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Ganon snarled as his weight was tossed back by the wind while he dodged aside the blades the sword cast. Bah, he was at a disadvantage. Ganon could either do ranged or melee bardsong, but you couldn't do both at the same time. They were two different kinds of music. He'd just have to stick with the melee; he'd gotten a brush of Abel's wind attack there, and it was rather feeble compared to most mages he'd dealt with in the past. He had the feeling Abel would fare better in--

Damnit! Ganon stepped back, clutching his bleeding upper arm. The other kris had just whipped past and left a nasty gash through Ganon's tough scales on its way by. It had come through his blind spot and taken him completely by surprise. Now in pain and still rather disappointed in Abel, he dodged aside another wind strike, leading Abel's attacks away from Blossom, nimbly sidestepped another and swung himself around, whipping the weighted chain out to try and wrap it around Abel's ankle. Should he meet success, he'd immediately pull hard in an attempt to get Abel's feet out from under him.

Steely Dan snarled, catching the lance on the broad side of his sword, and then he shifted it to force the lance to slide off to the side while he turned the blade and swung the sharp blade at Ghis' neck. Ghis was able to catch the blade on his axe, and Dan leaned forward, each fighting to shove the other back, their faces inches apart as Dan blew acrid, hot cigar smoke in Ghis' face. "Always hated you, Captain," he growled before spitting the cigar out right onto Ghis' nose. Ouch.

Chickenwire grinned at Alihi, twirling his axe in his hand. "Th' pretty lady wants ta play..." He smirked and moved to the side slowly, then leaned forward and shot forward like a flash, running full-tilt at her. His axe swept out once, twice at her midriff, forcing her back, and then he swung it forward and up at once, twisting his arm to bring the axe up at her gut. "C'mon an' hold still, then!"

Large and Clang squared up against Ephraim, both smirking. Clang bashed his sword against his own shield a few times, calling, "Come now, you couldn' break us up, could yeh? Be a crime, that," he cackled, and then he spun, picking up Large and throwing him overhead straight at the prince. Large laughed and spun in the air, blade held out and forehead, ready to take Ephraim's head off on the way over if given the opportunity. Clang ran behind his airborne companion straight at Ephraim, dropping to a skid and swinging low at the knees.

Ghis winced as the bright hot cigar end stung him on the nose and twitched, caught off guard by the gesture. The axe slipped, and only by ducking did Ghis spare himself decapitation, the greatsword slamming at an angle off his helmet instead, knocking him off-balance. As he stumbled to his right, he made a quick thrust for Steely Dan's stomach, forcing the General to block the lance with his greatsword rather than go for a killing blow. It allowed Ghis to step back out of range and readjust.

"Right back at ye, Dan," Ghis retorted, tightening his grip on his weapons. "Always wanted t' take command, didn't ye? Look where it's put ye--burning towns like a common brigand."

An exchange of blows. Greatsword falls on axe, lance beaten away by greatsword, greatsword falls on axe again. In his mind, Ghis wished he had a sturdy shield to block with, rather than the broad side of an axe. It'd give him a bit more of an edge. As it was, they seemed evenly matched.

"What's it gonna be, Dan? We CAN fight 'til Judgement Day and the Trumpet Sound, sure, but... ye CAN also surrender, ye know."

Dan's men still craved a fight, and if Ghis was denied them, well... maybe the others were up for a fight. Four Soldiers charged for the two archers and Charice, situated towards the rear of the fighting. Arrows fired at them, but they were ineffective--a few flew over their heads, while others were blocked by the Soldiers' shields. Two managed to converge on one man at the same time, and he chose to block the one aiming for his neck, taking one instead in his thigh. He grunted, pausing a moment to pull out the arrow as the other three charged ahead.

Charice's Pegasus shot forward, skimming close to the ground, aiming for the left flank. The Soldier covering the left side saw it coming, raised his shield expecting to bounce Charice's Slim Lance off...

