After his recent discussion with Hannah, Takashi had set to work on his detection project with an all new dedication. His results, however, had not quite matched his effort. Day after day of relatively flat readings had left him growing more and more annoyed, detached from the project.
So when a reading finally did come up, small and faint, he almost dismissed it as an anomaly. But the second time the reading came through, Takashi took it upon himself to investigate. Donning his Barrier Jacket and Shadow Mask, he left the lab for the nearby side road, just off the sprawling Infinity Drive.
It was there he discovered the source of his reading. A small, relatively weak youma, and something that on its own would've been of no consequence. What was of consequence was what was chasing it, hunting it. One of the girls he had heard about, possessed of an obvious power and wielding a staff he could only assume was a weapon like the Devices that Eclipse had come into contact with.
So from a distance he followed her, waiting for her to lay the finishing blow into the youma - so that he could arrive and do the same to her.
Runealy has been spending much of today making her way over to Mitakihara, once again trying to investigate a few things she has learned about the area. Last time, this was interrupted by a bank robbery. She was hoping for better this time around.
And during that walk, she had a chance to test her new phone. Hinote had shown Rune the basics of using it, and now she's trying it without him being here to guide her through this. She was able to eventually figure out how to make it call Gaofele's phone, and had been explaining to him: "I'm on my way to Mitakihara to find someone. Kind of a long way... just passed some place called Midori-Ya several minutes ago, might stop by there sometime during daylight. Did you ever see a road called Infinity Drive? It's huge! I'm about to get off it and..." She goes suddenly quiet.
A few seconds later, the alien princess adds: "People don't make noises like that. We'll talk later!" Closing her phone and putting it away, she hastily summons her tiara and uses it to transform into magical garb.
She didn't /see/ what the origin of the noise was, but she heard where it came from and is running in that direction to find out what the problem is.
Watching Runealy chase the small youma from a distance, Takashi was also using the time to size her up. He wondered if he could ascertain the source of her power, and acquire it, without needing to get into a dangerous confrontation. Probably not - from what he'd seen at the bank these were very driven individuals. He though back on if he had seen her at the bank, and he was sure he had. Which meant she might have allies, and he would need to strike fast. He made sure to follow closely.
On the ground, the small, skittering youma made good progress, until it darted into an alleyway. However, when it hit the end of the wall, rather than continue to climb it turned around. Small though it was, when cornered, its red eyes flared and it revealed a mouth of razor sharp teeth. It might only be able to take one or two shots, but it had apparently decided to stop running, as it dove at her.
Runealy continues her pursuit, following the sounds of movement into the alley. She's tense; it's possible she's following nothing dangerous, or something /very/ dangerous, and an alley would be a fine place to ambush her.
When she gets into the alley, the princess finally sees what she was pursuing. Sure enough, humans do not make noises like that. "A Witch!?" Homura told her what the term was. "No... something else... ahh!?" Her thoughts are cut off by the beast making its move. Her boot-wings light up with a silver-blue glow, launching her up and forward... carrying her above and past the monster's lunge! Spinning in mid-air, Runealy moves to descend so that she'll land just beside a trash pile without disturbing the netting used to secure it.
Eyes wide with fright even as gravity takes over to end her jump, the princess calls out, "What are you!?" This question is punctuated by a green orb launching off her wand, intent to burst into emerald sparkles if it impacts with the monster.
The creature was not only small, but ungainly. Immature might be a good way to describe it, as the orb impacts it hard, emerald sparkles raining down around it as it goes down to one knee. A human opponent might have tried to go for quarter, might have run away, but now that the creature has grown so hostile, hostility is the only thing it appears to have. Angrily, it begins to charge towards Runealy again, it's claws now bared, each ending in glinting, sharp black points, like some sort of horrid shadowy child.
And yet still the figure on the rooftop watches, gauging the anwser to two things: the strength of the warrior below him with the green energy, and why on earth his device decided to ping on this small little creature. Surely there were larger forces of darkness active in Tokyo!
