Ben:
Height: 176 cm
Weapon type: Switch Axe
Preferred weapon: Demolition Axe
Armour: Barroth
Armour pigment: Red
Monster: Plesioth
Age: 22
Place of origin: Loc Lac
Hair colour: Brown
Hairstyle: Short, Tousled
Eye colour: Blue
Trivia: Really likes listening to Queen
Sean now had an idea of where he was. He was in the middle of the arena, the base camp of the arena to his left. The Astalos was to his right. While it was on the other side of the arena, judging from its speed and aggression it wouldn't stay there long.
This worked out for Sean. The gunlance, despite his its name, wasn't exactly a good weapon for range, so he no intention of keeping his distance, assuming he could against the hyperactive wyvern. If he could keep his back to the wall, then he wouldn't be at any risk of the Astalos escaping his line of sight.
The only problem he was facing was when he could heal and sharpen. He had been given a shock trap, but he assumed that the Astalos was similar to other electric wyverns and that this would only power him up.
The Astalos took off the ground, flying forward at an incredible speed.
Sean snapped out of his thoughts and faced his weapon forwards.
As cricket-esque wyvern neared, he shelled it three times before raising his shield.
The impact of the attack was strongly felt, Sean being pushed back, but he managed to hang on.
When the Astalos pulled back to try and give itself some space to attack, Sean quickly thrusted forward into its stomach and fired. He repeated the action before the Astalos was able to get away.
Infuriated by the damage he had received, the Astalos roared. Sean covered his ears to block the noise. As he looked back up, he saw the Astalos charging up.
Before he could react the Astalos' horn increased in size due to the electricity.
"I thought it'd be able to, guess I shouldn't use the shock trap. Still… Now I really don't have a chance of escaping it for a while, I should hold off on shelling and preserve sharpness…"
The Astalos flew at Sean again.
Recognising that the attack currently being performed was probably going to be bad for his health in the long run, Sean dodged the attack.
However, now he had been forced away from the wall and was in the open.
Not bothering to stop, the Astalos charged at Sean.
Sean dodged this attack and charged forward, this time managing to hit the Astalos in the leg.
He attacked its stomach next, hitting it twice.
The Astalos swung around and Sean tried to raise his shield to block, but was thrown backwards.
He managed to find his footing instead of falling and looked forwards.
The Astalos had shot out balls of electricity and was sending them towards Sean.
The intention had been to take him by surprise from what Sean could tell, but the first round was easily dodged.
Sean anticipated the second two attacks, but saw the Astalos charging him again.
He dodged the charge, only to be struck from behind.
"Shit… not bad…" He thought, having been hit by one of the electricity balls.
He was only stunned momentarily, but that was enough. The Astalos easily connected with a swipe, sending him flying.
Sean painfully crashed into the ground, bouncing off of it a few times.
He struggled to his feet to see the Astalos charging again.
"Shit…" He thought "I can't dodge right now, I can't block, I can barely move… I could throw a flash bomb… No… it's head is pointed downwards, it wouldn't see it unless I rolled it underneath, but if I was close enough for that I'd be hit by the time the flash bomb went off… I can't heal either, this hit will probably do more damage than I can recover to take. Wait a minute… If this thing's like the Zinogre, then it can probably increase its charge some more, so if I use a shock trap it'll be stuck in place for a little while before it charges up… So I could use that time, even if I'm putting myself of more damage later… Oh screw it, as if I have another choice!"
He placed down the shock trap before backing off as much as he could to drink a potion.
He was mid way through his drink when the Astalos hit the trap.
He expected to see the Astalos stop in place, but instead of that the Astalos' electrical charge completely disappeared.
Sean almost spat the potion out in surprise, but managed to stop himself from wasting time for the sake of comedy. While many great things are sacrificed for comedy, including sleep and a functional social life, Sean's money would not be one of them.
"Well um… I mean… Okay… That uh… That went pretty well…"
Sean had now drunk the potion and was feeling a lot better about his life in general. He had also managed to sharpen his weapon. Things were looking pretty good.
The Astalos tried to recharge, but was out of battery.
He was still plenty mad, though.
The Astalos resorted to its earlier tactic of jabs and did so, but this time they were easily read and blocked.
The Astalos span around, his tail hitting the shield.
However, the tail was also stabbed.
But, unfazed by this pain, the Astalos swung around again to face Sean and tried to charge.
The attack missed and the Astalos was in confusion.
He looked back only to have a flash bomb bounce of his face.
The Astalos tried to dodge but was stunned by this.
Confused, he randomly struck out, an attack managed to connect with a shield on his left.
