Combat Training

It was a fairly nice day. The sun was shining, the birds singing, and a calm breeze to keep things from getting overly hot. The field just outside Alne stretched out to the east, the breeze causing waves in the knee-high grasses. Flowers dotted the field as well, deep green leaves and rosy pink petals. It was a picturesque scene.

Too bad it wasn't real.

Still in this digital prison. Every day in a game, but it sure didn't feel like a game anymore. Zorin exhaled slowly as he looked out over the landscape before turning back to the training area that had been hastily constructed.

A line of training dummies adorned the south section of the training area, nothing but straw bound with a bit of rope to large wooden stakes in the ground. Then well to the north some bails of straw were setup for archers to practice on. Finally, in the middle of it all was a large open dirt area, grass having been cleared or trampled into the mud some time ago.

Bright eyed and fresh adventurers were milling about, chatting with each other, as they all waited for the daily combat drills to begin. Most of them were new recruits for the Scale Emblem Alliance, but there were other adventures that come join in. There were notices around both Alne and the Town of Beginnings to advertise the training, hoping to help out those not yet familiar with the game system, and also work as a recruitment platform for SEA.

With quick gesture Zorin brought up his menu and looked at the game clock. "Almost time." He said to the sergeant in charge of training -- tall, stern looking Pooka male with long blond hair, who simply nodded with a grin.

If inspected one could see this unusually muscular Pooka was an adventurer named SaltyTears, and his light leather hauberk, longsword, and small iron buckler marked him as some kind of mobile warrior build. He stood off to the side of the training area with Zorin, watching as the last of the adventurers made their way over.

The Nero Idol With The Long Hair (trademark pending) is still pretty much a noob at the game. If you can still call this a game. But for now, it's a game. She has little experience with it, all she's learned is over the last week or so. In the real world she coasted on a cute face, a curvy body and a nice singing voice. Over here... none of those are THAT important, you gotta know how to pull your weight in a fight to survive. That's reality. Or at least, this reality.

So combat training sounds like a good idea. And she comes over, cheerfully upbeat, walking out of town to get to the gathering point. There was a name on the board post too, Zorin, but not a picture. She hmms as she looks around, until she spots the small group forming up. Must be there. Why else would people show up in this spot? It's rather undescript after all. "Ohayo~" she chimes energetically.

    Misa is not here to train. She is not a newb. Nor a new recruit for the Scale Emblem Alliance. She's here to observe as this is the first official training session since the Apocalypse. And it's an important one, given the rise in the SEA's ranks with all the Adventurers suddenly focused on finding a way to get home.

    As such, Misa is standing on a hill a little way from where the training session is starting. There's a clipboard in her hand as she writes on it with a quill. She looks a little lost in thought though.

When you stand in the fire, it is always someone elses fault. The healer was out of range. The tank didn't perform the swap. The ranged were too busy spamming dots on the wrong marked targets. The melee were playing their intense minigames of 'Whack o mole' that tended to provoke tunnel vision. All of these and more is AMPLE reason for standing in the fire.

These impassioned pleas, however, did NOT excuse them from combat training. And look -- the Scale Alliance was holding an open combat training session to drill some basics with new adventurers. What an opportunity to learn from their lateral alliance guildmates.

Nureha arrives with a rather drooping assemblage of Plant Hwyaden, all still painfully in the lower levels, including Lazion Shadowstep, who looks so embarrassed to be here that the cloud of anime blue-lines and red crosses could be seen for miles around. As this is an official and completely sanctioned drop off, Nureha in her dazzling purple dress warns them NOT to come back until they either have the sense to take their arrogrance down a few notches, learn a few things from the Scale Alliance, or come up with a better excuse.

After the grumbling has abated, Nureha lingers at the edges of the training field, making her way to the base of the hill Misa is standing upon and starting to scale it. Most likely out of interest.. eyes scanning the group and the training field set up from this higher vantage point, but probably also to make sure Plant Hwyaden doesn't.. get misplaced in the chaos of setting up.

The Explorer's Guide to Yamato, in the meantime, is not a complete noob in the game. Nevarri has been playing the game more or less since launch, but unlike other players she had been so focused on the exploration aspect that she hadn't really bothered Leveling, and she would be the first to admit that outside of a dungeon crawling with rats, she would probably need some serious brushing up of her skills.

Hey look! A Reika! The salamander elementalist's eyes zip in the direction of the famous idol, and proceeds to make her way over to her. Maybe they had more in common somewhere!

"Hiyo, Reika-saaan." Nevarri tips a finger in salute.

    Mizuki hurries over from Alne with Nevarri. She's still wearing the same armor she did from the Ezzo rescue, not having done higher-level content yet to get anything better: It comes with a striking blue cloak and a black, plumed hat somewhere between a tricorner hat and a cavalier hat. Under the cloak is a buff coat with a red sash around the waist, and a pair of black trousers completes the outfit. There's also a pair of shoulder belts crossing over the chest with pouches and the sheathed long daggers Giganpor made. Pirate-style boots would be included if she weren't in beast form.

    Honestly, Mizuki is finding simulated natural beauty to be much better than actual nature. No allergies or mosquitos. Plus she can appreciate long hikes better with a body that's so fit.

