"…I see." My lips twisted into a frown, "So…that's how it's to be, isn't it?"
Salt Meter + 5
I stand up, a man unbowed, looking into the classroom ahead, my hated foes before me.
Those who followed in my footsteps, behind me.
Salt Meter +5
"Is there a problem, Mr. Chron?" My androgynous nemesis said, smiling. He knew what was to come. If I was any judge, he welcomed it.
"No." I replied calmly, eyes slowly narrowing, "Not…quite yet, there isn't."
"Give it time."
The teenaged girl next to him lifted her knee up, a palm out facing me, before beckoning in challenge.
Salt Meter +5
Crowley smirked, "Not that much time."
"No…" My lips stretched into a grin, turning rictuous as they did so, "Not that much at all."
I saw white.
SALT METER MAX
A pressure flared upon my next, needles of burning agony feeding into my spinal column as I felt the force of my resentment overwhelming rationality, logic, emotion, love, truth, reality.
Searing heat, molten salt flew through my veins, filling my limbs with resentment. Like a beast, my nostrils flared and as I breathed in the bitter air I felt the burning sensation gather into my chest.
It condensed.
It pulsed.
SALT 200/100
"DON'T THINK THIS WILL END EASILY FOR YOU, TRASH!"
"Oi, oi, Kami-yan, I'm thinking we should get out of here." The blonde annoyance muttered askance at that one brat that refused to kill Aaron Gentles despite my best efforts.
"TOUCH ME WITH YOUR FAPPING HAND KAMIJOU," I growled, my fading vision focusing on the boy as he visibly flinched, "AND I WILL FLUNK YOU SO HARD YOU'LL BE CALLING THAT MIDGET GIRLFRIEND OF YOURS SEMPAI."
My chest burned, and I could feel the heat burning through my clothes. An alien mass forming at it's source.
"I'm afraid that I'll have to agree with Mr. Chron, Mr. Kamijou." Crowley replied, his eyes never leaving me. Next to him the girl, Kanzaki, reached for her sword.
"
I believe it's time for you all to leave." An indistinct silver shape wavered besides the one who was neither man nor woman, sinner nor saint, adult nor child, but an absolutely certain
pain in my ass.
"
NOW!" My salt boiled over, bitterness erupted from my chest, boiling through my veins!"
TEHK-SETTER!"
My heart was made of salt.
SALT 195/100
"A transformation?!" The freak's hand reached through the air, grasping around his misshapen stave, "And to think, it isn't magical in nature!"
My world turned white, distantly my mind noted the evacuation of a number of young teens, and that part of me slowly went silent as the distractions departed.
"NANASEN!" Lines of agony registered themselves on my body, but it was nothing compared to this grudge.
THIS GRUDGE!
My back arched back brutally.
THIS RESENTMENT!
The alien crystal sunk back into my chest.
THIS HATRED!
The salt hardened in my veins as my heart crystalized, shuddered.
THIS BITTERNESS!
It pulsed, erupted through my flesh without mercy, a fresh hell that still wasn't enough.
THISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALTTHISSALT Power thrummed, rationality discarded. Sodium became new flesh. Chloride new lifeblood.
⌈ ⌋ body burned.
Sheathed in crystalline chitin.
⌈ ⌋ eyes cleared.
Hidden behind opaque lens.
⌈ ⌋ fingers ached.
Barely restrained anger.
⌈ ⌋ body unfolded.
A new and terrible height.
"I am going to
hurt you." My eyes flashed dangerously, and a silent hiss filled the air as steam escaped through the burning agony that was this new form.
Crowley simply smiled, "Try to keep the damages down, won't you?"
New muscles shifted, new bones sprouted from my back, "That depends on you."
His/her head tilted to the side, silver hair flowing in an unnatural backdraft, "We'll just deduct this from your bonuses Mr. Chron." The staff twirled and I put a name to the form: The Rod of Blasting.
Reality became force and launched a blow of it's own accord.
SALT 185/100
The building split around me, reduced to so many splinters and debris. But it meant nothing to me…Because I knew this form. Inhuman strength. Unyielding rage. The alien meant to subjugate man in turn subjugated.
"TEKKAMAN…" I breathed, digging my armored feet into the ground, buying time to find the right name.
But there was never any other option.
"CHRON!"
Unseen crystals upon my back flared, emitting force to arrest my momentum as I weathered the aftershocks of Crowley's first strike. So distracted by this change in circumstance that my second opponent was able to close the gap and strike.
