Notus

Alleyway Party The air went out of the angel´s lungs as Luna knocked him into the wall, looking terrorized. Her question´s only effect was to make him start trembling in fear. "Or...I could let one of my friends here have you. That could very well be worse. I'm sure the sniper wouldn't mind using you as target practice by now." His hand, still wearing the glove, was involved into Raziel´s field, and this time he managed to answer; it actually looked like he was relieved to see another angel - or any being other than the monster holding him - apparently taking charge of the situation. "Nononono, I´ll tell you. Just take this thing away please!" he asked, obviously referring to Luna. Misara "We can´t let you have her." The first thug said. By then, the second and third men had arrived and tryed circling Misara to get to the girl. The first one put his hand on his dagger´s hilt and stood at ready. The people around them realized there was a fight about to start and began running away. Some were shouting for the city guard, and no one seemed to want to intervene. Bargus & Karol "Well then, you´re friends with a demon then? So I´ll ask you to come with us t-" the guard was interrupted by the sound of people screaming nearby. Some passed running by them coming from another street. "What the hell?" The guards looked at one another. "Ok, we´ll let you go this time. But stay out of trouble, otherwise I´ll remember your faces." the one in command said whie the shorter one returned the axe to Bargus. Then both turned and ran towards the commotion. Jarvis & Rhaeza Just when he was closing the tavern´s door, Jarvis cauht a glimpse of a man getting up from his table and, apparently looking at him. It was just a moment though, before the door closed and blocked his view. Gabriel "Hi, I'm here to meet all the other students and stuff for the big magic meeting! Did anyone else get here yet, or did Dad drop me off early?" "Uhmn, you´re here for the meeting? But aren´t you too young..?" Shelly started asking, seeming surprised, but then shook her head and smiled again. "Nevermind, sorry to be judging you by appearance like this. My own daughter, Hannah, is pretty smart too, though she is more into fairy tales than academics." With a graceful gesture, she pointed towards the stairs."The others already started, they´re up on the second floor. Should I take you something to drink up there? Our hot chocolate is really tasty."

Jesse, Lisa, Raziel, Luna, Jorgen, Lucille... Ok, it´s a party. Did I forget anyone? "Wha-" Lisa´s technique took the attacker by surprise. He didn´t expect to have his shield shattered that easily. After that things started to go down pretty quick. First he used a reinforcement spell on himself, and then was about to take flight when Raziel´s daggers activated. He let out a scream of pain and surprise, and protected himself as well as he could. Unlucky for him, his wings were caught in the full force of the trap, so he couldn´t hope to fly away anymore. As Raziel hoped, the strange glove endured the attack with no problems. Next it was time for Jesse´s bullet to hit him in the arm. The glove´s arm. For some reason, as his arm hanged uselessly on the side of his body, his face turn white as a ghost and the cockatrices disappeared all at once. Abandoning every effort to try and fight, he turned and ran as fast as he could towards another alley, rounding the corner at top speed... Only to run into Luna. If a ghost´s face could get even more white with fear, that would be his color. Just about that time, the group heard some surprised screams on the street as Lucille and Jorgen opened way and appeared on the end of the alley to join them. Bargus & Karol "Or are you both just dense enough to believe a young girl like me can defend herself without any weapons?" "You´re with him, girl?" The angel officer asked "Is him your bodyguard or something?" Misara The men approached Misara and the girl fast, but slowed down when they saw Misara´s fighting stance. The first to arrive was one of the underlings, who looked at the sheated sword and gave Misara a serious look. "Hey miss, hand over the girl and there will be no need for a fight here. You don´t want to stand in our way, I assure you." In response, the girl hugged her leg tightly. "No please, don´t let them take me! They make me do things I don´t want to!" Jarvis "Where did this happen?" "Why, there´s been a lot of cases like these around the city. There´s even some famous Artisans who were attacked." The barkeep proceeded (while catching Rhaeza´s mug with an agile movement and a smirk) " ´Poor guys wake up with no memories of anything that happened, except that they were assaulted. And they can´t perform any magic at all after that, it´s all gone. I´ve heard some commited suicide after that, nasty business." ((Murdoc and M_Cowher... I´ll update your´s tomorrow morning. It´s way too late here, I´m almost sleeping on my desk.))

