, perhaps most odd thing if not the most immediately noticeable, is the total lack of spells or energy-based attacks... everything is physical. Blades, boulders and blunt instruments, but nothing else. Latran walks to the edge of the building and leans forward, eyes scanning the battlefield. "Hmm... haven't seen a battle this large since the last Shaman Wars.. And those winged things are worrying." He glances to Xue. "If you get in too deep.. well... you know what to do." Rock reaches the top and just...stares.... "Well...fuck, guesss we're gonna have fun today." he smerks and flexes his hands. Xue Qian snerks "agreed". She then glances to Latran, and nods "If i do what i might need to do, make sure you stop me later" c_c Samantha sweatdrops a bit at Latran, pausing to watch him for a few moments before she turns away and, latching onto the rope, hauls herself up quickly, slipping onto the roof not long after Rock. She pauses to reach down and detach the kunai, looking back across the battlefield as she winds the rope around the dagger's hilt. It's the demons she's most concerned about. She barely acknowledges any of the words around her as she takes this in, then finally speaks. "Those'd be.. the things I was told of... they're his, Benedict's I mean. If I only knew where he was in all this.... I don't even know what he looks like." She lets a sigh part her lips, then glances at Rock and wordlessly passes him the makeshift grapnel - so he can get down on the other side.. before slipping off to stroll to the opposite edge of the warehouse, not yet drawing any weapons. "We gotta go for the ones with the red stripes on their faces... the others're our friends.... sort of." She heaves in a deep breath and looks back past a sweep Rock says, "No clue...I'm all for busting right through the middle for lack of anything." Xue Qian asks, "how do we tell THEM we're on their side... or are they already informed. and where are their spellcasters? or are the not using magics?" Latran says, "Well, I think it is most prudent in this case to kill or be killed." He begins to breathe deeply, stretching his neck a bit, a small growl forming in the back of his throat. Samantha sends a nod back towards Rock, next answering Xue, "I.. think they just fight. Apart from those workin' for 'him', all I've fought an' seen is melee fighters... pretty basic stuff, but.. in this quantity it's still not good to be up against. An' they know about me, one of 'em can speak English after Jack did.. something." She shrugs, then nods to Latran, "Just go with that... they should know what I gotta do, an' I'll be doing them a favour when it's done. For now I'd say we should, like my bro says, just.. bust through." She smirks a bit and turns away, setting one hand to the hilt of her sword and dragging it free... the blade giving a prolonged metallic whisper as it slowly emerges into the air, glittering brightly. "Though anythin' you can do to take those.. -things- out might be welcome. They'll know why I'm here too." Xue Qian nods "What can you tell us about them? weaknesses? abilities? I might be able to pick them off". In the meantime, she begins enhencing everyone, placing her hands on them, and adding enchantments of the coldest ice to Latran's blade(s), sam's sword, and rock's fists/feet Latran crouches down and peers over the building like some sort of gargoyle, now blood shot eyes watching the battle. With a sharp growl he dives down into the masses, sword gripped in one hand, lightning streaking after him in his fall. Rock unzips his the cuffs of his jacket, "Ready when you are..." Samantha nods to Xue, watching as she lays the enchantment upon the mithril blade. "I.. don't know much... I've only heard of these. The only ones I've fought touched by this guy're Johnny an'.. this Seraph, I don't know what happened to him. He might still be here. If so.. he's dangerous. I wouldn't say any of us should face him alone. He's like the others, but with white skin, an' yellow eyes." She blinks at Latran as he makes his dive and brushes past Xue, "Let's do this!" It comes out in a bit of a gasp as she takes off from the edge in a leap, hanging in the air briefly before a burst of ki whips off her legs and shoulders and she thunders down towards a mass of fighters, in her other hand four shuriken appearing - braced between the slender digits. Xue Qian steps to the edge, and starts casting, eyes going blue, swoard drawn, temperature dropping. Icicles form on the wall and around the edge near her, as she begins weaving her chilling Essence. As Latran comes in for the attack, two of the green-skinned creatures look up, snarls contorting their expression. As they stand distracted, another nearby makes a lunge and runs one of them through.. blood spraying out as his sword exits from the other side. The remaining one - a red stripe daubed diagonally upon his face - notes this but keeps his attention on the diving kobold, bringing up his crossbow and taking a quick, poorly aimed shot... all he has time for. Latran doesn't even bother with dodging the shot, as it nicks his shoulder he just cackles, landing on the red stripe sword point first, making a kebob. He pulls out his sword and howl his first kill off the day, diving deeper into the fray. Rock shimmies down the building on the rope and immediatelly charges one Redstripe and tackling it to the ground, then begins to pummel it. Samantha comes in towards the group unnoticed until the very last moment when she doesn't hesitate to snap a vicious kick into the face of the Redstripe who turns his gaze up towards her. As blood flies from the thing's pug-nose, she spins away with the momentum, curving her body around an out-thrust spear point and slamming her sword's edge into the throat of the attacker. Pausing to send a nod to another orc, this one with a black-daubed fang on the left side of its mouth, she releases the blade, letting ice crust around the wound as it remains lodged firmly, and springs away to deliver another kick to the creature still clutching its face from the first, this blow sending it flying back into its comrades. Xue Qian finishes her casting, and holds her sword before herself, it glowing with blue cold magicks. With a rising motion, she does ahorozontal swing, causing the ground to freeze, slipping up dozens of the creatuers. Following this, she does a vertical swing, causing the ice to shoot up in spikes, impaling more than half those slipped The creature assaulted by Rock is taken totally unawares, red-black blood smearing its features as the blows land home. As its twin shortswords scatter away through the dirt, two of its comrades break away with interest in this newfound opponent and bear down upon him, one aiming a spear-thrust and the other priming a crossbow hurriedly. Elsewhere others have noticed the joining of battle and are looking up, many falling as those slightly quicker to become aware move in for the kill... all in all, there's a very noticeable change - particularly as Xue's spell hits home. And on the air... fear. Fear in the magicks, and in the mage working them. Rock slides out of the way of the spear thrust, and grabs the weapon hauling back so as to cause the creature sprawl forwards. Latran sheaths his sword as electricity flares up around him, lifting shards of ice left over from Xue's spell. The electricity carrying them about him in a sharp icy cold barrier, ripping to shreds anything stupid enough to get too close. Samantha remains still for a moment after delivering her last kick, long enough to draw interest from all of those around, and suddenly the hole she has torn with her entrance is rapidly filled in with snarling opponents. Some are immediately engaged by Blacktooth warriors, and distracted, but others aim a myriad attacks at the girl. She is forced to curve her body every which way, eventually struggling free of the half dozen bladed weapons and leaping into the air. Hanging there for a few seconds by aid of some nicely timed ki-channelling, she glances towards her still-lodged blade and clenches her hand, "FAIA!" The cry breaks her lips, and she pulls her hand back again as from below an explosion sounds, ki erupting around the sword, sending blood and icy shards in every direction. As she drops she finally releases that handful of shuriken, four metal stars finding a different target. Landing she then looks around to place her companions... As his weapon is hauled upon, Rock's opponent staggers forward toward him. With a guttural growl he releases one hand from the spear's shaft and uses the momentum to aim a clothesline of sorts at the blonde fighter, before falling into him and attempting to bite down on his left shoulder. All around Latran, many orcs are stupid enough to venture near and get shattered, bone breaking and blood flying.. corpses falling all around the kobold. Meanwhile from the north, a shrill cry breaks through all the others around it... one of those demonic creatures flapping closer and landing on a shattered wall, about a dozen feet high, a short distance from the fray near the warehouses. In one clawed hand it flourishes a long scimitar, fire burning around the dark iron blade, and as it peers towards Samantha, then Xue.. then Latran... its piercing yellow eyes blaze with an inner flame to echo that around its weapon. Xue Qian makes a single hand motion, and motions her hand across the scene before her, sending an icy mist to chill the advancing hordes, but far enough away that those already fighting arent in its path, giving those coming towards them a harder time when they reach ehr teammates Rock grabs at the Orc and channels the ice element into it's face and attempts to wrest it between him and the readying crossbowman. Latran's ears swivel towards the demon, quickly followed by blood shot eyes. He crouches down with a growl, examining his prey for a moment. Then he leaps, claws out as he soars towards the demon. Rock's opponent snarls as his teeth miss their target, and as he is spun around he shoves backward.. the crossbow bolt that slams into his chest shortly after only adding to his momentum as he attempts to take Rock back into the ground with him. His comrade curses in that strange tongue and tosses the bow aside, dashing forward and pulling his dagger.. ready to make a cut at the blonde fighter should he hit the ground. The demon has begun to gaze around again, ready to bide its time and wait for an opening... but Latran's sudden move attracts its attention. The ten-foot beast opens its maw and screams, even louder and more piercingly than before, as it kicks off from the wall and flies forward.. muscles bunching in its red-skinned arm as it swings the flaming blade through the air, heat haze rippling all around the creature once you get close enough to make it out. Xue Qian closes her eyes, and focuses HARD, drawing mass amounts of Essence to herself, as the battle rages below. However, she makes no action as of yet. -.- Rock growls as he's taken down and at this point his Khi flares, his wings billowing outwards before slowly dissipating, the energy itself blasting into the body of the Demon he has a choke hold on and he attempts to rollaway from the other demon coming up in his stance. Samantha cries out as Latran takes off and, ducking a blow from a spiked mace.. rams her equally spiked shoulder into the offending orc's stomach. As blood streaks down the side of her body-warmer she spins away and - after grabbing her gore-soaked shortsword - leaps into the air herself.. firing off a burst of ki to carry her off after the kobold. A few crossbow bolts whizz her way, cutting through all around her but nothing hitting just yet - however she has taken a few cuts from her dodging down below. These don't bother her overly as she 'flies' after the kobold, sword trailing out behind her in one hand and blazing with blue-white tendrils. Behind her, some of the warring mass has finally been attracted towards Xue.. and a few bolts are also loosed up towards the roof she stands upon. Heat is met with static, and fire with lightning as Latran clashes with the demon, his sword coming out of the sheath just in time to block the flaming sword. The kobold opens his mouth and with a howl lunges to bite the neck of the demon to hopefully end it quickly. Xue Qian stands very still, too busy focusing to pay attention to arrows. Most never make it up to her, and the few that do only bounce off her, as her armor is ment to deflect or stop low to medium calibur gun rounds, let alone crossbow or arrows. Still she focuses, the Essence gathered becoming stronger and stronger, enough even Sam, with her minor magical ability, could easily notice it. Whatever is coming, it's pretty big. Samantha pulls close to Latran and his opponent as the latter roars, fire now ripping from its throat and down the kobold's back as he tears his teeth into its throat. Red-black blood, burning like acid, is what draws forth from the shiny red flesh. Coupled with the flame this should prove a handy annoyance, even though the burning scimitar remains extended and locked with Latran's own lighting-soaked blade in the air above. The nekogirl pulls to a stop and drifts back a ways, losing a little of her height and almost coming near enough to take a hopping slash from an angry Redstripe down below. The girl opens her mouth to scream something to Latran when Xue's disturbance registers and she snaps her gaze in that direction, the demon momentarily forgotten, "What the...?" Rock meanwhile has the upper hand, as one orc is reduced to only so much raw meat and the other's slash misses, sending him onto one knee beside the fighter. However, from behind him a crossbow bolt is launched.. its 'twang' sounding clearly over the other sounds nearby. Rock smirks and leaps up into the air and comes down on the dagger wielder slamming a khi charged fist into it's skull. But the twang...Rock begins to turn and, "Kah!" it wedges in his shoulder, "You piece of shit!" he charges across the groun elbow extended. Xue Qian releases this massive pent-up spell, sending icy magickal energy straight up, into the now-gathering, black clouds. Thunder can be heard, and after a moment, wave after wave of icy spikes begins to rain thick, razor sharp spikes of ice down upon the battlefield, mostly directed towards teh opposing army, but no ones perfect, and accidents can happen if one is not careful. Her eyes are open, and blaze with intense, icy blue trailing light. Rock smirks and leaps up into the air and comes down on the dagger wielder slamming a khi charged fist into it's skull. But the twang...Rock begins to turn and, "Kah!" it wedges in his shoulder, "You piece of shit!" he charges across the groun elbow extended. [rp] The fire and pain only cause Latran to bite down harder. the pain begins to elevate and then there is an explosion, is the only way to put it. A massive sphere of crimson ki, bursts out from Latran, sending a shockwave out in all directions, all in the orb going silent as it sucks all sound out of the air. Then another sphere bursts, all the sound absent previously roars in this one as waves upon waves of energy wash over friends and foes alike around Latran. The energy coming from Latran can only be described as immense, and only one other on the battlefield may know what it means. Xue Qian's eye twitches as she feels it, knowing exactly what it is Latran is doing, and only barely manages to keep her fear under control and keep channeling the raining icy death shards, a bead of sweat appearing on her brow at the strain Rock's elbow meets soft flesh, bone snapping as the green-skinned humanoid is sent flying back into one of its black-fanged enemies, taking not just the blow from the blonde fighter but also a shortsword into its back and through its stomach at the other side. Its only retaliation is to shove its loosed crossbow forward, attempting to at least get some kind of blow in as it gurgles its death rattle. Shortly after this sounds, all hell breaks loose as Xue's spell takes effect. Heads snap upward, attentions diverted completely and beady eyes widening in fright. Horrified cries tear through the night and holes appear in the throng all around as all struggle to get away from the piercing spikes.. hundreds failing and being impaled, blood flowing every which way, sickening crunches and splatters sounding across the field. Then Latran's attack comes, the cry of the demonic being echoing above those of its fellows and its victims in their agony as its torn apart by the blow and its acidic blood flows forth in torrents from its neck. Nearby Samantha just cries out and drops to the floor in a tense crouch, wincing in pain before suddenly a torrent of her own ki bursts out.. or is it her own? This is a bright golden, and forms a shield of sorts around her, keeping her safe from harm and out of view from those around her - who are dying by the dozen, torn to shreds, bone breaking and flesh tearing. The ground at the front of the field is soon awash with blood, the rubble-strewn earth slick with death, and the smell of fear filling the air. Latran stands among the gore, burned by fire and acid, and cackling like a mad man. His eyes, now glowing and unearthly red scan the battlefield. "Fear... fear.. death... pain..." And he begins to laugh in more mad rage. He spots a red stripe, and cocks his head at it, grinning to scare a demon. He zips forward at lightning speeds and removes the orc's liver. "Bleed! Bleed! HAHAHAHAHA!" Another orc stupid enough to sneak up behind him gets decapitated by a back hand. "Heee......." Rock looks for another opponent and motions at one with his hand, "Come on! You've got nothin on me!" he then swipes his hands at the target, "Double Reppouken!" the blast of khi tearing across the ground at his target. Xue Qian has to stop channeling the ice spell, and the shards stop falling. Seeing her projectiles littering the dead ground, she casts once again, this time simpler, and using her ice shards as a more minor focus. The temperature of the ground begins to drop rapidly, the blood freezing solid, making a nice, large, red skating rink on a large portion of the battlefield. She knows Latran's situation, and is scared, but knows he ultimately wont hurt HER, and at the moment, thats all she really worries about in this large a fight. Burrowing out of the ground beneath Latran comes a pair of massive claws which rip out from the blood stained earth only to grab his legs and attempt to pull him off his feet. Rising up from the soil, the beast's bone covered face is a nightmarish site. Small horn-like spikes stick out of it's head at various angles, and it's tough hide, where exposed from the bone plating, is spotted with brown spots that almost appear to be eyes. The beast cackles as it lunges for the organ stealing kobold, it's deep red eyes growing into slits as it sets it's eyes on it's intended prey... As the field clears of the last series of devastating attacks, the ranks to the north now have one aim in mind beside slaughtering each other - they now need to do away with this brand new threat. Blacktooth and Redstripe alike charge forward, the resulting stampede shaking the earth below and causing the blood-soaked rubble to shift. The cocoon of energy around Samantha dissipates as this stampede begins, and the nekogirl straightens up, heaving for breath as she sees the sight around her and looks to Latran... "What the... this is... Xue an' Latran....?" She shakes her head briskly and looks to the stampede, eyes widening further, "Dammit!" She ducks down and dashes forward towards the wall previously used by the demon who now lies twitching and gurgling in a pool of blood, its flesh hissing away from the acidic stuff.. all resistance gone as it dies. Reaching her destination, Sammy plucks two round objects from her body-warmer - having sheathed her shortsword en route - and pulls the pins on these grenades, slamming them down into little nooks in the dusty wreckage. She turns and sprints back a short way before crouching and waiting as the five seconds begin to pass.... meanwhile, Rock's next target is torn straight down the middle, chain links shattering and letting the flesh below be torn to the air. Though this target is one of only a few remaining in this section of the battlefield... others who survived the onslaught are running for their meager lives, slipping and sliding on the iced blood of their comrades, and of their previous opponents. Xue Qian makes a simple hand motion, and the frozen blood shoots upwards in dozens upon dozens, depending on teh size of the area covered, in rather large pikes of ice, impaling all who dont get clear in time, friend and foe alike Latran jumps away from the claws of the beast, and gibbers at it, cackling like some mad hyena. "Dance with me! Dance dance dance!!" He leaps to the side out of the way, spring boards off the ground, aiming to land and dig his claws into the beast's back. "Scream!" Rock curses loudly as the ice beneath deceides to tremble and he gets the fucking hell out of Dodge...at least diving away from any ice spikes that rice near where he was and shoulders rolls...and comes up gritting his teeth, "Fucking...." As yet more of the stricken creatues die from Xue's next spiked assault, their cries continuing to rend the air.. these cries are drowned out by the double explosion from Samantha's grenades. The entire section of wall is blasted outward, mortar raining down in shards and boulders for the oncoming horde. Dozens die from the initial impact, and their unleashed weapons and accidentally released bolts slay yet more orcs - Redstripe and Blacktooth dying together. "Heh heh... gomen nasai..." the nekogirl murmurs, glancing back at her handiwork, then springing to her feet. She blurs then, and reappears past the cloud of dust left by the explosion, those twin black daggers in her hands, "Heee-YAH!" Her fist blow slices warm flesh and virtually cuts the face from an opponent, before she becomes just a blur of motion, blood flying around her as she twists and turns, bending with inhuman grace amongst the mass.. dodging their blows for the most part and ignoring any that get through as she goes into her own variant of bloodlust, merely the love of battle.. of the fight propelling her onward. As Latrn jumps away, the beast rises completly to it's feet. Standing at just over 8 feet fall, the armored monster stares at it's insane prey and cocks it's head to the side. Once he jumps, the beast turns around quickly and goes to catch the creature by the throat with one arm as the other goes for the large axe strapped to it's back... Latran holds ups his arms to get grabbed instead of his throat. He may be insane, be he's not stupid.. n.n He swings from his arms, both feet coming up side by side, aimed for the face of this armored beast. All the while ranting in his insane litany. "Blood is life, blood is death, Oakali is blood!" Xue Qian uses a wind a modified wind spell to leap high into the air off the building top, flying downwards at high speeds, sword coming down on an enemy Orc, slicing it neatly down the middle. She looks up, spins, and with a quick slash, dices two more, beginning her own deadly dance with all the skill of one well-versed in the arts of the katana. Quick, close slices or stabs to vital areas make up her repetior*sp?