Powder Miner

The axeman actually recoiled a little at the approach of Sting, especially after the mimicking of the dead looter's sound. "Oh, no, she's some sort of-- of violent psychopath!" This earned a look from the swordsman. "Come now, be reasonable. Nobody ever accused us of being non-violent. But now it's time! Come on, we didn't come all the way over here to go without a fight!" TURN 3 ~ ENEMY PHASE "Yessir! Aaaaaaaaaah!" With a shout, the axeman charged the millimeters in Pinecone's direction, raising his clunky wooden axe, feet pounding against the dirt as the beetle went for his tle-less counterpart. The beetle raised the axe high above his head, in the air... Raider A attacks Pinecone! ...and brought it down, an energetic and forceful swooping motion that terminated with a thunk! This wasn't the thunk of an object embedding in wood, as the Marauder had not struck Pinecone's shoulder-plates. Instead, the axe came down, swished in front of Pinecone's face, and then clove through his fuzz to slam into his chest. And this blow was not the grazing strikes that his hands had received earlier -- it was a solid one, the most solid yet dealt in the battle yet, an impact that jarred Pinecone's entire body, the axe leaving bloodied from the red fluid now pouring down Pinecone's chest and soaking his fuzz as the Marauder's weapon left a gash in the bee. The soldier of Sunflower Hive did manage to get a counterstrike in on the Marauder, javelin dipping in to leave another wound on the beetle, this time on his thigh, but it didn't seem to stop him. This time, instead of a terrified scream, the Raider let out a roar. "COME ONNNN! COME OOOONNNNN! I CAME TO DO THIS!" As the archer approached, a silent ladybug woman with an expression of grim resolution on her face, she didn't make any proclamations, excited or terrified or even calculating and sane. Instead, she just raised her plastic bow and aimed it at Pinecone. Pillager B attacks Pinecone! With the twang of a bowstring, a plastic sliver flew at Pinecone, and stuck with a thwack into a spot on his chest near the larger axe wound -- but luckily for Pinecone, a light plastic sliver without force carrying it through does a lot less damage than a wooden axe with plenty of it, and the bleeding from that wound was comparatively minimal. Still... Pinecone was thoroughly wounded, and very much bloodied. The archer made her first sound, a "Hrngh!" of pain as Pinecone's return javelin struck slightly more solidly than her own arrow had, but she was still standing plenty resolute, and she made no further breaches of her silence. Watching his two compatriots get into battle with the large and armored bee, the sword-wielding butterfly took a look at his sword, at Pinecone's armor and bulk (despite his bleeding), at Pinecone's javelin, and then back to his sword. "Hmm... maybe not." Instead, the swordsman turned, raising his sword and using it to bat aside pieces of grass as he slowly approached in Sting's direction -- and then lunged at her! Marauder C attacks Sting! It's a bloody exchange that follows. Leaping from the obscuring blades of grass, the Marauder manages to get the jump on Sting, and before she can really manage to get her bearings on what happens, the undefended mosquito feels the point of a shockingly sharpened plastic sliver slice across her upper arm. While such a light weapon may not be able to push past armor or even Pinecone's fuzz, for the young swordfighter's uncovered arm it's more than enough, and the cut is very painful. Still, Sting isn't dropped by it, and her sword flashes out in retaliation driven more by emotion and pain than by a real calculated thought process. But it's enough -- the rapier stabs right past a blade of grass the Marauder had been using to hide himself and stabs him solidly, drawing a pained grunt and leaving both swordbugs in wounded but standing condition. Meanwhile, across the grass, yet another dagger-wielding bug, a jacketed (and sweating) aphid peeks through blades of grass, leaning and straining and generally just trying to get anything approximating a decent view of the ongoing fight through the grass patch. Still, he does manage it -- and he frowns at what he sees. "Ah, damn, hey, guys, it's getting pretty furious over there -- but I'm betting they're going to end up like the others soon. We need to make our way over and get involved! There's no use worrying about 'kill-stealing' when there's no kill to steal." "In battle comes solace from life's degradations. In death comes relief from life's depredations. In battle comes solace from life's degradations." The axeman, a red ant exile by the looks of it, chanted repeatedly to himself. "Ah, fuck, we have t--" "In battle comes solace from life's degradations," "We need to--" "In death comes relief from life's depredations." "Oh for -- go go go go! Just drag him along, he'll figure it out!" And they moved into the grass. TURN 4 ~ PLAYER PHASE Map Notes Status EXP: 49/100

