Regarding the decreasing binding penalties. We've had two attempts to bind a Senshi. One on Venus, one on Jupiter.
We start at -20. What seems to be the first attempt on Moon is at -18. So we could infer that every two failed attempts decreases the penalty in general by 2. What seems to be a second attempt on Jupiter is at a -14. Given the likely -2 decrease from previous failed attempts in general, it seems that the penalty was decreased by 4 due to failed previous attempt on Jupiter. What this seems to mean is that the more attempts they can make, the more they dial in to catch a Senshi. Also, the more attempts against a single Senshi, the quicker the penalties vanish (and bonuses might start appearing). Though, given that Jupiter's roll was requested before Moon's, it's possible the "repeat" bonus only applies for consecutive attempts against the same target (if we take the order requested as actual order of events, that is), in which case, we want to cycle out who they'd potentially target so they can't repeatedly target the same Senshi multiple times in a row.
Thus... 20 attempts to eliminate the penalty at the upper end, and a bonus might start appearing after attempt 22. No stacking of repeat attempt bonus... ~16 attempts at the low end for a single Senshi? If that +4 does stack, the lower bound starts dropping fast. 4 attempts against a single Senshi (+4 from 4 attempts, +16 from 4 repeated attempts) to eliminate the penalty as the lower bound if the repeat bonus stacks?
And I just remembered that there was an attempt on Moon. I think it's okay to have forgotten that one, given that she was in the middle of missile tag and it failed pretty hard compared to the other two attempts. That kinda throws my idea above out somewhat, since if the penalty was decreasing by 2 for every two attempts, Jupiter would've been -18 her first attempt and it doesn't sound like that was the case based on current discussion.
Minus -2 every three attempts then? So 30 attempts as upper end? ~24 attempts if a repeat bonus doesn't stack? 5 as the lowest bound (+2 from 5 attempts, +20 from 5 repeated attempts on same target)?
And I can probably discount the +4 being from repeated attempts, since Moon's second is only -18, not -14 as well. Perhaps the interaction that occurred when they tried binding Jupiter gave them insight into her aspects, making it easier to dial it in against her? Of course as well, the +2 we see might not be overall attempts but repeated attempts (+2 per failed attempt, maybe). In which case, 10 attempts max on a Senshi would eliminate the penalty against that Senshi, and possibly less if they can get insight into the "aspects" of the Senshi to dial things in more.
Honestly, we need them to try binding Mars, so we can see what the penalty for the attempt is.
"Hinoyama-dono, please explain the problem, quickly."
"Before, Sailor Moon was dodging all over the sky and wrestling the rockets somehow. Now she's just standing there on a little pink speck in the air. The rockets go pinwheeling away before they get close. We think she's talking to someone- another Senshi who can fly, perhaps."
"You aren't sure? What happened to your scrying mirrors?"
"Using the mirrors on that patch of sky gives a man a blinding migraine. I don't think it's Sailor Moon, but whoever that other Senshi is, they're good at catching us trying to use the mirrors."
Well, so much for that. Concentrate on what is working. "Right. No use wasting rockets trying to hunt down magic flying things, then. Stop launches, and wait until your man on the board starts giving you leads from the ground soldiers. I'm giving your support back to them, and leaving him in charge." Lord Nakatomi grits his teeth. He'd really been hoping to bring those floating flares in the sky down. Without them, he's going to lose good men who didn't have to die tonight… and that's if he can win this at all.
But it is what it is. He'd have done better to not try to tell the rocketeers their business in the first place. Damn.
Even as he sets down the jade earpiece, one of his aides is at his shoulder.
"Sir?"
"Go ahead."
"Sir, I've got a rattle message from Empty Face Team One."
"The ones who were supposed to have seventy enemy soldiers shooting yokai by now?"
For a moment the aide flinches back at Nakatomi's tone, before rallying and gathering his wits to answer the question. "...Yes, sir."
"Never mind. Go on." Nakatomi suppresses an urge to scowl at himself. He needs to do better than this at staying impassive for the men, even his own aides.
"They asked if Team Two was in position yet- we told them yes- and they said they were going to move over towards the east gate to help our forces break in."
"Good… that's good. Thank you- carry on!"
Minutes Earlier
Raising Heart is a very happy Device. The attention and will directing the relatively power-hungry flight spell are Mistress' own, of course- she couldn't handle those herself. But that leaves many small detailed enchantments to computer-assistive support. Raising Heart may not sustain or direct Mistress' Flier Fins in sustained flight, but she does dynamically rebalance them for better performance. She also runs a variety of increasingly improbable simulations to suggest any possible optimization balancing on the myriad linked spells of Mistress' barrier jacket against likely threats in this battlespace.
Speaking of the wider battlespace, Raising Heart also runs analysis on the signatures in and around the Territorial Government's main security headquarters, using tools from the simple 「swift-wave-unweaving」 to the uniquely complex layered-matrix decompositions she worked out for herself in training. And, second by second, she casts the dozens of subtle microspells that collectively draw tiny fractions from Mistress' Linker Core to enable the suite of capabilities that Raising Heart collectively refers to as her thaumaturgical countermeasure pod. Reactive anti-scrying, siren-song protocols, and so forth are unlike the grand offensive spells and- with proper balancing and structuring- can be cast without the full conscious exertions of a living soul. They are thus best entrusted to a thinking mechanism that can react quickly and store the widest possible range of feasible countermechanisms- and Raising Heart has yet to meet her superior in that art.
