All Along The Watchtower

Like sitting deep in the ocean, the weight of reponsibility is weighs heavily upon Jazuhanzu's shoulders. Everyone knows that an attack, somewhere, is impending. Everyone knows that, and despite what others tell her about this not being her fault, she can't help but feeling that it is regardless. She is the one that pushed the button that opened the door, after all.

She stares out across the waves with her spyglass from time to time, but for the most part, it's just a lot of waiting.

Quiet waiting.

Alone.

The alone part. She's good at that.

It was a boon that the Alliance had set up means of monitoring the seas near the island, as that was the most likely place an attack would come from after the big show of their naval power the Palace Land has made before.

But that did not mean it was the -only- threat that would come. War was fought on many fronts, in many ways. Scouts and stalkers had been dispatched stealthily to the shores beforehand, to prevent reinforcements from coming from inland. To ensure they had the enemy closed in. Was there another stronghold on the island that the invaders had not known about?

Not so tremendous. Only watchtowers. Still an annoyance. Still an asset to the local Alliance... so still a viable, if less impressive, strategic target.

A shadow moves through the forest of Eastel near the location, eyeing the position during the effort to remain out of sight and take stock of the situation.

If she could find who appeared to be in charge... and dispose of them...

The watch towers are simple things. Hastily erected, wooden log structures with a view of the ocean. A very basic and understandable effort to buy time to marshall a response when the inevitable occurs. And it IS inevitable.

The tentacled Undine sits upon her watch tower, spyglass in hand.

There is an adorable yawn.

Really, when no one is watching, Jazz can be accidentally unbearably cute since her guard is down. That yawn? Even the sound she made when she made it is painfully twee.

Still, an adventurer. Still meddlesome.

Only one Adventurer manning the tower? Hmph.... Normally she'd call that shortsighted, but in this case it would mean more people having gone to their defense.

No matter. Still an easy target.

Leaves barely rustle as the shadow bursts out of the forest surroundings. A knife is pulled from one sleeve as she does, enchanted inscription on the blade glowing briefly as sparks crackle across the surface. Which is then thrown at the lone Undine!

But it's clearly meant to disable her, as the four tailed fox is making a rush towards the tower itself.

You might want to stop that from happening. If you dare...

Zapped!

Jazz is caught off guard by the attack, really, and she can't even try to avoid it. She is not fast as lightning. Really, no one is. Much.

She falls from the tower and moves quickly to intercept it, barely getting an idea of who it is she's opposing as of it yet, but she leaps into it, drawing ... drawing, of all things, a ridiculous purple feather duster from inside her long coat, the maid's bow on her chest barely visible for but a moment as she holds it out.

"Stay back! I'm warning you," she squeaks, but truth be told, she is hardly intimidating.

Still, that warning does little to dissuade the fox-tail and so her next move is to weave the duster in a particular pattern, opening a small portal in the air from which a great spout of water goes towards them. Hidden within are countless, tiny, (also adorable) jellyfish.

Jazz's hair is up in a cloud around her, now, weaving in the air like she's ever under the waves.

The foxwoman's head snaps towards the voice, though it's the summoning portal that promptly draws her attention. She plants a paw on the ground and twists to redirect her momentum away from the charge. A pair of tessen warfans unfold in her hands as she does so, whisping with their own elemental energies as she turns to catch the initial rush of water and bend it away from herself, sending the wave crashing off into the water. "That was less than impressive, little fish. Maybe you should of stayed in the oceans where you belo--" Then stops as she notices the tiny jellyfish that still managed to cling to her arm, and frantically shakes her arm to jar them free. "--Hff. I stand corrected." Her four tails spread behind her, waving as they shimmer briefly, drawing some spiritual energy to herself to fend off the venomous effects of the sealife.

"But I shall make you regret not staying down when you had the chance." This time she lunges directly towards the Undine, arcs of air following in the wake of her tessen as they slash with her sweeping movements.

This time, Jazz falls back on the defense. She's fairly sure the hexes she wove into her last attack will kick in anytime, and a pillar of steam and stone erupts around her, blocking much of the initiatl attacks, if not keeping her from feeling a bit battered.

"You must be the one who hurt Estelle. She's a friend. I already don't like you." A glance at the tower, at the ocean. If this person is *here* something must soon be coming. She has to get up there!

"Your disposition is of no concern to me," the foxlady replies in a deadpan. "You would do best to stay out of my way."

The very ground rumbles beneath her paws, kicking dirt behind her as winds whip up at the same time, launching the Were Fang into motion once more. She ignores the Undine's attempts to stop her, propelling herself over her opponent and putting her focus on the tower once more. If one of the local Adventurers is willing to defend it must be of some manner of value.