Bend had already being frowning by this point -- being dragged around by a small, hysterical bee will frankly do that. But Lotus' words, which he just managed to catch under the racket Stardust was now perpetually making, aggravated that frown, the ant's brows furrowing in frustration. "Damn it..." Meanwhile, of course, the battle continued, with the party from the Redoubt smashing into the Marauders with speed and violence. As both Lotus and Pinecone closed in on the knife-wielding termite, he laughed and let his grin widen dangerously, taking on a tight, tense stance, waiting to burst with energy. "C'mon, c'mon! I welcome you! Wasn't happy to have to wait in the first place because I cannot, I am ready, let's goooooo!" Lotus attacks Looter B! He quite promptly receives an arrow through the collarbone for his trouble, causing him to jerk violently for a moment and spit an incomprehensible jumble of mostly consonants. "Cpfakhhh!" The termite then shook himself, the arrow waving back and forth from where it was still lodged in him as he did. "Ahahaaaa! That was good. That was veeeeeery good. No-ho-how, let's see what else you've got to offer, huh? Come at me you big lumbering sumb--" Pinecone attacks Looter B! The rather unhinged bug's ranting is suddenly cut off, as a javelin slams through his ribs. Yet, he doesn't immediately go down. "Just can't compete nowadays! Just can't compete with you crazy bee mantis fighting southern easterner southeasterner fighter people, can ya? Can ya? Can ya???" He remains standing for several moments, scrabbling at the weapons lodged within his body before yelling and throwing his dagger away, not that it comes even close to hitting anyone -- and the motion brings him to the ground with a crash and a roar, after which the termite's fire and fury and volume drains away. Looter B has died! Map Notes Status EXP: 43/100

"We are not going to get anywhere if we don't coordinate at least a little here! I'll want Yuyuko to off one of those Beasts, but it's not looking practical with how unfocused we've been about fighting here, so I suppose we ought to wait. You still shouldn't be focusing on the leftmost beast, Beast A, because we want Yuyuko to take care of it, but do fire at the other two!" LOTUS let out a sigh, annoyed, as the problem that had plagued them last time was starting to rear its head again -- too few of them could really deal out injury, and it was piecemeal. Dealing with these Shadow Beasts would be potentially difficult, but he was just going to have to trust in them. Masako was helpful here as usual in combat, at least. Isobel, meanwhile, ran up to Rory, and after very very visibly being tempted to just absolutely slap the living shit out of the faunus, she reeled in her hand a bit and just dealt the hunter a bit more of a relatively gentle wake-up slap, rather than give in to her frustration in a sadistic way. (It was still a little bit cathartic). "Come on, can't have any of you nodding off forever! Wake up, get fighting, stay alive!" Isobel uses Help Intent on Rory, removing the Gentle Repose condition! LOTUS uses Pathing Advice on Walmond, fixing her initiative to right behind LOTUS' for this turn and the next 2 turns (I initially misremembered its upgraded duration oops)! Tactical Uplink (Partial) is up next turn!

The first one of the variably-intrepid party to charge out in the direction of the heavily armed bandit foes, to make their presence known in the face of an old enemy deep in Redoubt territory... was Stardust, who charged out right in front of Pinecone, panicking loudly the whole time, and squeezing a cloth soaked with the juices of a finely-cut-and-pressed herb of some sort against his wound, causing the bleeding to slow and then stop, the cut cleaner and no longer painful. Stardust uses a Vulnerary on Pinecone! Having been forcibly dragged along, Bend watched as Stardust fussed over the other bee in an unheeding panic, and then hid behind him, and he massaged the bridge of his nose moment... before tooting a sour note directly at her. "C'mon, let go of him and step back a bit." Bend, uh, inspires Stardust! She can move again! (Which she does, to Charisma+...) With that little farce out of the way, the Ebon Knight proceeded to actually go on the attack, his massive bird once again lifting off, in what was frankly just a hop -- but a hop on a very large bird can be quite intimidating. "Oh, fuck, he's coming my way now! It's happening now, it's really happening!" The Ebon Knight attacks Raider A! Wham! Though the axe that the Marauder wielded threatened to give Ebon Knight a little trouble, with the crook of the beetle's axe positioned high to potentially be swung low and catch the lance, the crow rider ultimately found a way around that... stabbing low. The lance slammed brutally into the thigh of the enemy axeman, who let out a scream and tried to counterattack -- only to find his attempt rebuffed by the sheer bulk of Blackwing, the crow getting close enough to prevent the Marauder from really completing a strike, before hopping backwards at Ebon Knight's nonverbal orders. "AUG-- YEAH, HE GOT ME GOOD WITH THAT ONE, THAT HURTS." Map Notes Status EXP: 36/100

Lizaveta actually found that she didn't mind the idea of returning to their base and taking a break at all... the events of the last few weeks had been completely exhausting, in retrospect, and she was starting to feel herself dragging just a bit. Still... she couldn't let herself slow down! She braced herself, made a little noise, hyping herself up and trying to get energy into her for these crucial moments before the adrenaline properly kicked in. She was, at least, happy to give a piece of shit king like Darcy what was coming to him, as much as she could. She didn't mind taking his relic in the slightest. "People like your king devoid of virtue will inevitably find people like us in the way!" K17, Worm Fencer!

Jack had been about to walk over and just start dead-ass tearing apart the wall of rubble blocking the far door with his hands when Scarlet called him over; he had actually been, in fact, halfway across the room at the time. Upon her finding another solution, though, he shrugged and walked on out of the house. ”Whatever works works, you know. Although I bet I could totally handle a little bit of military-grade armor, heh heh.” Jack fondly patted his rocket launcher as he followed the others. ”But yeah, yeah, I won’t start shit ‘til it’s started at me.” He adjusted his Gauss SAW as he moved, getting ready to unlimber it and start shooting if they got jumped again. As they walked, Jack decided to talk to the other guys that Scarlet had evidently woken up. ”Hey, just be glad that you CAN stay in one place. Where I come from, except for the Sanctuaries and Gates, you’re constantly going around fighting your way in and out of places. Shit doesn’t stay for long. Even when one group locks the continent down for a while, you’ll always have everyone popping in to contest it again, and you’ll always be fighting SOMEWHERE. I’ve seen all of the outposts I’ve been at flip hundreds and hundreds of times. It’s fuckin’ pacific down here, dude. Has to be a hell of a lot of downtime.”

