Elenia

Marina had been alarmed by Ryu's sudden movement, but it was his words that got her.
What's that matter? Are you in some sort of shock that this isn't the Ryu you once knew?
He knew about the other Ryu, he seemed to know him well... surely that meant the real Ryu was still there? But she didn't have time to consider it as the Terran stopped Ryu attacking her, moving out the way just before Zet intervened.
She knew that Zet had stopped the attack to protect her, but it meant they had more time to try and find out what was happening with Ryu. Marina felt sure that the real Ryu was still inside his body, maybe just the magic of the demon was holding him back. If they pushed hard enough, it might be possible to bring him back into control. She didn't want to kill him, not while there was still the possibility to help him.
Then Ryu dissappeared again. Her hand tightened on her whip as she stared around, hearing his voice but not spotting him until the dark sphere started to form.
Ryu's power was like nothing she had ever seen before, if she didn't know better she'd have believed that it was the power of the dark gem. But Arienna had that so how could he have power like this? What was giving him this energy?
As she saw sparks of dark magic flowing in all directions, seeing the damage it caused, she knew they had to do something. It didn't take a genius to work out that the sphere could cause alot of damage to the area, and the civilians wouldn't have been able to move that far away so they may still be in the line of fire.
Her eyes suddenly hit the floor, noticing one of the puddles in the street... and she had an idea.
"Zet, I need you two to stay behind me." She said, stepping in front of the two men and putting her whip back in her belt.
When Ryu launched the sphere, she lifted her hands in front of her and a large, thick wall of water formed in front of them, stopping the sphere before it could hit them. Some of the surrounding buildings still got damaged but the wall stopped the worse of it.
Marina felt the force of it but held her position, her hands shaking slightly with the effort. This was the first time she had really used the water gem's magic and she knew she wasn't strong enough to dispel the magic. But if she held it back long enough, Marina was sure she could rob it of enough force to prevent any innocent lives being lost.

When the Lithelian blocked Ragnar's attack, he immediately let up on his force behind it, and nodded at the man's words, letting out a little grunt, but that was all. He was sure he wouldn't have hit the Aquarian, but it wouldn't do any good to argue his accuracy with his Glaive with this guy right now. And he also noticed how these two seemed to have almost no intent of killing this 'Ryu'. If they did, they would have attacked with much more force by now. The demon chuckled, and then vanished from where he was. Ragnar placed his glaive back on his shoulder, keeping his eyes on the spot where Ryu had vanished from, all his other senses focused on finding the demon. However, that was hardly necessary, as the demon quickly let his location be known by shouting, "This is perfect! I'll kill you three annoying insects in one blow!"

Ragnar's face snapped upwards to the voice, his dreads flailing around his head, readying his glaive for a throw, but this time he was aiming for a non-lethal area, Ryu's upper thigh. However, he didn't toss the glaive, instead waiting to see what the demon would do, as well as his former friends. Particles of unstable energy began to form in Ryu's right hand, bits of it sparking off and colliding into nearby buildings and the village wall, causing bits to shatter and fall off. Ragnar doubted that it would cause him anything more than a few scrapes, but he knew it would hurt the other two, who were sure to have a much smaller amount of damage they could take. But, he was surprised when the Aquarian stepped in front of the both of them, and told them to stay put, before forming a wall of water just in time to block the sphere of chaotic energy.

"What do you two want to do to him? Is there a plan?" Ragnar asked, the first words he had spoken to either of them. If this was their friend, or had been before he became possessed or whatever, they definitely wouldn't want him killing Ryu. But if he kept on acting like this, Ragnar wouldn't have much of a choice.

Zet was happy that the Terran didn't seem to argue about him blocking his attack. He was a bit overprotective of Marina, at least when he could afford to be. However, with Ryu's next attack Zet wondered if he had made the wrong choice. The man probably wouldn't have hurt Marina, plus he doubted that Marina would just let herself get hurt anyway. Maybe if it wasn't Ryu Zet would have let it go through. He may have chosen to protect Marina, rather then throw himself between an ally and an enemy, to protect said "enemy". Ryu disappeared for a moment and when he revealed his location once more it was with a bang so to speak.

Ryu's attack was reckless, and meant to just destroy and kill. They couldn't let his attack go through, but what could he do? Melee attacks and even at the range he could throw his daggers, there was nothing he could do to stop this. That's when Marina stepped up. This was the first real time he had witnessed the power of a gem in action. It was really an amazing sight to behold. "Marina..." Was all he could say as she blocked Ryu's attack. He didn't have the time to sit there and discuss how cool that was though, if Ryu had to concentrate even a moment on his attacks then Zet saw the opening. Him and the Terran needed to keep the pressure on him. Don't give him a chance to gather himself, and don't give him more then a split second response time. They weren't going for the killing blow, just enough for Ryu to slip up. Maybe even drawing his attention would allow Marina to overcome the attack she was holding at bay easier.

When the Terran spoke Zet looked at him for a moment only. "We need to stop him. I'd prefer to knock him out and try to capture him, to see if we can retrieve the friend who may still be inside of him. However, if that isn't able to happen... We can't let him kill anyone else. I think we can keep the pressure on him, and hope to see an opening or a slip up. Capturing is much more difficult then trying to kill someone." he last part was loud enough for the Marina and the Terran to hear, but was more to himself.

