Sakurako"<Not often.>""<Security's sooooo boring! Nothing ever happens!>""<Yeah but it's -easy-!>""<...Anyways we're kinda doing this more for the concert.>""<Should we check out the other brief?>""<Yeah probably should.>"The second brief is, well it's a lot less professional, just a word document with quick notes jotted down and images placed haphazardly. The client is Charlotte Leitner, first year student. Judging by the photo she's not exactly the most outgoing person. You ever see one of those people who's just beaming confidence? Well she's the exact opposite of that, a fucking blackhole for confidence. Her senpai on the other hand... yeah it's like night and day. Name's Remigio Escárcega. Doesn't seem to like wearing shirts, not that you're complaining. Apparently she got into a spot of trouble with some delinquents before and he showed up as her knight in shining armor or something. Standard anime stuff. Do oiled abs count as armor? Hold that thought.
"<So...>""<Well she could totally use some more confidence. And a makeover.>""<Aslan?>""<Already packed. Got the classic, the latest fashions, just say the word. And glasses! Can't forget the glasses! ...Though say, think we should use an illusion?>""<Why? It's not bad is it>""<Well yes but... she's not gonna get -confident- just because we Cinderella her up right?>""<He's got a point there. What are you thinking? We give her a fake identity?>""<Oh not a bad idea!>""<Wait, that wasn't your angle?>""<Nope! But I'm happy to take credit for it!>""<Why then?>""<It's obvious isn't it? If she screws up, we can just swap illusions and try again.>""ಠ__ಠ"Shef"<Gonna need a rain check on that skirmish.>"Oh hey the student's just Ignis. You quietly ready your RAM under the table. No way this is his only illusion here. He's close, close enough you have a shot at a grab, but you've the suspicion he outclasses you up close. Need an opening, just a small one, enough to grab him...
"<Exercise's canceled.>"Wait what?
"<I spoke to the AIs already. I'm all for a good ambush but with things the way they are, it's just going to be me trying to pick you off after each of your other fights. Not the best learning experience, so I was->"Minato, Shef, and YukiVoices. Faint, incoherent. The faintest ghost of an image. Fleeting, insubstantial. They begin to coalesce taking form within the mirror. A hazy half-remembered movie skipping back and forth at random. Each frame a different scene. Bewildering, incoherent. The cuts begin to slow, the image sharpens.
You see, you see a bar. The view is peculiar, details fading in and out, a sketch and a splattering of color on the same canvas, the two components blending into photorealism in small patches, raveling and unraveling with each second. The camera motions are odd, as if perturbed by- ah, perturbed by the motion of a body. Of course, this is a reconstructed memory, this is through Yuki's own eyes.
The audio hasn't quite stabilized just yet, it's echo-y and indistinct, the fact that Yuki's kinda just mumbling though it doesn't help though holy shit, that's, that's a lot of empty glasses. Why's Noriko patting her reassurin-
And we're skipping. Apparently.
"<Sorry! I'm still stabilizing the feed!>" An Abyssal Choir is a colossal being ressembling the figurehead of a ship, discolored flesh a mix of wood, barnacles, and metal, so throughly fused you can no longer tell where one begins and the other ends.
Its body is wrapped in chains, bound to an enormous anchor of rusted iron that bobs up and down amidst the crashing waves and darkened sea. Dancing serenely neath the waters is a ring of corpses, drowned bodies joined hand in hand, their formation spinning faster and faster as the titan leans closer and closer.
Neath its ragged hood its face splits open, a maw filled not with teeth but malformed skulls singing a siren's song. Even now, through the haze of half recollected memory it's beauty is simply a otherworldly.
"HEY! FUCK YOU!"Yuki begs to differ. The colossus continues its song.
"YEAH? WELL I BET YOUR MOM'S-"Skip.
"<Do not think us so short-shirted. Your enlightment is an inevitability. All that lives will reach Nirvana someday. Now let us begin your training Miss Tatsumaki.>"Isn't that the Bodhisattva?
Skip.
"<MARK MY WORDS! YOU WILL RUE THE DAY YOU DARED CROSS TEAM->"Skip.
