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Bloody Revelations     This time, there is no lengthy and elaborate trial to reach the particular, horrible corner of the Labyrinth that this 'Bloody Revelations' has laid claim to. There's no mysterious warpgate coordinates. No surly occult guide. No undead pack horse. No bizarre map. No twists and turns through a nonsensical hall of mirrors made of bad dreams and vague memories. In fact, the lucky volunteers of today barely have to use a warpgate at all. The moment they gather, the Labyrinth is already waiting for them, laying bare a plunging set of black, stone stairs, plunging into a hole in the ground that simply opens on the spot, dark and waiting.

    After all, it suits the spider to let the fly into its web as easily as it can.

    The passage beyond is pitch black, but easily illuminated by regular light, though doing so doesn't reveal much more than pitted, onyx walls and the odd pair of pillars of bone, being the only thing to mark progress by. It continues on for hours, too, but that might be worth it, considering just how mercifully boring it is. When it ends, it does so suddenly, as the walls and ceiling fall away into a much different kind of blackness, where all that there is left to walk on is a straight path of perfectly even basalt tiles, which enters into a wide, flat platform of the same, scored into a perfect grid.

    This time, though, there is only an audience of one. Surrounded by impenetrable nothingness, seemingly floating in the abyss, the only other thing that exists other than the platform, is the gargantuan hand of some monolithic, long-dead beast reaching up from below, in the palm of which is seated the woman dressed in unwound obsidian, sword left by her side, lazily kicking her feet over the edge. Despite the absence of anything else, the main platform is lit by something or another, though it's a faint, ruddy light, which leaves the very edges drenched in shadow, making it very hard to tell where they terminate.

    And yet, even without the chattering audience of gibbering, malevolent specters, oozing the evil aura of the dead, it's no less comfortable to be here. Possibly even less. It just clears up the signal of the only remaining aura, of a kind of pure, choking, ice-cold malevolence being stuck in the late shock of adrenaline and skipped heart beat that happens moments after a near-death experience.

    Also, without their cackling, very, very distantly, one can hear unintelligible whispering --sibilant, multifaceted, and very old.
Reinhardt Wilhelm     Reinhardt is surprised by the fact he can actually fit in here.

    The towering armored knight in powered armor arrives with hammer slung on his shoulder. He stares as the ghostly swords woman, eyes narrowed as he looks up at the giant beast she's seated on.

    He takes a breath, as the unnerving atmosphere reaches up his spine. He can't help but feel like he's in very hostile territory, which isn't too shocking given the decor around here.

    It looks oddly familiar, like the Beasts & Bastions sessions he'd GM'd back in his youth.
Leyanne Leyanne Mace goes through the warpgate on her 'conventional' bike - seeing as Skrat is currently in the shop with his guts all over the table. She stops and waits for the others to arrive, pouring tea from a large flask held in her bike's panniers.
The next to arrive are offered tea, as are those who arrive after that, until everyone has at least been offered, if not accepted, tea.

She looks over at the stairs downwards after a moment. "I think we go that way." the mouse mutters, unslnging the bren gun from her back to hold it lazily, waiting for the general concensus to proceed. Once the decision is made, she covers the rear of the group through their long passage through the straight tunnel, occasionally passing forward mugs of tea... and no doubt driving folks mad with her inane banter.

Upon arival at the game-board, she steps up next to Reinhardt, her antennae and tail twitching... last time she felt this cold was when they pulled her out of cryostasis.
"So, Slab, you ever get the feeling that something mighta been a bad idea?"
Starlight Bandits     The Bandits are here again. They wouldn't miss this for the world. Their expressions are unusually dour and serious this time around, and they are visibly prepared for what is to come. Both have long ropes wrapped around their waists and chests, they almost look ready to go mountaineering. As the stairs open before them...

    "I guess she's expecting us, huh Irvine?"

    "Seems that way, Molly. Let's not disappoint her."

    And so the two descend, using the time to go over their preparations. Molly counts the rounds in her revolver and how many she has prepped in autoloaders, Irvine counts how many clips he has for Praying Mantis...

    And then they arrive. Irvine looks around at the abyss, empty save for the hand and the woman sitting on it. "Where's your gaggle of tittering ghosts? Scared there might be an audience to your total defeat?" Irvine asks, staring hard up at Revelations.
Sanary Rondel After having to hold back for several jobs, Sanary's finally got one to look forward to! Mostly because it involves fighting things that may or may not involve be ghosts or soul-stealers or something. She's armed to the teeth, too, lugging around her trusty gunaxe and a pair of Physics staves for long-ranged healing.

     Maybe she won't be going too all-out tonight, but at least the option's there. Following that passage downwards, the healer still looks somewhat pensive about the whole situation. "So... Uh." She coughs lightly into her hand and glances around slowly, looking from Reinhardt to Leyanne to the Bandits of all people.

     "What's in it for you guys?" She doesn't elaborate past that, simply checking her gear again to make sure everything's in place while surveying the area and the woman observing them from the big hand. She squints for a moment, raises her hand...

     And gives her an experimental wave.
August Kohler For once, August Kohler is not wearing a generic hoodie. He's wearing a long-sleeved t-shirt, with some sort of protective vest over it as well as arm and knee pads. Obviously, these aren't the best defense against horrible monsters, but they're better than nothing. A shard of mirrored glass is in his hand, and he's silent during the descent, his expression one that indicates that he's thinking. It's only when he gets to the bottom that he speaks, and not to the woman on the hand.

"Irvine, Molly. With you here, there's no way she'll win." He smiles briefly and softly, before turning over to Sanary. "Freeing her prisoners. What's in it for /you/?"

And then, August walks up as far towards Bloody Revelations as she'll allow, before he speaks, attempting to look up and into her eyes. "My name is August Kohler. The deal is the same as discussed on the radio, correct? If we win, you free the ghosts and shut this place down. If we lose, you get our ghosts. I agree to these terms."
Tomoe Tomoe Does not like this, hell she hates it but she can't lerave it like this this trap out there for people who might be less wary and skilled than she so here the Iron lily is. She makes ready now and has a grim look on her face she understands the stakes here nad she may be darn well over her head she looks up to the 'host' of this event as she redies her weapon though the sword she has in hand is not Dawn Breaker it's different a bit more ornate and she seems as redy as she's ever going to be she looks over her allies for the day there's a few unexpected but welcome sorts and Sanary's here they have a healer.

"Shutting this thing down."

Is her reply to Sanary as she gets ready Lin would certainly notice the blade she's carrying is not the one she's used as long as Lin's known Sheena well better known to all of the multivbese as Eisen or Tomoe.
Yuuki Konno     Time to get real.

    Yuuki hadn't exactly wanted to come to some stupid death game. She just disliked the alternatives more. To turn away from this sort of quest would be to choose a longer life over a fuller life. It'd be a betrayal of her own nature and those who are counting on her. It'd be giving in to fear.

    Death is an old friend of Yuuki's. She's known it for a long time, and she doesn't fear what waits for her when she dies. She only fears failing to live her life fully, living as well as she possibly can. If that means taking on a madwoman's crazy death game, well, many of her friends have also taken on a deathgame. Now it's Yuuki's turn.

    Travelling with the others, Yuuki's normal overly-bouncy step is somewhat subdued. Like the last time travelling through the labyrinth, her steps are like they were back in the hospital. Her mind's in a dark place now, not just her body. But she doesn't seem terrified, just subdued. She smiles at Sanary, a bright and innocent smile that seems almost out of place. "I don't think I could live with myself if I refused this." she says cheerfully. "And you?" she asks rather directly. Lednor, she sort of understands. Sanary though, well, she doesn't really know that girl's motivations. And no, she doesn't quite understand they're the same person. She's figured out their association, but not the details.
Lin After a point of doing one crazy thing after another, keeping track of which was the craziest becomes kinda silly.

