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Marigold	Castle Ostia, near the border with Etruria      On the outer walls of the city.      A pall hangs over the town. Villagers have barred their doors and soldiers grip their spears tightly. There is a redness on the eastern horizon, but it isn't sunrise. The crimson banners of Bern flutter on the grassy plain.      From atop the city's outer walls, you can pick out the tidy squares of their spear-and-archer formations and the outer flanks of their restless cavalry. Siege-ladders and heavy ballistae are in evidence. Low thousands of men, you might guess, against Ostia's high hundreds. Their armor glints in the sun. The Ostian archers who line the walls with you are still dented and scratched from revolt.      Wyvern riders circle overhead, too high for arrows or magic to reach, like vultures ready to pick the castle's corpse clean.      Shanna patrols friendly skies, but the other Ilian mercenaries Hector hired evidently aren't the flying sort; she's alone in the air, and won't stand a chance against two dozen or more Bernish fliers when they close in. Rutger and Dieck stand near the front gate with Marcus and Roy, eyeing the Bernish army uncomfortably through a double heavy portcullis. Lucius, Clarine, and even Elen have formed a crisis team in a secure nook behind the wall.      Somehow, Lilina has wheedled or snuck her way onto the walltop too, along with Lugh, Roy's childhood friend Wolt, and (a temporarily pony-less) Sue as the little army's best ranged attackers. All the others are likely helping somewhere too (minus Hector and Guinivere), even if you can't see them among the mass of blue-clad Ostian guards.      "We can't know if they'll deploy their dragons like they did at Araphen," Roy advises tensely, down on the cobbles behind the front portcullis. "If we're lucky, they'll be scared to do it near Durandal... or near the Etrurian border." "If we're unlucky, Durandal might be our only hope," Marcus adds grimly from behind him.      It's an agonizing fraction of an hour later- enough time for even Rutger to lose their patience and gripe "What are they waiting for?"- when the battle joins.      From inside the walls, it's like a constant dull metallic roar. The shields of Bern's spearmen cover them against archers above as they set up ladders and try to scale; ballista-launched steel bolts and boulders crunch against the walls and carve off chunks of battlements. Here and there, a well-spent spellbook page punctuates the grinding of metal with a whispering of flame or a whipcrack of lightning.      There's a lot the Elites can do to sway the tides of that battle. But it isn't long before a more urgent target presents itself: the wyverns break their circling to plunge down like diving falcons. Most peel to the left and right to pick off the walltop defenders- "Don't give them time to scream," a man's voice says over the howling wind- but three land at the gate, hitting the cobbles hard enough to splinter stone.
Marigold	_______________________________              GALLE THE AZURE RIDER               THIRD WYVERN GENERAL OF BERN              AND CONQUEROR OF LYCIA             _______________________________             MELADY THE CRIMSON RIDER                GUINIVERE'S RIGHT HAND               EX-LEADER OF THE ROYAL GUARD         _______________________________                     NARCIAN                  While Roy staggers back up from the landing shockwave and his immediate guards draw arms, the blue-haired rider dispassionately surveys the crowd. "Melady, the portcullis." "Yes, sir!" "Narcian, kill this rabble." "Ehehehe! Gladly, Ga-- Y-YOU?! General Galle, we're outmatched! We must--" Narcian clutches his chest in horror. "Then I'll do it myself."      While 'Melady' dismounts to pull the portcullises' locking lever and her wyvern wrenches the inner one up with brute strength- she's got the beast well-trained- Galle spurs his wyvern to launch back into the air, swoop back down, and converts the twenty-foot plunge into a powerful hurl of his leather-lashed spear. Rutger narrowly deflects it away from Roy, but then Galle yanks the spear's binding strap to turn the thrust into a scything swing, whipping it across the gate's guards in a disorienting blizzard of disjointed strokes that leave a dozen Ostian guardsmen staggered or downed and bleeding.      Finally it returns to his hand with a dangerous flourish. "Show me what he's afraid of."      https://youtu.be/GbJC1Cw0gdo
Dysnomia	It'd been a very long time since Dysnomia needed to get familiar medical tools like she had here. And even then, at home, she'd have been left in a medical bed, or perhaps had injections of medicine made part of her implants' schedules. This whole business of bandages and gauze was entirely new to her. And quite unwelcome.     She'd no need of making her way through the warpgate--she'd been here, trying to recover from her altercation with Durandel, with limited success, offering Blemishine a cold, distant stare whenever she saw the knight handling the blade.     Most of the camp didn't even know what had happened--some trial, by the sword, perhaps?--and Dysnomia appreciated how those that HAD seen it seemed quite willing to keep it all to themselves. When the horns sounded through the camp, she stumbled out of her tent, grumbling quietly to herself.     She'd gotten that ragged cloak of hers mended--she'd grown somewhat attached to it--and the poor Ostian tailor that she had accosted with another lump of unrefined silver had insisted on doing more for the small fortune than just closing the tears.     This left her looking less out of place among all the others, now. She'd talked them down from a dress to a short tunic, with leggings.     She stood on the battlements, long before the battle started, watching the approaching Bernish forces--and the guarded lands of Ostia--with keen eyes.     "...Stars." Dysnomia growled, looking up at Shanna in the sky. "A front of one is no front at all..." Blade clashed, shouts and screams rang through the air.     For a brief moment, Dysnomia just stood there, chewing on her lip.     She opened her hands. Closed them. Breathed out. Smoke coiled around her feet, and she knelt down, on one knee, hands pressed into the stone of the battlement below her.     She was gone.     A contrail cut up from where she stood, through the air, toward where wyverns swarmed around Shanna. She touched one. There was a FLASH. It turned again, at a sheer angle, ignoring all laws of momentum. FLASH.     At each approach, Dysnomia's hands? glowed with burning energy as she cut through the sky, intercepting any wyvern she could catch with terrible violence.
Lilian Rook	'We can't know if they'll deploy their dragons like they did at Araphen'     "If they do, then apologies to Blemishine, but I'll be taking Durandal." says Lilian, without even half as much hesitation as to imply she had to think about it. "I don't tolerate desperate gambles, and I don't do 'hoping'."     Standing atop the walls, fully armoured, sword in hand, side to side with knights and lords, Lilian has only a miniscule fraction of mind to spare for the fact that she'd never in her life actually expected to be in a situation like this. It exists as a single warm coal of humming excitement, buried under the weight of practical issues before her.     She hasn't counted, but she's fairly certain the Bernish army outnumbers Ostia ten to one. The walls are of only short-term benefit, given the siege machines. Bern has largely sent less experienced men to attack Lycia, but Ostia's are already fatigued and afraid. Despite the number of Elites present, she can't shake have you ever held your fighting stance for an entire day? from her mind, seeing those thousand some spearmen. No one here is immune to several thousand bodies and ten times as many arrows. And the thought of losing one of Roy's caravan in the chaos, even with a victory, fills her with chest-sick, heart-thumping dread.     An odd thought enters her mind.     §The last time I felt this way, I was twelve years old, and it was the third and final book in the series. I didn't really grasp at the time why I resonated so much with the final protagonist's feelings at the wall; saved by the faerie, to protect his people, but unable to stand the touch of iron, and so incapable of bearing arms in their defense . . . that particular feeling of helplessness, having to simply pray things wouldn't go like they seemed they always would, made more sense to me over time. This is how I felt when I read that.§     §Even in this situation, though, I don't feel like him at all. Funny that by the time I got here, I'd stopped carrying steel at all.§     §If only I hadn't set my standards for victory so ridiculously high. Four years ago, this would have been easy.§     "The ballistae are an unignorable problem. The wall is about all we have fending them off. If they overrun the town, it'll be a nightmare to beat them back. We have to keep them on the other side of it for long enough to defeat them." Lilian says. Despite her professional checklist rundown of the situation, she does it without a centering breath or a reversion to her crisp and mechanical affect. She merely touches her scar.     "If they're still Bern's greener troops, they'll be susceptible to a rout. Taking out their leaders and demoralizing their front line with massive shock casualties is probably our only option. If their captains are killed or captured, their siege engines disabled, and they've taken a high number of casualties before breaching the wall, they'll almost certainly retreat."     Lilian tilts up her head to watch the wyvern riders. Fewer than she'd expected. A small blessing. "We can leave the wielder of Durandal to handle those. If they need help getting into the air, we should leave it to Parsons or Dysnomia. They'll have to dive to attack, but we don't want Shanna up there by herself."     Laying her hand on the crossed belts of hardcarry cases at her waist, Lilian looks to the rear edge of the Bernish formation. "I'll handle the ballistae. They should have no idea of my capabilities, so they'll be unable to stop me from immediately inserting into their vanguard. I'll set fire to each of them and see what I can do about the archers. Returning back will take a lot out of me."
Aidan Proudpick	There is a gleam in Aidan's eye, finally. A sign finally given from the world. This mission is vital. And he'll give it all of his body and soul. But there's something else. An renewed energy. Vigor. Fire courses through every inch of him, but it burns brighter than ever. There's a grin on his face. White wisps of life breath drift from his lips. As a rebel soldier, Aidan had picked up the most vital skill. Battlefield fortification. Hands flat, white wisps of magic flow from his mouth, each one following the guiding of his hands to form into chest high walls around the battle field. Along the sides to prevent enemy flanking of their defensive position. Along the field in staggered positions to prevent spearmen from marching in even lines. Standing on top of the castle walls, 'beastman' armor, lightly armored and flexible, Aidan flexes his fingers within his leather gloves. He's their defense. Their guardian. They shoot, he pushes up walls. He has a medkit in his bag. His orange eyes glint. For the first time in a long time, Aidan feels heroic. He feels he deserves to be here. "Show me what he's afraid of." "Gladly!" He bends back out of the way of the spear, using one of his bucklers to carefully deflect it. He's on the wall tops, it was a long shot anyways. A deep breath. Drawing in as much air as he can. Then, he lets it all out in a thunderous CRACK, a booming rush of air that pushes out from his mouth as he shouts, "FOR HOME AND HEARTH!". It's like a mighty hurricane, a rumbling swirling wind storm that pushes at the soldiers climbing ladders.
Flamel Parsons	Flamel Parsons is blasting from the top of the wall, making sure to keep track of Lugh and keep him protected in all this while frequently calling on him for psychic backup. No sunglasses today -- he's in tactical Psychonauts gear, which means the full-body jumpsuit that keeps his senses sharp and his thoughts flowing.     He'll need it. Amidst his determined efforts to keep Lugh safe, one of those walltop attackers knocks him violently over the edge by smashing straight through his shield projection. Making a motion like yanking the ripcord on a parachute, a thought bubble of bright white glowing energy emerges from him, blunting the falling damage and leading to a tightly practiced tumble into the courtyard near the gate. "Ghhh--!" He grunts when he thuds heavily into the ground. The shield's still flickering when it comes up to intercept the swinging blade, and the impact leaves him stumbling hard. But, strangely, there's the sound like a flywheel building up speed...     Feet plant on the ground, firmly as if bracing against recoil. "GALLE! STOP!" He calls out. "This isn't right! Nothing is right about causing all this violence and pain, everywhere in the continent! The kind of person you have to be to do this much violence at this scale, nobody should ever want to become that. Don't forget that it's almost never too late to make another choice and pull back! Because I'm going to fight hard for everyone's sake, but I really can't guarantee we'll win against this if you don't!" This isn't some declaration that the heroes are so powerful that he should back down and recant his ways. It's just Flamel, with typical weird honesty, using every option, and that's including an urgent pleading.     It's also including plenty of violence. Flamel's two first fingers clap to his temples. The rubble smashed up by the impact of the wyvern riders rises in the grasp of shimmering translucent psychic hands, and he slings them in a wide over-head arc to smash down on Melady -- or between her and the locking mechanism, anyway. Flamel doesn't let up on Galle though. The flywheel sound reaches a peak, and a pulse of orange surges along his whole body, to his shoulders, down his arms, across his head -- and to a point on his forehead, no more than maybe a centimeter wide.     Those firmly planted feet turn out to be necessary. The recoil on Flamel's brain of firing those psi-bolts is so hard that it nearly blasts him backward off his soles. The rapid-fire blasts are like a heavy machine gun you'd find mounted on some huge vehicle, not a personal weapon at all.
Trudy Grimm	Grimnir is nowhere to be found. Likely in some safe location with the other non-fighters accompanying the Lycian contingent towards Etruria.     With the rising tensions of the coming battle, though, Trudy has been busy infusing small bits of disorganized bones with the Rune of Death, creating a faint point of sickly glowing green on the castle wall visible from the field where the Bernish forces approach. A trick she'd used once before, back in the Urals, against a far more magically adept foe.     The curse forced into the bones twists them from small white fragments into dark collections of thin spines, like the needles of a cactus some three to five centimeters long. She's clearly not done and not satisfied with the result when the enemy line starts to move into range; but it'll have to do.     With a sigh, Trudy quickly stuffs the result into the skeletons of blackbirds covered in feathers, then sets them loose. A large flock of such undead birds scatters from the Ostian battlements out over the Bernish forces. When shot with arrows, they burst into shrapnel of Death-cursed bone. If ignored; they scatter these sinister caltrops in a more measured, strategic fashion.     The wyvern riders descend right as she sets the birds loose. Beside her, the Black Knight-- restored from his brief encounter with Durandal-- whirls around and presents the flat of his sword to Galle's flying spear. The blade protects the witch, though permits the spear to bite into the Knight's armor against his side. > "Melady, the portcullis."     "Tend to that, would you?" Trudy commands, turning her attention to the encroaching army. Whatever additional plan she has in mind is gonna take a minute.     The Black Knight responds without words but by simply leaping off the battlements entirely. The colossal greatsword he wields is brought down, leading with its mass and putting his entire armored weight behind it as he descends on Melady's wyvern roughly where the neck connects to the shoulders.
Madeleine Cadrasteia	BEFORE     Madeleine took up a position on the wall, anxiously chattering about the weather with anyone who'll listen. Once again she finds herself in the wrong kind of war - no epic clash of a few mythic beings, but thousands of ordinary men marching on an entire city. Torrie has come as well, clad in her muscled plate armor, nervously pacing inside the gate-house.     NOW     The wyvern general and his bodyguards descend, despite Madeleine's arrows. Melady dismounts and sets to work on raising the portcullis - and finds the mechanism quickly freezing over from a creeping frost descending the chains. A glance upward confirms that Madeleine has turned her attention away from the wall, and is in fact plummeting boot-first toward the knight. It's an easy enough attack to avoid with a hop backward, but that's what Madeleine wants, to force the rider away from her objective. Drogrung's great ghostly claw swipes at Melady as the huntress recovers from her landing.     Madeleine flicks her wrist and the bow cracks like a whip, straightening into its spear form. There's still a chunk missing from the haft where Durandal struck, but mortal weapons could only dream of exploiting such damage. For now the huntress focuses solely on keeping Melady at bay, using her weapon's reach to control the area around the portcullis mechanism. If that wyvern wants to fight it'll have to let go of the other portcullis, right?     Up above, Torrie charges out of the gatehouse with a mighty bellow, hoping the shock factor of an eight-foot-tall horned warrior will dissuade some of the ladder-bearers. Even so the hooked ladders begin to raise, and Torrie does what she can to help by smashing at the ladders with her heavy axe.
Angela	The news that Bern's ready to heavily press on their newfound allies is enough to result in Lobotomy Corp sending more Agents to lend a hand. Gebura is feeding tactical advice to the team but at this point she can't leave the facility to lend a hand no matter how much she'd prefer to charge into battle herself. She's already tied to the Seed of Light system. Tennant and Ceri are on the walls. "I admit I'm not really sure of our tactical reason for being here. These people can't help our project." "The Dame Commander wnats to help. That is enough for me." Ceri says. "Try to remember this is a real life or death situation this time." "Eheh... I know that--that's why it's weird. I get with Rita and the Leviathans but there's no risk to the multiverse here. Even the Commander would understand us not interceding here. Oh--I'm not afraid I just worry we've lost the plot a bit. The Lady won't be able to appreciate our fruits if we stumble this close to the finish line." "Lady?" Ceri shakes her head. "Don't want to know. If Lilian herself isn't enough, then the situation puts a bad taste in my mouth--is that enough for you?" Tennant rubs the back of their neck. "Well--can't say I'm a fan of conquering through violence and fear. Better to conquer with a love that is so terrifying you want to be engulfed by it, right?" Ceri lets out a small laugh. But they aren't the only ones. Two Disciplinary Team Agents that haven't been in the field for a while. Shajo and Nonon arrived as last minute reinforcements, making it to Ostia just in time to join the battle themselves--the extra time it took for the battle to begin has at least allowed these two to arrive before the fighting and not after. Shajo is wearing a new set of EGO Armor. Those that battled or otherwise recognize Carrion can tell from a look what the EGO Gear 'Smile' is drawn from. his suit has that same black and bone-web-like strands with numerous facial masks popping up around his chest and arms. In his hands is a large mace of similar material, with masks on one end and a large set of bloody teeth on the other. Over his right eye is yet one more mask. "Nonon. Gebura has instructed us no casualties this time. Tennant won't be useful on a field with this many enemies so it'll be up to us." Next to him is Nonon, healed up and wearing her usual batch of EGO gear from the King of Greed. She is grinning widely and bouncing lightly on her feet. "Eheh, we've survived standing against the Red Mist... so I think we can pretty much do anything!" Nonon punches the air a few times with her gauntlet. "Don't get too excited. This is a battle where we're on the backfoot like before." Shajo says. "...But we're stronger since then too, aren't we?" ''Show me what he's afraid of.'' "ALRIGHT!!" Nonon shouts, running right towards Galle, throwing a large punch with her Gauntled Hand out of pure excitement towards the upper body of his wyvern! "Got the power of TWO Alephs here!" Nonon boasts. "Let me know when you recognize our power, arright?" Shajo is slower to join the battle but is approaching with intent to support Nonon. MEANWHILE Ceri sees Melady join the battle and she raises her rapier with one hand while keeping her EGO Gear in her offhand, approaching her (Tennant is taking potshots at wyverns). "He called you Melady." The Ex-Director says. "Guinivere mentioned you." She points the tip of the blade towards Melady and darts forward towards her, going for her arm closer to the wyvern she'd been riding to try and prevent her from getting back on top. "I won't forsake my oaths like the people of this world seem so eager to. Engarde."