He pushed all of his attacks in that direction only to find nothing.
The Astalos was unsure of what to do, but what it did know was that the air to his right felt incredibly warm.
The right half of the Astalos' face was burned off by a wyvern's fire.
His horn was completely incinerated by the fire, but somehow he just managed to hang onto living.
He concentrated the charge to the wings, flying towards the source of the attack.
Sean's gunlance had overheated, so now shelling was out of the question.
Still, Sean could use the lance.
The Astalos was unable to focus properly, so its attacks, despite being devastating were off slightly. Some did end up connecting, but they weren't intended. The best idea it could get was from the most recent connecting attack from either side.
Eventually it felt a weight on its back, but only momentarily.
The Astalos assumed that Sean had jumped, confirmed from the shape he could see above his head.
Sean fell downwards with his lance pointed forwards.
The Astalos couldn't block, only turn to face the strike. It condensed as much charge as it could into the remains of its horn.
Sean's strike hit the electricity, but through sheer force and gravity he was able to force his way through, though he did take a fair amount of damage.
The strike burrowed into the Astalos' head, finishing it instantly.
Sean got to his feet and walked off, a little unsteady due to the final attack
Seventh fight, Sean vs The Astalos. Cleared.
Zach had chosen a charge blade for his fight.
He was in the slayground.
As he walked in he heard a noise above him.
He looked up and saw nothing. He looked back and saw nothing.
He looked forward again and saw the Nescrylla in front of him, upside down, its jaws ready to close around Zach, a move that would at best poison him and at worst bisect him.
"Huh… what are the chances." Zach thought before diving away.
He got up to see the Nerscylla swinging towards him.
Zach rolled to the left as the Nerscylla flew past.
Taking this chance to attack, Zach unsheathed his weapon.
A few attacks connected, but the arachnid quickly scuttled away.
When it was far away enough it shot out webs.
Zach ended up getting caught in one of these.
He was confused as to what to do for a few seconds before realising that trying to work it out wouldn't really help in the short term and dodging the Nerscylla pulling itself directly towards him.
Unfortunately, Zach was unable to completely dodge this attack and ended up getting hit by it. Luckily though, it did remove the webbing.
Zach once again started attacking. He got in a few slashes before dodging back due to the Nerscylla swinging its legs around.
The Nescrylla jumped up onto the net above Zach.
It started dripping down poison and grabbed forwards but found it hit nothing.
It then heard laughter above it and looked up to see Zach pointing and laughing from on top of the net.
It then swung around and brought out its jaws, closing them on Zach.
"Oh shit." Zach thought before getting caught by this attack and poisoned.
The Nescrylla then jumped backwards and shot out a web.
This caught Zach and made him unable to move his arms, but failed to catch him anywhere else.
"...Okay… well maybe I can use cleanser I don't have cleanser okay yeah then I'm gonna fail. Wait a minute… what if I… yeah!"
Zach had never fought a Nerscylla before. So he assumed that it worked like snow or mud and he needed cleansers or to get hit. He didn't think to just thrash around. Luckily though, he hadn't been completely immobilised and could still move. He decided to use this to his advantage.
Zach then started running at the Nerscylla while wildly screaming.
The Nerscylla was intimidated by this display and backed off.
Zach continued running at it screaming while the Nerscylla still felt intimidated.
"This isn't working…" Zach thought "If this keeps up much longer I'll pass out… I need to change my tactics!"
Zach then flopped to the ground.
"Help I have fallen and cannot get up." He said, not moving.
The Nerscylla moved forward slightly to try and study whatever it was like at, before ultimately deciding that it just wasn't worth and walked off.
"NO! COME BACK!" Zach yelled at it "I SERIOUSLY CAN'T GET UP I DON'T HAVE USAGE OF MY ARMS."
The Nerscylla turned around to look at him. It then turned back and started to go faster.
"DO NOT AVERT YOUR GAZE!" Zach yelled one last time.
Zach was now stuck in place.
"I only have one way out. There's no turning back now." He thought with utmost seriousness.
Zach then began aggressively rolling at the Nerscylla.
The Nerscylla turned its head again to see a man in his twenties rolling across the ground with an incredibly serious expression.
The Nerscylla was then hit by the rolling man.
In anger it lashed out with its legs, hitting the webs and destroying them.
Zach was then excited due to his plan succeeded and jumped to his feet to drink an antidote, but was interrupted by the Nescrylla ramming into him at incredibly high speed.
Zach was now low on health due to the poison and the attacks, so he had a choice.
He could drink a potion to recover health in case the Nerscylla attacked again but lose some of the health recovered to the poison, or he could drink an antidote and hope that the Nerscylla doesn't attack again.