    And Karal Rei Lin has just hit that point.

    She's made her preparations. Solidly meditated, for once, made sure she was in top notch shape physically and mentally... But even with all of that preparations, the trek to the Labyrinth and the arena that she probably should have simply left...? Far from a pleasant experience.

    The way that the landscape molds to the approach, becoming a narrow path, is almost enough to make her turn back. ALMOST.

    But she doesn't. She steps out onto the platform, teeth grinding and fists clenched tightly. It's no easy effort, hardening her mind and spirit against the whispers and shutting them out - but for now, her focus holds.

    "Absolutely nothin'!" Is her answers to Sanary, as she holds out a hand and focuses her will even sharply - forcing it to take shape. A golden blade, bright as a torch, swiftly manifests in her hands. As before, Lin's body begins to exude gold-white energies like a merrily crackling flame. Though heatless, it's a strange and heartening surge of color and life that even the dreary surroundings cannot completely drown out.

    "... But I feel like letting her ideas go unchallenged would mean losing at... something. Something important."
Leyanne Leyanne Mace shrugs a little and looks over at Sanary. "Well... don't really know to be honest. Part of me wants to say it's to free the ghosts. Part of me says it's because I'm crazy and I hate the thought of someone telling me I can't do something. But really..."
Tiny looks over at Karal, nodding. "What she said is right. Sometimes you gotta do something because it's the right thing to do, damn the consequences. How much evil has been done in the universe because good people decided they should stay at home and deal with their own problems? Nah mate. That's not the Martian way, and it sure as fuck ain't the Motor-Cavalry way."
Bloody Revelations     Apparently, someone had been anticipating today a lot more than everyone else. The way Bloody Revelations is seated is like a bored teenager, feet swaying over the edge of her skeletal seat, elbows on her knees, chin in her palm, and twisting a lock of raven hair endlessly in one finger, clearly impatient for a lack of anything to keep her busy while everyone has to take the passage. When human(ish) shapes step into the ominously dim arena, her face brightens up with an exuberant smile and bright, sparkling eyes, even going so far as to wave back at Sanary like a cute boy out the bus window.

    "Well, you took your sweet time!" she declares, straightening her spine and pushing back her hair. "But it looks like you even brought friends! So, I'll forgive you~ I think I've prepared enough for this many." She then does a quick count with one gloved finger, as if counting to nine were somehow more complex than any of this metaphysical putty sculpting. "So, just to be clear, once again, the rules are that you have twenty minutes to survive. If you die, are rendered unable to continue, or flee the area, you admit defeat, though in the latter two cases, you'll die anyways~ Other than that, anything goes. That's all there is to it! So, we'll start in three . . . two . . . one . . ." and then, abruptly, she takes a break to answer Irvine. "Oh, no no no. If they saw what I had prepared, they'd probably go nuts and try to join in."

    "Go!"

    At first, not much happens. The dark, basalt-floored arena in nowhere remains silent as the grave. A couple of seconds pass by, and then, as if rising from the floor, a churning wave of unintelligible and inhuman muttering reverberates from the stones, boiling voices and static-garbled hisses coming up like heat from a sidewalk. Then, off in the distance, the faint clattering of bone, and a high pitched whine that rapidly rises from an unnerving buzz to an ear-piercing shriek.

    From out of the blackness, at every single angle surrounding the platform, swarms of human skulls barrel in on the unlucky living assembled in their way, blind fire blazing from their eye sockets, and jaws split impossibly wide in brain-splintering screams of horrifying anguish. If for some reason, someone wants to get a good look at them, they'll notice that they're actually too large to be from humans, and that all of them bear some kind of marking where they've been severed from the first vertebrae. Unfortunately, they can fly, they move really, /really/ fast, and they come in swarms so dense that they bounce and clatter off one another in their frenzied flight. They don't appear to have any weapons, except hundreds of supernaturally strong jaws filled with calcified teeth.
Reinhardt Wilhelm     Reinhard nods curtly to Leyanne and August as they arrive,e as well as the bandits, Sanary, and Karal. Karal's words and Leyanne's earn a firm nod from the knight. "I could not have said it better myself. There's no respect in this for the souls of the dead." He comments.

    August helpfully gives the lowdown to everyone in the process, and Bloody corroborates that. Popping his neck, Reinhardt listens.

    He waits before the go-ahead is given, before he sees skulls appearing from out of the black. "Everyone get behind me!" He projects his shield, before tries to block the projectiles of fire.

    The screams, they could wake the dead. It's extremely disturbing, to say the least, and Reinhardt girds himself as he returns fire with a fireball projectile to the thickest concentration of skulls.
Leyanne Leyanne Mace frowns as she hears the chattering sound, her eyes narrowing as she spots the source. T then Reinhard's shield goes up. Oh, this... this is good. Without much comment, she twists the carry handle to one side. With a quick twist and flick, the venerable old LMG is now in its anti-aircraft configuration. She ducks behind the human wall for a little bit of cover from the fire, then opens up.
"Cover the other angles!" She calls out helpfully, trusting in the shield to cover them from that angle while she covers her chosen angle. "I got front-right." She says, her voice sounding a little strained as she tries to block out the screaming.

It's bad enough with ears, but it's also making her antennae twitch, and that just feels nasty.
Sanary Rondel "So there's no...? You're not getting any sort of...? Huh." August's, Tomoe's, Leyanne's, and Reinhardt's responses have Sanary furrowing her brow and murmuring incoherently to herself while trying to parse all that. Yuuki's reasoning makes a little more sense to her, at least, considering what she knows of the girl. Not that she knows about what Lednor's supposed to know or anything! Definitely not. Lin's reply actually has her laugh for a moment, and the healer shakes her head lightly before adjusting her eyepatch. "I... Think I get it now. You're a bunch of idiots."

     A beat. "/We're/ a bunch of idiots. I mean, we're all down here, so..." She throws her hands up dramatically, then shrugs at August after a little bit longer. "Hell if I know. Not like I could let-Er. I mean. A friend called in a favor."

     Is anyone going to even believe that? Who knows. Either way, Sanary's attention is soon back on the black-haired lady overseeing them from afar. "Twenty minutes? Uh... Not bad. Alright, bring it on!" She brandishes her axe and one of the staves, watching cautiously as the swarm of terrible skull... Things come swarming towards them. Taking cover behind Reinhardt's shield, she keeps her weapon and staff at the ready while channeling her energy into... August! Time to be an MP battery for a fellow teenager. "Holler if you need a pick me up!"
Leyanne Leyanne Mace shrugs a little over her shoulder. "I can't honestly deny that right now." she shouts to Sanary, over the clatter of her Bren
Yuuki Konno     Yuuki absolutely BEAMS at Sanary, grinning like an idiot. "We are!" she agrees wholeheartedly, and quickly throws a comradely arm around the girl. She'd do more, but her sword's already drawn and they really don't have time to disarm and hug or anything.

    Since she's keeping her sword at the ready, there's really nothing for Yuuki to do before Bloody Revelations declares the contest begun. She's prebuffed, and that'll last a while. Her equipment is as good as it gets. Mentally, well, she's not in a terrible place mentally. As Bloody Revelations gets her talk on, Yuuki claps her free hand to each of her cheeks then smiles. "Right! Okay, nobody die!" she insists, taking a ready stance.

    As Reinhardt's shield goes up, Yuuki peers at it. She grins, figuring it covers that flank well enough. Well, hopefully it does. She sets herself off to one side. After all a nice shield wall, while nice, doesn't protect the group from all sides. Yuuki stands ready, then begins to carve hell out of the mass of incoming skulls.