Ru Li Cheng	A burden.      A failure.      Weak.      Inexperienced.      'You've been having a hard time.'      'I doubt you will even grant life to the worms.'      Ru Li Cheng has no place here. Oh, yes, of course there's always a place for someone who can use a bow, and he's had one (a primitive one, of course, not a Yinghuan bow) in his lap since he smelled the enemy coming. There's always a *use* for someone on the battlefield if they can do that much. But he knows, damn well, that a god in a wheelchair may be a god, but he's still in a wheelchair. He's still a liability.      And a smile hides that trembling in his heart fairly well, at least to humans who can't see within him, who can't hear his innermost thoughts. A smile hides how well he knows he doesn't belong here, how even as an Elite he can't be called strong, how he knows he's been play-acting this whole time. What has he done in the Multiverse but make people take pity on him, feel sorry for him, like him? Be inoffensive and weak? Failed, over and over, to accomplish what was important to him? Supported the victory of others but never managed to be victorious himself?      The tension, the silence, gives him too much time to think. Again he considers how much harder it was to think these thoughts when he was trapped in his palace doing paperwork. How much easier it was to dream of glory and living a life and being a hero than it ever actually is.      His fingers have been tense around the bow the whole time.      Lilian comes up with a plan. Self-assured. Ready. Confident. Ready. How much he wants to be like that. How much he has always wanted to be like that. So ready to stand alone.      "I," Ru Li says finally, raising the bow in his lap and drawing an arrow, "Will help. If all I can do is ensure that you have a little more strength to return, then...then that is something I can do."      He can leave Narcian and Galle to those who can stand, who can really, properly fight, with more than just strength. When Lilian prepares to go out Ru Li is already drawing back the bow, pulling on it with enough strength, ready to-      -the bow shatters in his grip, bursts across his face, sprinkling splinters as the arrow fumbles out of his hand.      Even something like that.      Fine, then.      He scoops up the arrows in his hand and starts throwing them. He hurls them like javelins, like lightning from the sky, at the ballista support teams - those most likely ready to put out fires and force Lilian to expend more energy to suppress them. What arrows he has left he hurls at the odd archer in her path to spare her a cut or two.      And then he's out of arrows, and moving to grab any fallen weapons he can find, anything to throw - swords, spears, whatever he can to continue to support her. To do the very little bit that he's able to support someone else's victory.      As is always his role. As he was made to do. Swallow the bitter pill and do what needs to be done.
Lilian Rook	Lilian falls to fretful silence. What else is there to say? Odette is a capable medic. Mia is suited to mass warfare like this. Trudy can supplement them with troops of her own. But the rest of the group is suited to single combat, small units, or recon and ambush. Several are injured. Proudpick has no Aegis. Petra no longer has the Kana. Angela can't yet send someone like Gebura. And Lilian herself once again wishes for the umpteenth time that she could have--     'Don't give them time to scream'     §Ah. They said just the right words. Now I'm livid.§     'Show me what he's afraid of.'     It takes a lot for Lilian to grit her teeth, squeeze her grip, and slowly sheathe her sword again. It takes barely any less to trust that the mob of Elites at the scene will be able to handle this on their own. Somehow, whe manages to keep it down to the words that are for her and not for him. "I'm afraid I can't. You won't be able to see it." And then vanishes.     ...     It's a long way to travel, but Lilian is still completely fresh. Declining to go at Galle with full force has saved her an enormous amount of energy. Lilian lands somewhere on the grass, beside a resting ballista, likely starting its crew, with an unchallenged swiftness that only she is capable of. Scattering a fistful of runestones into the siege machine is as quick as she can make it; the quantity is excessive to the point of wasteful, but the resultant magical firebomb is what she thinks necessarily intense to prevent bucket brigades from saving the machine.     Then on to the next. And the next. Lilian maneuvers through the siege line as swiftly as she can, chancing as little time in the open as possible. Relying on surprising and disorienting the men in the vanguard, depriving them of opportunities to shoot at her, she pushes herself to bomb each of the enemy machines as the most valuable tactical opportunity she sees anyone having at the moment. Midway through, she has to acknowledge the fact that she'll have no area-denial tools left for the ground troops-- and then pushes on anyways.
Shinmyoumaru Sukuna	There are a lot of things Shinmyoumaru Sukuna doesn't do well, but wait patiently is absolutely one of them. Shanna isn't quite the only one in the air, because Shinmyoumaru's inability to sit still means that she took her bowl to the skies with Shanna, despite some growing discomfort with wars on this scale. People have seen her hover around plenty, but Shinmyoumaru doesn't always go *up* quite this high and this may be the first time she's been thought of as a truly flying combatant. But she is, when she wants to be! So there. From up high, Shinmyoumaru has a good view of the area. She could fly up to the wyvern riders, high out of reach, but she's pretty sure going up alone (or even with Shanna if she could convince her to) would just get her shot down. So instead every once in a while she uses her needle to fire a flurry of magic bolts off a repeated thrust, holding it like a spear, though they're far enough away - out of arrow reach - that she's more an irritation to them than a threat; they have plenty of time to dodge while the bolts get there. It's enough that she feels less like she's wasting time before the battle properly begins, though. It's when battle is joined that Shinmyoumaru turns her eyes downward. It's the chaos that hits her first and foremost. She'd be more comfortable with duels or skirmishes than *this*. The scale, if she's being honest, still frightens her; she doesn't want to be part of it, and so her attacks keep her out of reach; energy darts and bolts from her flying bowl, mostly, as she does not want to be bogged down in an army. The occasional arrow that comes her way, she wards off with her hat-lid used as a shield, or - once - with the Miracle Mallet, smacking it and shrinking it to the size of a pin. That one actually hits her, or at least tangles in her robe without quite working its way through, which is about the same thing. She'd probably have been content to stay up there if it wasn't for the diving wyverns. Shinmyoumaru is, even scaled up to her four-foot height, not really very big, and one of the diving wyverns clips her on the way down - whether on purpose or accidental she doesn't know and frankly it doesn't make much difference. The flying rice bowl spins until Shinmyoumaru regains control of it, now dizzy and slightly battered from being knocked around in the air. She dives after the three coming in to the portcullis proper - Galle, Melady, and Narcian - striking from behind. Her target is actually Galle with his whipping spear; she comes out of the sky, wielding her oversized needle like a lance in a dive of her own, a visible magical turbulence building around the lower edge of the bowl like churning water. The wave breaks as Shinmyoumaru impacts (or passes by with a failure to strike), spraying what appear to be simple shapes of fish out at Galle - but the fish, too, are made of energy, the strangest-shaped danmaku she's yet used.
Odette Raskins	Among those hanging out with the crisis team at the wall is one Odette Raskins, dressed in her recognizably navy blue EMT uniform and carrying that chunky duffel bag of hers that's host to all sorts of life-saving supplies that she's used more than she can remember at this point. Judging from the numbers she's seeing around today, she's expecting that unknown number to go even higher, and it's only through slow breathing exercises that she's not hyperventilating at all right now. It's hard not to think about how terribly things could go, but at least her breathing is steady. There's too many people she cares about here not to keep her focus and do her damnedest today. Too many people she likes. Too many people she respects. Too many people that the world still needs to survive. "W... We'll be okay. Worst case scenario... I-I'm trained to carry people and keep running. Then I can bring them back to Father Lucius and the other healers to get them fixed up so..." So they can save as many lives as they can on this side of the battle. There's lives on both sides of all of this, though, and there's the very real chance she might have to kill someone today, if it comes down to it. The thought of it alone is sickening enough to stop Odette from finishing what she's saying, but... She can do it, if she really needs to, right? So what if she's never actually done it before? It sounds so easy when everyone else talks about it. All it takes is one syringe and enough chemicals. Enough poison. Even just a lucky push if she finds something sharp on the ground. She really hopes it won't come down to that, but it's already looking less likely as the battle begins with that dreadful noise outside the gates. "Th... That's it, then. I'll see you later for the next lesson, Father!" She shouts out to Lucius, hands still trembling against her bag's strap as she pushes herself out of that safety-esque nook. Odette rushes right on out of there just in time for the trio of wyverns to announce themselves with that mighty crash, make their standings amongst each other known, and... "Wha? Y-you're..." Odette starts to utter at recognizing Narcian, but gets interrupted at realizing what Melady's doing. "Wait! That's the-" She finds herself distracted again just in time for Galle to rise and fall, his spear-lashing maneuver drawing a terrified yelp from her as it whips out all over the place. She dives under the first swing and hastily gets up to start running, but the follow-up slices across her side and sends the EMT tumbling to the ground. That instinct to keep diving, thankfully, saves her from even deeper cut, but it still hurts rather terribly. "Show me what he's afraid of." How the hell is she supposed to do that when she's afraid of all three of them?! The best she can manage is, in her panicked state of mind, is picking up the tip-side of a broken spear and hurling it as hard as she can at Galle. She doesn't wait to see if it does anything, though, as she starts scrambling around to check on those injured guardsmen. She needs to assess their injuries quickly. There may be those can help with a quick application of gauze directly to those surface wounds, and Odette sucks in a pained breath as she rips a heavily medicated bandage out of her jacket's inner pocket to halt her own bleeding by smushing it right on. There's others that she can help get back onto their feet just by shoving some painkillers into their mouths. The ones she's really worried for, though, are the ones that can't get up even with bandages and drugs, since she doesn't even know if there's an opportunity to carry them back to relative safety yet.
Desire Stars	Kamen Rider Geats, not Ace Ukiyo, peers out over the wall, having posted up with the army's other ranged attackers. The Magnum Shooter, in its rifle configuration, weighs heavy in his hands. His white armor and twin-tailed white-red scarf might inspire a little confidence in his allies, if he weren't observing in such concentrated quiet.     "Your marquess talked a big game about the food," says Geats to one of the archers. "If we lose this city before I have the chance to try it myself, I'm sending you guys the invoice for the contractors I hired." He lightly claps the archer on the shoulder, then shoulders the rifle in the silence before the battle.     Kamen Rider Na-Go, meanwhile, holds up her Armed Propeller, squeezing the handle to fly up and meet Shanna. Her matte-black armor is easy to spot, on the rise-up, and Shanna is probably pretty familiar with the buzz of the rotor by now. "Shanna! We'll watch each other's backs, right? Just like before." She sounds like she's reassuring herself, as much as the army's sole other flier.     Battle breaks like a thunderclap in the stillness of night, on a scale Na-Go has never seen before. As most of the wyverns break left and right to harass those on the walls, the cat-themed Rider's helmet bobs with her cry: "Left!" There's no tactical expertise there, no particular reason--but if there's one thing Na-Go has learned in her time here, it's that hesitation is costly. She flicks the Propeller Buckle in her belt, breaking left to ward off one of the wyvern riders swooping towards the wall.                                PROPELLER STRIKE!                                     The blades of the propeller whirl faster, disturbed air almost visible as a faint distortion. Na-Go blasts forward, through the aftermath of Dysnomia's bright purple flash, like a bullet through a thick curtain of smoke. Held out in front of her, the Propeller Buckle is not only a means of flight, but a weapon, its sharp blades making a torpedo out of her as she beelines a wyvern to crash head-on into it.     Geats, meanwhile, rains precision strikes down on the archers in the back, but however good his aim is, he's markedly on the side of the outnumbered force--the sound of a ladder clacking against the wall draws his attention away from the scope on the Magnum Shooter with a grunt of determination. Those shields are a problem--that is, unless one is aiming at something not strictly protected by them.     Geats leaps onto the lip of the wall, sprinting across the crenellations, his right hand extended while the left cradles the rifle close. A soft hiss-whir-click sounds, and from his right bracer there emerges a mounted, articulated cannon, blasting downwards--not at the soldiers on the ladders, per se, but at the visible *rungs,* turning them from easily navigated means of conveyance to perilous pairs of stilts, as white-hot laser bolts scream through the rungs.     Geats is clipped, by the claws of the wyvern Na-Go focuses in on, saved just as much by her wild tackle as by his placement of the rifle following the rake of the beast's claws. *Close call. She's getting better. Lilian has the ballistae. Her idea about a rout... too good not to try.* "Here it goes."      Balancing on the lip of the wall with the grip of the rifle hooked onto the crenellation, he gives Na-Go a little salute, before unhooking himself and sliding down the wall to meet the three who'd landed just a moment ago. Show me what he's afraid of.     "Yo, Narcian."
Desire Stars	Overhead, Na-Go is struck by a box, falling out of the air. She catches it, only by virtue of cradling it with her free arm to stay airborne.                              SECRET MISSION CLEAR!                                    The lid flies off, in the rushing air--but the bright red Boost Buckle remains snugly in its protective foam.
Blemishine	BEFORE:     Inside Ostia, after the announcement of Bern's army approaching, yet in the time when the defenders are all still rushing to their positions, a certain blonde-haired girl stands silently in the armory. Resting in front of her is the black-red blade that they brought back, waiting for someone to take it up for the coming battle. She hasn't yet, as her mind is still echoing with various things said before.     Among them...     Don't let it go to your head.     "I won't, Miss Rook," Blemishine quietly says to herself, with no one else around to hear. "I'm no legendary hero... and hardly a knight. I'm far from even being the only one worthy of wielding it. You, or Rutger, or Dieck... I know perfectly well it'd be more effective in your hands. But even if it only ends up being for this battle, I want to make good on what I said to Roland. What everyone said to him. And that he can rest, and let the past be the past."     Her hand grips onto Durandal's hilt, and just as before, she hefts it up easily. Eyes study it for a moment, and then her other hand grasps onto the hilt and brings it vertical. "... 'To be a knight is to be the noble light that illuminates the land'. I'll have to try to live up to that motto in my own way today."     She steadies her trembling grip with a heavy breath.     ... NOW:     Don't give them time to scream.     Atop the walls, a white-armored warrior bodily gets in the way of several Ostian guardsmen about to be either beaten off the battlements or pierced through with descending swoops. The bulky heft of Durandal is used as a shield in its own right, catching a lance thrust forceful enough to make her feet slide back, before pushing it back to offset the rider.     --and in the same motion, Blemishine allows the weapon to guide her sword arm in a wide slash to try and rend his wyvern right through, leaving the same white-hot gash along its body as it carved into Dysnomia before. Without his steed, he'll be falling back onto the far side of the wall - no longer a threat, if he even survives the drop in the first place.     Before he even begins tumbling away, she's already sprinting down the length of the wall to do the same to every other assaulting wyvern rider in her path, all the way up to leaping meters off the stone to cut through them mid-air, the weapon intent on finding its burning hot mark each and every time, before she drops back down at a running sprint.     She's help keeping the walls from falling for now. She won't be able to do that forever, even if she wanted to.     Because her eyes are on the gate, where she saw the trio drop down right on top of Roy and the others. Coming in like that, without any fear, they'd have to be...     She doesn't slowly and steadily fight her way across the walls closer to the gate; she carves a path that way.
