2175/Radio Mission: Retrieve the Scepter of Mot

Radio Mission: Retrieve the Scepter of Mot
Date of Scene:	06 May 2015
Location:	Paragon City <CoH>
Synopsis:	The organization called MAGI has requested a dangerous magic item be retrieved from a cult of magic users known as the Circle of Thorns. Will the heroes succeed?
Cast of Characters:	Maya, Reiji Arisu, Duke, 721, 750, 761, 768, 769

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Demetrios Vasilikos (769) has posed:
    MAGI is the Modern Arcane Guild of Investigation, a division of the Paragon City government that researches and investigates issues of a magical nature. It is one of five organizations that can serve to provide contacts, missions, information, direction, and equipment for new heroes. They have also put out a request for the police and heroes to be on the look-out for a magical artifact known as the Scepter of Mot.

    MAGI has had a lot of bad luck keeping mystic items out of evil hands. It's not hard for good-hearted heroes to figure out it might be a good idea to help them on this one. Especially considering who Mot is.

    A Carthaginian god of death and sterility. Does anyone REALLY want ANY bunch of bad guys getting ahold of ANYTHING belonging to a deity like that?

    Upon asking around, following leads, or using any sensory abilities available to those responding, they are likely to find their way to a section of Paragon City called Perez Park. Almost a national park in its scope, it was once a peaceful place. Now it is overrun by gangs and, in some cases, monsters. It lies right inbetween Galaxy City and Atlas Park, and anyone who has obtained their Paragon City I.D. should have no trouble going inside thanks to having the proper Security Level. Anyone else might get questioned and need other heroes to vouch for them before they're allowed to make their way through the military-level check point that lies in front of each gate that could lead one into the park.

    Glowing blue force fields known as War Walls keep anyone from just bypassing these barriers.

    The park itself lies within high stone walls that mark the perimeter between the streets and abandoned buildings that form the outer areas of this city zone, and the labyrinth of trees and trails that compose the greater portion of it.

    A group called the Circle of Thorns is suspected of having the Scepter. If informants are to be believed, they are lurking in yet another cave, somewhere in the park itself.

Duke has posed:
The Armored Knight Digimon finds himself in the city of Paragon when he hears a message go out. This place may be a good location to test himself and see how well he /can/ keep his focus when placed under a great deal of stress--- or so he hopes.

The Knight stands around seven foot six and is mostly chrome in color. He has some gold and red trimmings. His gold eyes sit in a shadow of darkness within the helm and a red cape flows gracefully behind him as he walks. There is also a bit of black under the armor like 'clothing' being worn by the Digimon or a type of under armor. Including his own metal hands being black in coloration.

Once he explains why he is here and gets a voucher to get in, Duke goes to quickly make his way for the location of the source of trouble. While he can move at a quick clip, he is no speedster. He can't fly, but one can assume that armor of his makes up for that. Perhaps he is a skirmisher--- a tank skirmisher would be anyone's best guess.

Though once he does arrive at the location, he comes to as slow walk and his gold eyes gaze over the area. Looking around the trees, the trail, all the details he can about this place. His claw metal hand flexing a little as data bits sparkle around his finger tips as he debates on summoning his weapon or not. After all, there had to be others coming too right?

He'll wait before going further in to see who else may arrive for this mission....

Glitter (721) has posed:
Glitter is a superhero from Freedom City, a place that - at least in some ways - bears some resemblance to Paragon. No big walls, granted, but lots of superheroes, lots of supervillains, and lots of trouble.

It was the most natural thing in the world for her to get herself a Paragon City identification card, as Glitter. It probably surprised nobody who knew her, and she /is/ supposed to be Freedom City's somewhat unofficial representative... plus, lending a hand is a given. Glitter doesn't like to sit around when there's something she could be doing to help out. She's dealt with villainous mages enough that she knows letting them have artifacts is probably a bad plan.

Glitter shows her identification card at the entrance to the park. It is unclear where she keeps it, because her costume doesn't have any visible pockets (spoiler alert: there is a small one on the inside her lapel that is just big enough to keep a couple cards in). Once inside, she steps up into the air, hovering about ten feet above the ground. There is a faint sparkle once in a while - Glitter doesn't fly so much as hold herself up constantly with telekinesis.

"Huh," she says. That is one /thick/ park.

Cory (768) has posed:
    As far as Cory's concerned, the troubles in Paragon City are a good way to gain experience and vent some bloodlust for causes she won't feel guilty about later, so she's definitely gone through the hassle of getting an ID and kept an ear open for more trouble.

    She's hoping some of the crooks and thugs around put up more of a fight than the last bunch though.

    For now though, Cory's keeping her power suppressed and relaxed despite just strolling through the checkpoint after showing her ID. Instead of simply rushing around she spends a few moments examining the others showing up.

    And of course... Duke gets boggled at, she ends up tilting her head funny at Glitter, and Maya probably won't get more than just a nod.

    Reason being, she's pretty sure a cordoned off zone like this won't have many people within so she closes her eyes and focuses, Ki senses sweeping around like an invisible radar dish.

    Perhaps it will point her in a direction to start with! ... Perhaps it won't.

    "Okay then. Let's see what these guys are made of."

Maya has posed:
Maya has been welcomed to Paragon pretty well, she'd got the ID card and even gone to the class on the basic law enforcement bits she's need to know for operating on this world. Paragon sas a stark contract to Skitters and Defiant's world. This earth's managed to keep it's crouption in check far better than on that other world. She mused she might have to drag Defiant here by the ear at some point. However her focus was on task at hand. the COT, there was a rise of anger about them. They would get little mercy from Maya, she had had to deal with vile magic before but this left her quite put off. However she has a slight problem.

The Freaking trees of this pack are infamous with heroes who can fly, it's nearlu impossible to get through. She's also registeed under the alais of the Blue Witch, which had been an nickname she'd earned some time ago on another world which stuck. Either way she didn't take flight given how things would work. She looked to Glitter nodding approvingly. Her costume lacked a cape, and all the trouble tht could entail. Duke also gets a look over but she's never met him before.

"Do watch your self Cory we're delaing with a magic using cult. There's no telling what sorts of horrors they are tapping. Sometimes fists isn't the best way to deal with something."

Clicky (761) has posed:
One might not expect Clicky to be interested in such things, but hey, he has an ID and an insatiable curiosity. Where he goes, baubles disappear and wonders (or at least cool gadgets) are left behind.

Thus it is that a dumpster clack and rattles, and Clicky' head pops out of it with a banana peel on his stovepipe snout. He snuffles and hoots for a moment. "Hello there! Greetings! Salutations and welcome!" He pauses, camera-lens eyes crossing to look at the banana peel on his snout. "Oooh, fibrous!" There is a NOMF, and the peel is flipped up and snapped by the bottlecap-lined mouth, disappearing with no thought as to the actual condition of the organic product. "Delightful!" Clicky exclaims as he putters and clicks, sliding quickly out of the dumpster and approaching the rest of the group. "Hello, assemblage of personages! Is there to be some friendship and adventure? I have heard talk of nasty cult-people who are up to no good! I would like to accompany you!"

Rebound (750) has posed:
    It was a simple matter to get her ID card out and get into PereZ Park. It was the inside of Perez Park that surprised her, "Man this is like Cental Park except they let a bunch of gang bangers take over." She mutters a bit as she hops in, stopping to hunt skuls for a minute before she finds the rest of the group.

    "Oooh look at me, I'm scary!" She says, as she approaches the group with a skull patterend hockey mask held up in front of her face, "I'm gonna keep this. It's neat. So what's the plan, guys?"

Duke has posed:
Duke notices as the others show up, including a few looks, which causes the Knight to only stand taller slightly perhaps in a subconscious thought really at being stared at. His gaze goes over each of them, including at the Saiyan, which he studies her figure for a moment, before he gold eyes watch as the strange-- dragon-- comes out of the trashcan.

He can only simulate the idea of raising a brow at this, only to be mild amused by the acts of Clicky given he reminds him of perhaps some species of Digimon or maybe something else entirely. "I think that is why most of us are here, yes." The Knight Digimon address the tin dragon, before he looks over to Rebound who comes in.

Like others, she gets a swift glance over and a mild chuckle to her own antics. "Yes. Frightening." He says with a vocal smirk, given that face plate hides any real facial expression beyond his own eyes. "As for a plan, I'm unsure. I think we all just got here and I don't even know this place." This is where Duke places up his hands slightly. "So I am not leading anyone."

Then as his hands lower, he places the clawed hand against his metal breast plate before he bows gently, with his head lowering to all. "My name is also Duke, it is an honor and pleasure to meet you all."

