VFX FINAL: Poppy "Popinjay" Jeremiah VS Va'Ul

Discussion in 'Roleplaying Forum' started by Wolfsbane, Nov 30, 2009.

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  1. The_Bob

    The_Bob Administrator Staff Member

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    The sword slapped the cloaked monk with bone shattering strength, much to popinjay's surprise. Instantly the surface it touched turned into a stripe of blue flame, consuming the creature, exposing ribs and shoulder blades.

    Simultaneously the window below the flight of stairs and the door to the roof were blown open, the heavy hatch crushing the flaming cultist. At one end of the landing appeared Va'Ul, axe spinning, on the other dropped three SWAT point men, weapons ready.

    More cultists flashed past the windows, climbing on the roof to intercept the rest of the SWAT team. The inside of the White House was now overwhelmed by them, even though there was no open battle - just short bursts of gunfire ending in a thud of one body, throat slit, falling on the floor.
     
  2. Xiao_Caity

    Xiao_Caity New Member

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    "You're fucking kidding me..." Poppy pants, the strain of the last half-hour starting to show a little. She's wild-eyed and stained with blood, quite a bit of it her own. She glances back at the SWAT team, then meets Va'ul's eyes... visor... whatever...

    "Let's handle this distraction, no?" She doesn't wait for an answer, she just adjusts her grip on the sword so she can hold it one-handed, tucking her injured arm close to her body as she screams a wild battle cry in the language of the demons, launching herself at the nearest SWAT member.

    The man reflexively fires, and she deflects the bullets with the sword, not even slowing down. Then she is amongst the closest of the poor fools, dancing amongst them with the blade swinging in great lethal curves like some twisted dance partner. Blood splashes around in great artistic arcs as she commits violence that Quentin Tarantino would have given his soul to catch on film.
     
  3. The_Bob

    The_Bob Administrator Staff Member

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    Va'Ul grabs the axe and watches as Popinjay slowly falls under the sword's influence, falling into berserker rage. He follows her as she lept to the roof in search of more victims, observing as the blade pushes her body to the limits. Slaying armored policemen and cloaked cultists, nothing was able to stop her as she dodged bullets and parried melee attacks. Assaulting her mind, the daemon trapped within the sword eventually unleashed her powers. Va'Ul barely managed to jump off the roof as a giant conflagration consumed the better part of the building.

    The force of the explosion downed most of the nearby helicopters and shattered windows in the entire city block. The giant was thrown far across the lawn, tumbling to a stop where the fountain once stood.

    Once the sky darkened again, the sword wielding daemon appeared from the cloud of smoke, shocked, suspended from the weapon embedded in one of the few concrete pillars that survived the explosion, dangling close to red hot support rods sticking out of the remains. The outstretched hand was now covered up to the elbow with runes similar to the ones on the blade, the grip unnaturally tightly locked on the weapon.
     
  4. Xiao_Caity

    Xiao_Caity New Member

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    Poppy looks at her arm, almost detached, not entirely sure of where the rage is coming from but aware that it is almost calming in its purity. She can't really feel her hand any more, engulfed in the runes as it is.

    Until the daemon tries to push into the core of Popinjay that is still the bloodthirstly little hellspawn that created death and destruction wherever it went - pointed, defined, tightly-controlled, vicious and very, very territorial. This is the part of Poppy that is demon, that carries her power to pop and the flames and everything else that her tainted blood gives her.

    She screams as her inner demon and the blade daemon clash, warring across her mindscape for dominance and possession. Fire flickers around her body, at first a thin flicker of flame but rapidly, very rapidly growing stronger and greater until she disappears in a roiling column of flame that gives off such intense heat that the column holding the sword blackens and cracks under the strain.

    The twisted, melted remnants of the blade rocket out of the fire, landing at Va'ul's feet. The flames dissipate, and there is no sign of the tiefling... yet.
     
  5. The_Bob

    The_Bob Administrator Staff Member

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    The sword lay in the bloodied earth, seething, melting the sand underneath while dissipating the heat. Tiny flickers at first, the runes started recreating themselves on the blade, its shape slowly returning. It was still quite useless as a weapon however, the demon within exhausted by the struggle.