Petra Soroka	For every two steps forwards in managing her insecurity in her place within the shared trauma of the war, it's been one step back, for Petra. She was bitterly leaky about missing the earlier betrayals, and then fulfilled by being present for the Ostian civil war. She missed out on bonding and missions, and then was present for conversations with Guinivere and Roy and the retrieval of Durandal-- and then abandoned when psychics came into the picture there too, like usual.     It's a constant push and pull that she's familiar with by now. Enough repeated coincidences can *only* be correlation, and she's spent her entire life struggling against the headwind of being normatively sheltered; separated from the experiences of the rest by the abstract forces that conspire against her. It's frustrating, but what's a girl to do about it besides keep doggedly returning to the battlefield?     So this-- the large scale clash of armies, defending the walls of their hard-fought and idyllically scarred refuge against their collective foe, underdogs and offworld saviors at once-- should be perfect, right?     Petra thinks so at first. She scrambles up to the preplanning tactical meeting vibrating with poorly concealed excitement, nervous as it is, eagerly accepting any tasks requested of her and doing her best to contribute her own suggestions: "If they do sic the dragons on us, do we have a way of getting Blemishine over to them, um, quickly? Do you have a fast enough response yourself, Blemishine? Or maybe..." Petra looks at Lilian for a few seconds, visibly contemplating the possibility of Lilian carrying Blemishine's time-stopped body over to the threat. "... Teleportation?" Lilian suggests taking Durandal, and-- "Oh thank god, that's way better."     Ten minutes into waiting and Petra's growing nervous fidgeting has been deflected into shifting her weight back and forth between her feet, and expending a cigarette far faster than normal. Rather than tossing the butt onto the ground-- *here*?? Absolutely not. Lilian would kill her, and it's lame anyways to litter in a world where everyone else isn't already doing the same-- she awkwardly presses it to her compact mirror to the muffled cry of "Why??" Watching from the walls in anticipation of those thousands of soldiers opening fire on them is... somehow, despite the orders of magnitude lower numbers, reminiscent of but more acute than the feeling of standing on the deck of the Union Busan while the seas seethed with monsters, a thought that unsettles her in a way she doesn't know how to conceptualize. Vibrating excitement settles and condenses, tight and airless in her chest, not exactly into fear, but not eagerness either anymore. That might be the *most* in-tune with the collective emotional tone she's been so far. "What are they waiting for?"     "Right?!" Petra gasps, releasing a burst of pent-up energy. Nerves translate through of her mouth to tone-deaf jokes she wouldn't crack in any other situation. "They could've let me know that I had time to finish watching the episode with Cinder before heading out. Fucking rude."
Petra Soroka	"If their captains are killed or captured, their siege engines disabled, and they've taken a high number of casualties before breaching the wall, they'll almost certainly retreat."     Releasing pressure and then hearing Lilian does a lot to help Petra settle into a more steady stance. She nods during the plan rundown, popping open her morphmetal and letting the metamaterial flow over her wrist and coil in her palm, warmly amorphous until needed.     "I can try the-- oh. Okay. Captains for me, then." Petra weighs the possibility of using Sting Silver to force her way through to the ballistae, before immediately discarding the plan once Lilian elaborates her own role. It really only leaves one thing for her to do, looking out at the army. "Can't do much of anything large scale when it's just me." "Show me what he's afraid of."     Now that Lilian's given her a task and a target, both muddily complicated aspects of the emotional-narrative weight of the battle take the backseat in Petra's mind. The moment the wyvern riders finally swoop down is the snap of a clapperboard, the signal to perform the role asked of her above anything else. Morphmetal slides between her fingers to flatten into a crude gauntlet instinctually to deflect Galle's spear away from her, even while Petra herself is taken off guard by the telekinetic?-- no, the leash he was swinging the spear around on is right there, her eyes catching it the moment before he yanks it to pull it back to his hand.     Petra's own Silver spear, color matched to the grey suit and trench coat that makes up the *third* ALEPH gear present, stretches out in her hands, slid into ready position before it's even at full length. One of the only unfamiliar faces to Narcian, her eyes still slide past Galle to the skittish loser himself, flickering uncomfortably steadily between his chest, his mouth, and his flop sweat, assessing him like a bullyable piece of meat.     "He's afraid of Lilian." Cold read. "But she's busy, so you're dealing with me instead."     Without a strap to retain her grip on her spear, Petra's move to hurl it at the trio of captains rather than close into melee with them seems like a one-time gambit at first, but halfway through its surprisingly fast path at Galle, it banks at a hard angle towards Narcian's head instead, like a baseball pitched to kill. Immediately after it leaves her hands, she's pulled out the transteam gun, aiming a series of concussive blasts of light around the trio to follow it up.
Marigold	"Mia?! Neon?!" Shanna blurts out, bewildered as they pass each other in the air. That look of confusion lasts even as she starts to work symbiotically: finishing what Na-Go starts by piercing riders and starting what Mia can finish by hitting wings. "We can't stay up here for long! Three isn't a front, eith-- eek!" A wyvern's talons come close enough to nearly give her a haircut. She plunges into the streets below, skimming cobblestones while hotly pursued by a trio of riders.      The Black Knight and Madeleine succeed in stalling Melady's objective- the wyvern instinctively defends her, and she instinctively defends it, lance straining to deflect greatsword and wyvern's swiping tail clashing with Drogrung's claw. "Ghh- Triffin! Careful!" she yells at it while it barrels after Madeleine with open jaws. Her spear lashes for the Black Knight's neck, oblivious to his nature.      "He called you Melady." The Ex-Director says. "Guinivere mentioned you."      Melady's eyes flash over, her gaze suddenly piercingly urgent. "Lady Guinivere?! What have you done with her, blackguard!" As soon as she can pull her spear from the Black Knight, she snaps to an immaculate wary-circling stance against Ceri.      Ru Li may be content to ignore the wyvern riders, but they won't ignore him. Narcian senses a comfortably weakened target and swoops up behind him, awful beast snatching to grab him in its claws. "Ahahaha! You're the little man who gave me grief before, aren't you?" Cowardice sheds immediately when he's no longer the outnumbered one.      Still Trudy, Aidan, Geats, Ru Li, and Lilian's sabotage outside changes the metallic roaring's pitch. The pounding of ballistae slackens towards asystole, and the Bernish soldiers scaling the walls are hindered enough that you might believe Ostia could tenuously hold.      Galle looks at Flamel in contemptuous bafflement for a split second; then he takes half that heavy-duty barrage of empathy and hesitation to the chest, grimaces with a stifled noise of agony, and swerves himself and his mount out of the way of the rest. "Save your breath. My loyalty is to Bern," he hisses. This is a man with a psyche like a polished arrowhead.      Nonon's titanic punch drives Galle's wyvern backwards a few inches on the cobblestones, staggering the beast; then with a tug on the reins it seizes her in its clawed arms, bear-hugging her while Galle stabs downward with his spear.      Still, he doesn't seem quite as much of a heel as Narcian is. When he torques the spear to catch Odette's thrown lancepoint with its haft and eyes her for a split second, Narcian might insult her in his place- instead he says "Get out of here, girl." He isn't keen on finishing the wounded, either, letting her re-bolster the walls with some and pull others to cover.      Shinmyoumaru crashes into Galle's back from his blind-spot and gets the satisfaction of a hissed noise of pain, wyvern thrashing with the danmaku spray, but he doesn't take long to reach behind his back, grab the inchling, and throw her to the ground where the wyvern can threaten to trample her. "Children?" he murmurs only a moment later, disgusted.
Marigold	Durandal cuts eerily cleanly through wyvern-flesh in Blemishine's hands, leaving flame-white incisions and swatting the riders aside on the other side with her bolstered strength. Narcian victimizing Ru Li up on the walls looks up, sucks air through his teeth when he recognizes the blade, and swerves his wyvern away to lash out with arcs of energy from his black-magic-infused runesword: "You dare sully our glorious battle with such dirty antiques? Get AWAY from me, wench!!"      From there the dread of Durandal- and Geats' taunting- spurs him into the same kind of dangerous tantrum that he had in his first battle, while Galle and Melady conserve their energy.      Swinging his blade erratically projects huge arcs of life-eroding energy that lash out in unpredictable directions to bite deep into buildings and stone, and while his wyvern hovering in the air like that makes them an easy target, his own wounds close as the blade's magic drains life from others- the walltop Ostian soldiers make easy fodder for that.      Petra's headshot nicks him close enough to skull-center that he squeals in pain and covers one eye, but even that doesn't take long to almost-fully mend in a target-rich environment like this, and he fingerpaints little blood smears down his own face when his hand lowers. "You dare sully the great Narcian's visage?! Rrhhh, my luck with blondes!"
Marigold	Out in the far distance of the meadowy horizon, past the waves of red troops that beat against Ostia's walls, stands a single (familiar?) figure in purple robes. Only those out among Bern's troops or with a vantage point can glimpse them- her?      Was she always there? Bern doesn't seem to find her presence alarming. The way she raises her hand in a lazy gesture towards the whole city isn't immediately threatening, but it prickles deep goosebump-inducing nerves.
Trudy Grimm	Ostia will hold. Trudy will see to that. She crouches briefly as Narcian's blade sears life-sapping magic across the battlements, then rises back to her feet to stare over the wall. Her eyes dart to and fro, as if searching for something or someone. The Death Rune, Eiwaz, glimmers ominously above Malice; the Grimoire of Despair. After a few moments, the witch's neutral expression splits into a wide sharp-toothed smile.     Shadows cast by soldiers in multiple locations darken, easily missed in the madness of the siege. Dark pools that expand visibly amidst the Bernish forces. Trudy throws her hands out to either side, the Grimoire floating now in front of her, "It's time to come out!"     Simultaneously, a baker's dozen of seemingly random locations deep within and behind the Bernish line basically erupt with swarms of armed, clattering skeletons. Fleshless warriors emerging from the void with swords, spears, bows and quivers of arrows, axes, and the like. Basic troops whose very presence is likely to cause panic and chaos in amidst overconfident Bernish soldiers.     In the Ostian courtyard...     The Black Knight's blow is halted through considerable effort. His feet slam solidly into the cobblestone and he wheels the greatsword back one-handed, then braces the long handle with both hands, his stance tight like the spring of a beartrap. When she rams the spear at the gorget guarding his neck, the tip skips off the angled metal and finds the seam between pauldron and chestplate, sinking in deeply.     He's a dead man. Just by the depth, that completely destroys his left lung. As teh Black Knight wrenches himself off the lance, his left arm goes slack; dislocated. He'll be drowning in his own blood within seconds.     So why isn't there any blood?     Right. He is a dead man.     One-handed, the Black Knight sweeps his greatsword up at Melady while her wyvern goes after Madeleine--     "No killing the woman!" echoes from the battlements.     --at the last possible second, the Knight's sword twists one-quarter turn. It isn't the edge he strikes with but the flat of the blade. Rather that the threat of cleaving Melady apart or splitting her open like a game animal, all he stands to accomplish is swatting her out of her saddle.     At the end of the swing, the Black Knight rams his sword into the cobblestone at his feet. He grips his left arm at the bicep with his right and-- with a nasty, dry crunch-- re-seats the shoulder into its socket. As he retrieves his weapon, his head jerks to the left and right with a series of distressing cracks and snaps.
Ru Li Cheng	In the middle of Ru Li's harrying, he's distracted. He sees a woman, out beyond the Bernish men, and the gesture she makes brings a nervous streak through his senses. It's enough that he tries to focus on her explicitly, to the exclusion of everything else-      -and then he's yanked out of his chair by a wyvern.      He wants to show contempt for Narcian. A coward who ran away when he was confronted with the possibility of defeat. A man who uses what strength he has to make himself feel better by tormenting the weak.      But he's the one out here on the battlefield, being a burden. He's the one who *chose* to come out here in a wheelchair - to force everyone else to adapt to his selfish desire to be useful. *He's* the one who made that decision. He could've stayed back with Hector. Helped protect Guinevere. Done anything other than fight.      The man might be contemptible, but he's competent. Lilian is right. He's competent, and he still survived eight versus one.      Petra's shot goes off. Narcian screams about blondes. Ru Li just looks up at him. His eyes meet Narcian's, briefly, and he finally says something to the man.      "I can taste your blood."      That's it.      That's all he says as his gears and muscles strain, as his body aches, as springs and bones that had been realigning twist to draw on strength they don't have. He reaches upwards to grab the wyvern by the wing-joint.      Who can you pray to when you are a god?      Yourself.      With all the strength he can muster, begging his own body to respond with as much power as he needs, Ru Li moves to rip the wyvern's wing clean off and bring himself and Narcian down to the ground. He hasn't thought out a landing. He'll worry about that later. For now, he just needs to survive destroying himself.
Lilian Rook	<J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "Have you ever drilled with a punching bag or a training dummy? Have you ever stood there until you've given it ten thousand hits, all in one session? Have you ever spent an entire day in your combat stance? Has the amount of times you've fended off in your entire life actually exceeded ten thousand?" <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "For everyone who answers no to any of those, don't wade into the front. You'll get exhausted in thirty minutes at most, then bogged down, overrun, and killed." <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "Commit as many of you as possible to handling Galle. Extract Melady immediately; capture her if you have to. Grimm and Dysnomia are better used handling the massed formations, so don't demand their help unless you absolutely have to." <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "Don't ignore Narcian. If he gathers his courage to attack, he *will* kill Ostian soldiers." <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "Don't forget that he fought you eight to one and escaped." <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "Raskins, save whoever you can, but you need to keep track of Roy especially, and Marcus if you can. If Lucius has to expose himself, shadow him over Marcus. Rutger and Sue can handle themselves, as can Dieck, and Marcus will take care of the younger two." <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "I believe that she is likely to come around to Guinivere and Elen, rather than stick with those two, once it becomes obvious that Bern can be defeated." <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "If she could be trusted to side with Bern and duty over Gunivere and personal bonds, wouldn't she have been sent after her, and not Narcian?" <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "I don't take Zephiel for a fool." <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "We need every ally we can reasonably get, and losing big names within the Bernish military, especially to desertion, is an opportunity to damage the army's morale quite badly." <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "If Galle is killed and Melady deserts at the Ostian front; weakened by civil war and supposedly hopelessly outmatched, right in view of Etruria, it'll make strategizing far more complicated." <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "They'll play it off as her sympathies for Guinivere, but the soldiers will doubt." <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "'What did she see? How was she so convinced? We lost a battle that was unlosable'."
Madeleine Cadrasteia	The wyvern lunges for Madeleine and catches a mouthful of decoy for its troubles. The huntress herself keeps Melady at spear's-length, fencing with the rider's lance, exertion already showing in her grim expression.     "Lady Guinivere?! What have you done with her, blackguard!"     "There's one way for you to find out. Is this what you wanted? Dying far from home, with your lady's name on your lips, not knowing what became of her? Has your heart so blackened in your time apart?"     The huntress leaps high and forward, relying on Ceri and the Black Knight to keep Melady's lance occupied. When Madeleine lands, she's drawn her knife and grapples bodily with the dismounted rider. When her lips draw close enough to Melady's ear she continues. "I could not blame you if that is your choice. But *is it*?" Madeleine punctuates her final question with a shove, intentionally giving Melady room to breathe - and to answer.
Aidan Proudpick	"We need more ammo! Or a hammer! Oh, let's go for a mace! Maces are easy! Get them over to Ru Li!" Aidan calls out down the line of archers. The squirrel is next to him in shield partner formation, whether he likes it or not. "If you fall, Hazelthistle will kill us both," he chides in a jovial tone. That is the last joke he is able to make when Narcian invades his territory and GRABS Ru Li. A snarl comes across his lips as the blade slashes through those around him, cutting into his own breastplate, and cutting down the men he was protecting. Blood seeps out from the wound behind the metal, making Aidan grasp at his chest. He pulls off his leather glove in one hand, tossing it and the arm guard to the floor as he moves. One foot on the wall, a rush of air beneath him to give him enough lift. Aidan LEAPS for Narcian's saddle, to push himself right into a face to face, nose to nose all out brawl. "Those were MY people to protect! And you know what? You are an breezing ugly son of a slug. There can't be a person alive who would put up with your smug STUPID SELF-INVOLVED ATTITUDE!" It's petty. It's nasty. He throws a punch with his buckler once at Narcian's stomach, then uses his other hand to dig his claws HARD into Narcian's face, trying to drag them as far as possible, just enough to give him a nice healthy scar across the face.
Dysnomia	As Shanna cuts into rider's wings, Dysnomia uses the momentary disorientation to tear through them in a curving blur of momentum and mist.     The only way this could be more her element would have been if it was in zero-g, coasting between asteroids. She turned sharply in the air, to make another dive, and a lancing pain ripped through her side, as her wound reopened.     One lucky wyvern rider was spared as the line of smoke zigzagged as Dysnomia's course veered toward the town, at high speed, like a comet--     --But she didn't hit the roof, no. Shifting JUST SO in her downward flight, she slip over the top of it, following Shanna and her pursuers into the street.     She hits the ground with a deafening THUD, leaving a small impact crater in the ground--but before she strikes, in that spare instant, as her body pulls itself back together, one burning line of plasma is in her hand...Two...Three...     She releases the trio of burning knives in a throw after the wyverns, even as she hits the ground with a CRUNCH that sends a rewnewed lance of pain through her body.
