[D11 EN] Rout and Madness (Closed)

[Akuta]

One down, one to go...and whatever else comes out of that portal. And then hopefully to a warm bed and a payday.

Akuta moves up, trying to maintain a canny defense as he rushes over. The Crab has gone down and if it's the Spider they're after, he's going to have to dangle some bait or at least make himself threatening enough.

"Oi, you skinny fucking bitch! You must not be much of a gaki with how lean you look! Must be starving!"

----
OOC:
Switch to Defense stance.
Simple action speak.
Simple action move 30 feet closer.
Defense Stance
ATN 22
Init: 16
Void: 2/3
Wounds: 0/38

[Tassu]

Seeing her friend stumble, Yakumo raised the lantern ever higher, the sacred light dispelling some of the miasma seeping from Rout's wounds, the gaki sneering in pain.


_________

Lantern damage | 3k2 ⇒ 9 (TN: ?)
Lantern still ok? | 1k1 ⇒ 11 (TN: ?)

_______________
Seika is 15' from melee
Akuta is 10' from melee

Koyuki, Yakumo and Rout are in melee.
Koyuki takes 48 damage

Yakumo 34
Seika 34
Koyuki 24
Haiso: 22
Akuta 12

[Yoritomo Seika]

"Hang in there, Kuni-san! Akuta-san!" Seika is talking mostly to keep herself anchored at this point, the surreality of battling miasma-leaking demons in a wrecked industrial disaster zone starting to get to her a bit.

She snaps off a clean shot, but the monk of Kyoso hadn't been kidding about the power pack on this antique weapon--even as the radiant beam lances through the dirty air to hit its target, Seika can see it flickering, cycling in and out as the last of the stored energy drains away. Shit! That didn't hit at full charge, did it?


---

Free action: speak
Complex action: shoot!
D11 EN Double Trouble!--round 6, shoot Haiso with CRABDEATH firearms/ref, no raises because I don't have helpful magic now... | 6k3 ⇒ 45 (TN: 15)
Snrk, okay. Darn sarcastic RNG. Hit.

Damage:
D11 EN Double Trouble!--round 6, CRABDEATH damage | 6k3 ⇒ 11 (TN: ?)
11 ignoring Reduction

Attack stance, ATN 20
Void: 3/3
Wounds: 0/57

Crabdeath power pack 0/4 (empty)

Ghosting info in PF

[Tassu]

"out of my way!" Rout hissed as she lunged at Akuta, miasma dripping from her mouth, madness evident in her eyes. Yet she could not land a blow on the deft ronin.


___________

_______________
Seika is 30' from melee
Yakumo is 10' from melee
Koyuki is busy bleeding to death
Akuta and Rout are locked in combat

Yakumo 34
Seika 34
Koyuki 24
Haiso: 22
Akuta 12

[Akuta]

As he dodges and twists out of the way, a mocking laugh comes from Akuta as he deflects her claws off of his blade. He slashes back at her in return, going for a long cut across her chest and neck, hoping to finish her off so he can collect her and her friends heads.

"You're looking like the snack now!"

----
OOC:
Switch to Full Attack stance.
Complex action attack.
https://sakkaku.org/d10-rolls/5797 - 42 to hit.
https://sakkaku.org/d10-rolls/5798 - 16 damage.
Free action speak.
Full Attack stance.
ATN 8
Init: 16
Void: 2/3
Wounds: 0/38

[Tassu]

With a cry born from frustration and fear, Yakumo stepped up, swinging the lantern she had been holding at the spirit. Caught unawares, Rout did not manage to dodge, the metal frame of the lantern hitting her face, the sacred light pushing through her eyes into her skull, melting whatever laid beneath. With a terrible screech the fiendish spirit fell down, it's frame slowly unraveling as the energies that had kept it together came undone, sickly green fumes seeping from the many wounds it had suffered.

Ranshin laid on the ground, his body rapidly decomposing, his flesh condensing into miasma with sickening speed, a scent of death and decay filling the air.

____
Lantern damage | 3k2 ⇒ 12 (TN: ?)
Lantern | 1k1 ⇒ 7 (TN: ?)
OOC: Combat is over

[Yoritomo Seika]

"Holy sh--"

Since there actually is some holy stuff going on, including the dead sidearm in her own hand, Seika swallows the rest of this mildly blasphemous interjection.

She stuffs Crab-death back into her gunbelt and cautiously creeps toward the others, a few yards away from her up by the corpses of the two gaki. "Are you okay? It didn't get you, right, Akuta-san? Susumu-san, is Kuni-san... um, is she...?"

