soul_logs | [OPEN] Mission 156

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[OPEN] Mission 156

Characters: Open to participants who signed up here.
Location: Lake Tahoe, CA
Rating: Various.
Time: March 27th, late morning.
Description: The second of the three Madness emitters outside Death City is the target for this mission. Bundle up, everyone -- it's gonna be a cold one.

The mission begins late in the morning, to allow the mission-goers as much sunlight as possible in the warmest part of the day. Not that it'll help much… Temperatures are well below freezing already -- unnatural even for early Spring in the mountains -- and a howling snowstorm threatens to blot out the sun, beginning up the mountain where the slope just begins to rise sharply.

The slopes themselves are fairly barren: a windswept-looking tree here, a cabin that may have once belonged to the snow patrol there, maybe a Madness-crazed bear or mountain lion. Those braving the storm are lucky enough to see five feet in front of their face in these conditions!

Those brave few who manage to make it to the top (enduring falling temperatures and defeating the corrupted fauna and hulking kishin yeti along the way) may come across their goal at the very summit of the half-mile-high mountain: the Madness emitter itself, in the eye of the storm… And one last obstacle: the Witch guarding it.

OOC NOTES.
- The event summary post containing all relevant links is located here.
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- If you have any further questions, the mod thread on the coordination post is here!

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It was the chance to observe a Witch in action that had caught Waka's interest. The vague summary by Shibusen was far from satisfying, and without the sources he had once possessed in Nippon, the only way to find out more would be to find one himself. Not to fight it -- he wasn't quite arrogant enough to think he would stand a chance as he was now -- but to watch.

Not that this snowstorm was helping the visibility any. Fortunately it worked the other way around as well; be it through luck or something else, he managed to avoid Kishin Eggs and other monsters as he made his way towards the summit, far beyond the areas Shibusen had assigned for unpartnered guests.

Waka squinted at the skyline, trying to estimate how far he was through the raging storm. He would have to be more careful the further up he got... Besides the obvious threat of a Witch, he was beginning to feel strangely heavy and trip over things that shouldn't be there. It was growing darker, too, despite it being daytime. So this was the famous Madness wavelength he had heard so much about... Not that different from the cursed zones back home, surely. He could handle it.

Ducking behind trees, rocks and walls, he slowly made progress towards the emitter, confident in his ability to keep his presence hidden.

The Witch stood at the very summit of the mountain, the emitter pouring out wave after wave of Madness into the air and atmosphere around her. The thick woolly coat wrapped around her shoulders made it look like she was wearing a jacket, but it was anything from the truth as the dark grey wool was almost white from the snow. Icicles hung from the long horns protruding out from either side of her skull, but the Witch paid it little mind as she watched the struggles below.

They were coming. The Witch could see through the thick and harsh wind to witness Shibusen attempting to scale the mountain. She had been waiting for them. Ever since the Shibusen dogs had destroyed the first emitter, they had been watching, waiting, in order to lure them here. And they had come like the imbeciles they were.

Waka was practically crawling now, crouching behind any cover he could find. The snow on his clothes and the white wings hanging from his helmet gave him some camouflage, but it was starting to get hard to tell just how dark it actually was. Would the enemy be able to see him before he could see them?

There. A figure standing at the peak of the mountain. Waka stayed crouched behind a large rock and tried to sneak a peek from the side... Only to find a dead face staring right back at him.

The prophet jerked back. The body was that of a woman in a torn, blood-stained white toga. She might have been beautiful had her body not become frozen and dead, torn open by whatever animals had been feeding on her flesh. Sprouting from her head were two white wings, one of them nearly torn off.

Waka slumped against the rock, almost laughing. So this was how they played. Of course. All those things he had been tripping on while climbing... Yes, he could see them now. Men and women and children, all with wings. Staring at him with those dead eyes. The ones that still had their eyes intact, anyway. He could see the accusation in them.

It was almost funny in how predictable it was.

It was fine. All he had to do was wait here for the Shibusen people to show up and watch whatever transpired. Easy. And he didn't even have to wait alone. There were so many of them...

Movement caught her attention, but the Witch didn't turn her head in that direction. Instead she glanced there from the corner of her eyes to see if it had simply been a trick of the wind. Which was doubtful, given that the weather up here was something she was manipulating in her favour. Had one of Shibusen's little pets made it this far up? Or was it something that had strayed from the herd?

The barest hint of a smirk curved on her expression moments before she began chanting beneath her breath. A few metres from behind Waka, a large woolly yak materialized. The large hoofs sounded near-silently in the snow as it went in search in the direction its master had heard the disturbance. It look much like the gentle beast that it was largely known as when it began to approach the human in question. Grunting, the large nose of the yak came within metres of Waka's position as it snorted softly and took in his scent.

It was really getting cold up here. In fact, it somehow felt even colder than before. With the corpses of dead Celestials sprawled everywhere, it was almost exactly like that time. He could practically see the Ark looming in the distance--

There was a snort, nearly muffled by the harsh wind, and Waka slowly turned to face the yak.

Oh dear. This could be quite bad.