    Mizuki's not here to train herself, per se, but she hopes that she can help some of the newbs. Also, she wants to learn more about how the Aincrad Liberation Front operates.

Proteus might have given this a miss if Nureha didn't throw some of their newbies into the fire. There's only a few things that motivate the Imp to act outside of her normal bounds, and guild loyalty is one of them. Despite losing her advanced skillset, the Imp is still confident, hovering around the edge of the training field and keeping an eye on the proceedings. She watches the Scale Emblem activity intently, as if waiting for something in particular...

It's a wonderful day the spot for the training area was a pretty nice one it was pretty she liked it. This new world always had something new to see or discover at least for so far. It is not limitless but there's a good lifetime worth of exploring to be done here. She also wanted to learn more about The Scale as well. She could get some feel, she was a towering woman clad mostly in plage armour as she strode in her green wings folded up against her back a she did so looking over the recruits the Sylphs guild tag would read Crescent Moon.

She'd end up falling in with Reika and Nevarri.

"Nevarri, Reika, hey!"

The then pauses as she draws her blade to run herself through some sort of basic sword drills, there's no sign of using any sword skills or any game abilities either as she does so.

Reika smiles and turns to Nevarri "Hey there." She's met the streamer a few times up to now after all. Although real life titles aren't too useful here anymore. She answers with a two finger salute, very idol-like. She seems in a good mood at least. She greets everyone as she gets close, recognizing most of them. Nureha, Muzki, Proteus, all people that got tangled with her in the last week or so. Misa was there with the spiders. And Gwen is also a frequent flyer in these quests. "So, battle training hm? Sounds good."

Despite calling himself a mercenary, Kaydon had joined up with Silver Sword. Though the main reason he did it was because he was promised a duel with the infamous William Massachusetts. And he wasn't going to pass up that chance.

But getting some practice in might not be the worst idea. Which is why the were fang has been lingering near the group of players getting ready to practice their combat skills. He's pretty confident in his own already, but without access to most of them due to the level drop, he's having to re-learn stuff from scratch.

After a quick nod to Zorin the sergeant SaltyTears makes his way to the front of the gathered adventurers and promptly starts shouting.

"Alright, listen up noobs!" he then gives a short shrill whistle and waits for everyone to quiet down and turn towards him. "Welcome to basic training. Or as I like to call it - the trial grind."

He looks around at the varied expressions of the adventures with a wry grin, ignoring those outside the training area off to the side, "I don't give two flips who you were before or how great you thought you were at this game pre-apoch. You are all just noobs to me! You think you were some pro star or messiah of the universe back in the day? Tough. You listen and make it through today - that's how you prove it!"

Then his grin slips a bit, "And for those that have no idea how things work or are new to all this. Well, this is why we have this training! We are going to go through the basics. Step. By. Step. And make sure everyone can survive in this world and know how the basics work."

Suddenly he claps loudly, "Alright, everyone line up in two lines facing each other. See that face across from you? That's your practice partner for the first few lessons!"

    Misa watches as some additional people filter in, just in time to catch the training session. She recognises some of them, nodding along a little in satisfaction. Even if they're not with the Scale Emblem Alliance, it's good to have them here to train. There may come a time when every Adventurer will have to fight. And it'll be better for all if they have experience.

    Misa returns to putting quill to clipboard for a few moments, though pauses again as she notices the Plant Duck leader heading her in direction. Misa gives her a nod, "Hello, Nureha. I appreciate you bringing some of your guild members to join in. It'll help make for better cooperation between the alliances." If Misa had glasses, she'd probably be pushing them up right now as she finishes, "And a little competition is healthy too." Misa turns to watch as the large combined group is split up into facing each other and receiving partners.

"My thoughts exactly." Nureha waits to answer until she joins Misa at the top of the hill, turning slowly to put both hands in front of her, right hand lighting touching her left. She raises a hand when she notices Proteus, looking momentarily relieved before she goes back to scanning the training field. Even here, the sergent's bellow is clearly audible.

Although they grumbled before, the Plant Hwyaden sprouts quickly pair themselves off with other newbie adventurers. Lazion, a blonde haired man in a tattered green shirt and leather pants with a beige half cape around his shoulders, spins one dagger around in a circle before reholstering it.

He looks around and spots Kaydon nearby. "Hey. Up for a round?" he asks with a casual grin. "Got to give these guys something to aspire to, right?"

The were fang arches a brow as Nureha approaches him, and then he grins, "You got it." Kaydon replies, as he steps forward, and draws one of the blades from his back, "You wanna go first, or should I just have at you?" He asks, moving himself into a combat stance with his weapon in front of him.

Proteus doesn't pay SaltyTears much mind. She doesn't consider herself one of the people being lectured, clearly, but she does nevertheless sweep her way into position in the lines, looking to one side, then the other. "Mmm." She hums, her tail flicking about.

"It's been a while since I had the chance to put my skills to the test." Proteus comments. "Are you ready for a bit of a training session... Reika?" She asks, looking up to her fated opponent with a gleam in her eyes. "Let's find out how much you've learned since that day in the cave."

