"What kind of villain would I be if I mono-"The kind you're being right now.Sillo didn't need to verbalize that thought as Aldred stepped forward, breaking the tension between him and Rose with his own sword. Before he knew it, the fight was on between the enhanced Purple Mana User and the threat to their lives. Sillo watched as the thorns, physical and psychological, flew in all kinds of directions excepts the ones Rose meant for them to travel: into Aldred's skin. He was impressed by Aldred's resolve to hold back his rage against the woman. However, he'd give him the credit that the blondie had more than enough practice holding back his true self.
Still, Sillo couldn't help but figure this would cut his friend....
deeply.
When the fire diminished, Aldred remained among the ashes, alive but in a lot of pain. It was clear his battle was finished. Sillo watched with calculative eyes as his friend slumped against a pillar, catching more than his breath. The focus point of battle had moved to Rose and Zane while Damion and Minori stumbled onto the scene. Sillo went over and sat next to Aldred, not necessarily being able to help him with healing as he didn't possess those abilities, but giving him his company was a close second. Meanwhile, he gathered his own strength for the upcoming battle he would inevitably have against the Wicked Bitch of the West.
Gah, it's almost like a Rite of Passage at this point.Minori called Rose a cunt and even Sillo had to widen his eyes at the word. He knew Minori's analytical side could make her a bit harsh, but he'd never seen her pushed to this level of anger to which she used such vulgar language before. And then he heard the voice of Aldred next to him, egging Rose on.
Dude, don't...He knew what Aldred was doing and understood that it was a decent distraction. It didn't make him cringe any less when she practically body slammed Aldred into a wall, leaving him broken and battered. Breathing a bit heavier out of hatred for her, he didn't act out upon the sudden urge to bitch slap the woman in her pretty perfect face. Instead, he patiently sat to the side and waited his turn, letting this internal emotion build up and fueling him into the future battle.
Zane took control of the fight...in a major way. If Sillo had been impressed by the was Aldred fought Rose, it was dwarfed by Zane's use of his abilities. He realized that he'd pooled his mana with Damion's in the most creative of ways as he prepared two spells he was sure only other Gatewatchers knew about...until now, that is. The Infinity Spells weren't to be trifled with...they did some serious collateral to the caster if they weren't careful. The result of that showed when Zane collapsed to the floor immediately after firing the Infinity Cannon. Sillo's concern for the redhead turned immediately to disbelief when the smoke cleared, showing Rose's body slightly disheveled and scratched, but mostly unharmed by two of the strongest spells the Gatewatchers knew. It was almost disheartening...almost.
A slow clap broke the silence. Rose turned after her attack on Minori to see Sillo standing in the open, an unmistakable grin on his face. He stopped clapping when he had her attention, holding his hands out and shrugging with apparent disinterest. Rose, despite everything, kept her guard up. Now what was
this one up to?
"Good job with that Infinity Cannon, by the way," Sillo's eyes gleamed as he continued, "Very few have been able to even cast the spell as far as I've gathered. Supposedly one of the most powerful. And you came out of it with nothing but a few scratches. That alone deserves our respect towards your marvelous power." He knew he was stroking her ego, which would confuse her even further than she was already.
He shut one eye and concentrated on conjuring...a boom box. More curious glances would be shot his way as Sillo picked it up and set it on one of the pedestals, brushing off an urn and letting it smash on the floor. "Hold on...just prepping some fight music," he held out a finger as a gesture of patience before hitting the "Play" button.
TheFatRat - Do Be Do Be DoThe music started filling the air as Sillo stepped forward, holding the bow staff with his life and preparing for the ass whoopin' to come. He knew he probably wouldn't fare much better than Aldred, Minori, or Zane had. But it was worth a shot, right?
Man or mouse, Sillo?
Squeak."Cute," Rose rolled her eyes at the boy's addition of music to the fight, "But it doesn't matter. I'll dance to whatever tune you wish. It won't make watching the life leave your eyes any less satisfying." She brought her curved blade up in front of her face, smirking with cruel satisfaction. "Now, let's dance."