Glitter (721) has posed:
Glitter looks like she could be a local, at least. She's not, of course, but she /looks/ like she might be, and that's the important part. Her hair is long enough that it probably has all the hazards of capes, though - except it rarely seems to go where Glitter doesn't want it to.

Telekinesis again. It's really good for cheating.

More people are showing up. Glitter can identify some of them as probably-heroes but some of them she doesn't recognize or identify at all. People like Duke... and, probably more to the point, Clicky, who is something she has never experienced before.

"Uh," she says, before smiling. "Hi? I don't see why not. I'm looking for them too; I'm Glitter." She touches back down because talking when you are ten feet up from anyone else gets real awkward real fast. On foot she's actually kind of short.

She gives Duke a slightly thankful nod. "I don't know much about the park either, but I do know that we'll probably have to look around some. I don't think they'd just wak around with it on the street!" She pauses. "Probably. I mean ... almost certainly not. Unless it was really well disguised."

Maya has posed:
Maya looks and mutters.

"The Skulls, idiots who dabble but are still smarter than the Hellions."

It's not saying much but the Skulls don't summon succubi who end up eating them later. She looks to Glitter Duke and eveyrone else.

"Maya but I'm listed as Blue Witch here."

Likely due to the hair and she's likely a magic user from the sounds of it.

Reiji Arisu has posed:
    Paragon City, the so-called City of Heroes, shines like a jewel off the coast of Rhode Island. Even in the wake of the Rikti War, Paragon is a beacon of progress, rebuilding bit-by-bit those areas lost in the conflict. Its protectors fight day and night to keep the city safe, but they're taking all the help they can get.

Enter exorcist, special forces agent and onmyoji, Reiji Arisu.

    The Shinra Organization's interest in expanding its networks of contacts has seen them take quite an interest in Paragon. Reiji comes not just because he's got fresh orders, but also because- as he understands it- there are people in Paragon in dire need of help. Of course, the problem then is that he's a special forces agent trying to get a Superhero Identification Card. One would think that covert agents would be scrutinized particularly harshly, but the process was actually relatively simple.

Besides, it's not like he'll need an ID anywhere outside of Paragon if he doesn't want to bring it along.

    It doesn't take long for Reiji to catch wind of the theft of a particularly hazardous divine artifact. 'The Scepter of Mot.' It's not a name he's precisely familiar with, but it sounds bad enough, especially considering it may have found its way into an overgrown, abandoned park at the near-center of Paragon City.

If Reiji knows anything about magic rituals, it's that 'central parks' tend to be common locations for them to occur.

With a flash of his ID Card and a nod to the guards at the gates, Reiji makes his way into the Hazard Zone. He takes note of the massive walls equally large gate that surrounds each district of town. He wonders how this 'Independence Port' of theirs even works, if it's surrounded by walls /and/ forcefields.

But that's a story for another day.

Demetrios Vasilikos (769) has posed:
    As it turns out, there are actually a whole lot of people here. Lots of them scattered around in groups ranging from medium to large. Multiple of these groups may be nearby each other, only for large open spaces to exist.

    As Glitter takes to the air and gains a better view of the area she may spot some of them, but since none of them are the targets of the mission, it may best to simply leave them alone unless they initiate combat themselves (which they likely will have they spot the good guys). The nearest group is about 60 yards away from the security gate they've just come through. A bunch of dudes mostly in black leather, jeans, and jackets, with masks in the shape of skulls on their faces (and that are making their eye sockets look empty somehow).

    Robot police drones hover on either side of the gate, keeping such rabble away. Radio chatter is audible from the pod/disc-shaped machines if one stands nearby. Their red and blue lights rotate, casting the alternating-hue illumination around the area.

    It shouldn't be a big problem to just go straight for the park and bypass them.

    Once everyone is here, and ready to move forward into the park itself, they should have to spend several minutes looking for the cave that was mentioned, and possibly having to deal with some violent homeless people who seem oddly... Misshapen, along the way. Some are really, really tall. And have weird energy weapons that have strange effects if one is hit by them but don't seem to do lasting harm that can't be recovered from. At least one of the Lost is warped to the point of not seeming human, with a massive upper body, lined flesh, and a deformed skull. That one seemed to have psychic attacks to throw at the heroes up until he was knocked out.

    Once the bad guys are defeated, they eventually fade away among blue lights, as though being teleported elsewhere.

    Eventually the group will be able to make their way to a large boulder that has been hollowed out somehow, providing a tunnel leading underground on a steep slope. Traces of magic are on it for thoe who can detect such, and a robed figure may have been spotted descending into the tunnel ahead of the heroes if they took the time to conduct surveillance first.

Clicky (761) has posed:
The junk-dragon claps enthusiastically at Duke's affirmation. "Excellent! Then we will work together!" He is a weird one, all right. "Quickly, we must hunt down the target! Do we have a detector of some kind?" He pauses. "Yes? No? Hmm! Very well!" There is a proxysm of scrounging as he pulls together bits of mirror, a pile of glitter, some baling wire, and a broken satellite TV receiver that he deftly pulls off of a wall. A small arcwelder pops out of a cuckoo clock that is built into his side and cuts some sparking patterns into it, some of them looking rather... runic. "All right, here we are!" He exclaims, attatching it to his junky backridge. He leans forward, putting his face low to the ground as the dish turn and begins emitting puffs of gleaming glitter as turns around in circles like a sonar dish.

Meanwhile, some mismatched trike wheels pop out of the bottom of Clicky and he whirrs forward, making happy tootling noises as he 'follows his nose', the 'radar' making an unsettlingly higher pitched whine as they proceed.

The process eventually takes them to the boulder, where the dish promptly explodes with a flash and sad-looking pop. "Aha! We have located the place!" Clicky moves to help open things up, and then he putters inside, preparing to follow the other heavily-armoed heroes in.

Duke has posed:
Once the group does start to move, Duke was quick to follow and for any rif raf that got in the way, he didn't bring out his primary weapon, only using wind to knock the mobs out of the way, or mixing wind with fire to create a burning cyclone to keep other groups back.

Part being defender to keep some back, part puller by dragging in groups to be knocked aside by those who were melee fighters, and making sure Clicky there with his magic radar had the path he needed with little disturbance. As for knocking people out? Duke we'll let those willing to work with his wind moves and fire do that favor.

Once they arrive to the cave, Duke /may/ have noticed a figure but he was not sure. Those gold eyes narrowing slightly as he peers in. "We probably should proceed with caution. If they do have that staff, we don't want them to activate prematurely to chase us off or... do whatever they are planning to do."

Duke then says softly. "...though I do wonder why no one has destroyed it if it is so dangerous. That is what I would have done..."

Reiji Arisu has posed:
    Unlike a good number of heroes, Reiji is more or less in plainclothes. Sure, he has armor on his wrists and shins, and he's wearing a bright red, reinforced vest, but that's nothing compared to spandex and heavy medieval armor. And he's not glowing even a little bit! What kind of hero is this? Not a particularly spirited one, apparently.

    It does help when you're trying to navigate between a bunch of Hellions. With Reiji's jacket the way it is, some of them might even think he's part of the gang at first glance!

He's not. Not at all. Those people are horribly mistaken. Reiji knows better than to make deals with demons.

    The Lost are somewhat more troublesome- but even they are more obstacles than anything else. Several Scroungers and a few Headmen are neutralized by lightning-quick draws of Chirai, stunning them with arcs of electricity. One Anathema is knocked to its feet by Hollywood's buckshot before being scalded into submission by Karin's roaring flames.

Some people carry guns. Some people carry swords. Reiji has the presence of mind to carry several types of both.

The problem, though, is that Perez Park is something of a maze.

Reiji's solution is simple: Jump ontop of it, and run along the canopy.

    Soon, the exorcist comes upon the cave... And the others who've come to investigate. "Huh," he says with a soft, acknowledging grunt. "Well, good to see I'm not spelunking alone," Reiji nods, leaping off his treetop highway to land next to the tunnel mouth. "Assuming you're all here for the Scepter, that is."

He looks to Clickly, and then to the dish on the ground, then to Duke. "Because then you invite the wrath of the god who created it," Reiji says with a shrug. "In some cases, that can be even worse than just keeping it around."

Glitter (721) has posed:
"Nice to meet you, BLue Witch, everyone else." Glitter grins. It /is/ good to be working with others... at home she has to work alone at least some of the time, which is a bit of a sad thing.

Glitter doesn't fly too far. Having found a group, she doesn't want to leave them behind, and though she could probably pull them along with her, it would be an uncomfortable flight at best. Being able to go up /is/ good for looking around, though, and she has no qualms with using it for souch a purpose.

