Location: E10. Action: jamming the spike into the ground, another rousing pep talk, trying to be brave and do it alone because he is determined to protect all of the people looking to him now, but reaching out to Elsa for help. Also, Laurelite has unlocked the achievement “Sassy Murikabushi Nickname,” give the lady 25 Gamerscore.
Frankly, Murikabushi was a little bit floored by how many people had come toward him and his group. While getting the spike ready, while preparing to do his duty to help end the Calamitous Harold and his reign of unholy terror, he’d missed……most of the people coming in his direction.
Some of them, he knew, outside the obvious connections he had with the senshi he’d landed with initially: Tianyi, one of his housemates; Chillingham, a friend of Tianyi’s, who’d become a Squire since the last time Muri had seen her; the popcorn girl in the pink who’d hung around Ganymede’s stacked up food table on the moon (Mönch); Madriu, who’d known Airan through the Nameless, and the bunny-boy senshi with him (whose name Murikabushi didn’t know, but he’d seen them together on the moon).……
Others who came this way, Muri didn’t recognize at all. Some senshi in a flame-pattern fuku standing by herself but looking ready to fight (Vela). A super-senshi with a cute undercut and her fuku looking artfully torn as she herself looked to Muri for instructions (Namaka). A younger-looking senshi in an Egyptian-themed fuku, who might have been rocking his neatly kept facial hair in a bid at looking older (Aberdonia). A pretty stacked Negaverse team, who seemed pretty content to do their own thing and at least not obstruct Murikabushi’s work, so he was happy to let them be (Team Rakovanite). Two senshi who arrived together, clearly some of the immigrants to Earth from space, one of them looking more than ready for a fight (Elkurud and Amateru). Some Captain, obviously half-youma, with snake features around his face (Nagyagite).
Even if Murikabushi had had orders ready to start telling people where to go, he couldn’t have given them.
The diva in the green hair, it seemed, had discarded her scythe (or at least passed it off to some Knight who stood near Gany-himesama and her luscious, extravagant ultra-fabulousness). Her Chaotic energy signature had already felt overwhelming, but as she summoned up discs of energy, that aura felt suffocating. Too huge to fathom. Too much for anybody to deal with. By the time she split the sky, Murikabushi felt as though he was being crushed by the sheer power and the force of Chaos that came off of the Negaverse’s Queen.
When her cannon actually fired, everything felt ten times worse, if not magnified by several powers of ten.
The Chaos that had already felt like so much—it made Murikabushi pause. Reel. His head spun, and he clutched his chest. Whatever this was, a heart attack would’ve been kinder. Because this, whatever this was, it felt like his starseed had caught fire. The feeling on his skin, he could live with. The nerve pain, the ache of his body trying so hard to reject this power that had no right to exist in the universe, all of that was tolerable. But not the pain of Chaos trying to get at his starseed once again. Even a different kind of Chaos, he wanted none of it, and the fact that she so casually bombarded everyone with that.……
Murikabushi’s eyes burned bright and furious as he looked back up at the group gathered around him. He forced himself to take deep breaths, glaring with nothing short of malevolence at the b***h who thought being a fabulous diva meant she could hoard power like this at the expense of so many. Maybe she’d used it for good this time, but what about when she couldn’t—
“Hey, Murikabushi here, for those of you who haven’t met me before,” he said, fighting to make himself sound steady and trying desperately to believe it himself. “Right now, I need anyone who can to make sure nothing ******** up what I’m about to do with the spike. If Harold tries anything, be ready to fight. I don’t know a lot of you, but you have the strength of senshi and Knights. That is not nothing. All of us has a power unique to us, and if we work together, we’re going to triumph. If anybody’s magic might be able to get that sixth spike out of Harold’s tail, do it. At least make an attempt. Please. Do not let Queen Becky With The Green Hair ******** intimidate you.”
He looked to Mönch, busy being sick as she was. “It’s okay to be afraid. It’s okay to be sick after what just happened. Power like that shouldn’t exist and it’s normal to react so badly to it. But we’re going to show Harold that he’s not welcome here and protect the Earth. And we’re not going to let Queen Becky see us sweat.
