Rhongonminiad
Waiting for the end of the Weebs
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I have not seen JAWS, but I would tell you that sharks are not that cool.
Oh well, to each one their cup of tea.
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Fate/Fake Knight (Fate double SI fic)
- Thread starter Firespit
- Start date
Oh well, to each one their cup of tea.
Assblaster5000
I trust you know where the happy button is?
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Ayyy, new chapie.
Ironically I was actually listening to a Touhou mix as I read this part.
Ironically I was actually listening to a Touhou mix as I read this part.
Main Character Heights
Chapter 8: October 31st, 2011
Firespit
Getting sticky.
- Joined
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Chapter 8: October 31st, 2011
The building the Department of Modern Magecraft resided in was many things, 'new' was one of them. That was to say, the building itself was originally built less than a century ago. With the recent expansion of the department, Modern Magecraft had grown from only having less than a handful of teachers and less than ten classes to a properly manned and functional department. The proclivities of its members also led to them having more modern events, such as the Super Official El Melloi II class Halloween Party.
It was quickly decided that Flat was no longer allowed to pick lots for getting the chance to name things.
Amanita had picked a costume that, now that she thought about it, felt a bit redundant when she was surrounded by mages. Well, she looked cute even if things got a little cold. She gave a short prayer to the building's central heating. "Well this is something."
Barbara, for her part, was sitting cozy in the much warmer rendition of Koakuma's outfit. She'd even gone plus ultra, coating her hair in tiny red alumentum crystals and using her magecraft to make the wings on her head and back move like living things, "If you mean their costumes, aye."
The pair had immediately gone for some punch and noticed that about half of the class had attended, which meant that the other half was either busy, boring, or being stuffy mages (but they repeated themselves). She spotted a few faces they had become acquainted with.
Holan, short for Holanrouvia Trista Diolone, was notable in mundanity: a store-bought werewolf costume. That in itself wasn't surprising as he was only a second generation magus. He waved at them before going back to talking to a black haired girl whose sight alone gave Amanita a flashback.
__________________________________________
Amanita looked at the desktop computer in a magus' apartment, confused and horrified. Every single thing that could be replaced with a photonic crystal had been, turning it into the most expensive piece of junk she had ever seen.
_______________________________________
"You look tired just looking at Luvindra" Barbara ribbed at her.
"For a bloody good reason. Especially since she's using photonic crystals as costume props." Amanita wasn't sure why Luvindra's costume was a suit of armor with the damn things embedded in it, "I bet that's an improvised mystic code."
"Magi."
They looked over and both saw that Yvernecarisburdoa was wearing a magical girl outfit. They seemed to have taken a liking for confusing their classmates. It still made them look cuter than they had any right to be.
"Amanita, Barbara, it's good to see you here." Their gaze moving between the two, "Luvindra said that she wanted to talk to the both of you regarding photonic crystals and other alchemically related stuff, but it looks like she's caught up with Holanrouvia."
"Yverne, don't tell me she-"
"Amy."
With a groan of exasperation, Amanita wasn't going to do the usual routine, "Ybernecarisburdoa."
"I still don't know why you can't just take them shortening your name." Barbara chuckled, before turning to the esteemed genderfuck, "Anyhow, watch me. Hey, you."
"Because Flat came up with it." The shorter girl huffed and crossed her arms, much to the fake demon secretary's amusement. At least the work she'd done to get Barbara subconsciously moving her wings in tune with her mood was showing itself.
After making a show about thinking about how Barbara addressed them, they finally said, "I guess we could all be a bit more informal today, so 'you' is acceptable. Where were we?"
"Luvindra got something one of us said offhandedly and ran with it, didn't she?" Barbara reminded them.
Yverne nodded, "Ah, right, something about how phones nowadays are basically computers and that they are 'wearable' computers."
"And I thought, hey, how about I make an actual wearable one." Luvindra said, approaching the group with Holan tagging in behind her with an exasperated look in his face. "It works pretty well if I say so myself. Been telling them about my amazing work Yverne?" She smacked them on the back, causing Yverne to stiffen.
"Luvi." they said, waiting for a reaction from the boisterous girl but getting nothing.
"So it's a mystic code then? What does it do?"
"Oh! Let me show you!" Luvindra said before promptly vanishing from sight, which made everyone present take a step back.
"That's pretty cool, is it done mostly via magecraft or alchemy?" Amanita asked as she looked at the space where Luvindra used to be.
There was a short moment of silence and … nothing.
"Luvi, you can go out of stealth now." Holan said, "You've made your point."
More silence.
"Pft, please tell me it's what I think it is." Barbara cackled, covering her mouth with a hand.
"That idiot." Holan brought up his palms to his face, "I can't believe she fucking managed to make something this functional in a week."
"She's both a genius and an idiot." Amanita groused, "Fuck's sake, what if something actually happened to her and we can't find her."
"Maybe if the spell is draining her dry, wait until the body appears and give it back to her family." Yverne shrugged.
Barbara and Amanita shared a look. Fucking Magi.
"...Well, if she was idiot enough to give it a hard-tap into her Od she deserves it." Barbara said after a moment. That was like plugging a blood engine directly to your heart. "Anyhow, two realistic options. One, it has a battery and she just used her circuits to activate it. That means she'll show up after a while. Two, it has a mana siphon."
"If either of those is the case, shouldn't she have tried to touch any of us if we can't see nor hear her?" Amanita tapped her chin with her fist as she thought. "I refuse to believe she was dumb enough to make her costume impossible to remove on her own, but I will make fun of her regardless if that's the case."
"Maybe she's trolling us. I swear I'm never letting her hear the end of it." Holan complained.
"I don't think she would appreciate being called ugly like that." Yverne said seriously.
"Right, dad said that mages weren't good at keeping up with society." Holan looked up at the ceiling thoughtfully, "How do I explain this?"
"Doing or saying things that will intentionally get a rise out of someone." Amanita said.
"One-sided flyting. Or… hm, how was it called when bards were so scathing it gave people welts? Satire?" The alchemist offered in terms that the magi would hopefully understand.
"A real art form." Amanita nods sagely.
As the group deliberated and tried to figure out exactly how Luvindra disappeared, the party continued all around them, others turned to look at them on occasion but it seemed like no one was able to spot the girl in the armor. At least until the doors opened and a short girl wearing heavy and concealing clothes in various shades of gray and her face always at least partially obscured by a hood. Gray. However, today was a little different as she was wearing a bright red hood and was carrying a box of pizza in her hands. Behind her one Waver Velvet came in carrying four more boxes.
There was something about getting delivery pizza that made even the multitude of magi turn their head towards the arrival. All twenty-three students without exception. Everything seemed normal until Gray approached the group.
"Umm, I was wondering why you four have post-it notes on your forehead that have'Dumb' written on them?" The girl asked shyly as she pulled her hood tight around her face.
The group of four looked at each other confused, "I believe we do not have anything on our foreheads." Yverne said, tilting their head.
"I, uhm, sorry." Gray pulled back and made herself smaller, "I was just asking because it was weird you weren't mentioning them."
Holan looked thoughtful as he looked at the rest, "Why would we not notice it?"
"It may be possible that she made them invisible to us as well." Yverne suggested.
"But she isn't wearing those notes. Wasn't the damn thing supposed to only affect her?" Barbara said, before pausing. Shit, Luvi had never outright said anything on the topic, had she? They could be dealing with something more esoteric here. "Gray, have you seen Luvindra? As in, in the last minute or so?"