* of the deceased. Rock charges his khi once again wings bursting from Rock's back and he rockets across the ground extending one fist and slamming it into the face of another target and then spinning and lashing out with a freezing kick to another and then slamming a punch into the kicked Redscars chest. It's face somehow grinning with satisfaction as it grabs it's prey, the beast grabs ahold of the axe and brings it around intending to slice off Latran's head. However, upon the sudden blow to it's own face, the monster stumbles backwards and looses it's grip on it's massive weapon sending it flying randomly off to the side. Cathching it's balance the beast screams in rage and thrusts it's catch head first against the ground with all the force and intent of smashing the kobold's face against the rocky blood stained street.... Samantha hesitates briefly as her ears twitch in mid-cut.. the black blade of one dagger halting inside the stomach of one staggering opponent. As its wide eyes find her, blood dripping from the side of its mouth, she pauses.. cocking her head to one side. The reason? Some of Latran's words registered across the battlefield. (Oakali? Then, he's...) Before the enemy all around can really pick up on her hesitation she starts to move again, ki now flowing down into the blades and.. becoming black, darker than the night the energy now as it flows into each cut and causes the orcs' cries to heighen in tone and volume, shrill death screams soaring around the neko along with the red-black blood soaking her. Others not involved with her begin to break off, many going for Xue and others surging past to engage Rock and Latran. The stream seems endless. Xue Qian slowly cuts her way to where Latran is, slicing endlessly, always single kills, leading into other attacks. A few hits land on her, leaving cuts in her armor, and the occasional lucky shot that goes between the plates and draws trickles of blood. Latran twists himself so he land on the ground with his feet. He shifs his arms to get a grip on the beast's arm. He attempts to use the beasts own momentum to send it flying over his head. And if it does going flying a bolt of lightning is launched out after it. Rock at this point stops expending khi allowing a group of the enemy to surround him and when it seems he'll be engulfed Rock curls his arms aroaround his body blue khi flaring up once more, he smirks and then slams his palms into the ground, "Raging STOOOOOOOORM!" and with that the engery explodes outwards from his body in a slicing tornado of blue khi. The beast screams as energy rips through it's form as it is indeed sent flying crashing atop a mound of discarded corpses, the beast lets out a deep growl. Standing, and clutching the remains of two orcs in it's hands, the beast hurls them towards Latran and Xue before loosing it's balance and tumbling backwards again. As blood spreys upwards from the crushed corpses it falls upon, it is more than apparent that the bolt of lightning took quite a bit more out of it than it had realised... Samantha pauses in her slaying once more, this time to draw herself back a half-pace. She slams one gloved hand back into the nose of an opponent behind her, the dull crunch of cartilage snapping sounding in her catlike ears... then she aims a vicious kick to the creature in front of her, bandaged foot crushing the orc's windpipe at the same as she shoves both hands out beside her... two black dagger finding their home in two black hearts. With that she releases the blades and kicks into a spinning upward flip, unwrapping her body a dozen feet into the air and hanging there again as her burning sapphire gaze locks onto a circling demon above. "Come to me!" She screams, her voice not quite her own, and fires off a burst to carry her upward at terrific speed.. her hands curled down towards the ground behind her. As the fingers extend, those daggers suddenly materialise and she grips their hilts tightly... before nearing the red-skinned creature. Flapping its black wings, all it has time to do is raise its fire-clad scimitar before it meets a vicious uppercutting slash from one dagger, followed by a spearing knee to the stomach the briefest flicker of a moment later. The thing buckles, spewing fire down below and searing more orcs to cinders. The nekogirl holds that position with a grin before pushing away and flinging both daggers forward from her hands... the blades embedding in the demon's horned skull. It plummets to earth with a stricken roar. Meanwhile Rock's attack is just as effective as he might have hoped. The crushing throng around him is broken, green-skinned muscular bodies flying like scattered woodchips in every direction, little more than sacks of flesh torn open by the 'Storm.. blood rains down from the skies before the forms flop back down onto the blood-iced earth. And Rock has a lull as those left nearby refuse to approach, fear in their eyes... Rock gasps for breath standing up straight and then heaves a sigh opening his red eyes his right hand burns with Khi brightly and Rock clenches his fist bringing the rage that wishes to surge out under control, "Thanks for tteaching me some stuff Jack..let's just hope it lasts." he then looks at some of the assembled demons, "Bring it." Latran dashes to the side and picks up the demon's axe. He heaves it over his head and rushes head long at the poor creature. Axe blade aimed for neck, to return a favor. Xue Qian holds her sword out in front, the tossed body being sliced in half as it makes contact with her lethal blade. She takes a hit from a light hammer to the lower back, and cries out in pain, but keeps her balance, the armor taking the brunt of the damage. She spins around in a circle, slicing everything 360 dagrees around her, and leaving a ring of sharp ice floating around her, which seperates and shoots into four directions around her, swathing a bloody path through a few ranks around her. She then waits for the next oncoming attacker, teeth bared in anger Only two of Rock's taunted opponents will step forward, the others hanging back wide-eyed and fearful.. many even struggling through the throng to get away. Ancient emnity is seemingly forgotten now, Blacktooth and Redstripe cowering together for comfort from these new demons.. these demons they never expected to face. Coming at Rock is one burly specimen who looks too stupid to feel fear, bearing down on the fighter with a greatsword cutting the air... and the other is a scrawnier creature wielding two long daggers much like those Sammy is now wielding. They attack as one.. intent on taking out this one demon. Samantha lands shortly after her opponent, whose muscular form shakes the earth, throwing up a wash of rank, bloody dust. The neko-nin remains in her position for a time, experiencing the same phenomenon as Rock... none of the orcish hordemembers willing to approach her right now. She stands slowly, letting those living daggers materialise once more between her slender digits. "An' now I'm comin' for ya, Benedict... I'll get my revenge." She says this in a dark murmur to herself, flashing a grin before she plunges forward into the throng.. kicks and slashes cutting down more of the unfortunate greenskins as they struggle to get away from the black energy whipping out from around her form. She makes as one possessed, for an old bunker-like structure further into the battlefield.. easily visible to any who look her way as the dark ki whips around her and curtains of blood rise to her left and right as daggers slice flesh. The monster sits up just in time to whitness it's own axe suddenly come inbedded into it's own throat. Screaming in agony, the beast grabs for the weapon's hilt, only to worsen the wound by ripping the axe loose. Blood flowing freely from the huge gash, the creature's head nearly comes free and it's scream is abruptly replaced with a horrible gurggle. Collapsing forwards, the creature dies patheticly. It's hands still clutching the axe tightly... Latran rips the axe free from the creature's grip, caressing the blade as he smiles. "I fine trophy... yes.." He smiles at the nearest group of orcs. "Play with me? I shall show you true chaos!" He starts to sends small shocks of lightning at the orcs, not lethal, more like cattle prods, cackling every time one squeels from being zapped. Xue Qian begins casting, and releases her quick spell, causing one orc opponent to suddenly start moving veerrryyy slowly, whom she quickly cuts the arms and legs off of in two quick slashes, then leaves alive. She, too, begins to aim for inflicting injuries of a more non-lethal, but much mroe painful, manner on her opponents, eyes getting a little more feral and savage, and she seems to be grinning a little more maniacly. Not quite insane, just letting her darker sadistic side show much more. She slices one orc's achillies tendons in a ducking slash, letting herself spin, making a slash across anothers face, cutting his eyes almost in half. The orc falls back, blinded, but alive, while she continues to wreak havoc gleefully Samantha reaches the iron-and-mortar bunker at a virtual sprint, her slicing almost mechanical now as she enters the flow of battle totally. But then.. it breaks, as she spins and kicks away an assailant who approaches from behind before spinning up onto the roof of the structure. She snaps her gaze backwards to take in her companions, and lifts her voice in a snarling cry. Suddenly both hands are thrown out, the daggers vanishing in black mist and appearing holstered behind her in their leather loops. Then the black mist coalesces into darker, more solid energy and fires off in a hundred ebon lances.. each seeking a foe and then carrying on through, spearing orcs by the dozen as the girl continues to sneer, her expression contorted in maddened fury. As bodies fall left and right, it makes a gruesome path of sorts from the front of the field, through to where the girl stands. Finally the spears of darkness are gone and she calls out, waving a hand through the air, "Here! This is the place.. I feel it!" The path remains eerily clear, most of the orcish number now frozen in place.. those that aren't attempting to retreat to the north at any rate. Xue Qian stops, glaring around, bangs shading her eyes, only one of which is visable, glowing dark blue, almost purple, through her dark hair. None of the orcs are attacking, and those still present seem no longer hostile by their actions. She looks around, sheathign her sword, and makign a beeline for whereever Latran is, the bunker 2nd on her priority list ATM Badlands - Sector E3
Samantha all but hurls herself through the corroded iron door of the bunker. Her mithril blade is in her hand in an instant, that familiar metallic whisper filling the musty air as she strides forward.. shifting its weight comfortably in her right hand as her tail gives a dramatic sweep behind her. "Let's do this..." she murmurs, flashing a crooked grin, before glancing back at the door as it swings on its hinges, ravaged by the conditions in the Badlands. In front of her the riveted metal walls of the room - barely six feet apart - lead in for a short distance before giving way to darkness, at the edge of this gloom steps just visible leading down. Xue Qian steps into the bunker behind Sam, fresh blood from the slaughter outside still dripping from her clothes, some hers, most theirs. She grins somewhat savagely at Sam, sheathing her sword, and calling Essence to herself, creating a small orb of literally cold blue light, which drops the temperature a few dagrees. She says nothing, however, the feral glint in her eyes and smile on her face saying volumes more than words could. Latran slinks in, looking more a wild beast than the normally sedate kobold. He swings his head about quickly, ears flicking about as he tries to catch sounds around him. He sniffs at the air experimentally with a frown. He speaks, his voice echoing of its own acord, as if Latran's own voice is overlapped by that of some demon. "As long as there is blood to spill." "Calm yerself big guy." In comes Rock looking surprisingly calm considering. He cracks his neck and looks over at his sister, "So where do we go from here? or are we just winging it?" Samantha's grin broadens at Latran's words, her sapphire eyes flashing in the dank light of the bunker. She's obviously not totally in sorts herself, those twin black daggers slung at her back still pulsing as if alive, almost as if feeding.. sucking on some unseen source. The slender nekogirl turns her grin likewise to Xue for a moment then looks to Rock. Her expression softens a little now she is focused upon her brother, and she shrugs her shoulders, "I guess we'll take those stairs down, huh?" She jerks the thumb of her free hand back over her shoulder, then spins to face the end of the bunker. The hand then shifts to the blade of her sword, and a sharp burst of blue-white ki is released which thunders down the blade, electrical crackles sounding as energy lights the shiny surface and spreads its light to the room. "C'mon..." she strides towards the steps, her sword's glow lighting the pitch black as she nears... and she heads down without another word. Xue Qian follows after Sam, grinning still. "Come out, come out, whatever you are" she says in a not-so-friendly tone Latran bounds ahead, making sure to get in front of Sam and Xue, gentlemen protect the ladies, even if everyone happens to be loony no need to throw out decorum.. He keeps going down, sniffing at the air. Rock cracks his knuckles and moves to the front as well looking about, he may not be the stealthiest guy on earth but he has enough sense of what to look out for. Samantha leans to the side as Latran comes bounding past, letting him take the lead after a slight petulant glare. She then heads down into the retreating darkness, which as the last member of the group makes their way onto the narrow stair - which is wide enough to admit two shoulder to shoulder - will begin to close in around them once more. Everything seems perfectly normal for a long time as the stair heads straight down and onward, lichen-encrusted brick marking the path. The odd patch may be a little slippery as a result. Provided this goes relatively without incident, the group will begin to notice a strange phenomenon creeping in... black veins running through the dull brown-grey stone. And an aura begins to pervade, the faintest hint of an evil prescence lurking in the air. Xue Qian glances from left, to right, to center, noting the odd decor, and silently trying to try tracing its source magicly. Otherwise, she is silent as she follows Latran pokes the wall, sniffs, shrugs. Then speaks in that echo. "Need to get the number of their designer.." He chuckles and continues on. Rock says, "I know plenty of people who would love the decor." he sighs, "I'm just surprised we haven't run into any resistance yet." Samantha gives an inadvertent shudder as she lets her gaze slip along those eerie black veins. She swallows and grins back at Rock, hiding a sudden feeling of panic with the cockiness she has already been exhibiting naturally, "They're prob'ly just scared... might even just be the guy himself, in which case..." she shrugs and looks back around, her bandaged feet gripping the stone tightly enough she doesn't have to worry about keeping her footing. "I can't blame him." Suddenly above her head a series of veins twist about the rock and then merge together, before expanding outward.. within the space of three seconds the ceiling is entirely black, and then it spreads in half that time to the walls and finally the floor. The neko-nin stops dead with a short gasp, and then shifts grip on her blade again, which promptly gives up the energies surrounding it. They dissipate into a fine mist before fading completely.. some of the light fading from the area. "N-nani..?" The girl's hand goes back to the base of the blade, her eyes widening after a moment's pause. Xue Qian narrows her eyes, watching, her 'cold light spell' still in effect, as she isnt drawing from the environment "Hit a nerve, did we?" Latran looks at the veins, and shakes his head, continuing to walk deeper. "Come on, we'll never figure it out standing here." Rock says, "...Well this is great..." his hands tremble slightly the inner demon inside wanting out, "Let's get this fucker...." Well seems Rock's control is starting to slip a little. Samantha remains where she is, shaking her head. "N-no.. wait..." she seethes, glaring down at her hand as ki bubbles at the fingertips and then dissipates the moment it leaves her pale flesh. As she frowns at her inability to utilise her energy, there are a few faint noises, like those of an egg slowly being cracked apart and then.. holes appear in the black walls, revealing a white void behind for just the briefest instant before dozens of hands burst through into view. They take on the appearance of the hands of the creatures that were battled outside, coated in thick green skin but otherwise human. They are larger though, two or three times the expected size and the arms they are attached to are scaled to match... most disturbingly they are covered in deep, ugly scars and stitched, many of which have burst open and leak blood and pus. The yellow-nailed fingers fly out at the ends of bleeding hands and grasp for those standing on the stairwell, horrible moans filling the air as they do so. That evil aura is suddenly much stronger, and very much traceable should Xue still have the concentration to try... Xue Qian never stopped sensing for a source, something that takes little focus to do. However, it takes enough that shes grabbed by one, in retaliation to which she hurls the small ice-light shes been carrying at it "I hate gropers!" >.< Latran holds his hand out to the wall, sending out a blast of electricity that arcs from his sword. If it can it spiders along the wall, begining to infuse the wall and ceiling with a steady jolt of electricity. Rock hops to the side and releases a reppouken at one of the hands, however, he get's snatched by one from behind which his struggles against, "Damn it...I aint yer boyfriend!" Samantha lets out a gasp as the hands make their way through the walls, and spins to the side. As she flies away to be impaled upon the grope of three grasping claws, her hand is flung out to the side away from her blade and lets off another burst of energy. This time as the fingertips brush against one extended green arm there is a smell of burning flesh, the tough skin sizzling under her touch. Meanwhile Xue's hurled ball of ice essence meets gnarled fingers the barest inch from her hand and the limb takes on a pale hue, paralysed for the moment. As for Rock's Reppouken and Latran's blast of lightning, they both dissipate away as they leave contact with flesh and fail to find renewed contact soon enough. It seems it's not just the nekogirl who can't throw around her energies right now. Xue Qian crouches into a stance as she spins around, and performs an Iaijutsu draw, attempting to slice a few of the hands off the wall "I've heard of disarming my opponents, but this takes the cake so far" Latran spread his arms out to the side, standing completely still despite the hands gripping and pulling at his already seared and burned flesh. "The blood calls, screams answer..." Divine energies begin to rise around Latran, soar is more like it. "Break the bonds, free the world, return all to the begining!" Black portals begin to form in the air, "Annihilation!!" Blades seemingly comprised of pure blood, but sharp as an atom edge begin to dance around, seeking and slicing. But oddly they pass through allies, doing nothing to them. Latran spread his arms out to the side, standing completely still despite the hands gripping and pulling at his already seared and burned flesh. "The blood calls, screams answer..." Divine energies begin to rise around Latran, soar is more like it. "Break the bonds, free the world, return all to the begining!" Black portals begin to form in the air, "Annihilation!!" Blades fly from the portals, seemingly comprised of pure blood, but sharp as an atom edge begin to dance around, seeking and slicing. But oddly they pass through allies, doing nothing to them. Rock lets out a loud "FUCK!" as one of the said blades passes through him and dispatches the hand attempting to grab him behind, and while he's stunned for a moment he kicks the arm in front of him and attempts to fall back to safety in the group since he has no weapons. Samantha winces as the hands continue to grab at her, sharp nails digging into her flesh and ripping as she concentrates. Her eyes close for a moment, letting the limbs continue their bloody work and then suddenly she releases a burst of ki off her entire body - blue-white energy hammering out into the air. It dissipates an inch from her form in every direction, but.. would do a good job of getting off those half dozen claws if not for the blade which slices through all of them in a single sweeping motion, passing through the nekogirl's shoulder as if then carries on to other targets. She opens her eyes then, and blinks at the crimson weapons soaring through the air. "There's.. there's more...?" She blinks again and looks to Latran, barely awake enough to throw up her left hand and fire off a ki-charged palm for another hand that comes arcing towards her from over her left shoulder. She stares at the kobold for a long moment as the now easy destruction continues. For every second hand lopped off, sliced to fall at the ground.. oozing blood and pus in fetid pools.. another emerges from the wall, the numbers only halving as this process continues. Xue's strike is also successful, bringing three hands to the floor with faint splatters, though more move to grab at her as the astral weapons are busy elsewhere. Xue Qian snaps her sword back into it's sheath, and grabs a pair of hands comign her way by the wrists, icy magicks answering her call, and causign the hands, arms, and all that she grabs to freeze, then shatter in her vice-like grip. However, two others make moderate slashes in one of her legs, and another in her side, although the armor takes the brunt of them. She continue's this pattern, grabbing, freezing, shattering, as fast as her hands can go, dodging as best she can when needed Latran cackles as the blades continue their dance, orcastrated with Latran's hand motions. He sends half to clear the way ahead, and the other half continue to dance around the four. "Move your butts, I can't keep this going forever, as much as I'd like to." He begins to prove his point by moving forward, and the swords start moving as well. Rock nods and begins advancing as well trying to knock the hands away with khi charged strikes. Samantha splutters as a blade cuts overhead and sends a stream of yellow-streaked crimson down upon her. She grimaces, reaching up to wipe the foul stuff from her cheek then she nods to Latran and ducks forward.. clearing a couple of dark steps in one bound. In the same movement she switches her sword to a two-handed grip and slices down through a couple of oncoming hands. "Gotcha.." she calls back briefly to the kobold then makes her way onward, imitating Rock to much the same effect as him.. her hand going out left and right as she hacks towards the front with her blade, effectively clearing a path though she still takes the odd clawed slash. Xue Qian nods, and takes off, yanking one frozen hand with her, crushing it into fragments as she goes, ducking and dodging hands, with the occasional Iai strike, as she goes Latran walks along, directing the slashes of the blade, flick of the finger here, wave of the hand there.. Rock more of the same of beating a swath through the hands. Xue Qian blinks as a hand about to grab her suddenly retracts back into the wall, and all returns to abnormal. With slightly less haste, she moves to the T junction Sam is at, looking down the left, then right right, then back again, waiting. She, too, is drenched in blood, but this is nothing new. Patiently, she waits for the others, thinking over what her scrying earlier had revealed c_c; Rock arrives at the junction covered in blood too, maybe not as much , but definitely enough, "Alright..we gonna split up here or just pick one path?" Latran stumbles into the cavern with a sigh, he drop his hands. Portals reform in the air and the blades fly through, the holes sealing with a flash of red. "Took you long enough." He twitches his ears and pulls himself erect, managing to look regal despite being bloody and burned. Samantha blinks up at everyone, finally seeming to come back to her senses as she gives a brisk shake of her head and pushes herself upright. "Well.." she says, pausing as she stretches lithely, her tail curling to match the curving of her back. She releases with a sigh and turns to look at the two paths, absent-mindedly wiping her blade upon her leggings as she considers each. Then she sheathes the sword and turns back around with a shrug at Rock, "We split up I guess... best way, right? ONE way's gotta be right, coz..." she narrows her eyes, slipping a hand to lightly finger the bared blade of one of the daggers at her back. "He's close..." Xue Qian nods "closer than we think.... from what i sensed, its possible we might not get out alive..." she grins that feral, mad grin again "Perfect" Latran cackles and shakes his head. "And I'm supposed to be the crazy one." He sniffs at the air, waving his hand to motion for everyone to be quiet. "Let's see if I can find him." Rock folds his arms over his chest, and just stands there quiet. Samantha glances at Xue and slowly nods, a little grin of her own emerging once more. "We'll win..." she murmurs, turning her gaze to Latran and raising an eyebrow. "You got an easy way? I c'n tell he's pretty close, but.. that's about it." She falls silent, watching the kobold as she reaches behind and pulls the two daggers free. Their dark hilts slip into her hands softly, and she holds the weapons by her side casually, occasionally giving each a quick spin. Xue Qian snerks as she watches latran do what he does best: track prey "Your not the ONLY crazy one, muzzlemutt" o_- Latran looks back and forth. "I smell two things, mix of those things out front and... something demonic.. that way." Points left. "That way" Points right. "I smell only those things outside." Samantha smirks and twirls both daggers, letting them spin in the air for three fast rotations before her fingers wrap around their hilts again.. each falling into her palm with a soft slap. "Then.. I'm goin' that way..." she inclines her head to her right, the left exit as you face that end of the cavern, and then turns to head off that way. Something changes in her own aura as she tightly grips those black blades, which pulse a little faster with that eerie life of their own. Xue Qian shrugs, smirking "Guess the demons it is.... hafta see if we can