Powder Miner

Isobel boggled at the spores "Oh man, there's a lot more of that than I thought there would be, and this is starting to get very trippy. That... reminds me of some of my coworkers, haha." Isobel paused, and when she spoke back up, her tone was rather more worried. "Ah, but we're going to have to hope that these aren't seriously toxic. Knowing what I know about plants and fungi... ahhh... well I'll be able to help for a while if these spores are sincerely dangerous, but at a certain point there's nothing I can do, and, well... perhaps it's best that I don't elaborate here! Just... be careful around those mushrooms, will you? Try not to dislodge a cloud of spores." LOTUS' attention was focused on something else, however... the lightning-quick chain of flashes and danmaku and blasts of electricity, rapidly covering the entirety of the battlefield in what appeared to LOTUS to be a combined display of both fierce intellect and raw power. That was... that was... that was really something. But besides just being "really something", a smile slowly spread across the AI-fairy's face, her circuit marks flashing a slow, satisfied green. LOTUS could work with this, oh yes, she could streamline that process even further. And with the amount of power on display... this had quite a bit of potential. She would stick with Masako for this battle. "Isobel!" the fairy shouted. "H-huh? What is it, LOTUS?" Isobel blinked, looked down at the AI, and responded. "I need you to throw me at Masako!" "You... you need me to what?" "Throw me at Masako, so I can advise her more easily!" "I-- are-- are you sure that's a good idea, LOTUS?" "I'm sure it'll work out, I've got wings and all! Just do it!" "Er-- ah-- well, if you're certain..." And Isobel picked LOTUS out of her pocket, got a solid but gentle grip on the little foot-tall fairy, and promptly hucked her to Masako, a perfect throw -- albeit one that would take response from Masako to complete. She was also surprised to find that on following through with the motion and reaching for her hatchet with the other, a simple little tight group of a couple of danmaku was sent at the fairies. "Huh..." It really wasn't much, and certainly wasn't going to be a mainstay, but it was cool nonetheless. LOTUS and Isobel delay their turn 'til after Masako's; LOTUS uses Efficiency Analysis on Masako to drop a turn of cooldown from her Deduction: Shocking Insight, and Isobel uses her Hatchet on Fairy Swarm B, dealing 1d4+STR (2 lol) damage. Active Cooldowns: Efficiency Analysis (1 Turn) 15% dodge chance, 20% poison damage reduction and poisoning effect durations shortened by one round,

"Uh, I think Atton's going to drive the vehicle, it's his, after all. Near gave me a heart attack when it appeared. Um..." Perlita turned to look at Iowa and spent several moments trying to place exactly where she was from -- she'd taken US history classes, but she had to admit that trying to pick out someone clearly from some time ago was kind of difficult. Her Persona was actually her saving grace here; after nearly choking the first time she'd actually gotten a good look at her Persona's appearance without being in a terrifying and alien situation, she had looked the figure her Persona appeared to be based off of up -- Joan Crawford. Not... delving into... whatever that represented... Perlita had still learned a lot about the flappers, and since this lady kind of looked like the people preceding the flappers... what was she, 1900s? 1910s? Maybe a little earlier. ...this all had taken a few seconds of clear contemplation on Perlita's part, before she eventually spoken up again. "You don't look older than the combustion engine... though I guess cars were pretty rare back then. But, um, yeah, this doesn't use horses, it uses an engine that propels it on its own. It doesn't burn coal or anything, though, it burns oil, so, um yeah, that's how that works and why there isn't anywhere to hitch horses to it or anything."

Navin laughed ever so slightly at Heidrun's "I suppose your line of work does sound dangerous" -- not a mocking laugh, and in truth not that much of a laugh at all, just a single little sound of slight amusement at the understatement. "Ah, well, yes, what we do is dangerous, very much so; you just missed our participation in a full war, if I am to be blunt. If it provides any reassurance, though, we have not had anyone die." Navin considered his next words carefully as he stepped onto the elevator, realizing that the net effect of what he was saying was probably indeed not reassurance. "How do I put this... we very much engage in combat, and it is very much intense, but at the least we all seem to know what we are doing." There was a pause as Navin reflected on earlier friendly-fire incidents in the castle -- incidents, plural. "...the vast majority of us seem to know what we are doing, that is."