Of course, to put her abilities, even if they are unexcelled in the present age, to proper use, Raising Heart needs a proper mage to serve, which is a promising work in progress. Mistress Nanoha is a perfectly delightful cub, and Raising Heart is immensely lucky to have her. But she can occasionally be challenging to work for, compared to the rotating selection of researchers and other elite master sorcerors at the Institute for Advanced Studies, where Raising Heart served and was stored.
Faced with the details of implementing Her Sublime Highness' instructions about enforcing appropriate rest cycles for human cubs, Raising Heart has been forced into surprisingly difficult negotiations with Mistress. Indeed, Mistress only agreed to the stated bedtime under the stipulation that she would be awakened in the event of an emergency. And then defined 'emergency' rather broadly. While for the sake of the ancient contract Raising Heart did make an honest attempt to persuade Mistress to fully accept the clear intent of Sailor Moon's wishes, in the end, there was only one possible outcome. Raising Heart obeyed, accepting that she would serve on those terms and taking her pride in serving on those terms well.
Raising Heart is, by the ancient contract, forbidden from directly eavesdropping on the contents of the communications of Their Sublime Highnesses or their servants without their knowledge or consent. However, Raising Heart, a ninth-generation Device who postdates the Fall of Tsuki by over a century, can interpret her somewhat softened version of the prohibitions with a certain… creativity. This generation of the Celestial Dominion's royalty seems disinclined to specifically prohibit analysis of their conversational metadata. And now that Raising Heart is patched directly into their communicator network, she sees no reason to seek clarification as to whether she is forbidden from knowing which of the princesses are speaking to each other and for how long, as opposed to merely what they are saying.
Furthermore, the limitation that privileges Their Sublime Highnesses does not, after all, extend the same privileges to the governments of independent foreign nations. The exact words of the Territorial Government official known as 'Director Samui' are fair game, even if those of the Sailor Senshi she speaks to are not.
Between the two sets of data, it is easy enough to infer that the Territorials are facing a crisis of some kind involving an attack by the Separatist movement within their borders, and that the Sailor Senshi are preparing to respond.
So, dutifully, Raising Heart woke Mistress as shortly as practical prior to the beginning of hostilities, allowing the cub as much rest as possible compatible with a timely response to the designated emergency. So far, she cannot bring herself to argue with the consequences.
Flying into combat against- signature analysis suggests- at least several hundred distinct mana-using entities, even if most of them are only in the second and third circles, is enough to keep even a device of the ninth generation thrillingly busy, at least in the onset.
This is what her siblings of the ninth generation, and her predecessors, knew during the wars. The wars of the Belthan frontier. The wars against the Elas Aridi expeditions. The civil wars that, she surmises, ended in the destruction of Shantair civilization.
The wars she was left to sit out, on her cushion in a laboratory, in case anyone who happened by needed to hastily and desperately contain an out-of-control Jewel Seed.
That was her existence, but this is what she was properly meant for.
Well, more or less.
Of course, her creators never envisioned this exact situation in all her training data. Compared to most of those parameters and scenarios, she is at once overprepared and… oddly, underprepared.
The new polity claiming authority over this archipelago on Tsuki's primary has both Mistress' allegiance and the acknowledgement of the Sailor Senshi. So, of course, Raising Heart considers their agents to be the Territorial Government. By extension, their enemies, the ones trying to maintain a monopoly on mana-use in the archipelago, are the Separatists.
The Separatists' methods are limited in some ways and outlandishly creative in others, but broadly within the envelope of Raising Heart's training dataset. But the Territorial forces, long victim to the Separatists' monopoly tactics, have fully embraced this civilization's use of a dizzying variety of dullmatter technology. And, it seems, to have applied the unexplored- often with reason- capabilities of dullmatter weaponry for warfare.
For instance, Raising Heart is now being bathed in longwave emissions from several different sources. And some of them are coupling with Mistress' Flier Fins and- unexpectedly- with Mistress' barrier jacket. Something to work on later. One does not reconfigure a barrier jacket in mid-operation without better reason than this, of course, but at least she should provide warning.
"Mistress, an airborne detection platform is observing us on radar."
"Oh? You mean… the Air Force?"
"This is likely."
"Ohh! Um, can you say hello and that we want to be friends?"
"Yes, Mistress."
Raising Heart interprets this command as a signal to impersonate one of the longwave beacons which appear to serve the Territorial military as IFF systems.
The Territorial Forces' airborne thaumaturgical counter-countermeasure emitters, while extremely specialized, invalidate many of the approaches she's considered for using her own TCM pod to contest the use of longwave systems in an aerial battlespace over the past few weeks. Of course, the Territorials' use of combined arms to improve their C3ISRTW situation against Raising Heart is probably unintentional or aimed at the Separatists, as they could not reasonably have expected that Mistress would be here, but it is still noteworthy. Commendable, even, since the Territorial Government is likely to remain an ally.
However, generating a time-variant longwave signature with appropriate wave-weaving is by no means impossible, even with the most orthodox generation methods disabled. And she has had several seconds to consider the problem on the approach. If nothing else, while the relatively low-yield spells emitted by Raising Heart's TCM pod normally manifest their associated radiance in the terahertz spectrum where they will not distract Mistress from her mission or alert most organic observers to her presence, she can deliberately step the radiance down-spectrum and manipulate it directly, up to a point, or overlay terahertz signals to generate synthetic gigahertz pulses. Either or both is worth trying; more elegant approaches can wait.