Unaware of being observed, Runealy keeps this battle on street level. She lands just in time for the monster to be rushing where she'll be at, so there will be no dodging this. Instead, the princess puts herself in a bubble of red energy and winces as its claws rend at her shield!
The defense holds, but she's being knocked backwards within her forcefield. After blocking a particularly wild slash, Runealy stumbles back, back, back even while letting her defense down... and winces as she crashes against a wall! With her vision momentarily blacked out, the princess fires at the ground between herself and where she last knew the monster to be. The intent is to kick up a dust cloud to conceal her, as a second green orb flies out... and bursts in mid-air, sending a spray of sparkles down the alley! Hopefully an attack that wide will catch the monster, as her sight is only now starting to return.
She doesn't have much to say right now, aside from shouts punctuating each shot from her wand. This beast doesn't seem to be able - or care - to talk with her, so Runealy isn't wasting any more effort on that.
The burst of energy that Runealy fires, though blindly, is perfectly timed - her air burst explodes just above the little youma, raining down its spray right onto the creature. There's a shriek from it as the light of Runealy's attack burns away the last vestiges of dark emotion the creature is using to sustain itself, and it thuds loudly down on the ground, suprisingly weighty for the thing. The dark energy that composed its body begins to bleed off, the angry red eyes growing dim and those red pinpricks still seem to flare angrily as the creature vanishes.
As the dust begins to clear, the sound of hands clapping together echoes off the walls of the alley - though with Runealy's ancestry and training it's just as likely her first warning of the new presence might be an enormous, dark pressure.
Takashi Agera - now Riventon - stands between Runealy's precarious position and the end of the alleyway, clapping loudly.
"Well done! Well done! It was looking hairy there for just a minute but you managed it!" Riventon says, dark energy swirling around him like a thick cloak. "A good show. I think you owe a lot to that magnificent device you're holding, though. Would you mind terribly, handing it over to me?" Riventon says, smiling, with all of the slickness of a used car salesman or a purveyor of trinkets.
"I'm remarkably curious about it. And it will be much easier than trying to prevent me from acquiring it by force." he adds, still with the polite, happy voice.
Runealy sags with relief as the monster dissolves, talking to herself with heavy breaths. "Finally, I got it..." She doesn't get to complete that thought, as something feels... wrong. "...another? I feel sick just being around this."
Then she sees Riventon arrive. He's applauding. "What? Were you just watching? You should have either run to shelter or helped. Or..." He's asking for her wand.
...No, he's basically demanding it, she realizes. He's demanding one of the things she'll need to save her world, meaning she can't enterain this idea in the slightest.
Runealy's mind races to consider the situation. She's stuck in the worst part of an alley, somewhat fatigued from fighting one enemy already. This mysterious man seems to hold several advantages. If she stands her ground and fights him here, the princess believes he will probably win. Trying to flee past him seems like it's playing right in to his hands. All of this goes through her mind within just a few seconds, and Riventon may well notice her terrified eyes scanning around every which way to take all these factors in.
She can't give him what he wants. She can't get into a head-on fight here. She can't flee toward the alley exit. That leaves one other option. Runealy speaks: "I don't know who you are, but my answer..." She suddenly aims at a wall halfway between herself and him. "...is no!" Another green orb flies out, this one intended to knock several bricks down and create a 'debris shower' she hopes will keep him away for a moment. Then her wings light up again as she vaults into the air, heading straight up for a walkway-and-stairs... a fire escape. She wants to go up, not toward Riventon.
Riventon almost immediately reacts to her attack, putting up a dark blue circular barrier to deflect what he expects is an incoming attack. This results in him only spending a (thankfully) small amount of his energy on a shield that deflects only rocks and shrapnel. It does buy Runealy some time, and she heads for that fire escape.
"Really? I was so polite, and this is how you repay me? Didn't anyone teach you any manners?" Maybe a show of force will convince her. Or maybe he should just blast her as hard as he can and run. That might be the more intelligent move, but more than anything, Riventon is somewhat annoyed she didn't immediately give in to the demands, and annoyed that she thinks she can escape. No, no. A show of force is the least he should do. In the hopes that he can buy himself some time, he suddenly channels a creation that he had practiced after watching Signum do one in small size during the bank robbery - a Barrier.
