[IC] TTG Chapter 4: Greed

[Shamitako]

Audience Phase (OOC: I'm alloting precisely one week for this, we shouldn't need more than two or three posts to get through it. Also yes I'm dumping the weird mechanics here too, just RP normally)

 

Splendorous. That was the only way to describe it. Queen's large throne room was painted gold with red tiled floors and purple tapestries hung about. Each wall had a pair of glass windows in them, although the light from outside was lessened by the rain which fell outside. To make up for this, a  large chandelier hung in the center of the room, lighting it with two or three dozen wax candles, causing the light to flicker and glint against the golden walls. Queen's throne was primarily made of wrought iron inlaid with gold and had comfortable looking cushions made of purple fabric. Queen himself was a rather short young boy with dark skin and curly hair. He was dressed in a purple robe and wore a gold circlet on his head, clearly he was playing up the royalty bit. Yet even with such a display, it managed to avoid feeling overblown.

 

Black Idol seemed rather happy as she stepped forward to begin the introductions. "My lord," she said, "allow me to introduce the competitors of the grand tournament."

"My thanks," Queen said, "Welcome contestants, it's a pleasure to have you. I'm told that the Revenant and Libra won't be able to attend, which is unfortunate." He clapped his hands three times and a group of men and women dressed in white robes ran out. They carried silver trays with glasses of wine and small loaves of bread on them. "Introductions are in order, of course, but there's a long standing tradition in the Plane of Greed to have a toast when meeting a great warrior." He grabbed the glass presented to him and stood, holding it aloft. "To each of you individually and all of us together." He said. He took a sip of the wine and tore off a chunk of the bread with his teeth. He then sat back down and waited for the contestants to come forward and introduce themselves.

 

Sully

 

While everyone else was enjoying a little wine in a fancy room, Sully was in the dining hall on the train meeting Lord. When he arrived, she showed him a small, glowing orange rock. "This is called a starstone." she explained, "I'm going to activate it, it will then flash brightly and emit a signal that will call Arcturus." She closed her hand around the stone and held it at arm's length for about ten seconds before dropping it. There was a bright flash of light just before it hit the ground.

 

Ỳ̵̷͜ớ̡͞͝u̶͠ ̵̧͢a̷̛̕r̸̀͟͟è̡̛͝͠ ̸̨͢w̴͜r҉҉̀͠ò̸̷̵͢ņ̸͡͝g͏́͡͡.͘͘ ̧͝͞Ś̸̨̧͘h̸̀͢͞e̶ ̶̶͡ņ́͞e̵͠͏̴̛ȩ͘ḑ̸͠ś̴̨ ̵̛̕͢h̸̨̀͘é́l̴̸͝p͜͜͝.̢̛͞

 

A moment later, Sully and Lord stood just as they had before the flash. Nothing seemed to have happened, but something was off. Lord quickly checked her HUD. "It worked." she said, "Twenty minutes have passed. Did it work?" Yet that wasn't it, something else was wrong. Sully realized what it was shortly. Asmodeus wasn't there, no matter how Sully tried, he couldn't get the AI to respond.

[Chevaleresse]

Hiroki, somewhat eager to be done with her introduction, shuffled forward in her disguise. The display was impressive, but not really unexpected - it didn't make much of an impact, save for a brief comparison to the welcome they'd received on Sloth. As usual, the artificial voice she spoke in was harsh and grating, though this time it wasn't quite as low-pitched; she'd fiddled with the settings on it, as she was wont to do letting a bit more of her natural tone bleed through. "I am the Hellfire Knight." A pause. "It is good to be home."

[IntSys]

Tai

Libra? She can't make it after all. At least, my flames were true. 

The throne room was filled with contrasting gold and purple, irking him a slight bit. He wasn't exactly familiar with the tastes of the royalties. As for formalities, he decided to imitate Queen.

He stepped forward and made himself heard. "I am Supernova," he reached for a glass of wine and rose it aloft, returning the favor, "to the generous God of the plane that granted us the opportunity to fight in His land." He took a sip from the glass and took a bite off a loaf of bread, then promptly returned to his original position.