Ok, good. Post incoming in... hopefully half an hour

Please wait a bit folks, I´m a bit busy now but I´ll have a post on soon! I´m feeling bad about NPCA#457, poor guy´s got the whole team to beat him up. While that, Misara is just up against a bunch of guys, protecting a kid. What could possibly go wrong, I wonder? Aalso, I did an edit on this morning´s post earlier regarding Gabriel. Dunno if that was noticed. Noir... this is kinda full right now, but do send your sheet. I will think about a way to make it work with more people, and if I succeed I´ll shoot you a PM

Jesse, Raziel & Lisa ((Psst Typh, cockatrices, not cockroaches )) The angel sighed as Jesse disappeared, and then waved the glove once more to form a force field all around him, much like the defense sigil from before, but bigger, to defend against the invisible sniper´s attacks. "I thought you would do so. But that must have a time limit, right? Let´s see whose magic lasts longer, then." And then Lisa transformed, getting the angel´s attention for real. "You´re a mage too? I´ve never seen that kind of transformation as well. Two new techniques for me in a single day, guess I´m lucky!" The cockatrices weren´t protected though, and while they fell to Jesse´s rounds and Lisa´s gun and sword, more of them kept appearing as replacements. And now they were using the rifle´s sound to locate the shooter angel. Jarvis & Rhaeza "You mean, aside from you and the other guy there who is just staring at nothing in particular the whole afternoon?" He pointed his thumb towards Rhaeza. "Now serious, there´s a ton of outsiders in the town, some of them can´t help but look suspicious." The barkeep raised his shoulders. "There are some weird things happening indeed, though those began before the gates opened. Some of them fancy mages were being robbed of their magic, if that´s even possible." Bargus & Karol "Sorry, but I don´t think you´ll find much people in this city who would waste time watching a demon performing some cheap tricks. Though if it was a comedy act it could be amusing I suppose." The tall one said with scorn. By then the short one had found the axe, and though it wasn´t uncommon for people to travel with weapons, that seemed to serve as an excuse. "Ok, you´re following us to the station."

@ Strat: Aaactually I was going to have you find Jesse & Lisa, but since you´ve already gone that way I just let things roll. Also yeah, if I don´t post something for your chars in an update you have free rein Now woah woah. Acquie?! Of course! I wasn´t planning on opening any more slots, but hell if I won´t make an exception for you XD.

Bargus & Karol The second angel started inspecting Bargus, clearly not caring too much about being gentle. The tall one started asking questions. "What´s your name and what business do you have in Marblegate?"

Misara "Have you seen anyone suspicious? Like, you heard about the incidents that have been happening, right?" "Eh..?" the girl looked confused, but after a moment she seemed to remember something. "We- well, there´s this weird old man following me. He looks like..." Then all of a sudden, a man turned around running on the other corner, three others behind him. He was dressed elegantly, wore glasses and was probably on his early thirties, white hair covering his head, but with a lean build and dominating presence. Seeing the two girls, he pointed towards them and gave an order to the other three, who started running their way. The girl, seeing that, screamed and hid behind Misara. "It´s them, it´s them! Please miss, protect me from the bad guys!" ((CG, don´t quote the whole post, takes too much space. Try copy/pasting the last speech from the npc you´re interacting with in bold, like I did in this post)) Jesse, Raziel & Lisa The angel seemed to be expecting the shot, so he quickly jumped back and summoned a defense sigil - something like a small round shield of light - to deflect the bullet. He wasn´t expecting Lisa to attack too though, and just barely avoided the blade by flying backwards with a powerful movement of his wings, which sent a gust of wind in the girl´s direction. "Uhmn, seems like I need to try harder." He extended his arm towards them both, his glove glowed and, in a flash, five cockatrices the size of a dog appeared from thin air and attacked them. ((Jesse and Raziel would recognize this as summoning magic)) Bargus & Karol A few time after the duo started walking, two angels of the city guard approached them. "Halt. You, I´ll need to inspect you. Put your hands over your head and face the wall." said the taller one, looking at Bargus. By the way they approached, it seemed they completely ignored Karol´s presense. Gabriel Gabriel arrived at the place indicated by the folder. It was a bookstore and cafe called, all built in wood , with two floors filled with book shelves that could be seen from the street through the windows. The inside was spacious, with round tables for five or six people distributed around the room. It looked out of place among the tall, modern looking buildings in this part of the city, but maybe because of that it felt like a pleasant place to spend an afternoon. Gabriel was greeted by a young elf woman on the front door. She was tall, as most elfs, and had long,purple hair and eyes matching that colour. "Welcome to Hanna´s Story Box! My name is Shelly, how may I help you?" she said, with a gentle smile on her face.