get front row seats" >=) Samantha strides ahead down the passage, not pausing to wait for anyone or casting a glance back. Her gaze is fixed determinedly ahead, every muscle in her body that is free to remain tense is kept so. Strangely this entire area - the cavern and now the dry rocky passage - is lit with a glow that makes everything clearly visible, though it's not particularly bright and has a certain unwelcoming hue. Xue might well sense that it's somehow tied to that evil aura. As the nekogirl continues along she soon comes to a darker area, where the ceiling which has been around six feet up suddenly shoots upward, disappearing into darkness somewhere up above. The passage itself is wide, with plenty of room to move on the reasonably smooth and clear floor. But each wall, to the left and to the right, in this place is not plain rock but instead shimmering quartz, which mirrors those within its gaze. The girl pauses just inside this section of the package, glancing around with eyes narrowed... Xue Qian steps in behind Sam, hands slightly cupped and ready to summon Essence into spells at the drop of a hat, but otherwise is as silent as possible Rock follows along after Samantha and when they reach the wide open chamber he gets noticebly nervous, "Shit...What are we gonna run into now?" Samantha shakes her head, "I dunno..." her gaze continues to flicker back and forth for a few seconds then, setting her shoulders, she strides forward a few paces. "Only one way'ta-" she cuts off and drops to a crouch, her bandaged feet kicking up a little dust as they grip the floor. Her ears twitch. "Find out." Up above something can be heard to shift in the darkness, and then with a sharp hiss something zips down, moving at incredible speed and kicking up a cloud of dust to match such velocity. Standing there is a creature like those faced on the battlefield above but.. twisted. Malovolent red eyes stare out from below a high forehead, the thing's face covered in scars. His thin lips twist in a grin as he stares across at the intruders, and one long-nailed hand shifts to the hilt of a sword at his side. His other hand.. doesn't seem to exist, as instead a mass of arm-length tentacles protrude from his shoulder. After a moment a long tongue darts out, forked, and runs across the creature's lips. Rock keeps himself from qretching at the site of the creature... "God damnit...and here I was hoping things couldn't get worse." Xue Qian raises an eyebrow at the large creature "Oh yum... If i remember my jokes correctly, Rock's the only one who shouldnt be worried..." she is, of course, looking at the tenticles, and being ever the smartass, even as sweat beads along her forehead in worry (This will either go really well... or really BADLY) c_c; Rock keeps himself from qretching at the site of the creature... "God damnit...and here I was hoping things couldn't get worse." [RP See] Samantha blinks back at Xue, not sure what THAT means, "Why shouldn't Rock be-" as she looks away the creature takes it as an invitation to move and darts forward. Darts is about right too, the movement virtually instant... and he's there, crouched in front of the nekogirl as she looks back around. With a startled cry she throws up her right hand, the dagger gripped pickwise as she attempts to deliver a fierce uppercutting slash. It meets only air as the thing shifts back, moving half the distance back to its original location... about six feet from the girl, who straightens up hurriedly and snaps back into a dagger-wielding variant of her usual stance. "F-fast..." she stammers out, wanting to cast another glance back but almost too afraid to... Xue Qian begins to cast, light blue energy surroundign her, eyes also glowing the same eerie blue color. Several small dots of ice begin to appear in a grid-like pattern, all throughout the room. Afterwards, she grins ferally at the thing "Now... the stage is set...". She draws her sword, and stands ready, although theres a brief flash of magic as she does so. If sam and rock look carefully, they might notice a slight dripping of water off of the handguard of the sword. the small 'dots' look like floating icecubes, perfectly stationary, about 2/3rds rocks height off the floor Rock however is only thinking of attacking at this point, just to try and size the thing up, Rock suddenlly launaches his body towards the creature, khi propelling him forewards, elbow extended and if he makes contact with the the creature he follows up by thrusting the hand hand forwards in a khi khi cahrged palm thrust, his twin wings of blue khi spreading from his back for a moment before dissappearing once more. Samantha's eyes flash and promptly narrow as Rock fires on past her, and she tenses up herself.. ready to move in if his attack misses. From the creature, there is simply a feral hiss as it stands now a good distance away from Rock - near of the back of the mirrored section of the passage and framed between two blocks of Xue's ice. The hiss ends, and that forked tongue flies from between his lips, coloured a nasty dark blue. As it reaches the point one would think it must surely be due to retract again, the movement entirely snakelike, it keeps going.. lengthening and shooting past Rock on towards the waiting nekogirl. As it moves, the forking ends get longer separately, and spiral around each other almost in a hideous imitation of Samantha's own 'Spiral' ki projectile. Calmly she shifts her feet, expression now almost that she usually wears whilst fighting - a kind of smug confidence mixed with total self-assured calm taking over at least on the outside - and flips up over the thing. Straightening in the air above, framed at the edge of the darkness there, she draws her hands back.. the two daggers poised and ready to throw while she hangs there for a few seconds, little traces of ki working off her feet and shoulders, keeping her suspended. Xue Qian casts another spell, increasing her speed via wind enhencement, and leaps up and sideways, runs along the wall a few moments, then leaps down at an angle past and behind the thing, slashing with her sword at a downward angle along its back, but with an added magical twist. A 'whip' made entirely of steaming-cold water, mixed with frosty patches, swings out as she slashes, going just beyond the blades tip. if the blade hits, itll be an extra deep hit as both would hit as one. if he dodges too little, the 'whip' will likely make a nice, although less damaging, slash along its back.
Latran snatches his arm away, glaring at Xue. "If you're going to grab me, at least be useful about it and freeze up some of my leaks, eh?" He continues to walk, and is indeed dripping blood from a few places. His whole manner is different now, an almost excited feel flows around him. Samantha isn't much better off on the blood front, her hair slick with the stuff and dark patches virtually covering her black body-warmer. She doesn't seem to care though, and that softly pulsing purple gem on her chest is working to fix what cuts she does have. Her gaze continues to flicker back and forth for a few seconds then, setting her shoulders, she strides forward a few paces into the room, and looks left and right before turning around. "Are you guys-" she cuts off and drops to a crouch, her bandaged feet kicking up a little dust as they grip the floor. Her ears twitch. "Comin'?" Up above something can be heard to shift in the darkness, and then with a sharp hiss something zips down, moving at incredible speed and kicking up a cloud of dust to match such velocity. Standing there is a creature like those faced on the battlefield above but.. twisted. Malovolent red eyes stare out from below a high forehead, the thing's face covered in scars. His thin lips twist in a grin as he stares across at the intruders, and one long-nailed hand shifts to the hilt of a sword at his side. His other hand.. doesn't seem to exist, as instead a mass of arm-length tentacles protrude from his shoulder. After a moment a long tongue darts out, forked, and runs across the creature's lips. Rock follows the group down and the sight that greets him is...agh. He almost gags, "Just what I need to see..." he quicklly moves into a ready stance and prepares, this is not going to be fun. Xue Qian blinks at the big thing before she can respond to latran, then gets a very feral grin, and a look in her eyes to match "Ooohhh... a new playmate. Hope we don't break this one as quickly as the ones upstairs". Latran flips Hollow from his sheath. "Ready to dance, my friend." The sword responds with a bluish white glow and the smell of o-zone filling the air. Latran shifts his hands on the hilt and twists, the sword alters into a double-bladed sword, which is spun a few times for effect, leaving a static trail. "Then dance we shall." Rock swipes both hands at the creature, "Double Reppouken!" and releases the double khi blast before moving away from the creature as quicklly as possible. It's gonna be a hell of a night. Xue Qian closes her eyes, Essence glowing around her as she weaves a spell. What appear to be ice-cube sized chunks of ice appear throughout the room in a gridlike pattern, floating about 2/3ths rock's height above the floor. This done, she also points a hand at Rock, sending an ice enchantment to his hands(gloves) and feet(shoes). This being done, she draws her sword, which, to the noticing eye, is dripping the occasional drop of icy water... Latran starts to run, and after a few seconds is moving at high speed through the cube maze, hoping to come up behind where he last saw the demon, sword held out like a pike, the tip giving off electrical bolts. Rock looks around and then begins to move through the cube maze himself to find the beast, just what he needed in the middle of a battle. Samantha's eyes flash as she senses the others moving around her and she snaps back into a dagger-wielding variant of her usual stance; side-on to her opponent, right leg extending out in front of her and the left held at a sharp angle to the other side, feet set firmly. With a flourish she simultaneously raises her arms, left hand coming to rest with fingers loosely curled beside her forehead, right hand extended in a beckoning motion. From the creature, there is simply a feral hiss as with a whisper of air it stands now a good distance away from Latran - coming up right beside Rock in the maze of ice. Apparently its control over this speed is good too, the abominable half-demon perfectly capable of navigating and thinking at such momentum. In its hand, the black-bladed longsword pulses as it is thrust below one floating ice cube towards Rock's right thigh, with a fair turn of speed though one likely matchable by the young fighter. Even as this is done, with another hiss that forked tongue flies from between the thing's lips, coloured a nasty dark blue. As it reaches the point one would think it must surely be due to retract again, the movement entirely snakelike, it keeps going.. lengthening and shooting around through the maze on towards the nekogirl whose back is now nicely turned away. As it moves, the forking ends get longer separately, and spiral around each other almost in a hideous imitation of Samantha's own 'Spiral' ki projectile. Rock passes one cube and sees the creature, releasing a sing Reppouken before sliding behind it again attempting to get behind the creature and flank it. Xue Qian casts a quick, simple wind spell, and LEAPS into the air, up and over the creature. She lands on the wall above him, and with a quick downwards kick off the wall, streaks down behind it, slashing at it's back, but with an added twist. A makeshift 'whip' made of cold, icy water, and a bit longer than the blade of the sword, lashes out as she swings. If the slash hits full force, both'll hit for increased damage. If the sword misses, theres a possible chance of the 'whip' still hitting, doing some minor damage. In any case, she lands behind it, stopping momentarily to regain her balance after that heck of a forceful landing Latran slides to a halt when he sees the creature down one of the aisles. He shifts the weights off his sword in his hand, and sends it flying towards the creature, looking like a free spinning circular saw blade flying down the path tearing up peices of stone from the floor. A stream of lightning connects Latran's hand to the blade like a cord, if the blade gets close to hurting an ally it will fly back to his hand. Samantha's gaze promptly narrows as she hears the faint sound as that sickening tongue come up behind her, and with incredible speed her feet tense and she kicks into a spinning flip into the air. Once she leaves the ground she tucks into a ball, tail curling around her tightly packed slender form.. then unfolds a good twenty feet up, well into the darkness. She comes down into view, at ten to twelve feet, and hangs there as she releases a sharp burst of ki, the stuff continuing to work off her bandaged feet and her shoulders while her hands draw back and then slam forward, a single blade flying forth from each. The black blades pulse a few times in the time it takes to travel - whatever is controlling them seemingly very excited right now. And each meets the tongue of the beast as it hastily tries to retract. This hesitation causes the next blow intended for Rock to rip past his right shoulder, the longsword's similarly black blade going past in a thunderous blur. The sword then is impaled into the dusty floor as the creature leans away from the impact of the slash from Xue, which hits home quite nicely, slicing through the thin sackcloth tunic worn by the thing and tearing a gigantic gash in his back. Red-black blood spatters out, in a fetid arc back towards Xue. "Shit!" that blade goes whizzing past him and Rock takes a moment to catch his breath, "Fucking..." a quick glare is given to Latran before he turns back to the creature and waits for Xue to clear out before releasing another Reppouken at the creature. Xue Qian is already covered in blood, so she makes no attempt to dodge the stuff, not paying it any mind, as she sheaths and jumps back after a moment. She stops, and begins drawing Essence to herself, waiting for an opening for a nice spell, still behind the critter Latran is appearantly still sending his sword flying.. c.c; "Shit!" that blade goes whizzing past him and Rock takes a moment to catch his breath, "Fucking..." now he's pissed. He releases another Reppouken before moving positions again trying to work in closer to the thing. Latran rushes forward as the blades spin lands home, and he keeps it grinding into the monster as long as he can. As he reaches his sword, he grabs it and spins with a stab towards the thing's chest. Samantha lands on her feet a moment later, her hair flapping soggily around her rather than settling so lightly as it usually does. Her feet shift in the dirt and she starts to run forward again but.. as her steely gaze finds the beast whose tongue is now pinned neatly to the ground, blood soaking in beneath it.. she watches Latran's blade hit home and grind into the thing's arm and left side... the limb lopped off now halfway down its length and a torrent of sickly smelling stuff pouring down into the floor. Against all the odds it begins to laugh, blood spattering left and right from its choking maw, and with a twitch as Rock's Reppouken hits home also, it starts to slump over... body turning entirely black. The mirrors of quartz to either side slowly start to crack, seemingly read to fall apart.... Xue Qian lets fly a spell, sending a whirring 'chakram' of sharp ice, attempting to decap the thing and finish it off Rock glares at the creature as it laughs, and at this point charges in and gives the damned thing a 'Dunk' hoping to shut it up permanently. Well... it was dying before. Now? The icy throwing weapon takes its head off, the tongue keeping its grip and bringing it down into the dirt at an odd angle, face planted down to the ground.. blood pooling about the severed neck, from which trail many greeny bulbous organic tubes. The body itself is sent crashing down by Rock's attack shortly after, dust kicked up as it does so. Then just as those walls seem ready to fall apart... they do, crystalline stuff falling down in large chunks. The sound is almost deafening as each wall gives way simultaneously, the resultant minor earthquake threatening to bring the ceiling down too. But it stays.. the sound then only replaced with a hissing voice, echoing out from down the corridor.. that evil aura still filling the room getting yet stronger as the voice sounds. "Come and find me... come and greet me. This is foolish." Darkness fades from the alcoves left as the mirrorlike walls gave way, and there within are a group of corpses, of the creature just slain... not decapitated but otherwise identical, their skin entirely black. Samantha doesn't even look.. on hearing the voice she straightens up from her defensive crouch - assumed as the quake began - and sets off for the narrow corridor... as she strides, those daggers appearing at her back, through their leather hoops. They no longer pin the creature's bleeding tongue. Xue Qian makes a sweeping hand motion, bluish residue Essence flickering off her fingertips as she puts her hand back to her sword "Guess that wasn't him, then.... go back and try the other path?". She looks to the unconscious Kobold "He'll be allright if we leave him here for now. He's had worse and come out fine." Rock grits his teeth at the words from that disembodied voice, "This is pissing me off. Everytime it's gotta be ooga booga, you merely killed a puppet. My father did it, NESTs did it...the fuck? Learn a new god damn trick." A dark chuckle sounds then, quite high pitched with a hint of madness.. though the evil intent there far overwhelms this. Then the hissing whisper again, as Samantha walks on without comment.. her tail flicking fast behind her as she strides towards the end of the next corridor.. which is simple stone, very narrow but seemingly dull. At the far end, some way away, it curls around and an arch sits on the right side, runes etched into its surface. "Why use a new trick when the old ones are enough to triumph? Come to me, brother of the tailed one and.. spawn of the elves. You shall all die this day... you are -fools- to seek my downfall." On 'fools' the whisper becomes four, all at s lightly different pitch and coming from a slightly different direction, then.. the ground gives another quake, short and sharp. Xue Qian puts one hand to the wall to keep her balance, fuming afterwards "Who are you calling spawn of the f$%&*@ elves?!?". uuhh oh. someone hit a nerve. the half-elf is NOT a happy camper after THAT comment "This thing needs to go belly up" she trudges quickly and angrily towards the door sam is heading towards, giving rock a look back to make sure hes coming Rock is coming alright, and not looking amused by big dark and gruesomes comments. Samantha gets to the end of the corridor and glances past the arch.. beyond it lies a sweeping chamber, stretching back deep into the earth. It resembles nothing more than a cathedral, though what gods would be worshipped here is a mystery... on either side, gigantic pillars mount the walls, and form alcoves of a sort between each pair. Nothing else marks the path to the 'altar' at the far off end of the room. This 'altar' is actually a tall plinth with a hundred narrow steps running up its height and at its top? A single figure, not large and not overly assuming at least from this distance.. though it is humanoid, that much can be discerned easily enough. With a screamed curse, Samantha makes her way inside.. the last thing Xue will glimpse is a lashing tail as the nekogirl throws herself through and starts to stride along the middle of the vast hall, the daggers soon appearing once more in her hands. "Let's do this, you bastard..." she murmurs darkly, a snarl contorting her lips then as she focuses on the figure. Xue Qian stops at the door as Sam disappears around the corner, looking back adn letting Rock go ahead of her before entering. She's magical fire support, and she knows it. As she enters, she directs a simple cold enchantment to Sam's weapons, not enough to cause ice damage, but enough to make the target struck be slowed down due to sheer cold Rock nods to Xue and and dashes after Sam, he's there for support folks. A low chanting begins, that chorus of voices rising together and echoing around the chamber. Samantha plows onward, until she finally nears the plinth. She stops.. and the figure turns around. The chanting then stops abruptly and with the same suddenness the room is suddenly scaled down - Xue, Rock and the nekogirl now all far closer together. Everything else remains the same, however. As the chanting stops the dark figure of Benedict turns around slowly, from where his back has been placed towards his would-be killers. He seems.. far less imposing than one might believe, should they not be capable of detecting an evil aura. He is similar in height and stature to an average human male.. a slender man clad in dark black chainmail, a strange greatsword slung across his back. Or.. not man, rather a particularly slender and lithe example of the creatures encountered in the Badlands, green-skinned and slightly neanderthal in appearance. The voice is the same as the one that hissed in the corridor moments before. "Welcome to my home..." his startling green eyes glint viciously, locking onto Samantha's own sapphire gaze, and a wind kicks up at the back of the chamber, pushing out at the backs of the three companions. "Come closer." Rock holds his ground narrowing his eyes distrustfully at Benedict, not to mention feeling a little disoriented from that shrinking. Xue Qian narrows her eyes, as the wind pushes her forwards a step, rage overcoming most of any fear present, also slightly off-center from the dimensional shifting, or what she equates to be dimensional shifting, anyway "Oh, I'm gonna come closer alright!" Samantha's voice starts in a murmur and works up to a gasping cry on the final syllable as she kicks off into a sprint up the series of steep steps. Benedict remains impassive at the top of the plinth, his unruly black locks shifting in the winds he himself has summoned. They get stronger now, urging the slender nekogirl forward as she runs. On reaching the top she lashes out with daggers, two quick cuts as she drops to a half-crouch - aiming the first for the throat and the second in an uppercutting slice from groin to throat. Both hit... sprays of blood flying out, but the god remains impassive, merely watching the girl with amusement as his wounds seal almost instantly. "How amusing.. you little ones can be so fun." His mailed right fist flies out as he leans forward, the speed and gathered momentum of the punch astonishing as it hammers into Samantha's cheek. She barely has time for a startled gasp before she is launched back a few feet, flying onto her back in the air... and it seems as if this demon is exactly as fast as the one encountered previously. As the girl goes soaring back down towards the floor, her body slowly turning, her daggers are released and clatter onto the steps below, each coming to rest finally on a different step.. one much higher than the other. Up above, Benedict straightens with a smirk and then looks to Xue at the back of the room. "Your turn.." the wind stops as the movement of the air in the room is suddenly turned inward upon the half-elf, their force all focused upon her. Xue Qian is hit hard by the sudden inverting of all the air pressure, and with a quick gasp of pain, she passes out, nose bleeding a little. while not completely unconscious and in REM, its definately enough to keep her down for a bit Rock grits his teeth and now tries to sieze the opening khi focusing in one hand ROck launches forwards with his Shining Knuckle attack. "How very dull..." Benedict hisses out, as he steps around Rock's attack. The speed is eerily deceptive, the godlike orc remaining totally visible and apparently barely making an effort.. he just.. moves. His right hand curls up into the air beside him, the air pressure around Xue again though nothing like as tightly... an attempt to lift her body into the air. His hand drops then and he focuses on Rock, tightening both chainmail-clad hands to fists. He smirks, "Shall we?" Meanwhile Samantha has continued her somersaulting fall through the air, only just managing to right herself in time to land catlike upon the stone floor.. the shock bouncing up through her slender form. "Strong.. too... strong...." she is gasping more than would seem necessary as she looks up at the high plinth where Rock and Benedict both are. Blood drips from a wide and bloody gash on her cheek, torn by the god's strike, and.. as the blood falls it quivers madly... some disturbance making it do so. The source of the disturbance seems to be a strange ball of light that has flickered to life off to the girl's side, inside one of the wall's pillared alcoves. It glows slowly brighter and brighter then.. begins to expand. Xue Qian is lifted off the ground, still dazed and