art thou a jester in the midst of battle; (OPEN)

[ex_cashcow493]

Who: The forces of Britain and Rome, as well as any passing individuals or those in between said lands. AKA a cluster of badasses.
What: Rift monsters and assassins? Sounds like a great family bonding experience to me.
When: Throughout this phase of Ashvar's attack.
Where: All lands controlled by Britain and Rome. Most of the action will probably take place on the shared borders or the joint outpost located in Hirawyr.
Warnings: Fighting. Probably some nudity because the Romans are involved.

It didn't take word of the attacks long to reach the ears of one of the twin Britain rulers, Arturia having a natural instinct for when battle was taking place. After brief communication with her brother and cousin, it was decided that this would be a most excellent time for their troops to begin to fight alongside each other. Certainly the Romans could learn a thing or two from the Britains and vice versa.

After deploying her generals and commanding officers to various areas, Arturia rode to meet up with her cousin. Surely her brother could catch up if he chose to or maybe he rides closely behind her. She heeds no attention to her surroundings beyond mere glances to ensure that no stray assassin might pick her off before she arrived...



This is a joint post for all Britains, Romans, and their allies to participate in a mass fighting log. It's spread out over the course of the next couple days and all are welcomed to participate. Make your own threads, have silly shenanigans in the nude, and do all of that. Britain and Rome are momentarily working alongside each other because bonding is important. Really, we all know they're just trying to outdo each other.

Comments

[puppy_lancer]

Well, now that Lancer, being exposed to one of the first waves of demon attacks, has made his way out of his base, he's now hanging around with the coalition army.

His back is still bandaged, as are his sides and his limbs. Even with his advanced healing, his injuries would still take a while to completely recover.

Of course, given that he's Lancer, he insisted on going back to the battle field as soon as the medics slapped some salves and bandages on him. Now he's waiting impatiently for the order of battle.

[fortheworldtosee]

Nero, too, had been receiving word from various locations about the portals opening up all across the land. And if there was only one thing Rome could pride itself in, it would the might of its military; it didn't take long for Nero to deploy her troops to the areas that needed the assistance the most, before mobilizing the Praetorian Guard itself to protect Palatine.

And Nero herself? She chose a few select troops and allies before heading (by waypoint of course) to the outpost shared by the neighboring kingdom. Here there were no Rift monsters just yet, but the soldiers were already on alert. It was calm, but the sort of uneasy calm that comes right before a battle.

She kept her ears and eyes alert, both for any hint of the enemy and any sign of her approaching cousins.

[lovelesswitch]

Medea stood by Nero while carrying a scrying device on hand. Fortunately, the Bounded Field around Rome was still in place and she could still see afar. Her face was contorted into disgust as she saw how much of these Riftspawn ran rampant across her lands. Disgusting creatures, the whole lot of them. ... how could so many have appeared on her watch?

"... Avshar... That man is always making a mess of things."

[fortheworldtosee]

"Hmph." Nero scowls at the name. She still hasn't forgotten the time Medea had returned to the villa after her scuffle with Avshar. If she couldn't bring the man down herself, Nero at least wanted to get one good shot at him for that.

But priorities! Nero knows where her priorities lie.

"Normally I wouldn't lower myself to cleaning up someone else's messes, but this is not something that should be overlooked."

[lovelesswitch]

"Yes. His rats have finally started to come out of hiding. They were better off lying in whatever hole they managed to find away from my sight."

Truth be told, Medea was a little wary of fighting Avshar face-to-face, but if this was a fight against his mooks, she knew she stood a better chance. The only concern at the moment was...

"... Will you be alright, Nero? This is your first great battle in a while."

[greyerrant]

Loken, for his part, had only word from Jeanne, his newfound (And not yet trusted), companion. The crusade company storms towards Hirawyr, the core of Legion-tested troopers, having fought Riftspawn only a few months back holding discipline well, as Garviel leads from the front, punctuating his orders with well-aimed bursts from his bolter,

"Cleanse them all! Let none escape to prey on the people of this place!"

They cut a sanguinary swath up the mountain towards the Palatine, clearly intent on securing the town from both the cultists and the Daemons.

"For the Rose Empress! Kill for the living, Kill for the dead!"

Nothing can stop the Astartes rampant, for he has been killing Daemons longer than most men have lived, an intensity that he has never shown in other fights possessing him now. This is no reluctant battle of the Grail War. This is what he was made for, holding back those forces of Darkness and corruption in the name of Humanity.

He halts for a moment, having just shattered a daemon's spine against the wall of a nearby house after a tremendous charge.

[puppy_lancer]

[Seconds after the demon is mashed against the walls of the house, another demon, its head neatly impaled through by some sharp object, is thrown out of the window. The man who had killed it now sticks his head out of the same window and calls to Garviel.]

