VVVVVigil: Valorous Veterans Vanquishing Venal Vermin

[Nova_Eclipse]

[Training Grounds]

Quin brings his arms up and over, turning his body as he inverts his sword as Zoph throws, using the flat of the blade to intercept the spear. This also means that Zoph meets his blade, rather than his shoulder binder or pauldron, which is probably a good thing for both of them, but Quin is unable to do more than meet Zoph's strike with his own blade. Only Quin's size and weight advantage keep him from having to stumble back from the force with which Zoph hits, and he seems impressed when he speaks.

"That's a good one!"

[5a Violista]

[Training Grounds]

Once the strike hits, Zophiel needs to bounce off. He lands and rolls in the direction leaving Quin directly between him and the grounded sword.

Let's see...he needs to distract Quin from noticing what's going on behind him. The easiest way to do that will be to draw his attention to Zophiel himself.

Zophiel gets up and smirks. He moves his blue sword to just his right hand and, holds his free hand out with his palm up and fingers curled. "If you think that one was good, wait until you find out what's next."

Black crackling energy appears in his free hand. Once that appears, he returns his hand so both of them are on his sword. Black threads shoot up the dark blue blade.
Meanwhile, the other sword - the bloodred one, still in the ground behind Quin - begins to be covered in the same black threads.

"Trust me:" He coils his muscles and his feet dig into the ground, ready to spring towards Quin and make an obvious attack. "You won't see it coming."

And so, Zophiel darts towards Quin and swings at him, aiming to hit Quin's blade as hard as possible.
At the same time, the red sword is pulled out of the ground, and - spinning like it was something being rapidly pulled by a magnet - flies in the direction of Zophiel. Which, Quin happens to be directly in between. (...but even if it does it, it won't be any more damaging than if somebody just threw a metal baseball bat. Without force being applied in the right direction, it's just like a flying club.)

[UncleWolf]

Spoiler

Show

Early Morning Training

The bird “shrugs” again.
”Well, yeah but-“ he hops off the table and flips into his usual shiny winged kobold shape.
”Still quite a few kilos in the chest and arms short of matching anyone capable of that. Why I stick to the small stuff.” he says, tapping the mithril dagger at his side he’s calling a sword. It’s in a scabbard, but judging from the hilt he keeps it very shiny. It seems exceptionally well made.

Early Morning Training

Mia has stopped drinking more of the tea/coffee mix. She learns quick. Still the coffein has at least a little impact on her that she got aware of the surrounding.

"Not my taste." she replies to Jezebel. she takes a look from afar at the weapons.
"If you need them lightened, I could take a look. I worked on such before, but they got replaced by energyweapons."

She then turns to the Kobold. "I guess everyone around here got their favorit weapons" she points at the sword on her back to confirm she got one, too.

Early Bird Lessons

The catgirl blinks, a little surprised by the offer, before carefully grasping the handle of the heavy blade. The full weight and size of it all catches her by surprise as Jezebel withdraws, and she briefly struggles to keep the tip from instantly plummeting to the ground. The best Blanche can manage is to stagger back a step and shift a hand to press against the flat of the blade, distributing the weight to better cope with it as she examines the Eviscerator's rugged exterior. The mention of her name doesn't go unnoticed; her ears flicker and a brow raises, but she decides to put off questioning it for later.

"Melee weaponry isn't my area of expertise, but I've never really seen anything in a style like this. Much more complex than the stuff I know - most folks I knew used monomolecular axes and blades. There were a couple piston-based punching weapons or mechanical hammers, but those were rare." She moves a hand to the chain, testing the spinning motion with a gentle push. "So this spins around the chassis, right? You could get some savage cutting power with that, I know that's what those old tools did to carve up trees, but these things are not razor-sharp. Maybe rapid blunt force trauma to, like, break open armor? I think some machinery does a similar thing to smash through rocks and stuff." Finished with her analysis, she frowns, lowering the hefty blade to gently rest against the ground and relieve the stress in her muscles. "I don't see why anyone would favor something like this over energy weapons or something like a monomolecular lucerne, though. Both things do a damn good job slagging or punching through plating, and the sheer battering power this thing has is just way beyond overkill. I mean, I dunno where you're from, but where I come from, people don't usually go running around covered in twelve-inch thick steel plating."