    The imp girl has no trouble visually tracking the attacking skulls, or hitting them with her sword for that matter. They're really fast but she's insanely fast. There's just too many though. She can't cleave through all of them, not even all coming in from one direction. She may well take bites from skulls orienting on her, or let others through while focussing her attacks on the ones coming at her. As good as she is, her skills of one versus many are a slight but significant weak point. She has armor though, and biting teeth versus metal armor means she's not likely to take a bite anywhere truly deadly.
Starlight Bandits     In response to August's praise, Molly gives him a fond smile before pulling him into a side hug and ruffles his hair. Irvine doesn't even look back, but he does say, "Damn right, young man. Watch and learn."

    Both the Bandits snicker, as if at some untold joke as Revolution justifies the absence of her cronies. But as she brings in her goons, the two share a nod. Rummaging in her pocket, Molly produces a smartphone, likely pilfered, and drops it to the ground, speaker up. She and Irvine then... take each other's hand, step close, and slip the other around each other's waist.

    A waltz begins to play from the phone, and the two begin to dance.

    A skull comes in, and the two evade it by lazily turning to the side. One swoops low, but Irvine dips Molly just low enough that the two duck under. Molly raises Irvine above her head, pulling him away from one that shears close to him. It's an utterly ridiculous display. Which may be the entire point.

    "You have a lot of fun with this stuff, don't you?" Molly asks Revelations as Irvine spins her. "Watching people struggle and die so you and your friends can get your jollies? Well, we're not here so you can have fun." Irvine seems delighted, and nods. "This little cult of yours, themed around laughing at the failures of those who tried? We're going to make a total farce of it before we make you tear it down."
Tomoe Tomoe seem sto agree fully with Lin on this and is moving towards working with her she's leeping an eye on Zeeken who seem tobe chipper as everbut is she? Or is it amask?She'snot sure but well she's here.

"Could use Lednor too."

She muses but there's not much time to do much more on this topic she keeps the blade ready and looks to Lin for a moment.

"You ready Lin? Zekken? Sanary?"

Then comes the thing the floor leaves her uneasy then comes something from the darkness skulls barrel at them and that when she gets to work as the flying screaming heads come and she's moving to start intercepting with her blade, she should have got out Mooncutter and used the Nagaitnata. Reinhardt comes the tech knight. She's glad to have serious muscle like him, evenwith a few unknowns like Leyanne it seems everyone is on the same page here they need to stop this stuff and damn she's packing some serious heat and she expect August fire based powers to be a god send here.

She moves left she moves right and will attemnp to sturke at them as they pass she's also moving very fluitles too not like onemight expect someone to move in the fgear he's wearing.

"Heh, I have to agree with the bandits on this. We're stomping your little cult out for the joke that it IS!"
Lin FLYING SCREAMING SKULLS! Of all the freaky things... Lin yelps and chain-backflips behind Reinhardt's barrier just in the nick of time as a few flying skulls clip her arms. She enters a swift spin-slash right there in the air, landing in proper Form for Single Point Shining Into The Void... which is NOT well-suited for a bunch of flying opponents.

    She uses Reinhardt's shield to her advantage though, since it ensures no skulls will be coming from ONE direction... that's where she puts her back towards, and simply starts SLASHING.

    ... And doesn't stop.
August Kohler As Bloody Revelations speaks, August doesn't reply at all, but he accepts Molly's side-hug, mostly because she could snap him in half. Instead, as the timer ticks down to go, he glances into the mirror shard, and speaks. "Persona." Blue energy flashes around him as he calls out a piece of him, his ego, and manifests it in the form of a robot soldier with a gun for a leg. As it appears, Sanary's boosting August, and he stops to crack a smile, feeling the energy flow through him. "Bloody Revelations, was it? I'm going to burn your challenge to the ground. Let's do this, Tin Soldier!"

As the skulls come forth, August shudders, briefly, but shakes it off, unwilling to allow his fear of terrible fire-eye skulls get in his way. As several come to try and rip him to shreds, the Tin Soldier moves in the way, blocking them with its arm (which causes the redhead to flinch) before throwing them off, pointing the gun up at the attacking skulls, and unleashing a torrent of fire. Skulls are engulfed in extremely hot flames, August being able to let loose a bit due to the mana surge. "This can't be the best you've got. Do your worst."
Bloody Revelations     A giant shield is probably the most valuable thing someone could have brought to this horrid little 'game', but, when scaled up for nine people, leaving it all up to Reinhardt to protect everyone else just isn't going to cut it. The skulls are not individually all that dangerous, but the sheer number of them that throw themselves against his energy barrier right from the get-go is flat out dangerous. It's like blocking an avalanche more than anything else.

    At the very least, though their speed is high, it seems their flight control is poor, and where they split like a river when they bounce from the crackling screen, they're left swerving wide and swirling around the group in circling layers while they adjust their course. The swarm makes it difficult for the skulls that come from other angles to get in, though slightly more difficult to hit in turn. Reinhardt's flame strike just ploughs right through them regardless, obliterating three dozen of them in a straight line with almost no resistance, letting off a firecracker chain of fading screams.

    As others soon find out, they really are only as durable as normal human skulls. .303 british is practically overkill, punching nasty holes through their bony craniums that send them tumbling into the abyss, and Yuuki's trained sword can shatter them like garbage skeleton enemies 20 levels lower than her. Some of them even crack on Tomoe's armour, where they hit it at a particularly bad angle, and where Karal strikes them, the bone fragments vapourize into bits of blood red mist, making her glowing saber an impassible wall.

    Seeing the bandits start to dance, their Abyssal spectator actually claps in delight. "Oh no no, this is really interesting! The learning comes from seeing how so many different people choose to defiantly face the Void up until the end! Yours is the first time I've seen anything like this~ I wonder how long you can keep it up?" Her eyes quickly fixate on August in fascination when the Tin Soldier is summoned, though it could be for any number of reasons. Her attention is very swiftly and obviously focused on him, and the bizarre dance of flaming death his Jungian minion does. Oh, don't worry about that~ she croons.

    Despite the ease with which any of the Elites gathered can destroy the skulls, the sheer number of them constitutes a very real risk of exhausting energy or ammunition before getting through them all, and even as they blow huge chunks in the orbiting field, more can be seen (and heard) approaching from the distance. Soon enough, they start actively avoiding Reinhardt's shield, circling around like chittering piranhas to find their opening to lunge and swoop down. They seem to act with neither self-preservation nor hunger. They're more like stage hazards or videogame enemies than even undead, which somehow manages to make it feel even creepier.

    They aren't the only threat for long, though. From out of the dark at the periphery of the arena, new shapes start to appear. Part architecture and part living thing, made of eerily fused basalt and bone, they're something like levitating, upright sarcophagi, mirrored on three sides and ritually engraved with images of the dead, save that where a head should be, they instead split into a squirming mass of suckered tentacles.

    These ones are quiet, letting off only a low, menacing thrum beneath the wet wriggling of their grasping tendrils. Where they move, the prehensile appendages lash out to snatch skulls out of their air and cram them into a hidden maw, cannibalizing them with eerily lifelike screams of terror. Each consumed soul causes the blasphemous etchings to build up a crimson glow, until they discharge the energy as scything rays of crimson light and writhing black smoke. Though it diminishes the amount of cannon fodder, where the swarm is thin, the group now has to contend with mobile turrets of deadly necrotic energy, forcing the tightly packed formation to break up, unless someone wants to lose all their limbs.
Reinhardt Wilhelm     Reinhardt pretty much exists to tank, and he's glad to do exactly that. "BRING IT ON!" He bellows with a laugh, before he tries to swing his hammer at a few of them as they come too close for comfort, like a big heavy flyswatter.