Though the use of various curses and disenchantments is noticed. Huh. She keeps running into some of the more estoic fighters, it seems.

"Abyssal seas, come to my aid . Lend your weight to this foe!"

Jazz's ridiculous twee voice is at odds with making these pronouncements, but the lightning crackling at her fingertips is all too real.

She has to get the tower lit, but her foe is hardly going to let her just *do* it. Still, the dark wave that she sends washing out over Daiyu is all too real and does indeed weight. Also, it feels kind of watery. Ew. Someone's tails are going to be wet.

The Hulijing's swift movements make her a difficult target, but this time Jazuhanzu manages to hit her with something that gets her to take notice as she's sent skidding away from her tower objective once more. Being a master of elements herself the wetness does not seem to perturb her that much. No one else is going to enjoy the smell of wet fur... Not that anyone else is here.

Though she does take a moment to wipe some moisture off her spectacle lenses with one of the sleeves of her dress, then redrawing her tessen pair, flaring them open as she holds her arms crossed. "So be it..." Directive changed, she charges at Jazuhanzu instead! Her approach brings an opposing essense of it's own though, as the malicious intent she had towards the tower was now focusing on her adversary, a small but foreboding dread prickling the back of the mind.

The more immeadiate threat is the inscriptions on one fan turning a dark shade, the enchantment drawing darkness to the blade as she strikes with it.

"..GNNGH!"

The blades find their marks, truth be told. The Undine has absolutely taken a beating thus far, between poisons and battering, but she's slowed things down to her own pace too. Bought herself time. She's backing towards the tower, now, moving to the way up to it. Seems she wants the battle fought on her ground, and well, she's fine with the way things are going now. Ice gathers at her hands, forming into a pair of sawing blades made from it that she prepares to let loose at Daiyu, but not before a further blast of ice is lanced right directly at her in a surprise blow that makes the earlier waters painfully freeze upon her skin, restricting movements.

The bitter cold cascading across her body is a telltale sign of what the little sea witch was casting. Daiyu's brow furrowed a little as she narrowed her gaze. Ribbons of water whipped up around her as the fox dashed towards her opponent while Jazu readed her blades of ice and threw them.

The waters roared as Daiyu launched into the attack, spinning as she did so. The rush of water was joined by the eruption of flames, the two opposing forces winding together. Followed by the howling of winds to drive her spin even faster. The ice discs slam into her, only partially disrupted by the deluge of both water and flames swirling around her. EVen as those same fanblades slice at the Undine repeatedly with her dervish of motion.

Despite her best efforts, not much of what Jazz could inflict was able to get through, and she's already growing weaker far faster than an opponent who is clearly her superior here. Then again, player versus player fighting has never been the Undine's forte. She leaps onto the ladder and scurries upwards, using rocks puilled from the earth to deflect the attacks against her. It works, to some extent, but it's the blast of venom from the stinging tentacle she conjured from the aether to lash out with that's the only danger she presents at the moment.

Tails flick to maintain balance as Daiyu twists away after her assault, a foot scraping against the ground and one hand being drooped down to do the same and arrest her swirling motions. The tessen are noticably not in her grasp to do so. Tucked away like many of her other concealed little tricks most likely. Her gaze fixates on Jazuhanzu, watching her actions. Watching her attack be launched.

And then smirks like only a sly fox can. "Got you..." She moves in such a blurr that even the shadows seem to ripple in her wake.

One hand grabs the handle of her parasol. Unsheathing the sword hidden within it, drawing it with such a quick and precise motion that she slices the tentacle in half! Paying the splatter of poisonous ichor little mind as she blurrs again. Using her speed to launch herself upwards

And then she's -right next- to Jazu at the ladder, both hands on the sword's hilt to bring it down in an earth shattering slash!

"Not yet you don't," retorts Jazz, as the water clinging to her in waves suddenly solidifies, blocking most of the impact from the blast. Sure, she's battered again, but the ice armor dissolves just as quicklly with another wave of her hand. The tower creaks and groans from the impact and, honestly, there's not mush she can do about it. Best thing she can do is get up there adn send off a signal, and that's what she intends, stalker be damned.

The water from the ice armor around her, freezing to the touch, dissolves quickly before blobbing around Daiyu.

Jazz is a Sea-Witch, after all. Making Cait-Sith and werefangs smell like wet whatever is one of her greatest powers.

Daiyu gets sprayed with the dissolution of water, mostly unharmed but the addition force and weight pushing her away from the undine and back towards the ground. Daiyu quickly adjusts, spinning around to catch much of the wetness along her own blade while orienting herself appropriately, to hit the ground on her feet.

