If we managed to get Praxis RoB during the fight, it would be the best. It is explicitly noted to scale endlessly so buffing this is the best optimal move.
After that I would rate it Cut Through>ADS >Tower>Ring>Pillars>Tears>Silver.
A Simple Transaction I
- Thread starter Rihaku
- Start date
- Original
After that I would rate it Cut Through>ADS >Tower>Ring>Pillars>Tears>Silver.
- Location
- 1
eh... Imagine you've got a person, and they're really hurt. broken bones, stab wounds, bruises. The broken bones and, depending on location, stab wounds, will make it much harder for them to do things and probably weaken their precision. But breaking a persons bones isn't going to make their skin physically less resilient. unless Armaments have... forcefield generators or something... I would, at first look, expect defence to be one of the things Not weakened directly by physical damage.
...Then again, if the Armament has overwhelming agi, it can probably just avoid our attacks and/or hit us before we can launch them. is that, or something similar, the point you were trying to make?
...Then again, if the Armament has overwhelming agi, it can probably just avoid our attacks and/or hit us before we can launch them. is that, or something similar, the point you were trying to make?
I don't think Pillars would run into that problem. If we're spending a Heroic Upgrade on it, then we're hot off the heals of beating Procyon (unless we're getting a heroic upgrade somewhere else later, and in that case the whole scenario is different.). We're, what, one day from using Pillars? maaaaybe two? and we'll have just finished with the latest Apocryphal proc. So I don't think anything we can't deal with is going to be coming to kill us within the time gap from now to our first Pillars use, assuming we kill Procyon.
Lealope
Not yet invincible
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Edeldross might not be a bad choice, if only to get the potential for Elixir. Would be appropriate for our first Heroic Advancement to grant access to the essence of heroism. Otherwise, I'd like the galaxy brained maneuver of picking Rennaissance Woman if possible and seeing how much that upgrades Gisena by. Hunger is growing fast enough already but Gisena's ability to spontaneously generate utility has been pretty disappointing thus far; I'd like to correct that.
Cut Through and Pillars are just too good as far as choices go... unless we could somehow flashbuy the Imperial Refinement.
Cut Through and Pillars are just too good as far as choices go... unless we could somehow flashbuy the Imperial Refinement.
Lul, Cursebearer loses against an Armament while he has Imperial Praxis, this is something Hunger would never be able to live down.
Lealope
Not yet invincible
- Pronouns
- She/Her
It's not just normal physical damage which Armaments can take regularly in their serious battles, it's a substitute for outright lethal wounds. This is like someone getting their head cut off and then regenerating. Them not being in top form immediately is the least shocking thing about that by far. Presumably, it's due to a temporary weakening of their overall Essence, kind of like a defensive version of the Shattering Blow. This is supported by that fact that the Blood Ring is incapable of fully healing them, even with cosmic levels of Rank.
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While I don't think that Imperial Refinement is efficient, somehow defeating Procyon is for sure the most suitable time to get it.
Lealope
Not yet invincible
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Yeah, that would be more for the meme power of MAXIMUM POTENTIAL. Might also improve our odds in the epilogue too, though probably not as much as not giving Hunger -Mental Stability.
Other choices I'd be willing to strongly consider would be Fisher King (for even better Decimator Mitigation) or possibly flashbuying the Ruling Ring and then upgrading that. Both the boosted Progression and the increased control over causality would be very nice to have, or perhaps some kind of direct interaction with the nature of the Ring War. In hindsight, we could've probably afforded to pass up on taking Ruler and Vassal (especially considering the upgrade we ended up picking
).God, we really should get Elixir, it's just too much of a complete waste otherwise.
Lealope
Not yet invincible
- Pronouns
- She/Her
General tactics:
So Super Juggernaut Undead Chimera indicates that manifesting a Shroud is taxing to the will. Could the key to this guy's defeat lie in that? Our Armour of Midnight will last for eight hours regardless of upkeep but he can't say the same. If we can think of ways to force him to maintain his Shroud, we might exhaust or even Exhaust him over the course of the day at which point he'll either retreat or become relatively easy pickings.
Obviously, we should probably flashbuy any appropriate FDS Stances available to us. I'm not sure if the full Stance would be worth it given our bonuses to ADS but we should be able to slot in two more with no problem. The additional stats that might come with it would also be helpful.
Maybe we could offer him a duel, 1v5 or whatever. While that's probably not something he'd normally accept, if we send out an emissary and tell him the alternative is us fleeing immediately through teleportation across the length and breadth of the Voyaging Realm, he might take that deal. This would be more likely if he would be risking the lives of the soldiers with him if he went for straight up war.
Letrizia could channel some kind of immense Sharpbright based Rank array with all the captains and citizens of Nilfel to abraid the Armament's Shroud, or at least contest its influence. Nilfel could open their treasuries and arsenal to Gisena who might be able to whip some kind of Artifice up, especially if they've got access to any kind of temporal distortion. Bloodline inversion is unlikely at this Stage but it could potentially help turn the tide through massively augmented Surgecrafters, even if its no longer worth picks due to the improvements from OaF II.
Could Letrizia offer to defect to the Republic side? That would probably neutralize this entire fight, though I assume she'd never go for it.
A blood bond with Adorie might manage to improve our Praxis stamina a bit; if not then go for a significant blood transfusion. Maybe enough effort spent on attempting to incorporate it would give us a pick.
How about immediately greeting them with a Tide of True Nullity? Assuming Gisena can still use her Ultimates in her ascended form. Alternatively, if we could blight the land until the remnant Nullity interfered with the usage of Rang, that would be helpful too.
Could we offer him intel on the location of any remaining Amarlts in exchange for a ceasefire that lasts a day or so? We could offer ourselves as hostage during that time, or perhaps Verschlengorge or whatever in order to delay long enough for Pillars. If not, even a few hours of ceasefire (perhaps claiming its for Letrizia to put her affairs in order) would be sufficient, since we could then try for a holding action until its time to activate Pillars and we can go train. If not that, then just an hour or two so we can get more preparations in order. This would be especially helpful for Call Up.
So Super Juggernaut Undead Chimera indicates that manifesting a Shroud is taxing to the will. Could the key to this guy's defeat lie in that? Our Armour of Midnight will last for eight hours regardless of upkeep but he can't say the same. If we can think of ways to force him to maintain his Shroud, we might exhaust or even Exhaust him over the course of the day at which point he'll either retreat or become relatively easy pickings.
Obviously, we should probably flashbuy any appropriate FDS Stances available to us. I'm not sure if the full Stance would be worth it given our bonuses to ADS but we should be able to slot in two more with no problem. The additional stats that might come with it would also be helpful.
Maybe we could offer him a duel, 1v5 or whatever. While that's probably not something he'd normally accept, if we send out an emissary and tell him the alternative is us fleeing immediately through teleportation across the length and breadth of the Voyaging Realm, he might take that deal. This would be more likely if he would be risking the lives of the soldiers with him if he went for straight up war.