outside the realm of consciousness Rock slides past Benedict slightly and turns lashing out with a kick at Benedict's chest before coming down and aiming a punch to his face. Benedict catches the first kick on his hand, dropping it from where it is raised. The mail soaks up the impact with a soft rattle... apparently it really is as it seems, no tricks just simple chain links. This motion will be mirrored in Xue now, the half-elf's form moving through the air in accordance with the movement from the god's hand. He just smirks a little wider as Rock's hand meets apparently very real and palpable flesh, a slight shifting of the shoulders the only perceptible reaction, along with the lidding of the eyes. (Very nice... you're strong. We should have some fun before I slay you, little one...) This time his voice sounds only in Rock's head... With a crackle of energies a silvery portal suddenly opens up within the alcove. The bright light eminating from it reflecting off of the pillers in the room giving everything an odd glow. Suddenly, stepping from the portal, a man cloaked in shadows appears and glances around. In a familar voice the man calls out, "Guess what folks, the caviliry has arrived!" As the man begins to laugh the darkness covering him fades and the form of Johnny C stands before the portal smiling like he's never done before. A few seconds later, before anyone can react, he's suddenly joined by another familar face. Dressed in a brown leather jacket and a pair of jeans the man runs a gloved hand through his blonde hair and smiles... Rock is kinda absorbed in the fight at the moment to really notice, "Son of a bitch!" he begins a series of punches and in a very berserked moment for Rock he rears back and attempts to headbutt Benedict in the face. Xue Qian is, well, floating in the air, still out Each blow lands, upon the equally mail-clad body and the bare muscular arms of the gloating greenskin. Then.. the headbutt. This hits home perfectly, and a spray of red-black blood flies out in response as Benedict's head jerks back. With this the hold upon Xue's form is suddenly released, sending her to the floor as the god himself rears back, body folding in on itself and then warping, twisting over backwards... and almost slithering through the air down the side of the plinth. The barest flicker of an instant after his form fades from view he reappears standing beside the still-motionless nekogirl, looking at the opened portal... specifically to the maniac. "Greetings.. my servant..." the god grins, showing sharp teeth inside his maw, and then looks down to Samantha as she struggles to right herself... unable to do so as a booted foot comes down upon her back. "I think not." Johnny glances around and spots his daggers. Before even attempting to make a move he holds his hands open at his sides and demands, "MINE!" Instantly the daggers are at his hands and his skin grows black as night once more. Dropping down like he was about to leap, the maniac readies his weapons and stares up at Benedict. His now white eyes full of hatred. "All right bitch... mind if your faithfull servent has a fucking word with you??? I got a bit of a problem with your healthcare package!" Charging forward he leaps towards Benedict and screams as his weapons go for the god's throat... Rock is about ready to feel victorious and then... oh now Rock's glaring down with all the fury he can, he begins descening the steps and throws his jacket aside and wipes hair from his eyes. Seems Rock's still looking to fight. Xue Qian is jostled awake by the landing, and benedict's words are enough for her still-waking mind to pinpoint. Looking in that direction from the ground, she points at him, managing to summon just enough Essence to cast her spell. A large spike of ice shoots from the ground behind Bene, angled at a 40 dagree angle from the floor, and aiming for his mid back. She may not be able to do much yet, but hopes thatll be enough to stun or immobilize him for the moment so others CAN. Afterwards, whether it hits or not, her head plops back onto the gound, waiting for the room to stop spinning Samantha cries out as Johnny speaks, her eyes widening, "J-Johnny..?" She struggles to look around now, rather than rise... but this time her movements are stopped again as another blast of air pressure is directed towards her slender form. "Still!" This hiss escapes Benedict before he darts backward, form blurring now as he uses his speed less eerily.. one mailed fist coming up to block the closest of NNY's daggers... the steel hisses in response, and bubbles away. Of course as he makes this backward manuever, he opens himself to Xue's spike of ice and there is a hideous scraping sound as metal jars against the frozen water. This leaves him open to any further attacks... for the moment. Meanwhile Sammy remains still... her body only giving a brief jerk in response to that sudden pressure before she is out like a light, only shallow breathing breaking past her lips. This gets a worried glance from the other occupant of the room, going seeming unnoticed as that silvery portal now closes, dropping the alcove into darkness around him. But.. the alcove is once more lit as golden energy floods out, lighting a form that should be familiar to all here... his blonde hair now rippling in a ki-induced wind. And a greeting is now directed towards the man descending the plinth, "Long time no see, Rock... ready to help me win this?" Rock is at the bottom of the steps when he senses that familiar khi and hears that voice. He smirks and looks over at the man who taught him everything he knows coming out of his dark mood, "You know it." he concentrates gathering his own khi, "Ready when you are." Johnny blinks watching the Benedict's guantlet seem to melt from his dagger's strike and grins. As the ice spike hits home he goes from grining to laughing. Without advancing he shrugs and twirls his daggers, "So.... looks like you got your hands full there... you need me to help you out? Poor thing..." Glancing from the corner of his eyes towards Terry and Rock he moves to grab Samantha and drag her out of the way quickly.... Xue Qian slowly and painfully pulls herself up, looking at Benedict with eyes covered in the shadow of her bangs. However, where her eyes would be can be seen faint purple eye-shaped glows, that look none too happy "Time for a coffee break... and i do mean Break". She stands there, Essence coming in large amounts, as she starts on something she hopes will be big enough to hurt this guy. No one makes comments about her heritage, THEN hurts her, and gets off scott free Terry tosses Rock a grin, then turns his attention back to the fray... deep blue eyes narrowing as they fix upon the slender figure just beyond NNY. "Thanks, Johnny..." he says softly as he steps forward from the alcove, raising his right fist which is lit with red-gold energy. "Keep her safe for me. And you... let's do this." he smirks humourlessly, staring down Benedict as the god straightens from his position against the spike. "Do what?" The orc hisses, reaching for the hilt of the greatsword protruding across his back, "You want to defeat me? When I could kill you all with a word... right here..? Why bother..." a smirk of his own cuts into his expression, and he glances between the small gathering, "A collection of fools like you are nothing to me. Have I not already shown that?" The blade comes free, and not black like the others displayed.. or even like the chainmail covering his form, instead it seems to be a normal sword. Terry shakes his head, letting his gaze find Xue briefly, "Hey, Xue.." then it's back to Benedict with another shake of his head, "Don't underestimate anyone here.. Rock... NOW!" With that he lunges forward, throwing his fist forward as he springs, the other arm out behind him as energies whip back around his tensed form, creating a reddy golden tunnel through which he travels straight for Benedict. Rock in the meanwhile charges after Terry performing his shining knuckle once more, only attempting to time it so that after Terry Strike, he does and then proceeds into the infmaous Rising Tackle. Johnny nods at Terry as he props Samantha up against a pillar. Standing just infront of her, guarding her, he tightly clinches his daggers in both hands and begins to use them to absorb as much of the negative energy in the room as he can, powering himself up incase he might need to step in. However, despite the increase in negative energies within him growing, turnning his thoughts dark and increasing his desire for vengence against Benedict, the maniac stands his ground. He made a promise to watch her, and damnit.... he's going to do it... Terry's fist slams into Benedict as the god hesitates before the dual assault. But he hardly seems afraid, or uncertain, and merely amused.. an eyebrow raising slightly. This drops as the blonde fighter's burning fist hammers into his chest, that built-up ki dissipating in a sharp flash and throwing the god back half a step. He then staggers a similar half-step to the right as Rock's fist makes contact similarly. Bringing his greatsword around as he falls, the green-skinned humanoid is then impaled on the end of Rock's initial kick and carried into the air by the succession that follow, the blade clattering to the floor loudly shortly after making apparently useless contact with Terry's jacket. As the two rise then into the air, Terry recovers from the blow and hops back with a breathless grin. (Guess I'd better thank Milly again, when I see her...) He spares a quick glance towards the others as he draws his right hand out to his side and starts to focus, golden energy flooding from his palm and scattering outward.. filling out the brightly burning form of a katana held between his lightly curled fingers. At the height of the attack by Rock, Benedict keeps going... travelling at a rapid speed up toward the ceiling high above, his arms splayed out and a sick chuckle breaking his throat. Oh, a good portion of that negative energy is likely coming from the diminitive half-elf sorceress standing not too far from the maniac and sam, eyes glowing with a faded purple light, teeth clenched in hate, and Essence sprawling around her as she weaves some high-end spell. Any magic sensitive folks would likely be eyeing her at this point, and the Essence itself is actually gettign thick enough around her to be visable to the naked, untrained eye. Rock flips back down and lands crouched to absorb impact before straightening back up and then looks at Benedict, "What's it gonna take...fucking a nuke?" Johnny glances briefly towards Xue as the darkness pours into him, filling his thoughts with simliar emotions. Turning his attention back towards Benedict he growls, his eyes begining to burn with a deep red, but still he holds is ground. His teeth tightly clinched, his body begining to radiate the black shadows that cover his flesh like a dark fog, blacking out the unconcious girl he's guarding along with anything else behind him. Watching but doing nothing only seems to be fueling his anger more... Terry grins at Rock as he completes the 'Astral Blade' technique.. a katana of pure white-gold energy now held in his outstretched hand. "I'd say we can spare him a little more time, right?" He glances across at Xue, inclining his head for a moment, then switches to a two-handed grip on the sword, bringing it up over his shoulder as he looks up at the still chuckling god. Benedict now doesn't rise any higher, but he's quite some way up - likely only one of those present would be able to leap such a height, and she's not in the best of conditions right now... and therefore also unable to sense the awesome magical essence gathered by Xue. "Hey, NNY.." Terry asks quietly as he remains looking upward, "You've dealt with this guy. What's he weakest against?" Xue Qian puts her hadns before her, slowly making the appropriet gestures for this spell, several rows of runes, composed of magickal energy, slowly revolving around her in rings, almost as if they were holographic images. Rock grits his teeth, "Y'know this floating thing is pissing me off..." he's feeling quite vulnerable not being able to attack his opponent who can do whatever he wants without reprisal. Johnny spits as his rage boils, "Weak against? Fuck if I know... something to do with intentions.... I think...." Terry nods.. twice, once to Rock and then again at NNY's words. "Right.. great." He heaves a sigh and looks down as up above Benedict continues his crazed laughter, starting to slowly spin in the air now. "Well, I now damn sure what my intention is... I reckon everyone else does too." He glances past the raised ki-katana at Xue again, watching her longer and more carefully this time. Xue Qian releases her spell, saying in a hollow, venemous tone "Clear!". There's a burst of cold magical energy centered on Bene, and going outwards about in an area of about 5 feet by 5 feet, causing a magical, cold-based slow to any and all in the effect area, friend OR foe. in an area in the center of that, about 3 feet by 3 feet, spikes of ice begin shooting up from the floor, then back down again, towards anyone in the area, at a rapid pace. From the ceiling, razer-sharp spikes of ice begin to fall in waves. From all around, ice javelins form in the air and fly at whatever is in the origional 5 ft by 5 ft area of effect, coming from 360 dagrees around the center. This continues for about a minute before the effects finally cease, the icy cloud still hanging there, continuing to keep slowed anythign within it, and slowing anything new to enter it. Xue Qian, herself, stops, catching her breath after the magnitude of the spell she just cast -.-; Rock is for the most poart outside of that area thanks to Benedict's floating position above them. He just hopes it brings the man down to earth. Johnny watches Xue's spell and grins, imagining it doing much more damage than it does. Images of blood soaked ice spikes dance through his mind. The urdge to spill blood growing within him so much he can nearly taste it. But... damnit... he promised. Trying to think of a way to join in the fight without leaving his friend unprotected, the maniac franticly glances around the room looking for something, anything, that might keep Samantha safe... the shards raining down would more than likely bring him down into the spikes on the ground, which would keep him high enough for the side attacks to also hit, which would also keep him centered on the middle of the 2 previous, thus doing maximum damage to any and all in the spells central maw Terry's eyes widen in surprise as he watches this all begin to go off.. and with a slight grin he lowers the blade and wanders around the outside of the jutting spikes, coming around opposite Rock and waiting as the effects continue, torrents of blood streaming down from on high. As the stuff slicks the floor, and colours the spikes of ice with its dark crimson hue, it becomes apparent that nothing so small can bleed so much... and the chuckling still continues, though it is broken by sharp gasps occasionally. Once the spell eventually comes to a close of sorts, that lithe form can be glimpsed up in the icy cloud, almost totally still. Then, it turns once, slowly and begins to fall... turning faster and falling with greater urgency as it leaves the cloud. Benedict finally hits the floor between the two blonde street-fighters, a cloud of blood bursting out from his broken body. And 'broken' is indeed right.. the chainmail coating him is sliced to pieces, links bent and busted, and bones jut out at crazy angles. Blood, pus, and organs are also all visible as a pool of the former spreads out thickly around the seeming corpse. Or.. no, that chuckle is still there, though it is muffled to begin with and then becomes more of a gurgle, bubbles floating up through the blood near Benedict's face, which is down upon the stone floor. Xue Qian falls to her knees, tuckered out for the moment. Big spell + lots of Essence spent + no latran to draw from at the moment = essence from within spent instead = VERY tired. Sweat freezes and flakes off her body almost as soon as it forms, and she breaths in hard ragged gasps. For the moment, shes out of commission Rock twitches, "God...damnit...stay dead you sack of shit." Rock's starting to slip one eye twitching in irritation, one hand clenching into a tighter fist. Johnny takes a step forward, his hands shaking as the bloody mess hits the ground, but still he holds back. Barely... The hilts of his daggers now growing so black from the boy's intent that they seem to be drawing in not only the negative energy in the room, but the light from the room itself... Franticly he glances back at Samantha although she's completly lost in the black cloud boiling off of his skin. "Damnit..." Looking back at Benedict he curses again, "DAMNIT.... "# Now logging to the file c:\Documents\MUCK\log.txt. Terry stares calmly down at the god's ravaged form, drawing in a few slow breaths before he looks up. "Rock.." he says quietly, trying to catch his protege's eye. He nods, "Save it... this might not be over. And you, Johnny." He looks back over his shoulder, and nods to the maniac too before sending a slight smile towards Xue. Turning away again he takes half a step forward, standing on the fringe of the bloody pool that surrounds the broken orc on the floor, and slowly raises the energy katana, switching again to a double-handed grip. Benedict continues to gurgle, and a few twitches break across his body, organs quivering and jutting bones jerking sidelong in response to sudden movement. Rock holds back but steels himself in case the orc has any surprises for them. He's not going to die today. Johnny continues as best he can to hold his ground. The feeling is overwhelming... so much darkness, hate, and evil pouring into him along with the waste his body normaly absorbs. He stares at Benedict's body with what almost seems like a hunger to attack it. Feeling the energies pulsating from his daggers he knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that this isn't over yet... not be a long shot... "Nngh..." a soft moan breaks from the nekogirl behind Johnny, and she pushes herself up on her hands, lifting her head and upper body from the floor. "Is.. is everyone okay?" She asks quietly as she blinks a few times, shaking her head back and forth. Her view of the scene is blocked by a sweep of blood-drenched ebon, but she can feel.. she can feel the auras present. Her bloodshot eyes widen, "What's happening?" Terry glances back at her quickly, a grin flashing on his lips, "Johnny.. tell her it's okay. We got it covered..." glancing back to Rock the grin broadens, the fighter's pulse quickening a bit now he knows he has something to protect, and his grip shifts slightly on the golden blade. "Rock.. if this isn't over, I want you to fight like never before. Use everything... if you lose it, I'm here okay?" With that he raises the katana over his shoulder and prepares to make the cut as Benedict lies still jerking. Rock nods, "I understand...but I have more control than the last time you saw me..." hopefully...I've done a lot today goes unsaid. He slides into his stance and narrows eyes, "Ready when you are." Johnny glares coldly at Terry's words and glances back at Samantha without making a single effort to hide his feelings, "Rock and your dad think they have things under control... so just shut up, alright?" Rolling his eyes he shakes his head to clear his thoughts, "Sorry Sammy... it's ok for now... get some rest while you can..." Forcing a smile he quickly turns his gaze back to the body of Benedict, his already tight grip on his daggers intenisfies until his nails pierce his skin beneath the shadows surrounding him and a trickle of blood runs down the length of the blade... Xue Qian narrows the purple-ish lights that are all that are visable of her eyes at the moment, hearing Terry say for Rock to use everything he has... including going over the edge. Breath a bit ragged in between words, she stands, sword drawn, and down at her side, air around her dropping in temperature "Shall i... also.. let it all go.... ?" Terry nods slowly at Rock and becomes noticeably more serious, more solemn as he hefts the blade for a moment... "You too, Xue.. everyone. There's no point holding back, not if everything I've heard is true. Let's do it..." his voice dies in a whisper and then he brings the sword down, light glittering back in arc from the blazing surface. Another twitch from Benedict as the blade comes down, and something arcs up from the many wounds in the god's back. Darkness, like that engulfing Johnny but hundreds of times more powerful, leaps out of the red-black blood to engulf the blade. As the blood left behind turns to a bright crimson the ki-katana is stopped in its tracks, the blonde fighter giving a grimace as he tries to force it. But it's stopped dead. Then the shadows begin to spiral up the weapon towards his gloved hands, and he is forced to release it, letting the thing dissipating in a golden burst as he launches himself back, landing in a crouch beside Samantha. Just as she looks up with eyes wide at Johnny's words, which sink in after a few seconds. "My... my daddy....?" Anything more is cut off as father and daughter both snap their sapphire gaze towards the form of Benedict. Those shadows have moved to cover the entire ravaged form, and the blood around it boils and hisses, before riding up in a vast column, thundering up towards the high ceiling. "It's over..." the hiss echoes seemingly from one of the room's many pillars, then repeats, and in turn each of the other pillars join the chorus, before as one they all repeat the same two words, all at a slightly different pitch. Rock closes his eyes and begins channeling his khi through his body, "Yeah sure...over for you. Just can't understand that we're gonna win do you?" he opens his eyes the red of his irises glowing for a moment. Khi crackling across his hands. Johnny's eyes narrow and uncontrollibly, he begins to growl... Watching Terry get thrown backwards was the last straw for him. The slight cloud of shadows flowing off of him intensifies and the maniac drops down almost to a duck as he unconciously prepares to leap. His eyes hastly scan the darkness pouring upwards for a target, but otherwise, he remains perfectly still... Xue Qian glares up, the purple glow intensifying, and her lips forming into a twisted smile "If you insist. Your funeral". The purple haze then bursts into purple fire lighting from her eyes, and the smirk becoming a sadistic sneer. The blue glow around the sword bursts into cold blue hellfire, enveloping the blade, and what seems to be black steam drifts off her body. When she speaks, its, like Latran, sounding as if two are speaking in unison, or there was an echo "I'll see to it no one leaves this room... alive". All trace of exhaustion gone from her, she holds the blade SilverFrost before her, electricity suddenly sparking along the blade beneath the icy hellfire, before leaping into the fray, slashign at the darkness, and anyone that gets between her and it, with a pair of quick horazontal slashes, one left, the next right, grinning like Yamazaki As Xue makes her devastating assault upon the darkness lying at the base of the rising column, a deep chuckle resounds through the chamber and the pillars stop their whispering just briefly, letting the sound of hissing, spitting blood sound as chunks and streaks of fluid fly out in every direction from the berserking half-elf. "IT'S OVER!" On this, all of the hissing voices start again but raised an octave, the highest of them all but cracking eardrums as their heightened whispers ring out. Then cracks appear in the stone floor, and the walls begin to shake... only the pillars lining the chamber seem to remain erect and undamaged. That central pillar, the one composed purely of Benedict's blood, hammers up through the ceiling and sends a rain of mortar down upon those below. Then with one last juddering shake the entire room is lifted up through the earth, more mortar and rubble tumbling down as the ceiling disintegrates away. In the space of a minute fresh air rushes in as the ancient temple bursts through and shoots up into the sky, seemingly dragged by that still-rising pillar of blood. It comes to a stop a hundred feet up, floating slowly. The crimson column continues though, finally lifting from the floor, burning up into the night sky, and then falls back down in a torrential downpour of life's blood. The remnants of Benedict are gone, without trace but for this gory rain now pouring down upon the airbound chamber... and that still soaking Xue and the rest of the chamber, after her crazed hacking. [!] Chi shouts: #Far off in the distant Badlands, a pillar of blood erupts from the ground, carrying with it the buried interior of an ancient temple that tears up through the landscape. The square of land, flanked on all sides by vast pillars, comes to rest floating high in the air.. held up by a bed of darkness as the blood arcs down in a crimson rainfall. Rock braces