    His eye glances to the dancing bandits for a brief moment, almost in disbelief and amusement at the display. Theyr'e sure flashy, he'll give 'em that.

    Of course, things get worse as TENTACLES HAPPEN. Reinhardt tries to slack at one of the flexible tendrils, but he's not exactly equipped for those. "CUT THEM OFF, CUT THEM!" He barks at the top of his lungs, knowing blades will do far better against the tentacles.

    Reinhardt moves to try and evade the tentacles as they discharge light and smoke. That's probably best to avoid.
Lin "If there's a challenge out there-- I'm going to tear it apart!" Lin exclaims heartily, despite being covered in small cuts and bruises already from the sheer torrent of bone fragments slamming into her - even if few of the skulls got close.

    And then... something new appears. She blinks a few times, eyes widening with alarm... and SLAMS her blade into the first series of shots that come her way. It sends her skidding away from Reinhardt's shields and RATTLES her arms, but she holds on- even as the necrotic blasts are half-dissipated, and half diverted. Shards of them fly in all directions! ... Seems her Glorious Solar Saber can handle such things.

    "What the HELL ARE THOSE?!"
Leyanne Leyanne Mace tries to use Reinhard as something of a wall... after all, she's not really much of a blade kind of mouse, though she's trained in the use of a knife. "I'll keep the skulls under control!" Tiny calls out. "Or at least I'll try!"

The only problem, in Tiny's eyes, with the Bren gun, is that it's only got a thirty-round magazine. Still, it's a magazine, not a belt-feed, so reloading is quick and easy... even if Tiny does only have a limited number of them. As soon as her next magazine is loaded, Tiny brings the gun back up to her shoulder, maintaining the steady stream of .303 British into the wave of skulls.
"Not a lot I can do against bigger targets if I'm stuck on AA duty... anyone got a large blast or anything like that to knock 'em down?"
Yuuki Konno     Yuuki enthusiastically carves up skulls, fortunately getting considerable reduction in the attacking numbers both from ranged attackers in the group and from Reinhardt's shield. She takes a few hits but they leave only small red marks. The imp is tough, too tough to be seriously harmed by a swarm of death-themed locusts.

    After cutting down a bunch, Yuuki ducks back within the protection afforded by the shielding and by Reinhardt's mighty hammer. Making herself small - smaller actually - she chugs back a healing potion. Between that and Sanary she'll be more than just fine, and ready when the tentaclers come forth.

    "Oh! I'll get them!" Yuuki calls out excitedly, abruptly dashing out from the group. It's a move that might well catch the skulls by surprise. They're circling around looking for openings, and Yuuki just blows past them like violet-themed wind. Some may be able to redirect and attack her, but as fast as they are they'll still have a time catching up to the agile faerie girl. She dashes for the tentacled things, then abruptly she stops and cuts. Her blade becomes a blur, tearing though tentacles and also trying to tear through the mobile sarcophagi bases as well. Out, wreck them with superspeed and with her blade... and hopefully back into shelter again quickly, or at least under cover-fire from her allies.
Starlight Bandits     The Bandits dance faster and faster as the skulls swarm more and more, less of them bouncing off the big man's shield. Until it finally happens. As the two part, hands still linked, another skull flies at them, forcing them to seperate their hands. The dance is broken. "Hmph! Point one to you, I suppose!" Irvine says, before the two just draw their weapons and start smashing the skulls with blade and hatchet.

    And then the next level of threat appears. Wriggling coffins that eat skulls and spit lasers. As the beams scorch the floor, that phone meets its fate, the waltz cutting off. "Aw! I promised I would return that," Molly huffs as she turns her back on the coffins. Irvine runs at her and jumps, leaping into her cupped hands so she can launch him! He soars, and comes down on one of the coffins with blade brought to bear. He swings, over and over, slicing away at the tentacles as Molly rushes in, weaving through the beams to join him.

    "Hungry? Here, eat up!" she yells, grabbing one of the severed tentacles and swinging it at the cut-up coffin's mouth, trying to make it choke!
Tomoe Flying skulls,they only seem tobe as durable as normal ones and Tomeo is starting to find otu they may be a bitmore for show than anything eklse. STill it's only the opening wave. Caliburn is in hand and the blade flames up with holy fire but Tomoe's not cast a spell it seems this new weapon ahs this intately too it and she'll keep at the skulls with it as they keep comming at her. Then comes something new and she makes ready to itnercept but seeing the tendrisl the tentacles get Tomoe's eyes to go a bit wide she attemps to focus and then she's forced to break up fromt he rest butshe'll attempt to strike at the enemy when she can.

"I have lived in Japan, you don't have to tell me twice!"
Sanary Rondel "... Eh? Wait, you're not supposed to..." Oh, whatever. Sanary's not going to try and think too hard about any of it, especially not when she's getting positive reinforcement for being stupid. Considering the situation, it's probably the smartest thing she's done all day.

     Either way, the healer is mostly focused on sticking to a support role, bringing out her staff to prepare a bigger burst of healing magic. She does twitch a bit when Tomoe mentions Lednor by name, but it's probably just because of the heads going around Reinhardt. They force her to shift gears into whacking them away while taking the occasional skull to the skull.

     Good thing Sanary's pretty hard headed herself. It's the tentacles that really screw things up, though, the sight of their weird elbow face mouth guns and the incoming blasts forcing the healer to move.

     "Who cares what they are? They'll all just die the same!" She still manages to take a nasty shot to the side, tumbling and rolling once before scrambling to her feet. She's still being a dutiful healer, though, usingt he axe to support her weight and throw a bigger burst of healing magic at Yuuki this time!
August Kohler As the fire dances, August notices Bloody Revelations looking at him. "What, am I interesting to you? Speak your mind, crazy woman." As the skulls melt away, he changes his posture, moving to see what comes next. Noticing the numbers, he keeps the skulls directly affecting him off of him, preserving the rest of his energy. However, when new shapes of tentacle coffins appear, August bites his lip and frowns strongly, his disgust obvious, as is his want of murdering these things. "The hell sort of things are these?!"

The Tin Soldier swerves in again, moving to ignite one of the sarcophagi to see how easily it burns, but is hit in turn with the necrotic energy, flaying one of its arms and causing it to writhe silently in pain. As does the Persona, does August, clutching the equivalent arm and showing signs of pain. "Agh, shit! Guys, try not to get hit!"
Bloody Revelations     "Oh aren't they just great?" Bloody Revelations enthusiastically responds to Karal, watching the glowing sword zip back and forth like a cat observes a wiggling mouse. "I had three whole days to come up with some new designs, so I'm really happy you appreciate them." She almost looks disappointed when a stray beam vapourizes the phone, but having the mad cacophony of spine-tingling screams seems like a suitable replacement tune to hum to.

    The floating horrors are significantly tougher than their cranial brethren. Their tentacles are not as soft and fleshy as one would hope, leaving an attacker with the unenviable prospect of having to cut through what feels like thickets of dense, fire-hardened wood. Reinhardt is lucky that his hammer is heavy enough to send one of the levitators slowly spinning away. They're where the lasers come from though, and so every pitted tendril hacked away is one less threat, and where all of them come off on a single specimen, it squeals, lists, and crashes to the ground as an inert lump of stone, but that doesn't save Yuuki and Irvine from new attempts to snatch them with the same tentacles they're aiming to cut down, and drag them squirming into the grinding mill of hideous teeth inside. Only the bright kiss of psychic fire seems to stymie their attention, where a corona of flame leaves them aimlessly lashing about in contortions of searing pain, no less dangerous, but entirely less focused.