Letrizia could channel some kind of immense Sharpbright based Rank array with all the captains and citizens of Nilfel to abraid the Armament's Shroud, or at least contest its influence. Nilfel could open their treasuries and arsenal to Gisena who might be able to whip some kind of Artifice up, especially if they've got access to any kind of temporal distortion. Bloodline inversion is unlikely at this Stage but it could potentially help turn the tide through massively augmented Surgecrafters, even if its no longer worth picks due to the improvements from OaF II.
Could Letrizia offer to defect to the Republic side? That would probably neutralize this entire fight, though I assume she'd never go for it.
A blood bond with Adorie might manage to improve our Praxis stamina a bit; if not then go for a significant blood transfusion. Maybe enough effort spent on attempting to incorporate it would give us a pick.
How about immediately greeting them with a Tide of True Nullity? Assuming Gisena can still use her Ultimates in her ascended form. Alternatively, if we could blight the land until the remnant Nullity interfered with the usage of Rang, that would be helpful too.
Could we offer him intel on the location of any remaining Amarlts in exchange for a ceasefire that lasts a day or so? We could offer ourselves as hostage during that time, or perhaps Verschlengorge or whatever in order to delay long enough for Pillars. If not, even a few hours of ceasefire (perhaps claiming its for Letrizia to put her affairs in order) would be sufficient, since we could then try for a holding action until its time to activate Pillars and we can go train. If not that, then just an hour or two so we can get more preparations in order. This would be especially helpful for Call Up.
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For some reason I remember being told that MDS boosts our power of ruin against enemies that have Might ten times ours, but I could just be making shit up.
7 Arete for 50% (11x -> 16x Ruin) increase in power of Ruin. If we get the chance for RoB we would get 700% increased offense and defense for 25 Arete. (+700% increased power of Ruin).
@ReaderOfFate calling in that marker
@DarkSideBard we have that weird condition on your marker about injuries. Do you think it counts as a veto for this vote?
@DarkSideBard we have that weird condition on your marker about injuries. Do you think it counts as a veto for this vote?
Can we do it, can we actually get a Synergetic pick once again. It was so long ago that we did it, now it is just an urban legend.
Birdsie
Sharp Talons Cleave The Worthy
- Location
- Poland
Here's some more omake to make sure the Dying gang doesn't win this round. An episode of GG is going to join this probably later today.
Rihaku-42342 said:
Climbing Further In This Accursed World!!
It had been precisely four days since Kazuma's arrival in the new world.
Curiously, it didn't seem to have a name, like, 'Earth' or 'Terra.' Its inhabitants didn't appear to comprehend the fact they lived on a globe spinning through the annals of an infinite cosmos around a huge ball of solar plasma. It was just the world to them, or the continent, or whatever. They had no sense of scale.
It was odd, Kazuma considered, because to his best knowledge, the curvature of a planet could be determined with simple observation and mathematical extrapolation.
Or maybe it wasn't simple: the more he leveled up, the easier it became to recall things he'd learned in the past, as well as consolidate and internalize them. He always had issues in his math class, mostly with arithmetic, but now it felt like he was ready to teach the subject at a middle-school level, if not higher.
More interestingly, he also remembered the rough blueprint of a steam engine. He'd spent a couple of hours researching how they worked for a science project and some of that knowledge came back to him, although not in sufficient quantities to improvise it on his own. Something to look forward to, in the future, he supposed.
His third day in Axel was mostly uneventful. Kazuma, Aqua, and Subaru once again went out in order to hunt Giant Toads as they had on the second one. There weren't many quest options better than that one.
Aqua, unexpectedly, was prudent enough to borrow some money from Subaru in order to purchase a cleric's staff for herself, while Subaru revealed the full extent of his ability to them - Return by Death. A unique skill that allowed him to travel back in time on a scale of hours or days via suicide, which his status as a Retinue member apparently improved, as he could now share the information with others.
He also warned them about the number of frogs they'd face being unusually high for the day; Aqua appeared to think nothing of it, but Kazuma caught onto the disturbing implication that Subaru casually killed himself to go back and inform them of this.
Later, in the middle of monster territory, Aqua suddenly remembered that her divine energy well had suddenly been refilled last night while sleeping, and she could get started on further mitigation of Kazuma's curses.
This distracted the Cursebearer enough that one of the Giant Toads he hadn't noticed managed to nearly gobble him up.
They finished the mission, earned 250,000 Eris, and in Kazuma's case, succumbed to the Affliction of Misfortune, but they were fine at the end of the day. Being covered in steaming frog viscera, heated blood, and lukewarm saliva wasn't nice, but Kazuma was getting used to it.
At night, Aqua started working on another treatment of curse mitigation - at first, a number of Sacred Blessings to wear down the curse's metaphysical ablative shields and then Sacred Dispel and Sacred Curse Break to immolate the core from which their effects were derived.
Kazuma was starting to, in his own eyes, gather a rhythm in this new world. A routine that he followed.
He got up in the morning, ate some fruit, took an accelerated shower, and then got dressed and went downstairs. There, he went straight to the Adventurer's Guild Hall, met with the rest of his party, exchanged greetings with people he knew if there were any, and then started looking through quest. Once he found an interesting one, he asked both Aqua and Subaru for feedback, they went to register their acceptance of the quest at the counters, and then they went out to do it.
In this case, it was only Giant Toads, but he wasn't one to complain about work, so long as the work actually paid its dividends.
In this case, it did. Magical superpower and money both.
On the fourth day, Kazuma woke up and met up with Subaru outside of the hotel, where the boy was idly waiting for him. They both went to the Adventurer's Guild in search of their dimwitted companion when they were suddenly accosted, right next to the entrance of the Guild Hall.
"Satou Kazuma!" The familiar boy in knightly armor clasped Kazuma's mantle with a pair of heavy gauntlets, bringing him closer in a vicelike grip. Kazuma failed to resist, even as he pushed back with grit teeth. "Why did you not inform me that the wonderful Aqua-sama is down here with you?"
"Ah, it's Matsubatsu," Kazuma realized after a second of wrestling, eyes widening but calming down simultaneously. "Let me go."
"I'm not Matsubatsu, stop forgetting my name! It's Mitsurugi!" the knight insisted. Nonetheless, he didn't argue much further, etting go of Kazuma's collar and repeating himself with a clear, loud voice, annoyingly obnoxious, like a hammer stuffing nails into wood, one syllable after another, "Mitsurugi Kyouya."
Subaru took on an enlightened philosopher's pose, one finger tapping his chin, the other resting on his waist. His dark eyes narrowed in deep thought, then he pitched his insane theory, "Is Katsuragi a Cursebearer? People keep forgetting his name, so maybe he's got the Brand of the Forgettable or something like that."
"My name is not Katsuragi and I am most definitely not!"