Bend looked at Pinecone -- and then around at the Marauders in the immediate vicinity being rather efficiently obliterated, then at Stardust panicking, and then back to Pinecone... Bend sighed, and shrugged, before pulling out the flute again. This time, his finger rubbed on an inscription on the flute's body: magic, actually, as it was a magic flute he'd actually acquired from a merchant outside of his hive a couple years ago, and therefore his property, unlike the swords that the hive gave out communally to its soldiers. Now, as it turned out, he had near to no talent for magic, but everybody was doing so well that healing Pinecone's fairly minor wound seemed like the best course of action... though no potential path seemed terribly world-shaking. Tweeeeet. . . Bend, uh... heals... Pinecone! The spot on Pinecone's palm where the arrow had dug in was still red and angry and sore, but he wasn't bleeding anymore, at least. Thusly treated, Pinecone wordlessly advanced on the quivering fly archer, and she began to pull back on her bowstring at the same time that Pinecone's arm darted forwards, releasing its deadly payload in a clean arc right at the fly. Pinecone attacks Pillager A! Both ranged attacks fired off successfully, and both hit their marks: Pinecone's javelin slammed into the archer's chest again, and this time it stuck in, leaving the poor girl with an entire javelin sticking out of her... but her padded clothing did appear to have prevented that javelin from being as deep as it could have; the end result was that she was still alive, but, well... "Aaaaah! Fuck! Ow, kuh, g-- aaugh!" she was not exactly happy, to say the least. At the same time, her arrow flew just after the javelin left Pinecone's hand... and then struck his now-empty palm, bouncing due to the odd angle of impact, but giving the armored bee an identical wound to the one that just got healed on his other hand. (Bend put his face in his hand, for a moment.) The archer Marauder's woes were far from over, though, as a massive bird with an intimidating armored man landed down beside her, causing her to jump a few millimeters backwards with a short, high-pitched shriek... Ebon Knight attacks Pillager A! ...and that ended up being her last sound in the world, as it was quite promptly and savagely cut off. Once again riding in with the weight and speed of a flying crow behind him, the Ebon Knight dove in with wooden lance affixed in front of him -- and then his charge connected, with a bone-jarring thud that slammed the lance entirely through the archer's chest. A wet death rattle sounded and then the archer went limp, slain nearly instantly by the powerful blow. It had not even found any weak points or been expertly aimed, the strike, but when the target had been stabbed with two javelins and the strike was that powerful, well... it didn't really matter. Pillager A is dead! TURN 2 ~ ENEMY PHASE The bugs a short distance up the bald pathway of dirt react to the demolishing of their brethren in differing ways. One cringes, one merely appears more resolute, one grins and takes on a combat stance, and another one simply nods and closes his eyes. The bug that had cringed, a beetle axeman (and not, in fact, shirtless), spoke first: "Aw, shit, they're gone now, we really need to go forward and--" Next, the grinning one, another bug with a dagger (this one a rather scarred-up termite): "Alright, our turn now! Let's g--" Finally (as the one who nodded, a ladybug archer, had stayed silent), the resolute one (a butterfly swordsman without wings but with a dizzyingly blue-and-red outfit) spoke up, and loudly at that: "Shut up! You'll all get to do what you came here to do, but let's at least accomplish something with it -- let them move up a bit so we can at least terminate our charges into them!" TURN 3 ~ PLAYER PHASE Map Notes: Status: EXP: 32/100

Satomi looked over her creations... they seemed to have perfectly worked out just as she'd desired them to. While that did mean that they did not excel, like she most definitely would have preferred them to, for her purposes (pragmatic ones, as all purposes had to be when one was dealing with Tainted creatures such as the undead), they were sufficient. "...right. This will help a lot when dealing with these skeletal abominations; better to try to break bone than pierce it. I believe that this should be sufficient for us to proceed -- come on, then!" And, with that, Satomi began to advance down the space behind the doors -- with the two monsters behind it dealt with, it was naturally much easier to advance. though Satomi did keep her shield raised and though she did try to remain relatively quiet, since the bats kind of were still there and all.