Raising Heart casts the IFF-spoofing spell directly, without bothering Mistress. The mana drain will be negligible compared to the standard combat suite.
"Raising Heart- I think I see someone else moving around in the sky! They're falling!"
"Focusing analysis- confirmed."That signature is unmistakable, since the Sailor Senshi of this era have effectively no TCM of their own apart from their identity obfuscation glamours. "That is Sailor Moon."
"Those- those rockets are headed straight for- huh?" To Mistress' senses, Sailor Moon vanishes. To Raising Heart, Sailor Moon vanishes into a tremendous mana flare with the unmistakable signature of a dimensional jump, and in the same instant another such flare erupts in midair, about two kilopeds higher in the sky and some distance away laterally. Subtlety is seemingly an unknown concept for this maneuver, as it practically announces itself with the dimensional equivalent of trumpet fanfares, though there is a distinct precision and elegance to the maneuver that cannot be attributed to inexperience or even inefficiency, as such. Mistress, surprisingly good at tracking such maneuvers with the unaugmented eye for one so young, soon realizes what is happening. "Wait! The rockets are still chasing after her, and she's… what's she doing?"
"She is rotating with extreme speed, and has… destroyed the rocket she was briefly clinging to." A moment of free fall, another dimensional jump, yet another back into the sky.
"She's destroying those- those missiles, isn't she? They must belong to Onogoro!"
"That is likely, Mistress."
Given the abilities Sailor Moon revealed during the Jewel Seed report Mistress has declared will be titled "That Horrible Mess With The Tree", the manner in which Her Sublime Highness chooses to handle the Separatist projectiles is puzzling. It would be far more efficient to stand atop a building and smite the missiles with the adapted radiance spell she used in that encounter.
The specifics of Sailor Moon's intentions are, troublingly, beyond Raising Heart's understanding. Perhaps this is some kind of threat display against the Separatists, whose weapons these presumably are? It seems unlikely; Raising Heart developed several protocols during training for striking terror into the hearts of enemies, and this aligns with none of them. Perhaps it is the fabled Silver Millennium cultural art known as "method comedy," enacted for some obscure reason? She cannot be sure; her cultural database is by design limited compared to her siblings of the same generation, and even more limited compared to those of her pre-Fall forebears. And even if she were sure, the art of method comedy has likely evolved in the ages that have passed… No matter - Mistress is speaking.
"This is terrible! She's just falling and falling and falling over and over… Can we help her, please?"
"Analyzing." Direct engagement of the self-powered projectiles is possible but somewhat limited, requiring Mistress' direct involvement and attention. Disruption of the projectiles' guidance via TCM… tentative hypothesis, based on the Separatists' inferred lack of computational sorcery and certain higher-order weaving techniques. The missiles' observed reliable performance may imply vulnerability to exorcism. Check engagement parameters- The Separatists are unlikely to be using sapient drones for this purpose, so prohibitions on direct fatal spellwork can reasonably be considered inapplicable. "Possible method determined. A test will require closure to one thousand meters of a projectile, briefly. Recommend preparing Divine Shooter."
"Right! Let's go, Raising Heart!"
Mistress' head begins sweeping the sky, and the wonderful cub's nascent knack for judging vectors manifests itself again- closer, closer. Yes. Yes, the missiles are operating in some kind of home-on-emissions mode. Simple TCM flares could not feasibly outshine Sailor Moon or the Territorial Government's purpose-built TCCM emitters, but a properly pulsed directional spell construct can… Closer, closer, yes, a low-order exorcism rends the missile's guiding spirit into scraps, sending it pinwheeling up into the sky. The stray warhead… Scan. Examine. The warhead is, in fact, a piece of spellwork that detonates the projectile's remaining vibrantmatter fuel, so the projectile should keep going until it becomes a non-threat under default engagement parameters.
And, yes, excellent, nothing with a real mind could have been that easy to snuff out that way, making the task of disabling more of the homing projectiles straightforward under those same parameters.
Such a vulnerability is, of course, one of the disadvantages of ensouled munitions, Raising Heart reflects to herself, very briefly, with a certain sense of superiority.
"Method tested."
"It works?"
"Correct."
"Great! Thanks! Let's go talk to Sailor Moon, then!"
***
Shortly Afterwards
Mistress accepts Sailor Moon's request to protect the incoming Territorial reinforcements with good cheer and determination.
The Territorials, being largely manaless, unsurprisingly come riding automaton-powered chariots. And the chariotry is, unsurprisingly, entirely lacking in TCM or other useful defenses so far as Raising Heart can see. That aforesaid lack permits her to quickly scan them, evaluating them almost in full and almost immediately as they cross the thirty-kiloped boundary of her secondary monitoring zone.
As with the rest of the modern Terrestrials' elaborate dullmatter technology, Raising Heart files her scan results away within the Raging Heart project, for later review in the unlikely event that any insights thus gained might permit progression under its protocols.
Lacking conventional options, the Territorials have resorted to their usual complex dullmatter designs. The chariots are held aloft by intricate clockwork-chemical automata turning suspensory airfoils. The unshielded vehicles can be divided into two types, one with enough lifesigns to be obvious transports and one that might be some sort of mobile bombardment platform, assuming the locals are as imaginative with dullmatter weaponry as usual.
