"I can't summon my Personae… my head's too muddy," Minato mumbled, staggering back towards the couch, leaning against its armrests. "Goddammit, we're gonna have to do this the old-fashioned way… somehow, I dunno…" he mumbled, kicking a Shadow crushed into the wall with the heel of his foot.
"Wait, what's happening, these guys are weeeeird!" Hibiki said frantically, punching away a Shadow towards a wall of compacted Shadow baddies.
"Don't argue, just fight them or you die hard!" Akihiko exclaimed. "I'm gonna try and get Ken…" he growled, stepping back from the Shadows and running up the stairs as fast as he could. Unfortunately it wasn't that fast.
"Where's Koromaru?" Junpei asked lazily, ramming his shoulder into a Shadow, smearing Ichor on his clothes.
"Awoooo!" A familiar howl answered in reply to Junpei's question, and the imposing presence of the three headed dog, Cerberus permeated the room. The three heads blew out a stream of blue-white hell fire down onto the Shadows, decimating a large number of them and carving out a path of ichor and soot onto the floor.
"Great job Korodude," Kanashi said, barely in focus as he tried to push a Shadow away.
"This is not going to end we-" Yashiro mumbled before finding a bladefist almost grazing his neck. "Holy shite!" he blinked, moving away from the gloved assassin as fast as he could. However, considering how unsteady his movements were, he certainly did not get out unscathed and there was a considerable gash in that area.
"Hmph," Red muttered before coating his fists in fire and launching strong punches at Yashiro. He was only barely dodging in his state, and he was stumbling back and forth between the punches. Yashiro did eventually get hit by Red's bladefists, and hot searing pain raced through his body.
"S-Shit…" Yashiro growled, and by now, he was considerably pissed. Still high, but equally as pissed. "You are so going down like you'll never fucking believe," he snarled and despite the pain he was most certainly feeling, he smashed his fist hard into Red's face, an audible cracking noise opening a crazed grin on Yashiro's face.
"Heeyyyy, Razor pencil neck bastard," Kanashi said with a sing song voice. Right on cue, he heard the familiar whiz of a razor and instinctively ducked. "Hey there you are! I've missed you!" he smiled cordially before his face turned into a frown. "Missed pounding in your sorry face!" Kanashi snarled, stepping to try and find Raz.
"Geez, these guys are all a bunch of morons," Nyx vaguely heard.
"Huh?" she mumbled, readying a Megidolaon in her hand.
"Kala-Nemi!" Ken cried. After what seemed an eternity, Akihiko had finally brought the boy downstairs to join the fight, and he was doing considerably well, killing Shadows with greatly placed Mahamaon and Mamudoon attacks in the hordes. By now, it was starting to clear out, however the Shadows had already done what they needed to do; stall for the assassins.
Yashiro had been doing well against Red, but there was only so much he could do with cut open and quickly cauterised wounds in his shoulder and torso and the pain was starting to catch up with him. He had managed to get a few substantial hits in on Red as he was inundated with rage but he was slower and that was costing him precious comfort and blood.
Kanashi was doing his best to keep up with Raz, but the little shit was so fast that he could barely have time to react to any of the razors that were sent flying his way. Being high didn't help and Kanashi couldn't do much in the way of damage. Raz however was, and Kanashi had already been wounded by several blades thrown at him.
Nyx rubbed her temple as she fired the Megidolaon and decimated most of the remaining Shadows; the few that were left were struggling against Koromaru and Ken, and between the two of them it was obvious that the Shadows weren't going to last much longer. "That's almost all of them…" she mumbled. Before she could relax however, Nyx heard the familiar surge of SP behind her and she barely jumped out of the way of some seriously vicious lightning bolts.
"You ain't going anywhere!" the hooded assassin smiled deviously before spinning and throwing another tendril of electricity in Nyx's direction.
"Oh really?" Nyx said defiantly, although she could admit that her headache was quite a bother and was preventing her from concentrating too hard on anything. Despite that however, she fired a red and black blast of energy in the assassin's direction; Night Queen.
"Aren't you vicious?" the assassin giggled as she raised her arms and lightning coated her hands. From what Nyx could make out, the lightning was most certainly generated by SP and not by any mechanical device that could magically spit out sparks everywhere.
"Hmph. Code name now," Nyx demanded stubbornly, looking down her nose at the assassin.
"Sheesh, I'm Lightning," she said. "Isn't that fitting for one like me?" Lightning laughed.
"All too fitting in my opinion," Nyx rolled her eyes and shot a barrage of Almighty spells at Lightning.
Lightning danced and hopped over every single attack and if Nyx didn't know any better, she had on a cheeky smile.
"F-Fuck," Kanashi growled as he desperately tried to summon his Persona through his muddled vision. "Don't you fucking die on me goddammit!" he snarled, despite the blood leaking from his wounds. Kanashi roared as he finally managed to force out his Persona, Agni and released vengeful hellfire upon Raz. But for Agni's sake, he had a headache from trying to summon!
Raz tried to dodge the large proximity blast of fire, but he didn't get out unscathed due to its huge field coverage. "Argh, not again," Kanashi thought he heard the assassin mutter, despite the throbbing in his head he couldn't help but smile.
"Man, they're doing work," Minato muttered, trying to eye where he should go. He wasn't quite sure how he could help but he did just see Kanashi force out his Persona. He could do this.
"You are insufferable," Nyx muttered, launching wave after wave of spells after Lightning.
"Oh, I know," she giggled.