"N-No, but by the way you're talking… did she do something?" The skittish girl asked.
"Activated a slapdash mystic code." Holan let out a sigh, "I did warn her."
The other students had begun to gravitate towards the stack of pizza boxes as Lord El Melloi II, he glanced at each one of the group and let out a groan, "So youve managed to get yourselves into trouble in the little time I was gone."
"If we hadn't you'd be checking for pod people, sir." Barbara huffed with a smile, wings twitching in amusement.
"Her costume was a set of armor, is that right?" He looked thoughtful.
"Yup. Was very excited to show us, or rather, not show us I guess." Amanita shrugged and adjusted the huge hat on her head.
"And yet we see different things that are not directly related to it." He reached down to his cigar case, before stopping, he probably wouldn't need to use the one that helped him think clearer for this. "Excuse me." He said, putting a finger on Holan's forehead and then pulling it back, hand empty.
"I didn't feel any post it note against my forehead if that is what you were going for teach." Holan sounded somewhat confused.
"No, that wasn't it. Tell me, how do you perceive my hand to be like right now? Go into details."
"Holding it up, fingers slightly bent."
"Your thumb is touching your index finger."
"Gently balled up into a fist, but not hard enough to grip something."
"Fingers completely straight, as if you've waving at us."
"Holding a post-it note with all of your fingers."
"And with that we can conclude that whatever it is Luvindra's spell was, it deals with one's perception. Her armor seems to be a pivotal aspect of the effect. Judging from the origin of her magecraft, it is likely to be based on the story of Sir Balin. Specifically the aspect of the story where an invisible knight slays someone under his protection. Said invisible knight being the brother of the Fisher King."
"Does that give us any clues as to how to turn it off? I'm not familiar with the legend." Barbara chimed up, mostly because all the magi were too proud to.
"Well that was not the important part. Amanita, how does one induce illusions and effective hypnotism into another and how do you clear the effects?" He asked
"At a fundamental level, it is inducing one's own thoughts into another person via magecraft. The specifics vary by tradition, but any long standing families should have ways to prevent the mental pollution that comes with. As for resisting its effects, it is affected by basic magecraft defenses to the point that it is difficult to affect a trained magus. In short, run mana-"
"Od" Barbara corrected.
"Od, through your circuits and it should help." Amanita finished.
"Correct, I tried that when I realized what was happening, but the effect is quite powerful." The professor grumbled.
"Let's give it a shot, then." Barbara said.
They closed their eyes and activated their magic circuits with a breath, Amanita imagined a key in her mind and turned it. "Burst." she muttered under her breath.
Meanwhile, in Barbara's, a bottle of cava had its cork fly off in a geyser of froth. She didn't bother speaking, a snap of her fingers all the focus she needed to give her system a deep cleanse.
The homunculi duo finally saw what was really going on since Luvindra activated her armor. As the others looked at them and asked what was going on, the pair noticed a puddle made entirely out of punch slowly flow outwards from the center where Luvindra was seated cross-legged with steam coming out of her armor.
"Ah crap." Both of them said at the same time and rushed to her side.
_____________________
"Aaaand they vanished." Holan said.
"Probably because they're directly interacting with Luvindra." El Melloi said.
______________________
As they got closer, they noticed that Luvindra was dripping wet with punch and the steam coming off from her armor seemed focused entirely on the embedded photonic crystals. "Hey, you two, can you finally notice me?" Her voice was strained, and the two noticed the glittering glow of magic circuits on her skin.
"What happened?" Amanita asked.
"Well, I was having the time of my life even if I couldn't turn my armor off…then teach came in with the pizza and…well, we were standing right by the entrance so everyone looked at me and it started to affect them too." She pauses to take a deep breath and hissed, "Lets just say that's when things started to get hot."
"Why don't you just take the armor off?" Barbara asked even as her crest lit up like a christmas tree, eagerly siphoning off the heat to make hunks of shitty black alumentum. Thank god she was good enough with thermal energy to not need to directly touch the armor, she could see heat distortion from here.
"Ahhh~" Luvindra sighed in relief before she realized the temperature was getting a bit too cold. She yelped and her back straightened as she felt her armor get cold enough to be a block of ice.
"Sorry, I'm not the best at doing this at range but I didn't want to burn my hands. It'll be better from here, though." Barbara said, finally clapping her mitts on Luvi's shoulders.
Even through her shock, she managed to look embarrassed, "I…uh, can't? I asked the maids to help me put it on."
Luvindra immediately got smacked on the back of her head by Amanita, "Dumbass. Where do we start?"
"There's no we here, I need to focus on keeping her from cooking herself alive." Barbara said, the alchemical coals flying off from where they grew on her arms to land in a neat pile on the ground.
"The straps on the upper back come first, then keep moving down." Luvindra helpfully advised.
Amanita did her best to undo the excessively many straps all over the armor while the photonic crystal enjoyer did her best to stop shivering. Any patches of skin the pair saw that was in contact with the metal were scalded. At least there was no skin peeling off just yet.
When half of the armor pieces (chest, bracers, boots) came off, the lights on the armor turned off and the trio was suddenly surrounded by a dozen students who just realized that there were three girls below them.
"Pfffft." Came the sound of Yvette pretending to try to keep her laughter in after seeing Amanita kneeling in a puddle of punch.
Barbara, dirty cheating alchemist bastard she was, was still spotless thanks to a subtle bit of kinetic manipulation.
_____________________________________
"Geez that was a rough one." Luvindra stretched as she sat on a chair, recovering.
"I fucking warned you." Holan said, "How long were you really working on it?"
"Eh, like five hours." She said sheepishly.
"Bullshit." Amanita said.
"You weren't named Flat Escardos last time I checked." Barbara concurred. That brat was unfair. 'Mmmyes, let me make a brand new OS on the spot, instantly, for every new program I think up. This is reasonable and rational.'
"Per week?" She said, as the glares from the others intensified.
"How many weeks?" Yverne said.
"Two?" Luvindra sounded hopeful.
"No wonder it almost killed you. A bit more and you'd have gotten a heatstroke." Amanta argued, "That's barely enough time for a decent regular costume."
"Next time just commission me for a heatsink matrix." Barbara grumbled. Seriously, she could've fixed the problem in an afternoon.
"I don't think there's gonna be a next time for a while." Luvindra brought up a milky photonic crystal up to her face and looked at it. "All the crystals are completely shot. Ugh, my mom's going to make me transcribe old manuscripts by hand again. There's people digitizing old books, you know."
The building the Department of Modern Magecraft resided in was many things, 'new' was one of them. That was to say, the building itself was originally built less than a century ago. With the recent expansion of the department, Modern Magecraft had grown from only having less than a handful of teachers and less than ten classes to a properly manned and functional department. The proclivities of its members also led to them having more modern events, such as the Super Official El Melloi II class Halloween Party.
It was quickly decided that Flat was no longer allowed to pick lots for getting the chance to name things.
Amanita had picked a costume that, now that she thought about it, felt a bit redundant when she was surrounded by mages. Well, she looked cute even if things got a little cold. She gave a short prayer to the building's central heating. "Well this is something."
Barbara, for her part, was sitting cozy in the much warmer rendition of Koakuma's outfit. She'd even gone plus ultra, coating her hair in tiny red alumentum crystals and using her magecraft to make the wings on her head and back move like living things, "If you mean their costumes, aye."
The pair had immediately gone for some punch and noticed that about half of the class had attended, which meant that the other half was either busy, boring, or being stuffy mages (but they repeated themselves). She spotted a few faces they had become acquainted with.