Early Morning Training

Instead of letting the sword be placed on the ground, Jezebel takes it back and casually flips it over in her hand so she can hold the grip and rest it on her shoulder. "Five inches, actually. And an engine block or tank tread but that's the least of what I've had to kill with this." She explains before reaching over to the controls for her training hologram and turning it on. The Ork from before appears for a moment before it is replaced by something entirely alien and horrific. It stands as tall as Jezebel herself, even though it is hunched over, and the body is covered in impossibly tight muscle covered by chitin. The entire organism could be considered nauseating to look at. "Meet the Genestealer. Stands over two meters tall when straight and weighs in at several hundred pounds of pure muscle and armor and hate." Jezebel explains before reaching over to lift up its taloned hand to show off the claws. "These claws might not look like much, but they are capable of shredding through armor, bone, muscle, steel, and rockcrete like so much wet tissue paper. It can cut through even the strongest armor with ease. The only reason my blade can stand up to them is because it has a powerfield to reinforce the teeth and help cut through anything I swing through. But Ugly here has more than just claws. The reason the Genestealer has its name is because it invades worlds and infects the local populace. They implant victims riiiight below the ribcage with a tiny little organ that slowly corrupts the mind and body." She explains, tracing a line beneath her own ribs and above her abs. "The corruption links their minds together, forming a hive that seeks new members. Over time, they breed, giving birth to mutants until eventually a new set of Genestealers are born and the process begins again."

She hadn't expected to be giving a lesson, but she was somewhat tired of people not understanding why her weapon of choice was such as it was. "They invade Hive Worlds especially, worlds in which towering megacities housing billions of people live. By the time such a cult gets noticed, there are hundreds of members and dozens of these. So, please, take a moment and look at this thing. Imagine it racing down a hallway at you with a half dozen others like it and many times that of mutants and enthralled humans. All seeking to kill or capture you as they rush forward. They scream, their psionic presence battering at your willpower, and lunge. Fire merely slows them, lasrounds and bullets bounce off, and there's always more. Look at this and please tell me that my Eviscerator is overkill. If you need more, I can have holo-vids sent over if you need visual proof."

[Nova_Eclipse]

[Training Grounds]

Quin stands his ground as Zoph springs at him, meeting the paladin's blade with his own, and not budging.....even when the second sword smashes into the tail binder on his back with a resounding clang. One of his eye orbs grows larger for a moment, as though he's raised an eyebrow, before chuckling.

"Impressive. I trust that's not all you can do, though?"

[5a Violista]

[Training Grounds]

Zophiel laughs as well.

He steps back, frees a hand, and yanks - and the other sword flies up to his hand.

"Yeah," he says, "but most of what I can do is pretty situational." He puts that sword back into the ground, so he can freely gesture with his hand as he talks. "I mentioned some of it to her-" gesturing at Naraisha "- I can do random stuff like healing, charging my weapons with holy power, tying knots, and making magic seals that can hold things back or block magic and so on."

[Nova_Eclipse]

[Training Grounds]

"Ah, very good," Quin says, taking a more relaxed pose, "Well, I think your abilities should prove useful, and you're quite obviously skilled, so I don't see a reason you shouldn't be allowed to join."

[5a Violista]

[Training Grounds]

"Okay, good," he says. He nods. " Thanks. I still wish I could have knocked you over."

He decides to put both his swords on his back again, and heads towards the spear that ricocheted earlier. "So, what, it's just paperwork left?" he asks, "or is there any other questions you have about me or things you want to see?"

[Zefir]

Early Morning Training

Mia appears calm when Jezebel shows the Genstealer, thought this seems to be more for Blanche then the others around. But since Jezebel didn't react to Mia's offer, she assume those weapons have a hidden meaning for Jezebel or something like that. No reason to bother more.

"They look nasty. We had to fight other creatures who also got this skintight armor. I heared from a few warrirs back then, that they even fought trees, but a weapon like yours would have been to slow."

[Shadowcaller]

[Spooky VIGIL Encounters]

If Cora does follow the spirit she will find it in a relatively remote corner of the VIGIL island base where it appears to be looking around. It seems likely it haven't been here before the way it's moving around the area.
For now it seems to be trying to sneak behind one of the buildings where she might just be able to reach it with her sword. She might recall that her mother has warned her of not hitting anyone with her weapon though. But does that apply to ghost dopplegangers?