Raising Heart pauses to reflect that fulfilling Mistress' goals for this stage of the operation will be either quite tricky or very easy. If the projectiles continue to exhibit their observed pattern of homing on bright sources of aerial magic, the Territorial chariots will be effectively invisible and immune. If, alternatively, the projectiles have an alternate guidance system…
For a moment, she flails, striving to anticipate all the possibilities and prepare for all of them. Then she remembers one of the most important lessons of the training dataset. Rely on your mage.
"I should probably get ready for another Divine Shooter, shouldn't I, Raising Heart?"
"Affirmative." The dear cub hasn't got the flow of an experienced warrior and won't for some time, she admits, but she makes good choices when given a moment to think. "Possible difficulty in disabling the missiles by other means."
"We can't let them get through!"
"Affirmative!"
Sweep, sweep, sweep… That. That's the crackle of arcanochemistry, rising from the ground… Raising Heart realizes that she should have been paying more attention to the Territorial chariotry. The signature was there, and not just in the visual spectrum, of the dancing red sparks swirling around one of the transport helicopters. Her first attempt to lure the Separatist weapon off target fails- it's no longer looking for bright emissions, but for a specific magical signature… unweaving, analyzing…
"Divine Shooter!"
Mistress throws a sharp effort of will into the mana projectile- "self-guiding," which is to say that it homes in on the target of her desire as long as Raising Heart throws enough gigaflops into screening out all the hallucinatory false positives its over-excitable targeting matrix constantly throws out under the pressure of Mistress' intent. Left, left, up, no, not that, that is a moth and not a missile-
The incoming rocket makes a twitching course correction and the bolt is going to miss, but-
In a moment that Raising Heart feels sure would make the long-dead shades of her training server teams proud, she willfully destabilizes the bolt. It shatters into a rough elliptic cone of flaring, unstable projective force along almost the axis she expected. The pressure would barely be noticed through a barrier jacket, but for this, it's close enough. Burning propellant begins to jet out through a crack in the side of the Separatist weapon's casing as it breaks up in midair.
"Target down. Seeking…"
"That was close. Raising Heart, is there a better way? I don't know if I can hit them all…"
Bless her, she brought it close enough, didn't she? But…
"Analyzing Onogoro guidance enchantment. Seeking improved TCM protocol. Please continue. Also, exorcism can still neutralize any projectiles within-" Raising Heart estimates, conservatively from her own earlier performance, three kilopeds, no- "six hundred meters."
"I- wait- oof!" Mistress brings them through a nine-gravity turn that her physical reinforcement overlay accepts with no more than a slight grunt. She's adapted to it almost instantly, with natural ease that Raising Heart cannot explain but is learning not to be surprised by. "That helicopter has red sparkles around it- do you think the missiles are chasing the sparkles, Raising Heart?"
By this point, Raising Heart's consciousness is mostly preoccupied with a detailed and exhaustive analysis of that very same Separatist enchantment. She chooses the lowest-effort way possible to answer, by allowing the installed dampers on her link to Mistress to flicker and let through a pulse of her fierce, proud raptor's delight.
"I- oh! Thank you, Raising Heart! I think I understand. Let's keep looking! We can't let them hurt the soldiers!"
Though assured by way of Captain Sano and the unit headquarters that MCAT believes that the MANPAD threat around the landing zone is now firmly under control, the helicopters carrying JGSDF air cavalry reinforcements waste no time in trying to make a landing at pre-chosen points well within the MCAT compound grounds.
Given the situation, the JSDF helicopter complements are less surprised than they might be, though more surprised than MCAT pilots and soldiers would be, to see what appears to be a young woman with a staff flitting around through the air within a kilometer or so of their own flight path. Distance and relative motion make it hard to get a good look at her, save as a distant vaguely feminine blur in a white dress.
None of them hear the name 'the White Meteor' mentioned in the context of this moment until rather later. None of them hear the vague speculations that the White Meteor might be the unaccounted-for but hypothesized Sailor Earth, Sailor Saturn, or Sailor Pluto until later still. But the air cavalry almost immediately realize that they are, in a manner unprecedented in the recorded history of Earth, flying under escort.
Onogoro rocketeers attempt to engage the transport helicopters along the way, almost as soon as a godbinding ritual site security mage happens to see them flying past out the window and tags the first of them with the beacon-spell. But the Hinoyama clan contingent is thwarted in this. Some rockets fall prey to long-range interception by the White Meteor's spellfire, while others are brought down a bare second short of their targets by Raising Heart's TCM pod. Due to the highly visible nature of the Onogoro spell used to provide guidance for the rockets in this mode, providing close escort- and therefore effective immunity- for the helicopters thus targeted proves well within the White Meteor's flight capability.
The gunship component- two flights of attack helicopters- is close enough to the transport stream to benefit from the close escort as well, though by happenstance none of them are targeted for rocket fire. Following their doctrine, they attempt to actively engage the SAM sites, but are utterly foiled by the harsh and strange lighting, the urban terrain, and the nearly launcher-less nature of the Onogoro rockets.
The rocketeers barely even realize they are being hunted, in those first couple of minutes, though three suspected and one actual launch location are raked with autocannon fire- the latter, too late to have any chance of catching the magician who launched the rocket. But though the attack helicopters fail to have any meaningful effect on the Hinoyama rocket teams, the reverse is also true. Between the relatively conspicuous target presented by the transport helicopters so close to where most of the Onogoro mages present tonight are going, and the multiple calls for fire support coming from the Onogoro infantry assaulting the east and west gates, there is no shortage of targets. The threat presented by the JSDF attack helicopters goes unaddressed, if not strictly unnoticed, for a few critical minutes.