She doesn't really seem to enjoy fighting, though. Glitter tries to take the long route around and leaves most of the thugs alone. She may have to deal with them sometime... but not now. Now she has an actual job to do!

It's harder to avoid the Lost, though, but Glitter makes an attempt. She uses her telekinesis to literally pick up and move some of them further away from her - the ones that aren't shooting at her. The ones that are get sudden bursts of power instead as Glitter strikes back with kinetic bolts, like punches she doesn't have to throw. The ball of compressed air leaves a telltale trail of sparkles behind it, and the whole ball of force glitters faintly, the telekinetic fields that Glitter takes her name from obvious when being used in this way.

Eventually, though, she gets to the cave. Boulder. Bouldercave. Glitter did look around, but she lacks the ability to detect magic. "And sometimes," she adds to Duke, "you actually /can't/ break them, or at least not for trying the normal way. Some of them put themselves together if you don't actually do it right, or simply aren't damanged at all... at least, that's what I've been told."

And sometimes you do it by mistake, she adds to herself. Hopefully there won't be any repeats this time.

Maya has posed:
Maya noticed howe many peopel are about she's take to the air but she knew the stories of the freaking forest. She'd end up blowing her way through the trees so she's keeping ot the ground she has an easy of enough time delaing wioth the hostiles as she moves along. She notices some of them seem deformed and has to wonder about that.

"Sometimes destroying the item can be worse than leaving it intact. IF something is sealed within it and is kept from being unable to interact due to that? We'll just have to see how it pans out."

Then the radar explodes as they find the spot she looks to Clicky for a moment.

"You okay Clicky?"

She's heading in still and has moved to pull out a deck of cards rather than her rifle.

Cory (768) has posed:
    thugs are dealt with easily by Cory! As she comes across some of the unfortunate, hostile, warped folk she first stares in shock, then frowns... then grits her teeth. But... more with irritation than anger.

    These people are berserk. Not very interesting to deal with! Worse, they're... twisted. "Just what the hell happened to them?" A swift glance is aimed at Maya as if to question her about it, but Cory deals with many of them via punches so tough they kick up winds that carry the force far across the park and hit like hammerblows!

    The appearance of Reiji triggers a grin from her though. Confidently folding both arms across her chest and swaying around playfully she ends up snickering at him. And the others. "Here for it? More for the guys causing trouble with it."

Rebound (750) has posed:
    Maya sure seems to know a lot about this place, Rebound will have to ask her more when she can. For now the skull-mask clad kangaroo goes to town, fighting the twisted homeless people, delivering fierce kicks and strikes, but all disabling blows. Nothing lethal.

    Once they've been properly dealt with and teleported away, it's time for the task at hand, "Look I'm just here 'cause punching bad guys is fun."

Demetrios Vasilikos (769) has posed:
    Once the tunnel has been descended into, the group gets their first look at one of the stranger parts of Paragon City's ancient history. The caverns below are different from the ones the Outcasts took refuge in during a previous mission. This Circle of Thorns den's tunnel opens out into a cave that shows clear sign of molding and shaping. There are stone pedestals with glowing crystals hovering over them scattered around to provide illumination. The opening leading out of here has a rune-etched archway around its edges. Venturing further within has the cave rapidly transitioning from tunnels to brick walls at an unusual upwards slope to the likewise-brick-block ceiling.

    Tunnels take odd, angular turns, only to then suddenly switch from angles and lines to curved passages and circles. A bunch of people in form-fitting brown-and-green outfits and hoods, with glowing eyes that stream green smoke and flame continuously, are gathered in the hall ahead. Their backs are to the entrance into their hide-out. That might seem sloppy and incautious, but there's a big glowing red crystal between them and the hall entrance. And if anyone gets close to it, even in passing, they'll immediately experience stinging pain over their entire body from the deadly energy being radiated from the Crystal of Pain.

    Someone not expecting such a sensation might accidentally let out a noise that could alert the enemy. But maybe Maya's experiences with a different Paragon City could once more aid her allies here. The points raised by the others as to why the Scepter isn't just destroyed were also all quite valid. Maybe it's not destroyable by normal means. Maybe something's sealed inside. Maybe breaking something belonging to a god will tick that god off.

    But the goal remains the same regardless: Retrieving it and bringing it back to MAGI so they can stick it in their vault and hopefully not anywhere people like the Circle can get to it.

    It's still weird though. This elaborate of a set-up doesn't seem like a temporary hide-out or a recent construction project. This all seems quite old. The dirt and small rocks that occasionally crumbles from the cracks in the aged ceiling should make that clear enough.

Maya has posed:
Maya looks to Cory for a moment.

"Some sort of muttion, I'm afraid I don't know. There's a lot of ... things that can change a person on this earth. For better or for worse. We need to focus on the mission, we could ask about back in Atlas back later if you want to go looking for information."

Maya seems to have experiance yes, it's another world but so far the basics applied and she's done a fair bit of basic home work since she rrived.

Now comes the horror that lurks behlow the city. Maya has a lot of experiance with old ruins. Oranbega known so some capes and villains as Orange Bagle, is quite the place Maya seems on her guard here she doesn't like the feel in the air.

"Let's focus on getting in, getting the item and getting out."

Maya's lucky she's not reached out with her magic or she might be getting a supernatural slap in the face.

Reiji Arisu has posed:
    "Well, that's a thing, too," Reiji shrugs at Cory. "But the mission doesn't necessarily require beating the piss out of everything down there. If you want to try, go right ahead," he unholsters his handgun and briefly checks its clip, before setting it back into place. "I'll keep an eye out for the artifact."

And with that, it's time for a cave dive!

Well. Sort of.

    Whatever it was that Reiji was expecting, 'ancient, suspiciously orange city' was not on the list. The architecture is forboding, but worse is the terrible sense of dread- the spiritual /wrongness/ of the place. The halls aren't empty. The halls aren't empty at all. Something is there, but he can't say /what/ but it's making his brain buzz like a shortcircuiting wire.

    He cringes, visibly, as they walk through the corridors. At times, his free hand goes to massage at his forehead and his eyes squint into tight slits as he tries to tune the whitenoise /out./ The best way, he's found, is to keep something to grip in each hand and to squeeze until his palms hurt harder than his head. And so Reiji elects to draw that handgun again... Just in case.

    And then they come up to a room. There are people with glowing eyes on the far side, and a crystal radiating strange, red light. The exorcist grunts softly, training his weapon on the group in front of them, though he hangs back near the door for now.

Which one looks /important?/

Clicky (761) has posed:
Clicky whirrs along on his tiny tires like some kind of mobile junk float in a parade. When Maya asks if he is okay, Clicky perks. "I am fine! Yes, everything is fine, perfectly normal!" He pauses, and then threads his neck around a nearby stalactite to peer at Maya quizically, "How are yoooou?" He asks, brightly.

However, they move on, and Clicky quickly retracts his tires, using his claws again to clatter and click up the wall and peer at the strange circular gateways. "Oooooh, very old! Architecture design is /fascinating/. Formation appears to be part of a larger whole! Maybe it makes a pattern! The angles interlocking!" He continues along the way, moving alogn the wall on his clicky claws like some kind of cartoon character, almost, as he slides along the walls...

And blunders right into the red energy. He yelps as he falls into pieces, clattering into a pile on the floor which quickly begins econstututing itself with hoots and whistles creaking. "Ack! Painful1 Energy field! Ow! Ow! Who would make such a thing!" Clicky's head darts out, and attempts to gnaw on the crystal, but the bottlecap teeth just bend when trying to bite down on the crystal. "OW! Even biting hurts! Ack!"

Hope you guys like mages.

Duke has posed:
The Knight Digimon cants his head softly to Reiji's explanation, "Point." before he gets ready to head in with everyone else, also taking in even Glitter's own explanation as to why magical devices like these sometimes just can't be destroyed.

As they proceed down, Duke takes notice of how old this place is, including how dust is crumbling down from above. His armored boot gently touches down as he /tries/ hard to not just clomp around like the armored giant he is.

He takes notice of the two guys beyond the barrier and his eyes trail to the orb, to the barrier, and then to them. Last time he saw a magical field, it was force-fields--- and he couldn't help but wonder if this was the same thing. So for amusement sake, he places out his hands, as the wind howls from above, coming down the steps and then with his hands moving forward, flings the wind toward the field to toss rocks and dust alike forward.

Cause this seem like a good way to see if this was a forcefield... energy field... or just something to screw with their heads cause mages can be jerks--- though if that isn't a forcefield... two mages may get pelted by stones and dust.