"NANASEN!" Kanzaki Kaori cried, whatever interpretive dance she was doing long discarded…And ponderously I saw the titular seven wires of her strike erupt from her longblade to close in on me. A speed impossible for an ordinary human to match. But for this moment, by whatever force had cursed me to deal with this frustration, I was no longer
merely human.
I had become a Radam, and for Radam…
"Humans are merely lower on the food chain." The wires struck against my armor, wrapping around it. I flexed.
"Even those who are praised as a 'Saint'." Her boot-clad feet shifted, and she was gone, moving at speeds that I would have marveled to see under better circumstances. But…Under
these conditions?
"Too slow." Pale white claws, a mockery of my human digits, closed into a fist in the air to my right. Instead of grasping together they met the flowing black obstruction of the girl's hair.
SALT 180/100
"
INNOCENTIUS!" A gruff voice ground out behind me, and my vision turned hazy and red.
My left arm swatted out, and a giant of pitch and flame was severed in two by the force of my backhand. The titan swiftly reformed, bearing it's cross of fire…But it couldn't harm me. Not when I was like this. Yet even so, it was a risk to the building and with it, my paycheck. It had to go. The first step to that was to find the mass-printed rune covered paper slips that formed it's basis. Thankfully, the spell's angsty user had made himself comfortable nearby.
"Stiyl Magnus," I gripped Kanzaki tighter to better grab his attention, "I'm not in the mood to play with oversized brats." The girl was tough though, she was definitely making progress prying open my hands. I'd need to get rid of her quickly so that I could finish with fucking Crowley.
"Yeah, well…" The boy's voice echoed through the corridor, but he couldn't hide his bitterness from my alien senses. No one could, "My boss wouldn't let me live it down if we lost two irreplacable resources in this backwater nation." He spoke into one of his cards, standing above me while smoking one of his tacky cigarettes.
"You have no idea how much I sympathize." Damn edgelord.
SALT 170/100
Two thick wires erupted from the floor beneath his feet, wrapping around his body before pulling taut, dragging him through the ceilings above me into my waiting clutches.
"But it's only polite to speak to people face to face," My armored face loomed down upon him, and the pain in my veins ebbed at the unsettled look on his face. Kaori chose that moment to finally pry one of my fingers loose, so I slammed the Necessarius partner's skulls together before tossing them down the hall.
I couldn't afford the distractions, not when I was so close!
SALT 160/100
"CROOOOWLEEEEYYY! WHERE ARE YOUUUU!?!?" My screams echoed through the skies, and my eyes caught a glimpse of flowing green robes in the air outside. Fires burned from my shoulders, and I shot upwards, tearing through the building that dared to stand in my way to get my damn wallet back. I could see him. My hand reached out to pluck his head off at the neck! I had him! I HAD HIM! IHADHIMIHADHIMIHADHIMKILLHIMKILLHIMKILLHIM!
A muffled boom echoed through the air before my vision lurched, my head shook, and I missed the smarmy little shit by a hair's breadth before slamming into the building behind him.
"Ah, Professor Kirihara, well timed." Crowley's voice leaked out, sounding entirely too smug with himself.
"Yeah, well, I could hardly let you be killed off by this young one before our transaction was completed could I?" A synthesized voice responded, somehow managing to convey exasperation…And I blinked, looking into the air next to Crowley…Where suspended between twin pillars of fire hovered…A fucking dog.
"Well then, young man…" The synthesized voice continued, and there was no way that the mutts attention wasn't on me, "Tell me, what do you know about combining robots?"
Clarity burst through the dam of my fury, a horrified realization as I recognized the new arrival.
"…Fuck."
"You're god damn right, kiddo." The dog, no, Kihara
fucking Noukan barked out a laugh, and in that moment the air was filled with the roar of jets and sunlight reflecting off clouds polished steel, hurtling towards one another with impossible speed and dread purpose.
SALT 150/100
I only had a moment! And Crowley wouldn't let me have it, that androgynous bastard! He once again tilted his weapon towards me, and I hastily dodged as the world beneath me shifted, drilling itself a hole where I once stood.
I needed a weapon, and my body answered. Crystals erupted from my arms, forming a massive glaive with a crackling of energy. Curved inwards like a reversed scythe, I recognized the shape and inwardly groaned.
My left hand grasped the inside of the pommel, where the handle lay, and I stretched my new weapon before me as new instincts guided my body towards the optimal form. Light condensed from the tips facing me, and I pulled back the ridiculous looking laser string.