Holan, short for Holanrouvia Trista Diolone, was notable in mundanity: a store-bought werewolf costume. That in itself wasn't surprising as he was only a second generation magus. He waved at them before going back to talking to a black haired girl whose sight alone gave Amanita a flashback.
__________________________________________
Amanita looked at the desktop computer in a magus' apartment, confused and horrified. Every single thing that could be replaced with a photonic crystal had been, turning it into the most expensive piece of junk she had ever seen.
_______________________________________
"You look tired just looking at Luvindra" Barbara ribbed at her.
"For a bloody good reason. Especially since she's using photonic crystals as costume props." Amanita wasn't sure why Luvindra's costume was a suit of armor with the damn things embedded in it, "I bet that's an improvised mystic code."
"Magi."
They looked over and both saw that Yvernecarisburdoa was wearing a magical girl outfit. They seemed to have taken a liking for confusing their classmates. It still made them look cuter than they had any right to be.
"Amanita, Barbara, it's good to see you here." Their gaze moving between the two, "Luvindra said that she wanted to talk to the both of you regarding photonic crystals and other alchemically related stuff, but it looks like she's caught up with Holanrouvia."
"Yverne, don't tell me she-"
"Amy."
With a groan of exasperation, Amanita wasn't going to do the usual routine, "Ybernecarisburdoa."
"I still don't know why you can't just take them shortening your name." Barbara chuckled, before turning to the esteemed genderfuck, "Anyhow, watch me. Hey, you."
"Because Flat came up with it." The shorter girl huffed and crossed her arms, much to the fake demon secretary's amusement. At least the work she'd done to get Barbara subconsciously moving her wings in tune with her mood was showing itself.
After making a show about thinking about how Barbara addressed them, they finally said, "I guess we could all be a bit more informal today, so 'you' is acceptable. Where were we?"
"Luvindra got something one of us said offhandedly and ran with it, didn't she?" Barbara reminded them.
Yverne nodded, "Ah, right, something about how phones nowadays are basically computers and that they are 'wearable' computers."
"And I thought, hey, how about I make an actual wearable one." Luvindra said, approaching the group with Holan tagging in behind her with an exasperated look in his face. "It works pretty well if I say so myself. Been telling them about my amazing work Yverne?" She smacked them on the back, causing Yverne to stiffen.
"Luvi." they said, waiting for a reaction from the boisterous girl but getting nothing.
"So it's a mystic code then? What does it do?"
"Oh! Let me show you!" Luvindra said before promptly vanishing from sight, which made everyone present take a step back.
"That's pretty cool, is it done mostly via magecraft or alchemy?" Amanita asked as she looked at the space where Luvindra used to be.
There was a short moment of silence and … nothing.
"Luvi, you can go out of stealth now." Holan said, "You've made your point."
More silence.
"Pft, please tell me it's what I think it is." Barbara cackled, covering her mouth with a hand.
"That idiot." Holan brought up his palms to his face, "I can't believe she fucking managed to make something this functional in a week."
"She's both a genius and an idiot." Amanita groused, "Fuck's sake, what if something actually happened to her and we can't find her."
"Maybe if the spell is draining her dry, wait until the body appears and give it back to her family." Yverne shrugged.
Barbara and Amanita shared a look. Fucking Magi.
"...Well, if she was idiot enough to give it a hard-tap into her Od she deserves it." Barbara said after a moment. That was like plugging a blood engine directly to your heart. "Anyhow, two realistic options. One, it has a battery and she just used her circuits to activate it. That means she'll show up after a while. Two, it has a mana siphon."
"If either of those is the case, shouldn't she have tried to touch any of us if we can't see nor hear her?" Amanita tapped her chin with her fist as she thought. "I refuse to believe she was dumb enough to make her costume impossible to remove on her own, but I will make fun of her regardless if that's the case."
"Maybe she's trolling us. I swear I'm never letting her hear the end of it." Holan complained.
"I don't think she would appreciate being called ugly like that." Yverne said seriously.
"Right, dad said that mages weren't good at keeping up with society." Holan looked up at the ceiling thoughtfully, "How do I explain this?"
"Doing or saying things that will intentionally get a rise out of someone." Amanita said.
"One-sided flyting. Or… hm, how was it called when bards were so scathing it gave people welts? Satire?" The alchemist offered in terms that the magi would hopefully understand.
"A real art form." Amanita nods sagely.
As the group deliberated and tried to figure out exactly how Luvindra disappeared, the party continued all around them, others turned to look at them on occasion but it seemed like no one was able to spot the girl in the armor. At least until the doors opened and a short girl wearing heavy and concealing clothes in various shades of gray and her face always at least partially obscured by a hood. Gray. However, today was a little different as she was wearing a bright red hood and was carrying a box of pizza in her hands. Behind her one Waver Velvet came in carrying four more boxes.
There was something about getting delivery pizza that made even the multitude of magi turn their head towards the arrival. All twenty-three students without exception. Everything seemed normal until Gray approached the group.
"Umm, I was wondering why you four have post-it notes on your forehead that have'Dumb' written on them?" The girl asked shyly as she pulled her hood tight around her face.
The group of four looked at each other confused, "I believe we do not have anything on our foreheads." Yverne said, tilting their head.
"I, uhm, sorry." Gray pulled back and made herself smaller, "I was just asking because it was weird you weren't mentioning them."
Holan looked thoughtful as he looked at the rest, "Why would we not notice it?"
"It may be possible that she made them invisible to us as well." Yverne suggested.
"But she isn't wearing those notes. Wasn't the damn thing supposed to only affect her?" Barbara said, before pausing. Shit, Luvi had never outright said anything on the topic, had she? They could be dealing with something more esoteric here. "Gray, have you seen Luvindra? As in, in the last minute or so?"
"N-No, but by the way you're talking… did she do something?" The skittish girl asked.
"Activated a slapdash mystic code." Holan let out a sigh, "I did warn her."
The other students had begun to gravitate towards the stack of pizza boxes as Lord El Melloi II, he glanced at each one of the group and let out a groan, "So youve managed to get yourselves into trouble in the little time I was gone."
"If we hadn't you'd be checking for pod people, sir." Barbara huffed with a smile, wings twitching in amusement.
"Her costume was a set of armor, is that right?" He looked thoughtful.
"Yup. Was very excited to show us, or rather, not show us I guess." Amanita shrugged and adjusted the huge hat on her head.
"And yet we see different things that are not directly related to it." He reached down to his cigar case, before stopping, he probably wouldn't need to use the one that helped him think clearer for this. "Excuse me." He said, putting a finger on Holan's forehead and then pulling it back, hand empty.
"I didn't feel any post it note against my forehead if that is what you were going for teach." Holan sounded somewhat confused.
"No, that wasn't it. Tell me, how do you perceive my hand to be like right now? Go into details."
"Holding it up, fingers slightly bent."
"Your thumb is touching your index finger."
"Gently balled up into a fist, but not hard enough to grip something."
"Fingers completely straight, as if you've waving at us."
"Holding a post-it note with all of your fingers."
"And with that we can conclude that whatever it is Luvindra's spell was, it deals with one's perception. Her armor seems to be a pivotal aspect of the effect. Judging from the origin of her magecraft, it is likely to be based on the story of Sir Balin. Specifically the aspect of the story where an invisible knight slays someone under his protection. Said invisible knight being the brother of the Fisher King."
"Does that give us any clues as to how to turn it off? I'm not familiar with the legend." Barbara chimed up, mostly because all the magi were too proud to.