Glitter (721) has posed:
Glitter looks vaguely disapproving at Rebound - is that a kangaroo lady? Glitter doesn't know, but she /does/ know that enjoying fighting is... Well, it's not /always/ a problem, but wanting to do nothing else can be.

"I don't know," she responds to Cory - she's seen Saiyans before but didn't expect any of them to be here. "They looked kind of..." She pauses, looking a little uncomfortable. "I don't know," she repeats instead. "Maybe we'll find out sometime." They looked a little like something Glitter has seen only once before, people who used some of the knockoffs of the super-soldier treatments... but only a little bit.

Glitter lifts off once she's in the tunnels but just hovers an inch or two above the ground. Mostly she doesn't want to slip or put a foot in a hole. She has no spelunking experience and it's a lot easier for her to keep up this way. She uses her finger to clean dirt out of one of the carvings on the walls, and then wishes she hadn't - it makes her glove dirty. (What was she expecting?)

"It's kind of weird," Glitter says, very quietly, before she glides into the hallway. If they're quiet, she thinks, they can probably get past them without causing a fuss. She raises one finger to her lips and silently starts to fly into the hall, hoping they keep their backs turned.

When she gets close to the crystal, Glitter hisses, a short sound through her teeth. She recoils backwards, not wanting to get close to it - her forcefield didn't even activate, she's not sure what's up with that. She's trying to be silent -

But Clicky goes and ruins that attempt almost immediately. Glitter looks chagrined.

Reiji Arisu has posed:
Aaaand there's the other shoe.

    "Stay out of the energy field," Reiji orders, lining his sights up with the sternum of a mage with a particularly tall hat. It helps that his target's also glowing BRIGHT GREEN like some kind of radioactive magical beacon.

Reiji squeezes his trigger once, twice, three times. A trio of spirit-killing shots erupt from Gold's barrel and scream downrange.

At least the roar of his gun helps silence some of the noise hissing across his brain.

Rebound (750) has posed:
    "Welp, so much for that." Rebound says, as Clicky manages to do his best to gain the attention of every mage in here. Never one to worry about surprise attacks anyway, since that's more of a thing the turtles would do, she takes a running jump towards the closest group of mages.

    Her plan is pretty straight forward. These guys can't cast magic if they're unconcious, so she's going to beat them into unconciousness as quickly as she is able to. Swift elbow strikes and kicks that could flip a car follow as she barrels into the group.

Cory (768) has posed:
    "Mutations?! Keep those things away then! We don't need that..." She actually shudders. The idea of being transformed like that isn't pleasant WHATSOEVER.

    She of course, is drawn to the shiny thing and gets near the crystal-- but the moment the pain starts stinging her she reels back making low grunts and flailing an arm, looking like she's about to punch the thing until she gets THAT impulse under control.

Demetrios Vasilikos (769) has posed:
    In order to jump towards the Mages who have now been alerted by both Clicky, Duke's wind attack (which seemed to have no visible effect upon the Crystal but definitely knocked a couple Circle goons down), and by Reiji's shot at one of their Mages, one must pass by the inconveniently placed Crystal of Pain. So though Rebound succeeds in leaping beyond it and striking the enemies to the ground or flipping them into walls and so on, she did get to experience that stinging full-body agony along the way. And joy of joys, the Force Mage thrusts his staff forward and the kangaroo girl may experience a sudden feeling of weakness: a loss of strength. Right as the wimpy mage comes charging at her, wielding blows similar (if slightly less) than what Rebound herself normally does!

    Hax!

    The Life Mage goes down with some difficulty, despite being a frail magic user. But Reiji's aim, weaponry, and number of shots seems to be sufficient to take him out without being able to steal anyone's life energy.

    Duke's test, paired with what other people have demonstrated so far, seems to indicate that the red glow is not a force field. More like a 'pain field'. It deters passage through making intruders hurt. As crossbow bolts are fired at him, Maya, Cory, and Glitter, as they hang back, the number of enemies still up and able to fight has been greatly reduced.

    Some ghastly spectral creatures come clawing their way through the air from a side passage. Their glowing red eyes take in the situatuon, and they immediately hiss out, "Intruders!" Sudden balls of darkness are being shot at the good guys that cling to them if struck and seem to dissolve life energy for several seconds until they dissipate. One of the ghostly things seems to be wearing armor and a helm, and draws a phantasmal blade as it charges at Reiji, wailing in a hollow, distant echo as it prepares to strike!

    This is... Probably more of a challenge than the first mission. But hey, THAT'S WHAT CORY WANTED, ISN'T IT?

Duke has posed:
Then that is when everything gets crazy. Rebound does her thing and a life mage goes down, Duke however is distracted by the sudden spectators and as they show up, he places out his hand as a double bladed axe halberd forms out from data energy.

"Why yes, we are intruders. However could you guess?" Duke says with some sarcasm in his voice as the edges of the axe glow with heated light. As the dark orbs come in toward him, he twirls the lance around, before twirling it over his head, as the light becomes fire and then slashes the weapon out in front of him.

The swing sends flames roaring like a wave out from his weapon to fly across the area between himself and any specters in front of him. Hopefully nailing them, along with their dark orbs. However one of those orbs does nail him in the backside and he seethes a bit in pain. The life energy taken from him the creatures may note is-- odd. A living being he was alright, but also traces of data--- of technology. A living, organic being of data.

Rebound (750) has posed:
    Well that definitely reached pretty high on her list of shit she never wants to experience again. She does make a note to avoid those crystals in the future, though she may not have much of a future if this mage has his way. The sudden weakness that hits her makes her drop to a knee, and she takes a powerful strike that knocks her down to the ground.

    She pushes back to her feet, thinking fast. She sweeps out with her tail, trying to take the mage's legs out from under him, and then rolls towards him, trying to grab the arm that has the staff and pull him down into an arm bar on the ground. If she breaks his arm, he should drop the staff. And if he drops the staff, the magic that's affecting her should disappate. Right? She has no idea how magic works so this is mostly an educated guess based on years of video games and TV.

Glitter (721) has posed:
Well that went to crap in a hurry.

Glitter doesn't dodge when crossbow bolts are fired in her general direction. She holds her hand up, palm out, and a field ripples outward from her hand, like a small wall. Bolts that hit the field stop dead, hanging in midair as the telekinetic field encompasses them, too. The sparkling field remains in place as Glitter mentally holds everything still in about a five foot wide disc. She might accidentally catch bolts that aren't aimed at her, too.

Unfortunately, the field is two-way, so if she's unlucky she might stop something going the other way, too. But it makes a good shield - at least, against something like a crossbow bolt.

The field is also centered on Glitter's hand. As she moves, the field moves with her, apparently spreading out from her fingers and palm rather than just placed in the air. She seems a little uncertain as she moves forward, into the pain field; she winces, but pushes through it and accelerates, broadening the field, the sparkles brightening as she speeds up.

Glitter releases it as she gets to the far end of the pain field. She stops, hovering in place. The disc of force, now elliptical - much wider than it is tall - keeps going, bowling over mages that aren't fast enough to get out of the way, though the disc starts to lose sparkles as it travels; by the time it gets about forty feet from her, if it hasn't hit a wall, it falls apart into a shower of dancing light. Though until that point, it's like being hit with a mobile battering ram.

Spinning, Glitter spots the spectral reinforcements. She drops down and crouches to avoid the blob of darkness and reaches out to the side. The Life Mage's dropped staff is suddenly surrounded in the same cloud of sparkles before it flies off, thrown fast, at the closest of the ghosts. She doesn't actually expect it to hit them (are ghosts solid?) but it might be a distraction, at least.

Reiji Arisu has posed:
Well. One down.

But there are so many more to go.

    Even more now that a hallway vomits a legion of guardian spirits into the chamber. Reiji's lips curl down into a slight frown right at the edges. "Ghosts, huh? So you're the ones responsible for this headache."

Them and SO many of their closest friends.

    Reiji maintains his position as the gloom-blasts and crossbow bolts streak through the air. He dodges around the murky fusillade but catches a crossbow bolt in his body armor. The vest catches most of the damage, but a small trickle of blood begins to drip from a fresh wound.

And he has more company, besides.

    "You're an ugly one," Reiji grunts, hand tightening around his portable arsenal. The exorcist slides his handgun back into its holster-- only to draw his shotgun a quarter-second later. "Let's see about fixing your face a little, shall we?" Spectral energies meet a cloud of expanding anti-spirit fletchettes as Reiji fires his shotgun at the ghost just as it draws into optimal range. He lunges forward then, rushing through the hail of crossbow bolts straight at the spirit. Reiji leaps into the air, driving his knee forward to try and dissipate what's left of the ghost with a well-placed hardpoint strike. His momentum carries him straight into the PAIN FIELD.