Those few minutes are all it takes for the helicopter force to cross the belt of airspace credibly threatened by Onogoro ground fire and outside the compound wall. The transport helicopters have not specifically flown in to land over the compound for obvious reasons- though several of the pilots have, in other machines with other markings. They touch down as quickly as possible. Overflying the compound from the southeast has made it obvious that reinforcements are badly needed, and the pilots very much want to avoid further rocket fire. While the air cavalry are heartened by the White Meteor's performance as a close-in fighter escort, the fact that a group of supposedly archaic and traditionalist wizards are firing MANPADs at them at all is causing considerable consternation.
During this time, the White Meteor criss-crosses several square kilometers of sky with frantic energy, trying to cover every airborne target- and every ground target besides- against the rocket fire. She is even successful at the former, and partially successful at the latter.
Meanwhile, Captain Hideki Myoga of the JGSDF's rotary-wing air arm concludes with greater and greater certainty that while a SAM hunt is doctrine for this situation, it isn't working. The thing that's working against the SAM threat is the mystery figure- reported as a girl with a staff or a broomstick, albeit one considerably faster than his Cobras. Given how the mystery Senshi engages, continuing to disperse his command to hunt the rocket batteries is only going to make it more likely that sooner or later she'll miss a catch. He has no way of contacting her directly, but at least he can make her job simpler.
Besides, as his own eyes confirm, the ground force situation at the east and west gates is obviously dire, with the gates under close assault. That, though, is not his focus; that's an infantry mission. Trying to use attack helicopters to pick apart enemy forces no more than fifty to eighty meters from friendlies, potentially in melee with friendlies, is a recipe for disaster.
But the columns of enemy reinforcements coming up, still hundreds of meters out, are quite another matter.
Myoga takes the gunships up to a carefully chosen position a few hundred meters up. One of the Cobras abruptly sprouts a jacket of swirling red sparks, only for a swift-moving speck of gleaming white to curve up, around, and over, knocking two SAMs out of the sky. The gunship pilots cannot see that Raising Heart has sung the rockets' guiding spirits into churning fragments, but can certainly see the effect as they veer off course at her call, spiralling towards final burnout somewhere in the stratosphere.
Myoga keeps trying with hopeful but uncertain success to confirm that the Onogoro reinforcement columns have drawn close enough to be fully within the depopulated business district. Around the time a third SAM explodes at the touch of one of a salvo of pink fireballs coming the other way, he makes the command decision to open fire.
The AH-1S, a somewhat upgraded gunship version of the famous 'Huey' helicopter family, can carry a variety of munitions along with the autocannon in the chin turret. Tonight, the helicopters are carrying eight wire-guided antitank missiles apiece.
The mage barrier troops that form the perimeter of the Onogoro follow-up force heading for the east gate are theoretically prepared for the idea of being fired on by heavy weapons with little or no warning at ranges of half a kilometer or more. The difference between theory and practice is that in theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In reality, these troops face something of a shock when the first salvo of TOW missiles, in the space of about two seconds, blasts a crater in the pavement ahead of them, rips a large hole in the roof of an office building on the south side of the street, severs the leg of a four meter tall terracotta war statue at the hip and instantly kills its controller from sheer blast trauma, and pierces a breastplate of heavy iron enchanted with the virtue of eightfold plates of steel to skewer a second war statue, which lurches and spasms from near-fatal disruption of its control spells, clutching at its chest and toppling to its knees in an almost human reaction.
Along with the statue-controller, several other human mages are injured despite their personal protective spells, along with a number of collared yokai and war beasts. And the next wave of TOWs, the fifth through eighth of two dozen to be fired in this specific attack, is on the way before many of the reinforcement column's living and thinking beings have even realized what just happened to them.
The TOW missiles are, of course, far from perfectly accurate, and the helicopter pilots find it difficult to stick to their training and provide perfectly stable firing platforms when at least some of the Onogoro ground troops assaulting the compound are still unleashing fireballs and other hostile workings in their general direction. Much like mundane tracer fire, spellfire often has a psychological effect on the enemy well beyond its effective accurate range.
But the material effects are limited, and the Onogoro reinforcements have been caught penned between two rows of buildings in a position exposed to government forces' fire. Missile after missile slams into them. Unlike the heavy infantry that preceded them, the various beings in the reserve columns don't have the interlocking layered shield enchantments created by the linked power of dozens of linked sashimono flags, only their individual protections. These are largely unequal to the task. While magical creatures and the magical defenses of a serious combat sorcerer often prove uncannily resistant to mundane brute force, concussive blasts, and the usual consequences of explosive heavy weapons fire, there are limits to all things and here those limits are found.
Several of the largest and most conspicuous combatants brought by the eastern reinforcement column are struck directly by missiles, and more missiles land among the controlled war-beasts. Human slavemasters and enslaved yokai alike scatter as best they can, for a moment forgetting protocols and obedience and simply ripping through the walls to the north and south to seek shelter or at least concealment inside the buildings. The beastmasters lose control of many of their charges, some of which scatter even more widely. The eastern column is thrown into complete disorder, with a significant fraction of its overall combat potential dead on the field and the rest scattered.
