The Lure Awakened (Private, Xald and Lani, Joinable with Permission, T-LG)

The two that are closest together. Go for the highest bodycount... Claire answered, more focused with keeping guard of her meister's presently lifeless yet statuesque body.

ooc: Not fully lifeless, but accurate enough

ic:

Justice nodded, fading back into form and working to force both lines of sight together before actually using either one. When xir eyes opened, the edges or reality were blurred by the visions of xir perceptive abilities, causing a nasty, hazy contrast akin to attempting a 3D movie with neither one's prescription nor 3D glasses. "Ready?"

Claire's weapon form hummed, and her soul reached towards Justice's. In moments, with the meister's acceptance, they again resonated, resuming the exchange of power that had cut off when Claire had taken to eating the souls left behind. Ready...

Without another word, thought or uttered, Justice knelt low, following the closest set of tracks to each other, eyes keened into their trails, in the bloodied recesses left behind by the tainted souls. The sounds became detectable soon enough, faint without the familiarity afforded by personal connection, but there nonetheless, assaulting xir senses with the faint taintings of madness onset. Left or right? Xe asked the question when the tracks began to fork, the stronger of the two paths echoing and resounding brighter, indicating that the egg was far closer than the other. Logically, it would be the best choice, but something in it felt off, and it seemed most reasonable to defer to the one that would actually be attacking and consuming the beast.

Pick one Claire said absentmindedly, humming a tune to herself while she sifted through their connection for something. Briefly, she entered her soul world, and the delight she felt at out much more vibrant it was after consuming just those five kishin souls reverberated across the connection, briefly boosting the speed that their resonance already offered Justice.

OOC: Can Kishin take the shape of a dragon, or are they limited to human-ish forms. I mean, even the guy who was also a boat has a human avatar. I'm just trying to find a good adversary for this thread.

ooc: Dragon-esque works well. Remember Jack the Ripper?

Banking, Justice took the oddball path, following after the closer one. The trail of it was stronger, and if the rumors were true, it would lead them to the source of this chaos, regardless. Using the boost in speed their resonance offered, Justice held the weapon behind xir, running in a dash, senses keyed and soul perception on high alert, following the bloodied path before them.

Claire kept herself focused on the resonance, making sure it didn't decay or break down. When she looked at the blood, she had to keep herself from growing squeamish, the resonance briefly faltering and, if Justice wasn't quick enough, sending her falling forward from the sudden drop in speed.

Balance was a thing that Justice was used to keeping, between the free running xe often did with Jasmine, the skating, and the use of her scooter. As such, it was of little issue for the meister to adjust to the sudden change of speed, compensating for the loss and continuing along the glowing madness path before them. You alright?

Sorry... Just, t-the blood... She said softly, as she once again made contact with Justice's soul and resumed their resonance, doing her best to keep her mind on keeping others alive instead of worrying about those already taken by the Kishin.

It's just soul residue, xe reminded her, voice gentle in the soul realms. The blood's just from the madness and soul consumption. Do you want me to drop my Perception? Justice could do so, fairly easily, but it would make tracking the afreet eggs significantly harder. If it helped Claire, though, xe didn't mind too terribly much.

No, I'll be fine... Let's keep going. She said in response, focusing her attention forward and working on keeping her connection with Justice secure. In the distance came a long keening screech, clearly otherworldly in its origin. A shiver ran up Claire's shaft, and the angel statuette attached to the rest of her weapon form shifted, it's hands going to cover its eyes.

Easy, Justice murmured, the calm of xir soul pulsating to extend further to the weapon. Moving Claire, however, xe held her in front of xir, the blade's curve seeming to wrap around xir side. Ready for a fight at any moment, Justice expanded the Perception field, bouncing xir wavelength off of Claire at an increasing rate.

Claire kept her metaphorical head on a swivel, enhancing each pulse of soul wavelength and cycling it back until their resonance was as powerful as it could be. She sighed softly, preparing for kishin eggs to assault at any moment.