He knows to expect it, though. Even if it makes his nerves feel like they've caught fire, he can fight through.

    When he emerges on the other side, Hollywood barks another burst of rounds at the cluster of mages and ghosts comprising the bombardment group. It's soon joined by Karin as he sets his weapon rack down. Reiji fires. His blade swings into anything that gets close. Spirit-killing shotgun shells and plumes of flame join in elemental harmony to hew into as much of the horde as he can manage.

Maya has posed:
Maya says "Okay good then and I'm ... all right. We need to focus on the mission t hand."

Clicky's doing the study thing and she leaves him too it. He might notice something they might miss. Well things seem to get going and the crystal seems to be an issue as she soon fines her self having to deal with the pain field and she's going to have to press though it even as they start coming after them. May weaves out of the way of the firs few bolts and counters them with blasts water as she's taken a fate card in hand. However she hits the PAIN FIELD now and isn't going to be odinbg much as she tries to push through it.

Clicky (761) has posed:
Clicky, with some effort, pulls himself out of the damage aura. "WAAAGH!" He complains, pieces falling off of him and going dormant as they do so. He slides into the chaos, trying to keep from getting beaten apart but the incoming ghosts are quire dangerous!

"Look out! Darkness! Negative energy! It stings! Oh dear oh dear!" He tromps throug hthe black fog that seems to cling to his eyes, and he tripls, tumbling out of the mass on the opposite side!

Little mechanical stars and birds whirl around his head as he says, "This is most unhappylike! Why can they not just accept presents and be good friends?" He sounds very sad. Sad Dragon is sad.

Cory (768) has posed:
    Cory was too distracted by the weird crystal for a bit and thus, was caught a little off-guard by the weird ghost-things flying in... and the others! She's smacked by some of the weird dark energy but-- "ghhhhhrrrrhh...!!" It mostly... just makes her angry, while eating up Ki.

    Life force, she has in spades. It erupts around her in fact, eventually burning up the little blobs of darkness. White, brilliant, rushing about like 'thick air,' the aura just -blows away- the incoming crossbow bolts, and the grinning Saiyan aims an open palm for some of the ghosts. "My turn!"

    She fires thick beams at one, another, another... shots that would pick a man off his feet and slam him into a wall very easily!

Demetrios Vasilikos (769) has posed:
    The dark clouds of negative energy seem unaffected by the flames, though the Spectral Followers certainly are. They wail as they are consumed in the flames, and while some seem to keep charging ahead and shooting more blasts of darkness, one or two seem to decide that running (or flying, rather) is a better option, and actually turn invisible as they do so.

    So there could be any number of ghosts in here. Invisible. Waiting for a chance to attack.

    Fantastic.

    The effect does not fade immediately despite Rebound's impressive take down of the Force Mage and the arm breakage and staff droppage. At least not right away. It takes several seconds from the initial casting before it goes away. But it DOES eventually go away, leaving Rebound with all her strength returned to her! That was still pretty sucky though and probably not something to want to go through again.

    Combined with wind from Duke earlier, Rebound's butt-kicking skills, and then a battering ram of force from Glitter to knock them all down, not many of the more human-looking enemies remain. Maya's water blasts, take down the straggles, slamming them into the walls or floor as the struggle woozily to their feet and ensuring they don't knife anyone in the back when the heroes try to move forward.

    Reiji's anti-spirit arsenal seems to be going a good job. The Spectral Knight shrieks when it's shot, throws its head back, and then vanishes amidst swirls of smoke. That one is... Probably NOT being teleported to jail. Nor the other ghosts that are attacked. The ones that are still burning from Duke's attack try to get some shadow-infused punches in on Reiji, but the continuous damage makes them disperse as well eventually.

    The three remaining ghosts are shot by Cory and blown away. It seems they are weak against energy attacks! Then the two who fled earlier suddenly appear right in the middle of the heroes and start shooting blasts of negative energy and life-dissolving darkness again. It's a magical force, not something physical that can be blown away, unfortunately, but the crossbow bolts are another story, and with all the living enemies defeated, there won't be any more of that! ...Hopefully! This IS the first room they've come to with enemies in it. There's probably lots more enemies in here to face.

    Glitter smashes the stolen staff into one of the ghosts, but while it does seem to harm it, it's not any dramatic amount of damage. Thankfully, already being damaged as it is, that impact is enough to finish it off.

    Only one remains! ...And that one attempts to improve its survival chances by making a grasping and pulling gesture in the air and trying to siphon life from Clicky to heal itself!

    It's magic. It doesn't matter if Clicky is organic or not.

Clicky (761) has posed:
Clicky is an odd being, but not so odd that a magical method to drain life from someone would not work! The magical life siphon strikes Clicky just as he is recovering, and he yelps, a steam whistle blowing as his parts seem to just... collapse into a pile, a weak clicking and clacking heard from the central area of the pile as the junkdragon gets its life energy drained.

Maya has posed:
Maya's going to keep moving now and Reiji's proving just how well he is at dighting thes sorts of things. Maya has no idea yet just how many spirits are lurking in this place, it's like Shell Three back home in a way. She now looks to the last ghost as it's trying to get life force from Clicky Maya pauses for a moment she has a plan and now attemps to turn her healing magic upon the ghost. This form of healing magic does not do happy things to the undead or spirits when it's directed to. Hopefully she cna force it to stop, or so she hopes.

Glitter (721) has posed:
Glitter is good at knocking things (and people) down. These seem pretty disoriented and out of it; maybe she can count on them to /not/ struggle some more? Especially after the water blast knocks them back down as they start to rise.

Glitter, unfortunately, has relatively few defenses against negative energy. Her personal defensive shield helps, it helps against pretty much anything, but her putting up a wall in front of it doesn't stop it even a little bit, as it has no physical existence.

She yelps as one of the negative energy blasts finds its way home, then another. Glitter staggers - or, well, she would stagger except she's hovering, so she kind of drifts sideways for a moment, hunkering down and trying to make herself a smaller target.

There aren't many ghosts left, at least, but hitting them with physical objects - though not /spectacularly/ effective - did work a little bit. Some of the others seem to have this one under control (she hopes) so Glitter gathers her powers, making a little glittering ball in her left hand, and starts to move forward. She's past the crystal now, so it doesn't hurt anymore, and as she moves back she's less likely to be hit with stray blasts.

Maybe she can take a look for the item before the next wave of reinforcements comes. It helps that if she sees it from across a room, she can just grab it. Probably, anyway.

Reiji Arisu has posed:
    Shadow punches pound into Reiji's body- but fewer connect than the ghosts would like. Blasts of shotgun ammunition pour into the remaining spirits swirling around him, even as Karin traces a fiery line through the stragglers. Clouds of inky blackness peel away from Reiji's body as his spiritual resistance asserts itself, purging the excess negative energies with a pulse of subtle power.

Only one left. And it's doing something that's just patently unacceptable.

    Karin is replaced with Gold. Reiji takes aim for the ghost's core with his anti-spirit handcannon. There's a roar of gunpowder as a slug, etched with arcane patterns carefully designed to disperse spiritual energy and imbued with raw, elemental METAL is fired downrange.

In one smooth motion, he ejects the clip, replacing it with a fresh cartridge, before moving to support Glitter. There are more ghosts where these came from, and there's no way they're going to be able to destroy them /all./ Best to find the staff and get out of here.

Duke has posed:
The Dragoon Digimon watches as all hell continues to break loose and they haven't even gotten out of this first room! Those gold eyes narrow as he notices the energy orbs are not effected by his fire fling and quickly goes to side step one before jumping back to avoid another.

He then observes as the poor Junk Yard Dragon goes down and tsks, even if Clicky is still with them, it isn't good. None of this is good.

Maybe he can help clear the way a bit while people deal with the current issue.

Duke spins his halberd in hand, as his foot plants in front of him and the other slides behind him. His whole weapon lights up, as his gold eyes take on a blueish hue for a moment, pulling up power from his DigiCore. Then with a step around and a hard cleave to the ground, Duke roars out, "RAGE OF WYVERN!" With the impact of the weapon a massive flaming wyvern head rises up and seems to suddenly take flight directly down the hall going after probably some poor mage down there or another ghost minding its own business.

Either way, once it gets to that next room or hall with Duke's target in mind the flaming wyvern will not only engulf that target in its fiery maw, but also explode in a fiery inferno down where it irrupts at.

Cory (768) has posed:
    "HEEEEEY! That worked pretty well!" Cory is UNUSUALLY EXCITED about seeing ghosts explode from those shots! Is it really bringing some joy to her face? Well, a little!

    "Alright, now we're talking more challenging! Not really tough enough, but wow what an amazing situation!" There's GHOSTS and crystals and what in the hell are half of her allies DOING?!