[Komodojoe]

Morgan

 

Ah, the plane of Greed. Now this was a plane to be in. It's considered the strongest plane and is one of the safest places around. Not to mention that a couple of Morgan's siblings live here, so this place is pretty much like a second home to her.

 

The room was... elegant, to say the least. The red-tiled floor, the golden walls, the purple tapestries, and that big chandelier with the addition of it's wax candles. Yep, this was a perfect storybook throne room if she'd ever seen one. And to top it all off, sitting at the throne was a boy named Queen, not that the girl was judging. She can't really speak for me, though.

 

Morgan stepped forward and made a formal bow toward Queen. She might as well just introduce herself now and get this over with. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Queen. I-I'm Strider." There was a slight pause as she stood back up. "Th-thank you for having us... and also for the refreshments." She walked back to where she was standing before and took the wine and bread that were presented to her. Morgan was hesitant to drink the wine since she never really drinks any sort of alcohol, even when she's in this plane. She eventually took a sip, though. It... actually wasn't all that bad. The girl squinted her eyes a bit from the alcohol, but she can handle it. Satisfied with what she's got, she took a bite from her bread and enjoyed herself.

Edited July 27, 2017 by Komodojoe

[Shamitako]

Adam

 

Adam knew Queen pretty well, the God of Greed often paid Lord visits. He didn't have much against the boy, but he also didn't really like him. He had some of the wine and bread then stepped up to give his greeting. "Greetings Lord Queen." He said, "Lord said to tell you she's bringing brownies." He left it at that and returned to his place in the line.

[Sutoratosu]

Sully

"Asmo... ASMO! Da fuck man, answer me!" It was no use though, and he'd known it before he'd even tried. No matter where he probed, how far he scanned, the AI's presence was nowhere to be found. It was as if... he'd disconnect from him entirely. But why- he'd only included that Emergency Evac. option in the first place so that encase somehow he ended up biting the dust one day, the one thing he'd invested the most time and energy into over the years could live on... and it only could've activated if somehow his vitals had gone flat or there was a massive disruption of brain activity suggesting...wait. disruption of brain activity... the fucking memory wipe...maybe it was a bit of a stretch but... maybe it had triggered the disconnect accidentally. Maybe whatever the fuck this 'Arcturus' dude had tried to do to him, it was bad enough to make Asmo's base parameters think it was a case of either disconnect or go down with the ship.

 

There was one thing however... a certain file, encrypted, hidden, likely left behind by the AI just before he bounced... Solomon could already guess what it contained.

      "Fuck..." The mechanic finally sighed. An Impulse later and his HUD dismissed its overlay of his vision, leaving nothing but physical reality in it's place. "Asmodious ain't responding, not even picking up his signature anywhere on the network...but he left a file before whatever happened. It's probably got the Meeting on there."

[Code: PIRULUK]

Kagari, somewhat listlessly, stepped forward.

 

"Hi... I'm the LOLI_HUNTER. Yes, with the underscore. Nice to meet you..."

 

Following that, she stepped back in line, visibly depressed.

[Shamitako]

Lord

"A file?" Lord asked, "What does it say? Do you know where Arcturus went or why he won't challenge Nil?"

[Bfroger6]

Mommo

 

Mommo was on her toes this time around. She spruced her knees up and down as she marched in place, looking totally different from her usual sleepy aloof self. After that talk with Aries, she felt different...she could hardly wait for her next match to come, and it reflected in her behaviour, because she remembered the promise he'd made her that they were going to finally meet in person after it.

 

"I'm the Slumbering Giant, Mommo Mikuri." Her words were faster than the pace her mind usually processed them. She had no time to think, she needed this to be done with so she could fight! She thought this as she held her pillow to her chest, hands clenched in fists.

 

To an unassuming spectator she would probably look like she needed to go to bathroom or something.