She twitched her empty hand, a vine laced with poisoned thorns ripping out of the ground and shooting towards Sillo. He brought the bow staff up, catching the vine before it got any closer and slammed it into the ground, halting it's momentum. Sillo had just enough time to look up to see another vine coming towards him. He balanced the staff on one end and lifted himself in a one-handed hand stand on top of the other end. The vine whipped below him in the space he'd previously occupied...then looped around. Sillo jumped off the staff as the vine caught it in the middle, pulling it to Rose. Sillo landed on his feet as Rose laughed, catching Sillo's preferred weapon.
"See? Only two meager vines and I've left you defenseless," she tossed the bow staff aside like it was a stick. Sillo watched his weapon clatter on the ground, then suddenly get enveloped by vines and pulled into the ground. He wouldn't be getting that one back. Rose lifted one hand, letting a tangle of vines erupt from the floor behind her. She still held that smirk.
"You're going to need something a bit more useful than a stick to deal with me," she shot her hand forward, the vines launching at Sillo like a pet under Rose's command. The vines swirled around each other like a wave as they approached rapidly. Sillo quickly phased out to his spectator dimension, letting the vines cascade downward on the space he currently occupied and at the same time didn't. He may as well no longer be there.
This time, however, Sillo didn't have time to catch a quick breath before phasing back in. The next thing he knew, he was being lifted by his shirt. Rose was standing in front of him, clearly in the same dimension as he was. She could get here too?
Ah, now that was plain rude."Hiding again, are we?" she tsked at him before literally throwing him out of the spectator dimension and back into reality. Sillo hit the ground hard which, coupled with his previous injuries, didn't feel great. He shot up like a rocket and turned around to see Rose standing there, still holding that blade. She hadn't even used it yet.
"I'm not surprised," Rose went on, "Hiding is your specialty, isn't it? When the going get's tough, you just pack it up and run, don't you?" Sillo held up a finger to interject, but Rose stopped him, "And don't say you're just dodging. Dodging and running are the same thing. You don't stop the attack. You just avoid it. Like you avoid all your problems." she brought her hand she held behind her forward in a circle. Vine walls shot up around Sillo, making escape by normal means impossible.
"You don't even know what's going on around you, do you?" he could still hear her voice loud and clear as it rang from behind the walls. "You shield yourself from your problems and act like they don't exist. Well, they do. They're right in front of you!" Suddenly, the walls started to close in on Sillo. "Your problems are always there, staring you right in the face. And they'll squeeze the life out of people like you. You can't dodge them. And like such, I'll let these walls take care of you."
Sillo tried to teleport once more, but no such luck. He tried phasing back into the spectator dimension with no avail. The walls got closer still. He couldn't dodge these vines. His breath picked up. Sillo found himself looking in all directions, looking for a way out. There wasn't one. The walls continued to make his cramped space even smaller with no mercy. In a few seconds, he'd become nothing more than a thorn filled cube.
He couldn't dodge this one. He'd have to face it head on.
So Sillo closed his eyes, exhaled, and thought of the only thing he could think of at the current moment in time: ninjas.
Well, not just a random ninja. More specifically, the ninja exhibit in the museum, one of his favorite places in the building. The part of the exhibit he liked to look at the most, despite the epic history and the cool apparel, were the weapons. He enjoyed the design of the shurikens, the functionality of the ninja-to sword, the adaptability of the nunchakus, and the cleverness of the black egg. However, one weapon stood out to him in particular...the one that would get him out of this situation.
He imagined a weapon similar to that of a bow staff with a single exception...the five inch blade attached to one end. Feeling the weight of the weapon in his hand and getting used to the distribution of said weight in his head, he inhaled sharply and spun a full three hundred and sixty degrees, letting the blade at the end of the weapon do the work as it sliced through the vines. They fell around him, halting their progression a few inches from Sillo's current position.
Sillo stood in front of Rose with a Naginata, a look of pure resentment in his eye. Rose's own eyes lit up as she saw she'd hit a nerve with the boy.
"Oooooo, I'm impressed," Rose said sardonically, "You can make something other than a stick. Well, granted that's still somewhat of a stick. But it's an improvement." She twirled her own blade, holding it a foot in front of her, wagging it back and forth as if baiting him. "Now, do you want me to play fetch, or can you actually not lose your grip on this one?"