Check the interiors. This town is outright infested.

[He...had found that last one snacking on some poor schmuck's brain. And then there were the piles of meat no longer recognizable as people...]

[greyerrant]

Loken doesn't say anything, just moves on to the next house. He could come in through the doorway, but they are expecting that. Instead, the servos on his magical armor scream, and he smashes through the bricks wall of the house, searching for the Corrupt inside. Once he finds one, he eviscerates it with a backhanded slash of his chainsword, helm's eyes blazing, but silent for the moment as his troops pile in to secure it.

[not_the_dolphin]

As the battle progresses, the gates of the town are shut. Now Riftspawn nor cultists could either get in or out. It was a risky move, but the move was made in the confidence of a sheer victory. Seeing Garviel's skills on the way over, however, made Jeanne confident of a sheer victory. The gates were shut now and the archers the maiden gathered are stationed around its walls. Few looked forward and others looked back, looking for any approaching threats to snipe off.

Jeanne had constructed a makeshift barricade of furniture, carriages, and literally everything in the middle of the road between houses. Men stood by on post with the girl at its center with sword in hand.

"We'll send those rats back to Hell before we leave this place. Their forces are crumbling. Protect any civilians and secure this place for them!"

[greyerrant]

Loken gives her a quick nod before storming back into the unsecured sections of Hirawyr, his bolter's coughing roar punctuating his righteous slaughter of cultist and daemon alike. At least once, he is reduced to only his fists, punching clean through bodies with his armor-enhanced strength.

"We need to secure Nero's villa. If the Empress is dead, all our work is for naught."

[formerly_known_as_prince]

Inside the town, an exhausted Utena was continuing her battle. Cut, bleeding and bone tired, she still seemed to glow somehow, and to move with an unnatural grace despite her armor. She led the riftspawn in a deadly chase from house to house, drawing them out to cut them down when they overextended themselves. Covered in gore, she moved towards the sound of human voices shouting. Allies or innocents needing saving, either way she had no choice but to head towards it.

"Ser Cerberus!" She called as she rounded the corner, immensely glad to see someone who was not a demon or cowering in fear.

[greyerrant]

Loken looks at her, chainsword screaming, raised, and covered in incarnadine splatters.

"Yes."

He shifts a bit, pointing his bolter at her, and fires, one of the magical bolts skimming just over her shoulder pauldrons to explode a winged daemon that had been intending to stoop on both of them.

"Well met. Help me secure this city, then... we march for Zeon."

[formerly_known_as_prince]

Some out of the way village, too small to be marked on the maps. Nothing more than a cluster of huts around a green. Utena arrived too late to save the sons of the blacksmiths and farmers who rushed out when the riftspawn came and now lie dismembered at the flimsy village gates.

Soon they'll rise back up and she'll have to kill them too.

For the moment, with need pressing, she drew the Sword Of Dios (broken halfway through, but what did it matter against their pulpy bloating?) and the rose with its long lashing stem and sharp thorns.

She's making her stand at the gate, twirling to slice with broken blade, then pulling two riftspawn together into each other's murderous embraces with the rose-stem. Another twirl and the rose stem catches the face of one of them and pulls it off from the putrescent, blackened muscle beneath. Heedless, the creature tries to fall on her anyway, so she ducks and impales it through the underside of the jaw.

The riftspawn know their old enemy/rival. For her part, she knows in some ancient part of herself that this is the kind of thing she was created to do. She seems to almost glow as she dances with the monsters, screaming war cries from a parched throat while the villagers look on in terrified silence or prepare to flee into the mountains.

She's taken innumerable small cuts though, and there are more of them coming up the road. She'll fall eventually if noone arrives to help.

[xiao_lan_long]

Kusuha uses her time plodding along the road in her magical combat armor to wonder what the point of forming a "team" is if she's always getting split up from Kyosuke and Excellen. Well, part of her time wondering that, the rest of it feeling guilty for questioning Her Majesty's orders, of course.

All of that, naturally, is forgotten as her magical knack for emotions clues her into a fight happening nearby. Rushing off the main highway toward the village, she comes across Utena's fight and is almost tempted to turn back, reassuring herself repeatedly that "It can't be as bad as fighting Avshar himself..."

Then she notices the lone figure fighting the Riftspawn, and her resolve is set. The inspiring, knightly figure cutting away at the monsters a) clearly needed help and b) looked really cool

"Um...moving to assist!"

With that, the huge armored shape that Kusuha pilots charges into the rear of the Riftspawn attacking the village, sword out and hacking away violently at the Rift monsters.

link me to some background on her please?