    Va'Ul took it and sheathed it on his back.

    He walked cautiously to the White House, to inspect the work of the cultists.

    Even though it's only been minutes, the inside of the building, or what was left of it, was partially transformed into a temple. The walls were painted with blood, dread runes inscribed between blood splats. People hung by their feet, some still half alive, cultists inscribing symbols around them. Sacrifices. They were working on summoning something powerful. The sun has set many hours early.
     
  6. Xiao_Caity

    Xiao_Caity New Member

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    "Give me that," Poppy snaps, snatching a cup from the hand of a bystander, but she recoils when she gets a whiff of the contents. "It's not even midday!" she says incredulously, shoving the cup back at him.

    She manages to liberate some coffee from one of the film crews by turning on her aura and glaring until they give in. The caffiene provides her with a boost and she rips the sleeve off her uninjured arm, turning it into an impromptu sling for her wounded arm. Fighting with one arm out of commission would be hard, but not impossible.

    She can almost taste the magical energy in the air, the changes in the atmosphere. The encroaching darkness is merely a side effect of what is happening. She laughs darkly and leans against the fence in front of the White House, waiting to see what dirty trick he'll come up with next.
     
  7. The_Bob

    The_Bob Administrator Staff Member

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    In only few more minutes, the capital building was shrouded in light fog, earth around it slowly shifting like a pot of thick soup ready to overflow. Despite all of the chaos that just barely come to a stop, the air was filled with silent tension, the noises of scrambling military units and police crews noticeably muffled by the energy overflowing from the rituals. Chants in a long lost tongue echoed across the air, ancient rhymes that universally struck fear into uninitiated individuals.

    The only crew that dared to come close after the explosion transmitted images of cultists appearing from the fog, heading into the building, among them a group of high priests carrying ceremonial staves instead of knives, walking with the same unnatural haste as the rest of the gathering. Almost everyone who failed to escape the building was turned into a sacrifice by now, branded by runes binding them to different demons the ceremony called for.

    Va'Ul stood in front of the building, unmoving, waiting. The walls started to crack as the ground shifted suddenly, sending minor tremors across the city. It was like a pulse now, from deep under ground, growing faster, stronger. At some point one of the sewer cover near Popinjay's camp slid aside. A curious set of frog eyes popped out, inspecting the gathering.

    Oh how cute !

    Va'Ul turned around and entered the crumbling building. As he crossed the doorstep, all of the doors and windows and other holes in the building closed as if the walls were alive and healing. The White House residence was now sealed off, to the despair of some unlucky monks that didn't make it. They slit their throats as fast at they could.

    Before anyone managed to curse or scream in terror, a column of demonic scum erupted from the sewer entrence, something that repeated in other places across the city, spreading gradually from the white house. Common fallout for a summoning of this scale. The array of weak demons ranged from ones that could be described as cute to blood freezing hybrids of man and beast, turned inside out, with lots of extra horns sticking out of inadequate places. They started to feast.
     
  8. Xiao_Caity

    Xiao_Caity New Member

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    "Well, fuck a duck," Poppy murmurs, blinking as a demonic duck waddles past her feet. "Oh, ew! Grandfather, how could you? It's a duck! I... oh HELLS! Mental images!"

    Most of the newly summoned demons either ignored her or sniffed at her before moving on, acknowledging one of their own. Apparently her opponent had yet to realise her own taint - that was good. She could probably use that to her advantage.

    She walks confidently through the mists, stopping only to growl at a couple of the twisted hybrids that were considering taking a bite anyway. A swift fire-fuelled punch to the nose of the nearest one soon put paid to that. They submitted to her superior taint, and turned their attention to far less dangerous targets. She saunters up to the newly-sealed White House and smiles.

    "Now, if I were a less messed up person, I'd just wait out here and see what happens. But that would be boring. No, I have something a little more entertaining in mind."

    She almost caresses the soul gem still hanging from her neck, its power now available to her with the spell-sucking blade no longer able to affect its environment, if only for a little while. With a little smile, she pops to the other side of the wall.
     