The sound of a massive explosion from far away entered Nader's ears, and after a surprised curse he began to speak with a triumphant tone. "Alright, nearly out of this fucking place! I'm going to dig in and keep defending here, I guess, since these piece of shit living dead don't appear to pose me any actual fuckin' threat. " Nader then gestured to the other XCOM operatives around him, including Database. "You all can go deeper into the Avenger or go fight some of those remaining space aliens if you want, I should be able to pretty much handle the rest of these assholes without a problem." As if to punctuate his point, Nader reached back and pulled his designated marksman rifle from his back, almost casually aiming the Osprey at one of the approaching ghouls and taking a shot. Nader fires the Mk. 3 Osprey at one of the Lost Runners in his square, dealing 4d6+DEX (5) damage, and forcing the enemies to pass DEX checks if they have dodges that trigger! Gut Punch is cocked. Active Cooldowns: Akimbo (1 Turn) PAW (0 Turns)

Magic the knight a g a i n

It turns out that Arminius had not been going for a physical battle or any sort of duel -- Satomi should have expected that, but she supposed she had expected even with how infuriated she was that he wouldn't try to outright kill her. But nonetheless, the soul-shard-stealer slammed into her despite her attempt to slash him away, and she felt an intense burning heat. Satomi let out a yelp, but that was only the beginning. She felt a strange sensation of bloating, and a discomfort -- and then heat. Heat, and then heat, and then heat, and more heat built up inside of her outside of her, her skin turning red and magma-like, and what had been a yelp turned into screaming as she began to burn, the pain horrific and very nearly overwhelming, agony lighting up in her entire body as her kimono and armor was singed and scorched. And that screaming... it was ragged, high-pitched, and most of all loud. Satomi screamed over, and over again, her voice filling the air with nearly no pause. The pain was only nearly overwhelming, however. Throughout her life, whenever Satomi had suffered something at someone's hands, it very often made her angrier -- the loss of her mother to the Scorpion Clan, for example, fostering not fear but furious hatred. This was the case here -- as she was set aflame, screaming, instead of curl up into a ball or stop or even slow down, Satomi pressed further, intending to make Arminius pay for what he had done to her, even as she screamed and screamed. Her hands went lunging forwards, attempting to use the very thing that had been done to her to sear marks onto Arminius' face by clamping her hands onto it and not letting go. Satomi attempts to burn Arminius' face with her hands thanks to the Meteorhead Essence effect, maintaining the grapple.

Ceridwen found herself taken aback slightly at the man's attitude, but it didn't last, remembering the treatment earlier, during... the battle. Maybe people here just didn't think of women in the same way as they did in the Stronghold. She kind of missed the Stronghold... but, well, she'd already done enough dwelling today, and though the red-headed dragon rider suspected that she wasn't done with that, she really didn't need to add to it right then and there. "Right. Um... I suppose I had been looking to purchase some javelins. I have a lance and, well, I've been using it, but... I'm more trained with the javelin and I haven't had an opportunity to use one for a while."

Lizaveta will attack Knight A, then Kane will do so as well.

LOTUS let out a sigh, and start to jump out of Isobel's pocket and try to fly, only to quite promptly hit the ground. "Ouch! ...I was hoping that that would work this time. Well... I guess I'm just going to have to stay in your pocket for now, Isobel. Let's go, we'll be needed in the fight, probably. Maybe I can try this whole danmaku thing, at least." With a slight chuckle, Isobel picked the fairy up, placed her in the blue apron's pocket, and then walked off with the others to join the battle.

Well, then, Satomi had an instant to think, that answered that question. It didn't seem by his stance that he was going to use iaijutsu, probably because that was a Rokugani method of conducting duels and he was a gaijin, but oh well, Satomi would. As Arminius started to move to lunge at her, Satomi didn't move out of his path. Instead, a hand whipped to the sheath of her katana -- muscle memory kicked in as Satomi fell into the stance of the iaijutsu lessons she had so specifically taken in order to prepare for revenge against Scorpions... though she'd expected the literal Scorpion Clan at the time. Quick as a flash, with Arminius still in the air, Satomi's sword whipped out of its sheath and through the air in an upwards arc, Satomi having the rather brutal aim to prevent Arminius' collision by stabbing him and hopefully carrying him over her body altogether using her sword. She was not trying to kill him --this wasn't a duel to the death, after all-- but she didn't mind giving him a good stab somewhere that wouldn't immediately kill him. Satomi uses Iaijutsu Strike with her katana, dealing 3d6+STR (3) damage First Strike!

