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Post by Jay on Feb 13, 2017 0:13:34 GMT
Dusk Things seemed to be going well - the strategy seemed to work. Fukami was able to close the distance thanks to her natural strength being supplemented by the Support Rounds.
When the sniper's partner made it to the magestone, Dusk took note of the surroundings. While she had been able to pick off a few more targets, they seemed to be... backing off?
Why?
At that moment, her questions were answered - the magestone began to twist and turn. Thrumming with magical power, it gave off a light that would be both blinding and searing hot to anything unprotected around it.
The two mages that sat on either side of the massive stone found themselves drawn into the light. The sounds they made - the screams of pain and agony - shook Dusk to her very core.
The stone would begin to shift itself into a different form, with or without Fukami standing atop it.
The result was a gigantic golem, made of the ethereal stone and seemingly tethered together by magical power.
"What is that thing?!" Dusk yelled, taking aim.
Things would only get harder here it seemed.
Human
Neutral Good | 27 | Female |
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Post by Fukami Tsukikage on Feb 14, 2017 19:18:16 GMT
Fukami made the last few jumps up to the top of the magestone, and it seemed to buckle under her weight, but not actually fall. She wondered if the spell keeping it in the air was somehow powerful enough to still maintain itself, despite the EMP.
Then everything went white.
It wasn't a soundless white. No, no. It was a white accompanied by screams that were clearly human, but so warped that they didn't sound human anymore. And Fukami was screaming too -- not out of pain, but terror. She knew that death was going to come collect her some day, but she didn't want it to sneak up on her like this. She closed her eyes and fell to her knees, gripping the rock. The light was so bright that it shone partially through her eyelids, even with her visor partially blocking it out. Everything around her shook, and she could feel the ground shift to the point that her body became vertical and her legs dangled while she clung for dear life.
When she stopped seeing the light, she opened her eyes to see the rock in front of her, then looked down to the ground below. There were corpses there, but they were hardly recognizable as such. They looked like they had been at the epicenter of an explosion, and perhaps that was what happened. If it was magical in nature, her armor might have managed to stave off the worst of it...
Fukami swung her feet to get a foothold on the magestone and started climbing, though she wasn't sure where that was supposed to get her. She heard a voice in the distance that sounded like Dusk, and turned the communications channel on.
"Dusk, what the hell is happening to the magestone?" she shouted. "I'm too close to it to see anything!"
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Post by Jay on Feb 24, 2017 16:44:17 GMT
Dusk Dusk wasn't too sure what was happening to the Magestone, but she could make an assumption as to why.
"It's a defense mechanism!" She yelled back to Fukami. When the woman went up with the golem, Dusk was quick to jump into action and try to fire her gun at the creature.
The bullets were largely ineffective. She didn't understand why either, considering that the EMP was still active. The momentary confusion caused her to lose her focus, and she was caught by an unseen burst of energy conjured from... somewhere.
The energy hit her exospine barrier, but it was strong enough to knock her from her perch with enough force that immediate recovery was almost impossible.
The golem wasted no time, however, and it's attention went directly to Fukami. It made an attempt to grab the Tenno, looking to possibly crush her to death in its grip. Human
Neutral Good | 27 | Female |
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Post by Fukami Tsukikage on Feb 26, 2017 16:19:52 GMT
"A defensive mechanism?" Fukami shouted into her communicator. "That doesn't tell me a damn thing!"
She didn't have time to check in on Dusk and continued scaling the magestone. She could see the slope curving ahead. It wouldn't be long until she didn't have to deal with a vertical surface. At least, that's what she thought.
A large shadow loomed over Fukami, prompting her to turn her head to see a hand. A giant hand made of floating stones.
"It's a monster!?" she shouted again. "You could have told me that!"
The shadow grew narrower as the arm closed in. Fukami picked up the pace of her ascent, but realized that she wasn't climbing fast enough to escape the arm. Instead of continuing, she pushed off the magestone, angling herself away from any of the floating rocks and praying both her body and armor would withstand impact with the ground.
Instead of hitting the canyon floor, she was swept up from the side by the giant hand. The stones condensed around her, leaving only her head and feet fully exposed while the ones coiled around her body like a solid fist had tiny spaces between them, irregularities where they didn't perfectly fit together. She could feel some of the metal in her suit warping, touching her abdomen. She struggled to push the rocks apart, but only managed to move them a pinch before they practically snapped back to strangle her harder than before.
