Intermission
Noriko & Tsukiko & OEM & Red
"Awakening III"
Willpower is humanity's greatest asset.
The ability to look at the impossible and declare it possible, to believe that a 0% chance of victory could become a 1% chance of victory, and that that 1% was enough to guarantee a change in fate. Some would call it delusions of the highest magnitude, but the reality is that this belief has yielded results for "humanity" time and time again, letting them topple beings that should not even be able to scratch, to grow so strong that in past worlds, they had been able to not only challenge, but outright defeat fragments of their own "Creator."
For humans, when push comes to shove, they are capable of doing amazing things; but...
There are limits to what a single person can do, regardless of that person's willpower.
"Humanity" might be the strongest force of all, but "humans" themselves do not carry that invincible power alone. They can be strong, certainly they can become strong all on their own, but they will never reach their full potential if they continue to exist all by themselves, and even if they become strong enough to challenge the 'Gods' all on their own, "true miracles" will be forever beyond their grasp.
The difference between a warrior standing alone on a battlefield, and a warrior standing alone on a battlefield whilst carrying the hopes and wishes of his fellows is massive; after all, the first is fighting alone, while the second is never alone, even if they would appear to be to others.
And despite what many would think...
The flame of a single human's willpower can be snuffed out.
But was she even fighting a human?
This mass of willpower and rage...
Was this a human?
Unthinking, uncaring, striking at everything with a blind monster-like anger that held none of humanity's warmth to it; it was a rage borne from the deep trauma that had thrust him into solitude, and the same rage that had built him up into what he is today, a warrior strong enough to challenge the divine in their current state. If rage were capable of killing alone, his victory would have been sealed right from the start, and...
The spinning force drives both predator and prey into the ground, which is which depends on whose perspective you were looking into; hands grabbing your head with impossible strength to keep the blade from cleaving her head from her body, the diversion in force is enough for you to push her down even further, holding her down with weight and rage everything spirals out of control and burns into a crimson nothingness.
Kill.
Rip.
Tear.
Destroy whatever you can get your hands on, kill her over and over and over, again and again, embrace that nature as a monster and tear until there's nothing left of the opponent for you to reach; the first few strikes are dulled blows with your one good arm, your head unable to move due to her vice-like grip on the sides of it, but that doesn't matter.
Each strike makes the crater deeper.
Rocks fly and bones break, blood splashes and she starts to resist in a more true manner, squirming and trying to claw at you with her blade-like nails, but the moment she takes one hand of your head in an attempt to throw you off, you swing down once more -blade finally usable- and in that moment-
---She decides you're not really a human after all.
-An intense pain brings it all to a stop.
Not that you want it to, blood spurting forth from a sudden wound to the neck, a razor sharp blade that had carefully and casually severed your vitals and was rapidly introducing your consciousness to darkness. As an ESPer, this is not a fatal wound in spite of it being the sort that would cause a human to die in seconds, but it's also something that heals slowly, a critical strike to the body's functions that will result in it simply being unable to respond to commands any longer.
---She had no interest in fighting monsters.
While she could be said to hate humans, she also held a respect and love for them that ran parallel to that hate. If a human wanted to fight her that was fine, as a former human, she would meet that challenge with her own willpower, after all...
If someone was going to kill her, it was probably going to be a human.
It was impossible for them to do, but they always seemed to find a way to do it anyway.
But this...
A rampaging beast?
If she had wanted to fight someone like that, she would have simply stayed in the Vortex with the rest of the Demons.
She had no interest in someone who fought without their humanity.
The laughter and joy in her eyes has faded to a light disappointment as strength fades your body; reaching up to grab your face, your resulting answer of a sword gouge to the chest is answered with a slam into the walls of the newfound crater.
Your body shouldn't be able to move, but you keep moving it anyway.
Stars exploding before the eyes of someone who was so lost in his own rage he had lost himself, keeps fighting up until the point where he is knocked skyward...
Does he recover in time to see the stars before all goes black?
To feel someone catch him before he strikes the ground?
It's hard to say.
---
"Grab him, Kresnik-!"
"...!"
The moment the man had lost consciousness, thrown bodily from the hole to hell he had been incessantly digging himself and his opponent into, she had recognized that the current situation was unsalvageable.
The reason for this knowledge is the flood of information that had come pouring into her mind with the awakening of this "Persona."
Current battle status of all in-range entities, names as well as estimated skills and abilities revealed that continuing to fight her for any longer was an exercise in futility.