"Well that was not the important part. Amanita, how does one induce illusions and effective hypnotism into another and how do you clear the effects?" He asked
"At a fundamental level, it is inducing one's own thoughts into another person via magecraft. The specifics vary by tradition, but any long standing families should have ways to prevent the mental pollution that comes with. As for resisting its effects, it is affected by basic magecraft defenses to the point that it is difficult to affect a trained magus. In short, run mana-"
"Od" Barbara corrected.
"Od, through your circuits and it should help." Amanita finished.
"Correct, I tried that when I realized what was happening, but the effect is quite powerful." The professor grumbled.
"Let's give it a shot, then." Barbara said.
They closed their eyes and activated their magic circuits with a breath, Amanita imagined a key in her mind and turned it. "Burst." she muttered under her breath.
Meanwhile, in Barbara's, a bottle of cava had its cork fly off in a geyser of froth. She didn't bother speaking, a snap of her fingers all the focus she needed to give her system a deep cleanse.
The homunculi duo finally saw what was really going on since Luvindra activated her armor. As the others looked at them and asked what was going on, the pair noticed a puddle made entirely out of punch slowly flow outwards from the center where Luvindra was seated cross-legged with steam coming out of her armor.
"Ah crap." Both of them said at the same time and rushed to her side.
_____________________
"Aaaand they vanished." Holan said.
"Probably because they're directly interacting with Luvindra." El Melloi said.
______________________
As they got closer, they noticed that Luvindra was dripping wet with punch and the steam coming off from her armor seemed focused entirely on the embedded photonic crystals. "Hey, you two, can you finally notice me?" Her voice was strained, and the two noticed the glittering glow of magic circuits on her skin.
"What happened?" Amanita asked.
"Well, I was having the time of my life even if I couldn't turn my armor off…then teach came in with the pizza and…well, we were standing right by the entrance so everyone looked at me and it started to affect them too." She pauses to take a deep breath and hissed, "Lets just say that's when things started to get hot."
"Why don't you just take the armor off?" Barbara asked even as her crest lit up like a christmas tree, eagerly siphoning off the heat to make hunks of shitty black alumentum. Thank god she was good enough with thermal energy to not need to directly touch the armor, she could see heat distortion from here.
"Ahhh~" Luvindra sighed in relief before she realized the temperature was getting a bit too cold. She yelped and her back straightened as she felt her armor get cold enough to be a block of ice.
"Sorry, I'm not the best at doing this at range but I didn't want to burn my hands. It'll be better from here, though." Barbara said, finally clapping her mitts on Luvi's shoulders.
Even through her shock, she managed to look embarrassed, "I…uh, can't? I asked the maids to help me put it on."
Luvindra immediately got smacked on the back of her head by Amanita, "Dumbass. Where do we start?"
"There's no we here, I need to focus on keeping her from cooking herself alive." Barbara said, the alchemical coals flying off from where they grew on her arms to land in a neat pile on the ground.
"The straps on the upper back come first, then keep moving down." Luvindra helpfully advised.
Amanita did her best to undo the excessively many straps all over the armor while the photonic crystal enjoyer did her best to stop shivering. Any patches of skin the pair saw that was in contact with the metal were scalded. At least there was no skin peeling off just yet.
When half of the armor pieces (chest, bracers, boots) came off, the lights on the armor turned off and the trio was suddenly surrounded by a dozen students who just realized that there were three girls below them.
"Pfffft." Came the sound of Yvette pretending to try to keep her laughter in after seeing Amanita kneeling in a puddle of punch.
Barbara, dirty cheating alchemist bastard she was, was still spotless thanks to a subtle bit of kinetic manipulation.
_____________________________________
"Geez that was a rough one." Luvindra stretched as she sat on a chair, recovering.
"I fucking warned you." Holan said, "How long were you really working on it?"
"Eh, like five hours." She said sheepishly.
"Bullshit." Amanita said.
"You weren't named Flat Escardos last time I checked." Barbara concurred. That brat was unfair. 'Mmmyes, let me make a brand new OS on the spot, instantly, for every new program I think up. This is reasonable and rational.'
"Per week?" She said, as the glares from the others intensified.
"How many weeks?" Yverne said.
"Two?" Luvindra sounded hopeful.
"No wonder it almost killed you. A bit more and you'd have gotten a heatstroke." Amanta argued, "That's barely enough time for a decent regular costume."
"Next time just commission me for a heatsink matrix." Barbara grumbled. Seriously, she could've fixed the problem in an afternoon.
"I don't think there's gonna be a next time for a while." Luvindra brought up a milky photonic crystal up to her face and looked at it. "All the crystals are completely shot. Ugh, my mom's going to make me transcribe old manuscripts by hand again. There's people digitizing old books, you know."
Rhongonminiad
Waiting for the end of the Weebs
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Thanks for the chapter
Finagle007
[Verified Great Old One]
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How did she even get that many photonic crystals? Those things are supposed to be real tricky to make for everyone not named Paracelsus.
Firespit
Getting sticky.
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With the power of a stupid amount of money.
Chapter 9: November 5th, 2011
Firespit
Getting sticky.
- Joined
- Feb 19, 2018
- Messages
- 62
- Likes received
- 555
Chapter 9: November 5th, 2011
"This way Young Miss." Lapis opened a heavy wooden door inside the Claschestu Family Library, leading Amanita into a private study, "This is where Lord Claschestu said you could access the mansion blueprints."
Empty bookcases to hold reference material during long research projects, two spotless blackboards, and a large desk made of solid mahogany. Everything was solid, carved wood for that matter. Fucking old money.
"Are you alright Lapis? Ever since we arrived you've been acting a bit tense."
"With all due respect ma'am, so have you."
"I just don't want to break anything expensive and be fined for it. What about you?"
Lapis looked thoughtful for a moment, "Permission to speak freely?"
Amanita narrowed her eyes, "You know you don't have to ask, but granted."
"The Claschestu family holds their servants to a certain standard. In our time with you and Lady Barbara, we have not been held to any standard but the one we place ourselves and we do not want to disappoint." Lapis said curtly
"Fancy way of saying me and Barb have no standards, but point taken." Amanita grinned.
"Please do not joke like that here. We wouldn't want the others to think we're offending you."
"Point taken, could you get me some water? I might be here for a while."
With a bow, Lapis left the room and Amanita began to go through the various blueprints. She immediately noticed that, outside the areas she asked for, access for everything else was blacked out, leaving only the outline of the house for reference.
"Geez, ink is expensive, isn't it? Could have just left it blank." Amanita complained out loud as she pored through both the blueprints and the information stored in her Crest. She began to mark the interesting spots and she began to plan the construction of the bounded field. Sure, she could build it in a half-assed manner but that ran the risk of getting discovered, and it would be boring to do it that way…
At some point Lapis brought a snack and left, and after a particularly tense trip to the bathroom, the homunculus maid spoke up, "It has been four hours, would you like a meal?"
"Huh? Sure. I could use a break." Amanita stretched her arms above her head and stood up, "Let's pass by the ballroom on our way, alright?"
"As you wish. I will lead the way then" Lapis bowed before opening the door, sending a small glowing butterfly to the depths of the mansion, "I've notified the kitchen."