Sillo narrowed his eyes and launched himself forward with air propulsion. He held the bladed end of the Naginata behind him and swung forward, using his own momentum as well as a little help from air magic put a lot of force and power behind the blade as it was brought forward. Rose brought her blade up to meet it, the clash resonating through the room. She didn't budge an inch. In fact, she didn't change her look, that same gleam of contempt still left in her eye as she blocked the blow with ease. Sillo flipped over her, his momentum carrying him over her as he landed on the other side, whipping the blade of the Naginata around and aiming for her hip. She didn't even turn to face him, reaching around with her blade to meet his once more and shove it aside before circling her blade around and thrusting it behind her in one fluid motion. Sillo caught it with the other end of the Naginata, shoving her blade aside, but taking more noticeable effort to do so.
And suddenly Sillo teleported. Rose had lifted the Anti-Teleportation barrier. Sillo was too pumped with rage and adrenaline to care as to why this was. If he had taken a moment to think it through, he would have realized it was Rose allowing Sillo to perform at his best so he could break his spirit. But Sillo was in a state of mind he'd never been before...a state of mind Rose brought him into. Thus, he wasn't thinking the way he usually did. But this was a disadvantage for Rose as well. It meant she could no longer predict what Sillo would be doing as he was no longer himself. But this was minor to her.
Sillo's teleportation left him at Rose's five o' clock, jabbing the blade towards her midsection. Her sword's arc was brought to meet the blade, easily casting it aside. Sillo teleported to her eight o' clock, whipping his own blade once more to strike at her. And again, she blocked. Over and over, Sillo teleported to a new position to strike. Over and over, her defense met his offensive strikes like an NBA star blocking a four foot middle school kid's shots. It was apparent that this wasn't working, but Sillo was persistent.
Then, as Sillo swung at her again, she teleported away, letting his own momentum carry him through the swing and causing him to stumble forward and fall. He rolled forward and sprang upright. Rose was laughing, leaning against the hilt of her blade at the corner of the room. She wasn't winded...she hadn't even broken a sweat throughout Sillo's onslaught.
"I give you full reign over your powers and you still can't do anything!" she taunted as Sillo charged at her, swinging his blade in a desire to demolish her. She teleported again, this time behind Sillo, who was panting hard. "Even Aldred gave me something worth fighting against. You are
nothing." The word cut through him like a knife, halting his motion forward to strike at her once more. Something snapped in his brain...something that ended his aggressive state of mind. He was back to his former self. He wiped his sweaty forehead with his shirt and replaced his furrowed brow of concentration with that familiar grin of his.
Nearly let myself slip there..."Whatever," he shrugged as he leaned against his own weapon, more out of exhaustion than out of actual contempt, "You can think that all you want. I matter to people. You can't take that away from me."
Rose's expression turned to one of amusement as her brow shot up, "Really? Is that why your parents are never around? Why you practically had to raise yourself growing up. You may have lived a somewhat normal life compared to your friends, but you might as well be an orphan like your little redheaded friend over there." she motioned towards the passed out form on the ground. This made Sillo laugh back at her.
"You think that's how you hit my buttons? Talk about my parents?" Sillo was laughing so hard he was holding his stomach, "Bitch, don't even start. My parents save lives every day. And they don't even need the fancy powers to do that like I do. I'm proud of them and I know they're proud of me, even when they can't show it. Meanwhile, I haven't even
heard of your family. I bet you were such a disappointment to them...like, kicked out of the family tree kind of disappointment. I come from the Deskern family. You don't even
have a last name, you worthless cunt." he spat the last word out at her like a jab to her gut. It may as well have bled like an ordinary wound.
And just like that, her relaxed nature turned into a raging inferno. Sillo could even see the flames in her eyes as she roared, "
DIE!" She launched forward, blade first, aiming for Sillo's neck. It was clear she wanted to see the room painted with his blood at the moment.
But Sillo wasn't having that. He teleported out of the way before the knife entered his vicinity. He had just enough time to bring the bladed end of the Naginata in front of him before Rose teleported in front of him, the same fluid motion driving her stab forward. He met the blade barely and teleported once more. To a spectator, the next few seconds would look like a fight was taking place across the room, the two combatants appearing and disappearing in front of each other, blades typically clashing at any glimpse they could get of the two. Blade met blade, parries and counters galore. The air might as well have been laced with sharp knives as the glint of silver steel practically made the makeshift arena sparkle.