“And by the way,” he added, “I want everybody Order here to be ******** nice to him.” By way of making his point, Murikabushi gestured at the half-youma captain. “Whatever you think about the Negaverse, he is not Queen Becky, so do not hold her bullshit d**k-measuring display against him when he’s here to help.” Probably. Murikabushi really hoped. If he was wrong, then he’d take the L later, but the Captain had had plenty of opportunity to sabotage them and he hadn’t. “None of us here wants the Earth to die, so let’s do this thing.”
Stabbing the spike into the ground went so well in Murikabushi’s head.
Technically speaking, it went well in practice, too. The spike pierced the ground, it went right into place.
But planting it sent energy coursing through Murikabushi like nothing he’d ever felt. His heart raced. Then slowed. Flailed around inside him, beating rapidly then jerking back to something more normal, then moving so slowly that each thundering beat seemed to take forever. But somehow, through the pain and strain, Murikabushi noticed something weird: his spike……the power pulsing off of it came harder and harder every time his heart beat.…… It was overwhelming. All of this—the burden, it was so big.…… Murikabushi could do this, and he had to, but—even power like this? Was it too much for any one person?
He had to do this.
Connected to something so much bigger than himself alone, he looked around, searching for Faustite……for Solaris……for Aquamarine……for Benitoite.…… Even when his eyes found the spaces where they were, something didn’t connect. Murikabushi couldn’t process what they were experiencing right now, couldn’t clock what they were or were not doing with their own spikes and their own duties.……
But he could clock Elsa. Right here with him.
His face fell as he looked toward Elsa, the one who’d helped Soya-hime Awaken him, the one who apparently loved him back. If Murikabushi let Elsa in on this job, would it hurt him? Some cost might come to Elsa.…… He might not have been able to handle it, so maybe, Murikabushi should have borne it alone.……
But so many had come out this way, putting themselves in danger to help him. To protect him while he did his duty. If he was at risk of failing…… No, but he could do this…… But Elsa…….
Murikabushi glanced away from Elsa, reflexively looking for Kerberos and ready to ask his senshi senpai for advice. He didn’t find Kerberos—wherever he, Ida, and Fang had gone off to, Murikabushi couldn’t think about it now—but somehow, Murikabushi knew in his heart what Kerberos would’ve told him.…… Not least because it felt so close to what Ojiisan would have said. And it would’ve echoed what Obaasan would’ve told him—had told him plenty of times before he’d purified, even—about how he couldn’t decide other people’s feelings for them.
“Elsa!” Murikabushi looked back to him, eyes sparkling and hands fixed to the spike, holding it in place. “Elsa, you—can you come help me? It might hurt you, if you do? I don’t know how, I just feel it, okay? So I’ll be fine if you don’t, I promise. But……I don’t want to make that choice for you. So……” Murikabushi gave him a smile, soft and earnest and hopeful. Strained around the edges, but believing so much in everyone who’d come out here to help save the Earth, and especially in Elsa. “Want to help me ******** up Harold’s big night?”
That power rolled over Encke, his gaze snapping to where Laurelite had climbed. To where Laurelite displayed her power as a pump though her as a way to shrink down the monstrous figure above. As a way to show off the power of the Negaverse, roiling his stomach and making him think...
Think, deeply, of when he belonged to chaos.
He had been theirs. Encke had been their tool.
Viatrix shook her head. No. She couldn't let herself be distracted by that. Not by the chaotic display. Not by the monster. Not by the shielding, either. It was holding.
Everyone alright?
"... No," admitted Encke, weakly.
This was why. This was why their winning was impossible. This was why the most they could do was try and survive against an unending onslaught.
Viatrix rubbed her neck. "Encke, you gotta pull it together."
"You're asking a lot," murmured Encke, as he glanced up to the snake belly above.
