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Anderson Quest: Killing Vampires and Werewolves and Leprechauns (Hellsing/Bloodborne)

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    • "Think it's your turn again," you say as you drop your phone back in your sleeves.

    "Hm. Mind if I ask about the thing you just showed me?"

    "The picture or the phone?"

    "The device. How does it work?"

    "Well, it all starts with electricity..."

    You scrape together a decent explanation of circuitry and binary logic from what bits of your college experience have survived your regular doses of head trauma. Nervous tics aside, Micolash is an excellent listener, asking enough pertinent questions beyond your expertise that you just hand him the now-dead phone and tell him to go nuts. The thing hovers above his hand and disassembles itself, allowing him to thoroughly analyze each component before ultimately creating an exact replica out of the nearby wall. He pulls the original back together and hands it back to you.

    "This should keep me entertained for a while. Thank you."

    "My pleasure." You toss it up and down a few times while he experiments with his new toy, occasionally sending blue-tinged sparks through it. The battery explodes a few times before he gets the voltage right, after which he beckons you to hand yours back over and charges it up to full.

    "Impressive work," you say, flicking through some of your favorite old photos. God, those Vermont park rangers were pissed about what you did to Champ.

    Micolash simply smiles. "Your turn."

    You rub your chin, searching for a subject, and turn back to him feeling slightly guilty for what you're about to do to the mood. "What happened in the Fishin' Hamlet? I got the gist of it, but what in the world did they do ta break a stone-cold badass like Maria?"

    Micolash's phone slides back together and drifts slowly to the ground while he fidgets with his latest cigarette. It takes him a few big breaths to muster up the resolve, the pungent smoke hanging lazily in the dead air.

    "Kos was dead when they got there. Still not sure what did it. She was full up with parasites, big as your arm. They'd peel the villagers open and insert the parasites in various organs. They'd cut off limbs one by one and attach parasites at the stumps to see what would happen, would carve out specific portions of their brains and replace them with parasite tissue. Kept them alive the whole time." His customary energy drifts away with his next exhalation. "Used some of the data to make my equations. Not proud of it. Not proud of much, to be perfectly honest."

    You sit in silence for some time before speaking again. "Your turn?"

    He shakes his head. "Would rather you just asked me something else."

    "Alright. Whatever happened to Bergholt Stuttley Johnson?"

    He goes from downcast to doubled over, sputtering as he struggles not to swallow his cigarette. You thump him on the back while he coughs and help him through the fit as mannequins scramble to offer him water. A few glasses and as many whacks later, he literally shakes it off and regains his breath.

    "Sorry about that. Never expected to hear that name again. You know he was actually a verb at Mensis? 'Take your time, don't Johnson it.' Or 'how in the world did you Johnson this up?'" He gives a rueful smile. "Probably should have listened to all the times they told me I was 'going Johnson.' I don't even know what finally happened to him; the way they tell it, he went up to some researchers that were working on a way to project themselves into the Great Ones' dimension and told them they were doing it wrong. Then he took out a hammer, hit their prototype, and vanished into thin air."

    He leans back in his chair, some pep regained. "Gods, can you even imagine? Humanity lives out its time in the universe, accomplishing great things that ultimately fade away with it until our only lasting legacy is Bloody Stupid Johnson wandering the cosmos for all eternity. It's enough to make a man religious."

    He laughs. You can tell it's his first time doing it in a while. "This is nice. It's fun to have someone to talk to."

    "Aye." You get up to stretch your legs. "You want me to go make sure the brain is dead?"

    "Nah," he replies, politely declining your next offered cigarette. "You're going after the thing upstairs. No matter who wins, the brain won't matter one way or the other."

    [] Keep talking
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    [] Go after the thing upstairs

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    • Escort Mission
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    • "Speakin' of," you say, tossing another pair of packs to Micolash as you rise, "think it's about time I pay our friend a visit. Wanna come along?"

    "From what I've seen and heard, neither of you have any concept of mitigating collateral damage." He unfolds himself and stands as well. "Rather not even entertain the possibility of getting in your way." He reaches out to shake your hand, then freezes and begins patting his pockets. He freezes again and attempts to slap his forehead, only to once again run afoul of the cage. "Hang on, before you go, have you got paper and something to write with?"

    "Can't ye just magick 'em up?"

    "Thought the same thing, but no." He shakes his hand out a few times. "No guarantee they'd still exist after you left."

