Ria wasn't stupid enough to keep his hands on Alder while Daeni went for the slash. Ria quickly pulled away only for Cerdic to come in between him and he let out a sort of a growl. Ria reacted on out towards, almost expecting him to attack next and tried to paralyze him instead, but ended up getting thunder for his trouble from Alder instead. His leg was distorting into whispers of darkness as the creature backed away. He couldn't react fast enough to avoid the rock, but managed to block it hitting his head by blocking his face instead with his hand. As his leg distorted, darkness from the heartless slowly began to feed darkness into his leg, and Ria's leg slowly began repairing itself. He smirked, almost feeling like he had the upper hand here as he spoke, walking so he was facing all of them with his back towards the cliff's edge, "You can keep on trying to break me, kids, heck you can even try to kill me, but you're living in an unfortunate reality where I can repair myself. Just takes a bit of time, but not too much. So what are you gonna do?" Ria raised his arms outward, almost challenging them to come and try to hit him as he said, "How will you try to break me toda-" Suddenly, a loud blast could be heard and suddenly Ria was struck in the back by what looked like a blast of... darkness. Either way, it tore straight through Ria's back and through his chest and he began to clutch it, letting out an inhuman scream. At the same time, Chrono should have felt the same pain as well, immensely and in the same exact spot. Everyone else could also feel this pain, but it wasn't nearly as intense. But only Ria gained a physical wound. Ria distorted into a blackened shape, with parts that still remained looking like Aevum, but it mostly looked like a heartless, a shape-shifting heartless type. As the screamed ended he yelled in a distorted voice, "i'LL MakE YOu ALl SuFFER SlOWER anD MORE PAinful DEaTHs For thIS. JusT WatCH. I'LL SuCK OuT wHAt'S LeFT oF yOUR LIghT beFORE I forCE ALL Of thE AiR AnD ENERgy OUt oF YOUr bODIES UNtIL YOu're BEGging ME To KILl you." Ria's wound repaired, and the creature seemed to slowly grow larger and more distorted as a result. But for this moment it's first instinct was to flee, and the creature reluctantly disappeared into the shadows. As Ria disappeared, the spot behind him had Mora standing there. Her head was bleeding as were her hands, and her side seemed to have the same lingering darkness on a spot on her side that Ria had pretended was there. In her hand though, pointed in the direction where Ria was, was a keyblade. Mora lowered the keyblade and looked at the others and tried to walk forward saying, "Everyone dig... I'll... I'll keep watch." she didn't look in the state to watch anyone, but she insisted.
When Hikaru spoke to her, Kaida nodded at him and said, "We'll become masters together!" the bird summoned out her keyblade and while Scar began to surround himself in flames, she knew it would be best to use water against something like that. Kaida motioned her keyblade towards him to begin April Showers, and water began to pour on top of him, and she hoped the others maybe had something better, but she couldn't imagine this was the worst attempt. Kaida used April Showers!
The desperation attack knocked Takehiko back a lot harder than he expected and the boy gasped out in pain as he tried his best to get up again. He was fine, it was just a shock how hard a hit that was, and he didn't know how many of those attacks he could handle. Or if his team could handle it at all. Take quickly charged forward and stabbed at Scroop towards the face and ducked down quickly in order to aim at his claws with two attacks. The boy took a step back and pointed the keyblade at him screaming, "Blizzard!" once more, letting a surge of ice towards Bright Eyes. He got on guard again and asked, "Everyone's alright, right?" HP: 30 AP: 15 MP: 0
YOU ALMOST MISSED IT (wait actually maybe you didn't time zones are a funny thing)
Take attempted to brace the attack to keep Aria from being getting hurt but it seemed he did not know the way and got a good hit for his troubles. Because the laws of nature compel the writer to continue anyway, Take pointed his keyblade to blizzard that mother before he attacked normally and braced once more. HP: 50 AP: 15 MP: 10
Yum yum yum yum ALL OF THEM ARE ACTUALLY REALLY CUTE I JUST WANNA EAT THEM UP
We were born to make history ⛸️彡♪
Daeni's questions hadn't seemed like something odd to answer, but before she could speak, she felt eyes on her and looked over in the direction as Alder had called out a warning to Daeni and ran straight at her. Mora looked scared for a moment before a sudden smirk appeared on their face and they quickly summoned out a keyblade to block it. But the keyblade itself was Xen's keyblade. A sigh was heard as the darkness seemed to leach off of them a bit and their skin and hair began to change, "I was hoping maybe your rush to get in there and Cerdic and Daeni's continued stupidity might have given me a little longer. But, I guess I was wrong." The darkness stayed but the form changed into the usual one to expect from them at this point. "That would have been really unfortunate if it turned out I was Mora and decided to make you suspicious but oh well. The fun of pretending to be Mora is over. It's a shame she died for a one minute act." Ria quickly attempted a kick at the stomach to push Alder back but instead got a keyblade to the leg. With a growl Ria ducked down and just grabbed a hold of Alder's leg. A quick shot of pain should have met Alder, and he should definitely have not been able to move and Ria sighed, "I thought we already had a lesson in close combat with me, but it'd be more fun to kill you first."