The barrier spreads out rapidly, shunting Riventon, Runealy, and any other magically aware subjects in the radius to a quasi-alternate dimension, allowing Riventon to more freely rain down his offensive powers. Luckily for others Riventon's barrier is quite big - it's makign them smaller that takes more energy.
"Nowhere to run now!" he adds, and begins to channel a large amount of dark energy into his hand. <Schattenschlag!> calls out his device, and a massive pulse of dark energy tears through the air, aimed in front of Runealy's escape path, ripping a massive chunk out of the terrain of the barrier's phantom battlefield.
"Next one will be much more on target! That's your warning shot!" he announces, channeling in his hand the neccessary energy for another Shadow Blast.
The Princess has no witty reply to Riventon's mockery. A frightened gasp is about all he'll get from her, as she realizes he's taunting her... and has figured out what she was up to. That suggests he's very sharp-minded, and she won't be able to just pick some random trick to fool him and escape or win.
So when the barrier expands over her, Runealy makes a very frantic look around to see what else she can try. She doesn't get long to think, as dark energy courses /just/ over her and forces her to end her boosted leap! Debris falls, knocking her out of the air and sending her crashing to the alley concrete in a hurt heap. "That's a warning?! That could have...!" Could have what? Killed her? Possibly. Rattled as she is, Runealy doesn't complete the sentence.
The sheer amount of power he's flinging around strongly implies she's outmatched. She could blast a hole open in somewhere and just run... but Runealy fears he'd just shoot toward the direction he last saw her in, and with dark-energy blasts that wide he'd probably hit her without having to directly see the Princess!
So she tries something desperate. Boot-wings light up again, and she charges headlong at Riventon! Runealy is trying to tackle right in to him, even as the gems on her tiara light up and spit out a rapid stream of tiny, green energy sparkles. A long scream accompanies this maneuver, one that is a mix of fear and aggression. Her only real hope is that maybe, just maybe, he can't bring that kind of power to bear if she's right upon him. She has nothing to base this belief on; it is a last-ditch gamble born from seeing no other option that has even a tiny chance of doing something to keep her from falling to this mysterious man.
The manouver does strike Riventon as a large suprise, and maybe for a moment it is evident in his eyes, as he is too slow to react to the idea that this tiny young girl, so clearly desperate, might close to melee range, having seen her attack patterns!
Axion, however, is not as suprirsed. <ROUND SHIELD> it calls out of its own accord, placing a barrier of that same blue-black energy between Riventon and the Princess, stopping her attack mere inches from its impact point. Riventon falls back into his standard speech pattern rapidly, using it as a cover to disguise his surprise, and perhaps concern.
"Close! You're really not that bad. But I'm... just... better."He says, as he thrusts his right hand forward, that energy ball still collected, ready to collpase the shield at the moment of attack. His shadow cloak moves more of its collected energy to the front to protect himself from the backblast of what's coming.
<SCHATTENSCHLAG!> Riventon's device calls once again - this time, the attack isn't aimed to miss.
'Not bad.' 'He's better.' These words cut deep in Runealy's mind. They're a different take on her own thoughts, as fear spikes anew when Riventon's shield stops her with very little to show for it; there's no way the blasts from her tiara would have taken him down on their own, and she was really banking on being able to tackle him.
It didn't work. ...Of course not, her inner voice thinks. Of course an obvious last-ditch gamble from a failure of a princess wouldn't get through. Fear and self-criticism combine to effectively gut any further offense she might have mounted.
Then... that shout again. She knows what it heralds. Runealy launches straight up, hoping to jump clear over the dark energy! It's a good idea, and perhaps the only right idea available to her. Instead of outright knocking her out - or perhaps worse - by completely engulfing her, it 'only' manages to hit the lower half of the Princess.