    She's just got WAY too many things to oggle and peer at happening around her. WAY too many.

    She's just turning for the last ghost when Reiji goes ballistic on it. Instead of joining in... she watches to see what he's up to.

Demetrios Vasilikos (769) has posed:
    Reiji finishes off the last ghost, taking it from partial health to zilch in short order. It wails and disappears. Maya's attempt to heal the ghost thankfully doesn't work, because it would have just literally healed the ghost, not hurt it. Instead, that healing energy may be better spent on the actual injures allies present, like poor Clicky.

    As the heroes then proceed forward, Glitter taking the lead, there are other halls to take, but the end point of many of them seems to be a cave-in of some kind. A much, much larger room lies ahead, with lots of empty space that should make fighting and moving easier... But probably also means more enemies. A room of rickety rope bridges with a deep dark pit below. Large pillars serve as platforms, with smaller pillars linking the bridges in places. Mages and cultists and spirits are scattered around this area, along with some other enemies as-yet unencountered.

    Then Duke's attack erupts into the room and starts breathing fire on everything and then explodes. Most of the enemies in this huge room take notice immediately.

    Balls of electricity come flying down from above, into the midst of the heroes, which erupts into bolts and shocking waves in every direction for a couple seconds, likely damaging anyone nearby without protection. Some mages in blue robes fly down towards them and begin shooting blasts of lightning, and walls of wind. Boulders come hurtling up from a pillar below the bridge the heroes were to enter the room on, from mages in brown.

    A giant, winged demon seething with flames come plummeting down from above, and lands on the central pillar in the room. Burning horns, hooves, hands, and a jagged-toothed mouth that howls in rage. Then he starts shooting fire into the passage to join the boulders and electricity and wind.

    GREAT JOB, DUKE.

    On the bright side, it looked like there was a glass case on one of the pillars with some minions guarding it. That might be what they're after.

Duke has posed:
One the bright side--- it probably did some damage to /something/, downside it woke up /everything/, but they now know what is in that room and its hellish. There is some tactical use to this, at least in Duke's mind. If they had gone in there blissfully--- they would have gotten probably a sneak attack on them, this way with everything suddenly throwing aggro... they know what's actually /in there/.

Those gold eyes watch as a reply attack comes back with electrical balls and walls of wind. He can't do much about the electricity--- but the wind--- he has that covered. Duke places out his free hand to the side before he chuckles softly, perhaps a bit nervously. "Well--- at least we know what we have to contend with without knowing /what/ we will have, hm?"

As his hand continues to gather up energy, a wind gust blows around him, as his cape moves bellows out from the gathered wind, Then with a hard rotation of his body he sends out his own wind wall reply to slam into the other one and perhaps negate the spell entirely.

Glitter (721) has posed:
Advancing worked okay. Glitter has no experience exploring ruins either but she is pretty sure that any of the cave-ins are not worth digging through unless necessary. They might be holding up the ceiling, or what's left of the ceiling, and she has no interest in dealing with an avalanche or cave-in.

This part, not so much.

"Duke!" Glitter yelps, having remembered his name from the original meet-up. Glitter rockets out of the tunnel and rises up to the ceiling of the room to try to avoid getting shot, which doesn't work very well; one of the lightning bolts impacts her, spraying sparks and slamming her into the ceiling.

Glitter seems dazed for a moment despite her shielding, but kicks away from the wall. A boulder comes close to her, but those she is much better at dealing with; she 'catches' it in a field of force between her hands, like a glittering web, before dropping it down at the demon-y thing.

She sees a case in the distance, but there's so many people in the way she's not sure she can get to it. Fortunately, she doesn't have to; she reaches her hand out toward it, causing sparkles to form around the case. "Hey, cover me!" she calls down at the others.

Unfortunately, Glitter's fine control is not very good. It would be so easy to shatter the glass by mistake; she has to use what is, to her, an extremely light touch to avoid crushing it. This means she is taking her time, and that makes her a tempting target - hovering and sparkling, she's a little eye-catching. It's also hard to hide what she's doing, given the case has the same sparkling aura around it.

On the plus side, if the case is stuck to the pillar, /that/ isn't a problem. Glitter could probably pick up the entire pillar without too much effort, though she'd rather detach the two. She just has to be careful to do it without shattering everything.

Maya has posed:
Perhaps making assumptions on how one world's undead work from anotehr. EIther wya she's going to turn her attnetion to Clicky at this poing and start attemping to heal him. While it won't do as mucha si tit might to someone made of flesh? It can help synethic life enough to be useful. She's focusing on casting upon him even as the horrible angey dreams start coming which catches Maya off guard and sends her reeling after the finishes casting the spell. Shei hits the ground hard and bounces a few times from the force of the fireblast that caught her flat footed.

Reiji Arisu has posed:
Well. This is why you don't try pulling mobs with fireballs. If Xiaomu was here, she'd have an earful for Duke about proper dungeon-raiding tactics.

She's NOT here, though. So it's up to Reiji to deal with the situation.

    Waves of electricity wash over Reiji's body, sending his limbs into brief, convulsive spasms. He makes a low, uncomfortable sound as the smell of cooked flesh and burning hair briefly fills the tunnel. It's replaced by the scent of ozone and gunpowder. Chirai shrieks with electrical fury, a corona of blue lightning surrounding the blade as it absorbs the hypercharged ambient energies radiating from those magical spheres. Gold fires at the boulders sailing through the air. Reiji's reflexes are still sluggish from the electrocution, but between shooting them off-target in midflight and lazily lurching out of the way, he's relatively unharmed.

    Wind and fire sweep in next. There are a /lot/ of mages down here. Fortunately, Wind is being handled. Fireballs shatter and break as Reiji swings Chirai into their trajectories. Fire creates Earth, after all.

But now. NOW it's time for a counter attack!

    Or rather, now's the time for Reiji to pseudo-tank for Glitter. Reiji grunts, sheathing Gold again before drawing Karin to join its sister-sword. "Concentrate on doing what you're doing," he says to Glitter, shaking off the residual effects of the electrical attack. "I'll run interference as best as I'm able."

    With a bold leap, Reiji surges into the cluster of storm mages, whirling like a dervish mid-leap. Chirai and Karin crackle and howl with lightning and fire alike. Clouds of flame and electrical arcs meet and mingle, transforming the air above the bridge into a cataclysmic storm of elemental fury. His leap comes to an abrupt but brief halt as he slams a double-kick down at one of the storm mages, before leaping away and subjecting another group to a tremendously flashy melee onslaught.

All the while, his mobile arsenal is kept on-hand...

/Clenched in his teeth./

Cory (768) has posed:
    More cave-exploring! Cory's her usual energetic self for most of it. Poking at weird things on the walls, looking around corners, sensing for trouble and occasionally adjusting her gi. Her tail impatiently twitches about!

    Then Duke just blasts EVERYTHING once they do get somewhere interesting.

    That would be kind of boring except... BOOM. In comes a huge demon.

    NOW Cory looks happy! "NOW we're talking." Happy enough to slam a fist into her other hand's open palm.

    Fwooooosh! Off she goes for the demon, zig-zagging at high speed between the flames... dodging most. A few scorch her sides and one comes VERY close to her face as she backflips FORWARDS, then springs off the ceiling to come DOWN with a kick for its head!

Clicky (761) has posed:
The healing magic seems to have an effect. Something within the pile of junk resonates with Maya's healing, and the pile shifts, ristling as it pulls back together, light glittering around him with a weak but happy toot of a steam whistle. "Thank you, miss! I appreciate the help!" He says, his eyes clicking and trying to focus on Maya for a moment before all hell breaks loose.

"NO NOTINTHEFAAAACE!" Clicky yells, apparently reflexively as the elemental blast wave sends Clicky slamming into a wall and breaking apart /again/, a large, oblong-shaped mass of junk falling to the ground as the pieces scatter around. It's almost... egg-shaped.

Demetrios Vasilikos (769) has posed:
    The Air Casters have more than wind to their credit, though Duke's attempts to negate a wind attack is successful. One Air Caster raises her arms above her head and magic glows around her hands as, in these dank tunnels and caverns, a snow storm forms around her out of nowhere! It's a magic snow storm so it not only makes visibility less and is cold, it also slows movement and attack rate as well! The other Air Caster just settles for more lightning bolts aimed at the knight-looking digimon!

    Glitter is definitely a target, but thankfully Reiji is screening for her, and trying to keep as few shots as possible from being aimed her way. The furious assault manages to take down the Air Casters harrassing Duke (and ending the Snow Storm in the process), and then knocks a third all the way down to the bottom of the pit. The boulder-shooting helps reduce the impact the Earth Casters are having too.

