[Episode One] Bones for Bread

Archives of Occultus Magica's beginnings, ten years prior to the current story.
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Kai
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Re: [Chapter One] Bones for Bread

Post by Kai »

The first thing that happened was that Aurus had managed to find his way through an Eye socket, and the tiny angry thing began to bounce around within the skull, shooting flames and curses out of every orifice, but it didn't seem to hurt the beast much. It did slow it down, however, but the Gashadokuro seemed to have noticed the earth magic, and stomped down on the raised bit of ground, smashing it back down. This caused two things, or rather, one thing in two places. The ground in front of Duncan and beneath Ruarc rose rapidly, the one in front of Duncan jutting up and intercepting the thin jet of water. It was sliced as a sacrifice to protect the Gashadokuro. The second upthrust of land, underneath Ruarc, sent him flying through the air, with such force that he arced over the canal and could see himself traveling straight for the Gashadokuro's feet....

When the creature stopped, Miyuki took the time to notice Miller running beside her, appearing to be slightly brighter than the night should allow. She stopped in her tracks, the skidding causing two trails of flame to gush up momentarily behind her, as she did an enormous double-take. "M- Miller-Sensei!" she called, awestruck, before Saph yelled to his Master
"Miyuki, It's.. I Think you're right! it isn't actually a Gashadokuro! It just used Earth magic!"
"What the hell could it be?"
"I think... One of my siblings! The Topaz!"
"WHAAAAT????" Miyuki blurted, hoping the teacher hadn't heard Saph talking.
"I know we can take it now, but still... something's confusing me..."
"Why did it take that form?" Miyuki finished, for him.

Miyuki set herself, and pulled the Ruby out of the Maiden and the Key, replacing it with the Sapphire, Changing back from red to blue.
"So it seems we had the right idea to start with." she said.
"We just need to try harder. We should make it with all this help, though." Saph agreed.
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Straken
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Re: [Chapter One] Bones for Bread

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Ruarc was pleased with his achievement up until it backfired on him. His mind went blank for a few moments as he became airborne in an arc high above the ground. As he became a shadow against the night sky he began to panic as it became evident that he was not going to have a soft landing.
“Craiceann na cloiche!” he said quickly as he cast Stone Skin, making his skin as tough as rock. “Oh god! Ohgodohgodohgod!” he shouted he came on an impact trajectory with the behemoth’s foot. In his panic though, the heavy Ancestral Tome slipped from the Druid’s hand and fell away somewhere into the dark canal. There was nothing he could do about, so he tucked in to try and take the impact.

The Irishman ended his brief flight with a solid impact against the beast’s ankle. He tumbled away in a daze before regaining his head. Scrambling to his feet he tried in vain to find the Tome.
”Well, I was not expecting Earth magic. I really need to get an Ice spell or something. Come on, think!” Ruarc thought to himself feverishly. With what he hoped was a flash of inspiration rather than insanity, the Druid dashed around the massive foot and got behind the behemoth.
“Créatúr na tine, theilgthe breithiúnas!” Ruarc shouted. With both hands free, he pushed all his magical energy into the palms of his hands and unleashed a massive torrent of flames that rushed upward. The flames roaring and blasting air to the point where his hood was blown back. With both his hands he formed jaws and manipulated the flames. At the forefront of the flame jet appeared the head of a dragon, opening its jaws in synch with Ruarc’s hands. The dragon roared upward and engulfed the skeleton as Ruarc snapped his hands shut to hold the flames and increase their intensity.
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Gwathdraug
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Re: [Chapter One] Bones for Bread

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Riley cut off the bells quickly after it was clear the skeleton wasn't bothered at all by the cacophony of sound and most likely all her illusions had done was annoy the locals.

When the giant bag of bones used earth magic on the two of the other mages attacking it, the Alstad girl's face broke into a huge grin. Taking another good, measuring look at their opponent Riley began creating the largest mask she could muster with her mana. Her two hands out in front of her and the grinning stage prop slowly growing in front of her the Riley glanced over towards Percy.

“Watson! Better tell your little flame jet he better plan on making his own exit – 'cause if he goes and breaks my mask busted out of those eye-sockets again I'll see he does more than just splits a few rocks!” The girl's voice held a joking quality to it, but there was also a large dose of tension as she strained her spell beyond the limits she had learned.