If you´re wandering why I didn´t answer Jesse yet, just giving a bit more time for Lisa to engage in the scene.

No crowd in the area Typh. It´s you, RNPCA#457 and Lisa

KomodoJoe, all ok with your character later on I´ll send you a PM on how to introduce him.

Jesse & Lisa "Very interesting ability. But that won´t do." the angel said, putting a weird looking metallic glove on his left hand. It had an intrincate pattern of runes on it, which indicated a magic item. "If you won´t teach me, then I´ll just take it from you." he said, quickly stretching his arm to try and touch Jesse´s chest.

Jorgen & Gabriel "Yes, yes, good child" the woman said in her bored tone. She then activated a rune carved on the table and a screen of blueish light appeared in front of her, registering the names they have given her. "The first lectures begin the day after tomorrow, but until then there are some meetings between students going on around the city. Here´s the schedule and the locations." She handed them a folder with a list of the "student meetings". Most of them were parties organized by one or other magic prodigies, and the rest was for academic talk between mages. Karol & Bargus ((I´ll let you finish your dialogue on Weapon Spirits. Signal when you´re done so I can post)) Jesse & Lisa The angel seemed confused by Lisa´s arrival for a moment, but then apparently decided to ignore her. He went after Jesse and grabbed his shoulder. "Not so fast there. I saw you appear out of nowhere a while ago. That´s no ordinary illusion magic. I want it. And you´ll tell me were did you learn it."

Misara Misara walked around aimlessly for around half an hour. The city was bustling with movement, stores open, angels passing everywhere, and lights coming from the windows of the tal buildings indicating activity in the magic ateliers. Some human merchants had carts on the streets selling their wares as well, though those were few compared to any other big city. After some time, she started to notice some people looking in a weird way towards her - specially from city guards. Some angels had an high sensibility to demonic magic, being trained to recognize their presences from the times of war, and though she was only half-demon, it was a given a few of them would feel something off about her. Most were not that happy with demons coming into their home - Angels were the very last to enter the Alliance because of their lack of trust in that particular race. She was turning around a corner when something bumped on her legs and fell to the floor, letting out a startled scream. Looking down she saw a little girl, probably around ten years old from her looks, sitting on the floor with a face like she was about to cry - what she promptly did a second later. "Oooouchie! I hurt my tail!" she said revealing, much for the older girl´s surprise, a row of sharp and menacing teeth. Then she changed to an angry tone "Watch out were you´re going miss!" Raziel The young angel in glasses on the other side of the counter inspected the gold as if expecting it to be fake - or just making a scene to look serious, perhaps. "Uhmn, I guess I could look around for you." he said, while putting the coin into his pocket. "I´ve heard that there´s someone from the upper ranks of the Alliance coming here under disguise. Couldn´t assert who it was, but given the last events around the world it is pretty likely." He then stopped talking and and raised an eyebrow to Raziel, as if expecting more payment. After a bit of silence in which it became clear his client wasn´t paying anything else, he sighed and kept going. "I´ve also heard from a Crafter that one of the students attending the meeting is supposed to be a magic monster with an absurd ammount of mana,even for angel standards. I know all those who were invited to attend are at least above average in magical studies, but whatever that one is, it´s on another level." Jesse Jesse didn´t have to walk much after leaving his ghost form before he bumped into someone again. Though it wasn´t as much bumping on as it was being bumped for - in this case, for an winged angel who suddenly descended almost over him. "Oh. Looks like I miscalculated my landing." The angel said, though it didn´t sound much like an apology. "You´re not from here right? Were are you from? What´s your magic type?" Jarvis "Yay matey, there´s this rumour going through the city that has put everyone ´bit on the edge." the barkeep answered "It ain´t anything secret though. People just added two and two with those last jobs at The Thousand and Shadowveil and concluded we´d be next in line. Some are sayin´ it´s a spirit from other world who is killin´ the leaders to conquer the world - bullshit if ya ask me - but most think it´s a power fight between the big bosses of the Alliance." the man placed a big wooden mug of ale on the counter and sent it sliding over it to another client. "The city guards are stopping almost every outsider they don´t like the look of - which is practically everyone who doesn´t have an halo and fancy feathered wings - and some people were even arrested for some time, but nothing conclusive." Rhaeza Rhaeza caught the mug that came sliding a bit too fast towards him. Luckily his reflexes where top game. He had been hearing the conversation for a bit, but only now he realized it was Jarvis talking to the barkeep. Bargus & Karol [in wait, because lunchtimeandi´mgonnabelate) Jorgen & Gabriel Jorgen and Gabriel looked around and eventually found signals guiding them to the event´s reception. Jorgen´s large metallic form attracted quite a lot of attention and scared looks, but seeing Gabriel eased most people enough to get them out of trouble. After waiting in a line for some time, they managed to get to the counter were an old woman with an halo over her head was handling the sign up forms. "Are you here to register for the meeting?" She asked, looking at the duo with a plain, neutral expression. "I need your names, and the name of the boy´s magic school, as well as his area of expertise." Luna & Lucille [in wait, because lunchtimeandi´mgonnabelate)

