There was still hardly any accurate assessment of how many bandits lined the area surrounding the facility, but it was far too late to take a headcount. Having finished all their preparations, the bandits signaled their attack, and their forces rushed ahead.
All four groups initially worried just how much it would take to deal with this threat. Sure, bandits were easy, but this wasn't just a handful of bandits. They could easily be swarmed and overwhelmed. This wouldn't be like the last time they had to fight here, this was actually far too dangerous, far too high risk.. far too uncertain. Ihzyhur and Xyithy took to the field, weapons drawn. Ice began to form in the area near Ihzyhur, his gift already active. Xyithy meanwhile started to shimmer and fade, her own hazy mist gathering by her own gift. Both of them advanced, knowing that everyone would be counting on them.
As Ehryinae set out with the embers, her staff drawn and already lit ablaze, she took a moment to wonder what Sxeiva had mentioned. They were fully capable, it wasn't a surprise to be spoiled. She took to the enemy before her, but left an opportunity to watch in the meanwhile. As their initial teacher, it was only right that she gave some of her attention to her students as well. She was told she should bear witness to what was about to unfold, after all. It but lent credit to the Arch-Magus' daughter that she had so effectively predicted this opportunity.
Thanrie meanwhile set into the enemies, throwing forth her weapon, and when it struck the ground and set forth in a shock-wave, numerous enemies fell. Added to the speed of her boots, she was a blossom of death, felling enemies everywhere with blinding speed. The massive number of foes wasn't a problem for her, not with the way she fought. After the waves of death begun, Ehryinae started to find it difficult to keep up where Thanrie had ended up in this melee.
Lwyn scaled atop the facility once again, her gloves active once more. She let loose with bolts that pierced into bandits and took them down. Her shots never missed, but her foes were too numerous for the few taken by single shots. She had to learn the shape of her gift, to find what else it could offer her. She needed more control overall, and right now she needed more options. There was no helping it, she would have to figure out something new. Thanrie looked to be having no problems though, and that made her ponder. Thanrie was just doing well because her attacks had such a great area. Well, of course then, she need to use shots that did more than sting.
Lwyn started focusing for a bit, building an impression within her mind, forming upon an idea that stirred within. She was using smart ammo to shoot upon her foes, but clearly her imagination wasn't that limited, right? If her bolts flew like missiles, then why couldn't they connect like missiles, and deliver a suitable explosion worthy of the idea. She loaded another light disc into her crossbow, and fired her idea upon her enemies. The shot connected and detonated, a fiery eruption proclaiming itself from the impact. Visually, it looked something closer to a very miniature nuclear blast from stories. This made her a bit nervous, clearly if her imagination took over too much, it could end up with a much more... authentic version of such a blast. Maybe simpler explosions were better for now.
Qheria had been unsure how to begin, but set off regardless, setting up a very small barrier around her, she left into her foes like she had of normal. Her boots gave her still plenty of a crushing impact, and her shields did plenty of the rest of the work, but right when Lwyn's explosion went off, she hesitated. That was not expected at all, her shield ensuring she had no worries of the blast, but the blast itself outperforming much of her own efforts. Lwyn was again forging ahead with the gift faster than they were, it wouldn't do to simply rest in her dust. She lept again, her mind racing for ideas. In all of her leaps, she was depending on her tools to yield results, her gift wasn't helping at all.
Maybe it should be. She paused under the protection of her barrier, pondering ideas. The barrier was a wall of force, blocking out everything from outside. The barrier however did not move.. but did it have to be so still? She built upon the idea over the movement of her next jump. She connected with another leap, the impact forming another shield that begun small, but with instant velocity ripped across the field in a growing sphere. Several bandits went flying, the sheer force of the moving wall crushing them in an instant, their bodies cluttering to the ground. She smiled, once again bearing a shield upon her foes to crush them. Nothing said that a defensive fighter like her had to be so harmless.
Mhyl meanwhile found herself in new ground. She had never actually faced her own battles before, and this wasn't a simple one. A handful of bandits rushed at her, alarming a number of her friends. Mhyl paused but a moment, and then her dance begun. None of their hits connected, finding no one where she once was. Mhyl herself turned her sight to her headset, turning to view her surroundings as a whole, instead of being limited to just what was before her. Even in her spins and leaps, her headset kept up. But this wasn't enough, being untouchable wasn't having her losing her anything, but it wasn't winning her anything either. She set her other hand upon her book and focused into it.