This impact sends her flying through the air, shrieking in pain and shock as she's driven down a street, through walls... and collapsing in a pile of debris!
She can't escape, she can't win in a head on battle, and she can't effectively hide. Runealy is out of options. ...No, perhaps not. There's one other thing she could do.
Runealy reaches behind herself, into the bow on the back of her dress. Her hand is shaky, her entire body twitching from pain... but she can feel a jagged crystal, one of several she swiped from the castle vault before this expedition to Earth. Something she brought as a last ditch choice, something nobody should be aware she has. After all, they're illegal... the ones in the castle were strictly to help the queen of any given era study what methods demons might use.
Tears blur her vision; Riventon becomes an indistinct blob of color as she holds onto the crystal. "False power at a price... poison... a trap..." Runealy repeats her mother's words in a dazed voice. The Queen's advice meant to steer her away from ever so much as considering using such awful things, knowing that nothing good could come of it. Runealy hasn't revealed the crystal yet, but her hand clutches it tightly as her terrified thoughts struggle with whether she should indeed bring it in to view and use it. Hurt and overwhelmed as she is, the temptation to use this horrible item runs high no matter what the consequences might be!
"Dandelion Shot!"
A green arrow of light, its head surrounded by a basketball-sized orb of faint energy, flies over Riventon's shoulder from behind. The arrow decelerates as the faint orb brushes against him--
--and the orb pops, releases a cloud of emerald motes that dance and sparkle, then rush for the nearest surface like gnats, stinging and flashing.
A building away, Guardian Gao lands on a rooftop, the oversized maple seeds accompanying him flickering out as he touches down. He already has another arrow nocked and drawn, the magic awaiting the shape it will be released as. "Back. Off," he growls, watching Riventon with a grim expression.
Hinote had spent the better part of the day memorizing lines. Memorizing lines was easy. When to say them was not. When his phone went off. This wasn't uncommon, what was uncommon, was that it was from a friend.
He made an Oath. That was important. His heart, was indeed, a flutter, both in worry, and because he'd never actually dealt with an actual emergency before! Regardless, he'd traveled a short distance, fast.
At some point, he transformed, and found his way up a fire escape when Gao's big Arrow Orb pops and comes onto the scene---fashionably late. Runealy is there. Gao is over there. And some jerk in a mask is being threatening. He knows a bully when he sees one.
Does he draw his sword?--- wait that's a stupid question. Of course he does. He points it threatingly at the unknown. "Stop what you are doing!" he demands.
"...and face us!" he insists. He does a good job at acting brave. In reality, he's a little scared.
Riventon watches Runealy hit the ground, slam backwards from the force of his attack. He doesn't see her fidgiting behind her, looking for a solution - he sees a successful attack, and he walks towards her.
"I warned you didn't I? I tried to be diplomatic and you repaid it with discourtesy. Now look at you." he added, continuing to slowly walk after her.
And that's when the call out of young Guardian Gao rings out behind him. This time, both Riventon and his device react too slowly, and any the arrow streaks past his defenses, detonating on his shoulder, showering him in the distracting motes, and preventing him from making any more offensive progress, as his shadow-cloak closes in, trying to suffocate the offending energy.
"An extra opponent!" Riventon says, looking upward to face Gao. Then, Guardian Hino also rises to the occasion, pointing his sword. "Well, three on one isn't very sporting." He adds. It's also not very good odds for him - a point his intellectuality loses very rapidly to his pride. "Well, it's really more like 2 and a quarter, given the status of your friend there." He says in his polite overtones, hoping to get a rise out of the two young defenders, to make them make poor decisions.
From his gauntlet, the two small orbs on its lower arm detach, swirling rapidly round Riventon, ready to run interception on any continued surprise attacks. "Come on, get down here and I'll put you in a heap just like your friend over there! Don't be foolish - you had better both run, before you get hurt." Somewhere, a voice is telling Riventon he might be the victim of the same advice, but he pushes it to the back of his head. He's the strongest here by far, he can -feel- it.