himself as the Room lerches and he stays on his feet for as long as he can, till the sudden Stop when he stumbles and then recovers, "What the hell are we supposed to eb attacking!?" Johnny, already ducked close to the ground, is probably the only one ready when the room violently leaps into the air. As it comes to an abrubt hault he puses up off of the floor, now levitating from the excessive darkness within him. Again, choosing not to move, the maniac floats there, blood trickling down both his blades as his nails dig into the palms of his hands. As the downpour of blood rain begins, Johnny begins to chuckle... revolted by blood or not, the maniac is enjoying himself... An ancient temple of sorts floats in the air, a hundred feet above the Badlands. The huge, rectangular chamber has a simple stone floor and is flanked on all sides by vast pillars. There are no walls, and no ceiling.. though a few remnants of clinging rock and mortar suggest there should be, or once was. At one end a series of narrow steps lead up to a bare altar, to which darkness now begins to flood, trickling in dark tendrils up from the base of the aerial platform. Assembled around a bloody pool in the middle of the room are the variously arranged forms of Rock, Xue, Johnny and Samantha.. as well as a blonde man clad in a brown leather jacket, knelt beside the latter. The sprawled form of Rock tenses suddenlly, his breath escaping his lips as his pupils dilate and then thin to pin points. His hands tremble as the blood pours down around him, and then twin blue wings of Khi slowly begin to spread from his back as he lerches to his feet, the sound of his heart pounding in his head. Then the young fighter grips his head and screams ferally. An ancient temple of sorts floats in the air, a hundred feet above the Badlands. The huge, rectangular chamber has a simple stone floor and is flanked on all sides by vast pillars. There are no walls, and no ceiling.. though a few remnants of clinging rock and mortar suggest there should be, or once was. At one end a series of narrow steps lead up to a bare altar, to which darkness now begins to flood, trickling in dark tendrils up from the base of the aerial platform. Assembled around a bloody pool in the middle of the room are the variously arranged forms of Rock, Xue, Johnny and Samantha.. as well as a blonde man clad in a brown leather jacket, knelt beside the latter. (re Xue Qian is currently insane, drenched in blood, eyes alight with purple energy, and sword enveloped in a combination of freezing blue hellfire and electricity. As the blood drips from her clothes and hair, she grins insanely, saying "Yum.... this makes me a bit thirsty", and resumes slashing at anything that appears a valid target of Benedict's being present, the grin resembling one of Yamazaki's Trinune arrives in a torrent of blue lightning in the night sky above. Thunder cracking overhead. Her form is in the air, a good forty feet above the rise of bloody ground that drips. Attached to her hand is Carla, who she releases a moment later since the girl can fly on her own and she knows it. Carla's wings do flap wildly, bringing her to float alongside of Trinune. Her eyes pass over the scene, locking on Samantha and..woah, Terry? And the others. She asides to Trinune, not taking her eyes from the scene, "Ne, Trinune, ca--" She's cut off as the sword gives a definite, "No." Back to the Dragoness. Carla nods her head, but doesn't do anything yet. Nor does Trinune, both of them floating in the air and observing for the moment. As soon as Jack appears with Tri and Cale he takes in the situation and like before he does what he always does. Calling forth the Phoenix flame he let's the enternal energies saturate his very being with it's power he smiles as the music only he can hear begins in earnest. But as soon as he sees Samantha AND Terry the music falters as he sees the darkness they face and he growls. "Not this time....not this time." and it begins yet again. Raiden appears in a burst of dark red magic, up in the air, about halfway up to the platform, a dozen feet away from the stairs, staff gripped firmly in both hands as he drifts in the air, openly trying to sense what energies are driving this. His curiosity as a exploratory wanderer besting him. A soft blue glow appearing to deflect the blood droplets comming down at him, showing a bubble shape. Really a PATHETIC defensive barrier, but its nice for anti-rain. Even blood rain. Kibi arrives and oohs at the temple. "neeaatt. ~/o I'm singing in the rain I'm singing in the rain.~/0", she starts to make her way towads the temple. Our goddess in training, ladies and gentlemen! o.o; Gold Iczelion flies into view, carrying a rather unusual burden: a SPARTAN soldier in full Mjolnir-class battlearmor. "Eeh, I do NOT like the looks of this," the purple-haired singer/planetary defender comments to her passenger as she takes in the 'landscape'. "And I hope those guys are all right ... I've gotta set you down somewhere, Chief - you mind getting dropped in the thick of it, or want a better tactical approach?" John-117 observes the combat taking place, "Drop me in flanking position, just in case, this is only Recon for now, and if I need to participate I'd rather be tactically in a better position." Takes a frag grenade in his left hand, just in case. Terry glances sidelong at his daughter, grimacing as he steadies himself from the skyward rocketing of the chamber. As the crimson rain begins to fall he starts to strip off his jacket, abruptly stopping himself once less instinctive senses remind him how soaked with blood the slender nekogirl already is. He stands instead, curling a fist at his side, "Xue!" His voice rings out towards the half-elf as she continues to attack the tendrils of darkness, "It won't do any good.. save it, and wait. You too, Rock..." His gaze takes on a fierce, but concerned, edge as it takes in his protege. But he shrugs it off for now... (He'll need everything, I can bring him back..) and he begins to channel his own energies, golden tendrils working off his shoulders. His other hand he extends to the girl below, who offers a slightly bemused smile and gets up. "I-" he cuts her off with a shake of his head and a slight grin, "Later... we got something to do okay?" She nods and turns to look likewise towards the altar, setting her shoulders a little more squarely and reaching for the shortsword at her back, "Okay, I'm ready.. I c'n do this now. I won't get hurt again..." Both remain oblivious to the arrival of their friends up above, and let the blood fall around them uncaring as they bid their time.. waiting for the chaos to ensue once more. Meanwhile the darkness rushes up the many steps into a single point, though never seeming to diminish as more and more rushes in. Slowly it then begins to form into a gigantic figure, impossibly large for the area supporting its bulk.... a huge humanoid form clad in a cloak many times darker than the night skies above. A single monstrous hand is visible, clad in a black metal gauntlet ringed with spikes. "This.. is the true Benedict." The hiss rings out as if from every direction around the temple's pillared perimeter, and outward also.. the voice rippling out across the Badlands. The aura of evil in this place is palpable, frightening in its power. Johnny's laughter dies down until he's simply grining maddly. His eyes wide with anticipation, he turns his head back towards Terry and Samantha to make sure they where ok, and then looks up at Xue and suddenly glares. This isn't right... this isn't the way it's supposed to be... Lifting higher into the air he scans around for some sign of where his former master could be hiding, but only sees the newcomers appearing suddenly. Now growling he begins to look around franticly again... Despite what Cassandra had told him, he still views this as -his- kill... He was the one used.... he was the one made into a puppet... and nothing is going to take his vengence from him... Then, as Benedict finaly reapears, Johnny begins to twirl his daggers in much the same way he always does... only now he takes his hands away from the weapons leaving them spinning in mid air. With a tilt of his head the daggers take off in a blur aimed for the center of the monster... Johnny watches the daggers fly with glee, "FUCK YOU BITCH!!!!!!!" Xue Qian sneers as the true Benedict appears, and then sees the daggers spin over her head. She fires off a quick enchantment, attempting to add cold to them, before, spinning, and sending a crescent-shaped blade of ice, with a razor sharp edge, following the daggers, lined up, but a bit behind, that twisted, vindictive smile directed at the giant Benedict, shouting "Everybody dies... and you die first!." Dragoness Carla looks upon the scene, the blood falling, the people gathering from the uprooting of the temple in the Badlands, she's impressed they can get here so fast, but then, they have a pretty good view of the giant temple to guide them, don't they? Her wings continue to beat in a hovering pattern and she reaches over to touch Trinune's hand, -needing- some of the magic as she actually begins to scan everything over magically, trying to get a bearing on this dark humanoid form that's been manifested. "Help, please?" She whispers towards Trinune. Trinune shifts her blueblue eyes towards Carla, then looks back to the scene below, "Okay." She says, pulling her hand away and letting Carla link into her magic resevoirs freely, for now. Trinune also scans the scene over magically, but hers is far more detailed than Carla's, even scouring over dimensions and the like as she looks. Needless to say seeing NNY and Xue launch their assaults on that demonic being Jack does the only thing he can..dropping down the the ground facing it he smirks as he calls forth his power in the form os a volley of explosive shards of light that will hopefully pierce the thing's skin and explode with all the force of heavy blaster shots. Raiden eyes the figure. . o O ( Can it be...? ...No, I don't think so... Still, it could be a shadow form, it is black enough, or another possessed being... I can't risk it. ) He resumes twirling his staff, building up energy for now, as he intones a single word, "Emulate!" bringing his staff's butt down into midair, a brief-lived magical circle bursting off from it before he resumes the spinning, preparing... Kibi uh-ohs seeing the monsturous hand. "Kibi thinks were in trouble. It's Sauron! Anyone here a heir of Isildur?", she contures to make her way toward the temple witout a care in the world. She looks up at the huge figure. "hey! No fair Kibi only one allowed to be really big!", and with that Kibi gets all huge and stuff. Kibizilla is loose! Ha ha ha, nice. n.n Gold Iczelion flies down (faster than her level flight across the Badlands was), and sets the Master Chief down off to the side of ... um ... that giant dark shadowy thing with 'the true Benedict' - which is even giving HER the screaming heebie-jeebies, and SHE doesn't have mystical senses! That's enough to tell her: This. Is. VERRRRRRRY bad ... and if all of the magic-slingers can't put an end to this threat, she has to wonder what an Iczelion's more super-technologically based attacks would be capable of doing. However, as she flies up to the level of the 'Benedict,' she does have one thought ... and she tries locking onto the Super-Gauntlet of Ultimate Evil with her gravity well, simultaneously holding it motionless (she hopes) and beginning to gather the power to crush it into a little ball of hypercompressed metal, a shimmering yellow aura beginning to shine around her body .. John-117 lands down, crouching so as to absorb the impact on his knees, and quickly dashes forward, slinging his battle rifle into position, aiming forward with it. He crouches quickly thereafter with the scope zoomed in, hunching the barrel of the rifle onto his right, raised knee, just watching for now. New still, so he doesn't realize what magic is really, but blames everything on a scientific purpose, if they can kill it, so can he. He unlatches a fragmentation grenade in his left hand, but holds it closed for now, awaiting a moment, or more so, a good reason to fling it into the mix. He watches as the attacks continue, trying to get a baring on the purpose of this monster and the battle. "Is this thing intelligent?..." Out int he badlands approachign rapidly from teh wall, a trail of dust is kicked up in a long line as a vehicle makes with extream haste towards the temple and a high gain radio signal goes out on all probable military signals "Chief, this is Kawatta, I need a status report." at the same time the driver thinks out loud .oO(Trinune I need to know about the magic thats going on here,) he knows the answer to that second request is gonna make him disorentated, but it's the bet way... Benedict's huge bulk shifts slightly as Johnny's dark daggers come flying forth. "Such a waste..." the hiss breaks out, quieter this time but directed straight into the maniac's skull... and that gauntleted hand comes around to swat the blades from the air. As the first flies off with a metallic ring, the other passes through a chink in the black armour, and a few frothing bubbles of liquid shadow pour forth from the seeming wound before it is sealed with a sheet of ice from Xue's enchantment. The blade of ice sent shortly after is shattered before it can make contact.. then blue-green slits flash in what must surely be the head of the massive creature, and these focus narrowed upon the half-elf girl. "I have died many times.. more than you could count, little elf-spawn. Now who else dares...? Tailed one?" He fixes these slits upon Samantha, who stands tensed alongside Terry on the platform. A sneer cracks her lips, her confidence returning as she pulls her mithril blade free and springs forward across the pool of blood, bandaged feet gripping firmly on the other side. She slips over near the base of the altar, setting her other hand to the sword's flat and firing off a sharp burst of blue-white ki. "I'll dare alright.." she murmurs, sapphire orbs flashing dangerously up at the black god. That energy begins to course across the blade. Her passion falters though as she watches Jack's blades of energy scatter on Benedict's black form, seemingly soaked up by whatever guards the dark figure. She glances across to the other man she considers father, eyes wide. But Benedict has long begun to ignore her, and the others on the platform... his 'gaze' taking in Kibi's gigantic form and then that of Gold Iczelion. "A big little girl.." he hisses, "And whatever you are... interesting. But the elements belong to me!" He waves his gauntleted hand, which has in fact begun to buckle from the attack.. and the metal simultaneously straightens itself out and explodes outward with dark energies, which burst in a shockwave of sorts above the platform.. rippling through the skies in every direction for a good half mile. Though the attack is dark, or evil, in nature.. unless caught directly in the central part of the shockwave most will only feel kinetic force.. though it should be enough to reduce all but the most hardy to their knees. And then Rock loses control and leaps at the gauntleted hand and attempts to slam a khi charged fist into the metal, only to be thrown back by the kinetic force of the attack. Though the figther is obviouslly injured, the berserk rage in his body pushes past the pain and he stumbles to his feet, body swaying from the strain, but he growls from his throat and leaps into a flurry of punches and kicks now at the giant gauntlet. Johnny screams in rage as his daggers find their way back into his open hands. Looking around at the crowd once more he glares... perhaps his vengence has pushed him to madness... perhaps the influence of Benedict on his waste lock is too great, but reguardless his eyes narrow into slits, and the dark cloud of shadows pouring off of him intensifies once more, leaving only his eyes visible beneath his black cloak. Releasing only a fraction of the energies he's absorbed so far he throws his hands upwards and the cloud around him comes alive. Dozens of screaming demons, much like the ones he released in the center of the city a month or so before, go flying through the air, their shadowed forms tearing through the sky towards all the newcomers... "GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE!!!! -I- was the one who was screwed over... -I- was the one who was used... THE ONLY ONE WHO IS GOING TO KILL HIM IS ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Xue Qian's burning eyes narrow in anger, and her sneer becomes a scowl of hatred as she half-growls, half-screams "DON'T CALL ME ELF SPAWN, YOU ASSHOLE!" >.< Dark blue energy begisn to emit from her form as she starts drawing more Essence to herself. The shockwave sends her back a step, but as she isnt actually casting, and is currently in a state of mind a little past Rock's, it doesn't interrupt anything. Blue runes of magickal power begin to form in the air around her, and her swords blaze intensifies a bit in reaction Dragoness Carla takes in everything she can before letting the magical scan stop. It's time to act now, she looks over at Trinune, "Trinune, listen, I--" She breaks off as the sword places her blueblue eyes upon her. She stares towards the sword, almost narrowing her eyes, "I said listen, dang it! I need your help, understand? I-" She breaks off again, Trinune sending directly into Carla's mind at the moment. Carla lets out a light growl, "I don't care! You help me or my friends are going to die!" Trinune's eyes now narrow as well, the blueblue within them shifting, just on the edges, to a slight red light deep inside. "No." She says, looking back down towards Benedict and the ensuing battle. "No more deaths." The blade says. Carla reaches over and takes Trinune's wrist, growling, "You might have more magic and power, but you don't know battle like I do! Admit it!" The girls tail thwips back and forth, and Trinune looks back towards Carla. And smiles, "No." And tugs her wrist away from Carla just as the kinetic force comes barreling from Benedict, Carla goes sailing back into the sky, while Trinune remains right where she is. Trinune conveys unto Kawatta in a massive and violent mind blast her results as Carla comes back down alongside of Trinune, "If I die, it's your fault, Trinune!" She growls, before arcing her wings, a purple and black glow flowing around her body, shining forth in the dark sky. Trinune looks to the departing Carla, staring as she begins to arc down towards Benedict. Her eyes turn to mix with blue and red magic, swirling around, no longer looking like actual eyes as her fists clench, "I hate you!" She yells, and her voice literally carries across the entire area of the Badlands, almost deafening in its volume, before the woman erupts into blue lightning, reappearing in her sword form in Carla's hand. Carla lets out a very, very relieved sigh and all of the purple magic begins to swirl and spiral down from her body, rippling up and coursing around the blade within her grasp, she doesn't dive in though, not yet, not just yet. o O ( Thank you Trinune. ) She thinks to the blade. Who thinks back, o O ( You are not welcome. ) The Dragoness spins through the air as the demon things come screaching, agily moving past them, ignoring them for now as more magic pours out along the blade. Narrowing his eyes as he gets off the ground slowly from the shockwave Jack Karrde glares at the 'god' and smirks a bit, this guy feeds on darkness...that means.. And the opposite of darkness is light... Drawing his two swords...Talon and The Phoenix Blade he channels his powers through them both, letting them become blades of enchanted steel and the light of the Phoenix's fire as he calls upon his powers letting light explode around him. "Bent Dick...you need to shut the hell up." he growls out as withount warning he blurs out and he goes to get right in the creature's face and with a war cry he brings all his fighting skills into play as he unleashes what can only be called a cyclone of slashes aimed at possible weak points in the armor. Think Omnislash but with two weapon style added into the mix. Raiden aims his staff directly at the target, drifting closer as she shockwaves comes in and grins darkly, "If its you, this should get your attention... EMULATE - ULTIMA!" With that, the aura about him vanishes, as well as any sign of charged enery about him, slamming into the staff, before from its tip, a MASSIVE stream of conical expanding energy unleashes likely blasting through the shockwave leaving Raiden safe, as the non-elemental, non-aligned pure energy blasts inward towards the titanic Benedict. And a large sweatdrop sprouts on the archmage's head as he senses the demons incomming. . o O ( This is where Xoretraera would unleash a second Ultima at them... Pity I can't do such. ...Oh well take a hit to deal a hit, I like that strategy. ) Its his most powerful spell he can cast. Not as powerful as the original wielder's version, but... Raiden wasn't designed for heavy hitting, but rather continuous hitting, not that the spell is by ANY means weak. Kibi mous. "Kibi is not..", she cries out in pain taking the shockwave point blank. She falls. Incoming! BOOM! She's out x.x Gold Iczelion curls up partway, bringing her arms up as though to protect her face from the shockwave's impact - which sends her flying back a few dozen meters in mid-air before she stabilizes, sparks dancing across her battlesuit. "Iteee ..." she moans softly, wincing as she untucks from her protective curl, and gazes at her enemy - *the* enemy, one that's being shared (and kami knows there's plenty to go around!) - with a bit of despair starting to settle in. . o O ( He just shrugged off a gravity well like it was almost nothing ... maybe if the others were here we could gang up like we did on that monster Void ... ) Her face hardening into a look of determination and resolve, Kiiro flies towards Benedict again, scanning the massive form for structural weak points - possibly a futile exercise, since she normally fights mechnically-based enemies, and this thing's more like a demon ... but hey, even a demon in physical form can have a fatally vulnerable chink in its armor, right? - And that's when a bunch of the OTHER demons swarm her, eliciting a truly terrified scream from the lavender-haired teenaged girl just before she starts lashing out almost randomly at them. Beam sword, energy bolts, fists, feet, whatever she can hit them with ... she's basically freaking out and panicking, despite her battlesuit/partner's best efforts to help her keep a cool head. John-117 Feeling the brunt of the force of that kinetic shockwave, his shields of the Mark 6 armor are taken down quite a bit, though aren't diminshed completely. He seemed to be talking to himself, but it becomes apparent to anyone that understands technology that he on a frequency radio line with someone using his MJOLNIR armor. The shields begin to recharge themselves, he starts thinking thought oO(Whatare these things? Who are these people? Strange...) He gathers himself, and spots the demons that Johnny had emitted, now wondering which threat would be more pressing. He decides that the Benedict monster is for now, despite Johnny's insanity and pressing against his intervening, he slings the battle rifle down, and takes in both hands, in his left a fragmentation, and in his right a plasma grenade. He launches forward, tossing with amazing accuracy a fragmentation grenade at the feet of Benedict that's not pulled, followed by a plasma, that is activated, hoping for the explosion of the plasma grenade to crack the shell of the fragmentation, and therein cause two explosions simultaneously on the Benedict beast. Thinking now oO(I don't care what this is, it's physical, it can die just like any Covenant asshole...) Pour souls who have closed distance with Benedict, owie for them. o_O; Samantha lets out a gasp as she hears Johnny make his exclamations. With a wild scream she throws herself up into a backflip, shooting off a burst of ki at the zenith and propelling herself up next to her friend. "What're you doing? This is serious!" Firing off another blue-white burst to keep her in the air, she draws back her free hand and slams a punch towards the maniac's left cheek.. putting all her strength behind it, her blood-soaked hair flapping wildly in the ki-winds around her. Terry staggers forward a few paces and pauses to take this all in, keeping his energies raging... finally the blonde fighter comes to a decision, leaving his daughter to fend for herself as he leaps forward and takes a running dash before firing off his own burst of energy and rocketing into the air to join Rock as his protege assaults the gigantic gauntlet. He lands atop the thing and balances quickly, dropping to a crouch and bringing his fist down.. then the other... and then the first again, each time unleashing a pillar of red-gold energy that hammers into the dark metal. He tries to channel some of this power to Rock too... hoping the other fighter can