Arnica was vaguely aware of the buzzing of the other Dark Mirror Senshi around him but it was hard enough to stay focused on any one thing with a godlike beast and the blast Laurelite had just thrown at it. Did she have more of that? How did they get that kind of power?
Briefly, he looked at Remarque to see if he looked like he had something like that to give, but none of the other Princes or Princess looked like they were conjuring up something like that, and the General Kings–well, maybe they’d poured all of their energy into Laurelite.
Maybe he was just in denial. On one hand, he wanted the snake gone. On the other hand…
Power like that shouldn’t exist in any universe.
“Well, let’s hope he packed us something strong enough to contend with that. Don’t apologize for your clumsiness, things happen. Maybe you’ll turn our luck around, yeah?”
…Though, the odds of that weren’t looking particularly good right now.
Dark Mirror Super Sailor Laon Location: H9 Action: Having a bad response to shift in pressure; ears won't pop/having a hard time hearing, nosebleed; trying to be very discrete about it all; still next to Arawn
There were too many people around and Laon couldn’t make out anything they were saying. At some point–was it when they’d first arrived? Was it after the Negaverse lady did that thing?–his ears had started to ring. The pressure was immense, like he was waiting for them to pop but no matter how hard he tried, nothing happened.
Too much was going on and he didn’t want Arawn to worry, so he did his best to keep a straight face and look a little less like a deer in headlights.
Arawn wasn’t looking at him, wasn’t speaking to him (probably?) which was ogod, because Laon didn’t know how he was going to fake that he could hear just fine. He was alert and on edge, paying more attention to Arawn than anyone else, ready to nod eagerly along with whatever he said. Maybe it would buy him a few seconds for his ears to pop.
He felt the blood drip from his nose a second later and raised a hand quickly to wipe it away, thinking himself very clever for taking care of it so quickly. At least his uniform was black.
Laon tried not to draw attention to the fact that he could still feel the nosebleed.
Daedalus glared up at the Negaverse Queen. She could not see him, and would not care, he knew. But in the face of her crushing aura, of her spectacular cannon blast, of the crushing, burning agony in his very soul, Daedalus glared.
Daedalus had never seen her before today. But he hated her. With every fiber of his being. Deep in his bones. Perhaps he was being unfair, because her flashy little display immediately put him in the mind of men on his world who had done similar disgusting displays of wealth and power. But he did not think he was.
Anyone who displayed that level of arrogance deserved nothing but the deepest contempt from him, and he would give her nothing else.
Murikabushi’s speech made Daedalus nod, sharply, and he moved to guard his friend, ready for whatever might come next.
“Murikabushi is right,” he said, firmly. “I have seen the strength of the Senshi and Knights of Earth. I have seen them work together to defeat the Chaos that infested my planet. We are strong enough together to stand in the face of this monster, and in the face of any others that may come.”
There were so many here. Allies and potential friends all. Even the members of the Negaverse who had found their way over, who seemed to care more about protecting this planet than about who was on what side.
Daedalus could respect that, even if he had no respect for their leaders.
Page 8, Page 22, Page 40 Location: D8 Action: With Amarynthos, Dering, and Reims. Trying to keep it together but worried.
Ephesus couldn’t help but curl in on himself. He clutched his hands to his chest and hunched his shoulders as if making himself small would help hide him from everything. He felt whatever that blast of Chaos was like it was chewing through him. He felt nauseous and it brought tears to his eyes as he watched the Calamitous Hollow be hit with so much energy.
He was afraid.
And he was afraid of what was happening with his parents. Were they really going to face off against the Negaverse Queen? She would kill them. It would be so easy for her.
He couldn’t watch, so he turned away and hid his face in his hands. Maybe then he couldn’t see the shields failing or his parents and family being struck down. He had healing magic, sure. But there wasn’t enough to bring someone back from a grave injury. Like from the damage that scythe could likely do.
“Fuuuuuuuuck,” Reims hissed as he stared at the huge ******** beam of ******** Chaos just being blasted like the rich kid showed up with an expensive super soaker when everyone else had a bunch of dollar store squirt guns.