[Sutoratosu]

Sully 

 

He was silent for a minute. He tried to play the file once... no dice. Again... same result. Third time, and finally, he gave up getting the damn thing to work and took a look at the encryption itself...

    "This..." he muttered "the lock he's put on this thing... these ain't the encryption patterns I coded him to use. Shit..."

     the notion was both a blessing, and a curse at the same time. On the one hand- it meant the AI was finally beginning to break out of the many, many extensive programmed parameters he'd set up for him, if he'd been able to go out of his way at some point to invent a sequence not even Sully recognized at a glance, and had judged that now was the time to use said sequence in order to keep the file safe. On the other hand, it also meant he himself was fucking locked out of the file until he could sit down and get to work picking it apart... which could honestly take hours. 

 

"I don't know what to tell ya, but I'm gonna need some time to break this thing open..." he finally told Lord "Whatever the hell happened though, it had to have spooked Asmo pretty bad to take measures like these. And Asmo wasn't designed to spook easy, if at all. Just what the hell is this Arcturus guy, anyway?"

[Shamitako]

Lord

 

Lord was visibly frustrated by the setback. She was relieved that there seemed to be progress being made, but even her extended patience was wearing thin in this stressful situation. She decided it would be best to go ahead and tell Sully everything, if only to get it off her own chest. "Well, he's..." Lord started to explain before Blink popped into the room.

"Hey, we're on." Blink said before immediately leaving again.

"It seems time is up for now." Lord told Sully, "We'll talk after your fight. Also, so tht you're not the only one in the dark, there's going to be a sort of exhibition match while we're here in Greed. You'll get the details after your match today."

She ushered him out with a promise to explain everything when they met next.

 

Queen

 

Once everyone had introduced themselves, Queen signaled a couple of the aides. One ran out of the room, the other over to Black Idol and whispered something to her. "Wait now?" the performer said in loud surprise. She quickly regained her composure and turned to the contestants. "It's time for your battles shortly," she said, "but first I'm told that we'll be holding the exhibition matches here in Greed. You'll be given details once you've finished today."

"Godspeed to all of you." Queen said, standing himself and bowing formally.

The contestants were subsequently led to the arena to prepare for their battles.

 

COMBAT PHASE

This combat phase will be allotted six weeks, ending on the September the tenth. Aim to finish early if possible

 

Adam - Silent requiem vs. LOLI_HUNTER

 

Adam rolled into the cavern where he was to fight the HUNTER. It was rather well lit for a cave, although the light was still rather dim. It was brightest around the  two large viewing windows that were set perpendicular to the contestant's entryways. Through those windows Adam saw the largest crowd he'd fought in front of yet. He didn't really have a plan for taking on HUNTER. Considering he'd only just barely taken down Revenant, he was actually going into this expecting to lose. The fact that the field was so hard to maneuver around didn't help either. Still, he wasn't giving up just yet, there was always a small chance he could replicate the miracle from the last fight.

[IntSys]

Tai - Supernova vs. Hellfire Knight

 

Tai stepped into the cave. The Hellfire Knight stood across him, armed with an intimidating orange cannon as well as an array of guns. The rough terrain could serve as covers as he approached the gun-toting titan. Though, the lack of airspace might hurt somewhat in his evasive maneuvers.

The knight's impressive defense was certainly a sight for him. Of course, to him, it was merely another wall to collapse before his assault. He designed his mech to destroy armor, after all.

 

"... Good luck, Hellfire Knight." He announced calmly, clenching his fists. "There will be no more interruptions." His jets roared as if in agreement, echoing throughout the cavern.

[Chevaleresse]

Hellfire Knight vs Supernova

 

"I don't need luck." Hiroki blustered into her comms through the voice changer, which fortunately for her did a good job of hiding her apprehension. Not about her odds of victory - with a name like Supernova, he had to rely on fire-based attacks, and it was doubtful he could heat her up faster than her mech could melt his. Lightly armored and highly maneuverable - she'd crushed this sort of build underfoot many times on her way here (sometimes literally.) But. . . she had to try and kill him. Could she do it? 