The blueprints really didn't do the ballroom justice. The central room was made entirely out of marble with a raised dance floor with enough space to comfortably seat fifty people. There were a series of side hallways that led to a series of alcoves that overlooked the main floor, each alcove had enough space to seat two people with a small table for drinks and snacks. Amanita made note that any background noise she heard in the ballroom was absent in the alcoves, which meant there was some kind of sound nullifying spell preventing any noise from going in or out of the alcove. Most notably, the entire ballroom complex was completely isolated from the rest of the house, as if it was its own little world.
Something to keep in mind for the bounded field.
Amanita wrote down details, everything from the position of the tables to the lights. Anything that wasn't written down in the blueprints, really. She walked out of the ballroom and came face to face with the main entrance. "Hm, a good way to prevent guests from wandering off."
"It has made things easier for the staff in the past." Lapis said with a smile.
It was at that point that Amanita could barely hear some yelling on the other side of the door, on the walkway leading up to the main entrance, a deep bellowing voice that quickly got louder and louder as he got nearer.
"We should go." Lapis said with urgency, lightly tugging at Amanita's sleeve.
"I don't care what that incompetent know-nothing thinks! His judgment is compromised. Getting bribed with a pair of homunculi. Pathetic." Resonated against the door, making it shake slightly before the extremely expensive door burst open and slammed against the walls.
A stocky tanned old man almost as tall as Barbara walked into the lobby. Dressed in a blue suit, a well trimmed beard, and his long hair tied into a knot behind his head. He paused for a moment as he saw the unfamiliar mage being accompanied by one of the homunculus maids and then snorted.
"And he lets in the common rabble, I shouldn't be surprised." He paused for a moment, waiting for her to say something, "What is your problem girl? You should introduce yourself to your betters."
Amanita could feel her body tense up as his attention was focused on her. This man was loud, aggravating and she just really wanted to punch him in the face, "For the moment, I am a guest of Lord Claschestu." Amanita began, not making even the slightest bow, nor the effort to stretch out her hand at the man, "What we do is irrelevant to each other's concerns." Given his attitude, this man was probably a member of the faction that opposed Fiorekis.
The man looked at her for a moment, his sneer deepening, "You waste my time with those deplorable deflections. Out with it, girl."
"I am just wondering why a magus of, arguably, high status is acting like a man way below his station as he tries to meet with Lord Claschestu." Amanita says the polite version of 'If you want to meet Fiorekis, why are you being such an asshole?'
"You would do well to watch your tongue, brat." He said just above a hiss, eyes narrowing as something unpleasant swirled in them.
The urge to use her Mystic Eyes to just tell him to fuck off crossed Amanita's mind, "Then don't pay any mind to my words." She tried her best to avoid a smug smile from showing on her face.
"You'll regret your insolence." He spat, pushing past her, the smell of smoke following after him like coattails.
Amanita waited until he was out of earshot, and then waited a few extra seconds for good measure before finally speaking up, "What an asshole." As she turned to Lapis who was looking pale.
"You just angered Duste Albaredge." Lapis said, "He's been the leading voice against Miss Barbara and yourself."
The lavender-haired girl took a deep breath through her nose as the implications of what she just did hit her, "Fuck, at least he doesn't know who I am."
"You do have a way with words when it comes to angering magi." Lapis only barely avoided clicking her tongue.
"I… thought I was being polite. I mean, I spoke formally?"
"...I see we will have to double your etiquette classes." Lapis said with the tone of someone valiantly suppressing a sigh. "Especially on the remit of what not to say."
"I'm going to need to give my mental suggestions another pass." Amanita sighed at another instance of foot-in-mouth. She REALLY was starting to understand Kiritsugu's entirely pragmatic approach towards dealing with magi.
____________________________________________________________________________
Once the first defenses were set up with the support of the Evoker division and it was clear that there were not going to be any large-scale attacks, the members of O3 began to work in making Tameloc a beachhead. As the Magi worked, glittering spires rose on the perimeter of the castle and threatened the surroundings with a menacing light. The seaborn would quickly find out that the Spiritron division had been given free reign in designing their defenses. Everything from telefragging beams to homicidal gargoyles falling upon any seaborn that dared show its face.
The only conditions were that it must be under control and aimed outwards. Bram still had to watch them like a hawk to make sure nobody 'overstepped their bonds' and 'impugned on his and his family's honor'. In other words, to keep the lunatics from sabotaging each other as magi were wont to.
Of course, minor attacks and incursions happened constantly and the existing defenses could not cover or effectively defend every single point of the outer castle wall. Especially when the poor bastards in design were handed a mountain of random bullshit and told to figure out how to emplace it for optimal coverage. As a result, both Amanita and Barbara got called in to break any attack while the magi finished construction. Originally it had been expected that there would be a minor attack once an hour throughout the entire defensive line.
"Just stop attacking, for fucks sake!" Amanita yelled out from the ramparts as a group of a dozen slugs lit up in crimson light as her vacuum arrows struck. She was panting from exertion and had bags under her eyes.
The estimates were off.
"Right, time for another recharge." Barbara said as she fished out a red alumentum shell and smacked her tiny friend on the back with it. Only half was needed to re-energize someone, thank fuck, and their superhuman status meant there was no physical strain despite this being the 43rd time she did this in the last eight hours.
Of course, no sooner had she smartened up Amanita, they got another screeching alert. At this point they had it down to a science, Barbara sweeping the tiny archer off her feet in a bridal carry and flying them to the next site.
"Five minutes! Just give us a five minute break!" Amanita complained, too mentally exhausted to complain about the bridal carry.
The pair dashed to the opposite side of the castle, jumping from rooftop to rooftop. They could see the defenses throughout the wall activating and magi letting loose spells. The other magi were being cycled around, new people greeting them when they got back to any point on the wall.
They currently didn't have anyone else to act as a fist to break the larger incursions so Amanita and Barbara did not get the luxury of taking a break. Of course, that didn't quite match up with how they were greeted by a massive explosion on the other side of the wall when they got close. Still, it could just be the automated defenses someone particularly talented had made.
That thought was put to rest the moment they flew atop the wall. Hundreds of tiny glowing green balls descending from the simulated sky, each one landing with a force that rattled their teeth and would've likely left their ears ringing if they were regular humans right now.
Standing in the rampart, with his ridiculously fabulous blonde hair blowing in the blastwave, was Wodime Kirschtaria looking out into the field as he put an MLRS to absolute shame. He turned around and impassively looked at them, his facade keeping strong.
Amanita, still being held up by Barbara in a bridal carry and with her arms wrapped around the giant woman's neck and holding for dear life, let out a gigantic sigh of relief. She signaled her partner to let her down and she stood unsteadily. She had a huge smile in face, "You're finally here commander!" She said with a smile, glad that they're finally getting relieved.
"Apologies for arriving this late. I was stuck in negotiations with a rather persistent magus in Sicily that asked for exorbitant prices for catalysts. I took the Director's plane as soon as I could." He looked around, "You two have done well."
Amanita couldn't even be angry due to the reason for the delay, not right now at least, "With you here we can take a break for a bit, right?"
"No." Amanita's heart almost broke as she heard him say that, "Go to sleep, I'll handle it from here on out."
"You're the best, bossman. We'll be off now." Barbara beamed behind her helm. The best part was that given how cyberspace worked, they didn't need to write up any reports. Command had footage of everything.
"Before you leave, though." Wodime stalled her with a small hand gesture, "I would like to ask of you a favor."
"We're listening." The alchemist said. She may like Wodime but there was nothing and nobody in the moonlit world that she'd agree to a favor with before hearing what it was.
"I'm going to be busy all of next week and Olga's caretaker has to deal with some family business." He explained.