"Subaru, please don't bully him," Kazuma pleaded. He was starting to actually feel really bad on Kyouya's behalf, and more than a little stupid about his own unlikely tendency to constantly forget the exact syllables of the name. "Despite his behavior and name, Mitsuragi is a valuable friend and ally."
Kyouya inflated like a scared pufferfish, stepping back in pure shock, veins frozen like an icy lake in winter and hands out to the side, as if preparing to be rammed into by a speeding car. "A-are you making fun of me? You can't possibly forget it moments after I spoke it?" His left eye twitched, lips deepening into a demented smile.
This was enough for Kazuma to realize his folly. "Oh, Mitsurugi, not Mitsuruno," he corrected, clicking his fingers in sudden realization. Kazuma took a good look at Kyouya's expression and cringed, internally and externally both. "Sorry. I've got a lot on my mind lately. What can we do for you?"
The armored hero shook his head, clearly forgetting the accidental slights in favor of focusing on the topic he intended to bother them with on that particular morning. Kazuma could already see the deep, subtle lining of accusatory hostility returning to his face, combined with a kind of fervent, punitive self-assurance.
"Aqua-sama told me about everything that happened. How could you let them throw her down here like that?" Kyouya hissed, mixed self-righteous anger and bitter, coffee-black disappointment seeping through his tone.
Kazuma was surprised by the level of anger, even outright animosity, there. It wasn't like he could do anything, so why would Kyouya complain about it? It was like a worm crawled up his ass and ferociously dug its teeth into a pustule node, refusing to let go.
Subaru, to Kazuma's side, let out a deep, tremulous sigh, as if totally done with the world, and pulled a dagger out of his right pocket. He was clearly keeping it handy.
"Wait," Kazuma said, raising a hand to Subaru as he swiftly realized what was about to happen. The other boy looked at him, blinking, and stopped the knife at where it was, raised halfway to his own throat in a horizontal grip. "Don't. Too much!"
Subaru frowned, lowering the knife. "Is it really?" He leaned in and whispered. "I could go here first on the second run and stop Aqua from babbling."
"You're clearly desensitized if you can do it so casually. I can deal with this," Kazuma insisted, before turning back to Kyouya who'd watched the whole exchange, trepidation inflating him like a balloon until his eyes were finally as wide as saucers by its end.
Kazuma looked down, taking on a genuinely apologetic one that he wasn't feeling in the slightest. Aqua had this coming a long way, even if he admitted that he didn't necessarily like her suffering. "Look, I'm sorry, Mitsurugi. I don't know what to tell you - I didn't want to argue with the angel who came to declare Aqua was coming with me. I'm a mortal; a human, so getting into the affairs of deities is... well, it seems to me like it'd be fundamentally unwise. Would you have done that in my place?"
Kazuma waited for the boy's response To his half-surprise - as he'd been hoping that it would work, but not wholly expecting it - Kyouya seemed to compose himself, the virtue of forgiveness flashing across his features, with a mote of regret to accompany it.
"I don't know," Kyouya admitted. The boy looked down with conflict visible as clear as sunlight in his body language, lips downturned into a deep, contemplative frown. He closed his eyes bitterly. "I confess I don't know, but I like to think I would have. I suppose I can't... ask too much of you."
Kazuma nodded in confirmation. That's right. I'm just a guy. Let this go without a stupid honor duel or anything of the sort. No need to feed the Affliction, right?
"When I met Aqua-sama earlier in the Guild, she was completely insistent that she'd stay as a member of your party, Satou Kazuma." Kyouya reached into a large bag on his left hip, then looked through and caught onto something that jingled as it moved. "As such, please have this, at least. I'll do what I can in order to support you." The boy offered Kazuma a leather pouch with coins, which Kazuma instantly and shamelessly accepted.
Kazuma nodded, his determined green eyes meeting with Kyouya's own sky-blue. "I'll do my best, Mitsurugi."
"You can remember my name half-a-minute after it was spoken," Mitsurugi noted, blinking. "That's... honestly impressive."
Kazuma couldn't help but smile, a little ashamedly. He couldn't help but admit, "I know. I've been repeating it in my head on a loop for the entire conversation and I still wasn't sure it was correct when I said it."
Mitsurugi sighed deeply, then left them without a goodbye.
Subaru moved to Kazuma's side, peering curiously over the boy's shoulder. "How much did he give us?"
"I dunno," Kazuma said. He was fast to open a utility pocket and drop the jingling mass within, as he turned to face his pseudo-suicidal partner-in-crime. "Probably around a million Eris. I'm not going to count it here. Too much risk that Misfortune will flare, or that the hate-inducing curse makes someone rob me because of some stupid vendetta."
Subaru nodded. "That's prudent. Do we pick quests?"
"I'll do that," Kazuma said, scanning the room for a second time. He confirmed his worst suspicion - the airhead got lost somewhere. "You go find Aqua. She's not in here, so she's probably in the inner atrium or behind the building, in the training field. Maybe in the toilet, I don't know."
"You can leave it to me, Kazuma-san!" Subaru answered with a nod, giving Kazuma a jaunty salute before he ran off.
Kazuma watched him go off with an indifferent expression.
It was a fascinating thing to note: Aqua insisted that she'd remain with their newbie party, rather than joining Kyouya, who'd be able to provide for her easily. Was she that stupid, unable to recognize a rich simp? Or was she actually disgusted and off-put by someone so willing to throw themselves down at her feet?
That was usually the case in these kinds of situations, Kazuma reasoned, but it wasn't like Aqua cared about propriety too much.
She was good at pretending she was righteous and nice, but in the end, she usually went for the easy way out. Not that he was any different; by nature, Kazuma preferred easy solutions to problems. That's why it was so interesting - did his speech inspire something in her?
No. That was ridiculous. He shook the thought out: it was the Geas of Incompetence acting up, making sure their fate was bound together was closely as possible.
It was nothing else.
After he assured himself, Kazuma looked at the noticeboard.
Hm. Quests, huh?
He approached the large corkboard and started perusing the options. To his displeasure, most of the good stuff the party wasn't ready for previously but that he'd seen recently disappeared, at some point between this morning and yesterday evening. It seemed like it would be more frogs.
There were some other quests that caught his eye, though. One request directly from the Guild itself called for a small party of adventurers capable of wiping out a small goblin tribe that took up residence in the nearby mountains, next to the road that went to Alcanretia. They were supposedly making regular hits on the passing caravans, which affected trade badly; the market was already in a perilous state because of the war, so it was completely imperative these creatures be disposed of as quickly as possible. Most importantly, it didn't look too difficult given their party's idiosyncratic powers.
The other request was for something that struck Kazuma as pleasingly familiar: a raid.
He'd been called on numerous times in order to assist in raids during his tenure as a top-rank player in Emerald Online. Every guild and their mother wanted him as their chief tactician; when crunching the numbers wasn't enough, or when fighting against other players.