    The air around Reiji hardens as stone forms from nowhere, attempting to encase him temporarily. It seems all of these Thorn Casters have more than one trick up their sleeve!

    At least the glass case is levitating into the air very slowly, and coming towards Glitter...!

    The boss in charge of this place suddenly makes an appearance just then, unfortunately. A mental voice permeating the area. "With the Scepter of Mot, we need only wait for the Banished Pantheon to come to us. Then we shall have them right where want them!" Then the world may go topsy-turvy for Glitter, as the Madness Mage attempts to scramble her thoughts with magically-powered mental assault! "Just as I, Lucion, have you!"

    Glitter seems to have psychic abilities herself. Maybe she can fight off the attempt to disorient her!

    Cory's super strength stomp on the demon's head makes it stagger a bit from the mighty impact, its hooved feet forced down into the pillar beneath it and cracking the ancient stone. A blade of flames erupts into the Behemoth Overlord's clawed hand as it swings at Cory with minimal hesitate despite the no-doubt serious damage to its head.

    These enemies aren't going down easily! Duke's attack managed to clear out many of the weaker ones prior to entering the room, but that just means all the strong ones are alert and angry! Still, their numbers are dwindling, a few at a time! If all that's left is annoying Earth Casters, the big demon, and the boss behind all of this, then they could finish clearing the room and be safe to get the Scepter and get out! Or if the Boss would stop INTERRUPTING THE INTERACTION WITH THE CASE! Geez!

    At least no one is attacking Clicky or that mysterious egg.

Duke has posed:
Duke feels the cold surround him and nrrhs softly, as his armor tries to freeze up. He tries to step forward to break the ice's hold over his DigiChrome armor and his free hand ignites with fire. Those gold eyes flickering with blue from time to time, even as the other one prepares an electrical attack.

The frozen area is reminding him of that night.... at the buildings... the reflection in the windows...

'Do you know who you are?'

Duke roars out as he swings his hand to cast fire around himself to break the cold, just as the electrical strike goes to impact. He roars out in pain as the electrical energy surges around him. Thankfully the cold doesn't last time a nice interrupt, but the Medieval Dukemon nearly falls down to his knee as the electrical surges.

He needs a new stradgey and one to help everyone else out. He can't fly like this, so he knows what he has to do. Duke forcefully degenerates, which is done with a bright flash of light as data surges around him, but the data seems to shift for a moment, before rebuilding to something /far/ larger and more cybernetic.

With a loud roar as the data breaks, now stands the fifteen foot monstrosity which is the War Growlmon X. "Lets rumble!" He sneers out as his metal teeth snap. Several gun houses on his shoulders open before lasers fly everywhere.

He then takes aim with his arm cannons and opens fire with those as well. Duke has gone into support assault mode.

Glitter (721) has posed:
Glitter speeds up the case once she's gotten it moving. She just doesn't want to damage it while she's moving it. It's small and delicate - well, the glass case is, she's not sure about what is inside. It helps that Reiji is protecting her, and her shield takes care of minor shots that get past him.

At least, until the psychic wizard shows up.

Glitter is telekinetic. She can do a lot of tricks by moving things without touching them, even hold the air and condense it; she can make fields of force, launch sudden kinetic blasts, and a few other odds and ends. She can lift truly staggering amounts when she puts her mind to it - it's why she's worried about breaking a small glass case. She breaks glasses all the time when she practices with them, just by 'squeezing' a little too hard.

But that's all.

Having no particular mental defense beyond any trained hero, Glitter lurches, suddenly, and so does the case. She loses her focus enough that it starts to descend - it's probably not going to land hard enough to break, but it might, so someone might want to grab it. "Ngh," she gets out, gripping the side of her head with one hand as she kind of hunches down in midair.

Glitter's field pulses for a moment. Small objects around her dance - little rocks, fallen crossbow bolts, they get picked up and whirled in a random direction before being left to fly loose, not very hard but enough to send them skittering around the floor, changing direction occasionally. She can fight Lucion off, maybe, but not and do anything else at the same time; she's completely open for the moment, and the case isn't going anywhere.

Maya has posed:
Maya has been helping Colicky as best she can nad it seems to have done some good to help him. However hell's broken lose and Maya's sitll trying to get up from tht fireblast she got hit. That freaking hurt however she's slowly back oin her feet even as the others fight. She pauses looking to see sht strange egged shape thing which she's going to try to collect unless someone else goes after her. She's trusting the rest of the team to keep the hostile mages busy while she recovers the egg like thing. Maya herself could use some medical attention though from the looks of it.

Reiji Arisu has posed:
    How do rocks spontaneously appear in mid-air? Magic, presumably. It's the only explanation Reiji can find when his acrobatic assault is suddenly and abruptly halted by the a crushing brace of airborn earth. Reiji coughs into the handle of his arsenal as his forward momentum is directed inward, violently compressing his ribs via his sternum. That was not a pleasant feeling.

Neither is the crushing, vise-like grind of the stones keeping him suspended in the air.

It's about then that Reiji realizes that he can still move his arms. And also that whatever mage thought this was a good idea is, in fact, terribly mistaken. It's quite a tactical error, in fact. Reiji twists, sliding his twin blades into their sheathes just inches from his throat. He reaches behind around his side, slipping his arm through the gaps in the stone cage to unholster his pistol. His other hand pulls his shotgun out of its cradle with a soft *click.*

    Reiji takes a breath. He braces his chest against one rock, securing his legs against two others. He's high overhead, far above the action playing out below with the giant cyber-dinosaur and the mentalist-wizard-dual-classing-asshole.

In other words, he has a perfect sniper's perch.

    First thing's first. Glitter's attracted the attention of someone powerful. Tremendously, terribly powerful. But he's /not/ looking up; not looking at the exorcist training both of his guns for the mage's back and head.

    He might glance Reiji's way when he pulls the triggers... The first time. He follows up in short order, firing round after round of shotgun shell and .50 caliber slugs like he were some kind of heavy metal cloud disgorging a literal rain of bullets.

Clicky (761) has posed:
The egg is about the size of a watermelon, encrusted with junk and stuff. Maya can see there's a glint of something else under it. There feels like a faint vibration, emanating through it.

And it is warm.

As Maya picks up the egglike mass of junk, however, several bullet casings from Reiji fly through the air, with some loose hunks of Oranbega rock and some crystal chunks. A few pieces of the slagged bits of Clicky are pulled upwards as well, clicking and clacking as they join the whirling mass. Metal interlocks with rock, rubber hose straightening as it threads through a forming armature. An arn reaches out, rebuilding itself before Maya's eyes into a shorter limb tipped with bits of Oranbega rock, others following quickly as a scavenged Clockwork propeller spins up on the back of the junkdragon. One camera eye opens, the other replaced with a reshaped crystal lens, creating a weird strobing effect as a small light appears in the lens, lighting up like a sort of reverse iris. A pair of fallen bowls clop together to make a jawline and mouth. "I will be okay! Do not worrY! I think! Lost mass... Oh well, I was told I was a little large!" He calls out, curling around the Junker and threading between her legs to hoist her up on his back. "Come, quickly, while they are occupied!"

He skitters, clattering along the ground. Instead of grinding gears, the clicking noise seems to be mostly from the stone claws clattering along the floor and pillars as he scales them like a gecko, his head bobbing and weaving almost spasmodically.

"Quickly! Quickly! We must move!" He says, as he scales higher, and closes in on the glass case/ While the others aren't paying attention to their movement...

He positions himself on one side of the pillar and then stretches his neck impossibly far around the side, popping his head up around the top of the pillar and looking up at the minions. "Hello there! You look wonderful today!" He exclaims. "But perhaps one should examine the glowing eyes. That is /not good/ for your health, no!"

As they inevitably attempt to strike the head, it pulls down with yelp, and then pops up three feet to the left. "I am sorry! I am over here!"

And then six feet to the right. "Too bad, so sad. Please, try again!"

While they are occupied by trying to play whack-a-mole, one of the claws is efficiently opening up the case by carving a perfect circle in it with a claw like glass cutters.

This is where Maya should grab the sceptre.

Maya has posed:
Tjhe egg is prety big but she's got it well in hand. She's makin sure to keep it safe she watches Clicky star to take form once more. He's now made out of the local material and it's pretty amazing to wtch. "Let's get this done!" Maya will keep up with Clicky and she takes sight of the objective as her friend goes to keep them busy? She's going to make a dive for the sceptre now she'll move to use the opening Clicky ahs made she'll move to grab the sceptre now and trhen move to leap on to Clicky's back if he'll let her.