[Nova_Eclipse]

[Training Grounds]

Quin looks thoughtful for a moment as he slides Excalibur back into his storage space, the sword seeming to pixelate and disappear into nothing as it enters the space in his shoulder-binder.

"Just a bit of paperwork, easily handled on our end. One of the Commanders might take an interest at some point, but if they need to ask more questions, they'll come find you. Did Naraisha show you around?"

[5a Violista]

[Training Grounds]

Zophiel shrugs.

"I got to see part of the place, what we passed on the way here," he says, "but not really a complete 'tour'. Wasn't really expecting one, however, except maybe the most relevant parts of the base."

As a religious guy, he does wonder if there's any chapels or other similar areas around, but it's not that huge of a deal.

[Arkhosia]

Early Morning Training

Blanche blinks as she takes in the tall and lanky form projected before her, suddenly seeming a fair bit more interested in what Jezebel has to say as she begins her lecture. But as intimidating as that Genestealer looks, all taut sinew and hardy carapace, fear isn't the driving force behind it; rather, it's the tactics and analysis that enthralls her.

And perhaps a better look at Jezebel's own form, now that the anger and sleep have worn off somewhat.

"It's easy to call it overkill when your home could only dream of crafting plating even a fraction as tough as that," Blanche responds, not entirely willing to admit outright that she was wrong. "I've met enough things here to realize that some aspects of my arsenal were lacking in power, but nothing else's showed up that I couldn't see a higher caliber dealing with yet." The genestealer being the unspoken exception, although not exactly something she'd in fact met either.

[Earl of Purple]

Approaching

Flying through the air is a large beast, its body the size of an ox. It's got four legs, each ending in large paws, and a pair of wide bat-like wings. Its body is covered in thick red hair crossed with black stripes. Trailing in the air behind it is a massive chitinous tail ending in a vicious barbed stinger, and its head looks pretty human, with no fur except for a leonine mane around the edges and bushy eyebrows.

It's aiming to land on the edge of the flying base, unless it's intercepted before then, and roar to attract attention.

[Morty]

[Approaching]

The creature's approach seems to have drawn attention from the island. Some of the staff gathers to man the defences, but it doesn't seem aggressive for now... At the forefront is one of Vigil's newer members, but certainly an impactful one.

"Announce yourself and your intentions!" Calm Reed bellows, as a few other members peer at the beast from behind her.

[Earl of Purple]

Approaching

The manticore stops and hovers briefly as it replies, a strange lisp to its voice from the many rows of teeth within its mouth. "They took my cubsss! And sstole my village! I can't get them back alone!" It doesn't hover long, though; it's too heavy and not manoeuvrable enough to keep it up for long, returning to looping and soaring. Unless a space is cleared for it to land, at least. It would appreciate that, although it knows it's very intimidating to the two-legged cave-builders.

[Morty]

[Approaching]

Well, the thing isn't aggressive, at least. Best to speak with it and see what it wants. The Vigil members spread out to let the manticore land.

"Who took your cubs and your village?" Calm Reed asks.

[Earl of Purple]

Approached

"Humanss took my cubss, killed my mate and sstole my village." The manticore isn't roaring, but it's still loud. "I thought they were merchantss, they had horsselesss wagonss, sso I did not sstop them. But when they arrived at the village, they killed any who ressissted, put the resst into the wagonss, and drove away the sheep. When I knew what wass happening, I attacked for the mutton, killed ssome and knocked over a wagon. But they were too many, and they had roaring tubess of metal that sspat gravel at me and I could do nothing but die. Another group had ssplit off, headed to my lair. They killed my mate and took our cubss. I wass not there, I could not sstop them. My mate wass blind, and sstood no chancse againsst the roaring tubess. They are headed to the large village on the mountain, the one that issn't attached to the ground." This close, there's several small wounds visible in the manticore's hide; whoever shot it did so with shotguns, not enough to harm it but a lucky shot to the face could have blinded it or worse.

"Pleasse, help me. I have none of the yellow metal that humanss like, jusst my teeth, clawss and tail. I cannot pay, sso cannot assk the goblinss in their mountain and know nowhere elsse to assk." The manticore bows its head to Calm Reed, and tears run down its great face from large, feline eyes.