Reika smiles as she takes place in front of Proteus, a few steps from the others so they don't get in the way of any other spar. "I learned a bit, but can always learn more." She winks, reaching in her back and pulling out the two blades from the crossed sheaths. It's rough, but she seems to have understood to take a comfortable stance as well, with her blades raised up at eye level on each side.

As training partners are sorted out between all the players, it ends up winding up that Nevarri's partner in this whole thing is the instructor, Zorin himself.

This was going to be rough.

Still, she's at the very least going to be polite about it, as she holds her staff in both hands and gives a polite bow in greeting. "Hello! My name's Nevarri. Silver Sword guild. Mainly an explorer. Nice to meet you."

She straightens up, and holds her staff out, "Best of luck in this lesson I guess."

Lazion smirks, taking the other blade from the holster at his other hip. "Hey. We'll go whatever speed you want, space cowboy. So you just go right ahead and I'll try and keep up." He raises the blades into a defensive position, preparing for Kaydon's first assault.

Zorin opting to participate to round things out unslings his shield and pulls his scepter out of his inventory as he lines up. Looking over at Nevarri and her introduction he blinks a couple times before saying surprised, "Nevarri, is that you? Wow, we very briefly met on the day of the apocalypse before being teleported to Alne! I'm not surprised if you don't remember me, we only talked for a moment before." He waves his arm around in the air, "all this happened."

He grins and gives her a nod, "Lets have a good match."

    Misa flicks her quill across the paper on her clipboard a few more times, putting ink to it. It's an odd means of writing, using a quill. But Misa seems to be doing well enough. She's likely had practice with it in the past.

    As the paired trainees match up against each other, Misa turns her head to Nureha, deciding to strike up some conversation by asking, "How goes the search for a location for your headquarters? I hope you haven't encountered any strangeness since that night." Misa recalls Nureha mentioning possibly seeing a strange figure, Misa still not sure what she was talking about.

    The person across from you is your partner? Mizuki turns and looks at Gwen. "Hopefully the newbies can learn something from watching us!" She initiates a duel in the menu, then draws her daggers and enters a combat stance while waiting for the countdown. "Let's show them how it's done, Gwen!"

Looking over the lined up adventurers as he slowly walks between them, SaltyTears continues his lecture. "First is understanding your menus, and how to use Artes without needing to pull up your menu and manually selecting them. Next is understanding your equipment, and how to be ready for a battle." And with that he goes into a description about how to pull open the menu to inspect ones inventory, the combat specs associated with it and also to review the details on the Artes one has acquired.

((OOC: Combat decks require 10 cards be in each of the decks (Attack, Defense, Utility) for a total of at least 30 cards. You can have duplicates of cards if you want, but it is recommended to have some variety. You must have the Concept Potential from your classes, race, kingdom, and profession, or relics listed on a card's requirements to be able to use it in a combat deck. You can check what your Potential using +sheet. This will also show you your Current Deck. If you don't have a deck then you can create one using +card/deck/create <name>. You will then need to +card/deck/switch <name> to set it as active.))

He nods as it seems people already know this are or catching on quickly enough. "Okay, good. Next is combat preparation. You don't just run into battle without a plan. You work with your team, come up with some basic strategies before you ever set foot into the tower or a dungeon." He then goes into further details of some regular pre-adventure and pre-combat planning guidelines.

((OOC: Use '+help card combat' to get details on how to create a card battle and '+help dice' for methods of randomizing turn order. The short is (1) you can create a battle with +card/create (2) use '+shuffle <name1>,<name2>,<other names if needed>' to randomize turn order.))

"Next!" he shouts out suddenly, "Battle itself!" He grins as he looks around at the other adventurers. "Okay, so remember this is still a game. It has mechanics. We need to use Artes in battle. Also most monsters telegraph their attacks in some way, so you have some idea a moment before it comes." He then continues with a few examples of monsters he has faced so far.

((OOC: The main commands you will use in combat are (1) +card which will give you a summary of information (2) +queue which tells you which cards are targeting you and which of your cards are targeting others (3) +card/status will give you an overview of everyone in the battle and their HP. And most importantly +card/play <card>=<target> to attack. Reminder that additional info is in '+help card combat'))

"Alright noobs. I think I gave you just enough info to start hurting yourselves. So on that note, show me what you have! Give it a try and see what you can do to your opponent. We have healers off to the side in case anyone gets low on health so go all out for now to give me an idea!" He grins broadly as he walks out to the side to watch the ensuing chaos.

Kaydon takes a moment to pop his neck, which isn't really a thing that one would have needed to do before the Apocalypse. Then he launches forward, thrusting the blade forward to try to bleed Lazion, and then sweeps around with the sword, slashing multiple times, really pressing the attack as he goes. Kaydon tends to be all attack all the time, only playing defense when he absolutely has to.

Nevarri blinks a little bit as Zorin points out their last meeting out, thus jogging her memory, so she's a bit surprised, "Eh..? Oh yeah! Sorry, I'd kinda forgotten after everything went crazy! I don't know if I ever got around to adding you, or any number of players at the time to my friends list. Sorry about that."

Nevarri herself had been so absorbed by her own situation after that day that she had failed to consider how most of the other players she'd met were doing. Her hand goes to flick open her friend's list, just to double check. "Well then, I guess this is a good chance to get properly acquanted." She smiles brighter.