”Ahaha, only if “stop for the time being” actually means “keep actively fighting and destroying our things”. The only thing that was stopped was your only useful contribution to this battle. A new ally? He was our foe, an oni employed for the sole purpose of destroying — and was fighting to his last misbegotten breath like the others.” She leaned forward and attempted a mirthless smile, but it was warped into a grimace by her own surging anger and disdain. ””Half-assed shit”. It’s like the words of the Crane, or perhaps what they mean. I was born to war, as was everyone else in my family, my clan. War is the reason the Crab Clan exists. War against twisted, inhuman foes given horrific abilities by a realm of pure evil, foes invincible but for jade powder, goblins who make suicide charges with flame that sticks to your body and burns you with no respite, worms that burrow into your flesh and will consume your heart unless you slice them out of your veins, massive slavering monsters larger than those ogres, beings whose very presence gives an affliction that cannot ever be removed and which will doom you to a life of seclusion and agony at best. And they cannot be beaten, only held back through the blood and struggle of samurai and ashigaru, of a clan that has done this for centuries and has BECOME war. And this is besides the wars with any of many foes which have convulsed our entire empire over and over. You are probably like those Samurai of the other clans, who are used to fielding an army against each other for a week until the Imperial court steps in and they can stab each other in the back there instead. Except, no, even the Crane were involved in the War of the Spirits, you aren’t even on their level. You are below them, and have no conception of war.” She leaned in further, with a wild look in her eyes, challenging him. ”And you’ve not got the duel training of the Crane either, I am sure. And I am no Crane, but I am trained in Iaijutsu. So the question is: who is going to beat this attitude out of me?” Her posture grew more tense, more challenging. ”Is it you, Arminius? Do you have the slight little amount of courage and honor in you that is needed to back up your threats? Will you try it in the night like a backstabbing, lying Scorpion? Or do you think I will be intimidated by the empty words of a coward?”

After the fight, Satomi just put her hand to her mouth, breathing irregularly — eyes darting between the fleeing goblins, the slain ogre, and patched area where one of her walls had fallen. Despite the battle being over, the rage and energy of combat was still pounding in her ears and flowing through her body, and it was all too much, even. She couldn’t calm down. Her wall was broken and should be repaired, but also there was the strange land that Leo had Tainted, and she was still furious, because there was so much to be furious at and it just wouldn’t leave her— And then Arminius went up and started talking to her about a conversation. Her response was immediate and her tone vicious and mocking. ”Oh, were you having a conversation with the massive creature that had just destroyed the walls and was in the middle of destroying our other defenses? Are you angry I didn’t stop fighting in the middle of the battle so you could get out the flower arrangements and the tea and have a nice little chat? Were you going to make friends with the wounded oni by just sitting down and having a polite talk as he crushed Azgrurk’s contraption and prepared to go through the gap in the wall? Was that your plan, hmm?”

Invigorated by the proletarian performance's passion, Lizaveta attacks Knight B again.

J5, attack Knight B!

"Ah-- um-- uh-- I didn't, no. Maybe because you're the only other Dragon Knight here, I guess." Ceridwen followed Johanna to the weaponsmith, and once Johanna turned around to move, Ceridwen's expression became a confused one, mouth slanted and eyebrow raised. Ceridwen wasn't really sure how to feel now. Johanna had definitely done a lot to try to reassure her, but she could definitely sense the distance there -- she was right, probably. And that was kind of sad, maybe. Johanna would definitely otherwise be the easiest person for her to talk to, just out of being the other Dragon Knight in the Allied Guard. Everyone else was from outside the Stronghold, and that made things a bit strange to the redheaded dragon rider. Hmmh. Maybe she needed to get over it... she wasn't sure who she'd talk to. Argos... no. Definitely not. She hadn't talked to any of the others much at all. Michi maybe? Michi had been pretty nice before. As Ceridwen got more and more lost in thought while following Johann, a large and scaly head was suddenly plopped upon hers -- Ynddi had matched her pace behind her. This drew a little squeak out of Ceridwen, and then a little smile, Ceridwen proceeding to stroke her dragon's head.

Lizaveta took a couple of deep breaths to calm her nerves (she really was charging into outright battle...!) and then she moved forwards, running up next to Kane and Ferdiad. "I will support you, my comrades! Let us seek justice together!" Then she opened a tome, dark magic gathering at her fingers, and...! K5, fire off a Worm at Mercenary A! (also, Kane will move to I4 and knife Merc C)