“Here goes act two!” Riley muttered to herself as she sent the large mask towards the skeleton.
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Kokuten
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Re: [Chapter One] Bones for Bread

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"Aurus!" yelled Percy as he saw the skeleton become engulfed in the Dragon's flame. Whoever was lighting that skeleton up didn't know that that fireball wasn't just a fireball! It was a little god with a mortal, super-charged body! The boy's eyes widened as he paled in realization of what could happen to him. Sure, he was the God of Fire, but he was in a form that limited his power greatly, and that dragon was HUGE!
“Watson! Better tell your little flame jet he better plan on making his own exit – 'cause if he goes and breaks my mask busted out of those eye-sockets again I'll see he does more than just splits a few rocks!” The girl's voice held a joking quality to it, but there was also a large dose of tension as she strained her spell beyond the limits she had learned.

“Here goes act two!” Riley muttered to herself as she sent the large mask towards the skeleton.
Percy blinked at the massive mask as he saw it fire away. How could something so small fire away something so large? A curious art that would require some investigated were not for the fact that Aurus was still trapped inside. Could he even unsummon him at this distance? Damned would he be if he didn't try. He slammed his staff down and called Aurus back, but got no response.

"Aurus!" Percy called for his previously hated comrade. Though, there was still no answer, not even in his head. The boy's heart sank.

Though, in that tense moment, for Percy, a massive gout of flame burst out the left of the skull, with an armored, horned demon pushing itself out the side of the skeleton's head. Horrific skulls on his spaulders breathed in at Ruarc's dragonfire like a vacuum, while every breath exhaled the molten blaze. The horned knight saw Riley's mask coming, and a concentrated blast of flames summoned a pick-up-truck-long, jagged blade which he stabbed into the base of the skeleton's neck, jamming it in-between the neck joints to try and lock the bony behemoth's swiveling head in place. With that, he pulled himself out, pauldrons still taking greedily from the druid's intense fire magic, and stood at the shoulder. With another hellish burst of flames, the monstrous knight summoned a cleaver, of equal length to the stabbing blade, and swiped down at the massive Skeleton's shoulder. Following that swipe, came a loud declaration, full of resonance and godly tremor.

"I AM AURUS! GOD OF FIRE AND FLAME!" came Aurus' words, ringing out over the canal, even louder than Riley's bells. Each word followed by a flood of flames from maw-slots of the Fire God's deathly helmet.
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Re: [Chapter One] Bones for Bread

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"Tch." Duncan cut off his cutting stream, and began to simply walk away from his casting site in silence, a scowl on his face. It didn't make sense; from what the databases had on them, the Gashadokuro should have been just another dime-a-dozen monster to him. Especially with all of Duncan's skill and talent. Obviously, this was either a Gashadokuro plus something more, or a fake. In all probability, it was one of them tampered with by magic; considering the hijinks at school, perhaps someone decided to mess with one of these? He dismissed that thought. Best not put together unrelated topics. Making sure to keep an eye on the scene, Duncan retreated back to his little corner of the concealing dome.

He grinned as the Druid-like earth user ricocheted off the Skeleton's ankle, before searching around for the lost spell book like a girl without her glasses. 'Guess someone didn't get along with the times.' Duncan though, before scowling at the sight of a flashy show of force. Shaped like a dragon, moving jaw, big size...anyone who used that had to be compensating. Or an idiot compensating. Either or really. He sighed. At the least, the other guy's little fire chibi was hacking away. Much better. And then it yelled out like a redneck in roid-rage. Duncan facepalmed. Still, he took note of the words for searching up later. 'Little shit is probably going to get swatted away or something. Just watch.' he thought to himself. As the Mahou Shoujo talked to her Familiar beside Miller, the bumbling teacher who had to go all against the 'don't come here this place is evil vibe' he'd set up, the boy watched the younger girl do something rather...interesting.