This seemed to be something like a fortress raid, but on a much smaller scale. The Demon King's Army started to do setup work on an outpost to the east, and since the army was occupied with the grand offensive led by Wolbach and her lackeys to the north, there could be no response down here. The Adventurer's Guild was petitioned directly by the crown to resolve the issue with the help of adventurers who'd be willing to take up their arms and break down the outpost, as well as presumably, kill or capture everyone there. It didn't seem like the option was too popular for what it said; Kazuma expected patriotism to take charge here, but only eight parties signed up so far, Dust's included.
More importantly, the raid would begin later in the day, with minimal waiting time.
The attack couldn't be put off for longer than that. If Kazuma chose to accept this, there'd be no time for either the goblin camp or the frog-hunting, and if it lasted for longer than expected - either due to enemy resilience or a siege - then he might go home suffering from missed sleep.
In his case, that wasn't a good situation to be in.
---
The last round's winners were Sacred Restoration and A Witch's Love. Good picks!
During the third day's questing, Kazuma earned a total of 80,000 Eris. Furthermore, Mitsurugi Kyouya granted you a sack that contained 1,000,000 Eris, which is roughly $9.5k. Not a bad sum!
After his rapid ascension and hegemony, Kazuma's leveling slowed down, but he managed to achieve Level 14 nonetheless. His Magic Power's incremental growth has been quite impressive in particular; soon enough, his MP will be sufficient that he could learn and cast a baseline Explosion without collapsing!
Quest Options
[ ] Toad-Hunting - More of the same: hunt down five Giant Toads and receive 50,000 Eris, plus a bonus of 10,000 for every toad body that can be salvaged into meat, bones, and alchemical ingredients.
If Kazuma's team can maintain the same output as yesterday, they should be able to get up to 250,000 Eris (or more) and he should be able to attain Level 15 or 16. Aqua and Subaru should be able to attain Level 7 and Level 6 respectively, accounting for their new status as Retinue members.
[ ] Skirmish Operation - A high-paying job: 500,000 Eris. A Demon King Army outpost is being constructed in area to the far east of Axel, and the royal guard is too busy fighting their main force to the north to do anything about it currently. The Adventurer Guild is amassing volunteers for a raiding operation later in the day.
It should be fine as far as Kazuma's Affliction of Slumber is concerned, though he might go home tired and wake up later tomorrow.
[ ] Goblin Camp - A relatively high-paying job: 350,000 Eris to anyone who can take down a crew of goblins that have been regularly performing raids on the merchant caravans on the road to Alcanretia. There's around twelve of them, and they shouldn't pose a threat to any party of at least four members with members whose level is higher than 8.
Kazuma expects that his elevated level, as well as Aqua and Subaru's special abilities, will even the odds enough to turn the difficulty on this quest from, 'medium' to 'easy.'
---
Name: Satou Kazuma
Class: Arch Wizard
Level: 14
[XP]: 100/850
Skill Points: 20
Strength: 44
Endurance: 45
Constitution: 37
Dexterity: 51
Agility: 48
Intelligence: 56
Wits: 64
Magic Power: 71
Luck: -960
Ring of Rebellion Effect: +10 to all statistics, Luck is capped at -100.
Unstructured Magic
Basic Magic (Unlocked Spells: Freeze, Tinder, Create Water, Create Earth, Wind Breath, Spark, Illusion (+2), Counterspell (+1))
Intermediate Magic (Unlocked Spells: Freeze Gust, Fireball (+1), Hydrostream, Mold Earth, Blade of Wind (+1), Chain Lightning (+1), Teleport, Paralyze, Wind Curtain (+1))
[ ] Save
[ ] Don't Save - In this case, what should Kazuma buy or focus on? His most recent upgrades have not opened any new spell options yet.
Make the selection on Curse Mitigation. For now, Aqua can only apply two Mitigation Points.
[ ] Grand Mitigation: Costs both Mitigation Points. Apply the effects of Direct Mitigation to every curse on this list, but Aqua is spiritually exhausted, lowering her Magic Power statistic by 50% for the next month and slowing down progress on the next mitigation session by 50% (current expected wait time: 1 week.)
[ ] Incompetence - Direct Mitigation: Slightly alleviate the user's need to follow whims, increase the capacity to apply prioritization of tasks by judgment rather than base urge. In the case of the Geas, decrease the interlocutor's compulsion and inability to apply rationale by 8.5%, letting them grow less incompetent by that amount.
[ ] Incompetence - Prudence: Once for every five times this Curse procs (random chance), the Cursebearer may choose to ignore the compulsion instead. If Geas, the interlocutor may be more easily persuaded not to base themselves in their urges.
[ ] Incompetence - Everbound: Increases the frequency of monumental tasks to be more common than once every six months, nothing else changes. If Geas, the interlocutor's capacity to be motivated to perform important tasks by other people is amplified, and they can now self-motivate if the task is of true, key importance to them.
[ ] Incompetence - Twinned Fate: One cannot die, while the other lives. The bond of Fate the Cursebearer shares with their interlocutor is magnified a hundredfold, then solidified like a permanent conjoinery of spirit. Should the Cursebearer die while the interlocutor survives, Fate will do its uttermost to ensure the Cursebearer's safe resurrection. Likewise for the interlocutor. If both die at roughly the same time, this choice bears no effect.
[ ] Misfortune - Direct Mitigation: Lower this curse's effects by 10%. Drops the potency of Fortune's Smile from 1.0 to 0.95 on the ISH. Extends the duration of Fortune's Smile from 1 hour to 1 hour, 18 minutes. The negative effects of Rewire Mitigation are alleviated slightly.
[ ] Misfortune - Haywire Mitigation: Lower this curse's effects by a total of 80% for most situations that matter strongly to the Cursebearer, such as combat with important enemies or significant political discourse. When not in such a situation, the effects of the curse are instead magnified by 100% for most events, and by 600% for events that would be considered humiliating to the Cursebearer. The Cursebearer's daily life will make them feel pathetic, inadequate, humiliated, and frustrated on a near-constant basis. They are a black cat in human skin.
[ ] Misfortune - Twofold Fortune: Gain an additional Fortune's Smile use, raising up the maximum slots to two. One use of Fortune's Smile now takes six months to generate, rather than a year. Otherwise, changes nothing.
[ ] Wretched - Direct Mitigation: Lower this curse's effects by 7.5%.
[ ] Wretched - False Impressions: The curse's initial effects are magnified by 22.5%, but it's now much easier to overcome it through word and deed.
[ ] Wretched - Factional: Select a broad group of people, such as "merchants," "royalty," or "Crimson Demons," when selecting this option. This curse's effects are highly lowered for that specific group of people, proportional to how large or broad the group is, to a significantly larger degree than direct mitigation.
[ ] Slumber - Direct Mitigation: Further lowers the length of sleep to 12 hours, 30 minutes.