Mora raised up her arm when asked to show the injury and the spot seemed to just have darkness linger in the spot painfully (think like, Braig's face in BBS if you're having trouble imagining what I described). She took in a sharp breath and said, "Maybe focus more on the heartless?" The heartless seemed to double in number at that statement and a couple of them began running straight towards Cerdic and Chrono. The one's fighting with Cerdic seemed to go down fairly easily, as if they were weaker despite there being more in number. Mora covered up her injury again and hid behind Daeni when one of the heartless lunged her way. Two others ran towards her from behind but Mora looked at them and her eyes briefly flashed gold and the two seemed to awkwardly redirect themselves to Alder. Tunnel Completion: 50%
>aelin and cstar EVEN RNG KNOWS WHAT'S UP
Take wasn't particularly fond of the way this guy attacked, something about it rubbed him the wrong way and if this guy had a stinger he might have been going through a whole other kind of PTSD but for now Take at least knew he was handling this fight okay. Though he was surprised Aria didn't have a glowly glow glow bracelet reaction to being hit this time. He hoped that was a... good thing? He didn't think about it too long and instead tried to slash another attack in while the guy took a breath from his attack. Then he lunged and managed another one before getting back into a defensive stance, glaring daggers at Bright Eyes. HP: 56 AP: 15 MP: 20
Take held up his keyblade towards Scroop and immediately began attempting to provoke the guy to try and draw away the attention and he said, "Yeah yeah, kill crush kill crush, whatever, can't kill or crush when you're dead, crabby!" he went and got himself a decent hit in before he braced himself knowing full well that was probably not the greatest idea but it wasn't like he'd been a bundle of good ideas before this point anyway. HP: 60 AP: 15 MP: 20
Takehiko was a bit thrown off when Jim had yelled for them to help Silver and Aria was running off. The boy already had firsthand experience with Silver switching his position on opinions of people depending on whether it benefited him. So Take didn't understand why he should help, when the next thing he knew he might just be jumped by the cyborg again, maybe even dying this time. But then Take remembered the night before when they were just... talking in the kitchen of the ship. The fact that Choma could sense good in the man still. Take placed a hand on his head where the first attack landed, he knew Scroop probably would have killed him if not for Silver's orders. But... He always did see people as good with only some pieces of evil. It just seemed in this case, Scroop had a lot more of those pieces. Take scoffed a bit at himself before summoning out his keyblade and running to help as well. As he got closer, he noticed the wisps of darkness emanating from the bug again and Take's eyes narrowed at him. He held back a minute while Aria cast Thunder and threw himself at Scroop with his keyblade to knock Scroop off Silver. Take then stood between Silver and Scroop, hoping someone might pull Silver back to heal him. This time, Take wasn't going to attack Scroop again, he was in defensive this time. Take sighed and said, "Honestly is it gold you want or blood? Cause at this rate I think you're just hungry for blood."