Oh yeah, they were definitely screwed. There was no way any of them could face off against a blast like that. But maybe the Negaverse wasn’t stupid enough to direct such energy at a single person. Maybe. He hoped.
But it was obvious that Dering was freaking out a bit. And Ephesus was too, but that was more Amarynthos’ problem because he was his boyfriend or whatever. And not that Dering was his boyfriend, but he was a boy and a friend so-- wait, that just made it sound worse, somehow?
He reached over to wrap an arm around Dering’s shoulders. He could see the way he was digging indents into his lute, so he reached up with his other hand to place over the one on the handle.
“We’ll be fine,” he insisted, ignoring how his voice cracked a little. He leaned close enough to rest his forehead against Dering’s hat. “Remember that little tune you taught me just last week? The A cord and then D. That was pretty easy and a nice tune, so… thank you for teaching me.”
It probably sounded like something stupid to say to someone in the middle of a crisis, but Reims knew Dering crumbled under perceived critique or judgment. He could hear the worry in Dering’s voice, and knew he was likely unsure of himself and his abilities, but Reims -- and their friends -- believed in Dering. And maybe if he remembered the simple tune he taught Riker, then maybe it would be easier to recall. And obviously, Reims would be there to help him.
Although, he wasn’t going to suggest that maybe Dering didn’t need to play his lute at all. He could just madly strum the strings but-- that would probably make him feel worse.
Elsa was glad, right then, for Muri’s inspirational tongue. For how he was able to pull them all together, even in this desperate moment.
And there was something…special, about being directly asked to help take some of this burden. About not having to just watch as Muri suffered whatever energy was channeling through the spike, about knowing that he had the chance.
Realistically, it wasn’t even a question.
He moved over, putting his hand on top of Murikabushi’s on the spike.
“I told you. I’m with you ‘till the end of the line. If this hurts me, if I suffer for it—I’m okay with that, because I want to be here for you.”
It was a simple equation. Elsa would not hesitate to accept whatever burden he needed, if it lessened Murikabushi’s. So they would do this together.
“Strengite!” Lepidolite greeted boisterously, and nearly laughed in delight. “Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes! You get a look at that? Wow! I’ll take another one of those, right? You picked a good spot to be, I think we’ve got the best view of this. Won’t be long now,” he decided.
Maybe there wasn’t much to back up his claim, but Lepidolite was confidently banking on them handling this. Quickly.
A few faces came and went while Hessonite witnessed Laurelite’s grand strike. Her eyes lit up, not in fear but delight. She was itching for any sort of opening but even she had her limits. Teleporting that high into the sky wasn’t an option but she seemed like she was trying to do the math for it anyway.
She allowed herself a brief pause to look at Brassite, who was a bit more chatty than the General Queen expected, but that enthusiasm was not unwelcome.
Hessonite grinned when asked if she’d taken off any heads, but maybe Brassite’s imagination was better than any gory truth.
“That’s exactly what we were gathering energy for,” she answered, no shortage of pride in her voice. “And why we should never doubt Metallia.” She grinned, at Brassite and Chrysocolla. “So when we get back to Earth, you make sure you keep up the good work, alright?”
His optimism was kind, but Hekate sincerely doubted that her magic could bring luck to anyone. The mist she summoned moved so slowly that anything moving even a tenth of the speed of that sky-serpent could easily avoid it.
She turned a worrisome gaze to Remarque, who stretched his wings in a way that made her want to reach out and see if the feathers were as soft as they looked.
“Didn’t all the wraiths take the energy to Mirrorspace?” Hekate questioned since she had only gone outside two wraiths on a single occasion, but was chased off by a half-youma because she’d probably picked a target that she knew. But when they were full, both creatures disappeared into a mirror.
“I don’t think Mirrorspace can reach us here. At least, not unless he was able to fit a full-length mirror in his subspace pocket.” But even those had limits on the size of items it could hold. As far as she knew, Mirrorspace could only connect to other mirrors on Earth, but maybe that was only the part of it that they knew.