    With the group properly broken up, the remaining skulls unfortunately have much more freedom to chase individual targets. They swarm about Leyanne, Sanary and Tomoe, churning about them from all sides, cutting them off from the others with their sheer density of animated bone and tooth. One appears at a blind angle to Karal, this one bearing massive ram horns, swept forward to evoke satanic imagery, and then when it connects with her sword, violently explodes into a swirl of hellish fire.

    It's also getting worse and worse to spread out. It was difficult to tell, with the deep shadow at the end of the arena, but getting closer, anyone can see that the stone blocks at its periphery are gradually falling away --they probably have been this entire time. Where the platform was originally 100 meters across, it has easily shrunk to 60 in the chaos, and it shows no signs of stopping. There's still nothing but impenetrable blackness beneath it . . . and across from it. The Deathknight beams at the first person to realize it.
Bloody Revelations     And it just keeps getting worse. Atop the already deafening chaos, the sound of tapping, rattling, insect legs becomes so loud that it's audible in all directions, bringing to mind a horde of spiders stampeding like wildebeest. What lowers itself out of the dingy blackness above isn't all that far off. At first all that's visible is the gigantic visage of a withered and emaciated human face, transfixed in a look of utter horror that looms down from the air, but as it gets closer, the shuddering black carapace it's affixed to becomes visible as well, and the vision becomes that of someone's terrified expression struggling to break free of a giant spider's chest cavity. The size of a semi trailer, it's a wonder that the thing floats at all, never mind with such an eerie glide.

    It also has too many legs to actually be a spider. Far too many. Their frenzied twitching and writhing makes so much harsh, skittering racket that it's difficult to even look its way. The thing is so big that it can easily reach just about anyone it once, hacking and stabbing and trampling away with multi-jointed limbs the length of buses, trying to pin the Elites struggling below like bugs. It doesn't stop there either. The otherwise unoccupied face takes a deep, horrid breath, inhaling the gathering piles of bone fragments, severed tendrils, and lifeless stone husks, in a whirlwind that threatens to suck up the living as well. After a few seconds of clearing the field, it grimaces hideously, and then vomits out a deluge of viscous white fluid, spreading over the entire stage until it pours off of the edges like a waterfall. Where anyone is unlucky enough to be touching it, its function is obvious --the stuff is designed to peel the flesh off of corpses to quickly make more skeletons . . . except it still seems to work on flesh that's still attached to a living person.

    And just as a triple whammy, when the wave clears, a great deal of the skulls it had drenched fall to the floor, turn over, and then sprout a number of spider-like legs of their own, racing madly around the arena floor at a much greater and more agile pace, spitting wads of their own, ghostly acid.

    "Oh, do I have to?" Bloody Revelations comments lackadaisically, watching the arena shrink to less than half. "I'm just wondering if your strange spirit will turn into a ghost when you do! I didn't think I'd get a two for one."
Leyanne Leyanne Mace snarls as the wave of skulls drives her back from the others - and it's at this point that she spots the Arena shrinking. "Oh for fuck's sake, just won't play fair, will she?" THe mouse grumbles, keeping up her rain of fire against the skulls - and anything else - that gets close. They're starting to bounce off her armour now in places, each impact forcing the rodent back slowly as gashes appear in the armour's undersuit, revealing white fur and red blood... dammit, she really needs some space to work here.
"Hundred and twenty rounds down." Leyanne calls out. "Down to 3/4 of what I brought. Slam? Can you clear me some space so I can crack out some grenades?"
Reinhardt Wilhelm     "You MADE these things?!" Reinhardt demands, growing more and more disgusted with this mysterious psychopath.

    Or sociopath, it's hard to tell and he's not the one with multiple MDs.

    He feels webbing around his wrist, and Reinhardt activates his shield, the force field emitter burning through anything fleshy in its path while he tries to free himself.

    Then the fucking spider comes. "Oh schisse." He says in horror, as he grips his hammer in both hands. "C'mon, come on..."

    Once they come in range, he swings his hammer, trying to get them to back off. Acid spit hits his armor, and he feels the plates sizzle like bacon. Pain roars through him, and he growls as he tries to smash more bugs.
Starlight Bandits     My goodness, she certainly has a lot of ideas, doesn't she?

    Even as Molly finishes force-feeding one of those coffins parts of itself, horrific visages of men fused with spiders descend and vomit acid all over. And to make matters worse, the lazily drifting skulls now have legs and scuttle about, spitting acid also to limit movement even more than the falling edges already did.

    The two finally take those ropes wrapped around them, revealing that they're tipped with grappling hooks. Spinning them, they toss them at the hand that Bloody Revelations is lounging around on, using it as a grappel point to get in the air, above the danger.

    "Is this all?" Irvine asks as he dangles and points his gunblade at the skulls, sinking rounds into them, right between their eyes. "I have to say, I kind of expected more. You spoke so highly of seeing people succumb to the horror that is their fates, but these creature designs are very juvenile. Really overusing the skull thing too... are you half-assing this, /Vermilion?/"

    Molly meanwhile aims her revolver at the spider creatures, pointing at one as it finishes inhaling and prepares to spit up acid. She fires, aiming for the mouth mid-barf in the hope of giving it the worst kind of acid reflux! "Now now, don't be mean Irvine. She probably just ran away from her nice home because her parents wouldn't call her that ridiculous name she gave us~ Someone like her has never worked a day in her life, you can't blame her for being lazy!"

    It's bait of the most transparent sort. But will Bloody Revelations fall for it?
Yuuki Konno     Hip-deep in tentacles, Yuuki slashes furiously to free herself from the ever-tightening trap. The tentacles can't easily catch her, but chopping through deadwood is difficult when you're wielding a rapier rather than a machete. This isn't an insurmountable obstacle though. As things look dark, Yuuki takes a moment to crouch low, her blade held at an angle.

    The obsidian blade glows briefly with a purple light, and she springs upwards with a series of slashes. The slashes leave violet afterimages, and the extra cutting power of dark magic make it possible for her to cut herself free.

    Yuuki fares somewhat better against the spider horror, as she can effectively parry the massive legs. If they're too heavy to parry she can use their mass to push herself out of the way, and she has no qualms about leaping off one limb to dodge another. The huge attacks are much easier to dodge than a mass of limber tentacles and she's making her way back to the group when the spider thing unleashes its most brutal attack.

    Yuuki makes a few semi-arcane gestures and wings appear on her back. That allows her to fly free of the whirlwind. It doesn't quite let her escape the acidic spray however. The girl shrieks at the pain of her flesh being eaten away. Well, at least that's what it feels like. The pain is real enough even if her leg merely appears to go bright red with damage indicators.

    Yuuki doesn't try to touch down, not until the white fluid clears away at least, not with her leg damaged to the point of temporary uselessness. She needs healing and perhaps a breath of time to quaff another potion. For now though, she doesn't take that time. Instead she uses her wings and her sword to begin tearing up the skull-spiders. She needs to give the support crew a break before they can give her a break in return!
Sanary Rondel It didn't seem too bad at first, but as that necrotic energy lingers, Sanary is finding it harder and harder to stand up straight without hunkering down and clutching her decaying side. "Kkh.. Dammit, yeah..!" She scowls and channels some raw energy into the wound, trying to reverse the effect and get herself back into fighting shape. As she does, she keeps lurching around to avoid more of those skulls. It's something of a minor relief, then, that they're only trying to ram her rather than imitate their tentacle-y brethren and spit more blasts at her.