It is said that gravity was one of the weakest forces on Earth, even in the universe Earth belonged to. The laws of the universe there were nothing like here, so there was nothing at all saying that gravity should be so weak in Celese. The ground itself crinkles around her, every blade of grass going flat. Each bandit near her was crushed into a space no higher than 0 and 1 Uyn high. And her dance continued, gravity itself dancing with her. She lent her focus around the field, crushing other places in turn as if by an invisible weight, as if painted by an invisible brush across the field. Enemies who tried to sneak up behind her found themselves instead the one with an enemy at their back, and then similarly crushed.
Ihzyhur, Xyithy, and Ehryinae begun to slow, seeing that they were quickly being outperformed. Ehryinae took a moment to smirk at the sight, Sxeiva wasn't kidding at how much of a treat this performance was. She was however aware of the limitations, being personally attuned to the circumstances. She was also using very expansive bursts of flames to take down her foes, but this only worked because her foes were so easy to deal with. Against more challenging foes, this kind of approach wouldn't work anymore.
Thanrie struck down once again with her shockwave, clearing the area.. except for a few who stood firm. During all the fighting, it was simply bandits who had rushed, the aethyrnz however had been a bit more cautious to first calculate the threat they faced. One aethyrnz turned to Thanrie with a rifle, predicting her location and movement, and fired. Thanrie fell to the dirt, her thigh being shot with skilled precision. Qheria lept in to help, only to find additional aethyrnz approaching. Qheria's barrier was up, as bolt of lightning struck through it. A barrier of force does nothing against something as unsubstantial as electricity.
Lwyn turned to help out, only to find the roof itself had been invaded by aethyrnz with jetpacks. As she turned to fire, one of them shot her crossbow, and the bow itself went falling to the base of the facility. She was left completely disarmed. Mhyl found herself facing such a foe as well, but instead of her movement pulling her through safely, it seemed instant calculations guided their actions much faster than she could, and she was also brought down.
Things were not going well for the Embers, Seekers, or Reavers either, their new foe was proving calculating and dangerous. They had faced such clockwork soldiers before, but it seemed the advanced model was dramatically smarter and faster. They also had very advanced weapons in comparison. Things were generally going poorly all around for everyone.
Thanrie struggled through the pain, despite things looking to be turning for the worse as they had before. Facing such foes that could wield calculated movements and ultimate precision, it looked like things might be hopeless. However, she was determined to not give up. She had grown tired of giving up, of suffering, of having to yield, the time for that had passed. The time for change had come instead, the time for... Thanrie paused in an instant, her intuition forming a fresh new idea in her head. It was crazy, but of course being predictable wasn't working in their favour right now.
Calculated movements and ultimate precision, this was exactly what she struggled with when she faced Mhyl in her own sparring. She was faster, but she never had the time to act, never had the time to think, never had the time to do anything. Of course though, she was fast, so the obvious solution was to give herself more time. Thanrie lashed out with her weapon, striking the ground. Even this trick of hers, she was simply stopping the weapon where it struck, a trick she had been using with her gift for some time now. But if so, why stop there? As the blade struck the ground, a ripple surged out from it, but not as a shockwave. To Thanrie, everything hit by the ripple simple stopped, frozen in a bubble of time.
To everyone else, the foes around her were at first still standing, and then they were divided into several pieces, Thanrie no where nearby. As Thanrie stepped forth from the bubble, time resumed. Lwyn had gotten a pretty good few of everything in that instant, thinking of Thanrie as a pure genius. Clearly, she was nothing like the naive girl she used to be. Thinking outside the box, thinking beyond the norm, of course their enemies couldn't stop them if they knew they were truthfully better. Lwyn however had no weapon, which would leave her at an impasse. However, her own original style was to throw attacks without her bow. She considered just creating attacks without a weapon, but remembered Ehryinae's lesson. It was far too dangerous to just use your body as a point of focus, especially when it came to weapons. That's why Ehryinae had used her staff and her...
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Lwyn's smile turned as a if a demon, raising an empty glove into the air. She activated the glove's magnetism, and with it built her own image of the magnetism pulling form a blade within it. She tossed this blade at her foes, but the blade had no effect. Of course, her foes were still too mighty for this, they were metallic soldiers. Metal, of course there were ways to deal with that one. She pondered for a moment an electrical burst, but decided that there was too much danger of conduction, considering she was on the facility. Instead, she opted for a more chemical solution. Another blade formed in her hand.. and even another in her other hand. The blade itself struck harmlessly upon her foes, but then burst into a chemical smoke. She was picturing some of the worst of chemicals, reactive with metal, corroding the metal with not only rust but also a breakdown of chemical composition. The chemical itself was lighter than air, for her own safety. Her foes however begun to rapidly meltdown around her.