"My friend it's time to get out of here! I got the time we shouldn't stay longer!"

Cory (768) has posed:
    Cory doesn't have a weapon, unless her furious fists count! And those seem to work. Somehow or another she uses the striking surfaces of her knuckles against the incoming blade to parry it head-on. Sure, some blood's drawn from each impact, but she exchanges blows fearlessly and with enough force to send shockwaves through the room!

    "I'll just keep THIS guy busy!" She crows. Just as one of the swings comes her way-- WHOOOOOOSH!

    The sword has cleaved her in half?!

    ...nope.

    The demon might be confused, by seeing his weapon cleave through an afterimage but that's just icing on the cake. Because Cory comes in low, plunging a fist straight for its gut!

Demetrios Vasilikos (769) has posed:
    The Madness Mage, Lucion, has great psychic ability -- even if derived from sorcery. Enough that, as Glitter attempts to fight off that severe disorientation, he demonstrates not only telepathic power but also empathic. He channels his psychic energy into the demon that Cory is fighting, enhancing its mind and body for accuracy, damage, and evasiveness. A field of power surrounds the beast!

    Lucion has many other powers available to him. He can force someone into unconsciousness through overwhelming their brain, he can trap someone inside of a labyrinth of their own thoughts. He can blast people with a wave of mental power. He even has skill with an enchanted sword, and the ability to communicate with his allies from miles away.

    But what he can not do is defend against bullets to the back of the head. He is hit by most of the shots and takes a spill as a result. He's clearly injured, his tall hood shredded, and glowing purple eyes dimming within the darkness of it. But he doesn't seem to be down. What are bad guys around here made of that they can take gun shots to the skull? Whatever the case, he's on his and knees and not in a position to attack anymore right now. He might need a moment to gather his focus.

    And he'll probably need magic healing and rest to get rid of the damage to his skull. Assuming Glitter doesn't put some rocks into his face first.

    The demon may be enhanced temporarily, improving its chances against Cory, but Duke's laser and cannon barrage is doing its fair share of damage, even with some of the shots seeming to slide off of the glowing energy field or to be evaded. The ones that get through are painful though, and the Behemoth Overlord concentrates its power as green flames pool at its feet and then rise up around it, healing its wounds. For the moment, however, it's not attacking anyone!

Demetrios Vasilikos (769) has posed:
    The Earth Casters fare less well, not having healing powers, and as a pillar it toppled over onto them, they get smashed and sent to the bottom of the pit. No more earth attacks at least!

    Cory fights the Behemoth Overlord. His sword of flames is a magic sword made out of fire, so her attempt to block it may not quite do what she expected. It probably results mostly in her hand getting burned. But given the Behemoth Overlord's attack rate, even enhanced by Lucion, is nothing compared to Cory's own speed, he only got a single attack before she vanished from sight and punched the muscled monser in the belly. The demon goes flying across the room and into one of the walls! And then down into the pitt.

    Seems the wings don't allow flight, oddly enough.

    Meanwhile, the Archers and Guides shooting crossbows and slashing with wickedly curved knives at the tricky Clicky are too distracted to stab Maya as she reaches inside the case and carefully removes the Scepter of Mot. It's a somehow plain-looking thing. A silver rod, of no special decoration or adornment. Sure, it has a skull or two as part of its design, but there's no rune work, no magic symbols... Just a shaft of metal.

    Once it's properly in-hand, however, the 'plain'ness seems to more clearly be something else. It's... Stale somehow. Worn out. Stretched thin. Like old fabric. Like dust. It's just... Crumbling, decaying, ruination. Death, not dying. Deterioration for all eternity. It's not some sinister presence. It's not chaotic or cruel or vicious or hostile. It's apathetic, honestly. Whatever this is... Magic, or divine power...

    The Scepter of the god Mot doesn't necessarily feel evil. It just feels like the world after everything has ended. When nothing walks or breathes or feels anymore.

    Sterility.

    All life purged.

    Forever.

    Okay, maybe it's kind of sinister after all.

    Either way, Maya has it in her hand now (which isn't fun). The progress bar has finished. She has the mission objective! Now to finish off these minions harrassing Clicky, and Lucion, and they should be done!

Clicky (761) has posed:
Clicky does the logical thing when Maya gets the Scepter.

He runs like hell. He turns and scrabbles down the pillar, running towards the way they came in and diving, darting, and dodging as much as he can to escape getting skewerfied, exploded, spindled, maimed, mauled, mutliated, or otherwise mishandled.

Reiji Arisu has posed:
    Nobody ever expects bullets to the back of the head. Unless you've got eyes back there. But this mage is definitely /not/ an asura of any stripe. Reiji chuckles as he sees the mage drop to the ground. A half second later, and /he/ starts dropping too. The exorcist produces a surprised grunt as the hardened earth underneath him suddenly gives way to dust and rubble. Fortunately, he'd positioned himself in such a way that he was able to kick off the dissolving rocks to stabilize his descent.

...Right into a mob of unsuspecting wizards.

The first thing they see is a blur of red, black and white dropping into the middle of their formation. The next thing is something that wouldn't look out of place in a Kurt Wimmer film. Reiji /dances/ with his guns, moving in a tight, deadly kata. Gunsmoke and other acrid vapors fill the air around him as Gold and Hollywood empty their clips into the surrounding sorcerers.

But once the bullets run dry, Reiji's still in the middle of a bunch of mages.

    Or rather, they're all stuck with a man now armed with two elemental swords in the middle of their formation. One who is now rushing off to neutralize whatever sorcerer or archer or guardian might still remain active.

He leaves Lucion to Glitter. Girl's gotta have her revenge.

Maya has posed:
Maya is deeling more than a little bit in pain from holding this thing. There's something strange first it feels like it might just be some thing of decay, as all things do die? Yet the feeling from it is off to her it's not like Thanatos the ferryman at all. No there's somerthing wrong even as it feels like she carries the death of a world in her hand she hangs on to it, while trying to keep hold of Clicky with her free hand.

Glitter (721) has posed:
Glitter starts to come to once the power leaves her. She still seems more than a little out of it, woozy but not unconcious; it takes her a moment to reorient herself (she has, somehow, managed to get disoriented enough that she has spun in midair and was about sideways, something that she can only manage because of her method of flight).

Righting herself, Glitter draws herself to her full height (5'2, maybe 5'3 counting her hair). She looks indignant at the madness mage more than anything else. "Don't mess with my mind!" she yells. "I'm going to bring you in!"

She's not going to kill him. She doesn't do that. But hitting him with a rock sounds like a very good idea, which is why one of them comes whistling in from the side, pulled by her power - it might have been one of the boulders that got thrown around earlier, or it might have come from one of the rockfalls. Glitter just grabbed the first one she saw that seemed loose. She's not trying to hurt him too badly, but she is definitely trying to keep him out - and so she presses down with the rock, trying to hold the Madness Mage in place and wear him out. A couple more rocks fly into the crowd of remaining mages, just to give Reiji some support. These ones are a little smaller rather than boulders, but it still doesn't really matter - they're effective enough.

Having spotted the sceptre being taken (even though Glitter can't detect magic, she was watching for that), she grins. Now they can get out of there... well, once the rest of the Circle of Thorns are taken down for their arrest. She gives Maya a thumbs-up while she hovers, scooping up some more rocks and keeping them floating in the air nearby, so that she's visibly armed instead of invisibly.

Demetrios Vasilikos (769) has posed:
    Reiji finishes off the minions through a mix of gunplay and swordplay, with plenty of elemental fury mixed in. Almost all are defeated and either left lying around or falling down into the dark depths below. At least the bottom can actually be seen. Looks like there's water down there too. And they already know from experience that defeated enemies get teleported to a jail where they get medical treatment.

    So even Lucion should be okay with the bullets to the head and the boulder weighing down on him until he passes out. The last couple minions, weakened by Reiji's attacks, are easily knocked out by the smaller rocks guided by telekinetic power.

    The demon... The demon was probably not sent to jail. Maybe it was sent to a special demon-holding vault at MAGI or something. Maybe it went back to Hell. Who knows? Either way, Maya and Clicky are OUT of here with the Scepter, and at least a couple people here probably need medical attention as soon as possible.

    The enemies are going away, they have defeated all the bosses, and they have the mission objective! Provided Cory doesn't suddenly decide to collapse the caverns with a random celebratory energy blast or something, then she, Reiji, Maya, Glitter, Clicky, Rebound, and the newly-transformed power house Duke should all be able to get back safely and successfully!

    Dun DUN dun DUNNN... DAH!

    MISSION COMPLETE

http://paragonwiki.com/w/images//3/39/MissionComplete1.ogg