Angela	''Lady Guinivere?! What have you done with her, blackguard!'' Ceri smiles, if a bit grimly, at that. It's the kind of response she was hoping for. "Serving her with my life. Don't tell me they told you we ''kidnapped her'' or some bollocks like that--the only reason we're here is because she asked ''us'' for help." She receives some orders from Lilian--she was frankly hoping to lure some of the 'enemy' to Roy and Guinivere's banner herself and if anyone can be convinced, it surely would be someone THIS concerned for Guinivere's wellbeing right? It would spell bad things for this little army otherwise. "Don't expect you to trust us but you'd listen if she told you herself right?" Tactically of course it would be best if she could be convinced with a minimum of fighting. "Bet Tennant even has some video footage happily talking about her opinions on ... culture." But there's no reason to pin your hopes on one tactic when you can reliably bet on both. She tosses her EGO weapon to the side as if it'd get in the way, though she doesn't toss it TOO far. She tries to keep the woman's attention on her. She can't really expect the Black Knight to understand. "Black Knight, stand down if she agrees to come with us." She asides to the undead because she can't leave something like that up to chance, even if she's not talking to him--she's doing exactly what Trudy said to do but she has no idea if it'd work. Instead Ceri fights--more like sport fighting for the time, aiming to keep Melady's blade busy--hoping that the others will go along with it. And so she is pleased to see Madeleine jumping on the opportunity like a true Huntress. She only aims to keep Melady's weapon busy until Madeleine goes for the grapple whereupon she doesn't go for a cheap strike--she is ultimately ruled by honor... But once she's pushed away, Ceri moves in with her rapier again because until Melady changes her course, she can't treat this as a game. "If your oath is to her, let us help you see it through." Ceri says. "Let's restore honor to this land together. Surely you've seen enough now to doubt but she could use someone like you now more than ever." Meanwhile!! Nonon remains not exactly agile. The wyvern is able to get it in her claws and pin her for a moment but she's flexing and pushing against them with all her strength to break free. "C'mon, I heard from Ceri! These would hardly be the first children Bern killed! Nor would they be the last!" Nonon shouts. The spear comes downward and Nonon can't really dodge but that's when Shajo catches up, swinging with Smile to catch the spear with the large and horrifying hammer. The mouth opens wide and clamps down on the spear as SHajo tugs the weapon back, hoping to pry it or Galle off the Wyvern using SMile as a leverage--or at least stop him from stabbing Nonon! "To Bern huh? I respect duty to your gang, but you can't imagine this'll be good for Bern on the long run--making very other nation their enemy. Even the ones you scare into submission are gonna look for the way to break Bern's back forever. This war isn't for Bern. It's Zephiel's war."
Flamel Parsons	"Save your breath. My loyalty is to Bern."     Flamel grits his teeth. It is so hard to stay this positive. he has to break off his machine-gun-like assault when a stray swing from Narcian forces him to dodge, slashes in his jumpsuit sizzling dramatically from near cuts. "Sorry! I can't-- I have to try!" He calls out. "I have to do *something*, you know! I have no idea if I can manage a win under circumstances like these, and I'm not even from here so I can't call on some total resolve-- Ghh!" He dives out of the way of a particularly intense slash. "These people, the people of Lycia, people who didn't do anything to deserve this violence, they're counting on me to do whatever I can to stop war like this! So I have to give up pride and be honest about things!"     His shield has recharged enough to let him deploy it at full-strength, giving him a moment to endure the slashes from Narcian -- though he has no counterattack. "I have to ask you all, even earnestly plead, to turn back. Or to go easy on us. Or, if you beat us here, to keep the thought in mind that you could do it at any time, in any way, to any degree. Whatever tiny acts of good I can ask you to squeeze through the cracks. Can you really want this in your hearts? Has it really made you *happy*?!"     He grits his teeth and clenches his raised hands into fists as he gears up for his counterattack... "Why do you think Guinivere defected the way she did, and joined us?! Being the monsters in a war like this, it may be a whole lot better than being dead." The shield breaks deliberately, and Flamel immediately rises out of that, levitating. "But it's still no good, it's no good at all, and it's no way for a decent person to live! LOOK!"     He gestures firmly, aggressively, wildly. To Narcian. "*He* loves this campaign, he *adores* this violence, he's the exact man that human minds invented 'conquest' for -- and Narcian ISN'T EVEN ENJOYING IT!!" He follows that up, of course, with a heavy barrage of airburst confusion explosives meant to break Narcian's tantrum at worst, and mess up the focus of his less-well-trained wyvern at best, in hopes of getting him out of the center stage of this battle!
Shinmyoumaru Sukuna	Shinmyoumaru Sukuna has the minor downside of, after that attack, having to manually brake or the 'water' will carry her along. She reverses her needle, using the eye end to drag along the stone with a screeching spray of sparks. So when Galle reaches for her, she changes her stance slightly, rising up as high as she can before leaning *down*, planting her entire weight very firmly on the needle and pushing against it. The bowl lifts up, 'jumping' overhead and out of his grip; the wyvern still manages to batter it, but as it's in the air and Shinmyoumaru has firm control this time, all this does is slide her back without much pain involved. And now Shinmyoumaru has one of her buttons pushed. "I'm not a child!" she declares, the surest sign that someone actually is. Mentally, she's about fourteen; physically, she does look younger, both because of her height and because she has a round, childish face. (Or wide, perhaps. Kao ga hiroi and all that.) Shinmyoumaru points her needle at Galle, stepping up; planting one foot on the edge of her bowl-boat, which rocks under her weight, and pointing dramatically. "En garde!" she declares, before she rushes him and his wyvern. Fighting Shinmyoumaru in melee is *frustrating*. She darts in and out, lunging with the aid of her bowl before pushing herself away, circling around or simply backing up. It's all the downsides of a skirmish combined with the fact that she's always there, flitting around, jabbing and occasionally cutting. Even without really meaning to, she works with Nonon and Shajo, going high when Nonon goes low or circling around to jab from the side while one of the others tries to deliver a powerful blow forward. Shinmyoumaru is not going to take any damage records here; it's like getting poked by a thousand... well, needles. "Why is Bern even here? Don't you have enough? You keep killing people, for - for *what*? Everyone hates you!" Shinmyoumaru can't imagine wanting to be hated. She can't even get to Narcian at the moment, let alone Melady, even though she said she had a net for her.
Odette Raskins	That split second when Galle looks her way is all it takes for Odette to become aware of her mortality yet again. She flinches for the briefest moment as she both brings one hand up like it'll actually protect her from his spear-slinging techniques while also getting ready to hurl the nearest thing she can at him (a handful of bandages), but lowers both when he... Lets her go? "D... Don't need to tell me twice!" Indeed, Odette isn't the sort to feel insulted as not being seen as a warrior, because she knows she isn't. She's here to keep people alive, after all, and seeing how Galle explicitly isn't actively aiming at those that are already injured has her wondering if he might not be that bad after all. That thought, of course, doesn't last long when she sees Narcian capitalizing on those that are already injured, both before and during this battle. She's not crazy enough to try and save Ru Li from his wyvern, but her own self-preservation instincts start falling to the wayside when she sees him swinging that familiar-looking energy around. "G... Get away from him! He's gonna-" Oh, he's already slinging that dreadful magic stuff all about. With so many fallen Ostians already in the path of those waves, though, she doesn't get a chance to think about her own safety as she starts sprinting for those that haven't gotten struck by those murderous waves yet. She dives for one soldier and shoves hard with both boots to push them (and herself) just narrowly out of the way of one of those vertical slices, then yanks their helmet off and shoves a pill chock full of caffeine and painkillers right into their mouth. "Get up! Leave this dandy guy to us... Uh. Them! Elites!" She practically orders followed by a quick slap to the face for emphasis, then rolls over the soldier to keep them pinned down as another dangerous wave sweeps by overhead. Peeking up at where Narcian is, Odette takes in a trembling breath before scrambling off of that soldier to sprint at one that's even closer to where he's slinging all that life-draining magic. "Down!" Odette calls out as she sees another swing incoming and one of many soldiers still in his weapon's path. She tackles one to the ground, barely keeping her own head in the process, and she goes pale when she sees those soldiers she didn't tackle dropping one by one as the life gets drawn right out of them. "C.. Come on. We gotta-" Odette cries out in shock as she realizes she was too late for this one, too, and she backs off rapidly while trying to find anyone in the immediate area she can actually get out of danger. As luck would have it, she sees another soldier still staggering around in a daze, and she only spares a moment to pick up and immediately fling a discarded sword at Narcian's wyvern before sprinting for that soldier next. "Incoming!" Odette barely gives a warning before ducking forward in mid-run to throw that soldier right over her shoulder, then keeps running/jogging to try and get them to that secure nook with Lucius and the others. It's a convenient time to check on the Father, too, before she can divert course to check on Roy and Marcus as her next stop.
Desire Stars	"Shanna!!"     Na-Go's cry is laced with a desperate undertone, as the pegasus rider is forced to land by three pursuing wyverns. Her right hand feathers the throttle on the Armed Propeller, while her left awkwardly fishes out the Boost Buckle. The DGP-branded box falls to the earth, as Na-Go swivels her Desire Driver to the side. The Boost Buckle, clutched tightly in her other hand, is rammed into the empty slot on the left side. "All I see from Bern is taking! You're not going to take this city..."                          Set! DUAL ON! Get Ready For...                             Na-Go's descent is punctuated by a hardlight mechanical arm that tracks her movement, a set of disembodied red leg armor dragged by its metal fingers through the air to snap over its matte black counterpart.                             BOOST & ARMED PROPELLER!                                 "And you're not taking Shanna!" Na-Go revs the accelerator on the Boost Buckle, its handle looking much like the accelerator on a motorcycle.                                   BOOSTRIKER!                                       Her fall meets something solid, before she meets the ground. It's the seat of the Boostriker, a performance motorcycle enhanced with DGP technology, delivered beneath her in a pillar of blue voxels by that same technology. The sleek red machine roars to life a split second before it hits the ground, its back tire spewing up loose cobblestone. The annelized exhaust pipes along Na-Go's greaves pivot, facing backward and blasting dancing tongue of fire. The added thrust sees the bike clear the rubble from Shanna's landing in a heartbeat. In another, Na-Go has popped the bike into a wheelie, the Armed Propeller forming a supercharged clothesline against the closest wyvern rider.     Na-Go doesn't know how she finds the means to guide the powerful machine--only that she and it are connected, in this moment, each pushing themselves to their limit in service of surpassing it. With a battle cry, she leans forward, sending the nose back to the ground and lifting the back end up, shifting her weight on the seat and wrenching the handlebars to send it into a high-powered spin. The rear wheel is like a wrecking ball, smashing into anything that dares menace Shanna.     The bike whips around, its back wheel squealing on intact cobblestone as she lifts the entire thing into a jump, boosted by the bike's own rearward thrusters. Leaning to one side, she extends her knee in a strike aimed at the nearest rider's jaw, the thruster mounted on her leg firing just before impact to send them flying.
Desire Stars	Outside, Geats is exactly where he wants to be--under attack by a dangerous but infuriated opponent. *Even if I can't capture him, even if he's done a great job of it himself... I can always make him less credible.* The veteran Rider must have heard Lilian. He must have heard her litany of warnings. But...     Kamen Rider Geats is on the frontline, flrting with death. His red lenses are on Narcian, because that's the best way for him to keep the wyvern rider's attention. But he deliberately runs into and out of engagements, forcing Narcian to hit his own men with feats of infuriating acrobatics.     Geats jukes a thrusting spear, swats aside a swung sword, and steps across a veritable path of Bernish helmets, all while taking potshots at Narcian. Even when a rising tide of fists and hand weapons sweeps over his unwilling footstools, Geats manages to avoid and roll with impacts, finding the space within a breath to quickscope with the Magnum Shooter and fire off a bolt at Narcian's sword arm.     He extricates himself from immediate danger with a frontward salto, breaking into a sprint to dodge the retaliatory wave of arrows (and dark lifesteal magic) he knows is coming.
Lilian Rook	Lilian can give the directions, and most of the Elites will even follow them-- a staggering change from not that long ago, she thinks briefly to herself-- but she knows that she's asking for a non-trivial task. Capturing an enemy general is even more difficult than killing one, and Galle alone is used to fighting groups of trained warriors in the way that most of her allies are not. Narcian is at his best in a target rich environment, and Lilian knows that many of the others don't take him remotely seriously. So seeing the battle unfold at the gates, and hearing the stream of updates through her radio, stains her determination with a blot of anxiety, clenched in her chest.     She has to do everything she can here. Lilian knows that. The large number of Elites piled atop the walls outnumbers the enemy generals two or three to one. But as much as others had learned to listen to her, Lilian has not commensurately learned to trust them in return. Unnecessary haste bleeds into her progress. Another siege engine. The wrong case for a second, when surrounded by guards. One too many stones for another, then one fewer for the last. Lilian has to draw her sword and hack through the drawstrings of the last one with a dangerous leaping cleave.     Eliminating that heavy firepower should multiply the lifespan of the walls tenfold. It's an immense relief of pressure on the Ostian defenders that is all but miraculous already. Lilian tries to imagine what it most look like on that wall, seeing the siege engines of the enemy line all go up in fire and splinters in succession like that. It must seem a miracle, she thinks. And still, she can't feel at ease.     §The mages next. There's few enough of them to make a difference by hunting them down. They're spread throughout the archers and their posted guards, but they're spaced reasonably regularly, and I can track them by sensing their magic amongst all these ordinary line troops. Arrows alone aren't a threat to the walls themselves, but even I can't deal with two thousand archers without running out of steam.§     Instead of returning directly to the walls, Lilian swallows the digusting taste of placing a friend's life in near-strangers' hands, and forces herself onward at pace. The weapons she'd prepared already have spared her stamina, so she isn't physically pushing herself just yet. Shutting out the thought of returning to Roy's lifeless body and a dozen excuses-- or Lucius, or even Rutger-- Lilian tunes her senses to the handfuls of magical power scattered throughout the army. Choosing the closest, she steels herself for a longer appearance, and is over there now.     §This is the one battle I get with Bern before they know about me. If we're lucky and take out all three leaders, the soldiery might not report anything conclusively, but I have to assume that the most advantage I'll have is right now. Zephiel had us fighting nothing but turncoats so far, so I should be able to hit and run with relative impunity. Ignore their guards. Target the tomes, then the casters.§     Lilian lunges from the crowd of Bernish soldiers near one caster, skewers their tome with the tip of her sword and flicks it away, then snags an outstretched hand with one of hers and twists to break their wrist. Carrying past, she strikes with the back of her pommel to the side of their head as she dodges away from the soldiers on each side, and skips again. Another mage is slated to lose a hand to a self-burning wound. Another has a tome shot out by Winter Crow and is bodyslammed into unconsciousness. Another is ambushed to be run through in that barely non-fatal fashion, and Lilian simply crushes the book under heel.
Lilian Rook	There's a little lag after each hit and run. She doesn't stop existing when vanishing. Unlike Haru or someone similar, she has to pick a place to go each time, and it's difficult to sense magic when no one is allowed to cast, thanks to the way magic is used locally. In the time she spends surrounded by soldiers on each leap, incidental tackles, and grazing blows from lucky startle reactions, are an inevitability. She fends most of them away, but simply has to trust her armour to take the few that land, and try not to let the pressure of being surrounded by armed bodies build up.     <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "Dysnomia, Shanna, hurry it up with the riders. Tennant, assist them. There are few enough of them for your ammunition supply, and they're the targets where you can make a decisive difference. We need people freed up to attack the massed archers."     Lilian stops only briefly, checking the situation and issuing correction when she's reduced the number of active casters by enough. The sniper should be on the handful of high-value aerial targets. She needs that plasma breath on the masses of archers.     <J-IC-Scene> Tennant says, "--Aye Aye, Dame Commander! What about that advisor lady..?"     The words make Lilian's blood run cold. She scans both ways, startled in a way she can't fully describe, trying to pick out where that woman could have been in the mass-- anywhere, given she'd been some sort of null presence at the Peace Conference-- before realizing the far distance would be more visible from the wall. Taking to a blank space on the battlefield, Lilian leaps up the terrain to get a bit more height, and spies exactly who she dreaded seeing, all the way on the horizon.     <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "Don't engage."     <J-IC-Scene> Lilian Rook says, "I repeat, do not engage."     The orders don't come easily to her. The idea of Tennant firing their first shot of the battle and taking the head off Zephiel's advisor is an attractive one, but she realizes, a desperate gamble-- a hope-- and exactly following her own assertion, Lilian doesn't dare wish for it. Even though she'd never been able to figure out what went on at the conference, something at that moment tells her that she shouldn't risk the idea that the woman is some kind of psychic or magical null.     The possibility that she can't beat her under ordinary circumstances still weighs on her. And Lilian Rook knows better than to fight when she can't shake the feeling she won't win.     Instead, she waits to catch her breath, and see what kind of magic she can sense-- if any at all-- gathered by that outstretched hand. If she is the dragon-summoner, Durandal is an easy answer. But . . .     §Deep breath. You know you have to. If she gets involved, you'll be the only one who can tie her hands long enough to make a difference. You didn't think you'd come out of this easy, right?§
Petra Soroka	Hearing Narcian speak ignites some strange form of advanced bloodlust in Petra, gesturing at him with her transteam gun and ranting to anyone within earshot of her on the wall, breathlessly angry and excited. "*'Wench'*?! Can you fucking *believe* this guy?! What, does he think he's from--" Well, he *is* from at least a rough parallel of the Middle Ages. "Who fucking *says* that?!"     Trust in Lilian supercedes trust in her eyes, though, so when Lilian warns them of Narcian's apparent *hidden* competency, Petra isn't taken by surprise when dark magic pours out of his sword. As pathetic as he looks, this is his *second* time showing his face in a battle. That means something, even besides Petra's dimly unconscious recognition of a 'recurring character'-- it means he got away, and still came back to fight again. Not expecting the Elites to be present, though, says a *lot* about the limits of that competence, and the courage that fuels it. 'Named character' is, in Petra's estimation, not too far off from how Narcian himself thinks of threat, with how eagerly he drains the life force of the massed soliders but quivers at recognizable faces. "Rrhhh, my luck with blondes!"     "I have a name, asshole! It's Petra!" Energy that corrupts life force is exactly what Petra's EGO gear is most suited to defending her against. The faint swimming of her vision and swell of nausea when Narcian's sword sweeps through the air above her is business as usual, when wearing Blue Star's psychic remnants, and out of habit she shields the lower half of her face with its sleeve to further dull its impact.     It is both within Petra's nature, and a logically tactical choice given his personality, to spew insults at him while her morphmetal spear reaches the end of its arc through the air and stalls to head back towards her. It's less within her nature to be shrugging off her EGO trenchcoat while belittling him, stripping until it's held free in one hand. "And honestly, you should be thanking me! I thought the hand over your face look was *great* for you; huge improvement. Mind if I match it on the other side and make it symmetrical? Or is scaring off the 'wenches' just by looking at them better than letting your personality do it instead?"