Unlike many of his companions, the dagger-wielding moth refused to rise to the taunts and gibes of Sting, remaining silent, wounded but wary and on his feet. Sting attacks Looter A! "Hrgk-" However, "wary and on his feet", as it turns out, did not mean "wary enough to dodge an attack". Whirling around through the grass to the other side of her foe, Sting lashed out at the bug that had tried to stab her. In what was half intention, as Sting found herself unnerved by all the blood and violence, and was half a clumsy and scared flail of her weapon as she turned, she powerfully clotheslined the moth in the neck with her sword... and because the weapon was a wooden rapier, it didn't cut him, but it sure as hell did drop him, gasping, to the ground. (Though Sting couldn't tell, if Ebon Knight looked, he would see that the bleeding man was in a state where he could either live or die, really.) Looter A is dead(?) Map Notes: Status: EXP: 23/100

Lotus attacks Marauder A: Lotus' arrow strikes true, as with all of the party's efforts so far, and the swordswasp gasps as an arrow slams into his gut, before exploding into a profanity of storm and rage. "Augh! Fucker! These attacks from far away-- gods damn it-- will you fucking let me FIGHT YOU PEOPLE?!" (Behind him, the fly archer awkwardly fingers her bow.) Nonetheless, with that arrow shot into the second swordsman, he was starting to look awfully ragged, as was the front squad of the Marauders in general. And, of course, they were far from done. Bend uneasily watched as Sting charged up at high speed, and then stared out with something of a resigned expression as she called on him to charge with her. "Yeah... sure, why not." He lifted his flute to his lips and played a brief ditty, operating... mostly on a regimented rhythm, helping to organize Sting's movements and give her some of the cadence that Sting needed as an excuse to charge in as far as she could. Recruit Bend refreshes Sting! "There we go! At least let me go out in close quarters! That's the way I'm supposed to go! That's the way I'm supposed to fuckin' go!" Sting attacks Marauder A! Sting dashes up, a bundle of an energy much more nervous than she would like to admit, right into combat with the bleeding swordsbug... but nervous as her energy may be, it drives her to leap up and stab the other bug in the neck during her attack -- it's not as accurate an attack as some of the others that her comrades have struck out with, but it doesn't take a strike dead center through the neck to be deadly. The wasp clutches his neck as his footing falters under him and he crumples. Marauder A is dead! Watching this, the fly archer behind him lets out a half-hearted "Maybe you're the bad guys," as her hands shake on her bow. The moth with a knife only mutters a "Tch." TURN 1 ~ ENEMY PHASE There's moment of hesitation, from the fly woman shaking with a bow as she regards the party that just flawlessly executed two of her comrades. But she closes her eyes and speaks in a tone that indicates she's quoting somebody else. "Better now than to wither away..." She lets out a shaky breath, and visibly steels herself, before she scrambles just a few inches forwards and raises her bow, pulling it back and aiming at the Ebon Knight's bird. Pillager A attacks the Ebon Knight! The bird-riding mercenary hops backwards in response to the attack from the archer, just as a certain bee bulls forwards -- and the arrow's flight comes to a sudden halt as Pinecone's upraised arm literally slaps it out of the air, drawing a terrified squeaking noise from the archer. The effect, however, is spoiled as blood slowly drips down Pinecone's arm into the dirt; it turns out that knocking that arrow out of the sky had caused it to bury its point in Pinecone's arm. It's not an extremely deep wound, but it is a wound, and it seems to shock the archer out of her shock. "I drew blood! I drew blood! I--" her celebration is cut shot as a javelin nails her in the thigh, drawing a shriek from her. Still, Pinecone's return strike is also anything but a lethal strike, and the fly glares at him, reaching for another arrow. "Hm." The other Marauder's move is much more silent, as the moth picks the exact moment of the archer's attack to slip in past both of the Redoubt-sent bugs currently fighting, the lithe figure darting in before Pinecone can even notice him and before the Ebon Knight can find any sort of opportunity to impede him -- and closing in on the mosquito girl hidden in the grass. Looter A attacks Sting! Despite the slick nature of his approach, the dagger-moth hadn't quite counted on the extent of Sting's nervous, slightly terrified, excited energy: the moment that the man reaches the edge of the grass, forced to halt lest his vision and movement be obscured and restricted slamming into it, Sting leaps backwards, and his dagger misses by an entire inch. Sting then leaps back forwards in a similar jerk of quick movement, and her wooden rapier doesn't miss -- in fact, it bites deep, the entire blade colored a red as the strike slams through the moth's dagger arm. "Shit." Further afield, two bugs watch. "They're getting chewed up out there... and not doing much about it. Should we do something?" "No. Wait. We're not here to baby each other, are we?" "...no, I suppose we're not." TURN 2 ~ PLAYER PHASE Map Notes Status EXP: 18/100

As a frankly terrifying amount of firepower came pouring out from the robot horde that they were facing, Perlita's fists clenched together, and her face set. If there was a very scary amount of weapons being fired at them... all that meant was that Perlita had her work cut out for her, and that she would need to do it! She was so often trembling these days, sitting there scared... Perlita couldn't say what had triggered it, but all of a sudden she felt an incredible wave of frustration over her own cowardice. Oh, well. She supposed that the only way to solve this was to stop standing there paralyzed and thinking to herself, and to do something. "Lyra! Be careful for a moment, I'm going to help you out!" She raised her arm into the sky and made a violent tugging motion downwards. "CRAWFORD! PATRA!" With that shout and that motion, Perlita's Persona appeared once more, and with a flair-filled twirl of her cape, Lyra would find that her biological situation was MUCH less vicious. Perlita uses Patra on Lyra, curing all of her conditions... and also healing her for SYN (12) HP in the process! Perlita also gains SYN (12) HP, in case she happens to have taken damage between now and her action.