Nureha watches the assemblance pair off and begin the first training exercise. She stays quiet for a time, letting Misa's pen continue to scratch across the surface of the paper until they come to the end of a page. As she turns to the next, Nureha answers her question. "The second and third candidate ended up being too small or suffering extensive integrity damage. One in particular was too close to the place where the PK event occured in Alne, and you know how superstitious players can get."

She listens to the instructors lecture with half an ear, nodding in some places as he emphasizes certain points. Especially preparation. Any individual plan may be useless, but planning was invaluable. "..So we eventually decided on the overgrown mansion complex on the Southern side of town. Whether we have friendly neighbors or not. Well.. a story for another day. And how is Sir Krusty and the Scale Alliance? Making steady progress now that you've secured Tolbana?" she purses her lips. "I see a lot are still languishing in lower level gear. I wonder... how much farther that gear is going to carry you."

Meanwhile, Lazion meets the oncoming attack head-on, a blast of swirling winds erupting from the contact and blowing him backwards out of the way of the strike. MOST of the strike anyways. A large and sinister gouge across his ribs would have been much worse without his defensive artes. In exchange, his blades became to gleam a dull black as he shot forwards, trying to deflect Kaydon's attacks and step in his guard, the chilling aura of the blades attempting to make Kaydon sluggish and punish him for the offensive.

((OOC: Buff and Debuffs in this generally do not stack. Instead only the most powerful of the buff/debuff is powerful. So if you have Guard Up 1, and Guard Up 2 buffs on yourself then you still only get a +2 guard buff because it is the strongest. Additionally, Buffs and Debuffs cancel each other out. So if a Guard Down 1 and a Guard Up 2 are on you, then you have a total of +1 Guard.))

((OOC: Hits. Understanding them is important for success. So if you have a defense card that gives 2 Defense, but has 3 hits, what does it mean? It means that you have a defense of 2+2+2=6. This is similar for attack damage.))

((OOC: How Buffs apply to Hits: If you have a Guard UP of 1, then it gets applies to EACH HIT. So if your defense card has 3 hits and 2 defense each, then with the buff it becomes (2+1)+(2+1)+(2+1)=9 total defense. This is similar for attack debuffs. Attacks and Defense with more hits are more affectd by buffs and debuffs.))

((OOC: Understanding EN (Energy). Each turn you have EN to use on playing cards. You want to use it every turn because you regenerate back up to 3 at the end of a turn. At the very start of a match you will only have 2EN, but if you are targeted with an attack it will go up to 3EN. Every turn you will then have 3EN to play cards.))

((OOC: After you have +card/play <card>=<target> all the card you can on your turn so your EN is 0, you will need to +card/done. This marks your turn as complete and cards are calculated on you for buffs/debuffs/damage/etc.))

Kaydon does his best to try to dispell the effects of the dark wave, but it leaves him open to be struck when he's trying to do so. The were fang realizes that his opponent seems to be attacking with quite a lot of debuff abilities, and he'll need to be extra careful. If too many of those stack, he'll go down in a heartbeat.

His sword, and Kaydon as well, gain a wind effect around them, and he lashes out in an upward strike, sending a shockwave of wind out from the blade, before following it up with rapid, wind powered strikes. Though being careful, he backs off after the blows, trying to defend against as much of the incoming attacks as he can.

((OOC: Forget if it is your turn to play card? No problem! This is another good use of +card/status. It tells you what turn everyone is on. Just remember the turn order!))

((OOC: Scratch Damage. Each turn someone is targeted with an attack they will take at least 1 damage, regardless if they guarded against all of it. This can only be prevented with healing.))

    The moment the counter hits zero, Mizuki adjusts her stance slightly to activate a sword arte! She flips the daggers in her hand to fold them by the blades, and then tosses one followed by the other at Gwen! "Hya! Hya!"

    They reappear in her hands afterwards because videogame.

Lazion grins as the momentum of the fight immediately shifts from a constant string of attacks to a more defensive series. What he DOESN'T remember, is that maintaining that momentum is almost as important as gaining it. He eats those shockwaves of wind straight in the face, knocked sprawling by the attack and sent ass-over-teakettle in a mess to the packed dirt.

Not a dignified position to be in, especially for someone whose guildmaster was watching. Lazion grimaced. "Okay.."

He sprang up. "I got marched into this kitchen, so.. Let's turn up the heat." He slices the air in an X formation, a blast of fire in the shape of an X blasting towards Kaydon while a moment later, two rippling currents of water follow in the wake of it.

Gwen is now waiting on Mizuki she'll give her a slight bow. She then is ready to move and she brings up her shield to intercept the brunt of the attack and follow it up with a savage strike from her blade. She moves in intending to use her size and mass against Mizuki.

"Let's see what you got!"

((OOC: What order do things resolve? Generally any On Activation effects will happen first when someone uses +card/done. Then healing is calculated. That is followed by each attack being calculated in the order they were played. Previously there was an ON HIT effect, but this has been replaced with ON ACTIVATION effects.))