 

She simply stood where she was, lifting into her customary hover, and set a fire subroutine that ensured she wasn't going to be wasting power on shooting the terrain. An instant of the high-pitched whine of her reactor presaged her cannons flaring to life, sending a barrage into every approach to her mech.

[IntSys]

Supernova vs Hellfire Knight

 

Tai quickly rolled to the right, before going full-throttle. The boulders in his way were not able to impede his movement, as he jumped across some and punched through some more, as if they were mere papier-mâché. His erratic pattern of navigation and his incredible acceleration allowed him to evade the barrage.

Ready.

 

After a bit of time, he bounced up and sent an uppercut into the ceiling, causing large amount of debris to crash down around him. He then dug into the ceiling with his fists, and quite efficiently;he had disappeared from his opponent's line of sight before the debris settled down. Should the Hellfire Knight pay attention, they would notice a glimpse of fire as the debris surrounded the mech.

[Sutoratosu]

Revenant vs Giant

 

The black mech stood at the ready on the killing field, visor burning with crimson light. Even as he ran the diagnostics in the back of his mind, he could feel that old presence stirring, that dragon, that demon, his awakening within the prison that was the darkest depths of the mechanics mind like a unholy flight of flame and shadow, the vast and quaking roar of a beast long since starved for blood. Solomon sighed, putting pressure against the mental bindings, if only to remind the beast of it's place.

       "Asmo still ain't back, sully boy...." no matter many times he heard it, there had always been something... tempting about the voice. Something deceptive. Something to be resisted. Without Asmodius' presence in his mind, it only now struck him just how so. "Just like the old days... when it was just you and me, before all this stuff about Tesla or that windbag... but, I forgive ya, sully. You can lock me up, seal me like some genie in a bottle, ignore and suppress me until you need me to sic something... but see, thats the thing. Unlike that little servant you conjured up to try and replace me-"

      "Restrain you." the Mechanic muttered gruffly. He seemed to be doing it alot lately, in all honesty he thought more and more he was picking up the habit from the old man... "Asmo was supposed to be the counter-balance, the thing that helped me keep you in check, shut you up... he only began to replace you because you wouldn't let go, wouldn't get with the program afterwards. You only got yourself to blame for that."

       "Pity" the beast responded, "to think what David would think now, if he knew his son was so damn dysfunctional with his own Doppelganger, so afraid to embrace the family technique... but see, that's the thing sully. Even despite all our ups and downs, here I am for you, still... waiting... can you say the same for your manservant now? You two were supposed to be working together, getting to the bottom of Arcturus, and he upped and left you without a word. What are you going to do now, Sully?"

 

The mechanic stayed his tongue for once. It was a good question, but honestly, one he had already known the answer to. As much as he didn't like it... no, as much as he hated it... it might've been time to finally do it... he'd been losing this thing so far, aside from the debut match, and like Asmo had said, if just one little thing had gone differently... 

 

If he stopped holding back, stopped the constant push to make things interesting... stopped putting himself at such a constant handicap... perhaps it was time. Time to stop neglecting what his father had taught him. Time to give what had ended so terribly so long ago, another try. He was a man now, afterall, not some child... the beast would not overtake him, not now... not ever again... He only wondered what Sasha might think, when she saw it.

 

Well... that's a worry for another time. This thing infront of him, it was easily the biggest and beefiest FAD he'd ever encountered. The raw ferocity he could offer, the savage resolve bordering on foolhardiness... 

     "If I set you loose, will you shut up about Tesla and Asmo?"

     "You set me loose, and I'll be too damn busy tearing this thing apart to even remember those two."

 

 

        

[Komodojoe]

Morgan - Strider vs. Libra

 

Morgan walked into the cavern that posed as the battlefield for today's match. While looking around the rocky, enclosed terrain, she had to wonder if this cave was natural or created specifically for mech combat. It looked natural enough aside from the viewing windows for the crowd. Speaking of... Nah. She's sure they're watching, either here or at home... or even at work if they can get away with it.