Ceridwen, being Ceridwen, didn't immediately take all of the reassurances to heart, but she couldn't exactly totally deny everything that Johanna was saying either. And it was nice to have Johanna dissipating some of her worries -- she'd feared that perhaps Johanna was furious with her, after that battle. She still didn't exactly feel great, though. The guilt over the people that had been hurt and killed was still going to pick at the back of her mind, Ceridwen could tell... especially because she'd never been in a battle like it, and seen allies die like that. That and she still had the execution looming over her head. She was responsible for those deaths in large part too. Argos screaming about it, that cleric girl who didn't seem like she even understood what was happening. Oh, and now she was remembering the sight of the dead villager again. Dammit. Dammit. She really couldn't keep herself under control today, and she was right in front of her commanding officer. True, she didn't put that much stock in rank, but... still. To Johanna's sight, this would mostly just manifest in Ceridwen lapsing into thought, her expression changing in increasingly distressed ways for a moment before sighing. "It's just... I don't really... sometimes I kind of see stuff like that and think I'm only here instead of another Dragon Knight because of..." Ceridwen sighed. "I don't know. Maybe you don't want to hear all of this. You're my commanding officer, after all."

Johanna's extremely simple question stunned Ceridwen for a moment (she'd been certain not only that Johanna thought of it as the result of her actions but that she was going to get a talking to because of it) but eventually she started speaking. "Oh... well... you know, the only reason you got hurt like that is because you had to follow after me when I charged in front of that last knight, especially because he just didn't care about me and went after you. And I... and... after you told me not to, too." ...and she kept speaking despite having answered the question, surprising even herself... "I just... I really wanted to protect the villagers. It's the thing I'm supposed to be doing, since it's the thing I can think of that I'm supposed to be able to do better than the others to be here in the first place, and," ...and speaking, her voice getting shaky... "I kept trying to protect people but they just kept going around me or ignoring me and some of us got hurt, and you got hurt, and-- and I tried to save those two villagers but I-- but it just didn't matter, and I really... I just... it's... it's the one thing I was trying to do, and they died anyway, I couldn't help anyone, not really, except maybe at the very end, and I just got people hurt and killed, I think and..." Ceridwen trailed off, stopping to breathe, having stopped walking, her expression suddenly turning to one of shock -- she hadn't intended to say most of that. But once she'd opened her mouth, it had all just come tumbling out.

It took a moment for Ceridwen to process what was going on, the Dragon Knight glancing up with the sorrow on her face purely replaced by surprise for a moment -- and then alarm, though at the least not full panic. "H-huh?! Ynddi, what are you doing??" Ceridwen rushed forward (noisily, with all the armor) to rein Yn Ddiddorol in, but Ynddi was already backing up and following behind the two, to Ceridwen's visible confusion, his gaze now occasionally flitting between Ceridwen and Johanna more passively, but plainly still observingly. (He'd observe what was going on himself and see if he could figure out what the source of trouble for his rider was.) "I-I'm sorry, I really don't know what he's doing right now. Uh, I don't think he'd hurt you, but-- well-- the things that he gets up to sometimes are really beyond even my understanding. Um. I'm sorry about that!" There was a pause as Ceridwen's various guilty feelings around Johanna caught up to her, and her expression withered again, Ceridwen once more downcast -- her hand moving to her stomach again, but then hurriedly being moved back behind her back the moment Ceridwen herself noticed. Ceridwen had been watching Johanna's gait whenever she'd glanced over, and she didn't want to, what... compete with that? That sounded strange to Ceridwen, but, anyway, since she was already talking to Johanna... "And, um... I'm... I'm sorry about your leg."

After the execution and the burial, Ceridwen (at the time barely keeping it together) had simply gone out into the grass, sat down, and then had curled up beside her dragon, managing to get sleep nearly instantly despite only taking off around half her armor for no reason other than how exhausted she was with both the wounds that she had received and the way she had exerted herself through the battle and burials. In the morning, Ceridwen looked... defeated, gaze downcast and posture loose and slightly hunched, hand sometimes hovering over her gut. None of her anxieties and guilts from the previous day had particularly dissipated, and though she at least had gotten more sleep than her commanding officer, her night had not precisely been restful itself, some of the previous day's exertion lagging in her muscles as well. Still, despite how drained she was, Ceridwen did have things to do, and she couldn't afford to fail to prepare to do her job later, lest she fail again. Accordingly, when Johanna turned off and began to head towards the weaponsmith, Ceridwen followed her, a distance to her side -- trying to avoid staring at her but nonetheless glancing back in her direction rather frequently. "..." Yn Ddiddorol was not a satisfied dragon. His demeanor and mannerisms did not speak at all of being defeated or downcast like his rider -- instead he was irritated, frustrated, tail occasionally flicking sharply or gaze locking onto some object in the distance. His human was very much upset, he could at least tell that much, but he had only the vaguest inkling of why. She seemed like she was guilty about something, but Yn Ddiddorol, intelligent as he was, was still a dragon, not a human, and wasn't quite capable of taking in and comprehending the entire situation. Besides, he had different priorities than his human. She paid a lot of attention to everyone around her, but to Yn Ddiddorol the only relationship he cared very much about was that that he had with his rider. Hmmm, that made Yn Ddiddorol think of something. The dragon could see Ceridwen glancing over at Johanna, her upset expression intensifying for a moment, and then looking away... and more than once, at that. Maybe it was the other dragon rider that was responsible for Ceridwen's state, somehow, and Yn Ddiddorol rotated around Ceridwen to be between the two, giving Johanna a look. This look was keen and scrutinizing, and Yn Ddiddorol's dragon face did not seem like a very pleased dragon face. "..."