"Well, let's find out where you stand." Proteus replies to the Nero Idol-turned-Adventurer. There is a flare of energy around her, her cloak billowing outwards as she weaves her hands together. "Drown!" She calls out, and a rush of water blasts into existence, encapsulating Reika. "Jet Spray!" She follows, thrusting a palm forward as some of that very water moves, attempting to gutpunch Reika while she's distracted.

"Oh this is a stupid idea." Kaydon says to himself, as he sees the fireball coming straight for him. He only has a couple of moments to react, and frankly he's not even sure if this will work. His blade glows a faint blue color, and he rushes towards the fireball, slashing the weapon at the massive blast of flames.

It explodes on impact with him, but he has actually managed to carve through the fire blast, albeit with some scorched fur for his trouble. Of course, now Lazion has to deal with the were fang charging at him, lashing out with that blade as he charges through the water blast to get at his target.

((OOC: Really understanding damage. This is the big one. How much defense do you need against an attack? How is it calculated? First you want to look at the total damage being done by the attack. So if an attack has 2 HIT and 7 DMG, then it has a total of 7+7=14 damage. You compare your total Guard to this. So if you have a guard of 2 HIT and 6 DEF, then you have a total of 6+6=12 DEF. The result? 14 DMG - 12 DEF = 2 Damage dealt.))

((OOC: What about multiple attacks? Your guard will continue to exist between attacks until it all runs out. You can also play multiple guard cards. They will defend in the order they were played.))

Reika isn't too sure about what effects each attack have, so she chains them without too much thinking for now. Attempting to roll out of the way of the Jet Spray, but it still grazes her. But she quickly gets back to her feet and comes in with her blades raised, aiming to pierce at Proteus' defenses, and follows with another stab attack, aiming to apply a debuff. She doesn't really know what the debuff does, but it's an attack. "Rupture!"

    "Ah yes, that 'murder'. I've heard the rumours." It probably wasn't a mob, as they shouldn't be allowed inside the town. It's doubtful that an NPC would have the ability to do that. Which does point to a PKer. Misa expected that this would start to happen and she's probably not the only one who did, "We may have to look at increasing security within Alne. Right now this is the center of a lot of Adventurer activity, including many newbies. It would be unfortunate to see them suffer at the hands of a PKer."

    Misa seems satisfied with hat she's seeing of the training session, attaching her quill back onto her clipboard and lowering it. She shrugs a little as she says, "The guild leaders, along with my lord, Krusty, are focusing their efforts on the push through the tower. It's starting to pick up pace as we learn more and get used to working with each other. Tolbana is another matter though... It's going to take considerable resources and manpower to rebuild it and make it into a thriving town. And supplies are still a little sparce right now... Especially given the large numbers of Adventurers the alliance now has to deal with. A downside to open recruitment. We'll manage though. We can have the lower equipped players concentrate on handling easier mobs and fields to gather resources and grind up their levels, until such time that we can equip them better."

    Misa turns her head to look more intently at Nureha, before asking, "Have you heard anything out of the New World Alliance, lately? They've been oddly quiet."

Lazion balks. "You have GOT to be kidding me." as Kaydon just flat out /charges/ the blast of fire, dissipating it with a single slice and carrying forwards in a cloud of smoke and scorched fur. He scrambles to back up, triggering the air attack too late and is nearly bodied by Kaydon in the process.

With few options that don't look like becoming kibble, he desperately tucks to one side, eyes glowing a malevolent purple for a second as he triggers a buff and fires off a precision shot with a small knife, trying to hobble Kaydon before they run over him like a siege train.

((OOC: Combat flow. Generally you want to try attack at least once each turn if you can. This means your opponent probably will need to spend a card on defense. If they are not targeted by any attacks then they can go on full offense and use all their EN to attack you. At that point they have momentum.))

Between the pairing of Nevarri and Zorin, things couldn't be more clearly lopsided.

Nevarri initially raises a Flame shield in preparation for anything, so which is a good call because Zorin's Enlightened Strike cleaves through the shield and barely punches through. The melee fighter would follow the assault up with an Iron Wave, sending the mage reeling.

In response, Nevarri flings out an Electrical Fuzz to try to catch the fighter blind, before flinging out a hefty fireball, only for Zorin to Repel the fireball nearly completely, much to the elementalist's dismay...

((OOC: Remember to check your +card to see all the debuffs or buffs that may still be on you. Some last multiple turns. But also remember it doesn't show the buff or debuff of cards that still haven't activated, so you may have another debuff coming in that will effect your turn.))

The swift, piercing strike comes in, and Proteus just smiles, gesturing. A faint hum rises in the air as something subtly bends around her, and the blade begins skidding across an invisible barrier around her... until the call of Rupture. "What?" Her eyes widen, and a moment later the blades push through, the rupturing assault crushing her defense and allowing the blade to slice across her with a gleam of Damage Red. "Haah..." She says, staggering back. "Well played. Let's see how long you can keep that up..."

Again, her hands splay out. "Omen!" She calls, runes scattering around her hands, alighting to begin show her potential future options, and she jukes left, vaulting as she hurls out a hand. "DARK WAVE!" She calls, a wash of black energy splashing out across the battlefield to bear down on the Idol and begin binding her actions with curses further.