"Is he a spy? Drug dealer? Arms dealer? Smuggler? Cocaine-based weaponry corporate spy?"Maria looks fairly nonplussed.
"<That's a lot of content... is there anything you're looking for in particular? We um, might be here a while there's several hours of fooage.>"Faith
Faith: 4, Hyper[5]
Frost Heart A: 2
"<Aim up.>"Dress comes up, shields flare pink, and you get the hell outta dodge. The ice hisses and cracks a you just ram your shield into it, discharging it's energy to burn into it as you launch yourself out.
The streets of flooded. Well, they're a little more than flooded. Flood waters are two stories high. And it ain't water either. No, it's nitrogen. Liquid nitrogen. And you, you can't even see it. So thick is the mist that veils it, so blinding, so impenetrable. You know it is there, you know that only because you just shot up out of it. Thank God your shield held.
Buildings and battlements just out from this new inland sea, frozen and
frost-fucked, ice-capped mountains of cement divided by plunging valleys that were once streets.
Enormous flowers rest just above the mist, crystalline blooms of ice perched atop of tower-like stalks. Burning sunrays dance across their reflective petals, you know not where they came from - the beams bounce from flower to flower, stretching out afar and bouncing away behind corners. Where they are aimed, that's easier, much easier. They're aimed at the planes, the frozen interceptors screaming through the air.
Each interceptor consists of a tubular body with a spike-like nose, forward swept wings, and undulating tendrils. Sizewise, they're comparable to a bear, so pretty big compared to a person but pretty damn small for an aircraft. And naturally, like everything else in this godforsaken winter 'wonderland' they're made entirely out of ice with darkened tops and bellies to catch the sunbeams, glassy wings that snap and shatter under the stress of their harsher turns only to reform mere moments later, and tendril arrays that expand almost fractally as they hunt their prey.
Oh yes, their
prey. The others, the others who escaped the weapon's activation. The civilians and adventurers. They're, not faring that well. The main thing is that well, a lot of them can't fly, and the ones that can, well they're not really ready to go toe-to-toe with the planes. Sunrays dance through the frozen skies, strobe lighting from plane to plane like a fucking rave as they rain freezing sleet and the occasional icey bomb upon the unfortunate stragglers.
"Hi Faith! I'm picking up some radio transmissions near you. Sounds like a tactical network. It'll patch you in now!"Suddenly there's a gunshot and the Interceptors scatter. Reinforcements. A counterattack. A motley mix of adventurers and students, many flying with wings of white flame. Leading the charge is a knightly figure with a billowing cape and a pair of shoulder-mounted cannons. His crackles through your outfit's radio, voice tinned yet flamboyant.
Eagle 1 Challenger <<DEUTSCHE WISSENSCHAFT IST DIE BESTE AUF DER WELT!
>>Also Cynthia's next to the him surfing ontop of what appears to be a miniaturized Predator drone.
* * *Nothing seems to kill the mood faster than the Russian winter. Seriously, this is the second time this week! Mere days ago you were engaged in the most serious of duels with your dear nemesis. It was getting good! He was invoking Zeus
and Satan! But then he started calling on Stalin! And then boom! Gulag Sphere! What kinda lame name is Gulag Sphere? And it was so anti-fun too! He just sat in there and refuse to come out! It was like he doing it just to mess with you!
Ah! But where are your manners? Let's start with your introduction shall we?
Your name is Distance Dark, Sinister Space Magical Girl, Defier of the Great Powers, Traveler of the World, of Worlds, and Nemesis to the Baron of Ruin.
And you are here, in the great Fortesss City of Kingshaven, for tea!
At least, you
were. Now you're here to vanquish the dastardly villain responsible with your SINISTER SPACE MAGIC! And
then have tea! As soon as you find them!
Seriously! Why is everyone turtling so much?!
Oh hey! A girl just exploded up out of that building! And she's a magical girl too! Another potential adversary? A stalwart defender of justice for you to corrupt? Who knows! She does look like she could use one of these jetpacks though, and you just so happen to have a spare!