Feeling in a better mood now that the bells were gone, Duncan leaned back and popped a Hi-Chew into his mouth, watching carefully. Whatever the little girl was doing, it had better be good.
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Re: [Chapter One] Bones for Bread

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Miller then realised that within an Instant, a 'God of Fire and Flame' had appeared next to him. At this point, nothing could surprise him any more, between seeing the students he saw yesterday take on something bigger than all of them, and appearing to do a damn good job (at least in his mind anyway, since he had no way of knowing how well they were doing.)
"I'll buy you some time!" Miller told Miyuki as he made a one-eighty degree turn and stopped, skidding as his momentum died down. He figured that between this 'Fire God' and himself, he could inflict some damage - His adrenaline was pumping, he stopped to take a breath and he could feel something anew rising within him for taking a stand, "GO!"

He took off his glasses and put them in the neckline of his sweater vest. He meant business. It seemed as though his act of standing against something so large to protect another had making whatever was lying within him awake with a visible flash of white light. To the others assembled, they could see it, and feel it. Miller was one of them, whether he knew it or not.

His first action was to rush towards the Skeleton, ignoring the radiant heat from the 'Fire God' and leaping up at least twenty feet into the air with a single, effortless looking bound. The first place he'd get to was to the skeleton's right leg, and he thought it prudent to start climbing, getting to the pelvic bone where the femur meets the joint. However, he realised that he couldn't keep climbing - the heat was just too intense to continue. On the other hand, he did realise that he could do some damage right there. He only had one thing available - Blunt Force Trauma.

He started punching the skeleton's thigh bone at full force. He could only punch once at a time into the hip, since he had to use his other hand to maintain a grip on the skeleton. He intended to knock out its hip joint and send it tumbling down. As he did so, he was roaring with battle rage - and he might have been on fire (not that he seemed to mind).

"GET, AWAY, FROM, THE STUDENTS!!"
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Kai
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Re: [Chapter One] Bones for Bread

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As Aurus burst through the skull of the large skeleton, it added an immense amount of dust to the air to compete with the flame- the stabbed blade to the neck added more. When Aurus summoned another enormous blade, however, the weight of both the larger god and his weapon caused the thing to stumble to the left- which, despite the implement being now lodged into its shoulder, turned out to be a boon for the Skeleton- Riley's mask missed its target narrowly, instead hitting the opposite shoulder and restricting the movement of that arm- now also causing it to slowly shrink.

Miller's attacks soon caused the man to be ingulfed in another large cloud of dust, obscuring his and everyone else's vision of the beast. Beneath Miller's fist, he could feel what he thought was bone turning into a rough gritty gravel, as if it were made from granite instead. The Skeleton reeled from the concentrated attacks, but managed to master itself and, despite its restricted range of motions, managed to smack both Miller and Aurus off, whilst also kicking Ruarc rather squarely in the gut and sending him flying a second time.

******

Duncan, from his vantage point, seemed to suddenly feel a sense of dread that he normally would not have. After all, the noobs were somehow winning, right? However, that quiet ringing in his ears that every human had, began to grow, steadily louder and louder until it was nearly the same volume as that of the bells from before. In fact, everyone could hear the ringing now, but Duncan got to hear something else:
THUD.
THUD.
THUD.

If Duncan turned around, he would see standing before him, not the dusty, granite colored fake Gashadokuro they had been fighting, but rather, a sickly pale skeleton of even greater height, this time with grotesque eyeballs in its sockets, and a long, flopping tongue. The bones were stained here and there with what could have been blood, and a stench of death came with it.

It was now obvious why the Topaz had taken its current form- Self Defense. The first skeleton, slightly worse for wear, one arm slowly but surely decreasing in size, turned around, and faced the Gashadokuro, just as it began a charge at Duncan, an arm outstretched to grab the young American mage and do what Gashadokuro do best- Bite his head off.

******

"Holy... Wha- I!. Um!"Miyuki could not finish a sentence, as things began happening so quickly that her mind could barely keep up. first a giant gout of flames, then a blaming man bursting from the skeleton's head. Two humongous weapons, and a glowing teacher later, and suddenly they had a second gigantic beast on their hands.
"Quick! Use Ice magic to lock it's joints!" Saph called out to his master.
"I can use Ice magic? and which one???" she retorted, still lost.
"Yes, and, I'd say the closer one for now" the cat answered.
Miyuki huffed. "Fine!"