    "Fair enough." You grab a few sheets and a clipboard from your sleeves and take a moment to introduce Micolash to the magic of the ballpoint pen. He takes the lot from your hands and goes to work with freakish speed, his hand barely visible to the naked eye as he fills up sheet after sheet. Finally, with the pen tip nearly smoking, he hands the clipboard back to you.

    It's filled with impossibly complex equations, written out in faultless script. A page and a half are dedicated exclusively to naming variables, the rest neatly ordered in such a way that, while the actual science behind it would take three minutes of freefall just to reach your head, you can at least follow the logic well.

    "What is this?"

    "The equations to break dimensional barriers," he says with a weak smile. "What I used to get here, refined by what I learned from the first attempt."

    You frown. "Ye saw what happened. Ye sure ye want me ta have this? Sure it shouldn't stay buried?"

    "Well, I mean, you're free to do whatever you want with it, but it's my life's work, you know? I'm not afraid of dying at this point but I don't want to be forgotten. Nobody does." He bites his lip. "Even if you're the only one who ever sees this, that's enough. Forgive an old man his selfishness."

    "I can forgive a lot," you say, "and so can this guy." You insert the clipboard in your sleeves and replace it with a copy of the Good Book. "This is what keeps me goin' through all the shit. I'd be delighted if you'd take a look." You scratch your head as he flips through. "Might have ta speed-read a bit, sorry."

    "No, no, go ahead, tear that thing to pieces." He puts the book down next to him and extends his hand, the architecture behind him reforming into a spiral staircase. "Best of luck, Father Anderson. Thanks for the company."

    "Thanks for the aid."

    "Just be careful; I don't have authority over anything beyond these stairs. You're on your own."

    "Nah, I've got the LORD behind me, just like always. See ye, Micolash."

    "Hopefully not," he grins.

    He opens the Bible to the index behind you as you make your way up, flick the lantern at the top step, and walk across the metal bridge into the air. The path runs along the outside of the building, overlooking the walkways that brought you there. You see the giants from before, apparently bored of bowling, setting up a footie game. You're not sure how fair it is when the goalie's wingspan is wider than the two outcroppings they're using as goals, but at least they're having fun.

    As you glare a new batch of dogcrows and crowdogs into submission, you hear a familiar ringing on the breeze. You fill your hands, looking around for whatever straggler from the Yahar'gul handbell choir found her way here, before the tone ends mid-ring as though a shepherd's hook yanked her offstage.

    Following the path around the corner and up a set of stairs reveals what looks like the three hooded bastards you, Yurie, and Simon tore apart when you first got to Byrgenwerth. One of them walks forward, heedless of the frankly excessive amount of bayonets in your hand, and tosses something between you.

    It's a hooded head and a bell, the former of which is still leaking.

    You look down at it and back up at them, confused, and they bow before pointing you onwards. You feint once or twice in case it's a trick, but none of them make a move to intercept. Guess you beat some manners into them.

    The next set of stairs open into a small plaza, at the end of which sit three hulking pig corpses with about eight or nine times the appropriate number of eyes. Yet more hooded men stand by them, blades bloody and maces dented. A couple carry torches, which the crisp smell of eldritch bacon suggests were used to excellent effect.

    Again, they bow to you and wave you on.

    You continue along until you reach the peak; through a doorway to your right sits a massive, open area that just screams "some big motherfucker is going to land in the middle and try to beat you to death with your own skull." In front stands what's unmistakably the towering alabaster woman you saw beneath the blood moon, hands clasped before her chest and eyes locked on the empty stage before her.

    Seems like everyone but Yurie got an invitation to the Byrgenwerth Reunion.

    [] Try to talk

    [] Try to fight

    [] Just go on

    [] Write in...
     
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    • Boss Battle: vs. Mergo's Wet Nurse
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    • "So," you say, sauntering up to the woman, "what brings a nice gal like you to a shitheap like this?"

    She looks down on you, puzzled. She replies with a stream of melodious nonsense, something like Japanese mixed with Mandarin mixed with three vodka shots and a tire iron to the back of the head. She notices your own lack of comprehension raises her hands. The flesh on her wrists comes apart and blood droplets twirl into the air like a school of morbid fish. Once there's enough of the stuff, half of it forms into a miniature 3D image of a woman carrying an infant. As you watch, the other half becomes an elongated eight-armed monstrosity, which rips the child from the woman's hands and glides through the doorway before dissipating and returning to her venal system.