Walking up all of the stairs that she found herself walking up had been a fairly annoying experience, and it had left even Isobel, who considered herself to be rather more athletic than her build would lead one to think, a bit out of breath. But at least she had found herself more and more relieved in the minutes that followed -- first, LOTUS had returned to existence, popping into her a pocket with a somewhat distressed expression but physically very much intact. And then there were the saplings... they were pretty saplings, really. Gorgeous, really, along the idyllic backdrop of the courtyard and the other plants there. That was one thing you never found in on the Exodus, really... even if one went to the absurd amount of work required to turn the hydroponics bay into a bona fide garden, there were always the other rooms around, much more practical. It didn't offend her --most of her life had been spent in space, after all-- but it meant that seeing something like this was. "They're lovely, aren't they...? Such pretty little trees. I could... I could just..." "SNAP OUT OF IT." LOTUS' mood was much, much more unsettled -- as it tends to be when you get MESSILY EATEN, which LOTUS in retrospect wasn't very happy about at all. It had been... pain and fear had been new emotions, and she found that she didn't like them at all. The fact that there was another inhabitant of this dimension in front of them wearing one of the corruptive artifacts didn't help with that mood, the fact that she was evidently one of the most powerful of all of the beings IN the dimension sure didn't help either, oh, and there were the saplings that, by the sound of it, put you to sleep forever. Yes, LOTUS decided that her mood was terrible and that she hated everything about this. "You need to SNAP OUT OF IT! ISOBEL!" Isobel replied in a dreamy, half-there voice. "Huh? LOTUS, calm down, everything is going to be alright. I--" Another shout ripped through that. "I said SNAP OUT OF IT. The saplings are likely magic, they're affecting you." Isobel replied in the same voice, but hesitantly. "I... need to snap out of it? I do, don't I? I-- I'll just need to--" SLAP! "Fuck," Isobel muttered, a pink-red handprint visible across her face now, so thorough that one could almost swear they saw fingerprints. "Fuck me, that hurt." Her hand went to much more gently stroke the stinging area of the slap, and then she drew herself up into a much less dreamy position, moving and swaying with preparation to try to dodge anything coming her way with lethal intent, rather than out of the strange dreaminess this time around. "That was pretty bad. I could have just... drifted away... let's try our best to avoid that, yeah? Someone should hit Masako, uh, probably somebody who won't just destroy her on the spot... Walmond! Why don't you give it a try?" "That's better. As for the other things that need to be done... Empi, step aside for a moment, will you? It would be nice if Yuyuko could take out one of those monsters, and we want to provide her with a clear space so we don't have a very unfortunate crossfire accident. And, Yuyuko, the quick way to do this is..." here LOTUS gave some advice, "Everybody else, focus fire on the rightmost of the shadow creatures, which I will refer to as Shadow Beast B! While they do predate my presence here and as such I cannot quite give exact advice on them, I have been told that we need to take care of multiple of them at a time or they will revive each other! Yuyuko can take care of the leftmost, which I will call Shadow Beast A, and perhaps if you pour in on the next one it can also be killed shortly!" Isobel uses Help Intent on herself, removing the Gentle Repose condition with a bitchslap to her own face! LOTUS uses Pathing Advice on Empi actually Walmond (and thusly Yuyuko if Empi Walmond gives up her action), fixing her initiative to right behind LOTUS' for this turn and the next!

"Haha, you're still not quite right, guy. But, well... I'm happy somebody is bothering to fight me close up, then. Let's fuckin' do it!" Ebon Knight attacks Marauder B! It's a swift and merciless strike that the cockroach Marauder promptly receives -- the loud caw of a crow sounds out, before the momentum of the crow and of the armored man sitting atop it ensure that the lance lands solidly and brutally in between the ribs of the cockroach. One stab was bad enough, but two bloody impalements is another thing altogether, and the swordsman's knees give out from under him, causing him to slide off of the armored mercenary's lance before finally hitting the ground. "Hah... hah hah... so be it, then. Thus goes... battle. The stronger lives, and..." As the bug's blood pools out under him, sinking into the loam, his voice falters, and then gives out entirely. The other three Marauders around him, even the shouty one, maintain a grim and respectful silence. Marauder B has died! Map Notes: Status: EXP: 7/100

The next laugh that comes from the heavily wounded swordsbug is a more voiceless and grim one, containing little mirth -- and it's wet. "That's not the point either, bee. I'm... not the one to explain it, I think. There are better people. More poetic." It's only now that the smallest of the four figures present speaks of, a wiry moth with a knife, who had been remaining perfectly still, waiting for a chance to leap. "Don't make this into a production. Allow us pride in battle." Recruit Bend, meanwhile, struggled to come up with a coherent answer, choking for a moment. "L- look- Stardust, okay- the world just isn't always a very safe place, even somewhere like the Scholars' Redoubt. Sometimes bugs just need to fight to defend the regions they're from, and some bugs just want to attack, okay? That's-- that's just how it is." He shot a pleading look at Ebon.

