Ah! That's the witch! Hit it! Hit it!
Panic. Summon another club for my left hand, and swing it into the mass. Use the leverage from the hands to pull my legs into kicking it at the same time. Do so with all the force I can bring to bear, and pull as hard as I can to increase leverage.
(in other words, kick with the feet, and then start whacking with the left hand.)
"The witch, this is the witch! She was in the other bundle hanging up here!"
[Bravery]
You grit your teeth and don't hesitate to fight back, repeatedly smashing a second club into the wire-wrapped arm. In the back of your mind, you recognize the oddity of suddenly having another weapon, but you don't dwell on it--your attacks still don't seem to be having as much effect as you hoped. You can hear a low growl of pain, but if anything its grip is getting even stronger, and the numbness is climbing further up your arm.
You pause mid-swing, trying to think of a better tactic. The solution soon reveals itself, as the creature shows its face. It isn't feminine, as you expected--it's an adult man, bald and fairly young, though his exact age is hard to tell because all his flesh is grotesquely swollen. A thick mask of wires entirely covers his nose and mouth, while a haphazard mesh of individual wires stretches across the rest of his features, tightened enough to cut little valleys into his swollen skin. His eyes are stretched wide, making him appear conscious and horrified, though it's only caused by wires holding his eyelids back... you hope.
He pauses as he meets your gaze, his grip loosening almost imperceptibly--you don't hesitate, immediately grabbing his arm with your spare hand, and pulling back on it as hard as you can, until you're practically standing horizontally with his arm fully extended out of the cocoon. That done, you pull your legs back for a moment, before stomping them both back down, directly into his face, while trying to rip your right arm out of his grip. The ploy works, and you fall to the ground, skittering backwards as soon as you can get your limbs under you. Now that you've escaped his grip, the pain from your arm is back in full force, but you don't waste any time examining the wound.
Once a safe distance away, you turn back to watch the man-thing climb out of its coccon. He's already half out, now that he isn't fighting with you while escaping, so you get a good look at his body. Armor of thick wires and cables is wrapped completely around everything except his joints and upper head, giving him a weirdly emaciated and thin look, except for his uncovered joints where the flesh bulges out like red balloons. Only a few thin wires stretch across those swollen sections, small lines of blood dripping from them.
His movements are jerking and sudden, but still very dextrous and precise, and he's entirely out of the coccoon before you can react. He stands low on all fours, staring at you with his unblinking gaze, but completely still, apparently waiting for you to make the first move. You still keep both your clubs protectively in front of you, in case he launches some sudden attack--his movements were
very fast, and could easily take you by surprise if you're not careful.
"A-Ah! I'm coming!" Mina shouts, getting out of her stupor and rushing to aid Alida. She would try to get off the ground, and go for the mass of wires that was supposed to be the Witch with her halberd if she managed to get close enough.
Can the sixth sense thing determine if it is in fact the witch?
[Creativity]
[Joy]
Alida's shout reaches you, and snaps you out of your stupor. You rush through the wire crowd until you reach the wall, where you imitate the manuever you saw Alida make earlier, running up the wall and then leaping further up at an angle. It's surprisingly easy, and you deftly grab a hanging ribbon and swing yourself up into the net. Once up, you start making your way back to Alida.
Though... you can already feel her vibrations echoing through the net, making her way towards
you. Hadn't she said before that she would follow you, and then you felt her leap up into it? You hang your head down to look, and clearly see her standing in front of some sort of gangly wire monster, bleeding profusely from her right arm. You hurriedly climb back into the net while shouting that you're coming, paying little mind to the vibrations in the net from ahead.
You get a view of it very soon, but rather than yet another wire monster, it looks like... another Alida? She's clearly panicked as she struggles through the wires, small cuts on her head dying her blond hair red, and sending thin streams of blood down her face. She shouts at you desperately.
"It, it can copy us! It made a copy of me, and, and a big wire thing, and they're coming! We need to go to those girls, before it separ-!"
You hear a loud explosion detonate somewhere behind you, and Alida looks at it with an expression of pure horror, stopping mid-sentence. Then someone starts screaming, loudly, from that direction.
Tooru doesn't stop to speak; she probably couldn't have if she tried, being mentally occupied by too many things, things which included an increasingly large amount of panic. She waited as long as she could for the girl on the ground to move (who had apparently decided that the best way to respond to a shout to get out of the way was to stand there with a vaguely confused expression), balled up the talisman again, and threw it into the mass of wire below.