And suddenly felt himself catch on fire. Magical fire, in fact. He gasped in pain, the fire forcing him to lower his guard as the lance struck his neck. The wound was shallow--Slim Lances weren't designed with heavy blows in mind--but you didn't need to dig deep to pierce the windpipe, and he fell to the ground, blood spilling from his throat as he died.

The sudden arrival of a Pegasus Knight with a small Mage holding on hadn't figured into the Soldiers' plans. One turned around, confused on who to pursue, and was met with two arrows in his pant leg, crippling him. The other, sensing the charge was now in jeopardy, attempted to save face by throwing his Iron Lance in the archers' direction, but it failed to sail far enough. By then, Charice had circled around, this time driving her lance into the back of the survivor's neck, burying it deep enough to strike windpipe. As he fell, she circled back, plucking it out of the dead man's corpse, then coming back to the archers' position again.

Still grinning Chad drew two more knives, that left him with two to still use. Readying the first one he threw it at the merc, the most persistent of his opponents and began a rush towards him, at the halfway point throwing the second one as another distraction, Jumping Chad did a vault over the merc, pushing off him for assistance, and as he landed spun slicing his blade through the mercenary's midrif. A split second later he drew his last to knives throwing them at the soldier with the wounded arm and the other with the wounded leg, the knives buried themselves in to to neck and chest respectively. All that was left was the unharmed lance wielder. It was only after Chad had drawn his dagger yet again the merc's top half slid off the rest of him, Grimicing Chad waited. He doubted the soldier would let him attack first this time.

He was right. The soldier charged right for him lance aimed for Chad's own midriff. Chad parried with the dagger and used his killing edge to make shallow cuts over the soldiers arms and legs. He was looking forward to teasing this one. That thought was cut short however when, as Chad rushed to the side for another angle of attack, he felt a searing pain in his side causing him to stumble. It was a rather unpleasant reminder of his side wound. Damn! Looks like I'll have to wrap this up quickly and get some vulnery on this. I doubt this guy'll just let me apply a vulnery in my own time. Slowing standing up Chad again readied himself into a defensive position. Waitning for the next attack.

Chickenwire was a gigantic bear of a man, and what he lacked in nimbleness he made up for in sheer, overwhelming power. Each clash of his axe against Alihi's sword sent a bone-rattling jolt down through her wrists, and her slices and jabs either met his shield or left a scratch in his skin. His unpredictable slashes-- reminiscent of a blue-haired Lycian lord's-- weren't getting him too far, though, and frustration was beginning to show on his face.

Time to switch to old street fighting. She'd seemed to analyze his fighting style rather quickly, so he'd just have to see how she dealt with street-brawling style! He dropped his axe and slammed his shield into her sword, then rammed his arm past her blade and attempted to grab her by the neck-- if successful, he'd lift her straight off her feet and squeeze...

Clang yelped as the prince's foot came down on his back, and his momentum carried him straight into a water trough headfirst. He drew his face out and gasped, throwing his head back and shaking it violently to get his wet hair out of his eyes. Large managed to flip upright as he fell after Ephraim's counter-attack, but the mid-air thrust caught him off-guard and slid past his blade. It caught him across the side, opening a shallow gash along his hip. Clang was already running back at Ephraim, sword thrust forward to attempt to ram it through Ephraim's back as Large dropped into a new, more dangerous fighting style, a reckless but impossibly fast attacking style, and charged at Ephraim from the front, swinging a series of four lightning-fast slashes.

Steely Dan and Ghis remained at the center of the battle in the square, in the middle of a huge circle full of all the people eager to get close to the dueling Generals.

That is to say, nobody.