Nureha listens to Misa quietly, not only what she says.. but how she says it.. and more markedly, what she doesn't say. Or believe. "It would be unfortunate, yes." she agrees, turning an eye towards the training session again. "And I may have a way to ameliorate some of the issues you've been facing.. but that will probably have to be at a later time." Dangle... dangle dangle. "..as for the New World? I haven't heard much from them since the conference. Probably sorting things out, between themselves. Nothing they wanted to trouble us with, I'm sure."

She gives Misa a demure shrug.

    Gwen comes in with a savage blow! Mizuki seems to be ready for it, though -- she steps in close, grabbing at Gwen's hand and only getting nicked by the blade, "You're too slo-ow~!" then bringing her feet up to claw at Gwen before letting go and kicking off, leaping back and into the air, and then spitting a fireball down at her before landing!

Reika heard something about a murder too, but she wasn't there to investigate it. She focuses on understanding the basic of the fight after all. She isn't looking to win or lose though, just understand it better.

And she's only improvising her attacks really, it's probably not efficient but it's still doing *something* at all. She hasn't been hurt, but it seems she received several impairements that she couldn't dodge... including a delayed effect of Drawning, at weakens out her defenses considerably. She acks, but taking a step back, she covers herself in a dark cloak of energy first, and then runs in for a double set of twin attacks, lashing out with each blade consecutively in a 4 hit combo. "Twin Darkness! Twin Cutter!"

As the duel between Nevarri and Zorin continues, it seems to even out as things keep going.

Nevarri launches herself out into the air via Stone Catapult, allowing herself to avoid a good chunk of Zorin's offense from Hammer Strike, and in retaliation she fires off a Whirling Disc at the still blinded fighter.

Kaydon is already moving like a freight train now. Because he's a Juggernaut, he doesn't stop when the blade hits him, though with the buff behind it, his HP drops like a rock.

If he's going down, though, he's going down swinging. So he pushes forward through the pain. He raises his left hand, making sure that his opponent is looking right at him (because who would want to look away from a massive gnoll trying to kill you?) and there's a flash from the gauntlet. It should be enough of a distraction.

The were fang leaps through the air, aiming to bring his blade down onto Lazion, and drive it through him.

The confident expression on Proteus' face is replaced with some wariness as she tries to weave her cage, but something is wrong. Her expression falls, her shadowed face turning grim as she looks at the way Reika is weaving and using her blades. "I think this is getting rapidly out of hand." She mutters. "But..." With a bolt, she launches forward on a Waterslide, ducking down under the initial twin-strike... Only to take the second pair of blows head-on. As she grunts from the pair of crimson lines slashing across her body, there is a little smile. "Heh. Nice moves." She smirks, and there is a sudden blast of close-range black power as she drives a fist forward, almost daring Reika to try to block it.

Gwen has blocked most of the assault but Mizuki seems to be fairly fast she see them boun away and she's able to block Mizuki's next strike entirely but the spell? Well, it's a freaking fireball there's no real fully blocking this at the moment. "Your playing rocket tag, girl. I don't need to."

She will then counter-attack and try to catch a full-powered downward strike on Mizuki's right shoulder.

Lazion just cannot cope with a Juggernaut bearing down on his skinny ass. That was his best SHOT and the guy chewed through it like it was yet another bout of soggy cracker gruel. He looked about as pissed as he did after about a week of the stuff too.

He lets out a small sound, like a squeaky toy being trodden on as the were fang leaps through the air. He attempts to flash away but in his panic the arte misfires, putting him straight in Kaydon's path instead. The blade goes right through Lazion's shoulder, who, in return, blasts a reflexive bolt of pure azure energy from one blade in a blinding desperate arc.

After watching the duels gone on for some time SaltyTears starts to clap loudly, "Alright, that's enough! Call it quits and form up again into two lines!" He give the adventurers a few minutes to organize themselves and receive healing if needed.

"That was a nice mix of embarrassing and confusing, but it does look like a few of you know what you're doing! That's good to see. I hope you help out other you find, these skills are important!" and he looks around at the adventurers, squinting slightly in thought. "You know what, I think you're ready for something a little bigger! Lets talk bosses!"

He starts to pace back and forth in front of the adventurers, "Bosses a big, nasty, and often ugly to boot. They have a lot more power then your average mob. But there are a few commonalities to most bosses. First, they usually try to attack everyone to some degree. They spread out their blows." He continues on like this for some time.

((OOC: In card combat a player can opt to become a Boss. This makes it so they get more cards and EN according to the number of opponents they face. Info about this can be found in '+help card combat'. Generally they just need to use +card/boss <#>, where # is the number of opponents. Combat is generally very similar, but the player set to the boss has more cards, EN, and HP))

Reika knows this is the third round, so there's no real danger, but she still tries to learn. She knows she's not built to take on attacks, so instead she uses a defensive move, rolling away, but not fast enough to evade it entirely, the fist hitting her shoulder, before she moves back to counter... except that she feels her movements are restricted somehow, maybe from of Proteus's attack? But she can't seem to muster anything offensive... so instead she falls on the defense, sending a wall of dark energy toward Proteus to hope to blind her.