When they got to what seemed like a safe place, two more Cosmos knights joined them; a Page (Salar de Uyuni) with long wavy black hair who held in her hand a gold-framed mirror, and a Squire (Irkalla) with striking silver eyes with gold stars and pearls placed carefully in her hair. Einhornhohle caught the hesitant wave from each of them and welcomed them both over with a warm, inviting smile.
“Come, come,” she motioned with a hand for them to gather close. “I’m sure Cosmos would be glad that we’ve found each other.” She’d only seen their princess maybe twice since awakening nearly a decade ago, but it felt less like fate and more like destiny that she was in the presence of four others. “My name is Einhornhohle, this is Kiringul and Yetzirah,” she introduced each of them in the same manner she had done before being teleported to this realm.
To Yetzirah, she looked at him with a softened expression before looking up at the clouds above them. “I’ll be honest, I’m not so sure we’re meant to kill it.” Surely, if this creature was such a threat to them, then Cosmos herself would have appeared to aid them. As it was, the power leaned heavily in the Negaverse’s favor. From what she could tell, there were four Royals to their six, and that wasn’t including the Vanguard leader or the Dark Mirror Prince.
There was a sharp pain in her chest, a burning in her starseed, from the waves of Chaos that sank beneath her skin. “I hope that the true goal is to save Earth and that our loved ones at home stay safe. But I can’t help but shake the feeling that we are colluding with the wrong side.” Something about the Negaverse’s display of power felt so inexplicably wrong to her. But it was difficult to rationalize how the great beast in the sky could be any less of a threat.
With her one free hand, she held onto a fistful of Kiringl’s sleeve, pulling comfort in his nearness, for she felt very unsure in their role in this fight.
“Hello,” she nodded her head to each of them in order of introduction. “My name is Salar de Uyuni. Though perhaps I think it would be easier to call me Salar,” she smiled warmly at the Squire (Irkalla), who had approached at the same time she had.
“I admit, I only became a knight about two months ago,” she winced at the admission. “I’m really unsure what I’m seeing here. I’ve never felt so many auras in one place,” many of which felt wrong, evil even. But nothing compared to the woman who ascended the stairs and attacked the sky-serpent with a massive amount of power that made her feel sick when it pierced the storm above them.
post 123 Location: H2 with Janggunite, Maikoh Action: Generally Upset and Displeased
There was so much of this she was decidedly not okay with.
Getting to pet the insanely soft ear at Maikoh's offer? Amazing. Wonderful. Best experience. She'd never felt so honored.
Getting dragged into... whatever this place was? No thank you. Worst way to travel. -4/10 review, a few points given for the uniqueness of it though.
Getting to feel the horrific level of Chaos their Queen smashed the Calamitous Hollow with? 50/10, amazing, breathtaking, one of a kind experience don't miss out, bring the whole family to experience the true wonder and majesty of the Queen of the Negaverse and Metallia. Any side-effects of fear and claustrophobia are probably normal and fully outweighed by the spectacular show.
Watching her cousin absorb in electricity again from this ******** storm? Lameia was pissed.
"Carnotite! Listen to him!" The blonde senshi was seething from where she stood near Maikoh, even giving the youma a pouting, huffing look when she endorsed this stupidity. "Not if she gets herself hurt," she mumbled, crossing her arms beneath her chest. "...the Queen was insanely impressive with that, though. The serpent's like half it's size from before? And those scales..." She allowed herself a wistful, covetous look at them over the shield.
Huffing, she looked to Janggunite and offered a slightly sympathetic, if annoyed look. "She likes showing the strength all that stuff gives her. Getting to tap into so much energy to give to the Negaverse had her on a hell of a proud high lately, showy b***h." There wasn't a lick of malice in her words, in fact... quite the opposite. Lameia might have been frustrated with her cousin... but she still was very fond of her. Proud of her, even.
"If Her Majesty can strike the serpent again like that... that'd definitely be enough for us to take it out if it came down here, I think. This'll be over soon."