The cockroach man wheezes out a pained laugh. "Little lady, I don't think you really understand how this works. We will be fighting to the death -- all of us." Recruit Bend cringes at the whole exchange... and considering that he was already incredibly on edge from the fact that they were being ambushed by sixteen fucking people, this doesn't do a whole lot to reassure his mental state, all told. "Awww hell, aw hell aw hell, really?" Damn, she was even greener than he was -- way greener. "Hey, uh, bee lady... look... sometimes... uh-- fights just happen, okay? You gotta... well, you gotta at least not break the moment somebody gets stabbed..." Of course, the fight he had been in, he had been the one getting wounded first, but, well, that was just first-hand experience, right?

As the two bees move up, one in a panic and one with spirits high, the Marauders they're approaching comment. One of the two to do so is the nearest Marauder, a dark-haired wasp with a sword, in loose red clothing and unarmored, who grins as they approach. "The first contenders! Well, little bees, what say we find out who comes out of this alive? A contest of blood!" Around some of the grass, a fly with a bow peeks out, her expression one of pensiveness. "I don't think these guys are from the Redoubt, funnily enough. I have a friend waaay up north -- those colors and the way they're acting are how he describes the bees from the Fields." "Yeah, yeah, cool, whatever, let's just get those kills." Pinecone attacks Marauder B! "Come on, buzzy, let's see what you've g--" The first strike, and the first blood, goes to Pinecone. There's no fancy maneuvers involved in the scuffle that marks the first fighting of the mission, but perhaps even to an insulting degree; Pinecone simply walks up slowly and confidently, the Marauder obligingly remaining still as he has no intention of fleeing... and then he ignores the taunting swordsman altogether, an indignant expression rising to the wasp swordsman's face as instead the javelin sails through the air right past him and strikes the other swordsman instead, a red-haired (and currently not very happy) cockroach with dark clothing. And, with the wooden spear's head now embedded in his chest for a few seconds before falling out with a squelch, that dark clothing becomes rapidly darker. "Oh shit, what the fuck, he went for me?! That's--" "Hey, what the hell, asshole, ignoring me?!" Map Notes: Status:

Near Built Upon Ruins, Scholars' Redoubt In the thirty years since humans disappeared from the world, the grass that they cultivated around their homes has grown long and unruly, growing inches longer than the height of bugs. It takes significant effort to cut grass, as each blade of grass must be firmly grasp and hacked at, typically without access to metal tools -- it is far from impossible, still, but each blade of grass does take some effort to cut, and what this means is that only the grass near to a city is typically trimmed, even in populous and important cities. The Redoubt is one of very few exceptions to this, with grass trimmed enough to actually count as a lawn, allowing the inhabitants of the Redoubt to see the heads of anyone in the grass. This maintenance of the grass, achieved by a fairly sizable workforce every couple of weeks, is something that is necessary in the case of the Redoubt, as the city's military importance and status as a hub of communication mean that it's vital to keep track of everybody coming in and to prevent any ne'er-do-wells from hiding out around the city. It is the early morning of the second day of your journey across the Scholars' Redoubt, and it has been once again reemphasized to the lot of you that this isn't the case elsewhere. Cutting a fairly direct path past houses and streets and grass on your way to the Scholars' University, you've experienced the stunning contrast between unkempt grass, kept in shade and weaving across curving paths and patches of bare dirt without visibility far out, and the human roads, as exposed to the sun and to other bugs as you can possibly get. Built Upon Ruins, the sole city of termites in the Scholars' Redoubt, has proven to be no exception. You have been cutting past it, and despite the culture of constant single-minded industriousness among its workers which the city promotes, the grass here is as unkempt as anywhere else around its outskirts. Part of this, although it's a distinct possibility that none of you are educated enough about them to know it, is that most of the termite workers are devoted to tasks within the city: artisan jobs, and jobs aiding in the constant reconstruction of the city, hard and dangerous work that takes much of the hive's focus. Whatever the reasons, the upshot of this is that one moment you are walking peacefully between patches of dew-laden grass, perhaps more or less groggily from person to person, the next moment you almost directly stumble into a fairly-sized group of bugs also winding their way across the grass outside the termite hive. There's a total cessation of movement for a moment as both parties register just what is in front of them, the moment exaggerated by the early hour. In your case, you count sixteen of the bugs, all but one armed with various wooden and plastic weapons, and largely unarmored but for bits of padded cloth or leather. The most notable exceptions come at the back, where the leaders of this group stand -- two warriors in wooden half-plate stand around a jacketed beetle with lustrous green wings who carries a tablet, and a bright-haired spider waits with a wooden hatchet, carrying a regal bearing. All of these bugs are wearing different levels of the color red... and this common but irregularly manifested color, along with their diversity in bug type, marks them with little doubt as Marauders. These Marauders are insanely deep into Redoubt territory, as well; these days it is truly vanishingly rare to see Marauders right here in the dead center of Redoubt territory, but they're here nonetheless. "It would appear that it is time, Seeker." "So it is, Wings." Seeker, as was apparently at least part of his name, spoke loudly now. "Come, bugs of the Scholars' Redoubt! We have come to meet you in combat -- to slay you and to take what you possess, as is the way of our people!" TURN 1 ~ PLAYER PHASE Two of the nearest four Marauders pipe up, shouting back towards the others. "Party leaders or not, you better not steal our kills!" "These bugs are closer to us -- this makes them our fight by right, until either we or they are dead!" Map Notes: Status:

