Faith: 5, Hyper[4]
Minato: 6, Hyper[R]
Noriko: 6
Shef: 4, Hyper[3], Resolve
Yoake: 6, Hyper[R], Hyper[R]
Yuki: 2
Arnold: 4
Evi: 6
Fleur: 4
SMII-SPECIAL A: 5, Resolve
SMII-SPECIAL B: 6, Resolve
SMII-SPECIAL C: 5, Resolve
SMII-SPECIAL D: 4, Resolve
Laser Cannon A: 2
Laser Cannon B: 4
Laser Cannon C: 3
Laser Cannon D: 3
Laser Cannon E: 2
Laser Cannon F: 1
In Minato's hand it appears, a spear, a simple spear of wood and bronze, quite literally blazing with otherworldly rage. Luin Celtchair is not used like a spear. It is not used like a weapon. It wields itself, the user's just the power supply. The targets, it'll handle them, provided Minato survives. He grips it tightly. He'll survive. He's sure of it. Luin launches forwards, Minato with it. A sidestep. Quick. Last moment, just enough to evade steer him out the path of the blades, the gunfire he'll have to handle himself. Regalia spin, bullets ricocheting off their forms. Many are stopped. Many get through. No matter. The weapons cross. Storm Mind B raises its gatling. Intent is to raise Minato's arm up. Avoid the blow. Jam its weapon, its spinning assemblage of blades, and its barrel right into his face, and pull the trigger. Action fails. Assumptions were wrong. A normal spear's source of force is its wielder. It pivots with their limbs. It may be pivoted. Luin is not a normal spear. Its force comes from itself. Sorcery trapped in a casket. Murderous intent with a form. When the Storm Mind pushes, it pushes back, and it wins. Thrusters flare. Storm Mind B dashing to the side. Reaction was predictable. Noriko is observant. Her weapons are never evaded, only delayed. And both Minato and Luin are her weapons right now. Winds reorientate the weapon, and then, they drive it forwards, faster. Storm Mind B drops its weapon and swings its fist towards Minato's head. Minato lets one hand go of Luin. Luin drags Minato off-balance, his body is now oriented diagonally. He is beginning to lean forwards. The fist now needs to adjust. With his free-hand, Minato brings his palm against the inside of the construct's arm, pushing it away, off-course. He leans further fowards, and lunges. Luin pierces Storm Mind B. The armor splits beneath the spear-tip, the weapon drives itself into the construct. Impalement does not occur. It fails to pierce through the armor a second time. Luin and Noriko drive the spear right back down, slamming the Storm Mind against the roof of the train. Luin accelerates forwards, angled downwards, continuing to pin Storm Mind B. Sparks fly. The plating on the roof is being torn apart. Collateral damage. Irrelevant. Luin cares only for its prey. Storm Mind B is being torn apart. Internally. Externally. It scrapes towards Storm Mind D. Storm Mind B expires two meters in front of Storm Mind D. Luin wrenches itself upwards, cleaving through the crumbling construct. Divine winds guide it, restraining it for a moment, keeping it from striking its target's torso. Its momentum sweeps it upwards, and as it points towards the head it drives forwards, from itself, and from the winds. It enters through the keyhole-shaped gap in the visor, embedding and soon tearing itself free of its victims's head, killing them near instantly. It follows through, the arc becoming a semi-cicle as rapidly decelerates, turning back to its other soon-to-be victims. Minato relaxes, letting his arms naturally follow its motions as he shifts his stance, tempering his weapon's bloodlust into something resembling a warding stance if only for a moment.
One second has passed.
Faith gazes backwards from the car, at the smoldering wreckage, the blasted and burnt heap of metal that was once a train carriage quickly sinking into the waters below. There no hole, no cartoonish tunnel right through the carriage. No, her beam had blasted, crumpled, and vaporized its way through her target. The force of the material being forced back, forced outwards, the havoc it wreaked was beyond explosive. Carriage #1 hadn't just been destroyed, it had been completely obliterated. And had something been behind it, that too would have shared in its fate. The missiles are beginning to draw close now, but something's strange, something's off about them - they're not taking the direct path. Picture the missiles arcing down from the across the train carriage. Picture the trajectories they would take to strike the car. Color in the trajectories, highlight the areas they cover, until you have a region, a region in space that marks through where the missiles are heading.
That region describes what you expect. That region is not what you are getting. Some of the missiles are coming from different directions, taking longer, less direct paths. And what Faith realizes is, those wayward missiles, they all come from the same parts of that region.
Picture that region again. Picture it as a swarm of missiles. Picture where Faith is, where Yuki is. Especially where Yuki is. Imagine cones projecting outwards from both of them, where the cones overlap the swarm, the missiles in the cone are moved, shifted off the side. They take less direct paths, they fall behind slightly. Align the cones with where the holes are. The cones are shadows. Regions of darkness cast by two light sources - Karen, and Satoshi. Karen too is important. Karen and Yuki are both important, because Karen and Yuki, are moving.
Imagine how that changes the shadows, imagine how that causes the swarm to shift and churn. That is precisely what is happening here.