* * *Interceptors scream through the frozen skies, arctic winds and cryonic magic funneling through their intakes. It looks like a ramjet. Isn't though, it's more a magic accumulator taking advantage of the magic saturated air. Saves on the weight. Lets them assemble and fire their weapons on the fly, no need to carry anything. The primary propulsion mechanism? Those beams of light. They're laser thermal rockets, internal fuel blocks heated by those lasers. Again, saves on the weight. Not a lot of mass. Not a lot of armor, though they do regenerate. It's all about mobility here and they certainly outclass your comrades here.
Don't get it wrong, you did soup up those jetpacks, add a bit of mobility you won't find off the shelf. Probably will burn out the enchantments, but that's fine, economy never was the focus here. Thing is there's a definite difference in speed and it will show soon enough.
That's fine, you'll make up for it with firepower. Besides, those drives only work with a power supply, take out the laser sources and they stop running.
Anyways, you're leading the charge with Distance and Cynthia flanking you. You grouped together with the TacNet app.
Interceptors are spinning around and swooping in and you're ready to cut them down.
Man compared to this, that first group of bank robbers were fucking
amateurs. If you gotta rob a bank wrong, you better do it right. This General Frost fellow has the right idea.
* * *The current theater of war is comprised of lines of buildings arrayed like concrete mountains with plunging valleys between them.
The aerial cavalry as of were are rushing down on side of the valley. Faith is in the air just in front of them, and past her are the interceptor swarms, spinning around to engage the interlopers, away from the frozen terraces and rooftops there terrorized mere minutes ago.
The sunrays focus on a small detachment for a few seconds long as they shoot up high and release their cryobombs. Airbursts most of likely, aiming to freeze or scatter the allied forces with the rest of the swarm readied to rush in and commenced dogfighting with those sleet-based weapons of theirs.
Faith"It won't be hard to escape in this chaos, the boundary of the weapon's effect radius is just behind those adventurers. Whether you run or you fight is up to you.""Will you be engaging?" You're notice a large serpentine mass of a black ice tracing out towards you. Point of origin seems to be the building you just exited. It's closing in quick. Guess that's what Winter meant about the ice retaliating.
"<Miss Tatsumaki.>""<Over here.>"Sol and Luna are on a nearby rooftop holding out some winter clothing.
Wait why are they not getting att-
You look up, traced into the skies above is a massive emblem, an inverted eye of providence overlayed ontop of a snowflake sigil.
You've seen something like that before. Their playing cards, they had a similar design on the back - an inverted eye of providence surrounded by interlocking gears, weeping a stream of blood that traces the shape of a pendulum.
Faith
Status: Fine
World Line: 2 1 5 1 1 1 4 3 4 6
Alterations: 5
Resolve: 0
Distance
Status: Fine
World Line: 5 3 3 3 6 6 5 4 4 4
Alterations: 5
Resolve: 3
Immanuel
Status: Fine
World Line: 2 2 6 3 5 6 6 1 5 1
Alterations: 5
Resolve: 3
Cynthia
Status: Fine
Details: Staying in formation
Allied Forces
Status: Full Strength
Details: Opening fire on Crystalline Interceptors
Ice Weeds
Status: Full Strength
Details: Beaming energy to the Crystalline Interceptors
Crystalline Interceptors
Status: Full Strength
Details: Deploying airburst cryobombs to try and scatter the Allied Forces and engage them in dogfights
Black Ice
Status: Activated
Details: Chasing down Faith as a stream of ice
Cynthia
A pureblood demon, classification: succubus. A ranged skirmisher who uses fear and charm magic for battlefield control striking a balance between harassing fire and decisive hits. She has three vessels in this battle consisting of two UAV fire support vessels and a humanoid spotter vessel.
Allied Forces
A small force of random students and adventurers whose standard loadouts have been augment with jetpacks and airburst napalm launchers. Meatshields and fire support basically.
Credits to Chevaleresse for the Phase 1 music suggestion and helping design the interceptors. Unfortunately Powder kinda bypassed the entirety of Phase 1.
Credits to Aston for the German translations.
Massive thanks to Strider for helping me with my writer's block!