Amanita could see where this was going. "So you want us to take care of Olga?" She was a magus, this wasn't something as simple as asking them to be babysitters. Whatever it was, she knew that he probably wouldn't tell them.
"Yes, I will owe you a favor for this." Wodime said without hesitation.
"Ah, so that's what's happening." Amanita realized that there was something going on in the background that Wodime couldn't talk about. Or he was probably just testing them to make sure they could be trusted.
"It's a deal." Barbara said with a firm nod. Whatever else was going on, a favor owed from Wodime wasn't something she'd pass up on lightly. Dealing with a prickly cactus child for a week would be worth it.
"There shouldn't be any issues." Amanita agreed. Even if Olga were to be a handful to deal with, especially if you accidentally pressed her trauma buttons. But she was still very cute. "Are you sure you can deal with all of this for eight hours? You gotta pace yourself, boss."
"This is me pacing myself." He replied simply, only the magus mask keeping him from looking baffled.
"I have a legendary knight fused with me and I feel inadequate." Barbara deadpanned.
"High level magi are something else." Amanita sighed, "Whatever I don't care, I want to rest, see ya later commander!"
"Go rest, I'll contact you about the details later." Wodime said and then dramatically turned around to look at the distance.
Amanita thought that he was just showing off.
__________________________________________________________
"Are you planning to perform some kind of ritual here?" Olga looked like she'd had an extra glass of vinegar this morning to go with her pus. Maybe it was about dragging her away before she had time to unpack? Then again, she was a noble, she probably expected the maids to do it.
"Nope, just training." Barbara chimed in with a beaming grin that promised trouble.
"Barb wants to fire that monster of a shotgun, and this is the closest range that knows about mages. Supposedly caters to those that like big explosions." Amanita supplied.
"How loud can a shotgun even be?"
"Hm, let's see, if I put all of an orange alumentum shell into kinetic as a cone shockwave and…" The alchemist muttered a mess of math under her breath, taking a few seconds to work out her answer, "Okay, decibels get annoying with distance, but it'd be enough pascals to liquefy the internals of an unagumented human up to 60 meters in front of me and explode all unprotected eardrums as far as 320 meters. Oh, it'd concuss people in that range too."
"That sounds worse than a howitzer shell. Use ear protection Olga, just in case. Barb…you're not going to use that today, right?"
"I said orange alumentum." Barbara huffed, waving her hand as if to dispel the mere thought. "That stuff is a pain in the ass to make, it's for special occasions and emergencies. Anyhow, in that hypothetical there shouldn't be as many issues as a regular explosion, since I'm focusing it down into a cone, but it'd rebound at still dangerous levels so yeah. Ear protection."
"That sounds absolutely barbaric." Olga said in a deadpan tone, "There must be a more elegant way to use it other than raw destructive force."
"Of course there is, you asked how loud I can make it and that's your answer." The alchemist huffed, "Let's see… I can't do this one quite yet but with the right combo of disciplines I can turn people into ash diamonds. Need to figure out how to get rid of the water, it hates being compressed. Although maybe it could make some interesting formations, with the liquid suspended in crystals."
"Which reminds me. We gotta make sure your mental defenses are up to par." Amanita paled at the thought.
"...Yeah, good idea. As I am right now I can stop hearts at a touch. Maybe at a range if I can finagle it with vitality. Nevermind, y'know, doing an Accelerator." It may be a good control exercise, actually. Inverting that many vectors right now would definitely take all her focus and touch range. Just making a heart or brain blow up at range was child's play, though. It wasn't anything impressive, regular bullets could do it too.
Olga simply stared at the two with an unreadable expression in her facade, she then turned to Amanita, "What about you? Did you bring something ridiculous to test here?"
"I'm just going to be practicing with my completely mundane handgun. I'm not nearly as flashy as that psycho." Amanita pointed with her thumb at her partner. "Gotta have a baseline competence for some training we got planned."
"Fine, fine. I'll just get out of the way. Like I always do." Olga muttered and sat down on a chair.
"Hol' up, what? Do you think we brought you here just to watch? You're coming out of here knowing how to handle a pistol at least." Barbara said, completely bewildered.
Amanita crossed her arms. "While I don't necessarily approve. The owner of the range said that he could give you a bit of training…though you'd have to start with an airsoft one for safety, even if you can reinforce your body to handle it."
Olga looked at them blankly, croaking out a single, bewildered, "What?"
______________________________________________________________________________
Shots rang out for the next few hours, a mix of powerful ones and weaker ones. Amanita could feel Barbara's gun firing a few booths away. Several rounds of targets went and gone. With a pause at the
"How the hell are you better than me on your first day? I hate beginner's luck." Amanita glared with her purple eyes at the final results…sure airsoft guns were different from real ones but still!
"Skill issue." Barbara drawled with a compulsion-grade shit-eating grin. Pity that Amanita would need to jump like a little kid to reach her chin.
"I can't hear you from all the way up there, lean down a bit." Amanta began gently punching her palm with her fist.
"Alas, I'd bludgeon you with my tits." The alchemist crowed, before finally stepping over, "Aight, let me look at that stance again."
Olga, for her part, was stuck staring at her results, eyes going from the unloaded airsoft at her booth, to the other magi. Amanita accepted Barbara's help even as they kept egging each other on, yet still somehow taking the insults they hurled at each other in stride. Barbara adjusted Amanita's stance, patting and prodding all over despite having the magecraft to shift the smaller woman's body all at once.
"There 'u go." Barbara said with a beatific smile like butter wouldn't melt in her mouth.
"Did you have to be so grabby?" Amanita blushed as she kept the pose, trying to remember it for next time.
"I didn't hear a single 'stop' back there." They both knew she'd back off the millisecond Amanita asked her to, much to her insufferable smugness.
Barbara only got an eye roll as a response.
"Harlots." Olga muttered mutinously.
"Love you too, sugar!" The alchemist chirruped in the most disgusting saccharine-sweet tone she could muster. Then just because she was an asshole, she turned on a dime back to encouraging mentor, "Now let's see those groupings, can't have mushroom girl outpacing my favorite student."
"Traitor." Amanita pouted.
______________________
"This way Young Miss." Lapis opened a heavy wooden door inside the Claschestu Family Library, leading Amanita into a private study, "This is where Lord Claschestu said you could access the mansion blueprints."
Empty bookcases to hold reference material during long research projects, two spotless blackboards, and a large desk made of solid mahogany. Everything was solid, carved wood for that matter. Fucking old money.
"Are you alright Lapis? Ever since we arrived you've been acting a bit tense."
"With all due respect ma'am, so have you."
"I just don't want to break anything expensive and be fined for it. What about you?"
Lapis looked thoughtful for a moment, "Permission to speak freely?"
Amanita narrowed her eyes, "You know you don't have to ask, but granted."
"The Claschestu family holds their servants to a certain standard. In our time with you and Lady Barbara, we have not been held to any standard but the one we place ourselves and we do not want to disappoint." Lapis said curtly
"Fancy way of saying me and Barb have no standards, but point taken." Amanita grinned.
"Please do not joke like that here. We wouldn't want the others to think we're offending you."
"Point taken, could you get me some water? I might be here for a while."
With a bow, Lapis left the room and Amanita began to go through the various blueprints. She immediately noticed that, outside the areas she asked for, access for everything else was blacked out, leaving only the outline of the house for reference.
