Azure Swordsman

     Drifting near a table she finds sufficient, her fingers drape across the surface as she seats herself.

     And leans back.

    And puts her feet on the table.

     “Ahh~” Relaxing. 

she found a table reasonably quickly and proceeded to put her legs up like the table was actually a footstool

as she spoke takeru found a chair, sitting across from her with a bottle of sake between them

“well, no use waiting” he muttered, resigning himself to his fate.

     Just how she likes it.

barely giving him a chance to get his bearings back she motioned for him to follow her over to the nearby tables, walking a bit in front of him as he realized his mistake

she wasn’t wearing any pants, this was only made more obvious by his suit jacket draped around her shoulders.  why was this happening?

     Idle mingling with a gentle sneer brings her to the edge of the room, where a familiar scent catches her attention and draws her to the corner. If it weren’t for her superior sense of smell she might not have caught him before he disappeared, but luckily for her (unluckily for him) she manages to find him just as he begins his escape.

     Fingers outstretch quickly to grasp onto his arm. “Look who it is…” Cooing in that honey-drop voice of hers she attempts to stop him. Shuten, of course, had not bothered to change from her normal clothes – the only difference would be the absence of her kimono, gone from an earlier scuffle that leaves her wit the metal wiring that looped around her form.

well that’s how it goes, he guessed, he may as well have a drink with her, he thought.  she was far from the worst company he’d run into in this city.  in fact if their only real interaction hadn’t been getting drunk on a roof they might have actually become friends.

well second chances and all that

it was only when he turned around that he actually noticed what she was wearing.  this time she actually had managed to lose her clothes only leaving some kind of metal wiring covering the necessities

he let out a long sigh as he took off his suit’s jacket

Just as the white-haired man voiced his complaints, a wolf charged forward at the group. Without any hesitation, Sion once again pulled out her pistol and shot the beast between the eyes. As if to add insult to injury, she slammed her foot onto its neck, the connection making a disgusting crack. 

『As I have been the one  felling many of the drones and beasts that wish to rip you to shreds while you’ve all been single-mindedly chipping away at the larger target, I believe I can fend for myself.』 Sion stared intently at the armored man.  『Once again, had you been more aware of your surroundings, perhaps you would have realized that.』

     Drawing Blue Rose, he opened fire, taking down a pair of them. A third rushed through, only to find a red sword thrust straight through its torso and then a revolver planted under its chin.

*BANG!*

“Don’t mean to cut in–” He’d swing the sword, launching the motionless beast back into the crowd. “–but you’re not paying much attention yourself, right now.” Seeing a temporary pause in the fight, he’d plant Red Queen into the ground and quickly reload his custom revolver. “How about we save the chit-chat until after there’s at least a thousand less of these?”

“hey I’m plenty aware of my surroundings” he grinned at the purple haired girl, “I was just paying more attention to myself and what I was fighting”

“but good to see that you can fight,” he grinned, “that means we may have a shot at bringing that guy down” he pointed Lapis at the large monstrosity currently terrorizing the city.

he chuckled as the white haired boy said his piece.

“a thousand less of them?” he grinned, “you’re right that would be a good idea.”

<host, are we going to?>

“yup” Takeru grinned as the sword he was holding in his hand grew to approximately 50 meters in length, “I’d recommend the two of you jump else this is gonna hurt”

and with that said, he swung the sword in a circle faster than the eye could see, a modified version of the single wheel meant to take into account the two near him

nearly two hundred wolves and drones fell at once.

Sector 004 is where her battles led her. She stayed close to the towering enemy, picking off the countless drones and wolves that attempted to interrupt the combatants dealing with the much larger mess. Alternating between Etherlite for the soulless drones and Barrel Replica for the wolves, she was dealing with them without much trouble.

As she fought, her eyes scanned the battlefield, every unoccupied partition in her mind running calculations on what the enemies would do next. A pair of men focused on the head caught her eye, as did the beast’s sudden jerk of a leg. Lightspeed calculations in her head immediately brought her to a conclusion of the next train of events. Without delay, she threw her whip towards them, wrapping them both together, and pulled them towards her right as the beast kicked the empty space they used to occupy.

『Be aware of your surroundings,』 she said as Etherlite returned to her,   『lest you wish to be nothing more than guts under the beast’s claws.』

     –Not a plan really worthy of any tactical commendation, but he wasn’t one for that fancy business.

     Red Queen drawn and revved, the two fought as a fiery hurricane–spinning slashing, bashing. There was no pause in his offensive push as he tore a path through the enemy’s ranks. Eventually, he found himself face-to-face with the big bad boss itself, and began to tear into it alongside the others that’d shown up. 

     As he fought, however, he–

                                                  “What’re freaks like you even doing here? 

                        “Monsters, all of you!!”

                                        “Just die and get out of our home already!!”

“Agh–”

     That moment of flinching hesitation brought by the unexpected voices had nearly cost him, had he not been yanked from under the giant foot crashing down. Shaking his head, he’d refocus before getting to his feet and revving Red Queen once more. No time to get distracted by pissy ghosts throwing temper tantrums.