After a quick and nervous inspection, Seika discovers--to her immense relief--that Koyuki is just bloodied, not dead. She's not even completely unresponsive [assuming Down wound rank?]. This makes holding her hand while incanting the healer's prayer less awkward, too.

--

D11 EN Double Trouble!--after combat, Koyuki healz, Voided | 6k3 ⇒ 34 (TN: 10)
Koyuki heals a sweet 24 Wounds, when she gets back on.

And now I'm away for the night, for real!

[Akuta]

As the gaki falls from the surprising strike from the Susumu, Akuta smirks.

"Not the weapon I would have first went with Susumu-hime, but looks like you really rung it's bell. Fuckin' gaki. The big ass horned one was a pain, the one that could walk through walls was a pain...now these two assholes."

The wolf shakes his head a bit and looks like he's about to go for the double tap on the fallen foes, but when they start to turn into miasma, he shrugs and flicks any spiritual residue off of his katana.

"Nah, I'm fine Watanabe-hime. Crab-hime there is lookin' like a sack of shit thrown down a flight of stairs though."

[Tassu]

The portal from which the two gaki stepped out flickers, tendrils of green energy crackling along its edges, the iridescent flashes of light slowly dimming even as winds pick up again, carrying eerie weeping sounds across the clearing.

[Susumu Yakumo]

Seika beat her to getting to Koyuki's side, but she still knelt down to hold the woman's hand, making sure she was indeed still alive.

"It did the job." Yakumo said with a huff, heaving for breath after all the strenous activity finally died down. "We... need to do something about this portal, I think? I'm no expert, but this could be the link to these creature's realm, allowing them passage to our world."

And now she gave a real look to Akuta. "And where the fuck did you come from?! Did you follow us?"

[Kuni Koyuki]

Seika's taking of her hand was met with the subtle feeling of life, and little more. Yakumo's hand holding of her hand was met with a little as the little bit of oomph and life she still had was met with a grip. Like she somehow knew who's hand it was. Each of them could feel energy, strength, surging back within her as the kami helped her body knit wounds back together and restore flesh. Finding herself with enough strength to cough she heaves and coughs up dirt and ash.

Strong enough to do so, Koyuki's hand leaves Seika's to push herself back up onto her knees at least. Never letting go of Yakumo's hand while she does. When she's up, the full weight of the blood she was covered in could be seen and it was something of a horror show. Only added to by the fact that it was all of her own, and her enemy didn't have any blood to shed in turn.

Heart panging for something else, some other way this moment plays out, she chews at her inner cheek and squeezes Yakumo's hand before releasing it. Looking over toward the Ronin she only briefly met with a very friendly:

"Call me -hime one more time and I'll rip out your fucking tongue."

It wasn't friendly.

"Also, fuck why you're here. Thanks," she adds, looking to Yakumo with an awkward little bloody smile and a shrug of her shoulders.

That was a bit friendlier.


Grazed 6/6 [27/57]

[Yoritomo Seika]

"It's okay, Susumu-san. I know him." Seika casts a quizzical glance at Akuta, feeling oddly tranquil as the adrenaline rush of the fight starts to bleed off a little. "I don't know what he's doing here, though. Suddenly got bit by a venomous heroism bug?"

She scrubs her palms clean(er) on her clothing, and then, moving automatically, her right hand fishes a blister pack of chewing gum out of one of her pockets. Blue Tiger Pink Passionfruit. Her eyes narrow a bit, noticing an uncomfortable similarity between the candy-pink color of the gum tablets and the sickly pink light bathing them all from the glowing portal, but with a tiny shrug she pops one into her mouth anyway.

"Gum?" She holds the packet out to the others with two fingers.

"So... think we can do anything about that?" she adds, looking uncertainly at the portal.

[Akuta]

Akuta ignores the others for the moment, looking carefully over the portal and hoping to glean some insight on what exactly they can actually do about it. Maybe that weird gaki burning lantern... It certainly was a puzzle...but perhaps one of the others also had some insight into the situation.

Turning back to look at the others now, he strides over and looks down at Yakumo. "You know, I'm goin' to pretend I heard, 'Hey, thanks for the help!' instead of what you said. Because it sounds awful fuckin' dumb to snap at the guy who could have just let you fight those things by yourselves, especially after your girlfriend there decided to find out what Desolation dirt tastes like. Fuckin' hell."

A look to Seika now. "When some pincer prick has you by the balls, you dance to the tune from time to time. I'm fuckin' done after this though. Bad enough I've already run into these assholes," he says gesturing to the miasma swirls. "And the other two. But storytime later, I'd rather figure out what the fuck is goin' on here and deal with it."