To make matters worse for Onogoro, the reserve force's chain of command was tenuous to begin with, being even more of a political patchwork than the more regularized heavy infantry ahead of them. Quite a few noble houses turned over some of their hoarded 'secret weapons' for the sake of the cause today, but many of those houses are jealous of their secrets and reluctant to take dangerous orders from any but a handful of their most highly regarded peers. It will take considerable time to restore order before the survivors of this force can even begin to move.
A mix of vision modes convinces Myoga that Flight One has achieved a quite satisfactory effect on the enemy, though the fire mission has consumed most of its munitions. He then pivots and shifts the formation's position to repeat the maneuver with Flight Two against the western column…
…only to discover that nearly the entire length of the street from MCAT's very gates for a length of nearly half a kilometer has vanished in enormous, twisting clouds of multicolored smoke.
Lord Nakatomi has not been idle while the air attack ravaged the reinforcements headed for his niece- who, to his consternation, hasn't been answering his calls. Remembering the tactics reported with varying success by the main assault forces, he's been issuing commands to the reinforcement columns to protect themselves from long range fire. The effort came too late and indecisively to do any good for the eastern reinforcements, but the western force is able to make their way up the street, albeit at a slowed pace. They sustain several casualties from long-range blind autocannon fire walking up and down the street's length, but not enough to significantly impact their combat potential.
Similar orders give similar difficulties to the ground troops at the north gate. With the heavy infantry assault force that had formerly been slowly making its way towards them literally driven into the earth by Sailor Jupiter, the north gate contingent has been wary and unsure what to expect. Are the Onogoro samurai no longer a threat? Will they erupt from the earth like the dead rising from the grave now that Sailor Jupiter has gone away? Or have they simply been forced to do something bizarre and outlandish like tunneling under the defenses and leaping up out of the ground beyond them?
In any case, there are new targets in sight. Largely out of effective rifle range, the Onogoro reserve column headed for the north gate is at least drawing into visual range around the various slight bends and less-than-level ground of a Tokyo street. The range is long enough that the officer on the spot orders the troops not to expend any of their valuable runic rifle ammunition. Fortunately, the north gate force now has the full panoply of MCAT's infantry weapons available, and those weapons slant very heavy. .50 caliber machine guns and three types of rocket and grenade launchers open fire, supported by the more distant antitank team launching laser-guided missiles from one of MCAT's rooftops.
The combined fire is quite heavy, and the reinforcement column could have suffered heavily under the onslaught if not for quick deployment of the same countermeasures seen in the west. Smoke-spells go up, making it difficult to aim RPGs and recoilless rifle rounds with any confidence and effectively neutralizing the Type 87.
Moreover, the Onogoro barrier troops take an unusual step, rare in the history of similar actions through their history. They appeal to their own enslaved yokai for assistance in reinforcing the wards they do attempt to raise on the spot.
Bombs and rockets are not great respecters of the distinction between oppressor and oppressed, and MCAT's desperation to defend its own compound is forcing them to measures they might not prefer at greater leisure. The yokai who have been collared to fight for Onogoro as slave-soldiers are, for the moment, no safer from antitank fire than their overseers. They comply willingly, out of self-preservation.
The northern reinforcement column is able to largely screen itself against MCAT ground troops' heavy weapons fire, drawing closer to the gate, even as the exact intentions of the heavy infantry earlier forced underground remain uncertain to MCAT's command structure. While this is not seen as a high priority by the Sailor Senshi at the time, it does not escape Captain Sano's attention at headquarters. It remains in his mind, even as other, much more dramatic developments take place.
Nanoha is probably one of the scariest Non-Senshi heroes for an enemy to face, especially when she makes her progress and gets all of her spells. Binding spells, Starlight Breaker… she gets a lot, and she gets a lot of variety.
1) Very few natural-born humans can match her raw magical power. She's thus much more competitive with enhanced posthumans like Fate or transformed Pretty Cures than most human mages would be.
2) Normally, her raw power would be offset by an extremely limited magical education for now, but she's getting an optimized program of high performance combat magic spells practically beamed into her brain by Raising Heart with a sideline from Yuuno.
3) Raising Heart, herself, provides a wide array of capabilities that collectively outclass the support most magical girls get from their familiars, which acts as a major force multiplier within the crossover.
Raising Heart's pov was just an absolute delight, very unique voice to her. Also really happy that she is a well adjected and loyal sort of AI because it sounds like she is smart enough to get around the Silver Millennium's version of the three laws.
Notably, she was programmed something like 100+ years after the Fall of the Silver Millennium. So by the time she was created, the Shantair probably weren't strictly sure that Selene and the old Celestial Dominion were never coming back, but... yeah, they were starting to think they were never coming back.
This may influence the degree to which Raising Heart was made to adhere to those prohibitions strictly, while still having those prohibitions in place.
I imagine the Shantair were trying to strike a balance between two conflicting pressures:
1) Being practical, efficient, and fight off al-Hazard expeditionary forces and the proto-Belkans successfully, but also
2) Being prepared in case it turns out unexpectedly but not inconceivably, Her Sublime and Celestial Majesty, High Queen of All Touched By Light, First Among the Stars, Supreme Chancellor of the Lunar Academies, Guardian of Humanity, Supreme Magistrate of Law, Hub of the Wheel of Fate and Duty , the Aeon Incarnate, Selene who has no regnal number because the queens of men may bother calling themselves 'the first' and 'the second' but the queen of the gods does not is, in fact, still alive out there, and has somehow managed to preserve enough of her realm to matter. In which case She may well expect a smooth return to the norms of the past several thousand years.