     "You chose the wrong... Uh... Rock in the... Whatever!" Sanary's inability to come up with a one-liner frustrates her enough to just start lashing out at the skulls with her gunaxe, trying to batter and cleave them apart as they swarm around her. She can't even get to her allies through the sheer numbers, and that in turn just seems to be getting her even more frustrated.

     "Stupid freaking... You!" Her swings are getting wider as the space between herself and her allies grows, both a blessing and a curse since she doesn't have to worry about hitting anyone with that giant axe. It even starts spitting out flames with each slash, the Fire shell loaded in it kicking in to add a bit more oomph to each swing!

     Until the giant spider shows up. It keeps her in place long enough that some of that acid gets on her staff-holding arm, drawing a sharp cry of pain from the healer and forcing her to drop it while taking to the air with her anklets just to get a breather from all the acidic EVERYTHING.
Tomoe It's hard to keep track of everyone in a place like this the tentacles are worse than she thought.She ends p having to hack and slash at things which are comming at her. The skulls will get more of Tomoe's sword as she tries to keep her two companions safe as she's able to do. But she also sees that Lin is in a bad place.

"LIN LOOK OUT"

Thing are getting spread out it's getting harder and harder to keep with her allies and this isn't even the end of thing ad more skeletons come and she's going to try to se ewhat she can do now.

She looks to SAnary for a moment she says nothing and keeps trying to fly but sadly she can't end up flying for long here ands shes' goign to save it she does however take a risk chanting a spell. Gold runes fly about her body and then bolts of light arc out about the arena seeking out the various horors it might not do much damage but it could give her allies an breather or an opening.
Lin "Whatever those are--hgggghhh---!!" Lin's suddenly faced with a nasty explosion, one that sends her tumbling backwards. She kicks the ground, bounces, and transitions into a few flips... only to spring forward and back towards the middle of the arena again... only managing so ten meters from the edge!

    

    By now she's looking a little frantic...

    Which leaves her face to face with a spider-monstrosity. She shivers right there... and starts to snarl. Even as she's still flailing violently against what skulls are still flying around and slashing them to bits...

    This isn't a challenge.

    This is an affront to all sanity, all respect for the dead... any sanctity of the soul. It ENRAGES Lin - the Lin of now, and who Lin was many many centuries ago...

    As soon as she's splashed by torrents of the awful bone-white liquid... she howls. A long, blood-curdling battlecry.

    "How many... how many died to produce this monstrous mockery of a sport?! This goes beyond just proving a point! I'm gonna tear this ENTIRE ARENA APART!"

    With that shout, the arena floods with a golden light, Lin shining bright as the rising sun - and in all the same colors. The blackness is under full divine assault from the one thing that shouldn't be able to breach this far down - the light of the Unconquered Sun.

    The light twists and spins into a great, nearly opaque blaze. That center of it spirals and swirls, twisting outwards into a great roaring eastern dragon coiled around an Anvil. The dragon's claws ready for a swipe and jaws open wide as Lin raises her sword and then drops down into a guard stance...

    Something's changed though. Her fury is so thick it's all but palpable. It fills the air like a burning haze, a pressure that bears down on the undead abominations Bloody Revelations keeps summoning.

    "PREPARE YOURSELVES!"
Leyanne Leyanne Mace only now catches the scent of oxidizing, acid-burned metal as it splashes across her armour, burning through the undersuit in places where the plates aren't. THat hurts, but it's no worse than a razor-sand storm on Mars... lethal only if you spend too long in it. She darts into the space cleared by Reinhardt's shield - she can't fly like the others, and she really doesn't fancy a brand new pair of cybernetic feet, thanks!
Once there, she hooks her bren gun's strap over one shoulder and yanks a grenade from her belt. The way she throws it, left-handed, isn't how one would normally throw a grenade. It's more like one would pitch a baseball, with all the pantomime that entails... and a puff of gas from her shoulder as she throws with all the strength in that modified cybernetic arm. A normal maple baseball bat wouldn't stand a chance...
"FIRE IN THE HOLE!"
August Kohler The fire doesn't burn as harsh as August was hoping for. The Tin Soldier steps back, firing an empty shot into the air to boost its attack strength, but during this time, the floating horrors would be able to get another counter attack, allowing them to further chew away at that wounded arm. The Tin Soldier responds with even more furious fire, hoping to incinerate some of the sarcophosquid coming at him. August is panting, as he looks towards Bloody Revelations again. "How can you enjoy this? What sort of person does? You said you're alive, so how the fuck can you have such a disregard for life and death?"

As he's furiously debating the death knight, August sees the giant spider-person-stone-horror. His frown and lipbite turns to the point that he actually begins bleeding, and his fingers start to curl up into his palm so sharply they cut the skin. There's a thought, as August considers the time. They have about three-four minutes. There's the possibility of more horrors, and the group is only /now/ using their full power. They'll run out of energy eventually, and the arena is shrinking. Therefore, he needs to take a decisive blow and draw attention off the others.

From what it looks like, August and the Tin Soldier just stand there doing nothing. But he's waiting. The second there's an opening in-between melee attacks, the Tin Soldier is moving forward, as August remains still, even as the edges fall apart. "Keep your distance. I'll finish this." Another blank gunshot is fired, as everyone in the group would feel a rush of defense and endurance. Defense buff, get. And then, the flames start to emerge...

And roar into an inferno, which begins to wrap around the Tin Soldier as it charges straight into the Horror. It mines a horrid face of pain and screaming, as August falls to his knees, but the Persona keeps moving, leaping onto Bloody Revelation's monster. The inferno grows, a kamikaze attack meant to burn both. It's incredibly obvious that the Tin Soldier is /weak/ to fire, as it is that August doesn't expect to survive this.

This is an attack of someone who is willing to sacrifice themselves for the others. August Kohler is fighting as if he's about to die.
Bloody Revelations     The utter bedlam, as promised, intensified by the minute. The edges of the arena continue to fall away, shrinking steadily down to the 30 meter mark, forcing the regenerating swarm of skulls, sarcophagi, spiders, and worse things, into a narrower and narrower area, becoming chokingly dense around the combatants, until they can barely see one another through the storm, beset from all sides, and with less and less room to move. Bloody Revelations talks over the sound of grenades and gunshots --of screaming and shattering bone-- as if it were background chatter at a cafe.

    "How many times do I have to explain to you idiots? I didn't go through all this trouble just for entertainment. I worked long and hard on this project, as a testament and ritual to one of the five Understandings. Just because you don't grasp its holy significance doesn't mean it's pointless. My enjoying it is a side effect~" She looks to the crater blasted in the arena by Leyanne, and the hole in the swarm it had cleared, and just like that, more of the dead things come. She glances at Yuuki and Sanary taking flight, and the tentacles direct their lasers on them as sweeping anti-air fire. Where she watches Reinhardt swinging his hammer, the fodder that suicidally throws itself into his mighty blows are joined by cooperators that leap on him from behind. It's difficult to tell if she's directing this play, or whether she's memorized it step by step, and it's all following the model.

    "Skulls are quite fitting though, aren't they? What marks a sight of mass death? What makes a pile of bones shocking to the core, instead of a butcher's workshop? It's the sight of all those things everyone has inside their head. The remains everyone instantly, primally identifies as human, and all their instincts go off, warning them away. That thing we hate to admit that we look like, when our the thin veneer of our unique faces comes off. Stare at a skull long enough, and you stare at the knowledge you'll look just like that sooner or later." She pauses to watch Yuuki take whirling path ripping through the spiders, and just in time to catch Tomoe grant her allies an ever-so-brief respite in her barrage of holy lasers, burning away part of the horde into red vapour. "Or something like that~! Truth is, skulls are really easy to get a hold of down here!" She then laughs at her own joke.
Bloody Revelations     In an act of incredibly inadvisable, and frankly stupid, heroism, August throws himself on the spider goliath. The blaze spreads instantly to its desiccated flesh, causing boiling fluid to bubble and froth from its arachnid joints. It screams and thrashes and flails like mad inside the corona of psychic fire, wrapping its legs around itself to stab and batter and break August's bones, but its struggles are in vain. The fire consumes it, flesh and bone, and soon it topples lifelessly to the ground, legs curled in the posture of a dead roach, as its blackened hulk falls into the void with the disappearing floor.