Try to blow up the giant tangle of wire below us!
You keep waiting, hoping the girl will actually move, and then she actually does! She rushes quickly through the crowd of wire figures, seemingly ignored by them, before running up the wall and jumping into the net somewhere out of your view. Relieved that she's finally out of the blast radius, you throw your talisman into the crowd below...
[Joy]
The blast is extremely powerful, instantly clearing the street, and sending powerful shockwaves into the net. You're thrown off your wire by the force, and are too stunned to catch yourself. On your way back down, you catch a wire with your forehead and are sent into a disorienting spin--you entirely lose track of the ground until you hit it, landing heavily on your right shoulder.
[Mercy]
For a moment, you just lay there in a heap, too confused and disoriented to understand what just happened. Then you try to roll over onto your back, and a searing pain explodes from your right side. It's far,
far worse than anything you've ever experienced before, and you can't help but roll around screaming while blindly clutching at your arm.
Observe Tooru
Tooru's attack affects you too, sending you swinging about, but the wires tied around your limbs keep you from falling. Tooru isn't so lucky, and you wince as she falls, catching a wire with her face, and then tumbling down to the ground and shattering a shoulder. Worse, though the section she landed on was cleared of wires by the blast, the crowd further down the road is not so safe. There's a long pile of the tangled figures that were thrown back by the blast, and behind that, the still-intact figures are now standing completely still, all clearly focused on Tooru's writhing form.
As you watch, some of the destroyed figures unravel, their wires slithering towards Tooru like a thousand tiny snakes.
Soul Gem: Glowing with a shining light.
Age: 14
Hair Color: Salt-stained blonde.
Health: Her right forearm is ripped up.
Inventory: Two club totems, dual-wielded, but no shoes.
Totem: A fishing club.
Stats:
Bravery: Talented~
Joy: Skilled!
Innocence: Amateur...
Purity: Amateur...
Mercy: Skilled!
Creativity: Cursed ;-;
Love: Cursed ;-;
Abilities:
Mobility Lvl2
Close Combat Lvl2+1
Totem Manipulation Lvl1
Berzerker Lvl2
Painless Lvl2
Effigy Lvl1
Soul Gem: Glowing with a bright light.
Age: 13
Hair color: Ashen
Health: A bit banged up, with a minor headache. Still tied up, too.
Inventory: ...Clothes, one would assume?
Totem: A Ribbon. The one her late sister wore.
Stats:
Bravery: Skilled!
Joy: Cursed ;-;
Innocence: Cursed ;-;
Purity: Amateur...
Mercy: Talented~
Creativity: Amateur...
Love: Skilled!
Abilities:
Mobility: Level 2
Close Combat: Level 2
Totem Manipulation: Level 0 (+1)
Heal and Steel: Level 2 (Active: Mercy++)
Soothe: Level 2
Flagellation: Level 2
Soul Gem: Glowing with a radiant light.
Age: 14.
Hair Color: Bright green.
Health: Fine!
Inventory: Her halberd!
Totem: A halberd.
Stats:
Bravery: Amateur...
Joy: Skilled!
Innocence: Amateur...
Purity: Skilled!
Mercy: Cursed ;-;
Creativity: Talented~
Love: Cursed ;-;
Abilities:
Mobility: Level 1
Close-Combat: Level 1 (+1)
Regeneration: Level 2
Sixth Sense: Level 2
Semblance: Level 2
Projection: Level 2
Soul Gem: Glowing with a shining light.
Age: 13
Hair Color: Bright scarlet.
Health: Her right shoulder is shattered.
Inventory: Mostly red clothes, which make it impossible to tell whether she's bleeding. Helpful!
Totem: Ofuda talismans, primarily thrown as manabolts.
Stats:
Bravery: Cursed ;-;
Joy: Talented~
Innocence: Skilled!
Purity: Amateur...
Mercy: Cursed ;-;
Creativity: Amateur...
Love: Skilled!
Abilities:
Mobility II
Mana Bolt II (+I)
Regeneration I
Gourmand I
Outburst II
Duet with Reality II
Author
Topic: Pumsy's Seeds - A ~MAGICAL GIRL~ game inspired by PMMM (Read 149755 times)