"Just... just stop..." Runealy's 'retort' to Riventon is pathetic, a mix of anger, disbelief, despair, and desperation. She can't even make eye contact with him, heart pounding as she's on the verge of making a drastic decision. Yet a familiar voice cuts through Runealy's thoughts. 'Dandelion Shot!' "Gao?" Her speech is a faint whisper, but her dazed mind is at least aware that he's here. That gives her pause.
A second voice joins in. 'Face us!' "Hino...?" She can see a blur that at least looks like the same colors as him.
Even her barely coherent thoughts can piece it together: The Guardian Knights are here. Her closest friends. The revival of a historic order. An institution meant to effectively take Waldian society's concept of a 'circle of shields' - the notion that one is surrounded by people who keep them safe, and in turn you are part of someone else's circle, in a string of mutual support 'networks' - to the next level. In some ways, their Oath is an agreement between the royal family and a few extraordinary people that they will strive to bring happiness to one another, and protect each other from demons so that they - and everyone else - might live to embrace peace and prosperity.
They're here, and that means Runealy doesn't have to use the crystal made of a demon's essence. Nobody has to know she was even considering it, or has one. Her hand releases it, leaving the terrible jewel hidden.
Instead... the princess crawls. She pulls herself along one hand at a time to get out of the wreckage, to try to get away from Riventon, to get out of sight. Runealy is suddenly very glad she was talked out of going to Earth alone. Right now this isn't 'two and a quarter'... Riventon is being too generous about her ability to continue the fight.
This is two on one, and the 'quarter' is simply trying to escape; she'd just be in the way right now. Runealy is trusting in her friends and leaving this to them!
Guardian Hino has never handled a 'real' opponent before. Woah, what's he /doing/. That's /amazing/, but... it's the words that get to him. "Yeah, you won't lay a finger on her again." he asides. He looks down at his sword, and thinks for a bit. How.. how does he use this thing? Maybe he just needs to trust in his own heart is saying at the moment.
That's to rise up. He lifts the sword up, and over his head and with a flash of red- and his sword lighting on fire, he doesn't call out the attack name, and instead, just unleashes a lovely torrent wave of fire. Well. That's a thing, he thinks. His sword can shoot /fire/!? That's awesome, he thinks!
He takes the time to try to move closer towards this Riventon, who apparently is just taking a defensive measure for now.
Gao's eye's narrow at Riventon's little zing. He was glad that he had come along to make sure that one demon didn't lead to another, and that he had informed Hinote about what was going on. While it seems like the demon was a one-off, this darkness-wielder is vicious enough to make up for it.
He glances toward Rune, slowly crawling away, then at Guardian Hino's wave of fire. Inflicting some retribution on Riventon is tempting... but Rune's safety comes first.
Diving sideways, Gao unleashes a swarm of thin arrows towards Riventon, but not directly /at/ him. Rather, the swarm is somewhat off-center; it wouldn't take much to avoid them, as long as the dark-thrower moves away from Rune.
Riventon isn't sure if he's more annoyed at their audacity to stop him in the first place, to stand after his threat, or the fact that they didn't react as he wanted. To be fair, he hadn't considered the possibility that the one with the sword would use it as a long range weapon. Between his own mind and his device, the two angles of attack leave him with one very good option he can see - so he takes it. The cloud of energy that normally serves as his wall shifts, coalescing at his back into two great wings - making him look for all the world like the silhouette of one of the demons of Waldia.
And with those wings he flies up rapdily, over the flames of Guardian Hino and well out of any fear of the arrows. He rises to Hino's height and reaches out with his hand, looking to channel a large dose of negative energy right into the guardian's body! "Fine, be rude, I'll come to you!"
As he does, the two orbs that detached interpose themselves between Guardian Gao and Runealy, harrying him with small dark energy pulses of their own, trying a similar trick as Gao, but in reverse - trying to flush him away from his wounded comrade and back towards the fight with Riventon. "And you! Don't introduce yourself with all that pomp and then behave so clumsily! I'll beat both of you and then catch up to her, so give me your best!" His pride may be getting the better of him, but all the same it's also psyching him up.