    But that's not the end of it. Karal flares her aura in the face of a crowd of suddenly hesitating skulls just in time for the ground to rumble beneath her feet, and for parts of the platform to erupt into geysers of shattering stone, giving way to the massive, twisting lengths of twin serpents of ghastly white bone, larger than anything thus far. Endless chains of grotesquely ornate segments support what must be hundreds of twitching and slashing claws, each mounted with a blood red gem, within which human shapes can be seen, silently trying to escape. Their heads are the jawning jaws of some massive, prehistoric beast beyond description, but their teeth are only for display, as between them lies a howling maelstrom of dark energy that consumes whatever is in its way.

    They spiral into the air and dance about one another in a way that could even be described as graceful, before swooping to the ground level, and swerving wildly about the increasingly tiny area, obliterating whatever is in front of their faces, dead or alive. Where they pass, massive, jagged spires of splintered obsidian leap forth from the tiles, rendering them unusable, and slashing anyone unlucky enough to be near them to ribbons. If anyone's keeping time . . . there's still 8 minutes to go.

    But it doesn't get there. One minute, the Deathknight responsible is watching like it's her favourite TV show. The next, all that id-driven satisfaction drains out of her face in the space of a single heartbeat, leaving behind only a complicated kind of maturely nuanced hatred that better befits her age. Molly ran her mouth. She probably shouldn't have.

    "That, coming from an indolent, air-headed whore, being dragged around on a leash by homeless mental invalid, who somehow believes the puerile garbage he /makes up on the spot/ just as much as /she/ does?! What would you /possibly/ know about work?! What kind of /laughable/ idea do you have of what it's like to have /any/ kind of responsibility?! Do you think I'd listen to this kind of /shit/ from someone who still hasn't given up their childishly asinine fantasies to face the real world that everyone else has to suffer, while they're busy prancing around and screwing?! Drop DEAD!"
Bloody Revelations     The medley of horrid noises the closing swarm of ravenous dead makes is blotted out in an instant. The air becomes chokingly thick with the scent of blood, spilled fresh and in nauseating quantities, and the tiles shudder as if something is banging on them from the other side, trying to get in. The sunburst mark burns itself dark onto the Deathknight's brow, where it smolders and trickles blood. Her surroundings burst into a roiling haze of black and violent flame, slowly consuming her throne around her. Red hot light suddenly runs along her right arm, collecting towards her hand, as if every nerve had become a tiny river of lava. It converges at her fingertips, which blaze so white hot that they shred the supernatural dark around her. When she thrusts her hand forwards, the world is drowned out in a prolonged, mind-cracking scream of burning metal, human anguish, and breaking glass, pushed through a dying amp too small to handle it.

    The entire area is flooded --drowned beneath an impossibly violent storm, where every raindrop is a streaking dagger of bloody hellfire, unable to make up its mind whether it is a blade, a flame, or a streak of disintegrating gore. Without possible description, the undead horde that the living are battling is abruptly slaughtered to the last. The indiscriminate deluge of fire cuts down skulls in the hundreds, eviscerates spiders and tentacles, and shreds the skeletal serpents into a million tiny pieces. The arena floor becomes a lush meadow of burning knives, point down, orange instead of the green of grass.

    And then just as quickly as it started, silence falls, the Deathknight takes a long, angry look at her now completely empty arena, and totally useless game, and then sits back down. Her aura disappears with a deeply vexed sigh, as she cranes her head up at the blackness, and half-assedly laments "Ahhhahh . . . I broke it. It looks like I wasn't ready for this level of understanding after all."
Reinhardt Wilhelm     Reinhardt pauses in the middle of the fighting. "...you sound -exactly- like someone I knew once." He says to Bloody without a hint of irony. Somewhere, the man once knew as Gabriel Reyes sneezes.

    Hammering tentacles and cutting them in half with his shield's edge, he completely misses the TIDAL WAVE before he's covered in water, practically drowning in rain from Hell...until everything stops.

    THUD.
Sanary Rondel "Understanding...? Screw that! We're gonna take this down because... Because... Screw you!"

     Sanary still isn't doing any better at clever or snappy responses than she was before, and her frustration at it (and everything else) is reaching an all time high. When she was just focusing on supporting her allies, Sanary was doing okay. She wasn't doing anything flashy, but giving August more energy to use with the Tin Soldier and Zekken more breathing room with healing was a good plan. The axe seemed like a good idea when she got sidetracked by skulls, but then there had to that giant freaking spider. Sure, coming up with something clever to say on the spot didn't work out, but surely she'd be able to pull her own weight against the giant spider's stupid giant spider body, right?

     Not really. With her allies focusing so much energy into attacking it and dismantling it, she can't even see a way to properly approach it without getting in the way. To make matters worse, August doesn't look like he's even in a state to defend himself!

     With that defense buff coursing through her, though, maybe there is a way. Sanary's not content to just stand on the sidelines, after all, especially with how annoyed she seems to be getting for no apparent reason. She drops to the ground and holds the axe in front of her to weather at least a few of those lasers sweeping against her and melding flesh with coat. The healer roars in defiance while doing her damndest to ignore all the pain. She makes a beeline for the teenager, barreling through lasers, skulls, freaking DEATH RAIN, everything! "So many shitty... Crappy... Stupid ass!" Sanary's barely even forming words when she reaches August, battered and covered in both acid and flaming burns while continuing to shout angrily at nothing in particular. Or is she shouting at everything?

     Maybe everything. Whatever the case is, she grabs him by the shoulders, then hoists him right off the ground with her raging pig farmer strength. The axe cleric focuses all of her remaining magical energy into a bright green cloud of healing magic, swirling it around August and slowly expanding it outwards. It's barely enough to keep her arms and legs from melting and breaking under the stress and the rain of burning daggers, but the bulk of it is focused on keeping the Persona-user alive through his kamikaze attack!

     And as quickly as the rain started, the rain ends with the arena empty of what they had been fighting this whole time. The healing magic keeps flowing and expanding outwards for a while longer, but Sanary somehow managers to look even angrier than before. It's not clear if she's even registering what has just happened.
Leyanne Leyanne Mace gets bowled over by the wave, rolled over and tossed around... until suddenly the wave stops, and everything goes quiet. After a moment, she picks herself up, coughing, her armour sliced, slashed, pummeled, torn -AND- soaked in gore. She looks over to see if August is still standing, and on fire. She looks over at him with a very, very vicious look, the kind that coud kill, and then stomps off to check on Reinhardt.
"Good news. Slab's not dead."
Yuuki Konno     Thanks to faerie wings Yuuki's still alive, and she's able to avoid the spiralling sweeps of the bone serpents. Sure they can fly too, but she's nimble even in the air and can read their path faster than they can change position to catch up to her shifts in movement. Being nimble and light means changing direction far faster than anything big can possibly do. It's simple physics.

    Of course she can't be fast enough to dodge the storm of raining hellfire. All she can do is smoulder, shriek once again, and dive down under cover to weather the storm.