Zach decided that it was most important to get rid of the poison and drank an antidote.
The Nerscylla tried to hit him again, but the attack was dodged.
The Nerscylla continued to try attacking and it was clear that it wouldn't back off.
"Which means that… my only chance is to attack."
Zach unsheathed his weapon.
The Nerscylla lighter attacks could be easily attacks, but its full body weight was out of the question.
Zach performed a round slash, but it bounced off.
"Huh, looks like it's time for the end." He thought, loading in five phials.
He quickly changed to axe mode.
Zach began to slash at the Temnoceran.
He finished it off with a super burst, bringing it crashing through the net and onto the ground.
He landed unsteadily but managed to remain standing.
Eighth fight, Zach vs the Nerscylla. Cleared.
Finally, Joseph was up. He had chosen to go with the bow, much to Zach's booing, to which he yelled that he didn't want his life at risk.
Joseph felt an incredible pressure.
"Godamnit…" He thought "This is the last fight for today… I can't screw up… My image would never recover…"
He looked over to see a Seltas and a Seltas Queen.
"Why… Why do I have to fight two?" He thought.
He then recognised something "Wait a minute… these are the two same monsters from earlier today. Oh, cool! That means that they should be weaken- wait they destroyed that guy. Oh shit."
Joseph slowly sinking into despair was interrupted by the Seltas charging at him.
Joseph dodged him and pulled out his bow. He shot off an arrow which missed as the Seltas flew around to face Joseph.
He outstretched his forelimbs and swung at Joseph.
Joseph managed to hop over the swing and shot off an arrow as he landed, this time connecting with the Seltas' face.
The Seltas didn't stop, though and continued to attack.
Joseph was surprised by this, having expected the Seltas to pull back from pain.
The Seltas took advantage of this confusion to swing his forelimbs at Joseph again, knocking him back.
He then hit Joseph with a green glob, weakening him.
Joseph got up to see the Seltas Queen charging him.
Luckily for Joseph, the Seltas Queen was a fair amount slower than her partner, so he was easily able to get out of the way.
He turned to face the Seltas once again.
"This Seltas might be faster, but I'm assuming that he'll be a hell of a lot more frail. So I should prioritise taking him out first, the queen'll be easily picked off afterwards."
Joseph shot arrows into the air.
Some hit the Seltas but most were dodged.
His stamina having recovered in the time it took for the attack to finish, Joseph ran forward and fired off some arrows.
Three, to be exact.
The first missed, the other two connected.
The Seltas flew away, unfazed.
He swooped through twice.
The first time it nearly connected, but the second missed due to Joseph understanding his tactics.
The Seltas now closed in.
As he did it swung his forelimbs at Joseph.
Joseph jumped backwards to dodge the swing.
The Seltas continued pushing Joseph, not giving him a chance to attack.
Joseph assumed that he would be able to attack once the Seltas tired, and sure enough that happened.
Joseph readied an arrow and was about to fire, but as he did he saw a shadow loom over him.
He saw the Seltas Queen raising up on her back legs.
"What? How the hell did I not hear this thing move!? Wait a minute… Ah, I get it. The Queen didn't move at all!"
The Seltas had repeatedly tried to attack Joseph. However, this attacks were never meant to connect in the first place. If the Seltas wanted to deal damage, he would've first weakened Joseph and then put everything into attacking in that opening. The Seltas' intention was to move Joseph across the arena. Joseph's focus was entirely on reacting and avoiding the Seltas' attacks. He had no form of awareness of his positioning. This easily allowed the Seltas to move him closer to the intended attacker. Now that Joseph's stamina was depleted from the dodges and his attempted attack, he couldn't escape from the following attack.
"Still though…" Joseph thought "There's something that I don't get. I've thought a few Seltas before, though never with a queen, but those Seltas didn't display nearly the level of planning that this one did. I'd assume that it's orders from the queen, but how were they able to pull off a plan like this without any communication? Even a Rathian and Rathalos duo can't do shit like this!"
Joseph's thoughts were interrupted by the Seltas Queen's attack. Her upper body slammed into the ground, causing tremors.
Joseph couldn't move.
Not letting him escape, the Seltas Queen swung around with her tail.
"Huh?" Joseph thought "The Seltas won't be able to dodge in time either!"
Sure enough, as Joseph expected, the Seltas was also battered by this swing.
Joseph was thrown away.
He landed with a crash.
He looked up to see the Seltas Queen ready to grab him.
Joseph was lifted up into the air by the Seltas Queen's tail.
He struggled to get out, but to no avail.
