Before the Looking Glass

The party hence proceeded forward through the ruinous settlement. While it wasn't quite a ghost town, even when one ignored all the monsters about, what few signs of not outwardly hostile life they encountered only served to make the whole area all the more unsettling, giving the new players the distinct impression of making their way through a diseased animal, not yet dead but drifting between death and life. The mushrooms seemed as both a literal and metaphorical parasite, draining the life and livelihood out of what could have been a place of joy and simple prosperity; cobblestone streets that ought to have been filled with the laughter of children rather than the cry of beasts.

Even taking detours for safety, the party was not able to avoid combat altogether. Twice they were ambushed by roaming bands of Muckwimps, the diminutive water imps posing little challenge individually (standing only about a foot tall, able to jump four times their height but 'running' only at a scuttling speed), they swarmed the party with groups of no less than 15 at a time, and could quickly overwhelm by having half their number pelting their prey by lobbing shots of sticky mucus from afar while the rest swarmed from every direction. The senior players had no trouble dispatching them and keeping the newbies safe, but Zephyr was still struck by the viciousness programmed into the digital animals when they attacked. It was clear that these encounters were different from those in the waterway. If he and Kate had wandered in this area by themselves, they'd have been torn apart in no time.

They also came across a roaming trio of Prawndrakes that they could have avoided, though Edgar mentioned needing to harvest some material from their chitin for some alchemical process he was working on, so the party split in three and engaged them. The amphibious beasts were a thrill to fight: lightning fast and intelligent, they wielded powerful water and lightning magic and swung razor sharp pincers dripping with a paralyzing toxin. Zephyr fought with Edgar (the 'fighting' mostly entailing running in to use some of his most powerful attacks when the elder player stunned the creature and then retreating immediately to avoid deadly rebuttal, keeping it busy to let the alchemist use his potions without interruption), while Kate fought with Mogar (being instructed to only engage in supporting him so as to not 'draw aggro'), and Itsjeff and Kazu handled the last one. This fight was more enjoyable and involved than the Muckwimp ambushes, but Zephyr knew that this was largely since this time the party had the advantage of getting the drop on their enemies. He had chosen to develop use his attribute points to make his avatar develop towards being a speedster character, but he knew that the prawndrake would have sliced him up without difficulty if he didn't have Edgar's supporting fire doing most of the work.

The most notable encounter, however, happened just outside of the house the party was heading to. The mage that they were tracking had used the seasonal changes to his advantage and set up a trap for anyone who might be snooping around his hideout while he was away. As soon as they got within 10 meters of the residence, they triggered a hidden magical 'tripwire' which sent what appeared to be three luminous globes up in the air. In fact, the globes were wrought out of the caps of the surrounding Ogon Fungi (or 'monster mushrooms' as kazu liked to refer to them), and exploded shortly after being launched, releasing heavy spore clouds in the area.

While everyone was able to take the anti-berserk Sedative items quickly enough to prevent having their avatar fall under the negative status, the spores attracted nearby creatures and the party was beset by two Consumed Ogoliths crashing through a nearby house and into the street the party was on, quickly being followed by five Consuming Fiends who were more than happy to help tear into whatever meal had triggered such a strong spore signal.

To this, Zephyr and Kate were explicitly told to stay the hell out of the way and as out of sight as possible while the senior members decided to take off the kiddie gloves and braced themselves for a boss fight to even put their skills to the test.

Zephyr had thankfully found that the destruction caused by the fungal giants crashing into the scene had actually created some rather climb-able rubble, and successfully navigated Kate and himself up to the rooftops where they could observe the fight.

Watching the seniors go all out was awe inspiring for Jason now that he was relegated to a spectator's position. Mogar activated glyphs all over his body that made him nearly double in size, rippling in rage-fueled muscles as his head morphed to almost resemble a bear's, and his body was covered in shaggy fur. Enchantments on his sword activated, making it grow in size to match him, and the berserker charged forth to tank the two giants by himself. He fearlessly swung the diamond blade with all of his finesse and training as a warrior intact, slicing one of the Ogolith's arms off mid-punch and ducking his head under the second giant's swing. with his sword low, the warrior leapt through the gap between the two off-balance mushroom giants and landed behind them. He quickly turned around and took the attack of opportunity to slash the disarmed Ogolith across the back, inflicting even more critical damage before the giant got to retaliate.