Mora accepted the help and shifted over onto the cliff and took a deep breath, getting up slowly and saying, "C-can we make sure that doesn't happen again? What even happened?" she held her side and moved closer towards the cave. She tried picking up a rock but immediately stopped to hug her side as she looked around. Shadow heartless began to appear and she quickly shifted behind Alder and Chrono, "Well, I guess there's that..." Tunnel Clearing Percentage: 40%
Takehiko eyed the place, fascinated by all the shiny objects and seeing everyone suddenly all in on the idea and Take... just didn't get it. Not the appeal or anything of the sort, but it made all of these people excited so he just shrugged it off and let them have their fun. When the captain mentioned securing a ship, he figured he would probably be one of the better ones to do that since everyone was so focused on the treasure, so he got himself walking towards the ship. As he did, Aria seemed to join him, asking about his head and he shrugged, "Oh, my head's fine. I wasn't knocked out by a hit to the head I lost air because I was being strangled... which actually... sounds a lot worse now that I say it out loud... my head is fine." He continued climbing over hill sized piles of coins, jewels, and treasures. But the only thing on his mind was how tired he was by the time he got back to the ship. He looked over and mumbled, "Wait... did I lose my mountain legs? Are you kidding me? Atmos... you softened me up... I'll get you for this." he joked, slightly, under his breath before he began looking around the ship for something to begin getting this ship afloat.
Mora had joined in with the focus on the rocks and replied to Alder, "Not... really. But I know the extractor was the start of all this, and I'm absolutely sure it is what will finish it. But what I have absolute no idea on is what exactly we need to do to finish this up." Mora grabbed a larger rock and began to carry it to a spot to clear it out of the way, when a blackish-purplish flash happened and Mora was knocked over, letting out a grunt as it happened and she flew towards the edge of the cliff. Mora tried to cling onto the cliff but lost her grip and she seemed to quickly fall down. A thud noise echo'd but after a few seconds, a pale, feminine hand popped up and Mora's head popped over. She looked extremely disoriented and having trouble keeping a grip as she said, "Help... mmmm... what.... what was..." and she felt her grip start slipping again.
Kaida didn't take any offense to the "mutant bird" comment. She had no idea what she was either, but hey if she looked edible enough to the hyenas- wait. Live bait? Kaida looked more offended by the idea her use was more needed for live bait. She was sure she wasn't the yummiest looking animal here. She looked around at the others and wodnered potentially what wolf would taste like seared before the decision seemed to be already made for her. Kaida flapped her wings and said, "You better hope I get eaten Aux. So I don't have to come and kick your butt afterwards for that." she grumbled and said, "Fine. Fine. Hula time... But I ain't doin much. I don't sit on your back or anything... I'll just... make a noise maybe once or twice..." Once the song was done, Kaida flapped her wings quickly and quickly led the charge going, "Aaaand then we ruuuuuun!"
Although Scroop's reaction to Aria's comment was cold and wordless, Silver waved his hands at him to allow it. As such Aria had pulled her keyblade out to heal Take and the black haired boy stirred and slowly began to get up asking, "What... how did I...?" he looked up and stared at Aria a moment and asked, "When did you get here?" he then heard a sharp breathing behind him and turned around to see Scroop looming over with that same intent to kill and Take said, "Oh. Hello there. I guess cranky here got the headstart. Good job, you managed to knock a kid out after an hour or two, I'm sure the captain is very proud of you." "Don't get smart with me boy. I'll snap your neck in a second." Scroop growled and Take rolled his eyes, turning to look back at Aria, "Thanks..." he stared at the ground a minute and asked the world, "Am I allowed to stand up?"
I-I guess....