"Shit… I can't let the fight end here...! This chapter's… not at... three thousand words yet!"
Joseph managed to grab an arrow and tried to stab at the Seltas Queen's tail.
The arrow was deflected and bounced off.
It clattered onto the ground a few meters away.
"Huh… So it really is over, then…" Joseph remarked in his thoughts, remembering what had happened to the other hunter way back in chapter 3.
At least, he thought that was going to happen, until he saw a giant crab crawl out of the ground.
"Daimyo!?" Joseph thought, before Daimyo shot off a pressurised water jet at the Seltas Queen's tail, making her flinch and drop Joseph.
Joseph was still surprised by this, but saw the Seltas flying straight towards Daimyo.
Joseph, moving at fast as he could, loaded in an arrow and fired it at the Seltas.
It connected, knocking the Seltas over.
While the Seltas was toppled, Joseph ran over to Daimyo.
"Thanks, Daimyo!" He yelled, before turning to the fight "I'm not sure how you got here, but I'll take it anyways. I'll try to fight the Seltas Queen, you keep the Seltas distracted for the minute, got it?"
Daimyo started to hit the Seltas while he was down.
"Good!"
As a side note, Daimyo had just gotten in by digging. The ground can easily be broken through, it's just that monsters are typically unfamiliar with the arena they find themselves in and don't think to try escaping this way. If they do get out, there are guards ready for them. Guards with big guns. Daimyo got past them with his amazing hiding skills.
Joseph ran towards the Seltas Queen.
He shot off scatter shots.
Luckily, the Seltas Queen was a really big target. A really slow, big target. Much more than the Seltas.
Joseph was able to dodge at a much more relaxed pace than before.
The Seltas Queen got ready to swing her tail around.
Joseph was confident that he could just perform two backhops to get out of the way.
However, when he backhopped he landed on his arrow from earlier and tripped on it.
He started falling to the ground and got hit by the tail mid fall.
He was sent flying a few metres.
Daimyo was keeping the Seltas back, but as soon as Joseph was hit away the Seltas got up. A water jet was shot in front of him. Daimyo expected him to stop, but the Seltas continued through, despite having his horn broken and receiving a fair amount of damage.
It hurried to the Seltas Queen and the Seltas Queen grabbed him with her tail.
Joseph was confused as to what was going on, but the Seltas offered no resistance. The Seltas was pulled onto the Seltas Queen's back, at which point his eyes began glowing.
The Seltas Queen and Seltas duo, now having become a Gurren Lagann reference, charged at Joseph.
Daimyo tried to run forward, but would be unable to reach them in time.
Joseph saw a switch off to the side. In multi-monster quests a wall could be raised to separate the two monsters. However, here both the monsters and Daimyo were on one side and Joseph was just on the other.
"Shit…" Joseph thought "If I could just reach the switch."
The Seltas Queen was already near, he wouldn't be able to get up in time to get away.
"Wait… I got it!"
Joseph pulled out his bow and drew it back.
He fired off a single arrow.
The arrow wasn't intended for the Seltas Queen, there was no stopping her with an attack at this point.
But something that could stop her was an immovable object, there was no question about that, as she certainly wasn't an unstoppable force.
The arrow connected with the switch, raising the wall up in the middle of the arena.
The Seltas Queen crashed into it at full speed, unable to brake. The queen and soldier were both injured by this.
Joseph got to his feet and started to drink a potion, thinking of what to do next.
"So now I'm okay, but the problem is that Daimyo is trapped there alone for the minute. While I'm sure that he'll be able to hold out, this isn't exactly ideal… I can't let the time before the wall drops go to waste, I need to work out what's going on. Splitting up won't work anymore, it'll turn into a 2v2 no matter what we do… Still, what's up with that Seltas…? Even after receiving an attack from the queen herself, he didn't seem to care… No matter how much he might care about the queen, it's clear that she's the one benefitting the most from this. Even his horn's broken as a result wanting help with her opponent. Is he hypnotised or something? I think that be it, he wasn't even surprised when he was grabbed. ...Just you wait for me and Daimyo to team up against you again, you'll see that a parasitic relationship like yours can't beat one like ours!"
The gate was then pulled down "Huh, good timing."
Joseph ran forward and shot off an arrow.
It connected, flinching the Seltas Queen.
Joseph ran towards Daimyo and then jumped onto his back.
"LET'S GO!" Joseph yelled, already firing off arrows.
Daimyo scuttling forward at an incredibly high speed.
He rammed into the Seltas Queen with his left arm.
While this attack didn't do much, it made the Seltas a very easy target. Which was good because Joseph had just applied some power coating.