The so-far ignored second giant would have turned around and met the berserker, were it not for the fact that Kazu suddenly came twirling through the air, a literal chinese dragon made of fire following her right foot: at first twirling with her, and then extending out and downwards in a an infernal arc as the girl kicked down. The Ogolith was consumed from head to crotch in a narrow column of fire and pain, remaining ablaze even after the main attack dissipated into the ground. Like her boyfriend and melee counterpart, the magical DPS specialist wasn't about to give her opponent any breathing room and immediately followed up her attack by starting up a new dance, one that vaguely evoked notions of an indian belly dance and animated the fire eating away at the fungus, turning the flames into fiery wolves that actively bit and clawed into the giant as they covered it, rendering the giant completely focused on trying to shake off its flaming infestation.

The pair maintained their assault on the giants, leaving Itsjeff and Edgar to handle the leaping and bounding fiends. Initially, the pack animals had seemed interested in blocking off Kazu on her way to help Mogar, quickly identifying her as the easiest thing to rip apart and mangle. However, a well-placed shot from their engineer's blunderbuss took off the leading fiend's head, combined with Edgar sweeping in from the side and cutting down another Consuming Fiend with his rapier, managed to distract the mob enough to let the fire dancer past and turned the attention of the remaining three fiends on the two former enchanters. Two of them turned on Edgar and forced the alchemist to quickly pull out a potion of agility and down it so he could keep up with the two enraged attacking enemies. He, probably better than anyone, knew how badly one did not want to get scratched or bit by anything carrying half the pathogens these critters were, VR game or not.

The remaining one went after Itsjeff, causing the enginner to activate the speed enhancement on his boots so he could outrun the monster and kite it around the battle field while he waited for his arcane blunderbuss to recharge. The annoying thing about fungi enemies, however, was that -while they were thankfully pretty light on armour- dismembering or decapitating them was about as effective at keeping them down permanently as shooting a zombie in the chest. Mogar was disarming his opponent for the third time now, and the Alpha Consumed Fiend regenerated its head within seconds and started angrily chasing down Itsjeff along with its subordinate to exact vengeance on the elf.

The good thing about them was that they burned easily. Kazu made quick work of her opponent and rushed off to help focus down the last ogolith, liberally using her most elegant and destructive hellfire to finish off the beast mogra had been tanking so far by repeatedly slicing off bits of the beast and meeting it fist for fist in superpowered beatdowns.

Itsjeff, once his gun was once again ready to fire, immediately turned around and faced down the nearer, weaker fiend. Rather than go for another headshot, he aimed for center of mass and the enchanted gauss rifle he called a blunderbuss blew a clean hole through the monster's chest and through its back mid-hop. While the monster wasn't killed, it was knocked down hard and its legs spammed futilely to get it back up right while its body tried to regenerate. The engineer quickly reached into his satchel and pulled out a small cube, tossing it into the monster's closing cavity. Immediately afterwards he took off running again to keep ahead of the alpha. Rather than just wait for his gun to recharge again though, he dropped three translucent disks behind him as he ran, the devices activating and exploding as fire mines when the Fiend approached them in its chase. The mines succeeded in tripping up the monster and setting it aflame, but from the enraged shriek it gave before resuming its chase, all this seemed to do was only piss it off further and make it hungrier for Itsjeff's mutilated flesh.

Guess there was a reason they called it the Alpha.

Thankfully, just as the second monster focused on the elf was just about ready to get up, the cube that was now lodged deep inside it activated and effectively became a molten lump of active thermite, setting the creature aflame from the inside out, taking it out of the fight.

Edgar, on his end, was unfortunately out of liquid fire potions to throw at these things, so he had to rely on his skill as a fencer to keep himself alive as he wore the beasts down. However, what he did have was a rapier coated in necrothurgic poison derived from the bulbs on these creatures' backs. He hadn't managed to get a deep enough cut on either of the two he was fighting currently for it to have much effect, having had to keep himself satisfied with glancing strikes and stunning blows to keep himself from suffering any injury. However, he knew the timing of his poisons very well, and he also knew that as he allowed one of the beasts to catch his rapier in its horns and engaged it in a deadlock that the second would take advantage of this and flank him to take him down quickly in his moment of distraction. This, of course, left the creature completely open to being tackled by its reanimated compatriot -the first Fiend that Edgar had cut down- and brought to the ground where it was quickly trampled and tail-whipped to death.