"Babylon Key! Unlock the power of Nature and freeze my enemy solid!" Miyuki chanted, not knowing where the words came from. A blue wind seemed to emanate from the staff, and before long had caught up the Topaz' feet, drawing swiftly up the Skeleton's legs, preventing it from moving. Perhaps it will make a good meat shield... the Japanese girl reasoned, starting to pant again from the magical effort she was forcing herself to make. However, Miyuki started to lose concentration, and the ice began growing all around- not just on the Topaz' current form, but the ground around it was steadily being covered with an advancing sheet of ice that threatened to catch Ruarc, Aurus, and Miller in its cold grip.

"Miyuki! Keep it together!" Saph warned, charging forward to try and rescue Ruarc from his predicament, the small cat grew several times in size and grabbed the druid by the cloak, trying to pull him to safety.
"I'm trying, I'm trying!" the girl grunted in response, falling to her knees as she concentrated harder on keeping the spell under her control.
"Send out Rubeh!" Saph suggested, getting a weak nod from Miyuki, and the second cat leaped forth from the stone in Miyuki's pocket, growing to a large beast, and rushing forward to save Miller, as well, dragging the teacher away from the out of control speel, just in time for Miyuki to Collapse from overexertion. Luckily, the collapse also stopped the spell, so it ceased its creeping, but the Topaz was still only half- frozen, if Immobile.
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Re: [Chapter One] Bones for Bread

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One moment, Duncan was relaxed, chewing on his mango flavored candy. The next moment, he was tense. It just didn't make any sense. Why the ringing? After being in the Gashadokuro's presence long enough, it went away; the ears literally got used to the sound and ignored it like white noise. But the noise was back, becoming louder. Why? A giant's footfall answered that. The American Spellcaster's eyes narrowed as his head turned to look at what he already guessed; a second Gashadokuro, taller than the last, was closing in fast. Too late to flee!

Thinking fast, he reached into his pocket and reached down to his elbow before impossibly pulling out a long rifle; a Martini-Henry. One of Duncan's trump cards. Hands moving with practiced ease, the rifle's leaver was worked open, a brass cased bullet fed into the chamber before shutting it closed. As the skeletal hand came around him, Duncan held the rifle tight against his body, the muzzle of the rifle pointed up into the a air. The Gashadokuro grasped the boy in it's skeletal hand and brought him up to it's mouth like a snack bar ready to be eaten. He wasn't going to go that easily.

12. Twelve hours worth of Duncan's magical energy was stored inside the bullet loaded into the ancient rifle, all devoted into doing one thing; making a mess. A massive blast of force and fire erupted from the barrel of the gun, entering directly into the mouth and impacting the spine in the back at point-blank range.

Nanoha would have been proud of that blast. If he was her student.
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Kokuten
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Re: [Chapter One] Bones for Bread

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It was like a pain Percy never knew he could feel.

There was an extreme burning sensation creeping up into Percival's spine as he made his way over to Miyuki. At first, when Aurus had transformed, the young boy had been in awe of his summon, and had decided to link up with the rest of the mage's in the fight. He knew Riley wouldn't stay too far away from him, even a situation like this, Elizabeth would yell at them both if they lost sight of one another. Though, as he approached the Magical Girl, the pain intensified. When he saw Miyuki's face, the pain relieved into a confirming satisfaction of learning how right he was, though, even that was forced away by another surge of needle stabbing agony. The veins on his head began to rise as his blood pumped intensely.

"Ka-... Kagami... I should've... known..." said Percival aloud in his masked voice, only it wasn't likely sure that she had heard that with all the casting going on. Even now, his throat was burning. What was going on?

Meanwhile, as the ice began to take over Topaz, Aurus continued his burning onslaught of the created copy. His morbid pauldrons continued to engulf Ruarc's fire, or what remained of it as he ripped both of his blades out and began viciously chopping and slashing into the freezing monstrosity. The God of Fire was a wrathful beast, but even so, his movements spoke of a well-practiced grace, even as his fiery blades plunged into his victim.

"Ha ha! I had forgotten that this world possessed so much to kill!" howled Aurus, his booming god-voice resonating in delight. "Ha ah--"

"Aurus!" cried Zulan within the mind of her burning counterpart.