At the same time as she lands she sweeps the sword upward, the blade's enchantment turning the moisture into a splay of icy shrapnel launched back up at Jazu.

Then one hand lets go of the hilt to flick her fingers, drawing between her claw-like nails a card. It looks like the sort of card you'd see someone use in a magic trick. Which she throws up at Jazu as well.

Except the card crackles with magic, and as the enchantment releases it takes the visual form of a snake, seeming to leap off the card to lunge at her foe!

"...GUAH!"

Once again, the surprise of the pwoer catches Jazz off guard, but she's got the right moves on cooldown to counter most of the impact, if not all of it. She's sweating at this point, hands shaking. She just has to get up there, and indeed, she's almost there. Now she's going to have to figure out how to set off a nice, magical flare without dying.

Good luck. A jet of water buys her time to think, hopefully. "Blackest oceans, guide me," she grumbles, tweely.

Daiyu takes a moment to use her own Enchanter magics to dismiss some of the counter-effects the sea witch had been trying to stack on her. Just in time to get shot with the small pressurized burst of water from above. She huffs, briefly wavering her sidebangs. "No wonder your allies cast you out here alone... Such meager attackers..."

The inscriptions in the blade of her sword light up once more, and Daiyu spins around to send the spiral combining flame and water shooting upward towards the Undine on the ladder.

The twin attacks cause her to reel back, throwing a bubble of hardenced ice and water up in her defense. Staggered by the impact, she can only open another portal of water behind Daiyu, allowing jellyfish tentacles to grab at her, once again delivering stinging attacks. "Powers of the Abyss, heed my command! Whatever works, you know."

She snaps her fingers, lightning crackling there. Just a little longer and she can set this baby on fire.

"Enough of these games." Daiyu leaps off the ground, casting a speed enchantment as she does so. As soon as her paws touch the support of the tower she bolts, using the speed boost to -run up- the tower towards Jazu. It's like taking the fact foxes are the one canine relative that can climb and turning it up to a wuxai eleven!

She slices once with the sword, parting but not completely deflecting the surge of jellyfish laiden waters, just keeping it from knocking her off her vertical sprint.

Until she finally kicks off, leaping towards Jazu once more with a ear splitting warcry even as she brings the sword slicing down with fracturing force once more.

"Weird thing to say when we're still trapped in one," remarks Jazz to Daiyu, dryly. She then stares as the fox runs its way up the tower and lets out a sigh.

"...brother." Another hardened bubble eruptse around her as the swords spark and shatter it, leaving her again *mostly* unharmed. She coughs up enough blood afterwards, however, to indicate she's not really all that well. Still, another summoned jellyfish limb from the aether, black and covered in brightly glowing spotting and bioluminescence, whips out at Daiyu once more. She's doing *some* harm.

The signal here at the tower is starting to alight thanks to her electric sparks. A dim fire starting to glow.

The sword collides with the elemental bubble, it's blade gleeming as it's enchantments strain against the barrier. Footpaws dig claws into the tower, two of her tail snagging around the woodenbeams to keep her from dropping back to the ground again even as the tendrils lash at her and Daiyu is force to pull her blade away briefly to bend out of the way.

Her gaze casts upward as the top of the tower starts to ignite. A signal? It was only some manner of signaling device? "Disappointing." She had anticipated some manner of secret weapon or such.

Her attention turns back to the Undine. "Warning your allies won't be enough to save you," she hisses coldly, even as she tries to viciously impale the other woman upon her sword.

"I would say something about making this tower your tomb, but that really doesn't work when neither of us is going to stay dead." Because respawning is a thing.

The next impact again pierces her defenses just barely, but it's enough. It's been enough the whole time. Sliced through once more, bleeding heavily, batteerd and injured, her veins on fire.

"It was never about saving me, you hack," she replies.

"Live or die, I did what I was here to do -- would that you could say the same."

She quickly fires a sprawy of dark water from her hands, chilling to the bone and interwoven with her witchy hexes, followed by stones to protect her from the inevitable attack.

...and then she hops off the lip of the tower and plummets to the ground below, buffeting herself just a bit with the power of air to protect herself from the fall. Even then, she lands poorly, and darst for the trees.

Daiyu raises an arm diagonally and then sweeps the pulse of darkened water aside. "It is of no conscequence. No manner of warning can truly prepare your allies for the storm about to land upon their shores." She leaps down from the tower herself, landing with a light thud after using a bit of her own wind magic to lessen the drop. The sword is given a shake to clear residue from it, and slid back into the shaft of her parasol. Which in itself is drawn and opened, then rested upon her shoulder. She stares for a long moment at the retreating form, then turns and walks away. Towards Shibuya. "At least this one had the sense to run for her life...."