Proteus can see the mounting stacks of the Cursed status rising on Reika, and the smile starts returning. Control of the battle is starting to return to her. The Dark Wave comes in, and Proteus simply lets it wash over her, her hands splaying out as she prepares to attack again...

But a moment before she does so, Zorin calls a halt. She pauses, looking over towards Zorin, and then back to Reika. "Mmm. Looks like you've got the upper hand this time, Reika. Good work." She stands down, returning to her place in line and relaxing. "Maybe we'll have to do this again sometime, without an interruption." She chuckles.

It's probably for the better that Zorin was so tanky, because Nevarri was throwing everything she had at the guy with little in the way of offense penetrating Zorin's defenses. The explorer in the meantime is feeling beat-up herself as she takes a breath. "This is why I didn't indulge in PVP." She comments as she catches her breath.

    Gwen charges in again. "You JUST SAW that didn't work! Aren't you gonna try to catch me off-guard or something!?"

    Mizuki raises one of her daggers to STAB the sword in mid-swing and knock it off course, grazing her again! Her little dagger somehow hits hard enough to do that because NINJA NONSENSE.

    Then she tries holds her hand out towards Gwen and tries to rapidfire a spell incant, symbols appearing around her and locking into place.

    "Destructionofnaturegatherinflame!"

    A bolt of intense fire shoots from her hand right at Gwen's center of mass!

    Then Zorin calls the halt and she lowers her hands. "Aww. I was just getting into it." She bows to Gwen, smiling. "Better luck next time."

Reika phews as she takes a moment to catch her breath, smiling at Proteus "I was just lucky, I guess. I'm not even sure what most of my attacks do yet, actually." Beginner's luck, at least it wasn't a dangerous fight. "If that kept going a bit longer I might have been in trouble though."

Kaydon is apparently way better at defending himself than his combat style would indicate. He somehow manages to bring his blade out of Lazion and in between himself and the blast, deflecting it away from himself in the process.

About to strike again, he hears the call to end the combat, and lowers his weapon, "Hey. Nice fight." He slaps Lazion on the back, as a way to thank him for the rather engaging battle, and then sheathes his blade and heads back towards Zorin for the next part of the training.

<<It's better when they CAN'T charge you, Lazion.>>

Nureha says into the chimlink, one hand to her ear as she looks down on the training exercise. In particular, where Lazion is staggering to his feet and obvioulsy out of breath. He groans, muttering 'yes mom' to himself as he takes out a pair of healing potions, offering one to Kaydon as he chuckles with chagrin. "Damn. Remind me never to let you go first again." while he limps a little over-dramatically back into line.

Gwen watches Mizuki as she makes her next move she's bouncing about she smirks at Mizkio trash takes her as the flame come she goes to wad through it deflecting some of it as she goes then she chants for a moment as she goes to chant another spell the match gets called and she cuts off the spell noting.

"I had you dead center in an Earth Pillar cast."

With that she bows slightly to Mizuki and will fall back from the training field for the moment.

After SaltyTears has gone on at some length about a Floor Boss on the second level of Aincrad he faced pre-apocalypse he pauses. "Alright noobs. Time to show me what you really learned! I've been grinding nearly non-stop since the apoch, and I have pretty good gear for what is currently available."

He unsheathes his longsword and rotates his shield arm as if to limber it up. He then bangs on his shield with his sword once. "Alright, pretend I'm the boss. Come at me!" He yells with a bit of a wild gleam in his eye.

As things settle down, Nevarri takes a step back mostly to observe SaltyTear boss up. "I think I've got the picture from here."

    Mizuki seems satisfied that she did the Well-Tuned Murder Engine proud. But that doesn't mean she needs to get rude. "So you did. Good game." She walks up to shake Gwen's hand after, and then... boss fight!

    "Hey!" She calls out to SaltyTears. "I'm no newb!"

    She waits for the battle to begin, letting the tanks move up, then leaping into the air to spit a couple of small but intense bolts of flame down at SaltyTears!

"Learn them well. If you can figure out how to do what you did all the time, you'll be a competent warrior." Proteus replies to Reika. Looks like this is a far cry from her cold attitude earlier towards the idol, at least. "Yes. I tend to try to gain long term control over the battle. It doesn't matter if I take early damage if later on you can't even hurt me."

That said, there is now the issue of SaltyTears. "Well then. Let's see if there's any substance to the man's bluster." She says, smiling as she raises a hand. "Whirling... DISC!" She calls, water drawing into a sphere over her head... And then she compresses it into a spinning buzzsaw of water, which she hurls at SaltyTears. "Let's see how you deal with this!"

Reika turns toward SaltyTears, not even a moment to rest. But that doesn't seem to matter much in this world, or not as much at least. She keeps her blades in hand as she looks toward the new target "Alright then, let's see." She remembers them telling her that Enchanters are mainly for debuffs... in a group that might be even more important than her attack power.

She holds her two blades with one hand, and raises two outstretched fingers in front of her face, focusing her energy on it, to then send it flying at their target "Thorn Bind Hostage!" That should slow him down a bit. While bound, she moves in for a gouging attack, adding up the ante on the 'boss'.

    Merek was coming by only to watch, of course it looks like the people are finishing up. He doesn't try to get involved with anyone, all the same he does take a moment to look and note if anyone he knows might be about.