Smiling that his mind-control agent was so effective on the beast, Edgar broke his deadlock with the monster in front of him just as the tail he'd previously severed finished regenerating, getting out of the way of its lashes and letting his new 'pet' get in between him and his assailant, snarling angrily and raising its own spiked tail in defence of its master.

The enemy fiend was momentarily confused by the behaviour of its compatriot, but quickly understood the signs of aggression and started hissing and raising its tail in turn. The two went low, and waited, preparing to pounce on one another as soon as one made a sign of flinching, becoming like still ponds on the edge of a storm.

The release and violent lashing of tails and tearing of claws never came, as both figured were promptly consumed in fireballs as Kazu pirouetted onto the scene. Edgar did not seem to mind the loss of the loyal Fiend and smiled at his compatriot. "Ahh, so you two have finally taken out the giants?"

"After about 90% of my magic reserves? yeah." responded the fire dance as she turned to the alchemist, two flaming corpses collapsing around her and soon fading away to digital bits. she added "these things really wouldn't suck so much if you didn't have a countdown timer on them basically slapping every status and it grandmother on you."

"On top of having a bunch of health." chimed in the alchemist, his magical reserves still mostly full but having burned through a few high-end items.

It was at precicely this point that Mogar went literally screaming past, howling in battle rage as he rushed towards itsjeff and the remaining enemy.

"Right, they're like a marathon and a sprint all at once. Asshole devs." sighed the spent magician, ignoring the berserker entirely.

Itsjeff, on his end, had had his gun recharged for a while, but was having a hard enough time creating enough distance between himself and the Alpha fiend to turn around and use the weapon. Additionally, his boots were about to overheat and need cooling down. He was not looking forward to seeing what a pissed off, flaming, fungus-infected lizard-dog-tentaclemonster-thing would do to him when that happened. Thankfully, he caught sight of the enraged man-bear heading towards him and immediately shifted course to run at him head-on.

Perfectly timed as if it was something they'd rehearsed a thousand times, teh elf ducked between the berserker's legs at the last moment and Mogar came up with his open paw, gripping the alpha by its throat and lifting it off its feet as the heavier man-bear pulled it into its charge. Before the fungus monster could orient itself, mogar thew it into the air and stabbed his sword in the ground. He wound back and caught the monster coming down with a fist to its skull, smashing the creature into the cobblestone below. Without hesitation the werebear began pummelling the beast with his bare fists with increasing speed, landing blow after bone crushing blow on the prone creature. With every strike he seemed to only grow in power and soon started to actually glow. Shortly thereafter the pummelling ceased and the gigantic warrior jumped back to his sword, gripping the gigantic diamond blade by its handle and pulling it out from the stone he'd sheathed it in. The glow that enveloped him spread to the blade and he let out a deafening roar before jumping high into the air. The aura around his body focused itself into the blade and it once again grew in size, coming to dwarf even the empowered berserker. Mogar lifted the blade high and brought it down like a meteor on the Alpha fiend, making the earth beneath his blade explode as all the pent up magic was released in one devastating strike.

Guess there was a reason he was called a berserker.

Once the smoke cleared, Mogar was left behind, him and his blade both reverted to their original forms and dimensions. The fiend did not regenerate.

"Shit mike, talk about 'overkil'" laughed Itsjeff from the side.

"Ain't no kill like it!" replied Mogarl, laughing along with his club leader. "Besides, it seems like a waste to end that form without using a breaker combo."

Jason had been observing every detail of the Jaegers fighting intently. He'd gotten an idea of their sense of teamwork before, but now he was completely blown away by how each member had known exactly what to do, when, and how. The way they all perfectly applied their specialties when going all-out to take out such powerful enemies with relative ease was a testament to what kind of skills you could develop in peoepl when they thought they were just playing a game.

Part of him wanted to say the display reminded him of watching his old team of broken mirrors, but even in accounting for the auto-physics of the game, if his own team had been this well co-ordinated, things might not have...

Well, he was simply realizing that this 'game' may have a few things to teach him. He turned to Kate and chuckled. "Somehow, I doubt we'll ever be spending enough time here to become that good. Still, that was a pretty cool show eh? Kazu's class name gets a lot more literal than i thought it woudl when he usses her big spells."
 