Runealy can hear the noises behind her. Gao's arrows sail nearby, and her ears do take notice. At first she fears she's about to be hit by someone or something, but eventually her dazed mind pieces it together; Gao uses arrows. He's trying to cover her.
Footsteps clatter, and Runealy realizes that Hino is moving in! They're both standing up to someone she hadn't been able to stop herself, someone who meant to take a very important part of her by stealing her wand.
Someone who still frightens her, even as he casts a shadow by taking to the air. Yet that fear is held in check by some hope and reassurance. Her friends are here, and that gives her just enough of a 'spark' to rise and begin a stumbling run away from the battle. She's on the verge of tripping, but keeps going; hearing dark energy flicker about behind her is a fine motivator. So she runs, not worried about the particular direction so long as she gets out of sight of the battle. After all... these wondrous voice-throwing boxes called 'phones' mean that even if she gets lost, she can still reach her friends.
For right now however, she does indeed need to 'get lost.' Too hurt to put up a meaningful fight now, the Princess feels the best thing she can do is get out of the way so her friends don't have to split their focus. It feels cowardly to do this rather than standing and fighting, but good sense urges her to just trust them. To believe that Hino and Gao can handle this!
The dark pulses sting, but at least Riventon is no longer focusing on Rune -- that's a good thing, as far as Gao is concerned. Still, the dark-wielder is enough of a threat that the forester similarly can't supply any direct help to Rune.
Well, if direct help won't work, then indirect just might!
Whirling to face Riventon, Gao draws another arrow, then releases it with a call of "Bramble Grasp!" The arrow peels into eight vines, each one covered with minor thorns and spreading in different directions, tethered together at the base, which is flying towards Riventon. If it gets close enough, the vines will try to wrap around the dark-flinger, bringing a small amount of pain and a decent chunk of inconvenience -- and possibly giving Guardian Hino a chance to strike!
Meanwhile, Gao palms the viney quarterstaff, still in its hand-sized shrunken length. It might not be as powerful as his bow, but sometimes the right tool for the job is an unexpected long stick.
Guardian Hino watches The opponent flies upwards, and this jars Hino for a moment, who's unable to also uncerimonously deal with being pumped full of dark energy. It burns, and rends, and never before has he felt such agony, but it lasts for a split second, before it turns into a dull burn. "Nrg.. is that--- the best you got!?" he calls out, He rebrandishes his sword and attempts to slash it again, sending out another wave of fire. This might be his only ranged option, and the dude is flying around. He has a feeling, deep inside, that he can't fly. Maybe jump a good deal upwards. But not fly.
He still attempts to bridge as much distance as he can as his sword sings through the air with firey waves.
Flying up, Riventon's hand successfully makes contact with the sword-wielding lad, and the energy channel is quick and brutal. As the energy burns its way out of Hino, Riventon can almost see something, some sort of pattern in the recesses of his mind...
And that's when Axion's announcement drags him out of it. <ROUND SHIELD> it calls out - but a moment too late, the processing of one half of the device weighed down by the difference in the other half - and the shield goes up just a brief moment after the arrow passes it, allowing the binds to wrap around Riventon.
While most of the actual pain is soaked by his light Barrier Jacket, the binds are still tight and squeezing. While the ensarement doesn't actually stop his quasi-material wings from providing flight, the effective binding of the rest, and the surprise, does allow Hino's fire slashes to strike home, the flare engulfing Guardian Hino's opponent.
In order to stop the fire from cooking him, energy must be diverted - this DOES cause the wings to fade out as the dark energy is repurposed to snuff out the fire and protect Riventon's body from damage. But now, he is falling back to earth, and it is all the device can do to set up several small, light barriers under him - which he smashes through, but each one arrests his fall so that he can roll with the damage, sliding back to his feet.
Alarm bells to him to retreat, but he's not heeding them. He can see his parents in his mind, he can hear their pronouncements he is the best. He is the best. "I AM THE BEST. YOU CANNOT WIN" he says, as much to himself as them.