[ ] Slumber - Energized: Ignore up to 3 hours of no sleep at no adverse effect, but must sleep longer by that same amount to make up for it. Likewise, can wake up 3 hours earlier at no adverse effect if necessary if it's made up on the night that follows. Cursebearer's "slumber debt" cannot safely accrue over 3 hours.
It had been precisely four days since Kazuma's arrival in the new world.
Curiously, it didn't seem to have a name, like, 'Earth' or 'Terra.' Its inhabitants didn't appear to comprehend the fact they lived on a globe spinning through the annals of an infinite cosmos around a huge ball of solar plasma. It was just the world to them, or the continent, or whatever. They had no sense of scale.
It was odd, Kazuma considered, because to his best knowledge, the curvature of a planet could be determined with simple observation and mathematical extrapolation.
Or maybe it wasn't simple: the more he leveled up, the easier it became to recall things he'd learned in the past, as well as consolidate and internalize them. He always had issues in his math class, mostly with arithmetic, but now it felt like he was ready to teach the subject at a middle-school level, if not higher.
More interestingly, he also remembered the rough blueprint of a steam engine. He'd spent a couple of hours researching how they worked for a science project and some of that knowledge came back to him, although not in sufficient quantities to improvise it on his own. Something to look forward to, in the future, he supposed.
His third day in Axel was mostly uneventful. Kazuma, Aqua, and Subaru once again went out in order to hunt Giant Toads as they had on the second one. There weren't many quest options better than that one.
Aqua, unexpectedly, was prudent enough to borrow some money from Subaru in order to purchase a cleric's staff for herself, while Subaru revealed the full extent of his ability to them - Return by Death. A unique skill that allowed him to travel back in time on a scale of hours or days via suicide, which his status as a Retinue member apparently improved, as he could now share the information with others.
He also warned them about the number of frogs they'd face being unusually high for the day; Aqua appeared to think nothing of it, but Kazuma caught onto the disturbing implication that Subaru casually killed himself to go back and inform them of this.
Later, in the middle of monster territory, Aqua suddenly remembered that her divine energy well had suddenly been refilled last night while sleeping, and she could get started on further mitigation of Kazuma's curses.
This distracted the Cursebearer enough that one of the Giant Toads he hadn't noticed managed to nearly gobble him up.
They finished the mission, earned 250,000 Eris, and in Kazuma's case, succumbed to the Affliction of Misfortune, but they were fine at the end of the day. Being covered in steaming frog viscera, heated blood, and lukewarm saliva wasn't nice, but Kazuma was getting used to it.
At night, Aqua started working on another treatment of curse mitigation - at first, a number of Sacred Blessings to wear down the curse's metaphysical ablative shields and then Sacred Dispel and Sacred Curse Break to immolate the core from which their effects were derived.
Kazuma was starting to, in his own eyes, gather a rhythm in this new world. A routine that he followed.
He got up in the morning, ate some fruit, took an accelerated shower, and then got dressed and went downstairs. There, he went straight to the Adventurer's Guild Hall, met with the rest of his party, exchanged greetings with people he knew if there were any, and then started looking through quest. Once he found an interesting one, he asked both Aqua and Subaru for feedback, they went to register their acceptance of the quest at the counters, and then they went out to do it.
In this case, it was only Giant Toads, but he wasn't one to complain about work, so long as the work actually paid its dividends.
In this case, it did. Magical superpower and money both.
On the fourth day, Kazuma woke up and met up with Subaru outside of the hotel, where the boy was idly waiting for him. They both went to the Adventurer's Guild in search of their dimwitted companion when they were suddenly accosted, right next to the entrance of the Guild Hall.
"Satou Kazuma!" The familiar boy in knightly armor clasped Kazuma's mantle with a pair of heavy gauntlets, bringing him closer in a vicelike grip. Kazuma failed to resist, even as he pushed back with grit teeth. "Why did you not inform me that the wonderful Aqua-sama is down here with you?"
"Ah, it's Matsubatsu," Kazuma realized after a second of wrestling, eyes widening but calming down simultaneously. "Let me go."
"I'm not Matsubatsu, stop forgetting my name! It's Mitsurugi!" the knight insisted. Nonetheless, he didn't argue much further, etting go of Kazuma's collar and repeating himself with a clear, loud voice, annoyingly obnoxious, like a hammer stuffing nails into wood, one syllable after another, "Mitsurugi Kyouya."
Subaru took on an enlightened philosopher's pose, one finger tapping his chin, the other resting on his waist. His dark eyes narrowed in deep thought, then he pitched his insane theory, "Is Katsuragi a Cursebearer? People keep forgetting his name, so maybe he's got the Brand of the Forgettable or something like that."
"My name is not Katsuragi and I am most definitely not!"
"Subaru, please don't bully him," Kazuma pleaded. He was starting to actually feel really bad on Kyouya's behalf, and more than a little stupid about his own unlikely tendency to constantly forget the exact syllables of the name. "Despite his behavior and name, Mitsuragi is a valuable friend and ally."
Kyouya inflated like a scared pufferfish, stepping back in pure shock, veins frozen like an icy lake in winter and hands out to the side, as if preparing to be rammed into by a speeding car. "A-are you making fun of me? You can't possibly forget it moments after I spoke it?" His left eye twitched, lips deepening into a demented smile.
This was enough for Kazuma to realize his folly. "Oh, Mitsurugi, not Mitsuruno," he corrected, clicking his fingers in sudden realization. Kazuma took a good look at Kyouya's expression and cringed, internally and externally both. "Sorry. I've got a lot on my mind lately. What can we do for you?"
The armored hero shook his head, clearly forgetting the accidental slights in favor of focusing on the topic he intended to bother them with on that particular morning. Kazuma could already see the deep, subtle lining of accusatory hostility returning to his face, combined with a kind of fervent, punitive self-assurance.
"Aqua-sama told me about everything that happened. How could you let them throw her down here like that?" Kyouya hissed, mixed self-righteous anger and bitter, coffee-black disappointment seeping through his tone.
Kazuma was surprised by the level of anger, even outright animosity, there. It wasn't like he could do anything, so why would Kyouya complain about it? It was like a worm crawled up his ass and ferociously dug its teeth into a pustule node, refusing to let go.
Subaru, to Kazuma's side, let out a deep, tremulous sigh, as if totally done with the world, and pulled a dagger out of his right pocket. He was clearly keeping it handy.
"Wait," Kazuma said, raising a hand to Subaru as he swiftly realized what was about to happen. The other boy looked at him, blinking, and stopped the knife at where it was, raised halfway to his own throat in a horizontal grip. "Don't. Too much!"
Subaru frowned, lowering the knife. "Is it really?" He leaned in and whispered. "I could go here first on the second run and stop Aqua from babbling."
"You're clearly desensitized if you can do it so casually. I can deal with this," Kazuma insisted, before turning back to Kyouya who'd watched the whole exchange, trepidation inflating him like a balloon until his eyes were finally as wide as saucers by its end.