    After it ends she rises slowly to her feet, limping heavily, her wings gone. She's in pain, badly wounded, and utterly exhausted. She only gained henshin a short time ago and while the avatar gives her strength, her pitifully-weak human body is what powers her endurance. She's built up some strength over the weeks, but not nearly enough to sustain fighting at this level for long. Perhaps she'd indeed been in over her head in this challenge... but she survived. More importantly, in the end she didn't give up. That's really what counts.

    Slowly the imp girl makes her way towards Sanary and August. When she reaches the pig farmer she'll just throw her arms around her and collapse. Good thing the imp weighs practically nothing. It's more a hug than a cry for help, but with the fight apparently over Yuuki simply can't muster the energy to remain upright while her leg's as injured as it is.
Starlight Bandits     A lot of things are happening at once.

    If Irvine were in a position to speak, he would have a lot to say about what August is doing. Stuff about how he's letting his man's romance burn out of control, so bright that it blinds him to other, important things. Molly would yell at him that he was being very dashing, but she would be sad if he died so he better not

    But they're a bit distracted by the torrent of hate that Bloody Revelations screams down at them.

    They would also respond to that too, if they could. Irvine would be all macho, asking how dare the woman say such hurtful things to his partner. Molly would be that kind of gentle snide, asking if she's upset that she has someone in her life and BR doesn't. But there is a rain of burning, cutting hellfire upon them. Not a thing someone wants to weather while hanging from ropes.

    After the storm subsides, that has to be it, right? The rope was burned and slashed to bits, and the two plummet into the abyss below? Ah, there it is, the snap of the rope giving way.

    But just after, two arms get onto the platform upon which Bloody Revelations' throne sits on. Two bodies pull themselves up after them. There, the Starlight Bandits stands. Covered in burns and cuts. Irvine has one side of his face covered with a hand as blood pools from under it. Molly looks like she took the worst of it, all covered in burns and cuts.

    In spite of it all though, they're beaming with triumph.

    "In spite of all you preached..."

    "Here we stand, alive. Remind us again what you said about the impossible, about living in the real world?"

    The two of them do that kind of stagger-walk you do when you're trying to hide how tired you are, and place a hand each on BR's shoulders. "And I believe you said you would tear this place apart and come back if we beat your little challenge. Glad to see you were so proactive about the first part! Now, come along."
Tomoe Tomoe says "So that's it huh? Going to have to wreck this...harder then."

She doesn't have much time to yell anything else at Bloody Revelations though as thing are heating up she moves to try and finish off the skulls for a moment. Tomoe recalls that one can reconstruct what someone looked like from the skull she muses she doesn't say anything as she's dealing with said skulls trying to go after them. Then comes the bad joke Tomoe just? She's having memories pop up of the leader of the Laughing Coffin and fears should he ever fin his way here. With the laser show she's been able to by her allies some time but can she do enough here? Lin is still fighting and she has to wonder about this Deathknight she is acting like she's watching a TV show when she thinks about it.

The noises are getting worse the horrible thing that happen next is a storm, no there's a scream too and the storm the rain is like a dagger o hell fire and her body is becoming covered in red distortion lines where her form seems to be giving away, it seem to be normal but it's clear to Lin and others who might catch a look at her? Tomoe is in a good deal more pain that she seems to be, she's making for August as he does he insane stunt but it's too late even as the rain bites into her she's cursing now she's failing here failing hard but Sanary seems to be a step ahead of her in this and she just ends up dropping to one knee for a moment and she looks up to Yuuki, she's breathing raggedly in a way that's nor normal for her fighting something has changed for Tomoe.

"Lin.... Yuuki?"

She looks to August, to Reinhardt and she seems like she's going to fall out and she's not getting up for the moment.

"The Baits are right, toud' also cough up the souls here too if I recall right as well..."
D She's breachinhard and her face is clearly showing the same sort of Triumph that the banits are.
Leyanne Leyanne Mace looks over at the Bandits. "Yo. You two earned yourselves a beer from me. Next tome you're up Hoonah way, come to my bike shop."
Bloody Revelations     Bloody Revelations doesn't seem to be in much of a mood to talk to anybody. That sudden flare of impossibly violent temper had dissipated pretty quickly, as if burned as fuel for that incredibly explosive outpouring of magic, but she seems more interested in staring at the dark than addressing any of the still (if only barely) living people left on a 15 meter floating platform.

    When the Starlight Bandits clap their hands to her shoulders, though, there is a subtle but extremely threatening click of metal. The Deathknight hadn't really moved, but the the scabbard of her sword is clutched in one hand, and the tsuba is pushed out two inches by her thumb, in that way preceding a draw cut. "Don't push it." she responds, still looking into the blackness. "Clearly, I was reaching for a form of meditation still too advanced for me. There's no point in keeping this here. But all of you are exhausted, wounded, depleted of magic and ammunition." Her head slowly rolls back down to look Irvine in the eye. "So don't provoke me to kill you, okay~?"

    Soon enough, blocks of pitted basalt begin to rise out of the void, and reconstitute a path back to the stairs. "Besides. Clearly this means I need to take a look at whatever strange places you got that idea from~"
Lin Between the horrific noises, sights, and things actively trying to kill them, Lin's having trouble focusing. Her proclomation made, her consciousness has become something... strange indeed. Target, analyze, and attack. No more banter, she's fighting for her life in an ever-shrinking region. Her previous proclomation about keeping August from dying is forgotten instantly in a flood of self-preservation battle instincts.

    Packed into a tight spot, existence itself is little more than a flood of sharp bones and screaming skull-things, necrotic horrors aplenty. The Dawn Caste - howling at the top of her lungs like a lunatic - is persenting a formidable defense to all of it. Exploding necromantic beings, suicidal flying skulls... it nips, chips, and tears away bits and pieces of her, this storm... but nothing can seem to pierce the defense that is her dancing blade, swift as the wind and vicious enough to be an effective wall against anything that gets too close. No matter what direction it comes from, she becomes a blur and her blade is where it needs to be.

    She's covered in blood (her own) and bone fragments (not her own) and starting to breathe hard, but marvelously bereft of any serious injuries.

    And then... the bone serpents. THAT shakes her out of her battle trance...

    The sunfire dragon her anima's become does not cower, but its eyes do flash brighter along with her own eyes widening. THOSE are not an enemy she can simply batter away and hunker against---

    "Shit--"

    And then everything is nightmares, screams, and necrotic shards.

    As it all comes to a halt, Lin drops down to one knee, panting heavily. The sunfire dragon display recedes, its anchoring anvil fading as well...

    "What power... haven't seen that kind of display since the gate of Lumiere. Gods..."

    Only then does she have the leeway to start looking around at her allies and paying more attention to what they're doing in the aftermath...

    She gazes August's way and immediately flinches.

    Stubbornly getting to her feet again, Lin holds a blood-drenchd fist out towards Bloody Revelations.

    "You've got one hell of a grasp on that wicked power... but if I was you I'd turn around and do something less likely to get myself eaten by one of those things. You think you can control this stuff?! It's... pure madness... this place... urgh."
Starlight Bandits     The two look down at the partially drawn blade that Bloody Revelations clutches... and both put on a wry smirk. Without a word, Molly pulls back the hammer on her holstered revolver. "One shot left, that's all I need~" But they don't press the point any further, removing their hands from her shoulder and taking the path to join the others. Their first stop will be to their employer, to tell him to give their portion of the reward to Chiu. They want to wash their hands of this whole affair.
Leyanne Leyanne Mace cougs a little, wavering on her feet. She seems to have gotten off pretty lightly, considering... but even then, it looks like there are broken (or possbly bent) bones, and the mouse is bleeding from a whole welter of places. Something in her arm is sparking, and dripping oil, and the outer lens cover of her eye is cracked.
"Let's just... get outta here. I need a drink, a shower, and a doctor... in that fucking order."