[Morty]

[Island Edge]

Calm Reed listens to the plea with stoic silence. The beast can clearly talk and it was attacked and wronged. It is Vigil's duty to right this wrong. Besides, who knows how many other people these slavers masquerading as merchants might have taken? It sounds like they're headed to Skyside. Not surprising. That city might only be improved by burning it to the ground and starting over from scratch.

"We can help you. The others are on duty here, but I'll find volunteers and we'll do our best to stop them."

[Earl of Purple]

Island Edge

"Thank you. I sslowed them down, took out one of their wagonss. Ssome will be on foot now, I think." Unless they were able to right it and the manticore didn't damage it apart from knocking it over, anyway. And that's doubtful, unless the vehicle is really rugged.

It bows its head to Calm Reed again, before closing its wings and sitting like an overgrown cat, facing out towards its lair.

[Recaiden]

When Calm Reed calls for volunteers, Alice will probably be the first of them.
Stopping demon invasions is one thing, but she particularly jumps at this chance to deal with slavers or kidnappers.

"How many of the humans were there?" the centaur asks the manticore as the heroes are assembling.

[Gullara]

[Spooky VIGIL Encounters]

If Cora does follow the spirit she will find it in a relatively remote corner of the VIGIL island base where it appears to be looking around. It seems likely it haven't been here before the way it's moving around the area.
For now it seems to be trying to sneak behind one of the buildings where she might just be able to reach it with her sword. She might recall that her mother has warned her of not hitting anyone with her weapon though. But does that apply to ghost dopplegangers?

[Spooky VIGIL Encounters]

Cora runs through the portal after the ghost! The ghost that looks a lot more like her than she does right now. In fact, Cora doesn't look like anyone. To the casual observer, she's a floating knight costume with no one in it.

The girl is in hot pursuit of the appearance stealing ghost, her padded training sword in hand. Trailing behind, Bastion, in his wizard halloween costume, comes through the portal along with Laela. They gotta catch up, but Cora isn't slowing down.

"Come back here!" Cora shouts after the ghost. So much for sneaking. The ghost may be trying to go unnoticed, but Cora might draw attention this way before long. "Stop pretending to be me right now or I'll fight you." That's the last warning.

[Morty]

[Island Edge]

Calm Reed lets the manticore answer this question. It's one she would have asked herself sooner or later.

[Earl of Purple]

Island Edge

"Not as many as before. I killed... seven of them. There were more than that left. I do not know numbers very well, and have trouble telling humans apart until I know them. They had five wagons without horses or other beasts of burden, two long and tall with roofs, into which the villagers went. One shiny and bright, which I knocked over. One tall and short, with large wheels, that pulled a normal wagon, and neither had roofs. Most of the humans which arrived did so in the wagon. The last is low and roofless, muddy and brown, faster than any horse I've seen. It had two riders that I saw. I think my cubs are in one of the first two. They are tall but solid, I could not make one topple easily." The manticore can't count past ten, unfortunately. It knows larger numbers exist, and can count in an abstract sense of knowing there's three less in a herd of twenty-seven than one of thirty, but that doesn't help much here.

[Murkus]

[Spooky VIGIL Encounters]

The dryad child Laela emerges too, trailing a long sequin dress and a rain of flower petals. Her hair is a huge pink poof of cherry blossoms at the moment, and it looks to be slowing her down a fair bit with how it all weighs on her little shoulders. A more cautious friend might remind Cora to be careful, but Laela just shouts, "Get 'er Cora! Beat her up!"

[Shadowcaller]

[Spooky VIGIL Encounter]

The doppleganger turns around and gives Cora a scalding look. "Fight?" They say in her own voice, their smirk turning wider. "I'll give you a fight!"
With just a flick of their wand a strange ball appear floating in the air before them and then disappears along with the doppleganger in a bright flash of light. Once the light fades the doppleganger lands on the ground with a loud thumb as they now stand many times larger than before with small clouds floating around their pointy hat.

They let out a giggle as they look down on Cora. "Still wanna go at it?" The giant version of her asks, grinning confidently.

[A visit]

Saint Lazarus will get a message from one of the other VIGIL members that there is a journalist in the base wanting to interview her. Faith Sunsworn from the Nexus Herald apparently.
As Laz is from Inside she might actually recgonize the name. Miss Sunsworn is known as a "undead advocate", though anyone who have read her articles would know that she claims otherwise. Still, as she is undead herself people has the impression that she's biased.