She won't die for good in this scenario no matter what, and continuing to fight her would seemingly only increase her power to the point of being literally invincible if it was allowed to continue on as it had been going.
She did not know the weakness, only that the girl she thought she had known would only pick fights in times and places where where this "immortality" is functional, and that...
"Tsukiko" and "Elizabeth" were both valid names for that body, because there are two souls inside of it.
She does not know what this means, however...
It does awaken the urge to not let her kill anyone else, as if to save "Tsukiko" by means of defying "Elizabeth."
For now, she has to take the bodies of the two and flee; the blonde woman was connected to the man, when he had fallen so had she; she knows neither of them personally, but she is still a police officer, and the urge to protect others is something that is not easily denied to her, even if she feels like the two of them are "monsters" in a sense.
Especially because they had seemed to interfere earlier for her sake rather than any quest of their own.
So she's left with no recourse but to escape, at least for now.
It should stop if they get out of the park, according to the police reports, none of the victims of the vampire murders had been killed around large groups of people-!
Hefting both bodies onto her shoulders -surprisingly strong now- the dash into the darkness is made without a hint of hesitation, newfound guardian entity floating close by, blazing red cross painted on the back of it's otherwise blank clothes.
Primed and ready to-
"Noriko~! Don't run, you just got the power to fight back~!"
-Deflect all the strikes that were sure to appear at their back.
Crimson daggers, bursts of fire and ice, and even a full blown sonic charge through the trees. The persona, her "other self" takes it all on with a calm that she can only find deeply admirable in spite of the intense sense of fear.
Deflecting all the blades, tearing trees and foliage out to detonate against the spheres of elemental energy, and stopping the sonic charge with a responding counter-tackle; the sound of shattering glass echoes out as it's fragile form is broken with a single fist, only to reappear at her side once more, something inside of her, some invisible force, rapidly depleting whenever it is forced to sacrifice itself to stop the vampire's direct charges.
However, the attempts aren't quite as aggressive as against the man with a single eye.
It was almost like the vampire was hesitating ever so slightly now that the target had become her rather than the other two, but...
Hesitating ever so slightly...
Is not the same thing as stopping...
A hammer of wind strikes at her back, and this time the persona is a heartbeat too late in it's reemergence from her soul. Thrown across the street right at the gates, the girl that would have died from this impact even ten minutes ago nevertheless takes it with only major damage, vision fading out to static for a moment as the enemy approaches from the darkness.
...And once more, the vampire hesitates.
All three of the bodies are lying around waiting to be finished off, and while it is more her style to kidnap and torture for some time before the kill, she does not even move to do that much...
It's only for a few moments, a sudden grasp at her own chest, and a look of pain crossing that otherwise horrific face, and-
Because of that.
They get away.
A sword slash scatters her form to pieces.
The attacker is nowhere nearby, nevertheless, it's attack seemed to ignore space and simply scattered the vampire with a single strike.
She never sees who it is before losing consciousness, indeed, no one sees the wielder of this unchallenged sword, but...
"...No one ever listens to advice."
Intermission Out
---
One-Eyed Man
Aoyama, Soba Shop -Gen-
Second Floor, Attic
Morning, Prior to The Fall
Your body felt heavy and unresponsive.
Sensation takes awhile to return, but the first of the five senses that seems to restart in a usable manner is the sense of touch; there's light cloth all around you, warm and seemingly clean, and your clothes feel very different, like a t-shirt and jeans and... bandages... rather than your more usual attire, and...
It's warm.
There's no wind...
No grass, the feeling is that of a mattress...
Vision returns soon afterwards, then hearing, then a heavy taste of iron takes over that particular sense.
You're in some sort of house, on a bed, with your wounds -strangely not healed all the way- bandaged with clean white gauze. The room is bland and uncharacteristic, lacking any real customization, and thus it appears to be some sort of guest room. Red has returned to the realm of the unconscious in an identical bed all her own, and while there's a futon on the floor, the occupant of that seems to have left long before you managed to return to consciousness.
Leaning against the nightstand, your sword appears to be right on the verge of breaking; cracks run up and down it's entire length, and the impression you get is that another good smack will probably shatter it to pieces, but...
The door opens after a few moments, and...
"Ah, you're awake."
A familiar, older man comes through the door in the usual wheelchair.
"Seems like we meet again."
He doesn't draw too much attention to the oddities.
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Originally Posted by The Man in the Wheelchair