[formerly_known_as_prince]

This, Utena thought, was officially the end. That terrible plodding banging could only mean the arrival of heavy riftspawn as reinforcements...an ultralist, perhaps. More than anyone could handle on their own.

As she turned for another slash, black and foul riftspawn blood splashed over her eyes, temporarily blinding her. She backpedaled, hacking furiously at anything that came near, the rose stem a whipping serpent, attentive to its master's distress. If Kusuha got too close, Utena would probably lash out at her as well.

[bathtothefuture]

Lucius was giving a test soak to his new outdoor hot springs bath, when he noticed something black and inky welling from below.

He stomped angrily from the bath, about to rip his workers a new one about how there was a perfectly serviceable outhouse over there when suddenly...Whoa! From behind! He was dragged backward into the bath by the underwater riftspawn, flailing, cursing, and trying to get a grip on the slippery thing the whole while.

[cursed_analysis]

The bathhouse was supposed to be a place of relaxation; a place where one could gather their thoughts and relax.

Arro had been trying such a thing, but found the place turned into a place of death while he'd been working out his next steps he wanted to pursue. He'd ignored the Riftspawn and those dying in agony around him until one had the nerve to grab his shoulder.

"How troublesome..." He stood up, grabbing the dying man by his face and rising from the bath as all attention turned to him as he was the only one unhurt. He was practicing what he learned from the vampire; stealing the man's muscle and bone tissue and absorbing it directly into his body. He'd decided he had enough of terrestrial life and since he was surrounded by raw material he was going to make a pair of wings. First though, these Riftspawn would have to be removed before they ate all of his hopeful work.

"In an instant vanquish mine enemies with this surge of power. Maziodyne."

The bathhouse erupted in an explosion of stone and mortar as the thrum and crackle of the electric spell drowned out all noise for a split second and then it was gone, leaving Arro to extract himself from the rubble with a groan. Powerful? Marginally. Immortal? Hardly. He'd hurt his shoulder thanks to a bit of the ceiling that fell down instead of up and now it seemed he wasn't going to get anything from the mess he'd made. Sighing softly and rubbing his temples, he adjusted his now cracked glasses and went to find some survivors to cower with.

And some clothes. Clothes would be amazing right now.

[bathtothefuture]

Lucius let out a strangled cry as the work of months went up in an explosion he had to duck and cover to get no worse than lacerations across his back from. Naked, he ran from the ruins towards the other man emerging from it.

"You blew up my bathhouse!"

[cursed_analysis]

"You..." Arro was annoyed again for a moment, but smiled after he recognized the man and turned to place his good hand on Lucius' shoulder.

"Fantastic work! My utmost compliments on it~" He had been enjoying himself very much, at least until it had been attacked.

[idkworldruler]

Well Mitchell and the rest of the small company that he was attempting to create wasn't exactly going to let a bunch of riftspawn overtake the town that they had started to call home, now were they? And so they had quickly found themselves intercepting a force of riftspawn outside of the town of Caemos. Gun powder and the sounds of drums and fifes quickly began to fill the air, along with the smell of gunpowder and the sound of the guns themselves going off, as his men began to engage their enemy.

As for Mitchell himself, he had been leading his men from a few yards away, giving out his orders to his units. Oh yes, he wasn't going to miss something like this for the world.

Can't get any later than this.

[fater]

Arthur was all over the border, making sure the forces are all holding up well. Excalibur in hand, high on his horse -more literatelly than figuratively-, he's here and there, cutting down creatures at chance, offering support when needed.

I have *yet* to make a tag in my own log. Think I win the late award here!

[ex_cashcow493]

"Hoh, have you come to check up on me?" In a manner just to tease him is one "little sister" with her own golden blade in hand, without a trace of exhaustion in her face. Mindless killing has always come easy to her: it's when she must strike against something living that she begins to wear down.

"Just when I tire of hearing the pained groans of the scourge. Have you always had such excellent timing?"

You win this time!

[fater]

"I know you would not want me to forget about you so quickly, so I have cut my way here." It's all good though, Arthur hasn't even worked up a sweat, at one of the newly discovered properties of Invisible Air is that cleaning the blood from the blade is extremely easy. Later on, Arthur is probably going to feel like it's a bit of an undignified use of such power.

"Of course. I never took pride on my past deeds out of a desire to remain in the shadows, but I did save more than my fair share of damsels in distress back in the day." Have a winning smile, sis.

Late tags ahoy

[puppy_lancer]

[Well, this place isn't half as infested as the last one. It would be an easy job if some nutjob on a horse didn't try to run him over.]

Hey! Watch it!

[fater]

I wasn't even remotely close to you.

[ That means he was close but always in control, sheesh. ]