It takes some time, a fair bit of time really, a few near missiles, half a magazine from Satoshi, a lot swinging from Karen, but Faith finally sees it, behind the chaos, behind Satoshi's evasive maneuvers, behind the sense of panic as the missiles draw ever-closer and she saw the small army of servants-turned-crusaders off in the distance. She sees the reason behind it all - the missiles don't want her, they don't want Yuki. They're targeting Karen and Satoshi, her and Yuki? They weren't targets, they weren't even collateral damage,
they were obstacles,
and the missiles are trying to avoid them.
"I can't shake them! They're too persistent! Ammo's running low, I've got one last nitro charge, but it will only buy us a bit of time. I say we board the train, at least then we've got room to shoot and dodge on foot."It took some time, but Noriko finally lands on cannon A. Flak was problematic, missiles, they were just nuisances. Too maneuverable to shake, too fast to outrun, good thing she had wind magic on her side. Concussive blasts to throw them off course before impact, and watch them go try curving back around. Well most of them at least, for some reason a couple of them just locked onto Yoake instead. Hope she doesn't mind.
Another lurch. Cannon's trying real hard to shake her. Missiles trying hard to dislodge. Good luck, she's got one spear jammed into it to keep grip, and plenty more wind blasts to throw around. The other cannons don't seem to keen to shoot her anymore. Guess they don't have the precision to hit her without hitting Cannon A. Too bad, she's got plenty. Her other spear's currently streaking towards Cannon B, it's been dashing out the way so far, but it needs time between dashes, her spears have no such recovery. As it spear thrusts towards its barrel, the cannon fires, an explosion of plasma throwing it off course. Oh no, whatever could she do? It's not like she can just magically course correct it and jam it right down its barrel. Oh wait, she can. The spear's about halfway down the barrel when the cannon just fucking fires. Well, no luck getting cannons to shoot each other, but getting cannons to just blow themselves up is beginning to look like a pretty sweet gig.
Yoake's ass impacts Carriage #10 from above. There is a horrific bang and the whole thing, this solid mass of metal just, crumples, cracks tearing through its form, the entire train reverberates from the impact. The thrusters all halt at once. The carriages bobbing chaotically in the water and falling to the side, basically just fucking derailing. Thrown up, thrown out from the impact is a flat metal disk roughly the shape of a drink coast albeit a bit thicker. Heaven's Draft. Shadows twist around it, congealing, a crosshair painting around it with a single dot at its center. A Black Halo. A final line of defence, the weapon powering the entire train just a split-second before now pumping its body full of that same might. What emerges is something else entirely. It is dress in black, black shoes, black clothes, black leather jacket, a silver cross hangs around its neck, a cross of burning neon pink in its hands, and a skeletal pair of wings formed out of lightsabers colored that same neon pink behind its back. Out of all the forms it could have taken, it apparently manifested as a near-carbon copy of the R&B phenomena
The Weeknd. Yeah... go figure.
Minato had just burnt about half of his stockpile chasing down Storm Minds A and C when the entire train tipped over. Turns out these new models know when to cut their losses and just try to zone, using their dashes and superior reach to just keep him at bay. Might've almost worked, but he's got a floating arsenal now, one that as luck would have it, was pretty damn good for blasting him out the way of fire and straight through these constructs. Cost him four false Regalia though and the cannons are still firing at him, something that's a
bit of an issue given that Luin seems to be perfectly happy to drag him through plasma flak to reach its prey. Doable of course, but something that'll chew through his arsenal fairly quickly. The fact that the train isn't so much a train as much as it's a collection of nine now-disconnected carriages drifting through a watery pocket dimension at speed doesn't really change that. The fact that Yoake is now alone fighting a lightsaber-winged copy of The Weeknd doesn't change his objectives either. If anything he'll need to get there faster to back him up, but Luin? Luin might not strictly get that, it, really just wants to murder everything and he doesn't have time to smell the murder roses right now. He'll need a plan.
Something's wrong with these missiles. Shef's had more time to watch them, it's a far easier task when they're no longer chasing you. He could already tell something was wrong, their trajectories, their angle of assault, they seemed to all be trying to come from the front, the ones from the back trying to curve in, as if trying to hit Yoake, and only Yoake. And when she teleported away, they just, swerved, swerved away from him and locked right back onto her. And the ones on Noriko, they're,
worse somehow. It's like they're having a harder time of finding their target, some of them fail to even lock on to her, veering off somewhere else. It's like they're homing onto her less somehow. At first he wondered if it was some sort of bias or heuristics. High speed missiles to counter Yoake, ones that avoided him so he couldn't just portal them right into their own allies, but if that was the case, if they locked onto Noriko they should work just as well, there's no reason why they display such a clear loss in performance. Those wind spells of her, they have no right to be keeping them at bay.
So at the end of all this, here's the current situation:
Yoake finds Weeknd Alter dashing down towards her at speed with his laser cross, an array of fairly large cannons appearing around him, arrayed in a circular fan and pointing backwards as to blast the surrounding area after his cleaving strike. Four freshly deployed Storm Minds (E, F, G, and H) are also coming in from Carriage #9 though they're still a ways off. Also y'know, there's all the fucking missiles swarming towards her from basically every direction ever.