Kazuma looked down, taking on a genuinely apologetic one that he wasn't feeling in the slightest. Aqua had this coming a long way, even if he admitted that he didn't necessarily like her suffering. "Look, I'm sorry, Mitsurugi. I don't know what to tell you - I didn't want to argue with the angel who came to declare Aqua was coming with me. I'm a mortal; a human, so getting into the affairs of deities is... well, it seems to me like it'd be fundamentally unwise. Would you have done that in my place?"
Kazuma waited for the boy's response To his half-surprise - as he'd been hoping that it would work, but not wholly expecting it - Kyouya seemed to compose himself, the virtue of forgiveness flashing across his features, with a mote of regret to accompany it.
"I don't know," Kyouya admitted. The boy looked down with conflict visible as clear as sunlight in his body language, lips downturned into a deep, contemplative frown. He closed his eyes bitterly. "I confess I don't know, but I like to think I would have. I suppose I can't... ask too much of you."
Kazuma nodded in confirmation. That's right. I'm just a guy. Let this go without a stupid honor duel or anything of the sort. No need to feed the Affliction, right?
"When I met Aqua-sama earlier in the Guild, she was completely insistent that she'd stay as a member of your party, Satou Kazuma." Kyouya reached into a large bag on his left hip, then looked through and caught onto something that jingled as it moved. "As such, please have this, at least. I'll do what I can in order to support you." The boy offered Kazuma a leather pouch with coins, which Kazuma instantly and shamelessly accepted.
Kazuma nodded, his determined green eyes meeting with Kyouya's own sky-blue. "I'll do my best, Mitsurugi."
"You can remember my name half-a-minute after it was spoken," Mitsurugi noted, blinking. "That's... honestly impressive."
Kazuma couldn't help but smile, a little ashamedly. He couldn't help but admit, "I know. I've been repeating it in my head on a loop for the entire conversation and I still wasn't sure it was correct when I said it."
Mitsurugi sighed deeply, then left them without a goodbye.
Subaru moved to Kazuma's side, peering curiously over the boy's shoulder. "How much did he give us?"
"I dunno," Kazuma said. He was fast to open a utility pocket and drop the jingling mass within, as he turned to face his pseudo-suicidal partner-in-crime. "Probably around a million Eris. I'm not going to count it here. Too much risk that Misfortune will flare, or that the hate-inducing curse makes someone rob me because of some stupid vendetta."
Subaru nodded. "That's prudent. Do we pick quests?"
"I'll do that," Kazuma said, scanning the room for a second time. He confirmed his worst suspicion - the airhead got lost somewhere. "You go find Aqua. She's not in here, so she's probably in the inner atrium or behind the building, in the training field. Maybe in the toilet, I don't know."
"You can leave it to me, Kazuma-san!" Subaru answered with a nod, giving Kazuma a jaunty salute before he ran off.
Kazuma watched him go off with an indifferent expression.
It was a fascinating thing to note: Aqua insisted that she'd remain with their newbie party, rather than joining Kyouya, who'd be able to provide for her easily. Was she that stupid, unable to recognize a rich simp? Or was she actually disgusted and off-put by someone so willing to throw themselves down at her feet?
That was usually the case in these kinds of situations, Kazuma reasoned, but it wasn't like Aqua cared about propriety too much.
She was good at pretending she was righteous and nice, but in the end, she usually went for the easy way out. Not that he was any different; by nature, Kazuma preferred easy solutions to problems. That's why it was so interesting - did his speech inspire something in her?
No. That was ridiculous. He shook the thought out: it was the Geas of Incompetence acting up, making sure their fate was bound together was closely as possible.
It was nothing else.
After he assured himself, Kazuma looked at the noticeboard.
Hm. Quests, huh?
He approached the large corkboard and started perusing the options. To his displeasure, most of the good stuff the party wasn't ready for previously but that he'd seen recently disappeared, at some point between this morning and yesterday evening. It seemed like it would be more frogs.
There were some other quests that caught his eye, though. One request directly from the Guild itself called for a small party of adventurers capable of wiping out a small goblin tribe that took up residence in the nearby mountains, next to the road that went to Alcanretia. They were supposedly making regular hits on the passing caravans, which affected trade badly; the market was already in a perilous state because of the war, so it was completely imperative these creatures be disposed of as quickly as possible. Most importantly, it didn't look too difficult given their party's idiosyncratic powers.
The other request was for something that struck Kazuma as pleasingly familiar: a raid.
He'd been called on numerous times in order to assist in raids during his tenure as a top-rank player in Emerald Online. Every guild and their mother wanted him as their chief tactician; when crunching the numbers wasn't enough, or when fighting against other players.
This seemed to be something like a fortress raid, but on a much smaller scale. The Demon King's Army started to do setup work on an outpost to the east, and since the army was occupied with the grand offensive led by Wolbach and her lackeys to the north, there could be no response down here. The Adventurer's Guild was petitioned directly by the crown to resolve the issue with the help of adventurers who'd be willing to take up their arms and break down the outpost, as well as presumably, kill or capture everyone there. It didn't seem like the option was too popular for what it said; Kazuma expected patriotism to take charge here, but only eight parties signed up so far, Dust's included.
More importantly, the raid would begin later in the day, with minimal waiting time.
The attack couldn't be put off for longer than that. If Kazuma chose to accept this, there'd be no time for either the goblin camp or the frog-hunting, and if it lasted for longer than expected - either due to enemy resilience or a siege - then he might go home suffering from missed sleep.
In his case, that wasn't a good situation to be in.
---
The last round's winners were Sacred Restoration and A Witch's Love. Good picks!
During the third day's questing, Kazuma earned a total of 80,000 Eris. Furthermore, Mitsurugi Kyouya granted you a sack that contained 1,000,000 Eris, which is roughly $9.5k. Not a bad sum!
After his rapid ascension and hegemony, Kazuma's leveling slowed down, but he managed to achieve Level 14 nonetheless. His Magic Power's incremental growth has been quite impressive in particular; soon enough, his MP will be sufficient that he could learn and cast a baseline Explosion without collapsing!
Quest Options
[ ] Toad-Hunting - More of the same: hunt down five Giant Toads and receive 50,000 Eris, plus a bonus of 10,000 for every toad body that can be salvaged into meat, bones, and alchemical ingredients.
If Kazuma's team can maintain the same output as yesterday, they should be able to get up to 250,000 Eris (or more) and he should be able to attain Level 15 or 16. Aqua and Subaru should be able to attain Level 7 and Level 6 respectively, accounting for their new status as Retinue members.
[ ] Skirmish Operation - A high-paying job: 500,000 Eris. A Demon King Army outpost is being constructed in area to the far east of Axel, and the royal guard is too busy fighting their main force to the north to do anything about it currently. The Adventurer Guild is amassing volunteers for a raiding operation later in the day.