"Zulan? Leave me be!" growled Aurus, huffing a flame as he chopped.

"You're killing him!" wailed Zulan painfully, terrified agony in her voice.

"Of course I'm killing him! This thing was dead the moment I--" declared the Fire God.

"No! Percival! He can't take this much! It's killing him!" said a harrowed Zulan, and a directed head towards the young boy on shore served true. Through Aurus' god-like eagle eyes, he could see Percy was barely standing, face red, heaving, and clasping tightly to Unity. At this, the god dropped his weapons in shock, the jagged hell-blade and war-cleaver falling down towards the canal. Aurus bent his legs and with a powerful leap, fired himself away from Topaz and towards the shore, reverting back to the miniaturized form as he sailed through the sky.

When the God of Fire landed on the shore, he tore up a path straight to his summoner. He came just in time to rebalance Percival's staff and keep the boy from tilting over.

"You Welsh idiot! Why didn't you say something!?" scolded Aurus, to what could only sound like a flurry of curses in variable languages to anyone nearby.

"I... I... thought... Thought this was normal... It aches a little when I summon you all anyway..." replied Percival, before hacking and coughing, a splotch of blood staining his mask. Now, Percy had seen a lot in his lifetime, the undead, magical beasts, but never so much of his own blood. He placed his hand on his face, and saw the print of his hand come back completely red. The Welshman began to shake as fear gripped him, kept from panicking and breaking down only by the fact that the pain had finally stopped.

"Fool! It stops being normal when you start dying!" the little god shook Percival, only making his condition worse. "Summon Modeka! Quickly!"
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Straken
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Re: [Chapter One] Bones for Bread

Post by Straken »

The Dragon Fire was a gift more or less from the Druid Council, and one of the first spells he had learned; it was also the most dangerous to himself. Besides it high mana cost to continue projecting the flames, it was also capable of causing him harm as the caster. Ruarc could feel himself faltering as his mana quickly drained, and the flames were beginning to singe his hands. Wincing against the heat and drawing up reserves of mana, the Druid did his best to prolong the attack.

Unfortunately, Ruarc’s efforts were in vain when the skeleton finally had enough and landed a powerful kick on that sent him flying backwards. Now on a much lower and faster trajectory, the Druid bounced and skidded across the hard pavement like a ragdoll until impacted a hill and lost momentum. Pain racked his body as he lay limply on the hard ground. The wind was knocked out of him and a sharp pain in his chest suggested a broken rib or two. With little mana left and a fair amount of physical pain, the young man couldn’t convince his body to move. All he could do was lie in a broken heap where he had landed while the battle continued on.

Ruarc could still feel the intense heat of the Dragon on his face and hands, but soon he felt a comforting cool air descend upon him. Shortly thereafter he felt something grab the back of his cloak and lift him up. Thinking it was the skeleton, Ruarc did his best to take deep breaths so as to force air back into his compressed lungs. More pain shot through him as his lungs inflated and put pressure on his fractured ribs. With enough usable air now, the Druid let out a gasp of pain.

”This isn’t the skeleton, it is similar to that Miyuki girl’s magic,” Ruarc thought as it became apparent that whatever had picked him up was taking him away from imminent danger. After a few moments in transit, which was more than enough for the cat to get away, the Druid motioned to be put while tugging a bit at the piece of robe that was in the large beast’s mouth.

After a few tugs, he pulled his robe free and dropped a couple of feet where he landed unsteadily on the ground. He turned back to the beast and gave a slight bow to show appreciation. Now able to move on his own he looked back at the skeleton with dismay. His attack had failed, and the others weren’t doing much better. A quick glace over to Miyuki showed that she was getting tired as well.

The Druid began thinking of different options to use and how the battle would progress, and the best thing he could come up with was to try and disrupt its ability to fight back. He centered what energy was left in him as he stuck out his left hand and pointed at the skeleton. “Daille de sin,” he said in a clear and resonant tone as he cast Blindness. Unsure if it would even do anything, it was the best and only help he could realistically provide until his energy came back.

Turning his attention away from the monster, Ruarc began to make his way closer to Miyuki. He walked a brisk pace and got to a position just in front of and to the left of Miyuki where he took a defensive position between the girl and the skeleton.
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