He hit the Seltas with arrows a few times, but the Seltas was able to retaliate with his forelimbs. While these would've connected with Joseph, Daimyo raised his right arm forwards to block the strikes.
Joseph then jumped forward from his position while the Seltas was pulling its forelimbs back from the strikes.
He first landed on the Seltas Queen, before kicking off of her head to properly reach the Seltas.
He slashed with his arrow, knocking the Seltas over and off of the queen's head.
It fell to ground.
In that moment Joseph and Daimyo both raced towards the Seltas and began attacking it while it was down.
He was down for a total of ten seconds before the Seltas Queen was able to stop them from killing him.
That was enough time though.
The Seltas was nearly dead and everyone there knew it.
But before this could be acted on by her opponents, the Seltas Queen acted on it.
She grabbed the Seltas with her tail.
Joseph and Daimyo both assumed they were going to combine again.
Instead, they became one.
By which I mean that the Seltas Queen ate the Seltas.
It was a fairly horrifying sight, really.
The Seltas and the Seltas Queen seemed to be the only ones unsurprised by it.
Now that the Seltas Queen was feeling a bit better after her meal, she let out a roar.
Normally at this point the Queen would've called in another Seltas and would've had a way better chance of winning, but not in the arena.
She charged forward.
Daimyo quickly scuttled out of the way of the attack by going to the right, Joseph jumping onto his back as he did.
Joseph shot off as many arrows as he could as the Seltas Queen moved around, Daimyo doing the same with pressurised water.
While it was certainly doing damage, there was no way of telling how effective it was against this refuelled damage sponge.
The Seltas Queen ran past them once more, but this time instead of charging away she turned to face them, her hind legs rising her up once again.
It was at that moment that Daimyo launched himself off the ground, shell pointed at the Seltas Queen, pressurised water sending him through the air.
The shell connected with the Seltas Queen, pushing her backwards as well piercing her chest area.
Daimyo was still pushing forward like an unstoppable crab train of death.
However, the Seltas Queen was starting to regain control of the situation.
It was at that moment that Joseph ran forward, holding two barrel bomb+s in his arms.
"Yeah!" He thought "This is just like the time when we fought a Jhen Mohran! We brought a load of barrel bombs, placed them on its back and kicked them! It dealt a load of damage to it!"
The barrel bombs went off with Joseph directly next to them, engulfing him in the explosion and sending him flying through the air.
"Ah yeah right… we also almost died…"
Joseph landed on the ground, both he and Daimyo had taken a lot of damage. Somehow, he was hanging onto his consciousness.
In the last seconds that he was awake, Joseph realised that he had lost the fight. Not because the Seltas Queen had survived it, but because he had been helped out by Daimyo, which, as established in Riko's fight, would result in disqualification.
"Fuck." Was his last thought before passing out.
Final fight, Joseph vs the Seltas Queen and the Seltas. Failed.
In the end, after paying for enough potions to bring everyone up to as much health as possible and donating a large amount of the remaining winnings to the local police force for no reason in particular except for bribing them to drop their charges of attempted murder on Riko they were left with about 60 zeni.
Sean looked at the money they had been left with, as did everyone else.
There was a silence that generally read: "Let's never do this again."
TO BE CONTINUED
So yeah that was a bit of a long chapter.
The Astalos fight was more fun to write than I expected, though I really hope I'm not wrong on the whole shock trap thing. I know that it loses charge when it's charged, I just hope that it can't charge more than one thing.
Nescrylla fight faced a difficulty when at the end of the Seltas fight I remembered that webbed doesn't work like that. But I refused to scrap that fight because of the rolling part. So have that.
Seltas fight lasted about 1300 words longer than I expected it to. It was pretty much the first fight idea for this arc, so it's weird to think that something that I thought of as "two weeks away" six weeks ago has just been written.
On a non behind the scenes note, as I type this New Dangan Ronpa V3 has been released today and I've been half writing this and half watching that for a few hours now.
I only plan on watching the first trial, because I don't want to wait for at least half a year (I'm assuming that it'll be released on Steam at the same time it's released on PS4, if not then I might have to get one, but that's besides the point) to learn whether the "Kaede isn't the protagonist" theory is true or not.
Not gonna give my thoughts on all the characters, I'll probably do that after I play it, but so far I really like Gonta and Angie, which is making me sad because I know that there's no way that they can survive this, due to Gonta being dench and Angie being potentially mentally unstable (I can't understand Japanese, but I saw the demo translation, which has the introductions and she mentions sacrifices to God… so take that as you will)
That's gonna be it for this chapter, next chapter should be a bit more relaxed (probably).