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And so they walked, continuing through the eerie setting despite its perturbing aura. Kate kept her hood up and took small breaths, making sure to stay close to the group even as her gaze kept wandering back down to her feet. That didn't last very long, however. After the first ambush by those awfully aggressive little monsters known as Muckwimps, Rue was swiftly embarrassed by how easily she startled for the rest of the trek. Bright ,red eyes flashed about as she walked, nervous and constantly looking out for potential dangers. And still, she didn't see them coming the second time around either.

How was fear useful at all if it kept failing her this way? All it ever seemed to do was paralyze her, hold her back...one would think she'd be used to the feeling by now, considering.

The air in her lungs grew cold in her chest again when Edgar pointed out a small group of large crustaceans called Prawndrakes he wanted to engage. Kate tensed, but did as she was advised while teamed up with Mogar. She was initially struck by how fast they were in battle, but did her best to keep up while the sound effects of the game made her clench her teeth and focus on how best to be useful, making sure not to draw the monsters' attention. It wasn't so bad when they clearly had the advantage, but it wasn't especially easy by any means. Nonetheless, Edgar got what he wanted, she and Zephyr got some EXP and they continued on their way.

Eventually they group arrived at their destination, and just as Kate's eyes looked up to examine the house, three glowing spheres catapulted just ahead of them and none of them could react fast enough to avoid their subsequent explosion. Kate ducked and nearly stumbled to the floor, covering her face as the gaseous clouds dispersed around them until the Jaegers swiftly made sure everyone took Anti-Berserk items. Kate had no time to question them, but was very glad those existed. Unfortunately, there seemed to be no such Anti-Monster item to prevent the mass that seemed to come out of nowhere. Two giant, blue mushroomy troll things stomped toward their group, slow and slimy and surrounded by incredibly creepy quadrupeds with no eyes that she was almost sure did not hinder them in the least. She didn't get a much better look--not that she wanted to--before she was told to get way out of the danger zone with Zephyr, who led her toward some ruins a little ways off the overgrown street.

Her hands shook as they made their way in the dim light and the awful memories crawling their way to the surface like kudzu in her mind. They were heading up toward higher ground and a low roof from which they could view the battle in full. Her fingers formed fists, bu that didn't stop the shaking and she couldn't look away. It looks different. This is different. We're not. running away.
She kept waiting for the worst, but they rarely took damage, using their powers--no, spells to their ultimate advantage in taking down the malicious creatures around them. They were all very quick as well; she could hardly count how many they were up against when the white ones moved so fast or got killed. Or in one case, turned against its own kind with Edgar's use of a potion or something. Belle hadn't understood the game before all of this, but it seemed even more daunting to learn the game mechanics when it could get this complex.

And Kazu certainly made it look complex, even if it was just flashy. Somehow, she was graceful about it too, dancing with the flames she conjured, long red hair whipping through the air as her powers tried to manipulate what others saw before she crashed to the ground---
Kate winced and let out a hiss at the far too frequent reminders. She hated how fragile it made her and how hopeless she felt, never knowing if they'd ever stop playing as long as her guilty conscience remained anchored in her head.

The fight sort of ended with a bang, as Mike, still half-bear and strangely as wild in his fighting as the wild animal his powers showed. The longer he took to finish off the digital enemy, the more cautious Rue felt toward him. She wouldn't make it obvious and she was probably foolish to feel this way, but part of her stopped starting to trust him...even if none of the others had gained much of her trust anyway, since she'd only just met them.

He turned to Kate and chuckled. "Somehow, I doubt we'll ever be spending enough time here to become that good. Still, that was a pretty cool show eh? Kazu's class name gets a lot more literal than i thought it woudl when he usses her big spells."

"Definitely," she breathed, exhaling loudly in relief now that it seemed actually over. "I didn't know the effects could be that..excessive. I almost thought Mogar was one of the enemies with the bear claws and everything." Her grip on the rubble she'd been led behind tightened even with the half-hearted smile on her face. "But it was really impressive. We should probably tell them that though." With that, she stood and headed back toward the Jaegers beside Zephyr with a congratulatory smile, still minding her breath around the possible remnants of the mushroom spores.

((It's been like 6 months omgs i'm an ASSHOLE! *insert awfully rambling apologies here* D: ))
 
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