And then it got complicated. Not to mention the free reign of teleportation Sillo was taking advantage of, he noticed at this rate that Rose was eventually going to land a hit if he kept with this strategy. So, as Rose teleported where Sillo planned to teleport, sword at the ready, he was prepared. When he teleported right into her ambush, he phased into the Spectator Dimension, the flurry of knives striking nothing but air. Growling in frustration, Rose entered the Spectator Dimension ready to slice up some Sillo Sushi. But the slippery fish was already back into reality, teleporting away from the spot he currently was in. The fight continued in such fashion, the multiplicative teleportation between Sillo and Rose as they sword battled now coupled with the Dimensional phasing left a confusingly awesome sight for spectators to behold.
And then the fighting slowed down. Sillo had quite a mana stamina that practically trumped the other Gatewatchers, but he couldn't go on forever. He appeared in the middle of the room, Naginata poised in front of him. Rose smiled wickedly as he appeared in front of him, knocking the Naginata to the side of his body and holding her own curved blade at his throat.
"I'm going to enjoy this," she snarled through clenched teeth, yet the grin remained plastered n Sillo's face.
"Y'know there are two sides to every coin?" Sillo stated in a matter-of-fact tone as he brough the blunt end of the Naginata in front of the curved blade, stopping the forward momentum that would've buried the sharp end into his larynx and ended his life. Grunting with all the effort he had left, he shoved Rose backwards, causing her to stumble and fall onto her feet, while he rapped her knuckles with the blunt end of the Naginata, causing her to let go of her blade. The result was Rose on her elbows staring at Sillo who held the bladed end against her throat. Despite this, she held that vindictive smile.
"Go ahead," she sneered, "End my life. Do it." But she knew he wouldn't. In fact, she'd planned for this. She'd let him get the upper hand so suddenly to give him this ultimatum, knowing what Sillo would choose. He wouldn't dare take the life of another, even of that other was the ultimate evil.
Sure enough, Sillo backed away from her, letting the Naginata fall to the ground beside him. He crossed his arms as he stood over her.
"No. I won't stoop to your level. Not that it's proven itself, given you haven't been able to successfully kill any of us so far." He stood and watched as Rose got up from her prone stance, brushing herself off.
"Allow me to fix that," she said before shooting her hand forward. Her curved blade flung forward at blinding speed, aiming for Sillo's neck. He responded by conjuring a wall of metal in front of him. Still, the blade cut into and through the wall, the blade's momentum finally stopped as it penetrated through the other side, inches away from Sillo's head. But she wasn't done yet.
Rose decided that his own conjuring would be his downfall as she unleashed a massive wave of vines to strike the wall. Luckily for Sillo, he'd ducked just in time for the vine wave to hit the metal wall, causing him to avoid the lethal blade still protruding through the metal. Unfortunately, he couldn't dodge his own makeshift defense measure as the vine wave sent him flying back into the exhibit wall, crushed between the metal wall and the other wall. He gasped as the air left his body and then some. Immeasurable pain filled his rib cage as well as some blood as it was crushed, likely shattered. The metal wall toppled over, taking the immobile Sillo with it. He didn't have any air to even make a sound of agony as he squeezed his eyes shut, wishing for the pain to stop. Finally, he managed to breathe...very slowly and very faintly. From Rose's perspective, he was as good as dead.
"You see?" Rose's expression was smug as he looked over Sillo one last time before turning her attention to the others, "You will be your own demise. You couldn't kill me, even when you had the chance. You failed everyone here. And now, you will die...but only after I've killed them first just so you can see the consequences for your actions." He then turned her attention to the one's left standing.
Sillo couldn't respond. He was in too much pain to. Not when Zane's own wit sent Rose away, unable to complete her job. Not when Zane gave a call out, seeing if everyone was alright. Not even when Aldred asked where they should go next. He wasn't alright. He would likely die within a few hours if they weren't able to get him to someone who could fix him. The fight had practically destroyed him. And so he remained motionless on the metal wall that ultimately led him to his current situation.
Could be worse...I could be actually dead right now...