"You know what?" Nyx said, stopping her attacks and holding out her arm to the side. "You're that annoying that I'm going to use this."
As she glared venomously at Lightning, a great, silver broadsword materialised in her hand and she held it one handed. "The last time I even remotely had to use this it was when I was fighting against that blue haired messiah," she shook her head as best she could and ignored the throbbing at the back of her head. Nyx stepped forward expertly and struck swiftly.
"Fucking hell," Yashiro growled as he once again found a heated bladefist embedded in his left shoulder and that finally set him to so much rage, he was literally seeing red. And then he smiled slowly, giving Red a dark smirk.
Completely ignoring his shoulder's outcries he forcefully removed Red's bladefist and grasped a thick hold on his wrist, very nearly starting to crush his wrist bones together. Red winced and immediately tried to remove himself from Yashiro's grip however he was not getting away from the seething boxer.
"Let me help you," Aigis said as she stepped to Nyx's opposite side and activated her Persona, Pallas Athena.
"I'd appreciate it," Nyx muttered under her breath as she swung her blade with a focused gaze.
"Holy shit!" Kurow cried as he nearly got hit by Raz's razors.
"Step aside 'dumbfuck'!" Kanashi growled mockingly as he got out his gun and shot at Raz with a speeding bullet. Raz had been slowed down by the intense burns that he had sustained earlier in the fight, and he almost didn't see the bullet coming towards him.
Kurow bobbed his head down quickly, and the apple on his head that had managed to stick with him all that time was shot through with the same bullet that Kanashi fired at Raz.
"I told you that I was good at this!" Kanashi smirked at Kurow, and Raz clutched his shoulder which had a bullet embedded in it.
"Tch, you win dumbfuck," Kurow conceded before punching Raz unconscious with a Megidola infused punch.
"You're done," Yashiro laughed as Red tried to calm down from his wrist being completely and utterly crushed by his harsh grip. Red gave a 'tch' of disappointment as he painfully removed his bladefist from his non-functioning hand. Then, he moved, throwing a wave of fire in Yashiro's direction.
"Hmph, seen that all before," Yashiro glared as his quiet rage rose in magnitude and he forcibly summoned his own Persona, Vayu, out. He ignored the pain and sent a huge gust of wind at Red that cancelled out the flames.
Then Red collapsed to the ground.
"Wha?" Yashiro blinked.
Minato and Hibiki smiled nervously behind Red, both of their legs raised.
"Oh goddammit you guys, I was going to end him!" Yashiro rolled his eyes, earning him sheepish looks from the two.
"It would've been nice if Mitsuru and Yukari could have helped, but they can't summon. Neither can Akihiko or Junpei," Aigis lamented as Pallas Athena cast Akasha Arts and sent a wave of Physical damage at Lightning.
Lightning of course dodged, but Nyx was ready right behind her. "You're done," Nyx said before bashing the flat side of the broadsword onto Lightning's head, making her collapse to the ground.
"Aw man, the place is totally trashed," Junpei complained as the last of the assassins were felled.
"Can we kill them now?" Yashiro growled. "They're just going to keep on coming back, you know that."
"We should…" Minato sighed heavily.
"Fuck, they Traesto-ed!" Kurow cried, indicating the empty spaces where the assassins once were before.
"That is a predicament… There is nothing we can do at this point however," Mitsuru managed to say.
"We should end them if we see them again," Kanashi agreed with Yashiro. "I ain't taking another one of that scrawny bastard's razors!" he declared ardently.
"Um… I guess I can kinda agree with it," Hibiki said meekly. "I still don't understand what's going on…"
"I'll explain it to you tomorrow," Minato said. "Anyways, you guys can stay here for the night. Just in case," he said, looking at Kurow, Kanashi, Yashiro and Hibiki.
"Alright!" Kurow cheered, practically throwing himself onto the floor.
"Oh dear…" Fuuka mumbled.
"I believe we should all get some rest. We did well, everyone," Mitsuru said before going upstairs.
"Beauty sleep, here I come," Yukari yawned.
"That was an adventure," Nyx sighed.
If only they knew how much more was coming…
AN: Now that that's over… I have a mini-arc to move onto. It'll be plenty important.
Anakin: If I liked a challenge these chapters would be 4000 words instead of just 2000. *rubs back of head* It's a typo. I don't like typos.
Raidou: Depends what you mean by 'they'. *sweatdrops*
Nights: Glad you liked them and everything. As much as a goddess with a headache and magic powers can dish out.
Suries.
Yoshikunitsu: It should slow down in the next chapter then.
Well, I thought I should inject some comic relief into this. Minato can wake up and fall asleep whenever he wants.
Suries.
XD: Haha, cool. Kanashi's one of my favourite characters to write since he's funny like that.
Well, I try with updates, and I update often enough as it is.
Angel of light darkness: But the Union Arcana isn't a real Arcanum so I won't use it. It might as well be the Universe Arcana.
Q/A SECTION
(Minato, Nyx, Erebus) Question 1: Yoshikunitsu
Minato: If there is, I don't know who that could be.
Nyx: Unfortunately I do not know. I'd imagine someone like Hemera, Aether or Hyperion.
Erebus: Well, there is a reason why the darkness is usually stronger…
(Aigis) Question 2: Eivexst
Aigis: Very. And I was right, it did. I would try, but I don't know any remedies for getting high off weed.
(Minato and Hibiki) Conversation 3: Yoshikunitsu
Minato: He kinda had to.
Hibiki: I'd rather not die. I don't mind getting hurt, but I ain't dying.