Take was shocked just how quickly Scroop seemed to move. He thought he'd gotten the jump on him, thinking Scroop wouldn't think they would lunge for an attack. But he was wrong, apparently, and the pirate got the upperhand as a result. Take felt his keyblade disappear the instant he hit the floor. And while it hurt his head, he managed to somehow not feel the choking. Everything was going black by that point, and the last thing he saw was Choma step in before he was out. Spoiler: Episode Takehiko Part 2 Atmos held out a blindfold in her hand towards Take. "Put this on. Your training for today will be to leave this library. Yes, it's that simple." It had been two days since the boy's arrival and it appeared that little had changed. He seemed to...acclimate to his surroundings but she wouldn't have called him comfortable with them. Or even with her. She knew things like this took time but she already had a feeling that he would be one of her more difficult students. It wasn't Take's fault of course but she knew he would have probably felt more comfortable with a teacher who was more structured and direct. Atmos on the other hand, was anything but direct. The second Take would put on the blindfold she would leave the room and magically move the door somewhere else. Somewhere on top of the bookshelves. The library was large and it would be easy enough to get lost in especially without one's sight. It was only one floor but the bookshelves sprawled out in every direction making hallways that led, in many cases, to dead ends and some paths circled around right back to where they started. It was a mess of a maze. If Take couldn't see then it was unlikely he'd ever leave. And that was the point. At some moment in time he would have to figure out that the test was unfair, remove his blindfold, and see that he had been cheated to learn a lesson. Take stared a bit at the blindfold, interested a bit in the idea of the test and said, "Can't just be that simple. I assume there must be a catch. Is there?" Take's progress on questions wasn't necessarily better, but because this was instructional to what he considered orders, he didn't find problems with it as much as he found it clarification. Atmos smiled faintly and shook her head. "No catch. The lesson will be over as soon as you make your exit. Unless you think that's too difficult for you." She teased. Take gave her a look and said, "Not difficult. I can do it." and he moved and placed the blindfold on his face. Once she was gone, he started his motion towards the exit. Mostly going off what he remembered, he avoided touching walls and edges unless he could help it, like for corners. Then he got to the point he knew the door should have been based on, not familiar landmarks but enough for him to know but... he couldn't find it. Takehiko actually spent quite a bit of time along that wall because he could have sworn that was where it was. But when he couldn't, he backed away and thought for a moment... perhaps he took the wrong turn? Then the maze began. Take walked the edges of the library, and seemed to follow the natural patterns, this time keeping his hand on the wall and walking. He could not figure it out, and he didn't cue into anything. But he didn't think Atmos would pull a trick on him, so he was fully convinced it was his own fault. Once he let go of the wall to go and find another area when he found a dead end, he was a goner. But Take wouldn't give up on it either. He was at it for hours, with no seeming determination to stop, if anything he got more frantic about it the longer he went on. He even got to a point where he started just going over everything twice before he finally stopped at the wall where the door was supposed to be and he slammed the wall and finally, for the first time in hours voiced out, "What am I doing wrong? This is ridiculous. Did I manage to turn into a different room? Does this library have multiple rooms?" Take kept on going, he didn't seem to catch onto the fact the test was unfair, and that was because of his faith in those superior. Take couldn't possibly believe she would put him in this test with the intention to fail. At this point, it was far too long, and he was started to get exhausted and a bit dehydrated, but he wouldn't stop. Several hours had passed and even though Atmos had something to keep herself occupied, a silly novel about the notion that a magical nanny could float down from the sky on an umbrella and fix a dysfunctional family, she was growing impatient. Did Take figure it out and just leave her to figure out that he learned his lesson and she was now having to learn to question him? It would have been an interesting turn of events and as she thought it over that was what must have happened. Surely this child could not have spent this long in the library. Or perhaps he had taken off his blindfold only to read because he had already seen through her plot. Both ideas made her proud. Atmos stood up and placed the book down as she made her way to return to the library. With a simple wave of her hand the door returned to its original position and she entered. She looked around and didn't see Take at first. She smiled. And then she saw the boy bumping his way around a corner and into her line of sight still wearing the blindfold. Her smile faded and her heart sank. "You can take that off." She called out towards Take. Take stopped and turned in the direction of Atmos' voice and heard her tell him to take off the blindfold and Take sighed and reached up and took it off, "I failed then, huh?" Take took off the blindfold and blinked a second, the light hurting just a bit before he readjusted and he turned and saw the door and walked over towards it and said, "Wait... I