feed off some of the 'spare' energy and use it to add extra power to his own blows. Of course then the attacks of others come into play and he is caught in an inferno of magic and physical heat, disappearing from view as the entire black form is caught in the same inferno. Along with Jack's slashes, the whole combines to send vast cascades of black shadowy fluid in arcs to the sky... this begins to rain down as did the blood before, and continues to flood out of the now-barely visible figure, pouring also down the steps of the altar and onto the floor of the floating chamber. And through it all comes a high cackle in that same tone.. this time mirrored many times, a cackle at a different pitch coming from each of the pillars around the temple. "You think this is enough?" This comes over the laugher, and also directly into the skulls of any inside the limits of the platform and its pillars, piercing their consciousness with a deep despair-inducing evil as well as the tone. (OOC note: anyone with mental-blocking or telepathy resistance of any kind will be safe from this) Rock screams back at the laugh and the power certainlly adds force to his blows, but it's a berserk rage that drives him now. And he continues to pound at this point causing small geysers of energy to explode outwards at each strike. Three of the shadow-demons immediatly go after the Kibizilla. Finding her already delt with they swarm towards Johny-117 screaming in a hight pitched squeal as he throws his barrage of man made weapons. They are soon joined by two more that come up from behind him, reaching for his legs to hold him in place so that the other three can deal with him. Ignoring the ones already attacking Iczelion, the rest of the Johnny-spawned monsters go after Jack and Raiden as they try to attack the massive form of Benedict. Johnny himself watches the anarchy and growls various profanities as they seem to be doing nothing to slow the progress of the newcomers. Before he can do much to join in he is suddenly knocked back by Samantha? All his demons immediatly halt in mid air a moment before resuming their attacks. "Sammy? WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT FOR???? I'm fucking trying to HELP you..." As he yells that he clinches the hilts of his daggers tightly again and watches her, ready to attack if she raises her hand again. Xue Qian starts giggling madly, body going loose, finishing her spell, and pointing an open palm at the giant. Several dozen cleaver-sized blades of ice appear and fire from the air before said palm, screaming towards Benedict, and not caring who bets in their way, or gets unlucky. However, as the psychic attack is done, she erks, resisting, just in time for the grenades to go off. She barely gets her arms up in time to try to defend herself from the explosions, but that doesnt keep her anchored down. With a yelp of pain, she's sent flying backwards, slamming into a pillar, and sliding to the ground, in pain, and a little angrier, the hint of an idea coming to her insane mind. Curious, she turns towards the pillar behind her, and draw-slashes as hard as she can, hoping to cut the pillar in two horazontally Dragoness Carla snaps her wings out just in time to avoid getting caught in the sudden Ultima that was cast and the grenade explosions. Her wings flap frantically, pulling her up and away from the explosion. "Geez!" She growls, not believing people are throwing those kind of spells when people are in close quarters with the thing! Yeah, it's big, but..she glances down to Trinune's blade, and her voice and Trinune's both resound inside anyone's head without mental shielding as well, o O ( You're going to KILL people like that! ) The purple and black magical energy has now focused down into a tight writhing liquidy mass down upon Trinune's blade, almost looking as if it has a life of its own, small shapes appearing within the magical vortex the blade holds. At the sound of Benedicts voice in her head, which is dulled as Trinune erects mental shielding around Carla right quickly. Okay, so, all those magical attacks, and the thing is still alive, not only that, but mocking them. Sounds like god's arrogance to her, she's heard it a few times, doesn't make it sound any less horrible this time around. Her tail twists in the air behind her, as if wanting something to smack into it, but there's just air and the demons she's darting around to avoid. She looks down to Trinune's magical encased blade, the purple and black energy shifts and changes, black shifting over to blue now. The air around Carla and the general vicinity, although already charged with magic, seems to just get a bit thicker as this happens. And then, she dives down through the smoke debris from the prior explosions and attacks, so far she hasn't noticed the big form trying to dodge anything at all, this is good, because hopefully it won't dodge her as she comes soaring in from behind...well, as behind as you can get from a creature like Benedict, Trinune coming up to arc above her head, she attempts to impale the blade straight down and through the upper neck lower shoulder blade area of the gods back, her eyes probably falling on Samantha and giving a light fanged grin and a mouthed 'hey' a split second occurs after. If Trinune should penetrate, it'll likely sink down to the hilt, and then, the magic encased around the blade will go into effect, attempting to travel throughout the general vicinity of the head, neck, shoulders, and upper torso. The magic itself is gravity in nature, though she's found out it has other weakness', she wants to try this first, and throughout the insides of Benedict, -assuming- all has gone well, the force of about fifty times normal gravity will explode out in seven different locations all along Trinune's blade. That is, if the blade made it in, if it didn't, well, it'll still go off, just in the air and general vicinity above Benedict. As soon as the flurry of strikes is done on Benidict Jack spins and goes on the defensive against the shadow creatures NNY sent at him with all the speed and skill he's got. Bad think is when the frag and the plasma DO go off he takes a good bit from that and he goes into a roll, his right side bleeding and scorched from the blasts. Raiden winces, getting a nasty cut in the back from a demon before he can twirl around, lashing out at it with his staff, using it expertly. He's a superb melee fighter for his staff, which glows slightly green, as its shaft gains blade-like qualities, allowing him to slash, smash, and bash wildly, trying to fell the demons around him. . o O ( Its not him. ...I have no reason to continue this. Still, pulling out won't be that easy with these damn things. ) The mental assault strikes him, but his eyes narrow, as magical energies arc through them briefly, as he fends off the ill effects with hardly a lapse in his combat, continuing his deadly mid-air dance, "Get away from me, pathetic beasts!" Erupts in a fury of agless power, to grant whoever summoned her a single wish, whatever it may beeewait, that's the other dragon. Gold Iczelion lets out a piercing scream as the telepathic assault begins, Iczel-Gold hurriedly scrambling to shelter Kiiro's mind from the waves of evil and despair ... an effort which succeeds after a few seconds, giving Gold Iczelion the chance to teleport out of the flock of demons, trying to get enough of a breather to regain her bearings. The question is whether five meters behind Benedict's head is the best place to catch said breather ... probably not, but Gold Iczelion is WAY out of her depth here. She's used to fighting mechanical monsters sent by Chaos, not some giant overlord of darkness and evil, for cryin' out loud! In the meantime, she's trying to regain her equilibirium as well as size up the situation again ... and by the time she knows where she is in tactical terms, Carla is up there trying to give Benedict a gravitational lobotomy. John-117 is dealing intially with the demons, his shields keeping up most of the brunt, slowly deteriorating. He reaches to his sides when he hears this strange pitch, that would make him feel fear, if he knew what such a feeling was. Not even to sound a bit over zealous, but being only bred to know war and battle, this sound does nothing to intrigue him and annoy him, make him lose a bit of his concentration. The demons swarming over him remind him strangely of the Flood...And there's only one way to deal with those. He withdraws his dual SMGs (Sub-Machine Guns), and begins firing into the belly of the demon beasts about him, and at his legs. the 30 foot mecha's feet twist and turn, manuvering the combat machine around obsticles, and people like the pilot allready has this course planned out, that or he has supream piloting reflexes, though he might go over the occasional shadow demon thing. The pilot of the machines gunts over a pair of loud speakers in the mech as the mental assualt begins, but Kawatta's brain just isnt wired the same way as a normal human. "Another giant god thinks he can take on this world. Time to cut you down." and while manuvering lateraly around the arean, a pair of twin .50 calibur machine guns in the head open up, making sure to aim for the thing's leg so to avoid pureed friendlies. And suddenly, a song rises from seemingly everywhere, yet no one particular place...a beautiful, soothing song with an incredibally unearthly value to it, inspiring a feeling of comfort in those willing to listen. It combats the feeling of despair induced by Benedict's evil, with hope; and in various areas, the ground begins to ripple in time with the music... Samantha shakes her head fiercely, glaring with wild blue eyes at the maniac.. "No! They're helping me, they're helping -us-! Stop it.. it's, it's-" her head whips around as she feels the power erupting behind her, and her eyes widen in shock, "P-pop?" The shock causes her to lose hold upon the energies keeping her afloat and she starts to drop, twisting herself to land braced on her hand and one knee before flipping back up to her feet. This in time to meet Cale's quick greeting and she smiles as much she can manage, and then sets her jaw and dashes forward herself, starting up the steps at none of her normal speed as she prepares. Xue's blades whip past the nekogirl and hammer into the hot black form of the god above, who remains impassive as he lets the last of the blossoming 'blood' flow, as well as the new gouts raised by these discs. He stands firm though. A few times the girl slips and stumbles on the blood but she continues up anyway... ki streaming down her blade with renewed force as her narrowed gaze finds the god. Up above, on Benedict's fist Terry remains crouching, his jeans now tattered and the ends of his long blonde hair singed from the energies that had washed across him moments before. "Rock.." he calls down, a little weak-voiced, to his berserking protege, "Hit me with everything you got... one blow, put it all in there." He then closes his eyes, keeping his balance on the gauntlet - which now remains eerily still but for the nasty dents made by Rock's continued assault - and beginning to focus everything he has. (OOC: will pose Bene's reaction to Cale in just a sec) [!] The sky over the island darkens, a veil of clouds hiding the moon and clouds ... and then a dragon dives out of those clouds, shrilling a challenge as it soars directly towards the Badlands - to the pillar of blood and the source of evil which erupted earlier in this evening. Some of those who take note of the dragon might even recognize it ... Bahamut. Rock twists his head up to see Terry and one thing echoes in the berserk mind, 'Bogard!' and even if he's not doing it to help Terry Driectly, Rock definitely charges Terry and Khi bursts out Around his hands as Rock Charges and twists his body bringing the fist around to slam into Terry Khi exploding outwards at the blow. The veil of darkness over the 'temple' is rent open by Bahamut's arrival, the great dragon's wings beating to slow its flight to a hover ... and then its jaws gape open, the purest of light focusing as Bahamut's chest swells, breathing in. The dragon's gaze focuses directly on Benedict, eyes narrowing in the inimitable challenge of god against demon ... and then Bahamut exhales with a mighty roar, the power of his Mega Flare breath weapon blasting Benedict at full strength - a power beyond the individual elements, yet bearing the hint of the holy will which summoned the lord of dragons to this place tonight ... power which rips at Benedict, but leaves the mortal combatants untouched. Benedict's slitted gaze flares again, this time much more weakly... as he stands there impassive, letting attacks flow into his vast dark form. That pillar sliced by the half-elf gives way now, and comes crashing down with a thunderous roar, smashing into the one directly opposite and sending its tip flying down towards the ravaged ground below. Meanwhile the god lets his attention shift to Trinune, impaled through his body... and at the burst of gravity a dark grunt escapes, thundering across the hovering platform. Bullets from Kawatta rip through his legs too, but these pass straight through as shadows twist and bend around them. The god falls still for a moment, then the burst of gravity is rapidly launched back down through Trinune, towards Cale... coupled with a violent spurt of the god's shadowy fluid, which feels like little more than a fine syrup in consistency. As the god raises another hand from inside the depths of his dark cloak, whatever he was planning goes undone as Bahamut's cry roars out, and a blast of energy rockets through the gigantic form.... and tears away at the altar underfoot. Soon he is once again engulfed in a wash of energy too bright to see what lies beneath... Rock twists his head up to see Terry and one thing echoes in the berserk mind, 'Bogard!' and even if he's not doing it to help Terry Driectly, Rock definitely charges Terry and Khi bursts out Around his hands as Rock Charges and twists his body bringing the fist around to slam into Terry Khi exploding outwards at the blow. [RP there, now in the right place.] Johnny watches Samantha drop down, her words echoing in his mind. Looking around at what he's done again, the maniac powers down and drops down just as she goes running up the steps towards her father. Not that powering down means anything to him at this point. His body continues to absorb all the negative energies being cast off whether he likes it or not, as does his daggers continue to syphon more and more stray energies into him as well. Johnny spends a good moment trying to decide what to do, only to completly loose his frame of mind when the giant form of Bahamut suddenly appears. Immediatly his demons return to the shadows that created them and vanish without a trace of ever having existed before. Johnny looks up at the beast with huge wide eyes, unsure of what to make of the situation. As it's attack begins the only thought in his mind besides the astonishment of it all being the rush from the increase of destructive energies all around him.... Xue Qian begins running from pillar to pillar, slicing each and every one she can. She noticed earlier that the pillars seemed to echo the voice and other things of the large being, and shes acting on an uncomfirmed hunch, but in her maddened state, its enough for her to try. There's enough people here to for him to chew on while she does this, she thinks to herself. Xue Qian is, for the record, injured in a number of places, and bleed internally quite a bit. She's just too nuts ATM to feel it. For now.... Trinune is a magical conductor, well, she's more than that, but that is one of her main uses and what she was created for Cale for. The gravity magic gets shoved back down along blade and hurled into Carla. She wasn't expecting that, it's never happened before, but then again, she's only fought one god and she kind of had some tricks up her sleeve at the time. The resulting explosion of gravity literally makes Carla sail up at an angle into the sky, almost a blur from the impact, she's broken a multitude of bones and blood splurts out of her mouth as she coughs, though, amazingly, one of her hands still grips Trinune. o O ( Wow...that..ow... ) Is all she manages to think as far as coherency goes. That really, really hurt, blood trickling down from her mouth as her eyes close in pain, her arc starting to take her down towards the ground. Trinune, however, erupts into blue lightning, forming into humanoid shape behind Carla as soon as the trajectory changes, her arms catching the girl up in them. Her blueblue eyes look down to the broken girls form, and her eyes narrow, green healing magic exploding around Carla's form. Who's fault was that? Hers? Was she channeling the magic improperly before the spell went off? Did Cale not cast it right? A thousand more similar questions cascade inside Trinune's mind, but they're soon blotted out as the swords eyes narrow somewhat, the blue once again giving way to a red, the two colors swirling about, the blue starting to lose it's hold on the red. The healing spell only lasts a mere second, and seems to restore Carla to general full health, broken bones are easy, at least for Trinune. The sword sets Carla back in the air, though she holds onto her wrist, "You don't die. Give it to me." Carla blinks, looking confused at first, before Trinune just mindlinks what she wants. Carla looks back to the ensuing chaos, frowning some. Well, as far as she knows, which isn't much, Trinune doesn't have that spell in her anymore for some reason, but...honestly, she's going to need it now, isn't she? If not, they're probably all dead by this god. As Carla's thoughts pass that way Trinune's grip on Carla's wrist tighten, "Now." Carla looks at Trinune, "I've learned to ask." She glares, but does it anyway, a white light flareing up around Carla's hand, swirling arouind it in small little arcing mini-tendrils, which then stretch out and flow into Trinune's wrist. The blade actually blinks, pulling her wrist away from Carla's and clenching her hands into a fist, the red blue mix shifting back over to blueblue as the tendrils writhe around her hand. Carla mm's, the glow fading from her own hand as she looks back to the battle, o O ( Hurry up, Trinune! ) She mentally growls at the blade, the magical intensity around their general area actually causing the air to seem slightly...thicker, than it normally would. Wincing from the pain in his side Jack narrows his eyes and he growls a bit as he stands up slowly. He's never done this trick this fast before...but now is not the time to worry about testing. Calling forth all the power he can muster (And since he hasn't used much to no power in a couple months...it's gonna be a lot) he saturates his entire being with it and focuses it to his hands. "...Four words Dickless One..." he says as he leaps straight up and at the pinnacle he comes down to give Benidict a strike right in the face with the cry of "ASHES OF THE PHOENIX!!!" And like that all the power he's had stored up is unleashed in ONE shot on ONE target. Raiden narrows his eyes, twirling his staff in a brief lull at driving the demons back just as they poof away, before he vanishes in a burst of yellow light. Reforming way up in the air, 100 yards away from the action, leaning against his staff. . o O ( I have no purpose to this match. It isn't the one I thought... It is powerful, as are many here, but... I have no reason to participate. Let whoever wins, win. I have no qualms or alliances with or against either side. ) Gold Iczelion actually grins, half-instinctively backing away from Benedict as the good guys finally start getting the upper hand, and can't help but let out a whoop of glee at seeing Bahamut make an appearance. There's just something about seeing one of your favorite RPG summon-beasts come to life that makes you feel like you're going to win the battle, no matter how hopeless it looked just moments before. Now ... if there's anything she can still do, now's the time to do it. Where's that damn gauntlet? Kiiro's ready to take it to the shrine for exorcism and purification, then dump it in a scrap heap for melting down and recycling ... and Iczel-Gold would agree with the sentiment if *she* weren't busy keeping Kiiro alive, sane, and relatively safe. They'd better have a vacation after this ... but first, Kiiro scans for the gauntlet, then powers up her beam sword, lengthening the blade enough to chop through Benedict's arm, and tries to fly in and lop the gauntleted hand off. John-117 feels accomplished, as if he was the one that destroyed the demons, his shields beginning to return to normal to his relief. A few twinges of pain mainly in his chest, his biomonitors revealing some slight depression in his health. A new voice echoes in his head quite suddenly, eliminating the dark one; no matter to him, he'll figure that out later. He continues reading his HUD to see a radiation read out bleep onto screen, he thinks to himself oO(nice to see that's working). The source of the radiation, though not harmful radiation, is Bahamut. For the first time in his life, he feels as though in awe, though gathers himself quickly so as this is not noticed. He returns the SMG's to his sides, quickly placing new clips in them, in case he needs them again. With no time to waste, he begins arming his battle rifle again, slinging it forward, holding the barrel with his left to keep it steady. He soon after begins pumping rounds from afar into Benedict using his scope to target specific parts such as his head, and chest - his target recticle painted read on his HUD as the target is huge. MRCS's sees the massive energy blast and doesnt even have to check it's source to know where it came from. "Bahamut! heh, Thanks Riris, thats the first solid hit all night." the mecha is thrown into a sprint, and switches over to the built in tan treds in it's feet, circling clear around the little arena, it drives straight for the point of impact Benadict made from the dragon's attack and jumps, large wing like holsters at it's side unfold and present the grip of an auto cannon to each of the mech's hands, grasping them both of the 80mm rapid fire cannons aim for where the thing landed and rip open with a voley of tungsten core rounds as it arcs downwards, towards the same location, aiming to land one 25 ton metal kick at where Benedict should be. .oO(Trinune and Cae are starting up with the libervastion, gotta make sure this bastard is pinned.) The music continues to swell around the area, spreading it's calming effect...and suddenly, a wind swirls around Sam, though not interfering with her running. A whirlwind forms, following alongside the nekojin for a moment; and from that whirlwind appears a bronze-skinned elven woman, with red hair, blue eyes, and a set of shimmering, iridescent blue dragon wings, as well as a long dragon tail...with a face which is likely very familiar to Sam... Said woman is flying alongside Sam, though her head is turned and she's smiling to Sam... Terry's eyes widen as they open, and his gaze flashes towards the incoming young figher. (He's really using it... all of it...) He recognises the energy he fought so long ago being used once more with hostile intent, and fighting back against every nerve in his body that screams to defend - to counter-attack - he throws his arms out to either side and takes the momentous blow full on. As the light from Bahamut's attack fades, revealing the charred, frayed dark form below.. which smokes slowly, foul smelling stuff filling the air.. Terry is launched back off the still-outstretched gauntlet, a trail of blood whipping up off his chest, shirt torn open to reveal a devastated mess of pulped flesh and broken bone below. But.. a strange grace comes over the blonde fighter as he twists and comes around smoothly floating in the air a short way behind Benedict. His bloodshot eyes, now red-streaked sapphire jewels, focus on the god's bared back, smouldering away... and then golden light bursts in a flash around the martial artist. His lips contort with a rage of effort and he continues to float in the shroud of ki, muscular form silhouetted there and every loose end whipped around by a ferocious energy-induced wind. With a primal scream he throws his hands forward then, leather shrouded palms facing Benedict. "EEEAAAAGGHHHH..." the cry starts low and builds to a scream as he finally cries out, "BURST TUNNEL!" And from his damaged chest Rock's blue ki floods, down his arms and into his palms.. power gathering there.... and he pauses a moment, just a moment, before the golden energy floods there also. Nothing surrounds Terry now, the man floating still with a gigantic build-up of ki, gold and blue, in his palms. And then it's released in a circular beam the diameter of his height, that rips off from him and straight into the back of the evil beast with all the force of his and Rock's auras combined. Samantha stops dead as she nears the top of the stairs, watching the multitude of attacks rain down. Finally she decides to drop to a tense crouch, blade held