----
OOC:
https://sakkaku.org/d10-rolls/5823 - Lore: Spirit Reams/Intelligence, investigating portal. 32 vs unknown TN.

[Susumu Yakumo]

"Tch, whatever," Yakumo, having gained an inch or so from her boots, could meet the ronin's eyes straight on. But she was also very much of the opinion that whatever frustrations and anger she might have at him didn't need to be dealt with now.

There was bigger fish to fry.

"Any idea on what we can do with this portal?" she kept the lantern still in one hand in case anymore beasties showed up. A stick of gum was accepted from Seika.

[Kuni Koyuki]

While everyone turned their attention to the portal, Koyuki just takes herself a good moment to slide her ass across the ground and pull herself closer to a bit of comfortable looking rubble. Resting an arm across the surface she leans against it heavily. Bloody mess of a human blood bag she just rests there, looking out over this gaggle of practical strangers.. and Yakumo, that thought stuck with her awkwardly. Shaking it out she just looks elsewhere, at the dirt in front of herself. Wounded, beaten, bloody, broken, but alive and kicking in a way that Tats woulda been proud if only also a little sad for.

Rikako woulda told her to stop kicking herself around and just get up, there was work to be done. She was dead though, and Koyuki wasn't of the mind to push herself anymore. Right now she needed the rest, she'd played her part.

Fuck everything else for now.

[Akuta]

"Fuck if I know if we can do anything about it...but I know that's a portal to Gaki-do directly. When the maskers blew this place, made the border between here and there all fuzzy. Don't suppose one of ya is carryin' a realm zipper, eh?"

He looked over at the portal, weapons still grasped. "I can call the maskers and get one of the Soshi here right quick to try and lock it down, but it'll take time and I don't know how much we got before that portal spits out another nasty. Either that or we go through and see if there is somethin' on the other side to shut it."

[Susumu Yakumo]

"Fuck..." Yakumo cursed, looking over the sacred artefacts they had with them. Could any of these be used for that purpose? "Yoritomo-sama, do you know if any of these could be used to close the portal?"

She swallowed hard, looking at the ground before looking at the strange shimmering portal. "... I'd rather not go in there unless we have to. We might not make it out."

[Kuni Koyuki]

"We're not risking that," Koyuki speaks up, trying to get her voice to carry the weariness in her tone is very apparent. Koyuki's tone was authoritative and she would not be bickered with. Shifting herself more onto the rubble to her side so that she can sit a little taller, shoulders more squared. A Crab warrior through and through, a pretty impressive sight regardless of the sleek red blood coating her.

"But.. good opportunity for a ronin? Bring the Scorpion this location, and that portal? They'll be appreciative I'm sure. Whatever you ask for, even. Not a bad take for a wolf," she says, that edge to her voice fighting against the struggle to maintain herself. "Anything else slipping through can be the Scorpions problem, we've done enough."

[Yoritomo Seika]

"If we could be sure, if we knew how to do it... that'd be worth the risk, right?" Seika chews her gum meditatively, considering the little she knows about the artifacts--especially the lantern and the crystal pendant Yakumo is wearing, whose properties are a bit more esoteric than the two weapons.

[Kuni Koyuki]

While the others contemplate the portal, Koyuki is given that brief bit of respite to herself. Though, as it would appear, she felt compelled forward once more as there was a problem that needed solving and she was confident she was one to be able to solve it. Gathering the blade that yet rested on the ground from when Koyuki had collapsed she sheathes it back safely. Approaching in that same path to put a hand on Seika's shoulder.

'Give me a hand?" she asks, her other hand clearly resting upon one of her yet open wounds. With Seika's aid, she was ready.

Cutting out a portion of the surroundings Koyuki found herself a placement to set herself up for the ritual. Reading from her densai the precise incantations to gain additional clarity from the Earth Spirit she was calling forth. This was a process that was beset by the difficulties of the situation and surrounding area, but after some time the ritual succeeds and her energy duly spent.

But Koyuki was ready, and Earth would answer.

[Rolls:]

[Seika's Heal Roll takes effect now.]

D11 EN Double Trouble!--end of the scene healing Koyuki, just rolling it now so Mei can plan. PtIP, water 1 spell | 5k2 ⇒ 27 (TN: 10)

Day 11, EN | Commune Earth, 3 Raises for Clarity | 6k3 ⇒ 22 (TN: 25)
Day 11, EN | Commune Earth, 3 Raises for Clarity | 6k3 ⇒ 22 (TN: 25)
Day 11, EN | Commune Earth, 2 Raises for Clarity | 6k3 ⇒ 22 (TN: 20)

[Pass with 2 Raises for Clarity, I rolled them all at once to save time!]