The darkness helping him shatter Gao's bonds, he fires two blasts, one for each of them, massive and powerful, at a high cost to his remaining energy. <SCHATTENSCHLAG!> announces Axion each time the powerful bolts are unleahsed, tearing their way into the battleground.
Runealy continues to stumble away from all of this, away from 'vine arrows' and flame waves and dark energy. She looks over her shoulder, glazed vision reveals three blurs still fighting. Three... not one or two. All three, meaning her friends are holding their own.
Good.
The princess staggers out of sight, slowing to a hurt walk and continuing to wander in... whatever direction. Her tiara vanishes after a while, and her energy to keep moving will last only slightly longer than her magical guise does. Eventually Rune goes no further, slumping down against a wall in a far off alley and clutching her phone. This is not some shallow addiction to a material thing. She's not waiting to text the latest gossip to someone or checking some online store's hottest new offers.
She holds the phone because this is no longer her battle. The phone is a symbol of her belief that Gao and Hino will find some way to triumph, and when they do... this box of metal and plastic will make that funny noise to tell her one of them wants to talk to her. She's sure of it; they'll call eventually to tell her everything is okay now. Until then... she sits, breathes, and waits.
Guardian Hino is blasted, with, more energy. He raises his sword in a defensive stance, but it fails to absorb any of the blow, rather, it hits him square in the chest and causes him to slide against the ground, where he'd feel that burn again. This hurt.
He had no fanficiul misgivings about his oath. Runealy told him as such, but he can still feel the burn as he takes a deep breath through clenched teeth as he tries to see through the haze his vision has become. At least, he's on the ground now.
This is when Guardian Hino charges forward, towards Riventon, and brings the sword in a slice into his form this time... "Fire.. Slash!"
Now he was calling out his attacks, NOW too? Maybe.. maybe he's getting the hang of this, finally. Regardless, he attempts to cut down Riventon, or at least, make him a more open target for Gao to shoot at.
Guardian Gao grins as the unrehearsed combination strikes true -- perhaps more due to luck of distraction than category of skill, but the results are clear. His fingers wait near the energy-string of the bow, watching as Riventon crashes to the ground, but not drawing yet.
When the dark-wielder shatters the bonds with a surge of energy, Gao's eyes widen. "Forest Wall!" he calls out, taking a knee as he extends the quarterstaff so that its tip slams into the ground. A thicket of plants spring up in response, providing some cover for the forester against the massive blast.
And massive it is, both in size and in power! Gao's defenses wither from the edges inward, and the Knight is knocked backward as the blast barrels through, weakened but still plenty strong. "We will not lose!" he yells back, rolling to his feet and drawing his bow. This time, the arrow has a pulsating mass of energy on its head, coruscating in various shades of green.
"VERDANT EXPLOSION!" Gao shouts as he releases the arrow.
The battle has taken its toll on Riventon as well - he can feel it, in his spirit, the fragility of his Barrier Jacket, the way he feels like he's exhausted in a deeper way than mere physical exertion. And still he stands, just like his opponents. But even he can push aside his pride and see how this battle is tilting.
And tilt it does, as the two Guardians press their attacks at the same time. In response to Guardian Hino's charge, Riventon stretches out his arm and a blue wall rises up. <PANZERSCHILD!> This shield is focused, and Hino's blade smashes against it, the shield and the blade locked in a struggle for supremacy!
And that's when Guardian Gao's bright green arrow soars through the air, smashing into the shield, and unleashing its powerful payload against it. The shield shatters, and Riventon gets an even clearer picture of just how much the battle has shifted so quickly, with Hino's sword continuing it's cutting momentum now, its magical flame pressing through the Barrier Jacket, allowing the magical blade to score true damage, cutting -though lightly- into the actual flesh of the Guardian's opponent.