In the span between one second and the next, I let fly my counterattack, an emerald light forming into an arrow of eldritch energy, hurtling through the sky at speeds far surpassing anything else unleashed this fight. I thought of Courage, and a bloodthirsty grin spread behind my expressionless mask.
"Stupid dog."
The skies filled with a bright explosion of green energy, shockwaves shattering windows and more fragile constructions within eyesight…But I knew in that moment I'd failed. My ears heard the humming of servos and twisting of gears.
"You're making me look bad."
"Can't be helped, young man." The synthesized voice of the greatest of the Kihara replied, "Transforming robots are a man's passion, after all."
The smoke cleared, and a hulking amalgamation of chrome and wire shifted in place midair, numerous appendages and tubes turned on me with lethal intent. Crowley's stave held in front of the freakish construction of mad science, it's tip smoking from where it had blocked my failed attempt to prevent it's existence.
"Round two?" Was his only response, and my vision went red.
SALT 140/100
Molten fury coursed through my beating heart, my mouth tore open with a scream, "UAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!" and I tore through the air after the little shits. Lightning arced through spiked appendages, and the thump of munitions being launched from tubes filled the air…So I threw my weapon into the oncoming strikes, the alien weapon piercing through the mobile armor with it's unnatural keenness. I couldn't keep getting distracted!
"CROOOOWLEY…" I hovered in front of the Chairman of Academy City, staring him in the eye even as he remained calm and collected, "CROOOOOOOOWLEEEEEEEEEEYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!" Next to him the air shifted, and a golden dawn began to take form, Telesma heeding his summons.
I punched him in his smug face, and my hand came back bloodied.
He was no longer smiling, and in that moment I felt a hundred, thousand, million tiny limbs lock into place in the air around me, pinning me down. To my side the hovering mecha had shifted shape, taking on a more mantis-like appearance where a number of oversized gatling guns hung ponderously.
They spun, and in an instant orange lances of flame were shot from gatling railguns, punching me through the skies once again.
SALT 130/100
I tumbled from the assault, the rounds failing to pierce my armor but their sheer kinetic energy driving me back nonetheless despite my best attempts to right myself. Twin cables lashed through the air, wrapping around the spinning weapons, their sinuous, alien construction keeping them whole even as they entangled and interfered with the sensitive technology powering the ensnared weaponry. Whatever forces were at work proved too much, and this configuration, too, exploded.
The barrage ended, I righted myself as the fireball of the mecha crashed into the streets below, my eyes locking with Crowley's. His face now clean, but expression no longer amused. I didn't have much time before whatever other forces he had in play struck at me. I'd have to end this. Quickly. My back flared with heat and pain, gathering energy as I prepared to charge the bastard. Wordlessly, he appeared to accept my challenge.
Whether he truly did or not was irrelevant. It didn't matter now.
SALT 120/100
"SALT!" Crowley's eyes widened as my armor shifted, becoming more streamlined, "INTRUUUUUDE!" White energy flared around me, forming a corona. I launched forward, taking a ponderously evasive flight path, moving faster than even my last offensive as burning pieces of slag and pristine technology hurtled at me in a futile attempt to impede my coming. Whatever I didn't manage to dodge simply vaporized as it impacted against my chitinous form.
In an instant I was upon him, Crowley's eyes wide with disbelief as the air around him grew hazy…But by then I had gripped his neck with one hand, the other occupied itself with keeping his weapon pointed away from me.
"YOU WON'T ESCAPE!!!" I roared, voice warbling inhumanely as two panels behind my shoulder blades popped open to rise above my transformed collarbone.
SALT 110/100
"Let go of me, you fool!" The would-be puppetmaster ground out, and I felt my lips widen in a feral, eager grin. Two more panels painfully popped out from my back, their edges clearing the expanded sides of my ribs.
"Do you have any idea what you're doing?!" The sky began turning dark, six points of eldritch light twinkling as they drunk in the light and forces surrounding the two of us.
"I know exactly what I'm doing!" Not really, but at this point I couldn't really give a fuck.
"LET GO!"
"DISAPPEAR!" The world turned pitch black, save for the six emerald stars illuminating us both.
I roared.
"VOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL-" The air stood still, and the radiance behind my back reached a new blinding intensity…I could scarcely contain my excitement at what was to come, "TEK! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" Color returned to the world with an eldritch dawn, washing over my hated foe…And I eagerly awaited the new day it would bring with it.
Salt 100/100
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[] 1d20
[] 1d100
I hope you didn't think I'd have a mental breakdown from a salt overdose, did you?
rofl:-