out behind her and still alight with ki. (I was coming to get revenge and now.. I don't even need'ta lift a hand... maybe I shoulda asked for more help in the first place..?) She blinks then as said woman appears, and turns her gaze to meet hers. "What're-oh.." she just blinks and keeps staring, oblivious to the thunderous sound of the pillars that crash down one at a time behind her as Xue makes the cuts... and also oblivious to what lies ahead, as everyone unleashes their vast power at the god she came to kill. Bahamut continues to hover overhead, but it's not preparing to attack again ... whatever or whoever summoned it is maintaining the summons, likely to bear witness to the battle's end. Benedict's already-smouldering form now finds itself under further assault immediately... he appears to have solidified too as the damage heaps up. Each attack by itself would be relatively ineffective, but as it is he cannot find time or gather his thoughts to attack... not for the first time he curses his pathetic mortal origins. No longer does his voice sound as the last pillar comes crashing down on the platform around the infernal half-elf... and can it ever sound again? Bullets ricochet from his black armour with deafening 'pings' and then energy blasts are rained down, Jack's Ashes washing across the gargantuan helmeted face, the vast power set to obliterate anything there - but can it succeed? All this remains to be seen, as coupled with the launched tunnel of combined ki from Terry the black form is a third time engulfed with mortal firepower. The gauntlet is shorn free also by Kiiro's attack, though nothing seems to remain inside, it is an empty husk, dented and battered already by Rock's repetitive assaulting. This leaves nothing at all visible of the god, and not a sound apart from that created by the wash of attacks. That aura remains though, and has barely faltered despite what has occurred to the dark physical form. Rock falls forwards onto his knees after Terry is launched away. Rock's hands tremble and his pupils return to normal. And the strain on his body causes the trmors to spread, not to mention the reallization that he had lost control again. Slowly the young man pulls himself to his feet and watches the assault on the god in stunned silence. Johnny stares up at the seemingly dying Benedict as his mind reals trying to grasp the gravity of the situation. It nags on him that everyone is missing something obvious... Then it comes to him in a flash, should Benedict fall... his creations fall as well... Ignoring everyone and everything he lets loose all of his stored energies that had been building during the fight into a collective mass of shadows that flow around him, literaly boiling off of his blackend skin. Suddenly the mass solidifies and falls to the ground spreading outwards to coat the entire surface of the floating platform and turning it entirely black, and hopefully hold it together and airborne should the demon-god indeed loose his power. The idea that his own power might fade as well never occurs to him as he drops to his knees and thrusts his palms out on the ground beneath him, trying his best to concentrate on what might be a futile effort... Xue Qian turns to glare at the 'god', smiling with evil intent, waiting to see what effect this all has, and deciding who next to kill when this thing finally dies, the purple fire in her eyes flaring a bit for a moment. However, for the moment, she keeps her distence and merely watches. Sun smiles warmly at Samantha. "Do not let me deviate you from your mission, my love. This will be spoken of when the time is right. Until then...I will protect you." she murmurs softly, spreading her wings. "And...I will aid you, but the final blow...shall be yours." Trinune shifts her bluered eyes over onto Carla, or, sort of, the brighter of the glows kind of shifts over and concentrates more to the side anyway, she doesn't really have eyes right now. Trinune's body has literally begun to vibrate, her right hand coming over to clench down upon her left wrist, the white light around it fluxuating wildly now. Libervastion isn't a spell she was supposed to have anymore, but then, Trinune isn't a normal being. Still, she's having trouble...digesting, as it were, the spell, and she can feel herself breaking apart. Her hand releases her wrist, and reaches back to the black band in her hair, pulling out the golden feathers from their place where they rest in her hair. She gripes the remains of the angel from before, comfort and warmth spreading out from her palm. Her eyes focus back down at her hand. And her eyes shift fully onto blueblue as some of her anger subsides, for the moment, the spell is hers, it won't eat her away. She clenches her left hand into a fist, and just as fast as the turmoil of absorbing the spell began, it disappears. The feathers are put back into place, and her blueblue eyes look to Carla, for intrusction, for help, or maybe just to look. "I'm safe." She informs the girl. Carla would roll her eyes, if she wasn't staring at the immense form of Bahamut that has descened from on high. But, she looks back when Trinune speaks, then looks down to where Benedict is, or where everyone else and the fury is. She frowns deeply, gods are gods, one thing she's learned, they're not easily killed, and sometimes, even when they're killed, they're not dead. They just form somewhere else, rising up from their ashes. She's about to move forward, the white light rejoining her hand and spreading along her body, when Trinune reaches out and takes ahold of Carla's wrist. Carla snaps her head at the blade, blinks once as the blade communicates with her, and then looks back to Benedict, and then..just a little to the side. She furrows her brow, staring for a moment before she nods her head, "Yes, yes, come on!" She growls, yanking her wrist free of Trinune's grip. The spell Libervastion encompasses Carla's entire body as she arcs through the air, gaining altitude once more on the scene. Trinune meanwhile, floats herself over to another side, rising up into the air. Carla's takes quick assesment of the scene, o O ( Yeah, gods. All immortal, but I see that little lifeline. ) She says, thanks to Trinune being able to see the dimensional connections in the area. She doesn't bother looking towards the blade now floating in the air, fully linked with her for the moment, it probably won't last, Trinune's so unstable. She looks upon the aura form of Benedict, and her eyes narrow down, "I bet you can still hear, whatever your name is." She growls, and arcs her wings, sailing down towards the temple, "So listen to my words." She growls, "You -don't- get to screw around with my friends, and you -don't- get to stay in this dimension, either. So, tell your stupid god friends back home if you have a" Dragoness Carla says, "So, tell your stupid god friends back home if you have any, that if they show up, my friends and I won't just shove them into a little dimensional hole, we'll outright end your immortal existence!" Her wings snap out, pulling her to a sudden stop about three feet away from the Benedict aura. Meanwhile, as Carla was sailing down through the air, Trinune was holding both of her hands out, the white light of the Libervastion spell, the power of god, rippling out from both of her hands into two perfect white orbs, which go sailing down. One of the orbs slightly faster then the other, and as it gets within a few feet of Benedict, it explodes outwards in a massive wash of the holier than holy magic, almost the exact opposite of the power Johnny is using, it heads right towards the main body of Benedict. Meanwhile, Carla's right hand comes up as that spell goes off, and Trinune erupts in a torrent of blue lightning, the blade appearing in her raised hand, and the second orb impacts down around Trinune's blade, white light erupting out around it as Carla swings, but not at Benedict, oh no, she's swinging at that little line Trinune noticed, that line that seems to be keeping him stable and holding him inside of this dimension. Trinune arcs through the air and connects with the dimensional lifeline, exploding out through the dimensions itself at it, rather than in this dimension, tearing and tugging at that shred, attempting to eradicate it into pieces so it will snap back in on itself and send the god away from this dimension, at least, that's what she's hoping. All of this happens within moments. Jack is well, out of the fight. That was the first time when he pulled off that stunt that took him down for the count...and he's not moving folks. Raiden floats at his vantage point, watching in silence, leaned idly against his staff. . o O ( Dragon God perhaps... Hard to place for sure. Definately a divine presence. The mortals aren't half bad. Some of them could possibly give Tibbal, Rass, Angella, or Link a run for their money. Still, nothing to the level of Xoretraera, thus far. Or the one I mistook this monstrosity for. The fast I escaped without too much harm proves that well enough. Its just durable, not powerful. ) Gold Iczelion deactivates her beam sword and flies up, trying to get a clear line of fire on Benedict. "You messed with the people of the wrong city this century, idjit ..." The 'scabbards' at her hips detach and split into halves, the four segments reorienting themselves into a 'cylinder' with one end centered on her hands, now locked together into a double fist. "Super ... TORNADO!!!" The cylinder spins rapidly as she focuses her energy into a single blast, amplified and focused for increased power - the target, of course, being whatever's left of Benedict, even in aura form. John-117 lowers his battle rifle, placing in a new clip, tapping his radio comm in communication with Kawatta, nodding to what he has to say, and makes preperations for an emergency drop, pressurizing his suit to it's maximum capacity. Afterwards the preperations are done, he begins to fire again with his new clip in the Battle Rifle at the auric area of Benedict, doubting a shot will hit, but trying anyway. His scanners picking up radiation signatures that pose for the aura. MRCS hits the armor with one foot as blasts of the GodSpell go off to his "Holy #$&!" the 30 foot mecha pushs off the armor, maybe crunching it, and maybe not, to get the hell away from ground zero. Sun smiles warmly at Samantha. "Do not let me deviate you from your mission, my love. This will be spoken of when the time is right. Until then...I will protect you. No matter what, I will not allow any harm to come to you...nor will nature herself." she murmurs softly, spreading her wings, castiing a shimmer of rainbow sparkles over Sam. "And...I will aid you, but the final blow...shall be yours." She reaches out to gently brush her hand over her fiancee's shoulder, smiling softly to her. Then, she lifts into the air without another word, a flute appearing within her hands; she lifts this, beginning to play a song of unearthly qualities...and the skies begin to darken. After a long moment, fireballs aimed at all foes begin to rain from the sky, though these fireballs avoid those fighting against Benedict. As that next wash of energies dissipates into the air around Benedict... the form beneath is once again revealed. Standing there is that same black form, dark ichor dripping from it and acrid smoke curling up into the air. At the top of the dark figure is.. nothing, Jack's final apocalyptic blast having removed the helmeted head entirely, disintegrating a whole piece of the godlike being. Other shots rebound from the armour, some creating holes, drawing more blood. The final blasts now launched rip through and around the form, and as Iczelion's attack comes the armour is shattered into a hundred pieces, a burst of black light accompanying the attack. Then they all hang in the air... as those green-blue slits appear in the middle of the night air, surrounded by the last dark tendrils of Benedict's physical form. These focus back onto Cale, even as the torrent of fireballs rain down from on high and light up the entire area, silhouetting all those within their glow. "How like them to continue..." the hissing voice comes, weak and broken but still loud enough. "You.. Dragonmaster.... another one held dear by the tailed one.... you win.. I.... leave...." the voice fades now into near nothing, just a dying whisper before the shadows in the air are gone, wisping away without any trace. And like that, with a windy hiss the evil aura is gone too. Nothing remains, nothing traceable of the entity known as Benedict. But is this truly over? It seems not as the platform lurches, tipping dangerously to one side. The fallen pillars rumble across its length, and anybody within is likely to have some dodging to do.... as they then tumble to the distant ground the platform lurches the opposite direction and then begins to plummet. Though slowed by Johnny's controlling energies, the ride is still anything but slow and hardly free from danger. Raiden shrugs and twirls his staff, bringing it down into midair, again vanishing in a burst of yellow light. Johnny becomes aware of the massive amounts of energy still being released all around him and does his best to push the thoughts from his mind while he continues to try to hold onto the floating remains of the temple. The strain becomes almost unbareble as the entire area begins to crumble from the effects of the holy energies being released upon Benedict. As if this weren't bad enough, someone's flute playing cuts through his head like a knife. Screaming from the strain he releases his own grip on things slightly and sits up, the enitre platform lurching from the reduced support. Reaching back for his daggers that he resheated just before attempting to hold the floating area together, he twirls them and embeds them into the shadow covered ground to focus his energies even more than before... however this only seems to stableise the platform as it begins to fall back down to the earth, taking everyone on it along for the ride... John-117 leaps from the platform now, having been warned, the pressure already increased in his MJOLNIR suit. He slings the battle rifle back, locking and securing his equipment. "Thought the last time I'd do this was on Sigma Octanus..." And so he leaps, stealing a move from the ODST's, he thinks to himself, he himself was jumping from the platform to land on the ground crouching, bracing himself, his shields weering to nothing. A close call, internal bleeding also a resultant thanks to the impact, but nothing a born and bred killing mission that a Spartan is couldn't handle... Dragoness Carla would be dead tired at this point, would be almost drained of all her magic, if it weren't Trinune who shot both Libervastion's out. She releases the blade, which erupts into blue lightning once again, forming up into the humanoid form of the sword. Carla's wings flap, keeping her clear of the black ground as she looks towards the disappearing aura and voice of the god. She narrows her eyes some, her tail swaying about behind her, "Never come back." She says, as the platform starts to fall down to the ground, oh great! She lunges over, grabbing Jack, but realizes that she doesn't have enough physical strength in this body, she looks over to Trinune, but before she can even think anything towards the sword, Trinune has grabbed Jack up and slung her over her shoulder, she then looks to everyone still on the tumbling towards the earth pillar, and immediaetly moves over, attempting to grab Terry and Samantha as well, what? Not Johnny or anyone else that might be falling to their doom? Nope. She'll tuck Jack under an arm, grab Terry around the waist, and sling Samantha over her shoulder, that is, if she's not prevented from doing this. Carla, not wanting to get whacked by falling shards, takes off into the sky quickly, looking around to try and make sure no one's going to be falling to her doom, she can at least slow their descent if she has too. MRCS lands...on nothing, the platform isnt where it should have been. Reholstering those twin auto cannons, if anyone's still in freefall as the mech sails down it tries to catch them in suprisingly acurate mechanical hands. As it comes to the ground it night s off the engines in it's back and crouches to absourb the shock with teh thunderous sound of metal against concreat. Xue Qian runs to the side and leaps off the edge of the platform, casting a windspell, and hurtling down at high speeds, the spell kicking in along the way. As she gets close to the ground, she pulls up suddenly, since shes using magic rather than actual physics, and skims along the badlands surface, over and around obsticles as needed, disappearing into the distance, a cloud of kicked-up dust marking her trail as she goes. Samantha blinks at Sun and just watches, rapt with awe, as everything takes place around her. In truth her brain stopped working a while ago, and she's running purely on instinct to survive... the same instincts that see her tear away from her gaze on Sun and stagger down the steps towards the floor of the temple, keeping her balance with a few flicks of her tail and an outflung hand. In the other she sheathes her shortsword. (Is it really done? After all that, we won?) She blinks as Trinune comes near and shoots another glance back to Sun before letting the swordgirl pick her up, throwing her a quick confused smile, "Th-thanks, Tri-chan... erk." The last as she is slung over the girl's shoulder, and she tries to take as much weight off as she can, letting a little ki work off her shoulders to help this. Terry has been floating free in the air since his attack went forward... blood dripping slowly from the rend in his chest. He also allows himself to be taken by Trinune, with a bit of a grin, "Nice to see ya again, Tri... how's it going?" With that he passes out against the shoulder of the swordgirl, not seeing or thinking on much else... the use of all his power at once, so soon after the events in Cassandra's afterlife, should see him down for the count for a good little while. Johnny screams as the platform comes thundering down, paying more attention to what he's trying to do than to anyone or anything going on around him. A shame too because it appears he's the only one left behind... His efforts in vane the huge former temple hits the ground and explodes in a shower of rock and debris sending the weakened maniac into the air, his daggers resheathing themseleves somehow of their own accord. Hitting the ground hard and screaming in pain he manages to be missed by most of the larger rocks but is still wounded enough that once his shadows fade along with his conciousness and the boy is revealed once more he's covered from head to toe in his own blood... Sun narrows her eyes, and her song changes; within an instant, she's enveloped in a whirlwind, and dissapears; then, she reappears, flying along next to Trinune, Samantha, and Terry. Her song fades at this point, and the flute dissapears once more. "Shall I go get Johnny...?" She asks softly, her tone neutral. Dragoness Carla is glad that everyone got off of that collapsing thing, than goodness. She was ready to try and send some wind magic if she had to to help stop their fall to death, and just make it a fall to broken bones instead. She flaps her way over towards Trinune, glancing down towards the airborne Johnny with a frown, but, he's not dead...okay, good. She looks back to Trinune, wanting to say something, but, she refrains, not sure if she'll set off the blade's emotions to worse. Best to let crazy swords do what they want, at the moment at least. Trinune, meanwhile, looks towards the catgirl slung over her shoulder, shifting her around in one perfect motion to cradle her in her right arm instead, "I've decided I hate death." She informs Samantha, then shifts her eyes over to Terry, who's passed out, so she says nothing, tucking him more underneath her arm and looking towards Carla, then towards Kawatta's MRCS. Samantha blinks sidelong at Sun, her mind rapidly churning everything over... "But you're-" she tails off with a hiccup as she's pulled around by Trinune. She blinks a couple more times, and just nods to the swordgirl for a moment before looking back to Sun, "Can ya get Johnny? He.. he might be hurt...." she tails off with a warm smile, her gaze lingering for a moment before her head lolls, she too seeming on the brink of unconsciousness, though rather than for a lack of energy it's for everything she's had to deal with, and is still having to deal with, mentally and emotionally. MRCS *grrrnngrrnGRNCH* as it's transmission...oh yeah, forgot to mention this mecha of the lots of shooty stuff is desil powered. anyways, it's transmission shifts up and down to find the optimium speed to torque for getting it's generators and pumps running smoothly after that impact and using the stored up reserves to get the mecha standing up again and pulling itself from a veritable nest of debries "I feel like a basketball dropped from a 747." Sun nods slowly, and promptly dissapears with no aid of any element; she reappears, after tracking Johnny's soul to this point, and wordlessly, she pulls out her flute, and begins playing a song. A shield of wind appears around herself and Johnny. Her song changes, then, inspiring Johnny's body to heal itself as swiftly as possible, likely no more than three or four minutes... Dragoness Carla glances towards Johnny as Sun takes care of him, good, seeing that Trinune isn't doing anything drastic, she was going to get down there, but instead she hovers over to where Trinune is, looking Terry over to make sure he's breathing and not overly wounded and bleeding, then hovering before Trinune and the catgirl, though she pointedly doesn't look at Trinune's eyes, "Eh, y-you okay?" She folds her arms, and gives a light fanged grin, "Stupid gods! Screwing around with us again!" She gets a light sweatdrop, you can tell she's joking and making light of it, she really takes it serious, but it's more fun to pretend it's nothing at all, ne? Johnny doesn't react to Sun's song... his wastelock and his daggers draining any form of magic thrown at him. But the darkness inside him is fed by the song. As it continues his blood at first seems to turn black and soon it begins to spread over any portion of his body not already covered in blood. The shadows manage to hold his wounds together, but nothing more... at least he's not bleeding to death now... Well, Terry's going to have a nice healthy scar there by the looks of things: the blow struck by Rock in the very center of his chest still bleeding freely and also giving off the occasional flicker of blue energy, though it's very fleeting. Beside that, he seems fine.. though of course the wound comes with a couple of broken ribs, and these are visible amongst the bloody flesh. Samantha jerks her head up with a quick attempt at a reassuring smile, her eyes taking a while to sort themselves out and focus on Carla, when she nods drunkenly, "'M okay.. jus'.. need to rest..." she glances towards Trinune and smiles a bit more before promptly flopping sidelong, resting her head in the crook of the swordgirl's neck and dropping slowly into unconsciousness. The gem in her collarbone is not glowing though - so clearly this is not due to any serious wound. Dragoness Carla looks over towards Terry after making sure Samantha's okay and she falls asleep. She mm's and gives a light fanged smile, looking over towards Terry now, she brings her hand over, holding it above the wound, but before she can do anything, a green glow erupts around Terry from Trinune, healing him faster. Carla lowers her hands back and looks towards Trinune, "Mm." She says, Trinune just stares back, then looks over towards Kawatta. MRCS manuvers it's way through the ruins over towards Carla and Co. where it crouches down and opens up it's chest so Kawatta can slide out to the ground and land on his feet "... how are we?" Sun halts in her song as this occurs, and her form is enveloped in light; it grows, morphing, into...an 80 foot long, 40 foot tall dragon. o_o The light fades, leaving behind a dragon covered in shimmering, iridescent blue scales, which seems to be a combination of the oriental dragon's long, slender body (though not AS long as the oriental dragons), and the western dragon's head, wings, tail, and feet. Ever-so-gently she lifts Johnny in her front talons, shielding him in there, and with a single flap of her wings, she takes to the air, gliding a short distance over to where Cale, Trinune, Sam, and Terry are gathered; she stretches her wings, peering down at the group, before moving to lay down to give those willing the capability to climb onto her back. Dragoness Carla looks over towards Kawatta, giving a light fanged grin, folding her arms tightly across her chest, "I'm okay, everyone else is alive, no big casaulties, thankfully. Not sure what that was, a god of some kind." She lets out a slow breath, looking back at Samantha, "We'll have to wait for them to wake up to know more. But, his name was Benedict." She says, glancing to Johnny, from whom she got this information, then