Petra Soroka	As promised, less like a boomerang and more like a train put in reverse, the spear slices backwards through the air to the opposite side of Narcian's face, coming from directly behind his head. Rather than returning to her outstretched hand, though, she instead holds up the base of her transteam gun, bottle already slotted inside and flipped open upside down. The spear catapults inside, liquidizing on impact and throwing Petra's arm back from the force, and immediately after the cap clicks shut she squeezes the trigger. Black fog glittering with fiberglass silver stars pours down her arm and over her body, exploding in a firework blast to leave her in her black and yellow Kamen Rider armor, weaponless with only the previously-shed trenchcoat in her hand.     Thin ribbons of morphmetal drip off of her gauntlet fingers, levitating in the air around her, and she wheels back her arm to, for some reason, throw the coat *itself* at him with massively increased strength. Droplets of morphmetal dart after it, stretching out in transit and then guiding the EGO gear to its intended destination-- wrapping, and then coiling tight, the Black damage-resistant armor around Narcian's sword. "Lady Guinivere?! What have you done with her, blackguard!"     Seeing Ceri toss her EGO aside makes Petra-- hypocritcally, but fairly-- nervous, and Madeleine is someone she absolutely extends zero trust in terms of ideological goal-advancement. Now fully armored and able to take a ballista bolt to the face, to say nothing of arrows, Petra leaps down from the wall to join the pair around Melady, boots skidding down a short slide of morphmetal that forms beneath her feet to break her fall before hitting the shattered cobblestone.     "She's--! Inside the castle, waiting for the people she *asked* for help to win! Us, I mean!" Petra's mind runs through possibilities of how to convince Melady, and in her adrenaline-fueled state, skips a few necessary steps of context. "She's thirty-two!"     "Er, I mean-- she's safe, allied, friendly, whatever. We've talked a bunch. She still plans on having a feast later, after we hold Ostia. She's been telling us about Desmond, and stuff, for context." After fumbling and babbling, having less context than everyone else and being acutely aware of that fact, Petra reaches for a technique she very rarely uses: lying, sort of. "She asked us to spare you."
Blemishine	Just like with Dysnomia, the Blazing Blade makes cutting through wyvernflesh scarily simple. One searing bright cut after another is carved into riders' steeds, and she never waits for either of the pair to crumple before moving ahead further with the massive sword at the ready once more. But even like this, even with a legendary weapon, she's still just one person. To really end this siege...     ...there's General Galle, and his two others. Melady... no, she can't risk fighting her herself. If they plan to convince her to return to Guinivere's side, risking killing her wyvern with Durandal would be a big blow against that. Having seen Shanna, she can't shake the feeling that both pegasus and wyvern riders value their mounts. But Galle himself... and Narcian. There are no issues there.     Running atop the wall, on one side, she can look over the interior of Ostia. What they're protecting. She can so easily envision Hector unable to sit still inside the keep, unable to defend his home this time. They have to fight hard enough for him.     And on the other, she can see Bern's army - where the siege line is being disrupted. It's in good hands with Lilian and the others. So she has to make a... difference... here...     That woman... Iðunn. Here...? Without Zephiel? Don't tell me she's--     But while her keen golden eyes are far off on the horizon, it's Narcian who's the immediate threat. "...! That sword again...!" The wince in Blemishine's voice as she snaps his way isn't for herself; as the blasts of energy lash out madly, she gets off relatively unscathed by leaping over one arcing wave and sliding beneath another, a bit of life force getting chipped away as she skirts too close, but not enough to slow her.     It's Ru Li that it's for, as well as all of the Ostians around her who are much less safe from Narcian's rampage. As one after another collapses around her, her grit teeth make way for focus, and she launches into a faster sprint. Before Galle, or anything else...     "There's nothing glorious about this battle, /Narcian/! You've caused trouble for long enough!" When the next burst of life-draining dark magic comes in, that's when she jumps high over it. Off the walls, into the air, directly over where Narcian's wyvern is hovering.     And Blemishine plummets, Durandal burning as it's brought down in a vicious, descending downslash. If Ru Li's attempt at ripping one of his wyvern's wings free isn't enough, then it'll have to contend with the knight trying to remove the other; the Blazing Blade tries to sever not just a wing, but rend a large chunk of its body away with one clean cut.     Narcian, harassed on several other fronts right this moment, will be left to plummet. She'll be hitting the ground below first, hard enough to make her knees ache, so she'll have to do her best to help break Ru Li's resulting fall if nobody else can.
Marigold	Marcus crouches in front of Roy with his badly-scoured shield, weathering Narcian's assault for them both. "Marcus, your arm...!" "It's nothing, Lord Roy. Just stay down!"      Flying through Ostia's sinuous alleyways is a harrowing experience even on a nimble pegasus; it's probably worse on a motorcycle, but worse still for Shanna's pursuers. "Mia!!" she calls back in sharp panic when her friend crash-lands, but she can't exactly stick around.      Mia picks off one of the wyvern riders with her plasma knives, sending them smashing into the cobblestones. Na-Go bludgeons another with her bike, swerving them to skim-impact the front of a stone building on a tight curve. Shanna rises into the sky, pursued by one more that she doesn't have room to wheel on, and-- Tsschh. Lucius fires a beam of light as thick as a man's height, burning the wyvern out of the sky and sending the rider plummeting onto thatch. Shanna waves down at her allies, beaming with relief.      "This war isn't for Bern. It's Zephiel's war."      "Can you really want this in your hearts? Has it really made you *happy*?!"      While Galle strains to pull his lance away from Shajo's weapon and his wyvern struggles with Nonon, he looks from the former to Flamel, with something like 'sympathetic disdain'.      "Men like you would never understand. People who were born complete. Bern made me whole, in ways you've never lacked. This is the repayment of a life-debt. Happiness and sense have nothing to do with it. Now, will you fight, or will you run?" With a grunt he kicks Shajo's wrist to pull his lance free, goads his wyvern to grab Nonon with its jaws and throw her into the air, and then tries to pierce her back in one smooth motion as she falls.      While Galle is off being ice-cold, Narcian is eating the bullying of his life. Even with dozens of Ostian soldiers and nearly a dozen Elites to prey upon, he can't outheal the beating he's taking from all angles, and he still flinches in pain with each blow- a vicious cycle, making him fall behind on the life-harvesting too. "Scaring off? I'll have you know just last month, a certain Clarine was quite enchanted with-- ghhk!" The saucily indignant way he tilts his head might just have saved his life from Petra's spear.      About the only good retort he gets in is "You aren't worthy to taste it, cur," to Ru Li, just before--      Ah. Ru Li Cheng does get the pleasure of coming away with the wyvern's wing, after all. And a good third of its body, sizzling-flame-white along a perfectly smooth cut.      Narcian lands on the cobblestones. "You... cheater..." he chokes out, before two-thirds of his wyvern lands on top of him. His hand reaches for his runesword, lying juuust out of reach, and then goes limp.      His allies don't seem all that torn up about it.
Marigold	In a technical and athletic sense, Melady is eerily superb- approaching 'the best of a whole kingdom', maybe. But while she matches Ceri's elevated sparring with whistling blade and sprays of sparks, her heart isn't in the play. "If you're an honorable woman, don't accuse Guinivere of treason! Clean your lying tongue!" And then, to Petra, bewildered: "What? She's thirty-five, or something."      Melady spares only a fraction of a second to stare wide-eyed at the Black Knight before she's tumbling across the cobblestones and grappling with Madeleine. She works the haft of her spear between them, keeping the knife at bay and kneeing Madeleine in the gut in the struggle.      It's Galle who denies her the chance to answer: just as Madeleine's releasing Melady, he swoops in to try and spear Maddie through the chest from wyvernback. "Hurt?" he calls down. "I'm fine, Galle!"      Real relief tugs at Galle's lips, even if it doesn't reach those cold eyes. "And... being chained together is no reunion, stranger! I don't believe you in the least! If you really want peace, just deliver Guinivere to me!"      Her eyes flit from the Black Knight up to Trudy. If she can't kill the puppet, then the puppetmaster...? "Triffin!" she calls out, and the wyvern flings her into the air with its tail. She plummets back down to slam spearpoint-first into Trudy's back.      Bernish soldiers are thrown into temporary disarray by the skeletons among them, and Lilian down-modulates the pattering of relentless assault on the walls again. The whipcrack of thunder's lash and hissing of fire flow almost entirely down from Ostia, now, and no longer up from Bern. Her magic-sense focused on That Woman finds--      It's like no other magic in this world. No tome, no rod, authored in a different time by a different culture to play by different rules. It's least unlike the awful black magic Wagner tried to work on her in flavor, but even that was worlds apart in technique. She's drawing far too much power to merely 'summon' or 'create' something dragon-sized. One could be forgiven for thinking she's going to try and blow the whole city apart.      Just then, Iðunn's shadow starts to ooze and reach out from her, as if a light brighter than the sun were shining behind her back- but there is no light, of course, at all. And then the trees reach out their shadows, and the hills, like spindly fingers to touch Ostia's walls.      That woman is patient and unhurried in her workings. There's no other effect just yet. But the Bernish soldiers don't like it one bit either. It throws them into further disarray.      "Oh, goodness, Odette, are you quite alright?" Lucius still has a big gleaming spellbook finger-bookmarked from his reverse orbital strike against a poor little wyvern rider, but his healing staff's in his other hand, and he immediately sets to work on the soldier she's brought him. "It's good you got him here so quickly. Oh, but you've gotten scratched up. Here," he says, sparing her a touch from it. The glowy magic, as always, helps her feel a little better!
Marigold	Galle senses the tide turning against him with Narcian downed. A sharp whistle and a tap on the side of its wing sends his wyvern lumbering towards the portcullis while he dismounts- and where 'Triffin' had struggled to lift it, Galle's wyvern simply slams through the inner portcullis with its shoulder, squirms into the gatehouse, and then starts digging its claws into the outer.      Galle alone stands between you and his wyvern's back while it works. He taps the butt of his spear against the cobblestones, takes a clarifying breath, and then whips his spear around his shoulders to give it momentum. Just as before with the plunge, the leather straps on it let him pivot its momentum at a moment's notice for whipcrack speed and thirty-foot reach, and the resulting blizzard of sun-glinting spearpoints is remarkably like Rutger's swordplay without Galle ever moving from his spot at the gate at all.      "Stop trying to take Melady from me. Be more concerned that I will take your lives from you. Come."
Madeleine Cadrasteia	Galle's spear intercedes before Melady can answer, and Madeleine takes a grazing blow to her side as she twists away from the attack. Then Melady is flung up to the battlement, and there's no more time for discussion. Torrie breaks away from ladder duty to shoulder-check Melady at the end of her arc, before her spear can find purchase in Trudy's unarmored flesh. The minotaur follows Madeleine's lead in trying to keep things non-lethal, using the contour of her double-headed axe to catch Melady's spear and keep the knight from bringing her weapon to bear.     "Stop trying to take Melady from me. Be more concerned that I will take your lives from you. Come."     Madeleine snarls like a beast. "'Take her from you'? I'll take your head first, you FILTH!" The huntress lunges forward, springing into the air to avoid the worst of Galle's sweeping attacks. Landing between Galle and his spear, at risk of tangling herself in the leather strap as it whips side to side, she flicks her spear's butt forward and Drogrung's tail swings out of literal thin air in an effort to knock Galle off his feet.     Then her spear's head comes back around and Drogrung roars, the challenge-call of a mighty beast, daring the wyvern to keep its back turned and its attention on the gate. Its call fades into a loud hiss and a 'thwock' as Drogrung coughs up a glob of stinging, poisonous bile at point-blank range. The awful stuff won't spread into a cloud, giving other elites room to participate, but a direct hit would be agony for the wyvern-general.
Trudy Grimm	The Black Knight shields himself with the flat of his greatsword, only managing partial protection as Galle's spear finds purchase in the right side of his chestplate and shoulder armor. Half a dozen piercings that should kill a man, and yet he continues to stand. He even walks, stalking forward through the barrage of stabbings. When Galle's attack concludes, the Knight sweeps his blade down and to the side, dragging it noisily across the cobbles as he approaches without so much as faltering.     The battlements beneath Trudy's feet shudder when Galle's wyvern slams through the inner gate and smashes up against the outer. Reaching out, she steadies herself on the parapet, glancing down for a moment. That glance shoots back over her shoulder towards the engagement in the courtyard. This is all the warning she gets that Melady has been launched in her direction. Hastily she scoops up the Grimoire in one hand. The other scoops a discarded shield from a fallen defender; with barely enough time to keep the lance itself from burying itself in her body. Knocked off course by Torrie's timely intervention.     Instead it bites into the shield and wrenches it from her hands, though it's enough to drive the witch back several paces, "Now hold on a moment-- Killing me won't stop him--" the Black Knight. Whether that would stop the skeletons on the other side of the wall is another matter, "Besides, wouldn't you rather talk to her yourself?"     From within one of her sleeves, Trudy produces a modest crystal ball. About the size and weight of a softball; she calls up the spell she uses to converse on radios and speaks, "Lady Guinivere? She's here--" and then hold the sphere out.     Melady should have no trouble seeing the image inside. She could even take the ball in hand if she wants; Trudy wouldn't stop her.     Meanwhile in the courtyard, when the Black Knight has gotten into range, his grip tightens on his sword just so and he brings it up across Galle in an upward diagonal. This is, in fact, just preparing for what he wants to do; at the top of the arc, the Knight grasps the outsized handle with both hands, shifts his weight, and brings the colossal blade directly down on Galle from above. Even a miss at this distance is likely to be dangerous, scattering chips of cobblestone like wild bullets.
Ru Li Cheng	'If you fall, Hazelthistle will kill us both'      As he grabs at the Wyvern's wing he suddenly registers what was said.      And prayer fails as uncertainty sets in. Of course he's going to fail. What's he thinking? He's injured. He's damn near *broken*. He's a burden to everyone. And now he's trying to rip the wings off this thing like he's healthy? Sure - if he was healthy he would probably be able to. If he was healthy he'd probably be able to crush the thing's skull. If he was healthy he would only be a little bit of a burden.      But he's not healthy. His strength is restrained. He's more than just untrained - he's partially-trained and heavily-injured. He can only push so far.      And it's not far enough.      Prayer fails. Strength fails. And he once again needs to be rescued.      The wing, and a third of the body, comes away when Blemishine cuts it free. He falls, and Blemishine has to catch him.      He tries to get to his wheelchair. He fails. Again. Spearwork keeps him away - whirling and lancing and stabbing and jabbing, forcing him backwards, unable to even grab the thing. He's forced to grab a spear to lean on to stand aloft, struggling to even do that much.      He has nothing he can do. Suppressed. Unable to fight. Unable to act.      His eyes flick to Narcian as he fumbles out of Galle's reach as best he's able. Well. There is one thing he could do.      He could kill Narcian.      It wouldn't even be hard. The man's unconscious. He could walk over there and crush his throat and succeed in that much. In that much. He could succeed. He could get that rush of success, that moment of victory, that knowledge that he removed an enemy and a dangerous one from the fight-      -...and then he would regret it forever, because that's nothing but petty vengeance, and he doesn't want to live that way. The momentary rush of success would die, and he'd be left empty and angry and in pain, so needy for praise and success that he was willing to murder an unconscious man.      No.      No. If he has nothing else, he will cling to that knowledge. That he will not sink so low as to spill helpless blood for personal satisfaction.      Instead, he stumbles his way over to the gatehouse, and stumbles, and falls off it. He's using his own weight to stab the wyvern, because it's literally all he can do - drive a spear into its back and cling to it and *hurt* it. To do *anything*. At this point...      ...at this point, he should retreat, shouldn't he...?      The thought crosses his mind. He closes his eyes, tight, for all the difference it makes (literally none). He's about to talk to Melady, but...      But she has no idea who he is. What would his plea matter? Why would it matter at all? As far as she's concerned, he's no one. The enemy. All he'd do is muddy the water. When Trudy pulls out the crystal ball, that's more than he could ever do.      He should just retreat. He should just *run*. Stumble his way back to Hector and Guinevere, help them, do what little he can to keep them safe. But...      But he wants to help so badly.      you selfishly go about playing hero to impress your barbarian lover and the rest of them      Every time...it feels like the words of Bai Li Ahan ring a little more true.