Qheria stood as the foes around her fell away, and had looked around. Thanrie had not given up, and while watching she even noticed the strange vapours rising from the facility. Lwyn was also pulling new tricks from a hat. A change of approach, then? She was originally thinking vectors of force, but that stops working when immaterial threats are involved. Electricity wasn't going to stop because it was pushed away, it wouldn't care. However, there was an atomic level for electricity, electrons. She still had to be careful, playing with things atomically could be far more dangerous than normal. But she didn't need to play with fusion reactions or anything. A proton wave, something which could cancel out any electrons passing through, but would still then incinerate enemies in a wave of energy. She had to be careful though, unlike her usual barrier, she couldn't pick friends in the range, this would just annihilate anything around her.
Thanrie however had moved away, and Mhyl was still a distance off. Qheria charged an unclaimed flank of their enemies and lept into the fray, a glimmer of light shining in her movements. Several aethyrnz fired at her in the air, but the shots had no effect. Then Qheria came down, and a blaze of white scoured the field. Bandits hit were vaporized, while any aethyrnz were left fully inert, everything they had for energy consumed and burned away. Qheria took in a few deep breaths, the burst having taken a lot from her. Clearly this was overkill for the bandits, but it worked very well against her mightier foes.
Mhyl watched as Ihzyhur, Xyithy, and Ehryinae were forced to retreat, herself struggling to stand back up. She had to feel a bit of pride that she was doing this well, she was actually fighting, but her friends were still doing better. It was aggravating, it was infuriating, it was unfair. She had expected much more of herself, she knew she was capable of so much more. She would not be left behind like this, not when she knew her own focus was supposed to mean so much more. She then remembered, she had vowed to make her own focus her own advantage, the focus of the elves as her own strength. She looked to her headset once again, and took her focus to every enemy within no less than 300 Uyn. She felt for her friends on the field, accounted for them, and focused upon the rest, the enemies that stood around her. None of them would be spared.
The sky above started to shimmer with a haze of bright blue in the red haze of the setting sun. The light grew in brightness and intensity as the sky itself formed countless rings above them in a stacking pillar. The ground itself begun to glow blue faintly, the yellow and blue mixture making even the grass appear green in this moment. Thanrie and Qheria looked around them in concern, although they did notice the grass near them yet remained yellow for a fair distance. Then Mhyl's wrath was unleashed, and a multitude of energy pillars struck down from the heavens, scouring the grounds below the rings. It happened in less than an instant, leaving Thanrie and Qheria without sight for a moment. When the light cleared, Thanrie finished off the last remaining aethyrnz on the field, the rest were already obliterated.
Mhyl fell over at this point, her stamina completely consumed. Chyurae rushed out to her aide, bringing her back inside. Zyuixqs simply stood there, feeling completely out of his element, having been unable to do a thing at all. However, it wasn't like the battle was concluded. With all of the main troops wiped, even the leaders gone in that melee, Khaexyn's latest innovation stepped forward. They had no name for these miniature colossal, walking as if they were giant power armor suits. Thanrie set off against one, her blade rebounding from it harmlessly. Lwyn recovered her crossbow and fired at one with another chemical blast, but it also had no effect. Qheria came at several of them with another proton wave, which at least caused damage, but not much more.
Already, they were facing a foe even more dangerous than the last, and already they would need to strive to even greater heights to claim victory. The difference in potential, they knew they would get no backup in this fight, the most they could hope for is that Mhyl might be rested enough to let loose with them. Qheria realized in the aftermath of her own strike that it was very unfortunate Mhyl was down at this point. Mhyl's attack might have been enough even for this foe, but her stamina couldn't endure such demands. They would either need to find their own victory, or at least hold the line until Mhyl was rested enough for another air strike.
Qheria considered her enemy, and just how much power it had. Clearly, an unfocused attack upon the masses wouldn't work, she needed to be much more focused. But how would she gather enough power to do much more than scratch this enemy. As she pondered, she noticed the same enemy had turned to her and had raised it's arm towards her, an end not unlike a cannon gathering electrical light. It was going to fire upon her soon. She pondered using her own attack to negate the attack, but was worried if it might be powerful enough without any amount of focus. Even with focus, did she have enough power. As it gathered it's own power, she wished she had a way to do the same.