They got lucky, if only in one aspect; only one afreet egg attacked them, but Justice was right to assume that something was off about it. Turning the corner around an old storage shed, Justice found xir eyes widening. Nearly in a panic, xe shut xir perception down, hopefully quick enough to prevent Claire from having seen through it. Holding the weapon across xir body, Justice stared at the mangled beast. Perhaps the meister had been wrong, and they were, at least in part, seeing real blood, as the form before them was twisted to the point where xe wasn't sure if it was inside-out or some twisted form of a butcher that had pieced corpses atop it's rotting form. A gag erupted from xir, but xe fought against the instinct, staring it down as it turned around.

ooc:

You've played DA, I know. Remember the blood mage creation thing of dead bodies? That, but more morbid.

Justice. Justice what is it?! Claire asked in a panic, trying to reclaim her senses of what was going on, to no avail. Her meister was keeping her shut out from the outside world, which worried Claire. If it was something that scared Justice, did she really want to see it? In response, Claire strengthened their resonance, even going so far as to push onto the second tier.

A lullaby soothed Justice's mind, the soft hum of Hush, little baby. It was a small comfort, but one that set xir rhythm back into motion. Looking over the beast, xe began working to analyze where xe should strike. It was a bulky being, most of the corpses seemingly pasted onto its torso, providing it with random, misplaced, extra limbs. Justice had no way of knowing if the limbs were functional, and to be perfectly honest, xe wasn't exactly willing to give it the chance to let them find out. The legs, however, did not look like they had been beefed up nearly as much as the main body. In theory, that could provide an easy weak point. In practice, easy didn't seem to sit right, even though even that much didn't seem exactly "easy;" Justice would likely need to hook one of the legs while sliding between them in order to reach it, an endeavor xe was not looking forward to.

Ready?

Ready... Claire mumbled in response, putting her faith entirely in Justice. She was effectively blind, alone in her own soul and useless in planning. She continued doing the only thing she could, pouring more energy into their resonance, and prayed.

As the creature's attention locked on them, face construed and holding more eyes than Justice felt like counting, even though only three of them were even usable, a loud roar burst from it's curved mouth, running up from where one eye was supposed to be and down to the proper end of a normal mouth on the other side. The sound hurt xir ears, but xe ignored it, working to dodge as one meaty arm swung at them from the side. Leaping away, Justice tried to close in on the beast, but even with it's slow speed, the sheer force of it's movements was throwing xir off, and it managed to strike xir side dead-on, at one point, flinding xir against the decaying building they'd come around.

JUSTICE! Claire cried out in worry, their resonance hiccuping as Justice slammed into the side of the building. Justice, Don't do anything crazy! She begged, not only out of a personal desire to survive, but because she didn't want her meister to get unreasonable hurt.

The meister let out a cough, ribs screaming in rebelling pain; xe'd probably need to stay at the infirmary for a time, after all of this was over. Looking up at the creature, xe tucked and rolled, moving away with Claire as the beast moved to strike them again. Glaring, xe folded Claire against xir side, taking the opening to run at it. Ducking, xe worked to slide, hooking it's knee with the scythe blade and pulling with xir full force as xe moved through.

Claire pushed the resonance to its peak at that moment, her blade glowing even brighter as Justice pulled it against the leg of the kishin, working to sever muscle and bone. The creature howled out in pain as the white-hot blade removed its leg, sending it crashing to the ground with a very noticeable thud.

Justice didn't give pause, immediately whirling from xir position once cleared. Altering the position of the weapon, xe charged, slicing the tip of the scythe blade into the neck, just below the base of the skull. Using every ounce of strength xe could muster, the meister pulled the scythe blade down along the spine, hoping to do enough damage to destroy the kishin egg, once and for all.

Claire strained their connection to its highest tier, the resonance blade growing more and more intense and melting through the meaty flesh of the kishin's neck. The creature writhed for but a moment before its entire form burst into a swirling black mass, which then exploded inward. For a moment, there was nothing in the void, and then a bright red soul appeared in its place. Claire shifted back to her human form, ignoring the soul and holding onto Justice, on the off chance she collapsed.