Dysnomia	One of Dysnomia's blades strikes true, but the others fall short, leaving Shanna to fend for...No. Na-Gon is there, in a wild burst of speed and a roar, spiraling propellers revving cycle making Dysnomia's eyes wide as the rest are cleaned up.     "Ha..." Dysnomia grinned, satisfied, pushing her to feet. Then, there's an impact from behind her, sudden and sharp. "...Ha?" She looks down. Sees a spearpoint driven straight through her midsection.     And just as suddenly, it was ripped free, with Mia left to stagger, with blood filling what would otherwise pass for her lungs. For any man, that would have proven a mortal wound. For a man like Gale, who was not so cruel as to put down the wounded, there was little reason to fill her with more holes. She fell to one-knee, back still turned to the battle.     But this weapon of his was no Durandel. While the wound on her side was still visibly bleeding through her tunic, the hole Galle's spear put through her chest.     She clenched her hand as if to seize something invisible. And there was a crackle of ozone in the air.     That was the extent of the warning, before Dysnomia turned, a whip of lightning uncoiling from her hand, moving in time with Madeleine--and the other dragon--leaving Galle with the uneasy options of retreating to give the negotiators space or staying within range of god-butchering acid and searing plasma.
Flamel Parsons	"Be more concerned that I will take your lives from you. Come."     "Trust me! I can't forget! This is a horribly frightening situation." Flamel, now invisible, flickers in and out of visibility when the spear slams into him. "But I have to keep hoping! If I let myself falter, if I don't hold onto every single chance that Elibe might get back to some kind of peace, then I wouldn't be doing the things I was born to do. I might not know what it's like to have a nation be part of who I am, but--"     A telekinetic hand snatches the leather tether. He can't disrupt the actual spear-motion, but he can pull himself forward in a sudden rush by yanking the tether! "I know what it's like to have something *MISSING*!" His words surge with a kind empathy, a focused and urgent well-meaning hopefulness. An earnest effort to connect. He skids over terrain using levitation. "You'd do anything to fill that gap! To solve that question! And I know I can't expect you to turn on the people who gave you purpose, but can't you see how this part of you, this nation of yours, is turning into a monster?!" Madeleine, just ahead of him, swings that huge tail, and Flamel slides under the thick body of the beast on his back. "I'm not asking you to move the mountains in your mind and un-fill the chasm, I'm begging on behalf of the innocent people in the Lycian League for however many drops of mercy you could find! The *tiniest* act of kindness means more than you know!"     He slams back onto his feet, closing the gap more with invisibility. "Because men like us, even when there's the chasm there, it's never possible to remove the kindness we have somewhere in there too!" He's gotta get behind the man. He *has* to. Especially because Dysnomia is attacking from the other side now. "If you're strong enough to hurt people like this, you can never be so hollow that you're incapable of mercy -- or stop having a duty to it!" A little of something Lilian Rook once said is crossing his mind.     And then the telekinetic hands turn towards the portcullis and the monster engaging there. They grab hard to try to hold it, to wrestle with the wyvern, with the kind of strength that could crush a common car. "Your loyalty to Bern means burning a dozen villages -- but how many?! Is there a threshold?! Where is it? And why can't it be nearer -- why can't it be *here*?! Or would you burn every village, every town, every city, every other nation and continent, because the king of Bern said to do it?!" He shouts, his voice still emanating from his invisible form, possibly just enough for counterattack.
Desire Stars	Narcian plummets. Geats' helmet dips rightwards, avoiding a spear thrust from behind as his free hand snatches up to grab it. A turn yanks the spear towards him and drives his lifted leg in a twirling kick towards the spearman's head. Tossing aside the spear, he makes a break for the gate, arriving just in time to hear... Stop trying to take Melady from me. Be more concerned that I will take your lives from you.     "Hohh?" A noise of amused, almost admiring challenge. "Narcian's no slouch. But you're in a different league, aren't you?" Come.     Geats chuckles. "Sure. This one's for the highlights." Come he does, charging right into that spear with enough certainty to call it into question. Is he confident? Or stupid? Those red lenses of his don't even follow the spear, and for a second, it seems like that's going to be it for Geats.     Of course... watching the weapon instead of the master is an amateur move, isn't it? The rider instead fixes his gaze on Galle's eyes, searching for intent where he can't find movement. Though his own movement seems as premeditated and smugly efficient as ever, a fighter as skilled as Galle can see the effort it truly takes to maintain. Sidesteps clear him by a finger's length, instead of a hand; deflections with the Magnum Shooter's heavy frame skirting far closer to Geats' vitals than that of the common soldiery or even Narcian's blasts. Take her from you'? I'll take your head first, you FILTH!     An opening, thanks to Drogrung's glob of bile. Geats wrenches his Desire Driver, flipping the Magnum Buckle to the other side. He leaps sideways, his foot reaching the wall of the gatehouse. Running along the wall, he slips just under a lightning jab, right in time for a landing cartwheel to evade another few by the skin of his teeth. His armor switches sides--his breastplate is now matte black, while the Magnum plating protects his legs.     "She sounds pretty important to you," says Geats, making a dangerous hard read with a standing roundhouse, catching the tip of the spear just long enough to step on it for an ephemeral instant. Long enough to make a straight kick with his leg, at the empty air, with Galle still easily twenty feet from him. An ankle-mounted cannon on his right greave extends to blast Galle's spear arm, Geats pivoting his stance so as not to be pulled off his feet when Galle yanks the spear back. "No one's saying you can't come with her."     Galle is too skilled to be surprised by the mounted guns twice, but Geats is experienced enough to know the value of even a fleeting surprise. He launches an assault of his own, a series of side-kicks, roundhouses, and fronts, mixed in with warding sweeps of the Magnum Shooter. None of it is as fast as Galle's thrusts, but that isn't the point of Geats' style--opportunistic patience and masterful control of space, however, are. Only a few of his attacks are meant to Galle, properly, while most of them are meant to inhibit the range of his spear and his ability to make rapid successive thrusts. It's all in service of keeping him in the weeds fighting another veteran.
Angela	''People who were born complete. Bern made me whole.'' "I know 'bout THAT if nothing else. I had nothing before The Middle--they were ''my'' Kingdom. Was a broken shell of a man looking only for his next meal. But they picked me up, made me part of something bigger. Can't see the tattoos like this but I never felt more complete than that day...until I met Nonon." Shajo breathes out through his nose. "It was only so real. You can forge yourself into an axe but you can't be loyal to a people if you are careless into who you let grip the handle.--Ggh!!" The 'Ggh!' comes when his wrist is kicked, resulting in his grip loosening on Smile just enough that the teeth declench and Galle is able to pull free without issue, toss Nonon up in the air, and skewer her with a spear! Or at least that WOULD have been what happened, if it was anybody but Nonon. The spear slams into her back but the armoring of Gold Rush renders her near invulnerable to spears! With a vicious SCREECH the spear carves a thick line into the armoring as Nonon scrapes off it. "Erk...! Damn you're tough! But you're not the type to get scared easy, huh!" Rather than try to get OFF the Wyvern, Nonon attempts to plunk her butt on the wyvern as well, throwing jabs with her offhand all the while (but these can readily be deflected). "I was totally born complete." Nonon admits. "Born on the high seas, never knowing my parents, but knowing I would be Queen of the Pirates one day... Yes, the Wings could never contain me... Only the fredom of the high seas could suffice for Captain Nonon! Battling mermaids, struggling against whales...! I understand you, Galle! You want to fight and don't wanna get bogged down in all this chatty stuff, so I'll fight ya until I wear you like a sleeve!" Nonon ends up traveling with Galle as he flies off to murder Madeleine, spending most of the while trying not to fall OFF the wyvern. She is thrown free as the Wyvern slams down as she forgot to clench with her legs, resulting in her nearly crashing into Ceri as she flies head first into a piece of stone. She stands back up quickly, bleeding profusely from her head. "GALLE! DON'T CHEAT ON ME WITH MADELEINE!" She yells before trying to throw a punch into his wyvern again with Gold Rush, expelling an eruption of golden energy out from her fist upon impact. (Shajo, swearing, has to take the long way to get there). "She better wear ''me'' like a sleeve after today." He mutters. MEANWHILE Tennant is given instructions to gun for Wyvern Riders. They take this advice and take potshots at the riders periodically, aiming for ones that are not too close towards allied troops because despite being a sniper rifle, it's a sniper rifle that's a bit iffy about friendly fire. Better not risk it! They have gotten pretty distracted by movie thought, though, and are now mumbling about wanting to see the other Dragonhearts but their budget is just not enough and... MORE RELEVANTLY MEANWHILE Ceri isn't sure that MORE people coming to try and convince Melady is going to help, particularly when Madeleine snarls at Galle and lunges for him. "Wingforsaken... Can't you set aside your trauma for at least one battle??" Ceri complains. Her goal isn't exactly to SPARE Galle but she's doubtful that Madeleine going after him like that is going to help with her objective. She exhales slowly. "Melady." Despite saying so, having her honor insulted repeatedly is essentially kicking her directly in HER trouble repeatedly. "I'm not accusing Guinivere of treason. The one who has betrayed Bern is the King. I speak no lies. If Guinivere talks to you, will you at least listen? I promise on my life it is no trick!"
Angela	''What? She's thirty-five or something!'' Ceri backpedals to pick up the EGO Weapon but she slides it back onto her back. This is mostly so it doesn't get kicked away into oblivion rather than an intent to use it. "You know we can't bring her out into the middle of a battlefield--" Fortunately, Trudy Grimm seems to have a plan. Ceri stays on the defensive as she says, "We can let you talk to her. Keep the ball if you want and you can talk to her whenever you want." She didn't ask permission for that from Trudy but the fact of the matter is--she HAS noticed Melady's skill. "I have no desire to harm a woman of honor and skill like yourself, I'd sooner burn the finest art." She glances to Petra briefly, "You got her age wrong?" She seems more surprised than anything.
Odette Raskins	Full of adrenaline just from getting that one soldier back to Lucius, Odette's barely panting at all, although she does slide a bit on the way down so Lucius has that much more room to laser that wyvern out of the way.  "H... Hi, Father Lucius! I could be better, but I could be worse!" She admits with an awkward and especially forced chuckle, trying to push that image of so many dying soldiers out of her mind and failing terribly at it. That boost from Lucius' glowy magic does a lot more for her mind than it probably would normally, though, since it's her and it's him and the fact that he's doing it for her specifically means he MUST be reciprocating her feelings however little he can even in the middle of this grueling battle. To put such faith in her like this means... She must really have a chance! One day, at least, if they can get through this alive.  "I-I did? Ahah... Well, I'll try not to get too hurt again, then! Gotta stay healthy so I can bring more soldiers back from the brink, right?" She laughs again, almost forgetting her own anxiety for a moment before looking back towards the battle she had just left. There's still far too many soldiers getting hurt all over the place, and she can still see her allies fighting off those wyvern riders and the encroaching army alike. "... Okay. Back to it." The EMT closes her eyes, taking a moment to collect her thoughts and nerve, then starts running right back into the melee. She still needs to check on Roy and Marcus, and the last time she had seen them was around where Narcian was. She just misses sight of Narcian going down beneath his own wyvern, but she does see... Oh. Roy and Marcus are in trouble! In her haste to get to the young lord and the senior knight, however, Odette runs across Galle's path just as he's starting another rapid-fire volley of long-range spear stabs along with- "Be more concerned that I will take your lives from you. Come." Unarmored as she is, Odette can really only rely on her mobility to not take a stab right through the chest. The first stab draws blood from a mere graze along with a wild yelp, the second is only narrowly avoided with a sudden jerk backwards, and the pullback from the second snags her bag's strap hard enough to pull her to the ground. Perhaps it's dumb luck, then, that she's low enough to the ground that the third stab and swing goes right over Odette's head entirely. Like before, she's not about to look a gift horse in the mouth, and she scurries away, quite crawling away as quickly as she can to leave Galle to the actual combatants so she can pursue her actual targets: Roy and Marcus! Seeing the condition of Marcus' shield and Roy behind him, she's already yanking a new roll of medicated bandages out of her bag as she approaches. "Mister Marcus! Mister Roy! I've got just the thing!" She shouts out with almost no regard to her own safety, perhaps on purpose, perhaps not, but certainly making herself out to be a target for anyone that might still be targeting them from afar or above. Once she's close enough to the lord and the knight, she promptly invades their personal space to maneuver around them to get their burns and wounds wrapped up without hampering their mobility (too much, considering she's practically climbing all over them) (especially Marcus). "Gotta get this on here... Some extra there... And you should be good to keep fighting a while longer!" She explains, then whips out a pair of pre-filled injectors. "And just a little extra to be sure.. But make sure not to be too aggressive, just like Miss Rook warned about!" And then she stabs them in the shoulders with the injectors, concocted with contents focused entirely on bolstering their bodies' ability to recover from injuries and a little on painkilling. Odette's forgotten to treat her own wounds from Galle this whole time, of course, so she's also bleeding quite a bit from her face and arm by the time she does all that.
Aidan Proudpick	Aidan leaps off the wyvern with a huff, slamming his foot down on the soul sucking blade. A brief thought. Could he wield it? It's a magical weapon. It would give him a new edge. He could train with it. Fingers reach down, just over it. A blade that heals you. And a blade that does so at the cost of others. Aidan grits his teeth and kicks the blade away, out of Narcian's reach. He slips the leather glove back on, settling his armguard into place before strapping it in. He doesn't interrupt Ru Li's contemplation, or speak up. He even considers if he should intervene. Ru Li and Aidan come to the same conclusion at the same time. Ru Li's decision is to move away, Aidan's is to take a step towards Narcian, just in case. But it does make him think further. That medic's oath. Does it apply here? Justice. Equity of care. Is he not helping Narcian because he's a bastard, or because there's other people who need help. There's still a battle going on. DID he cut the hate out from his body? He saved Perry because he liked Perry Talon. He squeezes his eyes shut, letting the sounds of battle and blood and the screams of the dying flood back into his mind. He'll ask Odette later. A flicker to watch Ru Li struggle. The thought to say something, pull him back, stand in front of him. That would just make things even worse. Spearwork snaps him out of the revelry, Aidan having to push his body to the side, spearhead sliding over his armor, hurling Aidan back to the ground with a hard crack of his shoulder on cobblestones. He rolls with the blow, bouncing back up to his feet. "Men like you would never understand." A bend of his legs, a pop back up to his feet. "You think anyone is born complete?! You have to dig and scrape and grab at everything to fill the hole in your heart! And even when you find it, you have to WORK for it! Be stronger for it!" It's not even an attempt to convince Galle. Just a snap back that Galle makes it sound so easy. "What did the King give you that is worth dragging down its people into a war? That's worth a hundred battles for them to suffer? How many people have been forced into a soldier's uniform! DO you serve Bern? Or do you serve Zephiel!" A hole in the spearwork. A flick of his buckler to push in closer to Galle. A twist, a swing, both bucklers down at Galle's exposed neck.