    Huh. You wonder if Alucard ever uses that trick to make sex scenes. You bet your Catholic ass I do.

    Annalise's words bubble to the surface of your brain and you point at the woman. "Lemme guess. Yharnam." You redirect your finger towards the doorway. "Mergo."

    Her eyes widen and she nods frantically. You furrow your brow.

    "Wait, that means ye're the one who fucked a Great One." When she tilts her head, you point to her again, say "Oedon," and rapidly move the finger in and out of a circle formed by the opposite hand's index finger and thumb.

    It's honestly something to see someone that pale and with that much blood blush. She shoots blood out once more in a transparent attempt to change the subject. This time, a tiny red you leaps at the creature from before and decapitates it, posing dramatically on the body while mini-Yharnam grabs her baby. She turns to you, eyebrows high and questioning.

    You nod. "That's the plan. But afterwards, you and I are gonna have a talk about doin' the dirty with false gods. Don't care if I have ta teach ye the whole English language first."

    You fill your hands and step through the doorway, only for the sound of marching to draw your attention behind you. The hooded men from before, eight in total, have arranged themselves before Yharnam. She tells them something that sounds inspirational and they line up behind you, weapons at the ready. With a grin, you scrape your weapons together in a shower of sparks and they follow suit, swords and maces and torches crashing together in rhythmic thunder.

    As you lead your new posse into the arena, you wonder how many of them there were when Yharnam first tried to get her child back.

    The battleground is, as your first glance suggested, near empty. The sole exception is the baby stroller in the far corner, which looks like an obvious trap until whatever's in it starts crying. You turn back to your team, the apparent leader of which nods, and motion for them to stay back. Part of you wants to send one of them in as a canary, but the potential loss of manpower just barely outweighs the amusement factor.

    You charge in, hoping for a quick and painless extraction, and something very big and very billowy swoops in to intercept. You bring your blades up just in time to catch a blow hard enough to send you skidding a good two meters. As you leap back to join your troops, who have arranged themselves in a well-drilled fighting formation, the creature hunches over the stroller and murmurs something soothing. From this angle, it just looks like a tall, lean bundle of robes, shifting slightly as the crying grows softer. Once it ceases, the thing rounds on you and unfurls itself.

    Rather than a head, it has a long, thin, empty hood that sways atop a pillar of fabric. Moonlight plays among the six sickles, dancing between the shadows of its great black wings. You smile so hard that the muscles in your neck strain at your collar.

    "Those are all goin' straight up yer arse."


    [] Write in...
     
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    • vs. Mergo's Wet Nurse: Weaponized Sociopathy
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    • The standoff continues for several moments, the creature's blades twitching in arrhythmic feints and your crew rooted to the ground in anticipation of its first real move. You offer a few fakes of your own, none of which draw a reaction. Time to upgrade it to a Mexican standoff.

    With clear, deliberate movements, you return your bayonets to your sleeves and pull out the club, twisting it like this. You point the thing upwards and fire a brief shot, which does manage to draw a flinch from your opponent. With a grin, you lower the barrel until it's pointed at the Wet Nurse's chest. The serpentine head swivels to look behind it for an instant and, despite the lack of any kind of facial features, you can tell it knows exactly what you're planning. As soon as it snaps back, anger rippling through its form, you pull the trigger.

    The thing curls in on itself, putting as much flesh as possible between the child and the beam of righteous combustion. Burning cloth spirals into the air and the pressure wave sends feathers streaming from its wings, but it does not falter. You only release the trigger when your gloves start melting into your flesh, and you don't even have a chance to swap ordnance before six sickles come screaming at you atop rapidly extending limbs. Smoke trails from one of the arms, charred and torn down to the bone, and in the compressed time that permeates your life-and-death struggles you see its grip on its weapon faltering.

    Eldritch steel clashes with Amygdalan chitin as you struggle to keep your molten weapon between you and the pissed-off beehive of blades. It's doing a remarkable job of making sure you can't block more than a couple at once, though your retreat forces it to settle for glancing blows that barely have time to bleed before they re-seal themselves.