Dan growled as he smacked the axe away suddenly and drove his sword forward, leaving a massive dent in the chestplate of Ghis' battered armor. It didn't break, but it was a point for Steely Dan, at the very least. He turned aside the inevitable counter-attack with his sword, then shoved forward, bracing his Killing Edge with one hand on the hilt and one pressed to the flat of the blade. He pushed hard, braced against both the axe and the spear as he tried to get the edge of his weapon against Ghis' throat. A smirk slowly made its way through his grimace of exertion. "Feh, an' yeh always wanted ta kick me off th' top. Back on th' street, when we were kids, even." He grinned, pushing harder. "An'... now," he added with a grunt. "Yeh can' tell me yer happy... Cap'n o' a bunch o' failures, eh?" He had to admit, internally, that Clarice and her mage friend were holding well against his infantry, but just wait until Needles sighted her. Then she'd go down, oh yes...

Clang's attack wasn't what worried him, it was Large's unseen slashes. Ephraim could barely make out where some of them ended up. Without any time to think, AT ALL. Ephraim dropped to the ground and swept his spear across the ground, knocking both off their feet before doing a somersault backwards from the ground. He landed a good few feet away from the two until he realized blood dripping down from his cheek. He looked at it and rubbed it with his thumb. "Huh, reckless attack but it doesn't exactly get your opponent 'shredded' you know?" Ephraim commented, he was about to say something else until a different trinkle of blood came dripping down to his chin from the side of his head.

"...I'd better be careful or that could be my head next.." eyeing the blood from the corner of his eye. He didn't feel it, he didn't even see it and already Large had drew blood from the noble.

A new opponent... Ganon rarely seemed angry, even in battle. At worst, he usually displayed disappointment or distaste. Then again, his foes were rarely so formidable, and his friends were rarely hurt so badly. Ganon bared his teeth as he crouched a bit, beginning to spin the chain at his side, whipping it around in front of himself, across his body, up, and back across his body again, building up momentum as he waited for Rappahannock to come in range.

Suddenly, Ganon crouched a bit and spun, carrying the momentum behind his weight around and whipping it straight for the madman's face. As it flew, he leaned forward and took one long step, opening his jaws to display his rows of long, sharp teeth while he roared. He whipped the scythe forward, flicking it to send a wave up the chain in hopes that he could wrap it around Rappahannock's neck.

Alihi's plan would have worked well had she taken into account the fact that Chickenwire was probably twice her weight, or close to it. When people described him as 'grizzly', they didn't mean hairy and unkempt and wild. Well, they did, but they also meant 'six and a half feet tall with huge steel cables for arms'. When Alihi grabbed his wrist and pulled, he paused for a moment to simply stare, confused. Did she really think she could pull him like that?

He decided not to give her time to adjust to the idea. He drew his fist back and rammed it hard at her face.


Clang was not as nimble on his feet as your average swordmaster, and was caught off-guard by the prince's odd tactics. He fell on his side, snarling, before rolling onto his back and shoving off the ground with his shoulders to land on his feet, and immediately he charged again, shield-first with his sword held out behind him.

Large WAS nimble, and he easily hopped over the swung spear before turning to chase Ephraim. He was already in range when Ephraim recovered from the jump, with an upward leap and two swift slashes to follow.

Alihi knew her opponent was big, really. But she was strong (sort of). Surely she would have been able to do something!
... Nope, not really. All she accomplished was making herself look like an idiot trying to pull someone a good foot taller than her plus probably twice her size. Before she could back off, she was forced back by his fist hitting her face.

She staggered backwards, stunned for a moment. Ow, ow, ow, her face hurt. Her hand cupped her cheek where his fist hit and she spat out some blood. Luckily for her, her jaw wasn't broken. Again, nothing too hindering, but she knew would add up eventually. Well, not trying that again... Let's try something else.

She twirled the blade around, making a random number of rotations on her right and left side, occasionally lashing her blade out at his chest or his arm or his neck or whatever she could manage to make contact with. She wouldn't dwell on this for too long, though; if he caught on too quickly, then that wouldn't be good at all. She needed surprise on her side.