The yak in question only seemed to sniff Waka curiously as its dark eyes stared through the snow at the man. Seeming to be satisfied, the large woollen beast began to step back and walk back out into the snowy mountain area as if it had just been passing through.

With the invader distracted, the Witch had silently slipped onto her broom as she made her way over to hover right in front of Waka. Peering down at him, her eyes as cold as ice, the Witch announced her presence.

"Do you know what we do to intruders?" She asked, her voice as frosty as the wind while her sharp gaze remained locked on her prey.

Well, so much for stealth. Seeing as there was no point in crouching anymore, Waka straightened and smiled up at the Witch.

"I suppose a date and a romantic walk on the beach would be too much to hope for?" he said lightly. He would have seemed perfectly calm if it weren't for his voice rising unnaturally high. All the empty eyes were really, really distracting.

Her face remained stoic as he attempted to answer the question with something that would favour his situation. It was anything from the truth, and her cold eyes seemed to glow almost unnaturally as the wind whipped around them.

"You are here to help destroy the emitter. I cannot let that happen," the Witch calmly said in return. "You were a fool to come here by yourself, little weak Weapon." With that, her left hand rose up and dashed out in a quick arc towards Waka as sharp ice shards formed and hurled themselves towards the young Weapon.

In hindsight, coming alone hadn't been one of his greatest ideas. He was still half-expecting to get visions -- or even just the vague premonitions he had felt while resonating with Amaterasu. Something to warn him of what was coming.

Right now, the future merely seemed very dark.

Waka threw himself to the side. His usual grace seemed to have left him, as he felt himself fall on something -- more corpses. There were piles of them now, all left to freeze in the cold. He had landed on them, in the midst of broken wings and limbs turned lifeless shades of blue.

A high-pitched, uncontrolled laugh rose from his throat. The prophet sat up, still smiling at the Witch as though nothing was wrong.

"So harsh, my ice queen! What if I just came to enjoy the show?" He giggled. "The scuffle is going to happen with or without me, so why get involved and make a mess of things? I seem to do that, haha..."

The temperature seemed to drop another ten degrees. The corpses stared at him. He couldn't see why. This one wasn't his fault. Was it? He couldn't recall.

Her cold gaze followed his movements, and so did her attack as she conjured sharp shards of ice to erupt from the ground that fool of a Weapon threw himself towards. This one was no threat to her, most of them weren't, but she wasn't about to let any group regardless of size anywhere near this emitter.

"You are trespassing," she coolly answered moments before her right arm was pointed towards the intruder, and from behind her, a rampaging herd of yak began to appear as they all charged towards their target.

She thought she has sufficiently warned Waka about this, but that wasn't enough. Perhaps they should both stop being cryptic with each other here long enough to keep the other alive.

Her soul blazed, cutting through the thick Madness as her paws carried her, white fur again protecting her from the chill. After traversing the Northern Regions of Nippon, flying over the snow was easy. Catching Waka before the yaks could reach him was simple, but protecting him from the ice was another matter.

Amaterasu leapt, ignoring the ice shards biting into her as she knocked Waka aside, spinning to a stop several feet from the patch he would've landed in. For a moment, her amber eyes leered at the Witch, but then, they turned on the stampede of yaks. The underside of her flank was turning red, but again, she ignored it and barked at the prophet. Quit dawdling! They had to go!

Having the Madness physically rammed out of him made Waka gasp. The Calming Wavelength washed over him, clearing out the darkness and turmoil in one dizzying swoop. He hit the snow, now devoid of any bodies or blood, and jumped on his feet almost instantly.

He wouldn't do her any favors trying to run through snow in geta and slowing them both down, and so he rushed to her side and touched her fur -- with a hand that was still shaking, he noticed with mild annoyance -- and transformed. Pillow Talk landed lightly on the wolf's back.

Let us make like a banana and split, baby!

Her calm gaze watched as the wolf jumped in to save the foolish Weapon, but the Witch did nothing more than remain where she was as the stampeding herd barrelled their way. She could feel the Madness beginning to edge away with the arrival of the white beast, and knew then that this one was a Meister with the Calming Wavelength.

It would have been so easy to wipe them both off the face of this mountain, and the Witch considered doing such a thing until she sensed something far more interesting approaching the summit. Ignoring the pair, and the rampaging beasts, she drew her attention away from her playthings and over to where she felt the large power approaching.

So... he had stepped out of the city for this, hmm? The pair behind her were no threat, and she didn't hide that fact as the Witch seemed to simply disappear within the snowstorm as if she'd never been there... well if it wasn't for the fact that the large yaks were still trampling the area in their attempt to catch the pair beneath their heavy hoofs.

Like I'm about to stand around!

She was already off when Waka landed on her back, paws pounding and carrying them away. With the yaks behind them, they couldn't immediately head down to base. Were they normal yaks or conjured? Were yaks even supposed to be here? They didn't smell right...

Either way, she swerved as they reached a safer range from the Witch and the emitter. They had to lose the herd one way or another.

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[OPEN] Mission 156

[Waka | Towards the summit | Closed]

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