Re: Pitched Combat [Final Round: Simulacrum Citadel]
01-09-2011, 05:30 AM
Originally posted on MSPA by Dragon Fogel.
Oh god I have to do it or I'll go through another battle and I can't survive that oh god but I'm killing me well he's not quite me but still oh god oh god aagh I can't do it but it's that or I die even more horribly aagh oh forget it I'm just going to do it here goes sorry other me
Jordan couldn't take it any longer. This battle had been the worst experience of his life, and if he actually survived, it would only get worse.
He flung the gigantic fireball at his other self. Jordan B was busy with the dragons. He wouldn't have time to react, right?
As it turned out, he could. He shifted the sword to his other hand, preparing to absorb the fireball with it while the Manikin-arm reached towards Right's incoming strike.
Right recoiled suddenly. He didn't want to be eaten by that thing. It probably wasn't pleasant.
The sudden shift in weight caused Eemp to step back, surprising Rong.
"What did you do that for?" she shouted. "You could have at least warned... ACK, GET IT OFF ME!"
The Manikin arm had, as it turned out, hit the other dragon and was now starting to eat her. Rong panicked, which in her case meant breathing fire. Jordan B was unconcerned, as he was able to keep her mouth away from him, and away from Jordan A - after all, even if the cowardly idiot was trying to kill him, the Organizer had been quite clear on the fact that the weakling had to survive.
Speaking of that, why hadn't the fireball reached his sword yet? He was better at holding it in the manikin arm; his regular arm was already getting tired. He glanced out of the corner of his eye...
And saw that Jordan A had changed tactics. The fire Rong was spewing out in a panic was being drawn into the fireball, which was now hovering in midair.
What seemed especially strange was that the fireball was getting smaller as more flames were added to it. Jordan B would have expected a bigger fireball, not a smaller one.
Jordan A recalled some text from early on in the Souvague Bwarl. The "Salsburg Loch, Knocka Roar" had cast a fire spell, and it happened to be struck with a blast from a gravity gun. This improbable event had led to the creation of a miniature sun, and the resulting explosion had been immense.
Trying to achieve the same effect with pyrokinesis instead of gravity was an incredible strain. And Jordan probably couldn't make an explosion on the same level no matter how much he strained himself. But it didn't matter; he just needed an explosion, period. And he was about to get one.
As he felt the pressure building up, Jordan A moved the fireball closer to the floor, as Jordan B let go of Rong and ran towards it, hoping to draw the energy into Alex's sword before Jordan A did whatever idiotic thing he was trying to do.
He regretted the decision when the explosion came, blasting an enormous hole in the floor and knocking him backwards with the shockwave, right into Jordan A.
The Jordans fell through the floor beneath them, weakened. Eemp, Right, and Rong were flung in the opposite direction, landing back in the library.
***
Meanwhile, the two Jordans had landed in an astonishingly nondescript room.
There was no furniture. The walls were completely white, and didn't even seem like they were really walls.
The only object of note was a strange dark sphere in the middle of the room.
It seemed to be made of glass. What was inside couldn't be clearly described.
But Jordan A had some idea of what it was. The Organizer has mentioned it at the start of the round. This was the portal to the Timeless Interstice. Whatever that was.
Jordan B got up, groaning. He walked over to the still prone Jordan A and grabbed him by his shirt collar - thankfully, with the human arm, not the Manikin one.
"Nice going, wimp! If I didn't have to keep you alive to make the deal go through, I'd kill you with my bare hands!"
Jordan A whimpered weakly. But he also noticed something.
Jordan B had dropped his sword. It was in a small pile of rubble next to the sealed portal.
He began channeling fire into the blade as his other self yelled at him to "man up already" and "stay out of my way". As the elemental energy filled the sword, it began to shake.
By the time Jordan B realized something was off, and that Jordan A wasn't simply meekly taking in the lecture, it was too late.
Without a wielder to control the energy, the sword exploded spectacularly. The seal on the portal shattered, and it opened, creating a vacuum that started to draw the two Jordan Smiths towards it.
The two Jordans had very different final words as they were pulled towards the infinite abyss.
Jordan B's were "Nice going, dumbass!"
Jordan A's weren't so much words as a long and extended scream.
***
The fall hadn't hurt the dragons much, but Eemp had landed headfirst, and was having trouble getting to his feet. His attempts to do so clumsily knocked books off the shelves.
It didn't help that Right and Rong had resumed their usual argument.
"We should have just killed him!" Rong shouted. "I'm not sure why there were two of them or why one of them had the Manikin's arm and that Alex idiot's sword, but I'm pretty sure that wouldn't have happened if we'd just killed him!"
"I would be more concerned with the fact that we're having trouble getting up and, for all we know, that second Jordan is going to come bursting in here and we won't be able to do anything about it."
"Look, the next time we see either of them, I'm just blasting him! No questions! Understood?"
Right sighed. "I suppose you have a point."
"And another thing - wait, what?"
"If we had just killed him, we would have won and the Organizer would have sent us home. Or whatever he's going to do."
Rong paused. It always took her aback when Right agreed with her. She tried to think of some way this could be a problem for her.
As she was considering the question, Eemp's feet knocked a book called Ale-Starrs onto her head.
It then fell open on the floor, revealing the list of combatants.
Only the first and third lines were filled in. But slowly, a name started to appear on the fourth line.
When it was clear enough to read, it said "Imp, Rife, end Roan".
Oh god I have to do it or I'll go through another battle and I can't survive that oh god but I'm killing me well he's not quite me but still oh god oh god aagh I can't do it but it's that or I die even more horribly aagh oh forget it I'm just going to do it here goes sorry other me
Jordan couldn't take it any longer. This battle had been the worst experience of his life, and if he actually survived, it would only get worse.