    Just as the pace appears to be picking up, the main body closing in on you, one of its arms drops to the ground and it lets out a piercing shriek. One of your posse, a swordsman, leaps away with blade bloodied as his companions bear down on their wounded quarry. Immediately, the other five arms retract and turn the area surrounding their owner into the sort of blender 1:00 AM infomercials dream about. A torchwielder goes down without a leg, but the rest do an incredible job of either slipping just out of range or somehow parrying the onslaught.

    It makes sense, you realize. No matter how diverse the arsenal, a fighter is always going to have some patterns it prefers. You generally figure them out after getting cut to shreds a few times, but for those without bullshit regeneration, there's always spending decades watching dozens of your compatriots die to the same opponent.

    The multitasking prowess that lets it avoid cutting its own arms off shows itself as you put your weapon on your shoulder for another shot. One of the two weaponless arms lashes out and grabs your wounded teammate, alternately whacking the others with him and dangling him between itself and you.

    Points for improvisation, you suppose.

    [] Write in...

    --

    CURRENT STATUSES:

    Anderson: Peachy

    The squad: One currently bleeding out after losing several important arteries and being used as an improvised shield/bludgeon

    The Wet Nurse: One arm gone, one severely burned
     
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    • vs. Mergo's Wet Nurse: Sudden but Inevitable Comeback
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    • It's a good thing Yharnam didn't recruit any real big sonsabitches for her squad; even with the flailing that may or may not be death spasms, the Wet Nurse's current meat shield isn't offering much coverage. As it twists and turns in ways that suggest either an atypical or nonexistent skeleton, you pull out an exploding chain and wait for your teammates to get out of the blast radius.

    It doesn't take long. Four of the seven still standing leap back out of range and the remainder let loose with massive gouts of fire that leave their target smoldering. Its grip on the stricken swordsman falters and you send the chain skidding along the cobbles.

    It's a lot more adept at air hockey than you expected, however, and the previously damaged arm swipes it away, leaving it to detonate harmlessly in the empty space between you. Well, harmlessly to you, at least; the explosion further ravages the meat shield, while his compatriots use the momentary distraction to cut the wounded arm off entirely.

    You can almost see the confidence surge among them like electric current. The Wet Nurse shells up more and more, abandoning its opportunistic counters in favor of pure defense. What was careful, in-and-out potshotting from the hooded men becomes a furious push that fills the air with flames and the rasping chime of steel on steel.

    As thick fog erupts from the Wet Nurse, however, that newfound confidence becomes a virus. Overextended, out of position in their lust for a quick victory, only one escapes the next flurry unscathed. Two heads roll in opposite directions, followed thereafter by two arms from different owners. The untouched one, this one a torchwielder, drags another compatriot out of the firing line as the latter trails blood from a long flesh wound.

    "Rule fuckin' one," you grumble as the creature glares at you, "never get cocky. Unless ye're me, of course." You reach into your sleeves and prepare to trigger the Amygdalan fist, brushing aside an intrusive thought that demands to know how conservation of momentum works when the system in question resides in two separate planes of reality. "Come on, then. I'm gonna fry up those wings and feed 'em to ye in a fuckin' bucket."

    Knowing a value meal when it sees it, the thing picks up its fallen blades in its two free hands and lurches forward. For all that blinding swordwork, it's not all that quick. You've had tougher pitches to time in the biannual Iscariot softball game and that's including the Home Run Derby.

    Then a rustling to your side gives you just enough time to watch a sickle cleave through the fog, your collarbone, and several of your right ribs. Only your freak reflexes save you from losing that chunk of your torso entirely, and your desperately-triggered fist goes wide. You leap away from what looks like a perfect copy of the Wet Nurse and unleash a storm of nails and pages, only for the clone to dissipate before you can hit it.

    You hit the ground stumbling, the creature's hood following your movements as though the fog wasn't there. It looks wholly unperturbed by its two stumps or its fresh set of burns as it watches you press the two halves of your shoulder back together.

    "You kiddin' me?" you hiss. "This ain't even the most hurt I've been in the last two hours. The last bastard I fought was five minutes old and still managed ta kick my arse harder than you." When it still refuses to respond, you grit your teeth. "Two o' you, five o' you, ten o' you, doesn't fuckin' matter. I've got the LORD behind me."

    The mighty wings thrum and the fog blooms around it as it bears down on you. Man, life would have been so much easier for Mama Anderson if she'd had a babysitter this dedicated.

    [] Write in...