It should be fine as far as Kazuma's Affliction of Slumber is concerned, though he might go home tired and wake up later tomorrow.
[ ] Goblin Camp - A relatively high-paying job: 350,000 Eris to anyone who can take down a crew of goblins that have been regularly performing raids on the merchant caravans on the road to Alcanretia. There's around twelve of them, and they shouldn't pose a threat to any party of at least four members with members whose level is higher than 8.
Kazuma expects that his elevated level, as well as Aqua and Subaru's special abilities, will even the odds enough to turn the difficulty on this quest from, 'medium' to 'easy.'
---
Name: Satou Kazuma
Class: Arch Wizard
Level: 14
[XP]: 100/850
Skill Points: 20
Strength: 44
Endurance: 45
Constitution: 37
Dexterity: 51
Agility: 48
Intelligence: 56
Wits: 64
Magic Power: 71
Luck: -960
Ring of Rebellion Effect: +10 to all statistics, Luck is capped at -100.
Unstructured Magic
Basic Magic (Unlocked Spells: Freeze, Tinder, Create Water, Create Earth, Wind Breath, Spark, Illusion (+2), Counterspell (+1))
Intermediate Magic (Unlocked Spells: Freeze Gust, Fireball (+1), Hydrostream, Mold Earth, Blade of Wind (+1), Chain Lightning (+1), Teleport, Paralyze, Wind Curtain (+1))
[ ] Save
[ ] Don't Save - In this case, what should Kazuma buy or focus on? His most recent upgrades have not opened any new spell options yet.
Make the selection on Curse Mitigation. For now, Aqua can only apply two Mitigation Points.
[ ] Grand Mitigation: Costs both Mitigation Points. Apply the effects of Direct Mitigation to every curse on this list, but Aqua is spiritually exhausted, lowering her Magic Power statistic by 50% for the next month and slowing down progress on the next mitigation session by 50% (current expected wait time: 1 week.)
[ ] Incompetence - Direct Mitigation: Slightly alleviate the user's need to follow whims, increase the capacity to apply prioritization of tasks by judgment rather than base urge. In the case of the Geas, decrease the interlocutor's compulsion and inability to apply rationale by 8.5%, letting them grow less incompetent by that amount.
[ ] Incompetence - Prudence: Once for every five times this Curse procs (random chance), the Cursebearer may choose to ignore the compulsion instead. If Geas, the interlocutor may be more easily persuaded not to base themselves in their urges.
[ ] Incompetence - Everbound: Increases the frequency of monumental tasks to be more common than once every six months, nothing else changes. If Geas, the interlocutor's capacity to be motivated to perform important tasks by other people is amplified, and they can now self-motivate if the task is of true, key importance to them.
[ ] Incompetence - Twinned Fate: One cannot die, while the other lives. The bond of Fate the Cursebearer shares with their interlocutor is magnified a hundredfold, then solidified like a permanent conjoinery of spirit. Should the Cursebearer die while the interlocutor survives, Fate will do its uttermost to ensure the Cursebearer's safe resurrection. Likewise for the interlocutor. If both die at roughly the same time, this choice bears no effect.
[ ] Misfortune - Direct Mitigation: Lower this curse's effects by 10%. Drops the potency of Fortune's Smile from 1.0 to 0.95 on the ISH. Extends the duration of Fortune's Smile from 1 hour to 1 hour, 18 minutes. The negative effects of Rewire Mitigation are alleviated slightly.
[ ] Misfortune - Haywire Mitigation: Lower this curse's effects by a total of 80% for most situations that matter strongly to the Cursebearer, such as combat with important enemies or significant political discourse. When not in such a situation, the effects of the curse are instead magnified by 100% for most events, and by 600% for events that would be considered humiliating to the Cursebearer. The Cursebearer's daily life will make them feel pathetic, inadequate, humiliated, and frustrated on a near-constant basis. They are a black cat in human skin.
[ ] Misfortune - Twofold Fortune: Gain an additional Fortune's Smile use, raising up the maximum slots to two. One use of Fortune's Smile now takes six months to generate, rather than a year. Otherwise, changes nothing.
[ ] Wretched - Direct Mitigation: Lower this curse's effects by 7.5%.
[ ] Wretched - False Impressions: The curse's initial effects are magnified by 22.5%, but it's now much easier to overcome it through word and deed.
[ ] Wretched - Factional: Select a broad group of people, such as "merchants," "royalty," or "Crimson Demons," when selecting this option. This curse's effects are highly lowered for that specific group of people, proportional to how large or broad the group is, to a significantly larger degree than direct mitigation.
[ ] Slumber - Direct Mitigation: Further lowers the length of sleep to 12 hours, 30 minutes.
[ ] Slumber - Energized: Ignore up to 3 hours of no sleep at no adverse effect, but must sleep longer by that same amount to make up for it. Likewise, can wake up 3 hours earlier at no adverse effect if necessary if it's made up on the night that follows. Cursebearer's "slumber debt" cannot safely accrue over 3 hours.
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Enohthree
Hypersane
Honestly I see Hunger's ability to advance from picking even a 1 pick fight prior to an engagement as superior to greater positioning. Even falling short we could still get Honing for combat intelligence and wits or something before fighting the good fight. We could even teleport back if needed since we're no longer Nightmare Flighting to Voyaging City to avoid this encounter.
If Subaru's willingness to suicide wasn't beneficial to us, I'd say that we need to fix his shit ASAP.
Unsure whether we should Save or Spend (I'm presonally inclined towards unlocking Advanced Magic), but I think the rest will be:
[Yes] Skirmish Operation
[I'm] Misfortune - Twofold Fortune
[Kazuma] Wretched - False Impressions
The raid is a great opportunity on which we can capitalize - obviously it's going to be a XP and Eris farm, but outstanding partecipation will boost Kazuma's reputation; finally, it's also a direct conflict with the Demon King, which means Aqua can be properly motivated to not fuck up. With this in mind, the two Mitigations are picked to maximize the gains of the raid.
False Impression increases any kind of positive reputation Kazuma will gain from partecipation; this won't be limited to Adventurers or Guild members, but I'm sure stories of a great performance will be spread thorough the population of Axel at the very least. Twofold Fortune gives Kazuma Fortune Smile, which should be procced exactly during the raid to assure the optimal result for the party - whether we're talking about Rep, Eris or dead enemies. This should also logically diminish the time of the raid due to absurd but positive contrivances, making Slumber less of a danger.
As much as Everbound is interesting, it's written plainly that we will have a new Mitigation session in a week - we can wait until then to pick it up.
DarkSideBard
Flying, without moving on
Absolutely not, since it isn't explicitly choosing a permanent injury. I reserve the right to be mad at you if Hold the Line wins and it does come with a new permanent injury, though.
I know that our deal says I would need to submit a thousand word analysis, but I have substantial decayed omake power from the last 2 votes and don't feel like there's much new useful analysis to do after this much has already occurred. Is that fine?