Thanks Strat! Also, post aaaalmost done. We have quite a bit separate situations to develop.

Oook, and now I´m on a bus. Net was terrible at home, and I just finished reading all posts and started writing - and my laptop´s battery is quickly dropping. I won´t be able to finish anything tonight, so it´s ok for you to keep posting. Tomorrow morning I will move on, and during the week it´ll be easier to keep up to date. Sorry about the delay

Soorry guys, had to take a bus home yesterday night and couldn´t post. Net here is kinda crappy too, but I´ll try to have something on as soon as possible. @IntSys: Uhmn... yeah ok, but be careful when doing this to avoid inconsistencies in the plot. @Krim: Glad to know everything went ok!

Uhmn... There was Charlotte´s battle, completely owned by Rain Dance Blissey with the rest of the team to back that monster up. Beating Ditto Arceus with Rock Smash debufs from Sturdy Steelix and Swampert, followed by Lucario´s Close Combat (Yep, Lucario. Older episode). Holding my own for quite some time against Solaris´ Garchomp using a Feather Dance Unfezant. Didn´t beat it, obviusly, but even then it was one hell of a fight. And most important, every time I look at my box and see the army I got there. My best team of all time, for sure, and that makes me realize how much better I´ve become since I started playing it.

Oops, sorry. Didn´t see you were there

Marblegate City 10 days later It was quite a ride West to Marblegate, and even though these were times of peace, few could expect to cover it without running into bandits, wild animals and the like. The regular way involved sailing from The Thousand to the mainland, passing by part of the Grand Sea - pretty rough on this time of the year - and crossing the Emerald Sea until they got ashore. From there, it was a ride through the thick forests on it´s margins, and beyond the increasingly rocky terrain as they approached the Desolation Peaks range. Marblegate´s airship port was still under construction, so for the time being that was not an option. Luckily everyone in the group knew what their fighting, so they all arrived safely. Marblegate itself was located in a mountain to the East of the Peaks, so they had to take the steep road that climbed to it. The cold and dry weather was pretty demanding physically, but to compensate for that the sky was an amazing view: never clouded, and so clear that the stars at night seemed to be at everyone´s reach. Marblegate had a reputation for that. The path itself was troublesome too, and various parts of it were true construction sites. Marblegate was almost totally closed to outsiders since it´s foundation, the Angels being extremely secretive of their way about their way of living and magical developments, and therefore they were just now building the structure needed for visitors and travellers. Due to that, the breath taking vision of the vertical city of the Angels was one few others got to witness before. Marblegate was located in the face of the mountain. While part of it was set upon a plain spot, having high buildings resembling outwordly skyscrapers and a silver metallic wall defending it, the rest was literally carved on the face of the cliff behind it, the stone a blueish white marble. From the hundreds of entrances carved in the mountain, they could see winged angels taking flight to move around, and for the non winged ones there were delicate bridges linking the buildings and the mountain. And thus their mission began. They had three days before the start of the meeting, which would take three more to end. ((Describe your arrival guys; you don´t need necessarily to get there together, since there´s not really a commander with you to enforce that. If you want to arrive as a team that´s great, but if anyone wants to go "lone wolf" there´s no problem.))