 

Now onto her opponent, Libra. As far as Miss Belle knows, Libra is an MAD mech, as in Melee, Armor, and Defense... not what the acronym spells. She's dealt with a few of these, but there is one thing about this one that's throwing her off: it has actual freaking wheels. That's not common, especially on a non-speed mech, as far as she knows. Maybe it just starts slow? Who knows, but there's a way to find out.

 

"Okay, final systems check..." Morgan said. The display for Strider's diagnostics popped up in response. Her guns, jets, the EAS, and her newly redone gauntlets, everything was all set and in the green. Good. Considering what she's up against, she's gonna need everything she's got. Everything on her side is all done. Now all that's left to do is to wait on her opponent and they can get started.

Edited August 3, 2017 by Komodojoe

[Chevaleresse]

HK vs Supernova

 

Tunneling? That was an. . . interesting strategy. And one that wouldn't work on her for long. She toggled the semi-automated barrage off, and instead channeled power into her big guns, aiming them up toward the ceiling where Supernova was attempting to disappear. A triad of beams lanced out from her cannons, burning into the rock and just ahead of where she'd seen her opponent start digging. She doubted that the lightly-armored mech could cope with her sheer output, regardless of how heatproof it was. 

[Shamitako]

Libra

 

"Hello!" Temperance called over comms as she rolled into the cave. She sounded quite excited already, perhaps the size of the crowd was influencing her. "Let's have lots of fun!" She said. She didn't make a move to attack, but she did start rolling towards Strider, shifting around and smashing through the jutting rocks around her.

[IntSys]

Supernova vs HK

 

Tai noticed his opponent's lasers' approaching with the sound of their collision with the ceiling. He had hoped that his opponent would continue using the same explosive bursts. However, the lasers' combined power would give him significantly less reaction time as he got closer through the ceiling. Not planning on guessing the exact point his opponent was aiming at nor continuing on dealing with the ever-threatening lasers, he switched to plan B.
 

In assumption of his opponent having not moved during his short absence from the ground level, he warped out of the small tunnel, avoiding the laser's impact, and reappeared above the knight.

One shot, one shot to beat you back into the defensive!

He crashed right down upon the gun-toting knight and slammed their main cannon.

[Speed 6 point bonus: Teleport once per fight - Used]

 

Edited August 4, 2017 by IntSys

[Chevaleresse]

Hellfire Knight vs Supernova

 

The sudden warp took Hiroki by surprise; she hadn't expected her foe to use such a maneuver so early. Most mechs couldn't pull that off more than once in a fight, if they could do so at all, so she'd been expecting that sort of thing to see use later in the round. The impact sent the Knight moving downward, and her feet spinning up toward the ceiling. Rather than trying to push out of the spin, however, she fired her jets and turned it into a twisting motion, aiming to bring the mech's clawed hand around to grip her foe. As she did so, she activated her special ability with a shout. "HELLFIRE MANTLE!" Supernova was close enough to get a quadruple burst of sound - the sound of Hiroki's artificial voice a split second delayed after the sound of her own natural one, and the faintest delay after those, both of them coming over the radio. 

[IntSys]

Supernova vs Hellfire Knight

 

[Melee 6 point bonus: Disengage once per fight - Used]

Hellfire Knight's claws caught Tai's mech tightly, setting it up for a thorough grill in hot plasma. His mech radiated light, as every piston in his mech as well as the engines pushed themselves to break free from the body lock, pushing the claws aside with immense force. As Hellfire Knight declared the activation of the Hellfire Mantle, Tai used the opportunity to escape from their melee range and pulled a safe distance between him and Hellfire Knight

"Heh, you play with flames as well?"

Standing at the edge of the heat, he could feel that the so-called Hellfire Mantle could easily roast him should he let himself get captured. "I'm amazed! You really went up to eleven with the heat." Too bad, I was only able to get one hit in. Not quite enough for the finisher.
 