"D-Dusk!" she said with a strained voice. "I don't think that I can get out of this on my own.
"Help!"
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Post by Jay on Mar 3, 2017 1:59:22 GMT
Dusk Help came in the form of a bang. A bright light would emit from behind Fukami, and an explosion resounded. The force of the blast dispersed the rocks holding the Tenno in place, allowing her a second to escape.
More flashes occurred, and the creature found itself disoriented and stumbling.
These grenades were miniature magical EMPs, made for a more tactical, single-target approach. They were the backup to the larger EMP that had since faded.
The glowing stones of the golem dimmed slightly, its movements slower. However, it was only temporary; soon, the golem would be back to power. This was the time that the agents needed to gather themselves.
Dusk shook herself of her rattles before making her way over to her comrade. "Are you able to keep fighting?" she asked, looking back to the now slowed creature. "It'll be back up soon." Human
Neutral Good | 27 | Female |
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Post by Fukami Tsukikage on Mar 5, 2017 23:36:30 GMT
Fukami didn't have time to sigh when relief came. The second she was free, she was also in freefall. It was a long way to the ground, a lot further than she felt confident her armor would withstand. She reoriented herself so that she fell face first, her body horizontal with the ground, and closed her eyes. The sudden jolt of impact rocked her forward into the suit's shock absorbers.
She moaned as she gripped the canyon floor and shakily pushed herself up, reopening her eyes. Even with the flat-chested armor, her breasts took a lot more of the impact than she was expecting and an irritating, throbbing pain shot through them. Mercifully, nothing seemed to be broken, armor included, but it still hurt.
"I'm... I'm fine," Fukami told Dusk. The second half her statement was said under her breath. "I think I'm fine..."
As she got to her feet, she looked up at the thing that had been holding her. She didn't have any idea what was trying to kill her in the moment, or any time to process its shape for that matter, but seeing that it was humanoid really... put things in perspective. Underneath of her mask, her jaw dropped. She'd gotten into a lot of crazy scraps before, but this? This was new. She was accustomed to fighting things that were more... human-sized, and this thing had already proven it could overpower her without much effort. It was a challenge, yeah, but it almost seemed like it was outside of her pay grade. It frightened her as much as it excited her. Or maybe those two feelings were actually one and the same...
"I uh... don't suppose you have any idea how we're going to stop that thing, do you?" she asked. Her usual methodology -- which consisted of hitting something really hard and hoping for the best -- probably wasn't going to help here.
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Post by Jay on Mar 8, 2017 16:30:13 GMT
Dusk Turning a gaze up to the inactive golem, Dusk shook her head. "I'm not sure," she said. It seemed too powerful to take on directly.
Directly.
Of course that was the issue. "We're going about this wrong," she said under her breath. Fukami's method of fighting was just as ineffective as Dusk's. They were fighting separately to try and conquer a foe larger and stronger than any individual effort.
When she looked up, she searched the golem for any place that might be a weak spot.
The magical tethers connecting the stones caught her immediate attention, as they began to brighten as the golem started to move again. "Those tethers... we'll try that next," she said, backing away from the golem as it started to awaken. Human
Neutral Good | 27 | Female |
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Post by Fukami Tsukikage on Mar 9, 2017 15:25:56 GMT
Fukami drew her sword out of its scabbard in response to the suggestion. "That's something I can work with," she said. "I dunno if you got the briefing on this, but my sword, Omamori -- it can cut magic. I know from my last climb that I won't be able to navigate well when I'm close. I need you to be my eyes, and maybe a distraction."
Fukami wasn't used to having partners, but knew this would have been her last day on the job a minute ago if Dusk didn't tag along. Come to think of it, she hadn't had a lot of ideas today that hadn't ended badly. Dusk was too calm, too stoic for Fukami to ever get a read on what was in her head. Almost mechanical. Even under this much pressure, she wasn't folding, or even cracking, and the only thing keeping Fukami sane was the fact that she'd pushed the full scope of the situation out of her head up until now.
There was a part of her that suspected she was little more than a scalpel being guided by a surgeon.