A quiet sigh. "Alright, I think it's probably long time to get things going, here. Bright, will you do the honors?" The armored man nodded, then drew in a deep breath and... "LISTEN UP!!" The black ant general was capable of frankly impressive levels of physical volume, "It is time for you to set off! You are going to be heading northwest -- a map will be provided to you, as well as supplies to help you on the journey, though it should not take more than a couple of days to get where you are going. This is an opportunity for all of you to see wider service to the Redoubt; do not disappoint us! Still, I do have faith in your abilities." "In blunter terms, we expect this task to be perfectly manageable; this is a fairly basic task as far as we expect, but it is still a fairly important piece of the Redoubt's functioning," Unbending shifted a little, and looked away for a moment -- some of his compatriots might have thought otherwise, but they frustrated him. He had been old enough when the Redoubt had been formed to understand just what its nascent traditions meant, something few others could say. "and this does mean that you should not take this lightly." Hobbling over on his cane, Unbending handed the map to the Ebon Knight, by far the one he expected to be the most competent; for obvious reasons, it did not have text labels, but pictorially it provided a fair description of the known world. Meanwhile, Coyote Crash made her way over to Sting, prying the bee from her hands and then leaning in to speak to her. "Be careful, alright? I know you're excited for this, but I'm not exactly intending to send you into some sort of pitched warfare here. You might not be able to earn your name if you do something stupid and end up terribly hurt, you know, and I know you want to earn your name!" With these final notes... "ALRIGHT BUGS... MOVE OUT!"

Isobel put a gloved hand to her forehead (the one that didn’t now smell of soup, thanks Masako, Isobel couldn’t have thought of a more roundabout way to explain that concept if she’d tried), working to avoid a headache, while the souped hand half-heartedly flipped Rory off. ”Well, I guess it did work pretty well. I guess the artifact is probably... just going to be in the box then, yeah? I’ll go put it in my bag, then.” Isobel tromped off towards the box and opened it up, gingerly placing the corruptive artifact in her bag as to avoid touching it directly, even with gloves on. As she did, she mumbled rather affrontedly to herself. ”He’s said himself he’ll be fine if his chassis is gone, just gone, but if he’s been kicked back permanently to where we’re from, we’re really fucked, Masako... I sure hope that I CAN trust that won’t be the case...”

Isobel abruptly bared her teeth in a hot flash of anger, crossed her arms and spoke with unusual vitriol, following Rory just long enough to get her words in. "I'm not going to play these games with you, Rory. I don't know if you have it out for me in some way, or if you just don't like people in general, but you can take whatever way you're trying to prove your superiority and get it out. It doesn't put you in the right somehow to dangle your plan over my head and then act superior because something you refused to communicate wasn't understood. We aren't here to play a game of 'who's smarter', we're here because we're trying to do our job of helping people, and that's something that you just seem to be unable to understand, you little shit."

"Well, I reckon that should be about good enough, yeah? I looked." They had to be somewhere to patch up and avoid the curfew, and at least checking was probably good enough -- after all, they had things to do, and it wasn't like the whole 'house' thing mattered compared to the, uh, everything else... thing. The point was that it really wasn't that big a deal, they'd be gone eventually and it would all just blow over after that -- it wasn't like they'd be doing any sort of permanent damage, after all (even taking into account that permanent damage seemed to be a thing that happened more on other words), so, hell, there wasn't really any issue after all even if they did bust into a house, right? So he walked over in the direction of the others, and gestured them over. "Hey, I'm finding us somewhere to tuck in for the curfew to avoid the rain, so follow me." And once he'd done that, Jack beelined for the nearest of the quiet houses he'd found and opened the door without real hesitation. If the door was locked, well... then he'd just try to open the door hard enough to rip the lock through the doorframe, no big deal. Jack breaks into a fucking house.

Diving in front of the innocent people had just been the natural instinct that came to Stretch. But what he had, rather unusually for Stretch Armstrong, been using his brain for was the attempt to reduce how much he got hurt by actively pulling back the Diamond Magic Juice from his body, hardening himself to something approaching the consistency of a non-stretchy person. But... it had hurt. It had hurt more than anything he had ever experienced before. It had hurt more than the time he accidentally exploded a rock and sent a massive piece of shrapnel tearing through his body. It had hurt more than the time he had been shot in the eye. Clubs, hammers, coming down, splitting skin and tearing muscle against a now-hard skull, shattering bone, bending and breaking his body... it had been a powerful, wide agony Stretch had never experienced before. Covered in blood, the only thing that Stretch could do for the first few moments after Harry brought him back up was stare. Then... "I thought... I thought I could... just make it. I didn't... think that that would happen. I thought that if I were less filled with Diamond Magic Juice then it would be okay. But... it wasn't okay. This wasn't..." Stretch couldn't bring himself to phrase it with levity or his usual chillness, "It hurt a lot. I just wanted to save those people. But it hurt a lot, and..." He could tell that something was wrong magically too. But he'd run out of words, and all he could really manage to do was look at Harry with a pleading and bewildered look, a look that seemed almost betrayed in some way. Not by Harry, not by the cosplayers he'd saved, and maybe not even by the Deadites, but by the world in some wide-eyed, odd sense. "Shouldn't... shouldn't it all just have worked out? I... don't get it. It's never been like this before. I was doing a good thing." He slumped for a moment, and then all he could do send a half-hearted punch in the direction of the Deadites, something he couldn't bring himself to put his usual bouncing, dynamic being into. Stretch uses Bouncing Strike on the Old Deadites, dealing 2d6+STR (1) blunt damage!