He couldn't quite muscle his way into the field of plasma without getting heavily damage, so he decided to wait out the incredible heat, paying close attention to Hellfire Knight's next move.

[Bfroger6]

Mommo - Slumbering Giant v Revenant

 

Mommo readied herself in the belly of the Giant, holding the pendant in a hand, pressed against her chest. He could think of only Aries who was waiting for her after this. She wanted to win for him, so she wouldn't need to feel bad when finally stepping in front of him, and that was a motivator enough for the girl at the moment. She saw the Rvenenant, they were going to be a dangerous opponent, but she felt she could do it so long as she kept her head focused, focused in her sleepiness.

 

Like so many times before, she could do it. She could win.

 

And so she silently began the battle. They were inside of what appeared to be a cave, with obstructing formations everywhere. As much as they disrupted her aiming, she was confident enough to shoot properly, and they were more going to disrupt her opponent if they opted for quick melee combat.

 

---

Raising one of the mech's hands up, Mommo only took less than a moment to charge up an energe blast and shoot it in Revenant's direction, ignoring the stalagmites. The blast would burst right through them like a large bullet, and as soon as Revenant would move to avoid it in any direction, Mommo would fire an array of her rockets at him, enough that they wouldn't be stopped by any obstacles. Destroying the rock formation would also cause a veil od dust to settle like a screen over the area, allowing Mommo to take further necessary measures for keeping Revenant at bay, unbeknownst to him.

[Sutoratosu]

Revenant vs Giant

"so sully... whats it gonna be?"

"...fine. Do it. I'll take care of everything else."

"Glad to hear it... partner."

 

The mech bucked with sudden motion as the beast settled into control, launching itself sideways and slipping past the stalactites as its glow faded into the shadows of the cavern, deactivated by the pilot. And as the blast collided into the earth and rock where they had once been, a subtle whirring was masked by the far louder cacophony of ruined stone... A whirring that soon split into several, smaller noises, each echoing off the rock face and various obstacles of the arena. When the Giant unleashed it's rockets, a matrix of lightning fanned out from the around the cave as they flew, striking the payload and detonating the barrage of explosives prematurely. 

 

And as the dust cloud emerged from the wanton destruction the FAD had unleashed, there was still no sign of The Revenant. The whirring echo continued from all around however...

 

**"I don't need to seeee yooou~"** the message came with a sudden, chaotic burst of static over the comms, the voice cackling to itself after the declaration with a nigh religious fervor, causing even more chaotic static before total radio silence took hold once again. Already though, sully was having a bad feeling about all this. Even as he tracked the electrical signature and other readouts, something Asmo usually did- and something the sheer amount of Electro-Magnetic interference his own mech created prevented most opponents from doing the same -he couldn't help but wonder just how long it would take the AI to get back to him, how long he'd have to let the beast have its day on the field. 

 

 

 

[Chevaleresse]

Hellfire Knight vs Supernova

 

"Playing with fire?" She made a grasping motion with her arm once again, and brought her main cannon to bear toward where she believed Supernova to be. "Maybe you play with fire. . ." She made a sudden, violent motion as if she were throwing something at Supernova. Her Mantle transformed itself into a horizontal wave of plasma, spreading out in a rough cone formation toward her foe. "But that's why you're going to lose!" The Knight's guns all flared up at once, creating an absolutely undodgeable wave of plasma. "Because I don't play games!"

[IntSys]

Supernova vs Hellfire Knight

 

!!!

Tai immediately took cover behind a big boulder, bracing the impact with his fists before his face.

The wave of plasma consumed his cover and his mech, as well as everything around them...
 

A blazing path was left by the wave of plasma, with a charred mech and its kindles surrounding him. "Good grief," the immense heat almost overloaded his mech. A steady exhaustion of heat allowed him to escape total shutdown, but it was only a short term one. He needed a way out, and fast, all while piloting a mech at its limits.

His mech's engines roared once more, "No games? Why are you here, then? Allow me to show you the exit!" He leaped forward, blazing right into Hellfire Knight with a right hook, aiming at their right wing.