He flung the gigantic fireball at his other self. Jordan B was busy with the dragons. He wouldn't have time to react, right?
As it turned out, he could. He shifted the sword to his other hand, preparing to absorb the fireball with it while the Manikin-arm reached towards Right's incoming strike.
Right recoiled suddenly. He didn't want to be eaten by that thing. It probably wasn't pleasant.
The sudden shift in weight caused Eemp to step back, surprising Rong.
"What did you do that for?" she shouted. "You could have at least warned... ACK, GET IT OFF ME!"
The Manikin arm had, as it turned out, hit the other dragon and was now starting to eat her. Rong panicked, which in her case meant breathing fire. Jordan B was unconcerned, as he was able to keep her mouth away from him, and away from Jordan A - after all, even if the cowardly idiot was trying to kill him, the Organizer had been quite clear on the fact that the weakling had to survive.
Speaking of that, why hadn't the fireball reached his sword yet? He was better at holding it in the manikin arm; his regular arm was already getting tired. He glanced out of the corner of his eye...
And saw that Jordan A had changed tactics. The fire Rong was spewing out in a panic was being drawn into the fireball, which was now hovering in midair.
What seemed especially strange was that the fireball was getting smaller as more flames were added to it. Jordan B would have expected a bigger fireball, not a smaller one.
Jordan A recalled some text from early on in the Souvague Bwarl. The "Salsburg Loch, Knocka Roar" had cast a fire spell, and it happened to be struck with a blast from a gravity gun. This improbable event had led to the creation of a miniature sun, and the resulting explosion had been immense.
Trying to achieve the same effect with pyrokinesis instead of gravity was an incredible strain. And Jordan probably couldn't make an explosion on the same level no matter how much he strained himself. But it didn't matter; he just needed an explosion, period. And he was about to get one.
As he felt the pressure building up, Jordan A moved the fireball closer to the floor, as Jordan B let go of Rong and ran towards it, hoping to draw the energy into Alex's sword before Jordan A did whatever idiotic thing he was trying to do.
He regretted the decision when the explosion came, blasting an enormous hole in the floor and knocking him backwards with the shockwave, right into Jordan A.
The Jordans fell through the floor beneath them, weakened. Eemp, Right, and Rong were flung in the opposite direction, landing back in the library.
***
Meanwhile, the two Jordans had landed in an astonishingly nondescript room.
There was no furniture. The walls were completely white, and didn't even seem like they were really walls.
The only object of note was a strange dark sphere in the middle of the room.
It seemed to be made of glass. What was inside couldn't be clearly described.
But Jordan A had some idea of what it was. The Organizer has mentioned it at the start of the round. This was the portal to the Timeless Interstice. Whatever that was.
Jordan B got up, groaning. He walked over to the still prone Jordan A and grabbed him by his shirt collar - thankfully, with the human arm, not the Manikin one.
"Nice going, wimp! If I didn't have to keep you alive to make the deal go through, I'd kill you with my bare hands!"
Jordan A whimpered weakly. But he also noticed something.
Jordan B had dropped his sword. It was in a small pile of rubble next to the sealed portal.
He began channeling fire into the blade as his other self yelled at him to "man up already" and "stay out of my way". As the elemental energy filled the sword, it began to shake.
By the time Jordan B realized something was off, and that Jordan A wasn't simply meekly taking in the lecture, it was too late.
Without a wielder to control the energy, the sword exploded spectacularly. The seal on the portal shattered, and it opened, creating a vacuum that started to draw the two Jordan Smiths towards it.
The two Jordans had very different final words as they were pulled towards the infinite abyss.
Jordan B's were "Nice going, dumbass!"
Jordan A's weren't so much words as a long and extended scream.
***
The fall hadn't hurt the dragons much, but Eemp had landed headfirst, and was having trouble getting to his feet. His attempts to do so clumsily knocked books off the shelves.
It didn't help that Right and Rong had resumed their usual argument.
"We should have just killed him!" Rong shouted. "I'm not sure why there were two of them or why one of them had the Manikin's arm and that Alex idiot's sword, but I'm pretty sure that wouldn't have happened if we'd just killed him!"
"I would be more concerned with the fact that we're having trouble getting up and, for all we know, that second Jordan is going to come bursting in here and we won't be able to do anything about it."
"Look, the next time we see either of them, I'm just blasting him! No questions! Understood?"
Right sighed. "I suppose you have a point."
"And another thing - wait, what?"
"If we had just killed him, we would have won and the Organizer would have sent us home. Or whatever he's going to do."
Rong paused. It always took her aback when Right agreed with her. She tried to think of some way this could be a problem for her.
As she was considering the question, Eemp's feet knocked a book called Ale-Starrs onto her head.
It then fell open on the floor, revealing the list of combatants.
Only the first and third lines were filled in. But slowly, a name started to appear on the fourth line.
When it was clear enough to read, it said "Imp, Rife, end Roan".
There's no reason for this | Or this | Death is inevitable | You can't challenge fate | The smallest change | I'm overwhelmed
I'm serious | It makes perfect sense | Easy as ABC! | I can't even explain it | Cleaning up someone else's mess
I suck | I rule | I've got it made | Really, I'm serious | This bugs me | It's all lies | I want to believe | Beauty is a curse
I'm serious | It makes perfect sense | Easy as ABC! | I can't even explain it | Cleaning up someone else's mess
I suck | I rule | I've got it made | Really, I'm serious | This bugs me | It's all lies | I want to believe | Beauty is a curse