"HA-HA!" Nader cried out jubilantly, violently jabbing a finger down at the floor of the elevator. "I FUCKING KNEW IT! YOU THINK YOUR FUCKIN' SECRET LAB IS GOING TO BE HIDDEN LIKE THAT? Monsters don't poop you stupid bastards maybe you figured I'd not figure it out despite being told and then I'd come and I'd search and I'd not find it, huh? But I figured that you'd figure that I'd figure that I'd-- I kn-- I knew it, see, I told you fuckers, now let's go see what you have hidden from for me down there, huuuuh?" Nader jabbed his finger at the floor again, and then as if what he'd just said hadn't been anything unusual at all, Nader peeked his head back out of the doorway and waved the overs over. "Hey! I found an elevator they didn't hide too well down here, it goes down to where the meat of this whole twisted operation is kept! I'm going down -- you all ought to follow me, though, because this is where we're all going to see what's REALLY going on in this place, I promise you that." And with that, Nader stepped fully into the elevator, giving anyone who wanted to quickly leap into the elevator to follow him a chance to do so -- otherwise, he didn't wait long, punching the down button on the elevator and preparing to be shown the truth behind this compound of the creation of false gods through reality. He was the one being given the chance to find the truth, and while he didn't doubt that it was in truth some variety of little game this cabal was playing with him, he'd play into that role in his own way up until the point where he finally got the chance to turn the tables. Let's see, he thought, how they liked that...

Satomi let out a long breath as the battle ended -- bleeding and smashed up, she was not in a fantastic position at all, and she had no medical ability, but she would not ever give herself the chance to slow down and stop -- she had a Duty to perform, and all that she did when traveling these many different realms was done in the service of strengthening them and strengthening herself in order to better strengthen the other worlds in turn. It was a simple fact that risk and injury was a part of that, but as a samurai, and especially as a samurai of the Crab Clan, the Courage to push on anyhow was something of the utmost importance. Their duty did not allow cowardice, after all. She hadn't let injury stop her before... and she wasn't going to now. Buuuuut first, there was something she was going to have to take care of. "It is awfully difficult to hit these skeletons solidly with bolts and arrows -- hold on for a moment, I am going to work on a solution to fix that, at least for myself, though I can also make an attempt at doing the same for you." Satomi proceeded to get to surprisingly careful work: she knew exactly what she wanted to do, but she had to both avoid impurity and screwing up her task, so this would take care. The first thing that Satomi did was to carefully cut lengths of chain off of the Spinner's body, being incredibly fastidiously careful to avoid touching its dead flesh, something she actually seemed to be incredibly afraid of, her hand jerking back violently whenever she accidentally got closer to the dead flesh that intended. Then, with that done, she began carefully looping a couple of links of chains around each of the arrows that she was carrying, attempting to avoid imbalancing them, and then she equally carefully hammered them into the arrows with the hilt of her wakizashi until the chains were embedded within the arrowheads, increasing their contact area significantly and making them heavier, if much less quick and aerodynamic and piercing. Then, she did the same for a container of the bolts for her Perfection Crossbow. Satomi attempts to harvest chain links from the Spinner's corpse without touching the Spinner's body itself, and attempts to craft the following item: Pounded-Chain Ammunition: Arrows or bolts that have had their arrowheads surrounded in carefully-balanced and carefully-hammered chains -- this has the result of obviously removing the ammunition's ability to pierce flesh in the same way, and it makes it heavier and slower, but it increases the surface area of the new "head" of the arrow and ensures that it transfers that force into what it hits directly and bluntly, instead of relying on a wedge to cut the target apart. When attached to a piercing-damage bow or crossbow (not taking a slot on its own), Pounded-Chain ammunition changes the weapon's damage type from piercing to blunt damage.

Yes, LOTUS decided that this plan actually was a really terrible one after all. Self-preservation was a very odd instinct for the personal AI unit, but the appearance of a physical form was messing with her something fierce, including giving her the ability to feel pain and how much being bounced against the soil again and again and again mercilessly REALLY WASN'T ALL THAT COMFORTABLE. "AAAAAAAA I HATE THIIIISSSS I HATE THIS THIS IS THE WOOOOORST!" LOTUS cried out, a surprising volume emitting from her tiny little body and she was yanked and dragged across the ground, followed by an extra-loud wail as she flew the final distance to the box, for the part that was no doubt going to suck the absolute most. Isobel winced as she watched the whole display go through, her teeth showing in a powerful cringe. "I know LOTUS volunteered for this, but..." what was being done to the AI-turned-fairy nonetheless was... "...this is really, really cruel. What are you going to do, here, AFTER she's trapped in the box with the ghost...?" Isobel paused. "You're... you're not planning on just leaving her to be eaten over and over, right?"