walked by this just a minute ago... how did..." Take held his hand out towards the door and motioned around before backing his hand up and asking, "Am I that inept?" he actually sounded hurt when he asked that question. Atmos shook her head. "No. You aren't. I just moved the door. The test was meant to frustrate you to the point where you'd take the blindfold off, realize that I moved the door, and realize that the test itself was unfair." She folded her arms. "Sometimes you'll encounter problems you can't brute force your way through or find that those in positions of authority cannot always be trusted. You must be able trust in your own judgment, Take." Take's eyes shifted to the door and then back towards Atmos as he spoke, "But... I don't have good judgement. That's why I follow and other's lead. Trusting my own judgement would just result in me still running around in circles in a library even longer... that's why there's people in authority and people to support... You gave me a task and I simply failed to follow it... unless you're implying I shouldn't trust you which seems... odd to establish." there wasn't a hint of conflict in his tone, but it was clear from the words he said that he was just confused, and he didn't get it. He wasn't even asking questions about it. Atmos placed her hands on her hips as she looked at Take. "The point is to make you independent. You can trust me but what if you couldn't? Placing too much faith in those of positions of power can be a very dangerous thing. When I met you, you were too willing to obey without questioning. You're still the same but you have improved during your time here." She realized that this meant changing Take think differently than how he was taught on his homeworld but this was necessary. "Keyblade wielders hold a great deal of power and if one were to be mislead to misuse their power it would be, needless to say, terrible." The Keyblade War came to mind but that history lesson was one for another time. "You must develop yourself so that, when the time comes, you may be able to trust your own judgment, Take." Takehiko stood confused and for the first time during this, asked a question, "But why would someone with authority abuse that power, they already have the most in that level, why would they need more?" he was nervous asking that question, he didn't look nervous, but his body language may have indicated the trouble in asking that, and he didn't look at Atmos when he asked, "People already put trust in those in authority. What's the point in abusing that trust?" Take felt himself grip his wrist, and the more he tried to process it, the most he strengthened his grip and his monotone broke temporarily as admitted, "I-I don't... I don't... understand...?" he finally looked at Atmos and he looked unbelievably confused, "Master, I... I don't understand..." "Sometimes people in positions of power are afraid of losing that power. Or sometimes it's still not enough. People can be cruel, Take." Atmos placed her hand on Take's shoulder and smiled. "Even though evil exists in the Realm of Light that doesn't mean we should abandon the ability to see the good in others." She spoke softly and confidently. She had been young and naive once. Wait. She was still young. She had been naive once and had known the pain of finding of learning that people sometimes did terrible things for little reason other than because they wanted to and sometimes life would just kick you while you were down. It hurt. But it was worth it to see those who chose to do the right thing even when they had every reason not to do so. Take felt her hand on his shoulder and nearly shrunk back at it but kept himself under control about it. When she spoke the reasons why someone may do those things out of fear of losing power, he understood that. Then Atmos mentioned the second part. Take looked away and said, "But... I've... always seen the good in others..." he then looked back at Atmos and said, "I've never thought of people as evil with bits of good in them... I've always thought of people as good... with evil parts." Take brought his hand up to his chest and said, "Is that not how it is? Is there that much dishonesty that I need a lesson to learn about that?" this made the questions pour out. Take's eyes seemed to just look everywhere while he was trying to process it. Finally, Take just seemed to calm down as his hand fell and he asked, his voice quiet and sounding like something clicked into place, "Is... that what they were doing at home?" the boy sounded like he almost didn't want to hear the answer. Atmos was glad to hear this side of Take, knowing that it had been there buried underneath all the conditioning of his homeworld all along. "You cannot allow yourself to become blind to those in power. As for your homeworld, it is up for you to decide whether they had abused your faith in those in charge or not. I cannot make that decision for you. You will have to make peace with whatever decision you reach." If she began telling him how to feel she would have been no different than those who conditioned him. If Take was to grow he would have to develop his own sense of self. Take looked a bit relieved at the answer Atmos gave, after a pause of silence Take nodded at her and said, "Thank you... I will learn from this lesson and grow from it." he took a bit to breath before asking, "Um, am I able to go and get food and water? I uh... I'm getting hungry." he rubbed the back of his head and said, "Probably should have guessed by the point I was hungry that this wasn't going to end well but I just don't know when to give up sometimes." there was a moment where the boy looked like he was about to smile, but pulled back before he could.