    --

    CURRENT STATUSES:

    Anderson: Right shoulder hanging on by a thread

    The squad: Three dead, two missing arms, one moderate cut to the chest

    The Wet Nurse: Two arms severed
     
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    • vs. Mergo's Wet Nurse: Exothermic Reaction
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    • Just as the creature rears back for a sixfold overhand strike, it vanishes into the fog and you leap away before its clone can bring down the house on your left. Sickle blows rain down as you scramble away; there's barely enough of a gap between them materializing and them trying to kill you for you to weather the storm.

    The one bright side is that the cut was so clean that you're already starting to get feeling back in your arm, allowing you to prep bayonets for a counter-attack. It's not just that slight bit of lag that's saving your ass, you realize; it's not doing a good job of leading you with its teleports, falling into the ancient trap of attacking where you are instead of where you're going to be.

    This, in turn, lets you predict where it's going to pop up next, and the rasping scream when you put a foot of blessed steel in its shoulder confirms that you didn't hit a clone. The julienned remains staining the arena keep you from pressing the advantage, which proves wise when a counter swing comes within centimeters of violently deviating your septum.

    The onslaught slows to about half its previous pace, and you can just make out the Wet Nurse standing in the center while its clone pours on the punishment. As it struggles to pull your bayonet from its shoulder, hand crisping as it does, one of the maimed men latches onto her lower body and bursts into flames, the others pouring on in a desperate suicide attack.

    The clone breaks off from assaulting you to carve away at them while the original teleports away. More limbs fly, but they put up enough resistance that you rematerialize atop the shattered walls by the time the pair turn their attention back to you.

    "Ye're goin' ta time-out, ye fuckin' bad habit."

    Nails, pages, and a good chunk of your energy reserves cascade through the night sky, closing in on their target like a swarm of pious hornets. The clone takes a desperate swing and the original goes Mr. Stabtastic again with the extendo-arms, but with so little room to maneuver on the narrow stone ring, neither manages a hit. The ward flares to life with the original in its embrace.

    You get about half a second of pained screaming before the holy light gives the flash of an overtaxed light bulb and winks out. The Wet Nurse uncovers itself and look at you with what, to your highly-tuned senses and unmatched empathy, looks like a heady mix of confusion and contempt.

    Then the fog begins to bulge, streams of light swimming through it as it warps and swells. The thunderhead roils, rumbles, sweats enough ozone to clean out your sinuses. The creature looks down at its surroundings, looks at you, and vanishes while your self-preservation instincts assume direct control and attempt to drag you behind a section of wall.

    "Oh, shi-"

    The mass of fog detonates with a sound like John Entwistle in a bass battle with God. The pressure wave peels a good chunk of your clothing off and does assorted bad shit to the bones and organs beneath, while the heat lashes your exposed flesh immediately after. You tumble back, stunned, and catch yourself on a metal spike by instinct alone. Your right shoulder, not quite mended, begins to come apart once again before you return to your senses and pull yourself back into the arena.

    Your teammates, if they weren't already, are dead as fuck, burned or pulped by the blast. You spit out some blood and wrangle with your double vision, looking for the Wet Nurse.

    What you thought was a big hunk of debris suddenly moves. Half of it vanishes, while the other straightens up with visible agony and rounds on you. Its wings are a twisted ruin and only three arms answer the call to spread in defiance.

    The crib behind it is totally untouched. One of the other arms trembles as it strokes whatever's inside with all the care a flesh-stripped claw can muster.

    There's no elegance left in its movement. It lurches towards you, dragging its blades along the stones in a shower of sparks, and you stumble to meet it in the center. Your pummeled brain can't figure out which one of you is Rocky and which one is Drago.

    [] Write in...

    --

    CURRENT STATUSES:

    Anderson: Lingering torso damage, concussion, exhaustion, internal bleeding, and bone damage

    The squad: RIP(ieces)

    The Wet Nurse: Three arms combat-worthy, severe burns, bone damage
     
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    • vs. Mergo's Wet Nurse: Falling Action
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    • Though the both of you stumble over the streams of blood and broken bits of man, you reach the center of the arena first. As the creature slouches towards you, you extend your index finger and thrust it straight down in a message all warriors instinctively recognize. It nods, scrapes two of its remaining blades together, and redoubles its pace.

    No tricks. No magic bullshit. No steps back. You are going to stand here and beat the shit out of each other until one of you falls over.