"Geez, ink is expensive, isn't it? Could have just left it blank." Amanita complained out loud as she pored through both the blueprints and the information stored in her Crest. She began to mark the interesting spots and she began to plan the construction of the bounded field. Sure, she could build it in a half-assed manner but that ran the risk of getting discovered, and it would be boring to do it that way…
At some point Lapis brought a snack and left, and after a particularly tense trip to the bathroom, the homunculus maid spoke up, "It has been four hours, would you like a meal?"
"Huh? Sure. I could use a break." Amanita stretched her arms above her head and stood up, "Let's pass by the ballroom on our way, alright?"
"As you wish. I will lead the way then" Lapis bowed before opening the door, sending a small glowing butterfly to the depths of the mansion, "I've notified the kitchen."
The blueprints really didn't do the ballroom justice. The central room was made entirely out of marble with a raised dance floor with enough space to comfortably seat fifty people. There were a series of side hallways that led to a series of alcoves that overlooked the main floor, each alcove had enough space to seat two people with a small table for drinks and snacks. Amanita made note that any background noise she heard in the ballroom was absent in the alcoves, which meant there was some kind of sound nullifying spell preventing any noise from going in or out of the alcove. Most notably, the entire ballroom complex was completely isolated from the rest of the house, as if it was its own little world.
Something to keep in mind for the bounded field.
Amanita wrote down details, everything from the position of the tables to the lights. Anything that wasn't written down in the blueprints, really. She walked out of the ballroom and came face to face with the main entrance. "Hm, a good way to prevent guests from wandering off."
"It has made things easier for the staff in the past." Lapis said with a smile.
It was at that point that Amanita could barely hear some yelling on the other side of the door, on the walkway leading up to the main entrance, a deep bellowing voice that quickly got louder and louder as he got nearer.
"We should go." Lapis said with urgency, lightly tugging at Amanita's sleeve.
"I don't care what that incompetent know-nothing thinks! His judgment is compromised. Getting bribed with a pair of homunculi. Pathetic." Resonated against the door, making it shake slightly before the extremely expensive door burst open and slammed against the walls.
A stocky tanned old man almost as tall as Barbara walked into the lobby. Dressed in a blue suit, a well trimmed beard, and his long hair tied into a knot behind his head. He paused for a moment as he saw the unfamiliar mage being accompanied by one of the homunculus maids and then snorted.
"And he lets in the common rabble, I shouldn't be surprised." He paused for a moment, waiting for her to say something, "What is your problem girl? You should introduce yourself to your betters."
Amanita could feel her body tense up as his attention was focused on her. This man was loud, aggravating and she just really wanted to punch him in the face, "For the moment, I am a guest of Lord Claschestu." Amanita began, not making even the slightest bow, nor the effort to stretch out her hand at the man, "What we do is irrelevant to each other's concerns." Given his attitude, this man was probably a member of the faction that opposed Fiorekis.
The man looked at her for a moment, his sneer deepening, "You waste my time with those deplorable deflections. Out with it, girl."
"I am just wondering why a magus of, arguably, high status is acting like a man way below his station as he tries to meet with Lord Claschestu." Amanita says the polite version of 'If you want to meet Fiorekis, why are you being such an asshole?'
"You would do well to watch your tongue, brat." He said just above a hiss, eyes narrowing as something unpleasant swirled in them.
The urge to use her Mystic Eyes to just tell him to fuck off crossed Amanita's mind, "Then don't pay any mind to my words." She tried her best to avoid a smug smile from showing on her face.
"You'll regret your insolence." He spat, pushing past her, the smell of smoke following after him like coattails.
Amanita waited until he was out of earshot, and then waited a few extra seconds for good measure before finally speaking up, "What an asshole." As she turned to Lapis who was looking pale.
"You just angered Duste Albaredge." Lapis said, "He's been the leading voice against Miss Barbara and yourself."
The lavender-haired girl took a deep breath through her nose as the implications of what she just did hit her, "Fuck, at least he doesn't know who I am."
"You do have a way with words when it comes to angering magi." Lapis only barely avoided clicking her tongue.
"I… thought I was being polite. I mean, I spoke formally?"
"...I see we will have to double your etiquette classes." Lapis said with the tone of someone valiantly suppressing a sigh. "Especially on the remit of what not to say."
"I'm going to need to give my mental suggestions another pass." Amanita sighed at another instance of foot-in-mouth. She REALLY was starting to understand Kiritsugu's entirely pragmatic approach towards dealing with magi.
____________________________________________________________________________
Once the first defenses were set up with the support of the Evoker division and it was clear that there were not going to be any large-scale attacks, the members of O3 began to work in making Tameloc a beachhead. As the Magi worked, glittering spires rose on the perimeter of the castle and threatened the surroundings with a menacing light. The seaborn would quickly find out that the Spiritron division had been given free reign in designing their defenses. Everything from telefragging beams to homicidal gargoyles falling upon any seaborn that dared show its face.
The only conditions were that it must be under control and aimed outwards. Bram still had to watch them like a hawk to make sure nobody 'overstepped their bonds' and 'impugned on his and his family's honor'. In other words, to keep the lunatics from sabotaging each other as magi were wont to.
Of course, minor attacks and incursions happened constantly and the existing defenses could not cover or effectively defend every single point of the outer castle wall. Especially when the poor bastards in design were handed a mountain of random bullshit and told to figure out how to emplace it for optimal coverage. As a result, both Amanita and Barbara got called in to break any attack while the magi finished construction. Originally it had been expected that there would be a minor attack once an hour throughout the entire defensive line.
"Just stop attacking, for fucks sake!" Amanita yelled out from the ramparts as a group of a dozen slugs lit up in crimson light as her vacuum arrows struck. She was panting from exertion and had bags under her eyes.
The estimates were off.
"Right, time for another recharge." Barbara said as she fished out a red alumentum shell and smacked her tiny friend on the back with it. Only half was needed to re-energize someone, thank fuck, and their superhuman status meant there was no physical strain despite this being the 43rd time she did this in the last eight hours.
Of course, no sooner had she smartened up Amanita, they got another screeching alert. At this point they had it down to a science, Barbara sweeping the tiny archer off her feet in a bridal carry and flying them to the next site.
"Five minutes! Just give us a five minute break!" Amanita complained, too mentally exhausted to complain about the bridal carry.
The pair dashed to the opposite side of the castle, jumping from rooftop to rooftop. They could see the defenses throughout the wall activating and magi letting loose spells. The other magi were being cycled around, new people greeting them when they got back to any point on the wall.
They currently didn't have anyone else to act as a fist to break the larger incursions so Amanita and Barbara did not get the luxury of taking a break. Of course, that didn't quite match up with how they were greeted by a massive explosion on the other side of the wall when they got close. Still, it could just be the automated defenses someone particularly talented had made.
That thought was put to rest the moment they flew atop the wall. Hundreds of tiny glowing green balls descending from the simulated sky, each one landing with a force that rattled their teeth and would've likely left their ears ringing if they were regular humans right now.
Standing in the rampart, with his ridiculously fabulous blonde hair blowing in the blastwave, was Wodime Kirschtaria looking out into the field as he put an MLRS to absolute shame. He turned around and impassively looked at them, his facade keeping strong.
Amanita, still being held up by Barbara in a bridal carry and with her arms wrapped around the giant woman's neck and holding for dear life, let out a gigantic sigh of relief. She signaled her partner to let her down and she stood unsteadily. She had a huge smile in face, "You're finally here commander!" She said with a smile, glad that they're finally getting relieved.