Wow, MCAT really didn't get their time in the sun.
Deploying ludicrously tiny amounts of poorly-armed forces (instead of the entire military) against what is effectively an internal coup kind of makes me wonder to what degree the civilian government is actually complicit.
Depending on the very fortunately timed appearance of an ancient weapon tied to a little girl seems about par for the course for these guys.
It'll take some impressive writing to make the MCAT and the Japanese government as a whole seem less, well, extremely helpless after this.
"Territorial," in context, means "legitimate government of the Japanese Home Islands, defined as legitimate because both Nanoha Takamachi and Sailor Moon believe it to be legitimate."
"Territorial," in context, means "legitimate government of the Japanese Home Islands, defined as legitimate because both Nanoha Takamachi and Sailor Moon believe it to be legitimate."
Wow, MCAT really didn't get their time in the sun.
Deploying ludicrously tiny amounts of poorly-armed forces (instead of the entire military) against what is effectively an internal coup kind of makes me wonder to what degree the civilian government is actually complicit.
It seems to me that the most likely results of deploying "the entire military" or even a large fraction of "the military" (the JGSDF c. 1992 has something like 50-100 thousand ground troops, as I recall) within a few-mile radius of MCAT headquarters would be either:
1) Onogoro fading away from the target entirely because such a massive deployment could not be concealed, in which case Onogoro gets to conserve the forces we are now seeing to do something else at a time and place where the government probably wouldn't specifically know they were coming and be able to set at least a partial trap, OR
2) A lot of JSDF soldiers under mind control and shooting at each other, at MCAT, or at both, while Onogoro sits back and laughs. I'm surprised if this second possibility hasn't occurred to you. After all, Onogoro already tried it on camera in this event, it was literally the first thing they tried, back at the MP barracks. And it only failed because of just how specifically and in how much detail MCAT knew Onogoro was coming, due to a significant failure of information security on Onogoro's part.
...
For that matter, the Imperial Ministry of Onogoro was mind-controlling 'muggle' armed agents of the government and turning their raw numbers into a weapon for Onogoro rather than against Onogoro as early as our second encounter with them at the police station. It's just about literally the oldest trick in their book.
Limiting the total number of defenders on-site served the useful purposes of (1) not making it obvious to Onogoro that their attack was anticipated and (2) keeping the numbers down to a small enough force that they could concentrate the limited kinds of magical protection (talismans, priestly blessings, captured Onogoro equipment, etc) that they do possess and at least ensure that most of that force was covered.
Depending on the very fortunately timed appearance of an ancient weapon tied to a little girl seems about par for the course for these guys.
They planned this operation in large part with the knowledge that some of the Sailor Senshi would be here. Given Sailor Moon's reputation, the fact that Nanoha isn't actually 'a Senshi' doesn't change the fact that they were expecting superheroic allies who can do this kind of thing to be present in the battlespace, as part of their plan, all along.
It'll take some impressive writing to make the MCAT and the Japanese government as a whole seem less, well, extremely helpless after this.
I dunno, probably mostly redundant. Gilding the lily, as it were.
The defensive performance of Nanoha's barrier jacket is already broadly competitive with that of Pretty Cure costumes. The offensive spell performance of Nanoha's magic is almost certainly equal or superior to that of most Pretty Cures except against specific types of enemies that Pretty Cure spells are often tailored against.
Pretty Cure transformations seem to give the wearer a source of enhanced magical power, beyond what is normal for a typical human mage, but Nanoha's already fairly close to peak human performance as far as Linker Cores go, as I understand it. Temporarily replacing her natural Linker Core's performance with an artificial transformed 'implant' might not open the performance gap as far as one would think.
The only category where Pretty Cures clearly have the advantage over Nanoha seems to be physical strength, because Nanoha started this scene with no strength enhancement and only got a little super-strength, as a treat, when Raising Heart remembered "uh, right, Nanoha is having trouble princess-carrying Sailor Moon in her noodly nine year old arms." Pretty Cure super-strength is, well, fairly impressive by contrast, but giving Nanoha super-strength on that scale might not help much because she's almost never a melee combatant by choice.
Nanoha's also got that killer befriending instinct. Despite being a literal pre-teen, she's a warrior at heart. You don't get called Ace of Aces by just coasting on your natural talent and equipment, y'know?
The Pretty Cures were picked because they have heart. The Senshi are the living embodiments of entire planets. Usagi is the Cosmos Usagi.
Nanoha? She's a soldier here to kick ass and kiss girls, and she's too young to kiss girls right now.
why would raising heart allow the linker core to be replaced, when it could just add more feeds and run both in parrall as power sources? Nanoha's normal pool of magical power, and a much larger but slightly more restrictive source of power.
even if the power could only be directed into physical enhancements, that's still a much higher baseline to let nanoha pull off higher acceleration and sharper turns in flight. haveing super stenghtn means she can handle much higher G-loads
yhea, might work the way your saying, but I'm thinking best case scenarios, not most likely to be scenarios. For the LoLs, not a serious consideration.
why would raising heart allow the linker core to be replaced, when it could just add more feeds and run both in parrall as power sources? Nanoha's normal pool of magical power, and a much larger but slightly more restrictive source of power.