Maybe she did. Nothing said that it all had to be her own power. She punched down upon the ground she was standing, a silver barrier emitted before her. The back of this barrier, she punched with her other hand, and coils sprung from it, circling around to her enemy. After her attack was set, her enemy fired. The attack struck the barrier, which begun to glow. Electrical energy surged along the coils from the completed circuit, bringing all of the energy around to the enemy before her. The entire thing lit in a surge of electrical force, before it fell over smoldering. Qheria went to figure out how to deal with her next foe.
Meanwhile, Zyuixqs dragged little Chyurae along. He knew they had no way to communicate, but he knew the help would be needed. He was growing tired of being so useless all the time, having to stand an icon of his family legacy. He crushed his spear within his grips regretfully, mundane solutions had availed them nothing. He had been tormented this ever since they were cast away from the Marauders, and especially the lunar cycle without Thanrie. He had dedicated that time in fact to his betterment, to find something he could do, and he was certain casting aside his legacy was a requirement.
Zyuixqs reached the fallen armor, and motioned to the casing for Chyurae. Still not understanding, Zyuixqs tried to open the case by himself. Chyurae then figured out why he was needed, and opened it up. Khaexyn had not been original here, the armor had it's own pilot, even if the pilot wasn't itself organic. Zyuixqs tossed the metal carcass out from the suit, and started to make his way inside. He then motioned for Chyurae to withdraw, which finally was understood. Chyurae again fled to the shadows and made his way back, unnoticed. Zyuixqs himself took his seat and got accustomed to what was before him. This was not a first time for him, none of the girls had in fact considered asking who exactly had driven the facility to the fortress in the first place.
The system had been overloaded, but it was restoring itself. If the pilot hadn't expired in the electrical surge, this thing wouldn't have stayed down long. He fiddled with the controls, getting accustomed to what everything did, as the systems came back online. Pleasantly enough, feeding the electrical circuit had supercharged the cannon, the thing was ready to output even more than it would usually, though that could cook the engine faster. Funny, according to how this thing had suffered, overloading the system core could chain react the entire system. This thing craved energy so much that it was a fault, feeding it could tear it apart.
Zyuixqs got the entire thing back on it's feet and made his way forwards. Thanrie paused, seeing another armor approach her, and tried to prepare for her own defense. However, the new-coming foe instead turned to one of the other power armors and fired upon it. The foe's energy levels spiked and surged, then the entire thing detonated. Thanrie stumbled backwards in surprise, what in the world had just happened? Zyuixqs popped open the back door. "Thanrie, they hate their own power, it's too much for them if they feed upon their own greed. Give them more than they could ever use." Zyuixqs finished shouting out the back, closed the door, and moved towards another target.
Thanrie was only even more shocked to find that was actually Zyuixqs, the useless guy they had always had around them. She had just been saved by Zyuixqs, of all people.. how did that happen? Still, his news was also a precious gift, this foe was suddenly so much easier to deal with. She pondered the details though, usually she would boost something to charge it too much, but boosting it would only increase the energy against her, not the amount contained within. No, instead she needed to actually supercharge it directly. She approached another foe, and struck out at it with her weapon. In that moment, time stopped. It was perfect, she had a connection, and opportunity. She charged the link of her weapon with a surge of energy, and then only boosted the energy of the connection, pushing even more power into the result. Once she had enough, she cut the connection, restoring time. Her foe meanwhile found itself dealing with far too much energy in the span of an instant, and began to surge. She walked onward as her foe detonated.
Lwyn and Qheria caught on to what was going on soon enough too, also surprised that they had an unexpected visitor on the field helping out. Zyuixqs however wasn't able to keep going for much longer, his own system starting to suffer finally from being pushed so hard. He pulled off to safety, leaving the rest to the others. There weren't many left at that point though. Lwyn charged her shots with an electrical surge, taking one down after a few rapid shots connected. It might have looked slower than Thanrie, but only because Thanrie could stop time. Qheria eventually only started having problems because her enemies stopped shooting at her. Their sudden switching to blunt strikes were however easily fended off, leaving victory inevitable.
Lwyn was the second to collapse on the field, having been able to hold on unto the bitter end. Qheria and Thanrie made sure she was brought inside along with Mhyl, for a well deserved rest.