^ Yep, in the future try PMing me. But thanks for the info CG Thanks for teling us Krim, I hope everything goes well on the operation.

"I have the information - actually, it´s more a bet, but it´s the best we´ve got - that the killers might attack again in two weeks. There´s a student meeting to be held at the Angel capital, Marblegate, and some prominent figures are going to show up." "Most of the participants are Humans and Angels, of course, buut for the first time the city is open for a group of Demon scholars and students aand even one or two of the Monstrous Races are coming. I can´t imagine a better scenario for them to strike. Be there on time, avoid any disasters and get the culprits. Dead or alive, and if I can give a personal opinion, I prefer dead. " Vermillio walked towards the exit, turning and bowing to them in an exagerated motion. "Well then, my boys and girls, I wish you all a safe journey and a succesfull mission. Ok, part of it is because we are screwed if it happens otherwise, but I´ve already taken a liking by you. Maybe I´m becoming too soft hearted. See you in three weeks, or in Hell." And with only that as a goodbye, the demon simply disappeared. So much for using the stairs. ((If you want to make any comments between your characters now is the time. Tomorrow morning I´ll make a post setting you in Marblegate))

Saame as with Tachibana. You´ll have to wait a bit to be introduced, but no problem

"If this is to be gathering intel on a target and then silently dispatching them, surely bringing someone specialized in direct combat will only serve to drive our prey into hiding." "Good point lil´ Gabriel" At this point it was already quite clear Vermillio kept calling him this on purpose. "We´ve thought of this last month, before the spies we sent to look for the culprits were wiped out. And, given how fast they were taken care of, there´s a chance that we are having info leaked from inside the Alliance as well, so we decided we needed a bit more brawl to accompany the brains into this." "Why are you heading things then? Wouldn't having a demon lead the efforts to snake out the people who killed an angel make failure a higher risk? It's that much easier to cry conspiracy if we fail, which is a very real possibility to be frank. Or are you not the head honcho for this task?" "Well, nope. As much as I´d love having a reason to take my arse out of the damn office for a change, what you mentioned is a real risk, not to mention that, I have a lot of other stuff to take care off. Anyway, it won´t be me nor anyone leading you. For the records you guys don´t even exist. The only ones who know of this group´s assembly are me and the other three founders, and we all agreed that we won´t have any contact with you during your missions. I´ll only ask you send a coded message to my office once in a while informing you are alive and kicking, but nothing else - and after you finish a job, of course." "You can count me in but...I have a bit of a...condition. I need unrestricted access to any all libraries and vaults containing books on magic and full access to magical artifacts that you've collected and hidden away. Don't tell me you don't have any. I do my research. Not only this, but I also need access to any we come across. And. I get to loot their mages and possibly the angels when we have time to spare." "Hehe, aren´t we demanding? Anyway, I can provide you a pass to the armies´ files and some libraries, but the more top secret stuff needs a more complicated authorization.And since you guys don´t exist, as I said just now, that could prove a problem." Vermillio then went for a malicious smile "Be my guest with the plundering though, if that would make the job more fun to you. "Well, it´s great to see everyone up and hyped for the hunt. It´s truly a shame I can´t go too, but I´ll be cheering for you - for all a demon´s cheering is worth anyway. Anymore questions before you start?"

Inno, just a suggestion: try to differentiate the type of writing you use for thoughts and speaking, like using italyc for thoughts or something along these lines. It gets much easier to read. CG, Huk´s linked it on the first line of his last post here. @Tachibana: That´s hillarious . So either she is completely defenseless, or quite overpowered. Tough character to run , but an interesting one! Ok, Twilight Avenger/Lisa accepted. I´ll talk to you later as to how we´ll introduce her into the plot.