- Location
- 1
An attempt to write a possible version of the upcoming fight... after a fashion. 760 words.
Hunger was fighting the Plenary Armament, and it was going poorly. as well, it was going swimmingly, and it was not occurring at all. The trouble- and success- had started a few minutes prior, when he approached it. When he swung the forebearer's Blade, releasing a blade wind, the Armament had been an indistinct humanoid blob. the blade wind had hit it in the arm, leaving a deep gash and not a single scratch. the armament had begun to turn and lumber forwards like a giant which had not moved for centuries, and also ran forwards with lightning speed and nearly took his head off with a swift jab. Hunger managed to barely dodge the jab and cut into the Armaments leg. He had also done nothing of the sort because the Armament was still hundreds of meters away, and simply released another blade wind at leisure. also, when he attempted to slice its leg in half, his blade had bounced off, gotten stuck two feet in, and sliced clean through. Hunger had garbed himself in the armor of midnight, and also was only protected by the amorphous evening sky, and so was able to survive the concealed weaponry in the Armaments foot point blank and wounded grievously by it shifting its leg back. He hadn't gone second stage yet, but it looked to be happening soon, assuming the Armament suddenly gained several times more power. Hunger leapt back to open up distance and reclined in a sunning chair as he idly sent yet another blade wind towards the Armament, which must have travelled a full three feet by this point in its lumbering gait. Focusing on his heartbeat, Hunger used the Ring to accelerate it severalfold, casting Deathly Star instantly to hurt the Armament, or at least stall it; he continued to recline when he noticed the Armament was surrounded by an army of allies which moved much more quickly. Hunger sidestepped an incoming missile while simultaneously blocking a punch with the Forebearers Blade and lazily getting up from his sunning chair. unfortunately, the missile exploded a moment later, buffeting him with the force of a space-warping explosion, and the blocked punch sent him flying, but he was able to easily seize control of the blood of the army supporting the Armament and bring them to their knees. Deathly Star had gravely scarred the Armament, and he could sense its rank had dropped appreciably; of course, the Armament was still at full Rank and Health, since no quantity of physical force could harm it. Regardless, he wasn't in the best of shape either, having been completely protected from all attack by the Armor of Midnight and had the evening sky shredded by the explosion. Furthermore, with the Armaments leg having been cut nearly in half and only slightly scratched, he could now easily keep ahead of its lopsided limp, and was struggling to maintain sufficient distance to not be pounded into a paste. He had long ago been brought into his second stage, and anticipated he would survive this fight without using it, but many of the Armaments weapons were unable to affect him in phase, so he had good odds of surviving regardless. Having subjugated the entirety of the Armaments support staff, Hunger used his control over Blood to bring its lumbering gait to a complete halt and started launching further blade-winds at a single point of its flesh to carve through. as Hunger attempted to flee in his ghostflame form, the Armament activated its shroud and tried futilely to launch more missiles at him, which he intercepted midflight with bladewinds and was unable to escape and walked out through trivially. Hunger had survived the Battle, but now knew the Armament was far beyond his ability to defeat, if he didn't have any hands, legs, or sword. Still, he was out of ideas and had plenty of options in reserve, and he could not allow the Realm of Myth to be overtaken by the Armament, so he fled and abandoned the Realm to its fate. His blade winds were now carving sizably into the single location, and he was still reclining while rapidly contending with the Armaments continued punches, kicks, and missiles and getting in the occasional slash; with every cut, the Star-scarred skin repulsed his attack entirely and was carved with a deep gash as the Armaments significantly-diminished Rank was completely unaffected. Luckily, the wounds which he had not taken were little inconvenience due to the Ring of Blood, and he was nearly dead from lack of mass.
The Problem, Hunger uncharacteristically reflected in a manner which must surely be non-canonical, was that he'd only seen an injured Armament before this point, and didn't even know how high his Rank was, since it was obviously much higher then the Armaments, and much lower, and exactly the same. in such ambiguous circumstances, any attempted prediction of the fight by non-canonical entities would devolve into pretended certainty, or if honest, into a list of many possibilities which were all mutually contradictory. hence his simultaneous death, escape for survival, flawless victory, and difficult but manageable fight.
really, it was more like he was a spontaneous imitation of hunger living in someones imagination, since he didn't actually share any personality traits with his mind a mere update ago, only surface-level powers.
At this realisation, he suddenly popped out of pseudo-existence.
The Problem, Hunger uncharacteristically reflected in a manner which must surely be non-canonical, was that he'd only seen an injured Armament before this point, and didn't even know how high his Rank was, since it was obviously much higher then the Armaments, and much lower, and exactly the same. in such ambiguous circumstances, any attempted prediction of the fight by non-canonical entities would devolve into pretended certainty, or if honest, into a list of many possibilities which were all mutually contradictory. hence his simultaneous death, escape for survival, flawless victory, and difficult but manageable fight.
really, it was more like he was a spontaneous imitation of hunger living in someones imagination, since he didn't actually share any personality traits with his mind a mere update ago, only surface-level powers.
At this realisation, he suddenly popped out of pseudo-existence.
- Location
- US
Very well, then.
[X] Rah13
EDIT: As for Birdsie's update, I think while continuing on Haywire Mitigation could be useful (80% on important stuff! That's above sixth stage mitigation!) It would also wreak havoc on Kazuma's mental health, which wouldn't be desirable.
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Fall back is explicitly stated to be the most likely to prevent Letrezia's death so I don't know why you'd be more willing to risk Catherine more than Letrezia.
Neither are you. You are just saying that theirs are invalid.
Not really, RoB isn't capable of moving our stats up the ISH so it wouldn't be as good for increasing power as Sword In The Stone, nor would it be as good at improving our rate of advancement as RR or Pillars.
You mean insulting other people and saying your arguments are better while theirs are trash is not a convincing tactic? Weird...
True, but RoB will increse our ADS Ruin seven times. Also Hunger's stats are ridiculously behind his Rank and that build hole needs to be plugged sooner or later.
Zampano
🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈🏳️🌈
- Location
- Simping for DSB
Nah, Wolfy might be abrasive but he isn't wrong. When people assert the opposite of his analysis, that's not the same thing as an argument against it.
Of course, being correct isn't the same as being persuasive... :/
HoratioVonBecker
Imperfectly Aligned
I mean, Fervenweirr is probably possible for us to just mindwhammy. With our 20+ CHA, and the fact that it's almost certainly weaker than us rankwise if it isn't berserk, it's probably something we could just talk down.
Procyon is simply the second-best case. Well, maybe third or fourth - the Wretched Armament, if it isn't long dead, might be easier to fight through Heroism, while the Martyr Armament would just need to be entreated via Rank (to bypass its' probable blindness and deafness) and it would have to let us go.
But yeah, Procyon is a pretty good matchup.