  9. The_Bob

    The_Bob Administrator Staff Member

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    As the little demon popped inside the transformed building, all noises went quiet. Demons stopped and the tremors ceased, silence echoing across the city in anticipation of what was to come. Without any warning, the building collapsed, imploded, as if sucked in from below, leaving only a pile of crushed rubble where it stood.

    A few seconds later, just as unexpectedly, a powerful wave circled from the building, shattering the earth as it went. The nearby buildings gave in, slowly crumbling as their foundations shattered. Water sprayed from broken streets, flames burst from beneath as gas pipes raptured and ignited. The chaos and destruction traveled outward as the building in the center split in two, powerful red light shining from underneath.

    Circular cracks appeared around the remains of the White House as it separated from the surrounding ground, becoming an island on a sea of escaping energy. It sunk slowly, floating left and right, eventually split by another wave of energy from below.

    A huge portal was opened, sucking in further rings of earth until it reached the rubble of the neighboring buildings. At that point it stabilized and the earthquake subsided. A major area of the city was now covered in rubble and darkness of a moonless night. Only the red glow of the portal provided light, shadows traveling across the city as things crawled from within.

    Darkness. That's what Popinjay found inside of the building. Silence and disorientation, with no sense of direction. For a while she was suspended in nothingness, just long enough for the felling of being tricked into a trap to sink in. Then the trip was over and her senses returned.

    She was in hell.

    The lakes of lava, rivers overflowing with tormented souls, barren plains and shattered grounds welcomed her as she appeared many meters above the surface, entering a free fall. There was a great commotion, demonic overseers barely managing to control their slaves. Everything and everyone tried to escape, a barrage of demons passing Popinjay on her way in.

    Parts of the White House were scattered all over the place, bodies and debris littering the plains. It sparked great curiosity among the locals, adding to the commotion. The president somehow survived all of this and was being transported in a battered limousine, secret service agents blazing away with machine guns at the approaching demons, the driver fighting his own war with the GPS.

    Va'Ul stood on a cliff overlooking a huge cauldron filled with tortured souls, observing as a crane was extracting a cage tightly packed with the unlucky ones chosen to experience true suffering. By having the axe drop into his hand he let his adversary know he sensed her.
     
  10. Xiao_Caity

    Xiao_Caity New Member

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    "You know, if I wanted to come home for the holidays, I could have organised my own transport," she quips. "If my grandfather or father catch us, you're going to be in real trouble, you know. They're very protective."

    She flicks her wrist, and a couple of blades shoot up into her waiting hand. She tosses one at Va'ul almost casually, and the second goes for the ground at his feet. Her injured hand is clenched tightly against her chest.
     
  11. The_Bob

    The_Bob Administrator Staff Member

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    Va'Ul tried to parry the knife with his axe but it managed to evade his weapon, correcting course for the head. He stopped it by letting it pierce his left palm, fingers twisting unnaturally as it went half way through.

    He tossed the knife back at her, almost ignorantly, letting his attention be dominated by the raising cage.

    Whips cracked and dozens of slaves stopped powering the ancient machinery, the cage now near the edge of the cliff. Va'Ul stepped closer and punched through one of the bars, immersing his left hand in the tumbling mass of spirits. He the one he was looking for, some others making a break for it when he removed the hand. They were caught soon enough.

    He tossed the spirit to the ground. It started regaining shape, growing. It needed time.

    Va'Ul turned to charge his opponent again, axe spinning.
     
  12. Xiao_Caity

    Xiao_Caity New Member

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    She'd forgotten how her talents seemed to be stronger and more focussed here, and she was almost as surprised as Va'Ul when her knife changed course. However, she wasn't going to miss any chance to take advantage of circumstances. She batted her knife away almost casually, and it spun into the abyss below.

    Poppy ignored the shifting spirit for the time being and instead focussed on the charging metal behemoth. He was pretty fast for a big guy in armour, but there was a limit. She, on the other hand, was a hellspawn in hell itself, and her reflexes, already sharp, became simply obscene here in the very seat of her power.

    She dodged around his strikes, tossing daggers at the ground as she moved. They were forming a vague circle in her wake, and the hand of her wounded arm started to spark a little, almost as if she was holding a sparking circuit against her chest.
     