Shef is currently under fire from laser cannons I and J.
Minato is currently being pulled towards the freshly deployed laser cannons G and H from Carriage #7 by Luin. This is also pulling him right towards their flak blasts. Cannons E and F are now locking onto him, but since they're behind him, Luin's speed will likely render them a complete non-factor.
Faith and Yuki are still dealing with a whole load of missiles closing in on their vehicle.
Noriko is... actually, things are looking pretty good for Noriko right now. Cannon A's still trying to shake her off, C and D are locked onto her but don't seem too keen on doing friendly fire, and the missiles have proven to be completely ineffective against her thus far.
Faith
Status: Fine, Shield of Courage x5, good shielding
World Line: 1 3 1 1 1 5 6 4 6 5
Alterations: 3
Resolve: 3
Minato
Status: Quite hurt, Luin Celchair (True), 5 stockpiled units, Sudarshana active for one more turn
World Line: 3 3 2 1 2 2 2 1 3 2
Alterations: 1
Resolve: 1
Noriko
Status: Fine
World Line: 5 2 2 2 5 2 4 1 6 6
Alterations: 5
Resolve: 0
Shef
Status: Fine
World Line: 2 4 4 6 4 5 4 1 3 5
Alterations: 3+
Resolve: 1
Yoake
Status: Slightly hurt, Requiem active for one more turn, Rackupressure
World Line: 1 5 5 5 3 3 1 6 3 6
Alterations: 4+
Resolve: 0
Yuki
Status: Fine, good shielding
World Line: 3 6 1 5 6 2 6 5 2 5
Alterations: 5
Resolve: 3
Karen
Status: Probably wishing her powers scaled off of anger rather than arrogance, uniform is in tatters
Satoshi
Status: Fine
Weeknd Alter
Status: Fine
Arnold (Altered)
Status: Knocked out, reverted
Evi (Altered)
Status: Knocked out, reverted
Fleur (Altered)
Status: Knocked out, reverted
SMII-SPECIAL A
Status: Destroyed
SMII-SPECIAL B
Status: Destroyed
SMII-SPECIAL C
Status: Destroyed
SMII-SPECIAL D
Status: Destroyed
SMII-SPECIAL E
Status: Fine, Power Supply Estimated at 100%, tether disconnected
SMII-SPECIAL F
Status: Fine, Power Supply Estimated at 100%, tether disconnected
SMII-SPECIAL G
Status: Fine, Power Supply Estimated at 100%, tether disconnected
SMII-SPECIAL H
Status: Fine, Power Supply Estimated at 100%, tether disconnected
Floating Laser Cannon A
Status: A spear has been forced through the armor at the top and is fairly close to skewering its internals
Floating Laser Cannon B
Status: Destroyed
Floating Laser Cannon C
Status: Fine
Floating Laser Cannon D
Status: Fine
Floating Laser Cannon E
Status: Fine
Floating Laser Cannon F
Status: Fine
Floating Laser Cannon G
Status: Fine
Floating Laser Cannon H
Status: Fine
Floating Laser Cannon I
Status: Fine
Floating Laser Cannon J
Status: Fine
KarenA precision unit, able to rapidly strike foes at all typical ranges with her magatama jewel whip. Her sheer ego distorts reality, protecting her from harm proportional to her own arrogance.
- Demon Slaying Technique: Wing Clipper [3]: Karen strikes at an enemy's limbs, weakening their next attack.
- Demon Slaying Technique: Wind Slash [4]: Karen slashes the air with her Magatama, creating a powerful shockwave that cuts opponents from afar.
SatoshiA highly technical close quarters specialist armed with rod of force that can alter its own dimensions and well-versed in multiple martial arts. She has immense amounts of willpower.
- Technician [3]: For one turn, Satoshi focuses and brings out more of her Regalia's potential
- Spirit Injector [4]: Satoshi readies up a surge of spirit energy to inject into something.
- Override [5]: Twists reality, altering the properties of a target implement through sheer force of will. Dissipates shortly after physical contact. Ineffective versus Awakened, but good for improvised weapons and vehicles.
All the servants have been safely reverted and knocked out due to Heaven's Draft having its power diverted.
No more missiles are being launched, again due to the carriages being cut off from their power supply. Though there's still plenty of them in the air.
Okay so because I know this will be a question, here's how the carriages are arranged.
Carriage
| Details
|
#10
| This is the front. Yoake and Weeknd Alter are here. Shef is in-line with it.
|
#9
| Storm Minds E-H are here.
|
#8
| Laser Cannons I and J are here.
|
#7
| Laser Cannons G and H are here. Minato is crossing over to here.
|
#6
| Storm Minds A-D were deployed and slaughtered here.
|
#5
| Laser Cannons E and F are here. The boatcar with Faith and Yuki on it are in-line with it.
|
#4
| Laser Cannons C and D are here.
|
#3
| Probably carrying more Storm Minds.
|
#2
| Laser Cannon A and Noriko are here.
|
#1
| RIP
|