The place was already packed with a mess of energy signatures that made the guardian cat feel uneasy. The wiring in his brain jumped between friend and fiend and the fight or flight was confused. Gripping Phekad as to not loose them, the sky continues to roar around them. Amongst all this commotion, a surge of power sparked up all around in arching lights, jumping overhead and around them like a trellis of power. And through this a s**t of power erupted out and into the sky as the giant creature above them. Whatever was happening, he was just confused.
Covering his mouth and swallowing, he looked around to see if anyone was saying anything, but I stead the sky shook down and reigned down scales stop them. Whoever knew what was happening had constructed some kind of shield, but the scales were already weighing it down at spots. What happened if the whole thing shattered and another shaking of scales fell down?
The blast of Chaos terrified him. He wouldn't let it show, but the sight of that thing rocked him to his core, and a wave of illness hit him. What would it take to launch such a weapon again? What kind of range did it have? Or was it just Laurelite herself, saturated in Chaos so often, so much so, that she herself had something akin to senshi magic, now? Just rooted in Chaos?
Asmodeus, his gorgeous, perfect, unruffled, brave, and terrifying-in-her-own-right-fiance, wasn't scared at all. God, he loved her so much his heart ached. With that thought in mind, he was able to turn away from the fear Laurelite had instilled in him with her weapon. Asmodeus knew just what to do, even when he didn't express his feelings to her.
"I'm glad to see you two could make it," he managed to say to Cern and Procyon, regaining his usual strength and stoicism. "The more we have, the better."
Volterra hated every second of this. Ne wished ne'd never been awoken. Never had to lose nis civillian identity to come back to the side of the light after being taken down the wrong path. Wished with every fiber of nis being that ne was at home, content and ignorant, working on another of nis wood projects, anything, anywhere but here and now in this horrible, horrible moment, gearing up to fight a giant ******** snake monster from the depths of hell space to stop it from eating the entire Earth.
But ne was here now, and that meant ne had to suck it up and deal. No matter how uncomfortable the Chaos made nem. The blast twisted their insides with how wrong it was, and ne wondered how ne'd never felt it like this when nis starseed was taken by Chaos. Ne shuddered but braced nemself, taking steadying breaths.
This was it. Do or die. The end of the world. And ne was really, really pissed about it. If ne just harnessed their own terrifying emotional energy from the deep well of hate that constantly boiled near the top of nis consciousness, ne could do this. Whatever it took. Ne would save nis home.
Oh hell yeah. Belenos could get behind that. The blast of Chaos shrinking the crazy legless lizard in the sky felt good. They would totally win this thing. Belenos had no doubts.
Demeter was eternally grateful that the Dark Mirror Court seemed to be... rather relaxed. That nobody was trying to get in their face about why they were there or anything. It was nice to just stand next to their girlfriend at the end of the world and not worry about making any enemies just target them instead for the thrill of it or whatever.
The blast of Chaos from Laurelite made them queasy, and they held their breath for a long moment before the feeling passed. Seeing how much smaller the snake had gotten, though... That was good. Right?
post 123 Location: F3 with Lyndin and the Vanguard Action: Judging
She didn't need to be able to feel the aura of Chaos to feel sick. Daesva gagged and coughed where she stood, trying to muffle the sound with the back of her hand. The very pressure in the air felt like it was making it harder to breathe...
Yes, it was useful against the creature. Yes, it clearly did great damage to it. But what if she ever decided to use such horrible power against them? The very concept sent chills through her body. Immediately, she made an oath to herself to refocus herself once they were out of here and Earth was safe. She would do more to aid the Vanguard and Velencia. She'd been dawdling long enough.
People approached--she wasn't keen on it, and almost smiled when Vyn took a successful shot. But if they were willing to help... from a distance. Fine.
The Knight? She felt sick again. She heard the commentary from her fellows, especially Caelyna, and she almost wanted to tell the Knight off. No apologies, at the very ******** least? Manners or humility didn't exist in most humans, it seemed. Or dignity.