"Apologies for arriving this late. I was stuck in negotiations with a rather persistent magus in Sicily that asked for exorbitant prices for catalysts. I took the Director's plane as soon as I could." He looked around, "You two have done well."
Amanita couldn't even be angry due to the reason for the delay, not right now at least, "With you here we can take a break for a bit, right?"
"No." Amanita's heart almost broke as she heard him say that, "Go to sleep, I'll handle it from here on out."
"You're the best, bossman. We'll be off now." Barbara beamed behind her helm. The best part was that given how cyberspace worked, they didn't need to write up any reports. Command had footage of everything.
"Before you leave, though." Wodime stalled her with a small hand gesture, "I would like to ask of you a favor."
"We're listening." The alchemist said. She may like Wodime but there was nothing and nobody in the moonlit world that she'd agree to a favor with before hearing what it was.
"I'm going to be busy all of next week and Olga's caretaker has to deal with some family business." He explained.
Amanita could see where this was going. "So you want us to take care of Olga?" She was a magus, this wasn't something as simple as asking them to be babysitters. Whatever it was, she knew that he probably wouldn't tell them.
"Yes, I will owe you a favor for this." Wodime said without hesitation.
"Ah, so that's what's happening." Amanita realized that there was something going on in the background that Wodime couldn't talk about. Or he was probably just testing them to make sure they could be trusted.
"It's a deal." Barbara said with a firm nod. Whatever else was going on, a favor owed from Wodime wasn't something she'd pass up on lightly. Dealing with a prickly cactus child for a week would be worth it.
"There shouldn't be any issues." Amanita agreed. Even if Olga were to be a handful to deal with, especially if you accidentally pressed her trauma buttons. But she was still very cute. "Are you sure you can deal with all of this for eight hours? You gotta pace yourself, boss."
"This is me pacing myself." He replied simply, only the magus mask keeping him from looking baffled.
"I have a legendary knight fused with me and I feel inadequate." Barbara deadpanned.
"High level magi are something else." Amanita sighed, "Whatever I don't care, I want to rest, see ya later commander!"
"Go rest, I'll contact you about the details later." Wodime said and then dramatically turned around to look at the distance.
Amanita thought that he was just showing off.
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"Are you planning to perform some kind of ritual here?" Olga looked like she'd had an extra glass of vinegar this morning to go with her pus. Maybe it was about dragging her away before she had time to unpack? Then again, she was a noble, she probably expected the maids to do it.
"Nope, just training." Barbara chimed in with a beaming grin that promised trouble.
"Barb wants to fire that monster of a shotgun, and this is the closest range that knows about mages. Supposedly caters to those that like big explosions." Amanita supplied.
"How loud can a shotgun even be?"
"Hm, let's see, if I put all of an orange alumentum shell into kinetic as a cone shockwave and…" The alchemist muttered a mess of math under her breath, taking a few seconds to work out her answer, "Okay, decibels get annoying with distance, but it'd be enough pascals to liquefy the internals of an unagumented human up to 60 meters in front of me and explode all unprotected eardrums as far as 320 meters. Oh, it'd concuss people in that range too."
"That sounds worse than a howitzer shell. Use ear protection Olga, just in case. Barb…you're not going to use that today, right?"
"I said orange alumentum." Barbara huffed, waving her hand as if to dispel the mere thought. "That stuff is a pain in the ass to make, it's for special occasions and emergencies. Anyhow, in that hypothetical there shouldn't be as many issues as a regular explosion, since I'm focusing it down into a cone, but it'd rebound at still dangerous levels so yeah. Ear protection."
"That sounds absolutely barbaric." Olga said in a deadpan tone, "There must be a more elegant way to use it other than raw destructive force."
"Of course there is, you asked how loud I can make it and that's your answer." The alchemist huffed, "Let's see… I can't do this one quite yet but with the right combo of disciplines I can turn people into ash diamonds. Need to figure out how to get rid of the water, it hates being compressed. Although maybe it could make some interesting formations, with the liquid suspended in crystals."
"Which reminds me. We gotta make sure your mental defenses are up to par." Amanita paled at the thought.
"...Yeah, good idea. As I am right now I can stop hearts at a touch. Maybe at a range if I can finagle it with vitality. Nevermind, y'know, doing an Accelerator." It may be a good control exercise, actually. Inverting that many vectors right now would definitely take all her focus and touch range. Just making a heart or brain blow up at range was child's play, though. It wasn't anything impressive, regular bullets could do it too.
Olga simply stared at the two with an unreadable expression in her facade, she then turned to Amanita, "What about you? Did you bring something ridiculous to test here?"
"I'm just going to be practicing with my completely mundane handgun. I'm not nearly as flashy as that psycho." Amanita pointed with her thumb at her partner. "Gotta have a baseline competence for some training we got planned."
"Fine, fine. I'll just get out of the way. Like I always do." Olga muttered and sat down on a chair.
"Hol' up, what? Do you think we brought you here just to watch? You're coming out of here knowing how to handle a pistol at least." Barbara said, completely bewildered.
Amanita crossed her arms. "While I don't necessarily approve. The owner of the range said that he could give you a bit of training…though you'd have to start with an airsoft one for safety, even if you can reinforce your body to handle it."
Olga looked at them blankly, croaking out a single, bewildered, "What?"
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Shots rang out for the next few hours, a mix of powerful ones and weaker ones. Amanita could feel Barbara's gun firing a few booths away. Several rounds of targets went and gone. With a pause at the
"How the hell are you better than me on your first day? I hate beginner's luck." Amanita glared with her purple eyes at the final results…sure airsoft guns were different from real ones but still!
"Skill issue." Barbara drawled with a compulsion-grade shit-eating grin. Pity that Amanita would need to jump like a little kid to reach her chin.
"I can't hear you from all the way up there, lean down a bit." Amanta began gently punching her palm with her fist.
"Alas, I'd bludgeon you with my tits." The alchemist crowed, before finally stepping over, "Aight, let me look at that stance again."
Olga, for her part, was stuck staring at her results, eyes going from the unloaded airsoft at her booth, to the other magi. Amanita accepted Barbara's help even as they kept egging each other on, yet still somehow taking the insults they hurled at each other in stride. Barbara adjusted Amanita's stance, patting and prodding all over despite having the magecraft to shift the smaller woman's body all at once.
"There 'u go." Barbara said with a beatific smile like butter wouldn't melt in her mouth.
"Did you have to be so grabby?" Amanita blushed as she kept the pose, trying to remember it for next time.
"I didn't hear a single 'stop' back there." They both knew she'd back off the millisecond Amanita asked her to, much to her insufferable smugness.
Barbara only got an eye roll as a response.
"Harlots." Olga muttered mutinously.
"Love you too, sugar!" The alchemist chirruped in the most disgusting saccharine-sweet tone she could muster. Then just because she was an asshole, she turned on a dime back to encouraging mentor, "Now let's see those groupings, can't have mushroom girl outpacing my favorite student."
"Traitor." Amanita pouted.
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ArsMagna1337
(Unverified Oracle) (Unverified Omake Machine)
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This should be in the extras tab.For those of you that are curious regarding character heights:
Olga is domineering but bullyable.
Kay Redfield
Versed in the lewd.
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Ritsuka Fujimaru would beg to differ. I mean, in the LB7, he managed to turn a combat simulation into a dating sim.
Firespit
Getting sticky.
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Harem Protagonist EX is a hell of a drug.
Firespit
Getting sticky.
- Joined
- Feb 19, 2018
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- 555
Well, the mistake would have probably gone unnoticed if the results didn't actually try to use his authority.