    Maybe it figures this is the only way it can beat you. Maybe it doesn't have enough steam left to chase you around. Whatever the case, you pull out the placenta and welcome it to Thunderdome with a swing that nearly takes you off your feet. Something under the robes goes crack and its blades answer back with deep, murderous cuts along your upper body. You bellow, it screeches, and the two of you trade earth-shattering hits among the smouldering ruins. It's the sort of fight you live for, pure conflict unsullied by tactics or morality. You fall into the rhythm like a daydream or a fever.

    One of its sickles takes out your eye at one point and you barely notice; it's not like depth perception matters when you know exactly how far away it is. You pull weapon after weapon from your sleeves, discarding them between strikes rather than readjust your balance. Ludwig's blade carves through the handle of one sickle, your club rips another clean from your foe's hand, and it frantically carves away at you as you put your entire body behind roaring pendulum blows. Each cycle leaves more of your flesh, blood, and bone behind, coal for a burner that's devouring itself.

    And then, suddenly, you swing and the Wet Nurse isn't there. Your weapon carries you off your feet and into the jagged mess below. You sputter in the smoke and blood and wait on wavering hands and knees for the creature to behead you. When your head remains firmly attached to your neck, inasmuch as it can ever be said to be, you squint through the haze to see it crumpled on the ground, misshapen and torn from your onslaught. You're too busy struggling to breathe to come up with an appropriately pithy eulogy.

    Beneath the baby's wails, the crackle of burning flesh, and the remnants of your left ear piecing itself back together, you hear soft footsteps from the entrance. You watch Yharnam visit each of her fallen men, or at least the largest pieces she can find, and bow. She gives you one as well, deeper than any of the others, before scooping her child into her arms. The two walk through the doorway and into the endless evening, her coos kneading the baby's cries into laughter, and you try to stand.

    "Wait," you slur, "still gotta lecture ye about fuckin' a Great One before marriage."

    NIGHTMARE SLAIN​

    A lantern rises from the earth as the world, like its fellow Nightmare before it, begins to come apart. You grab onto it and fall into its light just as the last of the colour is leached away.

    You awake, whole but bone-weary, to the familiar sky of the Hunter's Dream. It's blindingly bright after the gloom of the Nightmare, and you keep your eyes shut as you stretch several dozen kinks out of your joints. With your best smile on, you open them back up.

    "Hope," you call, "have I got a story for..."

    The sentence dies on your tongue as you look to the end of the path and the heat washes over your face.

    The Workshop is on fire.

    "HOPE!" you shout, looking frantically about.

    "I am here, Hunter Anderson," she says from behind you. You whirl to see her downcast, hands clasped together. Ebrietas sits beside her, arms and tentacles wrapped around herself.

    "The dawn will soon break," she continues, speaking as though from a script. "This night, and this dream, will end. Gehrman awaits you, at the foot of the Great Tree. Go on, good Hunter."

    [] Write in...
     
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    • The Offer
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    • You gape at Hope. Neither she nor Ebrietas can meet your gaze.

    "The Hell are ye talkin' about? Ebrietas, what's goin' on? Why's the damn Workshop on fire?"

    Hope's gaze sinks further down and Ebrietas curls further in on herself. As the flames roar behind you, you switch tactics.

    "Gettin' along like a house on fire is supposed ta be a metaphor. I should know; the Pope told me himself after-"

    "Gehrman set the flame," Hope interrupts. "It is how he marks the end of a Hunt. Go to him, Hunter Anderson. He has your reward for your long struggle."

    You bite your lip and cast your gaze between her and the fire, which writhes and warps as its feast dwindles. Blackened pages slip through growing holes, reduced to ash before they hit the ground. You reach into your sleeves to pull out a fire extinguisher, only for Hope's wooden fingers to fall around your forearm. Her grip is not uncomfortable, but there's an authority to it, as though her feet hide roots as thick as telephone poles beneath them. She stares directly into your eyes, seeing everything behind them while you struggle to read even the surface of hers.

    You match her stare for several moments before turning to your only disciple present.

    "Ebrietas?"

    Hope said Gehrman will explain, she says in her version of a mumble. She said this is all for you.

    You take a deep breath, count to five, and sag as you let it out. Hope releases your arm and clasps her hands together once more. As the roof sags and shatters, you turn towards the open gate and walk into a field of white that the ashes refuse to sully. The adrenaline your shock granted you is gone, your legs sagging and stumbling as you walk up the slope. Gehrman sits smiling in his wheelchair, the flowers around him untouched. You have no idea how he got there. You're so Goddamn tired.