over to Terry, o O ( Good to see him again! ) She thinks to herself. She looks towards Sun, always enjoying the sight of a dragon. Trinune, meanwhile, continues to float, "Hello." She says towards Kawatta. Kawatta leans against the leg of the mech "Hello Trinune. How are you?" Trinune responds back towards Kawatta, "Beyond explanation." She informs him. Carla ehh's, "W-well, a-anyway...why don't we all go back to my place n stuff and we can let Samantha and Terry rest down on the couches n stuff or in the spare guest rooms?" She rubs the back of her head, getting a little nervous about Trinune. Sun's head twitches, and she turns to look at Carla. She speaks, though with great difficulty, "Sssam, Terry, and Johnny will be fine in my home. I shall care for thhhhhem." Kawatta nods to Trinune. Samantha stirs a bit against Trinune, a little hiccup escaping her throat. "Nngh..." she pushes herself up a bit, and looks across at her rediscovered father... watching him with a little frown, which fades as she smiles warmly and reaches around with one hand, tracing the line of his jaw. She blinks and looks away then, dropping her hand back onto Trinune and looking at Sun's dragon form. It takes a moment for her to remember, and she smiles at her, "It's alright.. I think,... C-Cale-sensei kinda helped.. back there. We should go explain.... or somethin'..." her head lolls again, eyes half-lidding as she fights back another wave. Sun's wings flare. "I would like to care for you all...I can do it." she replies, tongue sliding out and 'tasting' the air. Kawatta looks over at Sun "I wanna hear this explination too. Besides, it's rude to turn down an invitation." Dragoness Carla blinks over at Carla, "Eh, oh, er, okay then, I suppose." She shrugs her shoulders and looks at Samantha, wondering if maybe she's just kind of out of it and doesn't know what she's saying. She looks to Trinune, "Mm, want to j--" But, before she can finish, Trinune cuts Carla off, snapping her head towards Carla, "The battle is over, no one is dead." She informs the girl, "I desire company." And with that she erupts into a torrent of blue lightning, taking Terry, Samantha, Kawatta and his whole MRCS with her. Carla blinks.. "Trinune! Dang it!" A black mist forming up around her. o O ( Arrrgh! What is wrong with her?! No, I know what's wrong! Grrr! ) Sun frowns, letting out a low hiss. "Denying me of caring for my own fiancee!" she snarls, and flaps her wings once more, taking to the air with Johnny in tow. The Charis Home: Living Room The living room of the Charis home is beautifully decorated. Multiple pictures of dragons are along the walls, and also a few of castles and such. There are a few couches here with a table in the middle of the room for placing food or feet and such on. In front of the couch is a 60" screen tv with dolby surround and all that other techinal stuff ( spared no expense ). A few windows add light to the place giving it a nice feel to it. There is an open doorway into the kitchen and another door leading down a hallway. Dragoness Carla sweatdrops bigtime! Note: Kawatta is deposited at the doorstep, "Trinune! Th-that was very rude!" She scolds, but the sword just ignores her as she drops Jack roughly to the floor, she knows he heals quickly, and then drops Samantha and Terry on each of the couches. She then holds her hands out towards them both, their body's erupting into a massive green glow of healing energy, attempting to bring them to conciousness. Carla sighs and just watches, growing quiet as she glances to the entrance, moving and opening the door so Kawatta can get in. Kawatta blinks "luuuucy, I m-a hooome." Samantha stirs as the energies are poured into her, a little gasp escaping this time as she awakens. Terry remains unconscious, though his breathing becomes more regular, and that wound on his chest is done to a nasty scar already, though through the blood this might not be immediately obvious. The nekogirl sits up with a shiver and keeps herself up on one arm as she looks around wide-eyed, "I.. nnh." She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath, "Was... was anyone hurt?" Trinune lowers her hands after Samantha wakes up, Terry doesn't. That means he needs more natural sleep. She could wake him up, but she doesn't, instead looking towards Samantha, "Yes." Of course people were hurt, Carla was hurt, she was hurt, she starts to think that's a stupid question, and shakes her head at Samantha, her lip semi-curling into a disapproving twist, before her face goes blank and looks to Kawatta, "Hello, again." She says to him. Carla looks to Kawatta, "Hey, eh heh..." She hops over the couch, flumping down next to Samantha, "S-so, that was Benedict?" She asks, criss-crossing her legs underneath her. Kawatta walks inside, wondering why he was deposeted outside, he stands near the group, wanting to hear just what benedict is Because your MRCS is there, Kawatta. n.n; Doesn't fit in the house. Samantha blinks at Trinune, slowly trying to figure out anything more in the swordgirl's gaze. Then she blinks again, "B-but, who? Were they-?" She stops seeing the slight disapproval and looks instead to Carla, "Yeah.. it was... to think I was gonna try an' do it alone..." she smirks slightly and rubs at the back of her neck, "But..." her gaze lingers to her father again and she swallows tightly, "I don't understand.. what happened? Why is my pop back...?" Sun appears in the living room, sending a scowl towards Trinune immediately, wings flaring a bit...though she remains silent. Dragoness Carla looks over at the sleeping Terry, then back to Samantha, she shakes her head softly, "I dunno, eh heh, I know Johnny was trapped and was going to be let free to help you!" She pulls out of a black mist that drawing, handing it to Samantha, "This is from him, finally got a chance to give it to you, gomen. Things had been kind of...complicated, latley." She glances to Trinune, then looks over to Kawatta, "Ne, have a seat!" Trinune looks towards Sun, and her eyes narrow slightly, "You are..." She pauses, correcting herself, "You're not invited, if you desire conflict, I will end you." She's taken that scowl as a threat, and decided there's probably emotions of hate, so she'll just return them. Carla err's quickly, "T-Trinune! Sh-she can be here if sh-she wants!" Sun narrows her eyes at Trinune. "You HAPPENED to have taken my fiancee. I stated my desire to bring her home, and you ignored that desire in favor of your own wants. I wish no conflict. I just wish to bring my fiancee home." she mutters. Kawatta says, "Ahem...pardon me, but you Fiance agreed to come here, so get that damn chip off your shoulder." Samantha glances at Trinune and frowns, "Yeah.. Tri-chan, leave it..." (What's wrong? Why are they fighting?) She looks past the swordgirl to Sun, wondering again at her.. altered appearance, but with a quiet blink she decides to ask later, and just sits up for now, shifting up to make a little more room on the couch. (It's okay, Sun-chan.. I owe them an explanation, and they're my friends. They helped me fight.) She smiles at Sun then looks over to Carla, taking the picture from her hands, "What's-" she stops dead again and gazes down at the picture, "This is from Johnny....?" Trinune shifts her blueblue eyes onto Kawatta, then back to Sun. Then over to Samantha, then to Carla, then, she moves over and takes the seat next to Samantha, sandwhiching her between Carla and herself, undoubtedly stealing what was Sun's offer spot. She says nothing though, looking towards Samantha in silence. Carla shifts some on the couch, hopeing Trinune's done...well, doing anything really, she's so unstable, she nods at the picture, "Y-yeah! He said to give it to you..ano..." She looks at Sun, "Where'd you put Johnny, anyway...?" She blinks. Sun blinks over at Samantha, and frowns. ( I merely wished to take you home, and spend time with you...I have not gotten any time with you, and I wished to talk with you on this affair... ) She glances to Carla, her gaze still hard. "He is at my home, resting and under my care." Samantha tilts her head, peering sidelong at Trinune. "N-ne.. Tri-chan... I kinda reserved that seat.... um." She bites her lip softly and looks back to Sun, lifting a hand to idly stroke at her hair which is liberally -coated- in blood. Not hers however. She nods, "I hope he's okay then..." (I'm sorry I had to go away for a day.. I... didn't want ya worrying about me out there. I took Xue and Latran, an' my bro... I thought they'd be enough.) She peers at the picture again, a few tears welling up, "H-how didja get this, Cale-sensei?" Dragoness Carla blinkblinks at the hard gaze from Sun, sweatdropping, "Ano ne, don't get all huffy at me, eh heh, Trinune's not my sword anymore, really, sheesh." She gives a fanged smile, then looks back to Samantha. She erks suddenly, her tail smacking back against the couch cushion behind her, "Ahh, d-don't cry!" She stammers, shifting around a bit, "W-well, I-I was on the roof, you know? And er, I heard someone screaming my name, eh heh, b-but, it was across dimensions so I didn't locate it for a bit, er, w-well, anyway! I went there and found Johnny and he told me about Benedict and told me to give you this! Gomen nasai, I didn't get it to you before the fight." She lets out a slow breath and slumps a little bit. Trinune doesn't say anything back towards Samantha, simply watching everyone now with her blueblue eyes, which might be for the best at this point. Sun frowns. ( You should have told me! What if you would have gotten KILLED out there?! ) "I am not getting huffy at you. I am merely very irritated about this." she mumbles. Samantha sniffs back her tears and looks over at Carla, inclining her head slightly. "But.. that's okay. I mean, at least I got it eventually right? An'.. anyway." She heaves a sigh and pauses, before slowly standing up from between Trinune and Carla, and making her way over to Sun. She's a little shaky still, but seems to be recovering admirably. She reaches for Sun's hands with both her own, and smiles into her eyes, "I.. didn't wanna tell you coz I knew you'd worry." Worth noting it's not just her hair soaked in blood.. it's like she's been swimming in a pool of the stuff, though her face is at least fairly clean, the hair having shielded it and sweat having washed a great deal away. "But I'm fine, right? I'm not hurt...." Sun frowns at Samantha. "You could have been hurt. Badly. And I wouldn't have known until someone would tell about me! I could have HELPED...I even OFFERED to help, Sam, and you brushed me off!" She scolds, then sighs. "I will be at home, tending to Johnny's wounds, while you talk." she grumbles, closing her eyes. Dragoness Carla is sooo glad Samantha didn't cry, that's a relief! She nods her head, "Y-yeah!" In response to Samantha's words, then glances over at Sun and rolls her eyes, o O ( Whatever, it's not my fault. ) She folds her arms and flops back on the couch, fanning her wings out so they're not crushed behind her. Trinune's blueblue eyes shift from speaker to speaker now, still not intruding on the conversations for the moment. Samantha offers a loose shrug, "The main thing is 'm fine, right? I won, an' I got..." her gaze slides to the sleeping Terry, "I got my pop back. An' it's over... it's all over." She smiles sadly at Sun and releases her hands, folding her arms across her chest, "I'll be back when I've finished explainin', I don't need much rest... Tri-chan kinda fixed me up I think." Sun sighs, nodding slowly. "Hai..." she whispers in a slightly dissapointed almost...hurt tone. ( I'm happy that you are alright, and that you have your father back. However...in truth, knowing that you purposely didn't tell me...it feels like you don't trust me enough to tell me that you're going into something that could pose a threat to your life...and that thought really hurts. ) At this point, she dissapears. Dragoness Carla blinks as Sun just says yes and then disappears. That's...kind of weird. She shifts some on the couch, not sure what that was about, maybe telepathy, is that what it was like when her and Trinune used to talk? She glances over at Trinune, who looks back to Carla and gives a smile at her. The girl mm's and smiles back feintly, Trinune's gaze switching back over to Samantha's. Samantha sighs a bit as Sun disappears. She brushes the fingers of one hand lightly through the air, as if stroking her fiancee's cheek though she's no longer there. "I was just tryin' to make you not worry..." she whispers softly.. hesitating for a few seconds before she turns back to face the others, setting her hands in her lap. The picture of a proper little girl.. except for the blood and tarnished weaponry. "So..." Dragoness Carla smiles fangedly at Samantha, she's seen people fresh from battle, so she doesn't worry about it too much. She tightens her crisscrossed legs some, "Yeah! Tell me about this Benedict guy n stuff, if you know anything that is..." She glances to where Sun was, then glances to Kawatta, "By the way, anyone want some strawberries or food or something? A drink?" Samantha laughs softly, looking from Kawatta to Carla with an attempt at a grin.. quite a good one actually, and it's heartfelt. "Strawberry Italian soda'd be great..." she murmurs, a little shyly, then heaves another quick sigh. "Yeah. So... um. I guess.... how much d'you know? It all started a while back when this goddess, Cassandra...she started to use me, makin' me sleepwalk....?" She tails off with a slightly raised eyebrow, waiting to see if this has been imparted by her friend the maniac before she goes on. Dragoness Carla gives the lightest nod of her head towards Samantha, a black mist flows up along the coffee table, despositing two s.i.s.'s on it. carla grabs them and offers one to Samantha and then nods at the chair or the middle seat of the couch, "Ehh, sit down and get comfy, ne?" She offers, taking a sip of her own drink. "W-well, I remember you being possessed by her once. Mm, the only thing Johnny really told me was that you were in terriblye danger from a guy called Benedict." Samantha nods slowly, quite missing the soda for a moment as she looks at Carla silently. Then finally she blinks and snags up the drink, moving over to the chair so she can see everyone all at once. She perches on its edge, quite forgetting the bloody trail she's likely to leave, and sips her soda before having a quick think. (Where should I go from? It's all so hard to remember...) "Weeeeell.." she stretches the syllable out as she looks heavenward, then looks down to Trinune.. then to Carla, "Thing is.. it started months ago. I was bein' made to walk into the Badlands, an'... well. I can't remember how I found out, but it turned out Cass wanted me to.. kill this guy Benedict. They're from the same world, see... they've fought before." Dragoness Carla nods her head, listening closely as she takes a long drink of her soda, glad of it. "I see." Hey, upon reflection, Benedict appearing got her out of going shopping for girl clothing! It's not all bad afterall he showed up! Sip. Trinune folds her arms across her stomach, continuing to remain silent for now. Samantha nodnods, "An' then.. I kinda waited around." She fidgets a bit, and takes a long of her soda, swirling the straw around afterwards. "An' waited... an' waited.... an' then." She frowns now, some memory paining her, but shakes it off and continues, "Some stuff happened, out in the forest... that night you and Yoiko-chan left and I went on alone. The next morning... I forget. Coz.. I wasn't me.... I think....." she tilts her head to one side, mouthing a few silent words, "N-next time I woke up.. I saw you stabbin' Jack..." Dragoness Carla frowns suddenly and pushes back into the couch, she looks over to the side, shifting the soda around in her grasp, her tail tip twitching nervously, "That..mm..th-that wasn't me..." She lets out a slow breath, "...that was Trinune, she did it to stop Jack from killing Kawatta..." Trinune shifts her blueblue eyes to Carla, then to Samantha, not offering any further explanation since Carla sum'd it up for her. Samantha quickly shakes her head, "Doesn't matter..." she says hurriedly, and offers a smile.. looking between Carla and Trinune. "It doesn't matter, coz yer my friends. An'.. Jack told me anyway." She shrugs and fixes her gaze on Trinune for a moment, "You too, Tri-chan... I know y'wouldn't do it if there wasn't a reason okay? It doesn't matter...." Dragoness Carla nods her head, giving a light fanged smile at Samantha. Trinune stares at Samantha, and does say something this time, "I enjoyed it, don't worry." She replies to Samantha, now, what she means is, she enjoyed the feeling of helping to save Kawatta, not enjoyed stabbing Jack, she didn't feel anything about that, however, things will be misinterpreted. Carla mm's, shifting some on the couch, she knows Trinune's just a sword, even if she has emotions and a soul, she's still a sword, just different than any other, "A-anyway...you were saying?" She says, trying to get Samantha to go back to telling her tale. Samantha blinks at Trinune, and shifts uncomfortably. "Y-you enjoyed it...? Um. No, d-don't answer that..." she offers a little nervous smile and turns her attention back to Carla, nodding a couple of times. "Yeah, alright. Well.. after that, I dunno... it all went a bit mad again. Johnny came back, an'.. Elu-sama killed him. An' then he came back but.. evil... dija read-oh!" She stops, lifting a finger from the side of the glass. "Gomen.. I forgot. It was while you two were..." she flicks the finger back and forth between Trinune and Carla. Dragoness Carla shifts -again- on the couch at the mention of that time, looking over at Trinune, who stares at her but looks back to Samantha soon enough. "Y-yeah, w-well...w-we had some problems, b-but...it's...w-well, it's better than before. Since I d..er.." She stops, not wanting to bring up that she died, not yet, until Samantha's done with her story. "But, no, I didn't read about it, eh heh." She gives a fanged smile, taking another sip of her soda. Trinune leans back against the couch. Samantha nods, "Hai.. I know, I tried to help remember?" She shifts one shoulder in an unbalanced shrug, and takes another sip of her soda.. thinking as she does so. "Well, that was pretty huge... somethin' like a hundred people died, an' I.. I had to kill Johnny." She looks down with a frown, still not quite able to live with herself over that. "'S why I went after Benedict.. last night." Dragoness Carla gives a slight nod of her head at that, listening closely. She mmm's, "R-right, that's...that's why I made that..that pendant for you..." She nods her head, giving a nervous fanged smile, she meant it as a goodbye present as well, but then she died...and things with Trinune changed, again. "Ahh.." She says at the Benedict thing. Samantha nods slowly, "Yeah.. he was controllin' Johnny see. He tried again today, so.. I had to hit him." She sighs a bit and looks up, her expression brightening suddenly, "Oh! Yeah.. I almost forgot..." she blushes and reaches up with her free hand, arching a finger beneath the neckline of her red tanktop and hooking the pendant's chain.. pulling the beautiful crystalline heart into the light. She fingers it lightly, the surface shimmering.. and forming a stark contrast with the girl's dishevellment and grubby clothing. "I'm never gonna take it off.." Dragoness Carla smiles widely at seeing the pendant, her fangs gleaming briefly, "I'm really glad yo like it!" She says, happily. Samanatha's was the hardest to make out of the gifts, it was totally worth it though. "Well, I'm glad everything turned out okay and no one caught seriously hurt to where they would die." She glances over at the sleeping Terry, "It's good to see him too! He helped me with my magic once, ya know?" She says, looking back to Samantha. Samantha nods her head at the first.. smiling happily. Then her eyes mist over a little as attention is again drawn to Terry. "Yeah..." she whispers, glancing over at him.. she starts to look away again but her gaze lingers, "I-I can't wait 'til he's up again... before.. when, he came for me. I only got a few days, an' most o' that was fighting...." she fingers the pendant idly as she continues to gaze, tears looming slowly in those twin sapphire orbs. Her tail curls around her ankle, tightening a little... Dragoness Carla erks as Samantha starts to get teary, and she sits up on the couch, "N-ne! D-don't cry, all right? Oh.ahh.." She puts down her soda, shifting around, girls getting teary eyed makes her all nervous and worried! "..i-it's okay, ne?" Samantha nods again, not shifting her gaze one bit. The tears don't quite fall.. again. "Yeah.. it's more than alright." She grins and looks around, and finally a single tear works down from her right eye, cutting a path along her slightly smeared pale cheek. "It's the best thing that could ever've happened ever...." Dragoness Carla errks and scoots over on her knees, setting her soda on the table and like, kind of, moving her hands around to try and almost patpat her knees, but she just kinda pats the armchair instead nervously, "H-hai! I-It's r-r-really good!" She smiles fangedly, really big! Samantha nods, sniffling a bit, "It is..." A little tremor creeps into her voice as she struggles not to cry too much... she's feeling the discomfort from Carla, as her empathy is working a little better in her current tired state. "I don't wanna cry.." she whispers, as some more tears streak down. She reaches up to wipe her fingers across her cheeks, just making the tears more obvious as they smear. Dragoness Carla erks as she starts crying fully now, "Ahh, I, er, I m-mean..n-no..well..ah..mou.." She shifts around, not knowing what to do! But, Trinune stands up and walks over, attempting to lift the catgirl up and cradle her within her arms. Trinune has received empathy from her Jack sucking, so she's able to pick on others emotions if she desires, though she hasn't yet learned to turn that around to change emotions, otherwise she'd be changing her own constantly, but she decided to go and cradle the crying catgirl. Samantha gasps a bit as she's picked up by Trinune.. and well, even if the swordgirl weren't so strong the neko-nin is very light... she shivers a bit, and continues to cry, nuzzling up a bit.... she's happy as can be, but all this emotion and the ordeals of the last day have come down on her at once. "Th-thanks..." she murmurs through her tears.. falling silent as she cries. She might well cry herself to sleep, if nothing is done about it... Trinune shifts her grip and turns around, sitting down in a chair and hugging the catgirl to herself, almost protectively. Samantha helped Carla get over her massive depsression, which was driving Trinune insane. She knows Carla and the others still think she's crazy, but, she doesn't care, because she also knows and believes she's insane. Also, your empathy would pick up about ten to fifteen different varying emotions flowing through Trinune at the moment, the dominant one being a sense of careing and protectivness towards the catgirl. Carla blinks, sinking back on her knees at Trinune's, well, care...she's never seen her do that before, she sits back on the couch, letting out a slow breath, deciding to let Samantha cry it out if she needs to, or cry to sleep if she needs to, since it seems Trinune's going to stay stable for the moment, she thinks... Samantha blinks and looks up after a moment, "R-really..?" She's questioning this wash of emotion she can feel suddenly... and she remains frozen, staring up at Trinune through eyes shimmering with tears for a good two, maybe three minutes... then as more tears flood down she sinks back down against the swordgirl, cuddling up to her gratefully. Her tail also slips from around her own ankle to Tri's, curling around the base of her leg and giving a gentle little squeeze before it falls still. (Thanks so much...) Trinune stares at Samantha, she's not able to make out what the really means, and this brings confusion forward, but Trinune literally swaps that back out with the careing emotion instead, it seems, though she has an insane number of emotions going on at once, some of them conflicting, she's learned to shove some further towards the surface than others, maybe this accounts for her sudden mood swings. o O ( Of course. ) Her mind goes into Samantha's own, and she tightens her hold around the catgirl....enjoying the moment, something she's never done before, she thinks she likes it though. Carla sits back on the couch, watching quietly, her own eyes starting to droop unconciously. Samantha eventually stops crying and starts to fall into the realm of sleep... her own thoughts? There's not quite so many emotions in there, but around the happiness is almost a sense of.. awe.. at her situation. She never imagined Trinune could be like this, not from experience or from anything she's been told... but she's grateful, and comfortable.. clearly happy to remain here as long as she's welcome. Soon dreams take over though, and she makes a soft purring noise as she sleeps... | |