Zet sprinted in forward. He pulled two of his throwing Daggers and threw them straight for Ryu, after amplifying them with his ability. His sleeves were almost completely soaked at this point, and he could really start to feel the pain. He was used to it though, and could fight through it. The Daggers were headed straight for Ryu. He wouldn't want to be hit with them, since they could pierce steel in their current condition. They were merely distraction tools though. His main target was Ryu's leg. He whipped the chain he still held around and straight at Ryu's leg. He was hoping for it to wrap around Ryu's leg and he could tear him down from the sky, slamming him into the ground. Then it would be up to the Terran to keep the pressure on Ryu. Of course Ryu would probably retaliate somehow on his own. Zet was kind of fearful that he'd channel some of those sparks through his chain. However if he brought Ryu to the ground, it would be worth taking the hit. It wasn't one that would kill him, he knew that for sure. Zet could take a beating and got stronger from them. As long as they pierced his skin that is.

As Ari continued her little rampage, she began to feel exceedingly drained. All the raw energy she was letting off in the shadows was draining her quickly. Finally, she just resorted to all she really had; her boots and her hands. She ran, bumping into people and shoving them blindly out of the way. Some called after her, but most just watched the crying girl run. Cobblestone streets turned to dirt roads, dirt roads became grassy foot trails, and grassy foot trails dissolved into nothing. Soon she was simply running to who knew where. The tears that stung her eyes impaired her view and her breath began to burn in her chest. Finally, her foot caught a gnarled root that stuck out of the ground and her body collided with the ground. Hard. The wind effectively knocked out of her, she rolled onto her back and stared up at the canopy of trees above her. This place was familiar. In some respects, it was soothing. She wanted so badly to stop crying, but the pain throbbing in her heart, as well as in the dark gem, was unbearable. And ever persistent was Everen’s taunting voice, calling her weak, foolish, and a disgrace. And she began to listen. Listen to how stupid she was. How big a disgrace she was. How weak she was. It even began to color her memories, the darkness spreading little by little as it clawed greedily at her mind. Had her mother really ever loved her? Maybe Everen WAS the one good thing in her life. Had she been wrong all along? She felt so small right now, so inadequate. Pulling herself up against a stump of a tree, she sat with her back to it, her knees pulled up to her breasts as she simply put her head down and cried, “Daddy, where are you? I need you…”

As Ryu witnessed the his attacked stopped by the power of the Water Gem, he growled abit in rage as he used his other to go agaisnt it, planning to add more force to push it harder down onto them. That moment of distraction was the first as he caught sight of the incoming daggers, seeing where they were heading as he leeps upward into the air, almost like he kicked off of an invisable platform, to avoid the daggers. His movement were stopped when chains caught on his legs, making him look down at Zet being behind it. "Why you!!!" he yells before he was then yanked down from teh sky and into the ground, slamming into the floor. As he made contact, is control over the sphere of energy started to lose grip, weakening it enough for it to break apart with a hard enough force.

Ryu growled more, almost monster like as he forced himself off the ground, glaring at Zet. "Your dead!!" Once he yells that, a swarm of ten blades, all beonging from the soilders her had killed, appeared around Ryu, all covered in a dark aura and all aimed straight at Zet. Filled with rage, he sends the wave of blades at Zet in high speed.

Rie had been chasing after Ari, the girl could run that's for sure, it took her a while to finally catch up to her and it seemed as though that were only tru because Ari had tripped. Rie heard Ari call out quietly for her father as she jogged over to her and crouched next to her. Rie looked down at the girl with great concern, "Ari, what's wrong?" she asked as she reached out to help Ari up.

(short post is short)

Ari's eyes widened as she heard Rie's voice and felt the girl's presence. There was something different about her though. Obviously there was the now growing pain and on some level hatred, but there was something else. She couldn't quite put her finger on it, and though she didn't try very hard. Her head simply came up with a jolt as Rie crouched next to her, and in her eyes there was fear, pain, and on the deepest level, hate and anger. She focused on Rie's hand and a wall of darkness spread between them, "Don't touch me!" She said, though it was weak, "Just leave me alone. Just everyone leave me alone." She wanted to just melt away into nothing. As if reacting to her will, the darkness that had erupted between them spread, seemingly consuming her until there was nothing left but an imprint in the dirt. She seemingly floated through darkness until her back touched up against something. She turned and was nearly blinded by light. Firelight. Torchlight. She was back in her room. How she got there, she had no clue, but she was here. Everything felt so bright and cheery. She'd left it looking neat and tidy this morning. Anger she didn't know she had flared up in her, and the shadows lashed out, upsetting furniture and just making a mess out of everything. When she finally opened her eyes, the torches were dark, and the room was plunged in darkness. But as if by some sixth sense, she walked around the ruined room, and began to put her armor on. With an almost monotone voice, she said, "I am a tool of war. I am a suit of armor to be used to fight. Nothing more. Nothing less."

Marina was struggling to keep up the block, even though she had already robbed the sphere of some of it's force it was still very powerful and she wasn't used to using this kind of power.
But she had noticed Zet moving towards Ryu so she needed to keep it up, if only to buy him a bit more time.
It was hard to believe they had been reduced to this, fighting their friend. How had this happened to Ryu? No matter what they did, he just didn’t change back to the way he was. Surely he wasn’t completely lost? There had to be a chance.
Marina heard Ryu shout and suddenly felt the force of the sphere lesson, realising that he must have lost focus on the energy. Gritting her teeth, she pushed as hard as she could with the water, finally dispelling the sphere altogether but almost collapsing in the process. It was way too much of a drain to her system to use that much magic.
Closing her eyes a moment and taking several deep breaths, she tried to regain some strength. Even she could tell the battle was far from over.
Her head snapped around as she heard Ryu's words, seeing the blades heading towards Zet.
"ZET!"
Using what little energy she had left, Marina sent a ball of water towards the blades, trying to knock them off course.