    "Good Hunter," he says in the same monotone as Hope, "you've done well. The night is near its-"

    "Why'd ye burn the Workshop?" you grunt. You ran out of patience for Dollar Store Crypt Keeper monologues hours ago.

    His smile shakes, but stays moored. "Oh, that? It'll come back. It always does. It's more symbolic than anything else." He crosses his arms on his lap and leans forward. "I can't even imagine what you've been through tonight, Father Anderson. What you've accomplished is nothing short of incredible. Now, I offer you a reward:

    "The peace of death that was stolen from you."

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    • Boss Battle: vs. Gehrman, the First Hunter
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    • A cocktail of confusion and anger shoves your exhaustion aside and plops itself down in the hole left behind by your adrenaline dump. Your legs lock and your fists clench, soreness kept at bay through sheer moxie.

    "What? No. Fuck that and fuck you." You straighten up to your full height, looming as hard as possible. "Ye know me. Ye really think I want peace? I've still got work ta do, ye one-legged git."

    His smile crumbles, replaced by the purest agitation you've ever seen on his face. Every part of the tableau, from his crumpled hat to his peg leg, says that this should be amusing. Instead, it's inching towards terrifying.

    "You've done your job, Anderson. The Nightmare's gone and your disciples can lead Yharnam through whatever comes after. I am giving you the opportunity to rest."

    "Like Hell. I ain't restin' 'til the LORD Himself comes down and tucks my arse in." You turn around and storm back towards the gate. "I'm takin' Ebrietas and goin' ta the Chapel. We'll come back when ye're ready ta cut the bullshit and just talk ta me like a normal Goddamn human being."

    As you march down the slope, grumbling about the old man's AARP Morpheus routine, a heavy chime stops you in your tracks. You look back, half-expecting Hope to be standing next to him for a musical number about the desirability of death, and your eyes widen.

    Gehrman's on his feet. Foot. In his hand sits the most twisted, overcomplicated bell you've ever seen, the sort of thing you'd get if St. Paul's Cathedral got hit with a mortar and five drunkards tried to twist the debris together into a single bell with their bare hands. You can't even pinpoint the note; it seems to run through the entire spectrum of hearing, plus a few frequencies reserved for bats and sound technicians with delusions of grandeur.

    "Do you recognize this, Anderson?"

    "No, but I think the more pressin' issue is the fact that ye're fuckin' standin'."

    "You should," he says, crushing your attempted aside beneath his oratory heel. "It's how I brought you here.

    "Haven't said:
    You think you may have heard a bell of some kind before you died but that could easily have been the sound of the butler's heel shattering your face.
    Click to expand...
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    You said:
    You walk back through the doorway as Gehrman begins organizing the dresser, rearranging a few vials and bells.
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    Been said:
    He returns the black blade to a shelf alongside a trio of small ornamental bells.
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    Curious said:
    He stretches to place a trio of bells and some tools back on the upper shelves.
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    Click to shrink...

    Father?" said:
    The man in question wheels himself around at your approach, placing the streamlined chunk of Amygdala he was tweaking on a shelf beside some bells.
    Click to expand...
    Click to shrink...

    Your mouth bobs up and down. The portions of your brain dedicated to quips and one-liners put up "Back in 15 Minutes" signs and run for the liquor cabinet.

    "You've been useful," Gehrman continues. "And you have one last chance to keep being useful."

    You pull out your bayonets and take a fighting stance. "I don't want ta do this."

    "It doesn't matter what we want. Only what's required of us." He raises his beloved black blade and connects it to the wooden handle on his back, resulting in a massive scythe that he holds with the ease and care of a lifelong violinist. "Tonight, Gehrman joins the Hunt."



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    • vs. Gehrman, the First Hunter: Duel of the Fates
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    • As the flames and smoke dance behind him, Gehrman simply walks towards you without a care in the world. Even the slight limp from his peg leg looks more like a swagger than a sign of weakness. You crouch down and burst forward; reach ain't worth shit in a phone booth. Collect call from your boot to his ass and he's accepting the fucking charges.