Desire Stars	Na-Go, meanwhile, has again taken to the skies. But not using the Armed Propeller! The yowl of a cat echoes through the town, ringing clearly through the air despite the din of battle.                                    BOOST TIME!                                        "Dysnomia! Grab on!" Dysnomia hears it, before she sees it--a giant, red mechanized cat, with a tail formed of the Boostriker's heat-annealed exhaust pipes and its rear tire mounted behind the 'driver seat,' forming the arch of the cat's 'back.' Its headlight-eyes flash as it races towards her, Na-Go's hand extended to Mia to grab her and pull her aboard.      "Hold on tight, okay? We're going to do something about that wyvern wrecking the gatehouse..." Na-Go's usual air of tension is... gone, actually. That sounds like real confidence. She leans forward on the mechanical animal, and it bucks upwards, claws no longer finding cobblestone but empty air. It travels upwards, on trails of dancing flame, its tail flicking before jets of fire send it surging forwards at speeds that make the roar of displaced air seem deafening.      Na-Go flicks the Armed Propeller buckle in her Driver, then revs the Boost Buckle. The Propeller grows to several times its original size--but Na-Go holds it just fine, thanks to having switched the Boost armor to her upper half. Extending safely behind Dysnomia, the propeller winds up, fanning the flames of the Boostriker's footfalls into a whirling inferno that seems to chase the two of them, a curling finger pointing defiantly higher and higher into the sky.      "When you see it--dismount and let him have it!"      The Boostriker lets out another feline yowl, before doubling back like a cat that's spotted a fleeing mouse. Na-Go utters a mustering battle cry, holding one arm out as the thrusters on her forearm pivot and flare up. The Boostriker looks like a red comet, falling to earth, pulling up at the last second to barrel towards Galle's wyvern through the damage it's already done. The infernal cyclone behind her burns brighter, a wall of fire bearing her cat-themed Rider emblem, before she shouts with effort, partially dismounting to swing her leg all the way around the handlebars for a knockout kick aimed at the beast. The Boostriker crashes into it, too, a fullbody tackle, and all of it is accentuated by the fiery tornado rapidly condensing into Na-Go's foot in the moment just before the impact, all of it exploding the moment right after.                           BOOST PROPELLER GRAND VICTORY
Lilian Rook	§That's enough mage hunting. They've lost their siege engines and their magic-users because of me. That's a devastatingly outsized impact for just one person on the battlefield. If I quit right now, I'd have multiplied Bern's casualties fivefold at minimum. How completely unfair that it still wouldn't be enough. The others are doing their best just to hold the gatehouse so I can accomplish this much. Now--§     Lilian halts even in thought. Feeling out the shape of 'Iðunn's' magic, closer than anyone else, overrides anything and everything else she could possibly think about and replaces it with a cold stab of blood-chilling dread all the way down to her stomach. "There's no way." Lilian whispers quietly to herself. "She has to be the summoner. Another five dragons at once, like before. Or else why . . ."     The reversal and extension of shadow isn't something Lilian has to stare at. She's seen something similar when Scáthach got serious; and when she executes her most overdone finishing move herself; that a spellcaster is causing it in the midst of simply building up their spell puts a sense of instinctive doubt into Lilian that makes her want to freeze in place and hope that woman simply doesn't notice it. The knowing of who she's pointing it at is most of what pushes her forward. The rest is the process of moving inexorably forward; one forced, mechanical footstep ahead of the other. The only way through is out.     Lilian works her own spell. Having far outstripped the older magics she once used, she begins the familiar process of drawing circles of coruscating black-gold and rapidly combining them into piece-by-piece assembly; something that takes two-handed manual gestures, like forcing together gears that don't fit, and a tremendous outpouring of energy visible from the wall, never mind obvious to Iðunn. She doesn't build all the way to the stationary mass-battle array she'd used aboard the Busan, but charges a half-sized array that she can fire and move away from.     Some part of her hopes that it critically injures her target. The smarter part of her expects, if she's lucky an illusion to dissipate, or if she's not, to disrupt Iðunn's focus mid-casting. She's gone only a second and a half after the final discharge gesture. Enough time to watch her combined circuit fire a void-blotted lance of white-gold distortion fit to melt a narrow hole through the outer wall, see Iðunn's defense, and disappear.     Narcian going down isn't enough. He was specifically a threat to the massed defenders, and pressure on the Elites holding the gate house. Galle is through the first portcullis. Melady isn't bending. Several Elite defenders are injured. Being away for that long is already more than Lilian can take. Whatever work she could do amongst the archers' ranks isn't enough.     She reappears at the gatehouse a moment before her magical attack gutters out on the horizon.
Petra Soroka	Narcian is unconscious! That's one out of three captains down, and with his wyvern butchered and sword out of reach, even if he sprung back to his feet immediately, he's soundly defeated. Just like Lilian asked, he was neither underestimated nor ignored, and even though he's the least vital member of the wyvern rider trio to deal with, that's still a task complete.     But... now what? Should Petra just execute him? No one else is likely to, given that the others around him immediately are Ru Li, who doesn't seem like a killer, Ceri, who's otherwise occupied, Blemishine, who seems too purehearted to kill a downed opponent, and Proudpick, who exists as static and a pounding headache. It's probably pragmatic to put a hole in his head, like the worst people alive would always comment when watching zombie movies even though no one ever asked. But this is real life, and in *real life* Petra would be better off double tapping a corpse during a zombie plague.     This isn't that. The metaphor is hardly even related. But the fact that her mind is wandering to this extent means that she... probably doesn't actually want to do it? <J-IC-Scene> Petra Soroka says, "--Do we kidnap him?" <J-IC-Scene> Aidan Proudpick says, "Why?" <J-IC-Scene> Petra Soroka says, "I don't know? I can't think of any reason besides, like, keeping him in the dungeon and hitting him with hammers."     And so, Petra chooses mercy(?). Narcian's sword levitates up into her hand, carried by the morphmetal bands securing her EGO suit around the blade, and she ambles over to Narcian's unconscious body while the bands autonomously unwrap. Pulling the loosened cloth armor away and dropping it aside, the rune-patterned black sword is exposed right as Petra comes to a halt beside him, looming a little in her own black armor.     Rather than cutting off his head, she abruptly squats down and grabs him by the scruff to lift him effortlessly one handed while the floating morphmetal bands snap around his wrists and ankles instead. She turns her helmet in the direction of Lucius's camp, but then reconsiders, opting to instead throw him like a ragdoll over the entire wall and barely slow his fall with telekinetic antigravity tugging from the Silver handcuffs so that he doesn't splatter on the other side. Narcian is now firmly collected, assuming the city doesn't fall.
Petra Soroka	"What? She's thirty-five, or something."     "Er--! What was her name?" Low on available metamaterial, Petra is reduced to brawling at both reach and height disadvantage to Melady. Her most effective weapon, and the one she's inclined to use at Lilian's instruction, is talking, but for some reason she's fixated on this topic specifically. "The woman in the white clothes? Looks like partway between a nun and a bride?"     Unfortunately, Petra has never remembered the name of a retail worker, waitress, or customer service agent in her life. Fortunately, Lilian said her name just a short time earlier. "Elen! Said she was lying about being thirty-five and is actually just thirty-two. Well, she said she was trying to keep her 'mystique', I guess, not lying." Absent other forms of pathos, Petra's most familiar method of communicating the emotional truth is an unfiltered stream of facts and experiences, to try to turn herself inside out and transmit the essence of the experience to another person. It's still a weird detail to fixate on. "Bern made me whole, in ways you've never lacked. This is the repayment of a life-debt. Happiness and sense have nothing to do with it."     Trading off dance partners after Melady flings herself away, Petra can't help but feel at once grimly respectful and exasperated at Galle. She knows exactly how little trivial things like happiness and sense come into the equation, when it comes to the duties you hold to the external loadbearing pillar of your self, but it's *annoying* that it's in *opposition* to her. He sounds so close to making sense, but if he really made sense, he'd be on Lilian's side instead.     Still, though, it's important insight for changing track in the arguments against him. Or, even, abandoning the idea that arguing against him is a viable strategy at all. Petra's thrusters and double jumps bring her over and behind Galle, ducking behind him between him and his wyvern while she talks-- momentum at the end of a leash demands that he can't direct attention towards hitting her with the dancing spear without turning away from the others, and whatever extreme-angle glancing blows might land on her, they don't even manage to shear sparks off her armor.     "I guess, like, why *should* there be a limit to what you'd do, right? I mean, I know I have my *own* person like that, and if she asked me to burn down every village in this world then I wouldn't even bother listening to Flamel after the first time he asked that." The rhetorical strategy of undermining her own allies is a familiar one to Petra, but she's banking on Galle being a certain kind of comprehensibly unhinged. "Did Zephiel give you purpose somehow? I heard he's a really ideological type guy. Or is it just that Bern is 'home' to you when you didn't have one before, so you can't imagine betraying it because you already know what not having that pillar of yourself feels like?"     Melady is up on top of the wall now, so from this vantage point while physically attempting to rip the wyvern's claws out of the stonework, Petra can only look up vaguely in her direction. "Did you say 'from me' because you're, like, some sort of creep, or Melady's bestie, or did you say it because what Bern wants is an extension of yourself?"
Blemishine	You... cheater...     "...This 'dirty antique' is a whole lot more than that, Narcian." That's all the breath Blemishine has to spare on him as he clocks out, and she has to hastily catch Ru Li and set him down with worry in her eye; that probably doesn't help the concerns running through his mind right now. But she won't stop him when he tries to stumble away under his own power.     She has something of an understanding of when that'd hurt more than help. In a way besides the physical.     And also because with Narcian dealt with, there's the other threats. Like she thought earlier, Blemishine wouldn't dare help with Melady; it's too risky to bring Durandal to bear there. And Iðunn is both too far out and too much of a threat to leave to any but Lilian. So it's a good thing that Galle is making himself the front and center threat right now.     Real relief tugs at Galle's lips, even if it doesn't reach those cold eyes.     Her own golden eyes are too good to miss that exchange, the first thing she's seen of Galle in person. It's not the sort of care for another that she's often seen among their enemies' ranks here; having fought mainly turncoats, and with Narcian as the primary example of an actual Bernish general to go off of, it does halt her for a moment. Does he care for Melady the same as she cares for Guinivere, or...     There's little time to think on their relationship, as Galle's spearwork is on another level. It's that same preternatural eyesight that lets her catch one flashing spearpoint with Durandal - using the flat of its blade to block and deflect it off course. That leaves the countless others behind it.     It's impossible to knock /all/ of them around her aside. It's the most she can do to keep her legs braced and footing proper as she batters back and realigns Durandal for every shift in Galle's stance she can see, following his shift of posture more than his weapon to find the right angle. Even if she wanted to cut his wyvern down, she'll have to get through this and him to reach it.     One foot in front of the other, as the echoing ring of steel on steel fills the air. "Sir Galle--!" He's certainly already earned the right to be referred to that way more than Narcian ever did. Blemishine raises her voice as if to start speaking, just to momentarily be suppressed again beneath the flurry. When she gets the chance to speak again, her voice is a little firmer.     "...You feel like someone I wish I could avoid fighting. But I know I can't right this moment."     There.     A gap between one potentially-fatal strike and the next is when Blemishine stomps down and lunges forward - it's not enough to close the entire distance before she's under assault by innumerable spearstrikes again.     But it's close enough that she can take advantage of Durandal's sheer size and length to make up for it, along with the strength it grants, driving a momentum-driven thrust with the Blazing Blade through the gap in the storm for the Wyvern General.
Lilian Rook	"Thou art responsible to thy blood first above all else, both the blood of thy line, and the blood shed for thee." The words must be for Galle, because that's who she's looking at, atop the wall and spattered lightly in blood and smudged with ash. "Die for Bern if you have to. Your soldiers have certainly died for you in the past." Lilian breathes deeply, searching for a feeling rather than the punchiest words. "But Melady is responsible to Guinivere before Bern. Don't command her to betray her entrusted charge."     Lilian leaps down to the cobble path from the top of the gatehouse. She doesn't bend to absorb the landing. Her armour scuff the stones where she lands. "I thought I'd made myself clear! Anyone capable of massed attacks, get out there! Leave the wyvern to Durandal!" Lilian calls out, raising her voice over the localized uproar. Drawing her sword once more, Lilian stalking forward at an aggressive pace, throwing the scabbard aside as she closes. "I'm back. So the General is no longer your priority."     She doesn't need to hear the starting gun to go at it. Just outside spear's range, she throws an arc of cutting magical bolts with a slash of her arm, individually weak, but which abruptly curve mid-flight to force Galle to bring his weapon back if he wants to defend against all of them. Then skips the prepatory motions of sprinting and charges on the wake of her projectiles, minimizing the gap between pressure and strike.     When Galle's spear scythes out again, Lilian throws herself side-down and slides narrowly beneath it, skating on raw momentum and the smooth surface of her armour. She kicks up from her nearly prone posture without the mandatory transition, negating Galle's obvious window to wind back and impale her, and swings Night Mist upward over her shoulders to sever the cord manipulating Galle's spear while Flamel holds it still--     A feint using her carefully shepherded resources that instantly becomes a lunging half-sword thrust into the lightly armoured part of his dominant arm. The cobblestones spark where her right foot circles around to kick his legs out-- standard, but unlikely given his build-- and then Lilian reverses her stance and strikes at his other knee with a vicious low side kick instead. Lunging back half the distance, she darts left then appears right and throws a heavy full-extension swing at Galle's same side, and moves to charge right through.
Marigold	Lilian's terrible scouring blast strikes Iðunn directly, flutters her hair and robes while scorching the latter black, and furrows the dirt she stands on while casting an ash shadow on the hillside behind her.      Iðunn is utterly unharmed. She doesn't turn her face Lilian's way.      The hungrily reaching shadows pause for a second or two, then crawl up Ostia's walls and begin to graze the battlements.      When Narcian and Galle's long-range assaults let up, Marcus and Roy cover behind the corner of a brick building. Odette can pry the mangled remains of Marcus's shield off his arm; it looks like his forearm's been broken even through the metal. He winces when she tends it. "Thank you, Odette." "You're a lifesaver. We'll get up to cover the battlements now." "Lord Roy-?! That boy... out of the frying pan, into the fire."      "Nnnh! Give me back--" Melady grunts, while trying hard to overcome Torrie in the blade-on-axe-lock. She still finds time to lash out with a kick at Trudy, before she parses what's in that orb.      "Melady! Please, stop this! It's alright!" "Lady Guinivere?! No- what trick of sorcery is this?" Melady's glare scythes upwards to Trudy's eyes in indignation, and then pierces through Ceri and Petra trying to reassure, but Guinivere's pleading pulls her eyes back down and softens her face with knitted anguish. "It's me. Can't you see? I'm in the castle, just over there. Melady, I..." "You've really joined with the enemy, then?" "I... suppose I find myself with those Bern has made an enemy of." "Why?" "Melady, surely you don't think this war is what's best for Bern?" "No, but... if you went of your own will, why not tell me?!" "You were away with Galle. I..." "You could have sent a messenger!" "... I suppose I didn't want to besmirch your honor by asking you to come along with a traitor." "Oh, Guinivere..." "Don't say it like that!!" "Scold me later, my lady. I've got to talk to Galle."      Geats' leg-mounted shot scorches Galle's sleeve, shears off a pauldron, and burns his arm. But the surrounding skin it reveals is heavily-scarred already; he's fought through just as bad before. "Hh. Okay." A recalibration of his grip, his style, and his expectations. "What did the King give you that is worth dragging down its people into a war?" "Your loyalty to Bern means burning a dozen villages -- but how many?!" "... Until I met Nonon. It was only so real." "Did Zephiel give you purpose somehow? "I'm a man with the soul of the sky," says Galle,     (who has that Ilian-blue hair so like Shanna,)         (Shanna, who had said something like,)             ("only women can be pegasus riders, you know?")                 (and "only Bern has wyverns.") as his last self-evident words to make himself known.      With Geats, the Black Knight, Madeleine, Aidan, and Nonon closing in on him, Galle can't afford to be making big tether-sweeping attacks. The two ends of his spear, moving to strike at once with total economy of motion, let him fight like two people. The haft used to slide along kicks and plunging blows is a third. When his glinting eyes find the opening, he lashes out with vicious steel-toed kicks, and that's a fourth man's worth; his hand passing his belt to draw a whickering knife and plunge it into vulnerable sides lets him count as a fifth. When Petra joins, he can duck and weave around his wyvern's lashing tail synergetically for six.
Marigold	Still outnumbered, when Lilian, Dysnomia, and Blemishine join. Galle can't quite muster a seventh, eighth, and ninth. "Melady!!" he calls out through gritted teeth while weaving under a roundhouse, nudging up a haymaker, and jabbing at Aidan all at once. Little wounds accrue whenever 'perfection' still isn't fast enough (or when there's no such thing as fast enough), one nick every five or ten harrowing seconds. He can't spare time to defend his wyvern- only to throw his knife at Flamel, disrupting the telekinetic grappling just long enough to let it halfway brace against Na-Go's impact. It's still dazed in a pile of rubble.      "I'm here! Stop!!" Melady drops down from the battlements, landing between Galle and everyone else. "Galle... Lady Guinivere is with Lycia. Please, stop this!" "I see. And that is where your heart leads you, Melady?" "Yes! Please. Let's put an end to this pointless war."      She stares at him, hands clasped, and he stares back, for what- if no-one interrupts it- could be an uncomfortably long pause. "... Galle?" "Well? Strike me down." "No!! What are you saying?!" "The path you've chosen will have you kill your countrymen. If you are truly committed to it, start with me. I won't resist." "You-- you idiot! I can't! I won't!!"      To Petra, Melady desolately breathes: "He's my partner."      Outside, the tenor of the battle is changing. The constant clanging-roar of battle is giving way to a roar of a different kind; massed human panic and surprise. Something's shifting in the balance out there.
Flamel Parsons	Flamel's reflexes are fast, but it's like he said: He's not native to this place, and so it's a fundamental truth that he can't lay his wellbeing down for its sake the same way that others can. When the knife comes at him, those telekinetic hands lash out fast to clasp the blade, quick enough to let his steed go a bit. But his focus is broken, no more grappling for now. "What...? You mean, you need...?" He stops, thinking. No, it's not within Flamel's power to steal an entire dimension of a man's existence, even with this much on the line.     "Anyone capable of massed attacks, get out there! ...I'm back. So the General is no longer your priority."     He jolts as he feels the rumbling. The panic and surprise. He might not be able to understand or detect Iðunn's power, but he can feel the human sentiment responding to it. "Oh god-- pull back, everyone get out of this!" He shouts, trying to draw people away from the tense encounter with Melady -- and towards the immediate need. What did that woman do? What's approaching? He rushes to the top of the battlements again with rapid platforming and levitation, a desperate climb. He's charging that flywheel-like energy in his body again, panicking. "Are the monsters here? Bern's monsters, the dragons?!" He calls out, trying to muster every single bit of remaining energy he can to hold off Bern's reinforcements... or in this case, possibly, main forces.     He doesn't need clairvoyance to tell that he wouldn't be able to stop this, in this condition, if a rush of supernatural, ultraviolent anti-psychic dragons are on the way.