Ceridwen struggled to keep her own composure here -- she had not meant to consign them to death. She'd just argued for imprisonment. But it seemed to her that she was the one who had put the final nails in their coffins anyway. "I..." Ceridwen blew out a breath and looked down for a couple of moments, searching for words, before she finally looked back up, eyes a bit watery. "I don't think I have the right to look away."

Ceridwen genuinely hadn't expected that. And she wasn't really sure how to handle it. "But--" She fell silent. Imprisoning them would be crueler, wouldn't it? "C-can we just--" But all of her own words still did hold true, didn't they? Even if that now seemed to be looming over her, in a sense. "...I think we should at least wait for Johanna to get back.

Upon hearing the squabbling between Chen and Rory, the talk about danger in the forest, and Yukaro's threat, the incensed fairy in Isobel's pocket put her palms to her face (wow, a facepalm, LOTUS had always wanted to try that) and came to a conclusion: "We're all going to die." Or, at least, that was the conclusion that LOTUS reached before a smirking Isobel promptly began petting her head again. "H-hey! Is this just what you're going to do every time?" Isobel (who had had to resist a coquettish smile when Yukari had made that flirt, seeing as she currently had someone else in mind), for a moment, had a shit-eating grin. "Ehe. Ehehe. Maybe." Her expression quickly grew serious, however, especially as the party walked into the forest and the graveyard became apparent. "LOTUS, I'm absolutely willing to do my best here, but now that we're getting into real danger, you really need to calm down. It has to be difficult, but you're here for a reason, because you're good at tactics, and now you need to take that role back up." The fairy exhaled with a sigh, and looked down. "...right. Okay." She looked up at Chen, short white hair bobbing with the movement. "Yukari said that all of our abilities have been converted into "danmaku"-- but it was never specified just what danmaku are, and I'm not familiar with it myself. What is danmaku, precisely?"

 “This wasn’t just some... random thing, Argos! It’s not like these four didn’t have anything to do with it! They were all here and they were arranged! These four were just standing by and guarding the general while he oversaw the whole thing! It’s not like they just happened to be here and he suddenly decided to send those knights off to attack, you heard them, this was something that they were all here to do, it was an operation to “secure” the village! They were even talking about his decision, like, a few minutes ago!”

Ceridwen stuck a lock of her hair in her mouth for a moment, chewing on it as she became visibly more distressed, but it dropped out of her mouth as she responded with... a lot of fire, this time. "They? They? They? Who the-- who the hell is they?! "Their justice", who are you talking about? Is it the Warrior's Village? Are you saying that the attack on them, those people, those people right over there," Ceridwen pointed an arm emphatically in the direction of the village, "is justified because these guys were put in jail once? Look, I-- I never left Goya and the Stronghold much, so I don't know a whole ton about Caliss, but it seems pretty unlikely to me that the people in that village were the ones to put them in jail. Some of those people looked my age, Argos! So why is it fine that they get attacked, or that their heads are had? Why is that okay?!" Ceridwen let out a long breath. "I, I don't like yelling, but-- but I don't understand how those villagers couldn't matter to you! It's like they're a footnote! Is it that you never really saw the fight with the village, or saw those villagers die? Because I-- I did, and I'm not going to just forget it! Maybe it wasn't right that they were in prison in the first place, or maybe it was, I, I really couldn't say, but that doesn't mean that the people this attack killed just didn't exist, it doesn't make it right all of a sudden that their deaths happened. They're not just some... faceless mass, I saw! They're just not in front of you right now because they're dead, or tending to their wounded!" Ceridwen popped the lock of her hair back into her mouth and shook her head a couple of times, trying to calm down, with only partial success. "Maybe there's some other prison that isn't Soniere, I don't know, Caliss is big, there probably isn't just one prison in it! But you can't just act like it's fine and dandy that those villagers died defending themselves just because they live in Caliss, Argos! That's what I care about!"