[Rebonack]

[Spooky VIGIL Encounter]

Lapis was minding her own business.

Her own business being patrolling the VIGIL grounds to make sure no gross pod people sneak in!

But there haven't been any of those and even though Lapis is sure she must be doing a great job since none have shown up she's still kind of jittery.

Sure, she does a really great job of keeping the grounds all trimmed and pretty, but what she really wants is a chance to prove how helpful she is!

Maybe that chance will come.

See, she had been in a tree doing some pruning when she spotted a bunch of children (and an empty knight costume?) running through the grounds shouting about fighting. Then all of a sudden the one in a witch hat did something and grew HUGE! Super huge! Gigantically huge! Way bigger than Lapis!

And that's kind of a problem since it happened right under Lapis' tree and now she's clinging tenaciously to the top of the witch's hat with weird purple clouds floating around her.

"Umm... I'm not sure what's going on and I don't really love it that much," the little seraph laments.

[Gullara]

[Spooky VIGIL Encounter]

Cora shouts and backs away quickly, ending up next to Laela and Bastion. She cranes her head back to look up at the giant doppelganger. For the first time Cora feels in over her head.

Bastion purses his lips and points at the ghost. "You're gonna be in big trouble! The bravest heros in the world are here and they'll stop you!" Maybe one such hero is on top of her hat, even! Right? He then tries to grab the girls' hands and run away.

[Lord Magtok]

A Visit

Jenette hopes this isn't what she thinks it is. If Faith Sunsworn is here trying to prove that undead can be good people too, if she intends to use Saint Lazarus as an example of the kind of heroics that the post-mortem community is capable of, that people shouldn't hate and fear scary, flesh-eating monsters simply because they're scary, flesh-eating monsters, well...Jenette really isn't sure she can agree with any of that. If anything, being a ghoul has only made her even more keenly aware of how crude and barbaric they really are. There's a whole lot of work involved in hunting and feasting upon her fellow man, and none of it is pleasant.

"You asked for me, Miss Sunsworn?" she calls, as she decides to face the inquisitive journalist head-on. Easier this way, since she can wear her helmet and keep her identity hidden here, whereas if she told the reporter to buzz off and get lost, she could get ambushed with an interview later on, with her face on display for whatever cameras the Nexus Herald has waiting for her. No, better to get this over with now, while she still has some sort of control over that sort of thing.

[Shadowcaller]

A Visit

Miss Sunsworn's undead nature is easy to gauge even from a distance. While the journalist didn't include pictures of herself in her articles Laz can still recognize her from other pictures. She have several distinct undead traits but it a way that makes her look more creepy than disgusting. Her eyes are blank but the bloodshots and all other gross details are hidden by a soft yellow glow that they're emitting, like a large cat struck by a flashlight. In the same way her skin is ghostly pale but there are no signs of rot or discolorment as far as Laz can tell. Though as she's wearing a buttoned-up brown coat and gloves she might be hiding something of that nature.

But as it turns out, Faith is there alone. Not photographers, no unpaid interns, nothing. She does have a shoulder bag seemingly intended for a camera but it isn't out as the journalist approaches Laz and offers her hand to shake. "Yes, I was wondering if you were up for a future interview, Miss Lazarus." If Laz accepts the handshake she can probably tell that Faith's gloves also are unusual. They seem thicker than even winter gloves and look unusually large, especially the length of the fingers. Faith doesn't let the handshake last very long though.
"It would be a feature in a long-running series of mine. If I had planned things better I would have brought some cut-outs of previous enteries, but you could always look them up online if you want." Faith smiles sheepishly. "Usually I just call a few days ahead to give people time for these sort of things but as I was around intervewing another VIGIL member for an unrelated article I decided to meet you up in person instead." She gestures behind her. "I hope that's alright? We don't actually have to do the interview here and now. I just wanted to see you in person first really."

[Nova_Eclipse]

[Training Grounds]

Quin nods, and gestures for Zoph to follow him.

"I can give you the quick and dirty, if you'd like. Come on."

He leads the paladin towards the HQ, while deciding where to start.

((This can be handwaved, if you'd like.))