    He doesn't so much step out of range as drift, moving with unearthly lightness as he dodges your swings and weaves his scythe through the gaps they leave behind. This man is keeping up with you, the strongest human being to ever walk God's green earth, with a gardening implement. He doesn't have Maria's speed or the Orphan's sheer physicality, but they'd almost be extraneous next to his skills. No wasted movements, every swing at the ideal speed and angle, every twist in your onslaught deduced and accounted for in half a heartbeat.

    It's kind of sad, you think as you trade glancing shots to the chest. Yharnamites had decades, maybe centuries to get their shit together and not one of them could match the original.

    But you haven't spent the last who-knows-how-many hours with your thumb up your ass. Rapid strikes that would have decapitated you in London seem almost slow to eyes that had to keep up with Arseface, snath blows you recognize from Logarius' arsenal failing to crack your defenses. There's frustration in his eyes, though it doesn't reach his limbs. If he thought he could polish you off that easily, he's got another thing coming; nobody in this world or any other is better at staying in people's faces long after their welcome is worn out than Alexander Fucking Anderson.

    Finally, you get just a bit too close and he leaps back. As he does, you pull your club from your sleeves, twist it like this, and take aim. He dodges the initial blast, as expected, but you keep the trigger down and sweep it across the field until the grip starts to burn through your gloves. Gehrman seems puzzled by your high-impact botany, but his smile creeps back onto his face once the resultant fires start huddling together into a proper conflagration. You spread your arms wide as the burgeoning inferno battles the still-burning Workshop for oxygen.

    With the clock now ticking, he glides forward and the two of you begin your clash once more. The fires are working in your favor; his avenues of escape are rapidly closing. His backsteps gain a touch of desperation, the vaguest hints of panic spreading through his counters. Right as you corner him between two patches of flame, however, he meets your charge with a headbutt that flattens your nose across your face. You stagger back and he slams the base of his scythe into your throat before carving through your ribs as though they aren't there. Your legs give out when you try to swing back; he got some of the squishy bits. Gehrman looks down on you as you spit up blood and force yourself to say upright.

    "Nothing to say, Anderson? You've never been at a loss for words before."

    "Fuck you," you manage through your buckled windpipe.

    "That's it? 'Fuck you?'" He rears back and drives his peg leg into your solar plexus, doubling you over as you struggle not to choke on your own blood. "You can end this whenever you want, Anderson. All you have to do is stop. Put down those bayonets while you still have some dignity."

    You hack the gnarliest, bloodiest loogie you can manage at his face. He responds by hitting you with a left hook that produces an unhealthy number of crunching noises in your jaw. You stumble back, offering what could, with the correct lighting and a dedicated PR campaign, be termed a grin.

    "Dignity?" you slur. "Don't know the fuckin' meaning o' the word."

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    --

    CURRENT STATUSES:

    Anderson: Heart and lung damage, broken nose, broken jaw, windpipe damage

    Gehrman: Superficial wounds, beginnings of burns on lower body
    Adhoc vote count started by Tricia on Jun 9, 2017 at 10:59 PM, finished with 40 posts and 16 votes.
    • [x] Use the explosions as cover. Hop back into a non-burning part of the field and cast a Holy Ward, wrapping bible-page armor around your torso and limbs. Pray for the ward to spare followers of Christ and burn non-believers.
      [x] Whip one of your exploding bayonet chains at German's Scythe, trying to tangle them in his Scythe.
      -[X] Then break the Old Hunter's Bone (insert appropriate quip considering it's probably Gherman's tibia) and go back in. Take out his legs, get him on the ground.
      [X] You feel like you could use a hand. Or two. And you've got just the thing...
      -[X] Store the Amygdalan arm in the clutch of the Amygdalan spring-loaded fist, then have that grip the Amygdalan club. Hit him with the arm of a false god wielding the arm of a false god wielding a club made out of a false god. He'll be too busy being impressed to dodge.
      -[X] Use your Blue Bullshit Bible Bubble to shield you so you can get in close enough to hit him
      [x] Whip one of your exploding bayonet chains at Gehrman's Scythe, trying to tangle them in his Scythe.
      -[X] Use your Blue Bullshit Bible Bubble to shield you until you get in close enough to hit him.
      -[x] Taunt Gehrman for his hypocrisy. Point out that he's got a s**t-ton more reasons than you to lay down his weapons and accept his death...and yet he refuses. Because he too has a duty to fulfill...and because this fight is f**king fun!
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