Riventon staggers back. His chest is aflame with pain, his mind is aflame with chaos. But quickly, he gets it back under control. Now's not the time to continue fighting for pride. There is more to pride than just fighting - otherwise he'd just be some sort of brute. It can also be about not letting your defeats define you. "I've got so much more left for you two!" he begins, defiantly. "You can't protect everyone... you can't even protect her!" Then with the last vestiges of his energy, he uses tactics his opponents have used against them.
First, from the guardians: Reinforcements! The dark energy that saturates the battlefield begins to coalesce into many shaowy figures - malevolent faces, red eyes, and slashing claws lash out at the two guardians!
Then, from the princess herself, he emulates a simple distraction... one last blast, aimed at the ground between him and his opponents, kicking up a very direct shrapnel and energy shield to cover him while the very short-lived but very malicous shadows make a last ditch attack against the Guardians, both to harass them away from Riventon and to get one last attack in. With this, the barrier fades away as the world shifts back to normal, and Riventon makes his escape, for now.
Guardian Hino is set to lean into Riventon, and either stop him for good, or force him to flee. "I can't protect everyone... but I can protect who's close to me...!" he demands--- but as he goes for a swing! Ugh!? What are these!? He begins swinging at the nearby beings with his sword. It doesn't take much it seems, to cause them to cease existing and defintily are not human looking to him.
He's never seen anything like it before!
Well, that's a lie. That thing on the bridge was worse, obtensily. Maybe that's why he's not freaking out insanely right now about this all.
The shrapenl repels off his armor as Riventon makes his escape.
Guardian Gao brings up an arm to protect his face from the shrapnel, then he scoops up his staff as the shadows close in. With these numbers at this close of a range, archery is impractical... but a quarterstaff sweep can be just the thing!
He swings mightily at the nearest shadow, expecting a solid hit and the recoil that comes from that. Instead, the shadow barely resist before falling apart, leaving Gao spinning wildly, clipping a couple more before he regains his balance. "Hino! Are you okay?" he asks the other Knight, even as he takes a few more controlled swipes at the shadows.
It's frankly a miracle Riventon makes it to one of Eclipse's local lab-slash-safehouses before something worse happens; the damage that's been done to him physically pales in the amount of emotional energy that it took to hold up, and to get that far. And he's also very, very mad. As much at his enemies for their opposition to his goals as himself for not being able to overcome them.
"But..." he begins to nobody in particular. "...I will not give into this. To losing. To despair." He'd seen what happens when you go that route. "I will... just have to rise above." He said to the dark lab, bandaging his own wound. "I am still alive. And that means I can still grow in power. I will do everything that I am destined to do. I will come out on top!" he shouted at the top of his lungs to the empty safehouse.
Because no matter how exhausted he might be, how much pain he might be in, he would come back. He would improve on his mistakes. He'd beat them all. To do otherwise would be to dissapoint his father, the memory of his mother, the tremendous gift he was born with.
Guardian Hino continues to swipe , and swipe...and swipe, until these things are gone, or Gao's gotten the last. That's only when he replies. "I'm okay. What about ----" is Runealy a giveaway name? he just says. "The Princess. Is she okay?" he asks worriedly, as he takes a few, hardened breaths.
"Is that the last of them. What did that jerk want?" he asks. "Anyone you know?"
"Not someone I recognize," Guardian Gao shakes his head, keeping an eye out for any other ambushes. "The Princess might know."
He looks around, frowning slightly. Rune isn't there, which is a good thing considering the blasts that were thrown around, but he's still going to feel better once they meet up with her. "Send a message to her," he says to Guardian Hino. "Let her know we're okay, and ask where she is."
Gao paces around, bow at a ready position. "I'll keep an eye out for trouble while you write the message."
Guardian Hino blinks, how can he reach his---oh it's just. In his hand. Suddenly. He just shakes his head. He'll boggle out how he pulled it from out around his armor later. He goes ahead and sends a text.
>> Jerk is gone. We're okay. Are you okay?'
While he waits, he puts his sword back in it's Scabbard, he doesn't want to go slicing off his fingers testing it's sharpness again. (He knows it's pretty sharp now!)