“Yeah yeah, got that already!” He cuts himself short, grabbing a charging drone and using it to knock a surrounding group of the beasts away from the newly positioned trio. “Would sure be a helluva lot easier without the backup dancers crashing the party–!”

either way, it wasn’t much of a problem for him in witch hunter form, just make sure to avoid the monster’s claws and he could cut down as many of those things as he could see.  such were the advantages of having all of his powers restored.  if he needed to, he’d use god hunter, though it didn’t seem like he’d need it.  the risks far outweighed the benefits.

well, as it stood, he’d cleared out enough of these smaller creatures, and now it was time for the bigger one.

dashing in, he readied his sword for a jumping strike at the beast’s belly(?) when he noticed someone else underneath it as well

“need some help?” he asked, coming to a stop, unfortunately underneath its feet.

it didn’t take more than a second before he felt himself being yanked out of the way, only for the giant foot to come crashing down where he and the now complaining boy had been.

“shut up kyouya” he muttered, mistaking the boy’s complaints for that of someone he knew from his own universe, “let’s just figure out how to bring this thing down.  purple hair? can you fight?”

     Willing to cooperate with a stranger for now, she considered his question for a moment. Indeed, it seemed to have grown in size over the past few minutes. How intriguing. Despite her preference to go at it alone, this was an excuse to observe the foolish actions of those around her, at least. It was silly at best, but she found herself curious as well. Deactivating her visor, she answered him.

“yeah these guys have never been very good to use.” takeru muttered pointing up at the sky, “at least everyone has their stuff back now to deal with this shit.”

but she’d brought up a valid point.  how many people around here actually had a plan for what to do about these things.  odds of something coming out were pretty high and it could likely demolish a majority of the city, if not the inhabitants as well.

what was even more troubling was that the npcs were gone, as if they knew what was coming and that it wasn’t good.

but as for what he planned on doing

The cocoons spread throughout the city grew a steadily increasing heartbeat throughout the duration of the day. Quiet at first, but near the end the sound was so loud that it sent vibrations throughout the entire city. Cracks began to form down the sides of the structures, and before long what was contained within had been set loose on the city.

Spiraling black strings of matter burst, overflowing before taking on the form of a physical manifestation. Reptilian scales embedded within the beast’s skin, limbs latching onto one another as foreign beings towered above the majority of the city. The gatekeepers, slightly transparent in color yet tainted by nature. Reapers foregoing lore, they weren’t in possession of scythes nor were their bones present. It didn’t matter as their tasks were all the same - to strip breath from lungs, motion from limbs, sight from eyes, noise from tongue. Sounds emanate from their bodies, voices dissimilar to those who roam the city. Upon further inspection, these creatures compound were made of the felled and forgotten.

Taking several steps forward, long limbs drag across concrete shattering infrastructures at will, leaving scraped imprints along the ground. It didn’t take long for most to surmise that this would be among one of the most difficult bouts the city has ever seen.

Over 300 feet is size each, they would certainly be the biggest.

     “Let’s go to the roof, I want to bathe in starlight as we drink.” Which roof? She looks at him expectantly.

she was getting very familiar, very fast, he simply couldn’t keep up with her pace, instead being dragged along by her

Time for some questions about our lovely setting! Remember your reblog karma and send some questions to those who you reblog from so everyone can get in on this meme action! Links have been provided to some of the more obscure districts for your reading pleasure. In addition, thank you to Ink, Kevin and Prof for helping me think of questions!

as he said that he walked into the shop, heading to the front counter and asking where the sake was.

good there were some cheap ones. looking around, he grabbed the second cheapest bottle he could find.  the cheapest was probably cheapest for a reason.  after paying for it he returned to the waiting girl.

     With a smile she sweeps to his side, arms looping around his so that she practically hung off him.

I guess the night is pretty nice, the moon is rather large tonight

ugh, there was still her request though.  well, the most effective way to deal with this city always did seem to be going with it.

She couldn’t help but break from her own glass and barely stifle her laughter at his reaction “Oh! Come on sugar, do you think I’d be so cruel? And talk about unoriginal.”A thoughtful look crossed her face as she finished her own.

“Has your sword always had a soul? How curious. And you fuse together? Well, I’m sure that’s a sight…” 

Her eyes flicked back to her now empty glass. Instead of ordering two more, she simply had a bottle placed between their glasses. A quick pop of the cork and she filled them both. 

he took a sip from the glass finding that whatever it was didn’t actually taste that bad.

“yeah my sword’s always had a soul, since she was first created to kill, uh... baldr I think it was.” he explained, “she generally takes on human form or just disappears entirely.”

taking another sip he thought for a second.

“more like she forms armor and a sword” he continued, “she isn’t actually here right now.”

as he sat he listened to the rain fall outside the bar.  it clearly wasn’t letting up anytime soon.  it looked like he was stuck there for the time being.  well may as well make the most of it.