She rid herself of the thought. She had to. She had to avoid thinking too much and stay in the moment, in the "flow", or everything up to this point wouldn't just be for nothing -- it would be worse than when they started.
Fukami nodded to Dusk before activating her cloaking device and dashing toward the irregularly-shaped golem. The tethers along its body pulled its limbs like an enormous marionette, and the closer she got, the harder it was to keep track of how they were moving. She started at its feet and sliced through the "strings" on a small portion of its "ankle", cutting the piece clean off. The golem shook, apparently losing balance, and Fukami smiled under her mask.
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Post by Jay on Mar 16, 2017 0:19:58 GMT
Dusk Fukami dismantling the ankle told Dusk everything she needed to know; her shots weren't strong enough to efficiently destroy those tethers, but Fukami's blade definitely was.
Thus, she dedicated herself to try to move the creature's body parts out of the way to allow her partner easier access to the threads holding the construct together.
The beast's arm would come next. "The arm!" She called out to Fukami. A shot from her rifle had enough force to knock the golem's arm away and expose its tether.
They could take this one-by-one, and hopefully nothing extremely bad would occur. Human
Neutral Good | 27 | Female |
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Post by Fukami Tsukikage on Mar 23, 2017 16:26:13 GMT
The shot from Dusk's rifle seemed to startle the already precariously-balanced golem. Though it made no noise, save the subtle hum of the magic string pulling it around like a marionette, it seemed as if it was silently screaming as it lost footing and plummeted to the ground. Fukami could sense -- no feel -- the shift and ran away from its foot before it landed, diving for safety as the ground violently shook.
The second the dust began to settle and she could see her target again, Fukami darted after the colossus's arm, as Dusk had suggested. The golem planted its hand on the ground and was using it to slowly push itself up, but its sheer size slowed it down. Once in range, Fukami scrambled up the monster's arm as quickly as possible. Its constant lurching made it difficult for her to maintain her grip, but fortunately, it seemed to have issues actually returning to a proper standing stance.
Out of Fukami's sight, though, a robed, faceless figure approached Dusk from behind -- a figure who had been just far enough away from the golem's shockwave to still be in one piece. The man underneath of the mask had learned at this point that using magic against the Tenno was digging his own grave, and he decided to rely on a primal weapon with him instead: a large rock.
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Post by Jay on Mar 25, 2017 18:00:34 GMT
Dusk The golem's constant movement seemed to be causing issues for Fukami, and Dusk was quick to try and assist her partner. She drew a device from her pocket - something made to try and keep the construct rooted in place for a few seconds; long enough for the Tenno attached to it to get a number of well-placed hits in.
Dusk, however, let out a pained sound as she was hit in the back of the head with a rock. She fell to the ground and tried to gather her bearings. Her shielding had gone down from the shockwave, which left a - rather hardy - human. One vulnerable to a rock.
"How... rude..." Dusk muttered, before she turned on her back to point a gun at the mage. "How very rude of you..." Human
Neutral Good | 27 | Female |
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Post by Fukami Tsukikage on Mar 26, 2017 15:56:18 GMT
Fukami slashed away at the golem, tearing it apart tether by tether. When its arm was finally severed, it came crashing to the ground. Fukami clung precariously to its shoulder as the stone monster shook her up and down, trying to get her to release her grip. She gritted her teeth and held fast, sticking her sword into the rock to gain extra leverage.
That was when she heard a shout. A yelp of pain.
"Dusk!" Fukami screamed. She withdrew her sword and dropped to the ground, landing on her knees. It didn't take more than a second for her to leap to the conclusion that their friends from earlier were still around. She activated her cannon and pointed in Dusk's direction, but realized that she seemed to have the situation under control.
Fukami, however, didn't. She saw the shadow approaching her before the golem could do anything. It seemed stuck to the ground -- be that from Dusk's handiwork or its broken foot -- and reached for her with an open palm. Fukami rolled over on the ground and drew her sword again as the Golem's hand came down. This time she was ready.
Her blade clashed with the humming tethers that strung the golem's palm as it came down, cleanly separating them. The top half of the creature's hand fell on Fukami, but she caught it with the same hands she used to grip her sword and flung it off.
The golem wasn't completely disarmed, but it was cut into enough pieces to only amount to a fraction of the threat it had been before. Now, the question of the day was how to end it.
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