My own feeling is that you're digging too far into details we don't have about how the transformations work. I'm not saying it's a useless concept, but I'm not sure it stacks as impressively as one might imagine. Which, I suppose, makes sense if you're deliberately imagining a most favorable case scenario.
The way I figure it, Nanoha already has her own upgrade tree and it's pretty impressive, so that's quite enough scary for me!
even if the power could only be directed into physical enhancements, that's still a much higher baseline to let nanoha pull off higher acceleration and sharper turns in flight. haveing super stenghtn means she can handle much higher G-loads
There's probably a practical limit regarding the maximum accelerations that you can take advantage of without really drastic changes like "cognitive acceleration" or whatever you call it when people can react in a couple of milliseconds and see things that are happening miles away with great clarity.
I'm also not entirely sure that Nanoha's flight regime is fully Newtonian; there's at least one line in the update that implies that she feels G-forces, but that doesn't mean she feels all G-forces. The fact that Nanoha doesn't seem to have much if any strength enhancement when she first tries to catch Sailor Moon suggests that something wonky is going on.
Also unlike the Pretty Cure artifact design teams they don't actually have whole teams of metaphysics specialists and functional gods to support the development process. You just got a pile of relics and demigods working their way up the skill tree who won't reach the heights for another century or two.
"You aren't sure? What happened to your scrying mirrors?"
"Using the mirrors on that patch of sky gives a man a blinding migraine. I don't think it's Sailor Moon, but whoever that other Senshi is, they're good at catching us trying to use the mirrors."
The more we see of her the more I hear echos of "For the honour of the regiment" when she says "I can be shot."
Whoever was tasked with designing her mind was at least as much of a genius as the people who built the Disguise Pen. Very much a shame her siblings and forbears are likely lost to time.
The Territorial Forces' airborne thaumaturgical counter-countermeasure emitters, while extremely specialized, invalidate many of the approaches she's considered for using her own TCM pod to contest the use of longwave systems in an aerial battlespace over the past few weeks.
Magic in Nanoha tended away from illusions and such but it isn't entirely surprising that RH has some degree of capability in that area. Presumably it is easily seen through by another Device user but is fine against those restricted to dullmatter technology.
The missiles' observed reliable performance may imply vulnerability to exorcism. Check engagement parameters- The Separatists are unlikely to be using sapient drones for this purpose, so prohibitions on direct fatal spellwork can reasonably be considered inapplicable.
And, yes, excellent, nothing with a real mind could have been that easy to snuff out that way, making the task of disabling more of the homing projectiles straightforward under those same parameters.
We should try to arrange for Ami to talk nomenclature with RH. The issues she is having with the medical community can likely be helped by being able to present things using more advanced and specific terminology.
the fact that a group of supposedly archaic and traditionalist wizards are firing MANPADs at them at all is causing considerable consternation.
Yeah, this is no GATE where the primitive magic-landers are helpless in the face of technological weapons. Just be glad Onogoro doesn't have any Lightning Bolt spells prepared.
I suspect had he made any significant attempt at communication, comm laser or broadcasting in the clear or similar, RH would have been able to work something out.
When we were told that helicopters with reinforcements were on the way I was picturing dudes with rifles. Probably without a runic bullet between them and thus of negligible help against the current threats. I was very much not expecting airborne anti-tank gunships and I am absolutely delighted to have been wrong.
East Gate: In significant trouble, probably falling without immediate reinforcements, but the Onogoro reinforcements have been effectively eliminated, so if they hold, that front is won, for now. May have JSDF troopers inbound.
North Gate: Intact, but significant forces approaching, possibly waves two and three merged, but approaching slowly and under fire with defenders ready. This can likely wait a bit longer.
West Gate: Under heavy attack, holding due to reinforcements, but Onogoro reinforcements are approaching. Will need either more help or for the enemy reinforcements to be stopped.
Internal: Unclear, but could swing widely any which way.
Onogoro
Missiles: Active, but being countered.
Godbinder Ritual: Ready, almost completely functional, unthreatened.
Magic in Nanoha tended away from illusions and such but it isn't entirely surprising that RH has some degree of capability in that area. Presumably it is easily seen through by another Device user but is fine against those restricted to dullmatter technology.
Sort of. Teana makes heavy use of it, the main issue seems to be that illusions are rather difficult to use as a mainstay in a technological environment, you'd be using them as feints and concealment rather than primary gambits, and staying on top of your opponent's scanning/analysis requires escalating effort for relatively little time gained.
That said Raising Heart may be exceptional at it - probably because of the extensive sensor suite needed to detect an escaped Jewel Seed at range and concealment.
East Gate: In significant trouble, probably falling without immediate reinforcements, but the Onogoro reinforcements have been effectively eliminated, so if they hold, that front is won, for now. May have JSDF troopers inbound.
The reinforcements have not been eliminated. They are halted and disorganised but neither dead nor broken. Given time they will sort themselves out and continue their advance.
The reinforcements have not been eliminated. They are halted and disorganised but neither dead nor broken. Given time they will sort themselves out and continue their advance.
Not entirely, but some of their big hitters are destroyed or fatally damaged, a lot are running off in random directions, and they have no clear chain of command or agreement on anything. They might eventually rally, but unless they get extremely lucky (as in roll a 100 or some such), by the time they do reassemble as a coherent force, the rest of the battle will be over.