Madeleine Cadrasteia	"Well? Strike me down."     Madeleine takes a half-step forward. "I'd lo-"     "No!! What are you saying?!"     Madeleine nearly drops her knife, visibly flabbergasted. "You mean he- you don't- wouldn't want me to-" She doesn't seem to have considered that Galle's attachment may have been reciprocal. "Are you sure?" she asks, half-pleading.
Angela	''He's my partner.'' "YOOOOOOO!" Nonon shouts, on her back because she had been kicked away but hearing this seems to have given her a second wind and she just flips back up to her feet. "NONON." Shajo shouts as he finally catches up. "Don't--" "YOOOOOO!" Nonon shouts, lifting Shajo effortless up with one hand and depositing him on her back like she's giving him a piggyback ride. "You're a BATTLE COUPLE? Oh my goddddd, Shajo and I are a battle couple too...!" "Nonon, this isn't the time to ask for a double date--" Shajo pleads. "WE SHOULD GO ON A DOUBLE DATE." Nonon exclaims. "It'll be fuckin' AMAZING, like, you're such a cute couple and we're a cute couple--" ''I'm a man with the soul of the sky.'' "...Yeah," SHajo manages. "Can't ask you to betray--" "I CAN." Nonon shouts. "If it sucks you can hit da bricks like Netzach always says! You've got the sky now and I totally get how you feel like it KILLS me it just KILLS ME when I don't get to be on the high seas, my soul is totally the SEA alright and if someone gave me the opportunity to go back I'd be ecstatic! And you can be totes grateful about that but you've got a total badass as a partner you can't give that up because of HONOR, she's so hot and--" Shajo clears his throat. "We're not going to kill you--fuck, don't ask your partner to kill you..." Ceri exhales and looks to Nonon and Shajo, "Fight's not over but..." She looks to Lilian. "...I think the tide's turning."
Ru Li Cheng	Na-Go hits the wyvern out from under him. Ru Li tumbles to the ground, the spear shattered. He has to roll out of the way of the rubble to avoid being crushed.      Pathetic.      His fingers tighten against the grass. Broken once for another world's problems, a world he didn't even care about, a world that led him to sell his morality for a taste of his dream. Because of that world, because of the failure there, he's unable to help people he's been spending so much time with - the people helping him train, the people he watches over at night, whose sleep he protects, who rely on him to sound the alarm so the rest of them can be rested and refreshed in the morning without fear.      That's all he's good for. Being a watchman. Being a bureaucrat.      His fist hits the ground. The ground shatters beneath him, a crater around the sheer force of the impact, probably stumbling one of the few remaining ladder-raisers by complete accident.      Beyond, he can taste the terror. He can smell it rising from the people. He can see it on their faces. Something is about to happen and he can't do anything to help, or to stop it. All he can do is watch. He can't even avert his gaze.      He drags himself to his feet, as best he can, which as it turns out is not well at all. The shattered remnant of the spear is at least useful as a cane.      Retreat. Run away. Leave. You can't do anything. Just go. Just stop being here. Be smart. Stop being a burden. Stop being a fool. The fight's already won. Or lost.      He closes his eyes. He's picked that habit up from being around humans. They try and shut out the world when they can't bear to look at it.      But he can't do that without shutting out everything.      The sharp cane does its job, at least. Getting him to his wheelchair. Getting him there so he can sink in. So he can start wheeling back.      So he can retreat.      Coward.
Dysnomia	She barely has time to register the incoming roar of the Boost before Na-Go is already there. She feels the intertia of a plan in the air, folding her into it, and she barely has an option to refuse--Her hand reaches out, clasping hold of the rider, then pulled up with her onto the bike.     "When you see it--dismount and let him have it!"     They're already on the way, already up, it's too late to doubt. Too late to reconsider. She can barely fly as things stand, but when Na-Go leaps from the bike, Dysnomia follows, lagging behind her in the air a moment, before rushing onward, a contrail of her mist and steaming blood seeping out behind her as she drew back her hand, burning claws as long as she was tall emerging from one hand, drawn across the body of Galle's wyvern in a SLASH.     And then she's climbing up, atop the gatehouse, using this renewed height to ascend to a higher perch. A light blossoms in her chest, shining through her teeth, as she looks over the battlefield. For the moment, the pretense of concealing her nature is lost to her, and she looses a fountain of white-violet plasma, an arcing solar flare chasing the Bernish army and--     --?!
Desire Stars	The path you've chosen will have you kill your countrymen. If you are truly committed to it, start with me. I won't resist.     Geats lowers the Magnum Shooter.      "Don't say things like that!" Na-Go angrily calls out to Galle. On the other side of the wall, Na-Go lets out a startled yelp as the Boost Buckle rockets off of her Desire Driver, interrupting her admonishment. It veers out of the gatehouse and into the blue yonder, leaving Na-Go without the superpowered armor. The Boostriker is gone, too, and the Armed Propeller, back to its normal size. She lowers the weapon.      "...We've been on the back foot, this entire time. I can count the number of times we've arrived somewhere safely on one hand. But still, Roy, Guinivere, Lucius, Shanna, they all keep fighting! Do you know why?! It's not because they're stupid!" Na-Go all but shouts, stepping forward and pointing at him. "It's because there are some things worth keeping alive no matter how hard you have to fight, because all the money and power in the world won't give them to you. Love is one of those things. So... if keeping that alive means changing sides... then I'll see you in camp."     Geats' helmet bucks briefly upwards in a little chuckle. Pride--not in himself, but in his fellow Rider.     "Flamel's right. Let's get to the battlements, Na-Go." He strides past Galle, clapping Na-Go on the shoulder. The two of them head for the battlements, to assist in keeping the walls from being breached--Na-Go as a melee combatant with the Armed Propeller, Geats with the Magnum Shooter in rifle configuration.
Trudy Grimm	Melady is suitably taken care of and then jumps down; which allows Trudy to return her attention to the battle outside the walls. The skeletons she summoned have been doing their thing this whole time, undirected and merciless. Easily destroyed but numerous and mixed in with living soldiers of Bern to sow maximum chaos.     The witch exhales, closing her eyes for a moment, then lifts her gaze to Iðunn up and behind the Bernish force, across the stretching shadows she exudes. Her tense face splits once more into a smile, albeight a strained one, "Oh? And what curse are you bringing about?"     She exhales. Eiwaz, the Death Rune, vanishes from above the Grimoire. In its place flickers to life the blazing orange rune of flame, Kaunaz. Pushing this downward, the witch forms a runic circle at her feet and sets about examining the structure and goal of the spell being woven by the mysterious woman.     Down in the courtyard, the Black Knight slides his blade back and then sweeps it up, resting it across his armored shoulders with the faint rattle of metal armor. He has nothing to contribute to the conversation between Melady and Galle, but it's clear that fighting has for the most part ceased in here.     After a moment, he crouches where he stands, then leaps up to the battlements with a heavy sound. Another leap later sends the undead warrior into the fray on the other side where he can take command of the skeletons like a general commanding soldiers.
Aidan Proudpick	"I'm a man with the soul of the sky," says Galle. The anger in Aidan's voice falls into a sympathetic murmur, sadness entering his voice. "The world beneath you. Small, but new. Every mile lets you see something beautiful. The wars and troubles disappear. And then knowing you won't ever go back up there again. But it's NOT worth killing." Aidan twists back, letting the jab slide right past him, barely catching across his waist. He is eager to see the battle dwindle, to stop fighting Galle. A glance at Nonon and Shajo. A stray thought. A crook of a smile. A turn towards Ru Li, opening his own mouth. He was there. Could he manage any words to say? Would they matter coming from h- A general call out from Lilian. A glance back at Flamel, then up into the battlements. Aidan scrambles up them, climbing quickly up the wall to stare out. Fingers dig into the air, pulling out white wisps like dough, letting them spin in his hands to then press into a single tiny compact ball of winds.
Odette Raskins	"Oh, this is..." Odette inhales lightly through her teeth as she sees the condition Marcus' arm is in while getting those larger shield bits off. "I-it's not untreatable, just... We're going to need some time to get this fixed up. For now..." Oh heck, Roy already wants to go up to the battlements. "A-already? I mean, I know that stuff feels okay, but it doesn't mean you're invincible!" She calls out with obvious concern, sighing after a moment once she realizes she'll have to improvise so as to not let Marcus fall behind his charge. With a liberal application of medical tape, a sword, and extra bandages for padding, she's able to fashion a makeshift and relatively sharp splint for Marcus' arm! "Let's hope there isn't any more fire for a bit.. Um. B-but try not to move that arm too much, okay? We'll get it fixed up for real once things calm down, and then you'll be in good shape in no time." She reassures, then wipes what she expects to be sweat off her forehead only to realize that she's still bleeding. Maybe that's what that light-headedness was about. She can't afford to stay still, though, and she has to bandage herself up on the move. So many wounded, so many interruptions, and she just keeps finding more and more injured soldiers to wrap up in bandages and smear ointment on to make sure they can at least get up and out of harm's way. It's easier to find them with her glasses' HUD readouts, at least, and Ostians are naturally favored, of course. Even so, Bern's soldiers (of those that are somehow still alive atop the walls, anyway) also get bandaged up and sent on their way, although there's still a clear tension in her movements around them, like she's both prepared for and really hoping they don't come after her from behind. There's more reason to be wary, of course, when she sees Melady and Galle still standing and staring at... Each other? She's giving them a wide berth at first, but the more they speak, the more she realizes that the battle up here might actually be over. Galle's words confuse her far more than anything else she's heard today, though, and Na-Go's angry shouting quickly has her realizing what's going on. Tensely, the EMT approaches the red and blue pair while raising a hand meekly, like she's waiting for them to give her permission to speak. "E... Excuse me. Um. M-Mister Galle? You could always retire, so you don't have to fight your people or hurt your partner on purpose." She glances over at Melady, clearly not understanding her choice of words there while going along with that. "And if you're worried about being found, I can even bring some stuff from home that should help." Flamel's shouts prove to be a little too concerning to procrastinate on for much longer, though, and Odette leaves that last part unexplained while moving to join him atop the battlements with her bag (mostly) full of medical supplies for post-fight treatment. "Wh.. What is it, Mister Parsons? Is... Are they still coming?" She asks with that usual trembling tone in her voice, ducking down a bit to peer towards what she can only hope isn't Bern's main force. Isn't the battle supposed to be over already? She squints to try and get a better look at what he's actually directing everyone's attention towards, but what is it she's even supposed to see out there?
Blemishine	I'm a man with the soul of the sky,     She remembers, how Shanna described Ilia's pegasus knights. If he...     ...so that's how it is. How Bern made him whole and complete.     No wonder his loyalty is unshakable. Which means they really might have to...     Leave the wyvern to Durandal!     I'm back. So the General is no longer your priority.     "Dame Commander...!" After disarming Galle - or otherwise - the wyvern he was defending with his very own body was exactly what she planned to go after. He's too skilled to just ignore to try and cut it down instead, at least not without expecting him to capitalize on the opening. But now that she /is/ here, and all together they've managed to pin the General down, she can...     ...stop, as Melady comes down to interrupt the fight. Blemishine halts Durandal, blinking at the silence that washes over everything. She won't be the one to disturb it. But she certainly will have something to say when...     "Well? Strike me down."     "He's my partner."     "...So it /was/ like that," she murmurs, tentatively lowering the sword with a heavy sigh. After a moment, she shakes her head a little too vehemently, ponytail whipping with the motion. "Sir Galle, I think I have a better idea of why you'd go so far for Bern. But even the most loyal person to their country has to be able to see when things are going wrong with it...! Even besides that, your feelings for Lady Melady have to be worth something, too! You have to know how she would feel, if she had to cut you down unar--!!"     Her words cut off, turning to stare up at the battlements; at Ostia's wall. "...What's going on?" Remembering that Lilian also gave an ordered for 'massed attacks' outside, she quickly questions the Dame Commander, "Is Iðunn doing something--?" She double-takes back towards Galle and then his stunned wyvern, before glancing down at Durandal. As if it'll give her some sort of answer - though she knows it couldn't, with Roland's soul now departed.     After a second, her head is also one of the ones that crane up to follow Flamel as he hastily gets up the battlements. "/Is/ it the dragons...!?"
Lilian Rook	'I'm a man with the soul of the sky,'     That alone comes closer to stopping Lilian than any other fear or apprehension she's felt this entire time. Her attention is fully devoted to blocking any more mental connection than she makes immediately and instinctually. Mirror thoughts are denied. Hypotheticals are cast out.     She succeeds just enough to swallow down the awfulness of the inevitable and reply "I'm sorry that Zephiel has misused your sky so." It takes a few attempts to force herself to stop holding her breath. "Perhaps you deserved better than this. Just as Zephiel deserved better than the old king. But the people of Lycia certainly do."     "You can take your wings and fly for them, instead, or be captured here and await the Bern that will be there for you after. Selfishly, I want you to. I wish you would. But if it's . . ." Lilian is briefly unable to do more than stare at her hands on her sword. "I'd understand." The need to think about the Paladins is irresistible. Her place on this side of the war, overwhelming.     After all, is her reason any different?
Marigold	"Ah... you're too kind, Odette. I've had broken bones before. It's you I'm worried about. Get Lucius to look at that cut on your head," Marcus says while holding out his arm good-naturedly. "I appreciate that, but there's people in worse shape than me up there," Roy retorts to her. And then they're off.      "Are you sure?"      "Yes I'm sure! I love him!! What's wrong with you?"      "YOOOOOO!"      Utterly flabbergasted: "What's wrong with you?"      "Are you sure you're safe with these people, Melady?"      "Well, I'm less sure Guinivere's safe with them..."      Shadows finally ooze over the battlements and spike from there across the city in their long streaks. And every shadow in the city, too- the walls, the trees, the lamp-posts, your own- stretch out to infinity from east to west in defiance of the sun, and in obeisance to Iðunn's simple gesture. There's hardly a strip of light left.      Those narrow strips of light are all you have left to judge it by when the shadows start to squirm and deform. Trudy learns what Lilian gleaned, plus a little more: this is a truly immense spell to 'create life', of a sort.      "Oh god-- pull back, everyone get out of this!"      "What is this," even Melady finds the urgency to ask while blinking back tears, holding her hand up to catch one of the few remaining light-dapples. When it keeps squirming, she drops it and makes a noise as if it were a gross bug. "Galle- Galle!! We have to get out of here! Whatever's happening-" "I don't know either," he admits, searching for certainty in her eyes. In his own way, he looks afraid.      Up on the battlements, Flamel can see--      An army clad in green and white, mages screened by cavaliers, rushing around the walls from Ostia's west. Bernish troops are bristling and assuming defensive positions. A green-haired horseback general with a spellbook in hand leads the white-clad troops, calling down hewing blades of wind to bite at Bern's heels.      The shadows hesitate, and then retreat. All of them shrink back towards that woman, who after a moment longer, turns and seems to simply vanish from view too.      "Look," says Roy up on the wall, still leaning on Marcus for support after the rush of Odette's painkillers. "Isn't that Cecilia...?"      "But it's NOT worth killing."      "You understand a little," Galle says. His head tilts towards Lilian. "She understands more. It's the same as being alive." He only looks slightly perplexed how she knows.      "So... if keeping that alive means changing sides... then I'll see you in camp."      "M-Mister Galle? You could always retire..."      Galle's listening. But his eyes don't leave Melady's for a while. The thread of fate between them is stretched to its breaking point. Both of them look choked up. Galle is, actually, the first to have to wipe his tears away.      "Here's your mercy," he says to Flamel. "And don't stop me. Without my word, it'll be a bloodbath down there," goes to Lilian. He rather boldly turns his back, tugs his wyvern's reins up from where it lay in the guardhouse, and tries to take to the skies. "Wait! Galle!! At least speak to Guinivere! We can--"      Nobody is likely to try and stop him but Melady's reaching hand. On his way out, he calls for Bern's retreat.
Dysnomia	Dysnomia feels doom fall upon her. The light of her own fire is swallowed up by shadow crawling over the battlements. All the wrath of her breath is like trying to chase back the night with a candle. Gritting her teeth, shadows of mist begin to spread from her back like wings--     --And there's another lancing pain in her side, sharp and overpowering. She cried out, in pain and surprise, and began to slide off of the gatehouse, falling to the battlements, in the midst of suffocating shadow.     This was it, then. Her death had been waylaid, but it was here for her now. She took a shuddering breath, and...     ...     It retreated. "Still alive...?" She asked the sky, clasping a hand to her side, relishing way it stung.