Kaydon does not like this guy's attitude. But you know, he's also come to expect it from MMO players, there's so many types out there, of course you're going to run into people who're cocky and arrogant. He figures he'll just need to help show this guy he's a noob still too, even with his few extra levels.

Maybe next time he'll Inspect someone before he runs his mouth.

Kaydon is off like a flash, the were fang moving rapidly before leaping and aiming to deliver a spinning downward slash to SaltyTears' cocky face. The guy might have good gear, but things in this world are far more dependent on things other than gear and stats.

Gwen has dusted herself off and she looks to Mizuki she's about to say something. However, she thinks better of it and falls in for the next bit of the training she notices Zprin has been grinding.

"So going grind hell huh?"

She will move in at Zorin and the first thing a tank needs to do is get aggro. She'll launch several attacks. She chants casting a pair of spells the first one causes a very powerful burst of holy energy for one at Zorin in a rather blight explosion and she follows it up with a forced spray of water.

Reika is targetted by a large hammer it seems, or something flat and solid at least! Some quick reflexes allows her to minimize the damage though, bringing her sword to redirect and bounce the attack just enough that it slides next to her, but not precisely enough so it still grazes her side. Nothing too worrisome though. She moves in for the next attack, crying out "Heartseeker!" as her blades seem to aim for a weakpoint. Fortunately hitting the 'heart' in these games don't seem to be too much of a problem, otherwise it'd be scary.

    Mizuki stumbles as she lands as the Thorns effect hits her. "Dammit..." And then magic is flung at her, and she starts the incant for shields too late, holy light and flame covering her body in glowing 'wounds' as her Duel HP bar is already at 55%. She sucks in a breath; Even at 20% pain, it still burns!

    Okay. Okay, that was just unlucky. Healers and tanks can cover for her, she just has to keep doing her job. She tries to circle around SaltyTears and then POUNCE on him from behind, aiming to rake claws across his body, slice across the claw-wounds with one of her daggers, then leap back and spit another fireball, much as she did against Gwen!

Kaydon isn't quite done with SaltyTears' BS. It seems the were fang wants to teach this guy a lesson. Because after his initial strike, the Juggernaut manages to deflect both the Holy blast and the strike with the flat of his blade. The after effects of Holy linger, but he can work around that.

He jumps forward, clearing the ground between himself and Salty in nearly an instant, blade turning over in his hands so he can stab downwards. And stab he does, multiple times, aiming to really drive home the POINT.

The incoming blasts of brilliance on Proteus get a grating grimace from the cloaked Imp. With a gesture, space bends around her, and a moment later she's sliding out of the blast zone of light on a wash of water. "Enough of that." She says, and flicks a hand, a series of runes appearing around the 'boss' of the moment, preparing to trigger... something. But what?

As the attacks start to come in SaltyTears starts quickly maneuvering around. Jumping over some attack, blocking others with his longsword or buckler. The attacks of the first few adventurers seem to be utterly futile, SaltyTears weaves and ducks around them in seeming ease while also sending blows back at the new adventurers. That is until Gwen comes in using an Arte chant to distract SaltyTears in her direction which throws him off balance and provides an opening for Reika to sneak in a powerful piercing attack to his chest, causing him to stumble further.

Grimacing, SaltyTears hops backwards, planning to create a little space to recover and then shift to the attack. Unfortunately for him, Mizuki had quickly circled all the way around and was able to strike from behind with her claws which dig in deep leaving bright red damage marks before leaping backwards again herself to throw a fireball.

At the last second SaltyTears evades the fireball, but find runes floating in the air around him - the result of Proteus's spell. It seems his movements slow down as some kind of dark energy seeps into him. With is movement slowed Kaydon takes the advantage deftly moving in to deliver a quick series of stabs.

Under the onslaught it becomes readily apparent that SaltyTears HP is dropping rapidly and he will die if this continues. A loud whistle comes from the sidelines where Zorin had moved back to observer from. Zorin then calls out, "That's enough! Clearly, you underestimated these adventurers, SaltyTears!" He chuckles as he moves forward and calls the healers with a wave. Grumbling can be heard as the healers surround SaltyTears and Zorin turns to face the adventurers.

"Well done. Very well done! I don't think I'm going to let SaltyTears live this down for some time!" he chuckles before continuing, "I hope each and every one of you gained something from this experience! These are the skills we need while we are here, it is critical we are able to use them well!"

He continues to gaze over the adventurers present, "I see a lot of potential here. I hope that you will consider joining the Scale Emblem Alliance. We are highly organized and work to keep players safe, provide training and equipment, and are actively working to help bring us all back home. If you have any questions then feel free to come discuss them with myself after we conclude." And after the briefest of pauses he says, "And I suppose that's it! Consider this training session complete and enjoy the rest of your day."

Reika wasn't going to push the fight to death, so she's fine with stopping. They have proven the point at least. She sheaths her swords back elegantly, and bows to the 'teacher' "Thank you for the lesson~ I feel a bit more confident now." She smiles, and bows to Proteus as well "Good work as well." She salutes. She seems to have understood her lessons at least, and the effects of her abilities better. She didn't want to be a liability, not after her death. That was rather shameful.