  13. The_Bob

    The_Bob Administrator Staff Member

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    Va'Ul stopped, armored boots plowing the stomped ground, and looked at the pattern of knives around him. A trap ! It was too far in each direction to escape and the spell was almost ready. Instantly he unsheathed the bent up sword and thrust it in the ground, all in a flick of an eye. The battered weapon lit up as it started to feed on the spell, shaking as it's inner demon frenzied in lust for revenge.
     
  14. Xiao_Caity

    Xiao_Caity New Member

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    She'd forgotten about the daemon in the sword in her embrace of the power of hell, but this wasn't necessarily a bad thing. Its powers would also be enhanced by its presence here, and she wondered just how much power it could take.

    She gripped the soul gem as tightly as she could and drew as much power from it as she handle, and lightning crackled around her, leaping from her hand to the nearest dagger and spreading across the circle, the daemon blade acting as an extra focus, splintering the lightning into a vicious grid of power. She kept pouring energy from the soul gem into the spell, seeing which would fail first...

    The daemon's appetite, the soul of the chaos mage, or the blade that held the daemon fast.
     
  15. The_Bob

    The_Bob Administrator Staff Member

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    Va'Ul fell to the ground, dodging lightning bolts, but ultimately it was useless, his armor catching sparks and turning into another node in the web of lightning. The armor vibrated as the power surged through, slowly reaching the point pieces started falling off, metal splinters annihilated not far from where they came off.

    Just as the monster was about to burst, a large crack forming across the chest, the power started to fail. The runes across the blade flickered and exploded with blinding light. It started to consume all of the energy, extinguishing the flames on the daggers and setting the giant free.

    Va'Ul dropped to the ground, his right arm crumbling at the elbow, and with usual haste recovered, leaping just beyond the area of the effect.

    The spellbraker sword was now hovering above ground, sucking in all of the power focused on the area. It even denied the daggers their share, pulling the beam to it's blade. And it pulled, creating a blinding beam of energy directly attached to the soul gem, scorching the ground between. The soul gem cracked.

    The blade thrust itself back into the ground, restored and engulfed in blinding white flames, burning many meters high. Va'Ul dodged as the ground beneath him cracked, the void traveling far enough to crumble one of the demon lord castles barely viable on the red horizon. The sword grew an eye, just above the guard, cracks traveling from it, down across the blade.

    It attacked Va'Ul, cursing him in demon tongue, scarring the axe blade as the giant parried the attacks.
     
  16. Xiao_Caity

    Xiao_Caity New Member

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    Poppy swore when the soul gem cracked, sending shards of now inert crystal into her hand. She was definitely going to need a medic soon if she wanted to keep use of it. Today was, all told, a pretty shitty day.

    That was when she realised that maybe, just maybe, she'd made a very big mistake by powering up the daemon blade. Sure, it was focused on Va'Ul right now, but how long would that last now it seemed to be fully awake? Demons were notoriously capricious - daemons were a hell of a lot worse.

    Tempting though it was to leave her opponent to the inevitable consequences of carrying a daemon around as a weapon, there was no guarantee it wouldn't come for her next, and they had an annoying habit of being able to follow their targets across dimensions.

    Gritting her teeth, she pulled out one of her longer, stronger knives and joined the fray, attacking the blade from the opposite side to the metal giant.
     
  17. Dark Elf

    Dark Elf Administrator Staff Member

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    Screaming with the agony of hell and beyond, one of the tortured souls escapes the cage, darts through the air with demonic speed and snatches the knife from the sorceress!
     
  18. Xiao_Caity

    Xiao_Caity New Member

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    "What the FUCK?"

    She flips backwards away from the daemon blade and the spirit holding her knife, easing one of her less lethal blades free and shifting into a defensive stance, eyes darting back and forth between the knife-wielding spirit and the sword.

    "I really don't need this right now," she mutters, realising that there's something strangely familiar about the spirit...
     
  19. The_Bob

    The_Bob Administrator Staff Member

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    The sword was getting faster and more powerful with every attack ! The strikes that missed often split the ground, creating chasms reaching many kilometers, the ones that hit tossed the giant around like a rag doll. The creature inside no longer resorted to cursing, now it growled and roared with every move. Combined with the repeating series of cracks as it exceeded the speed of sound, the battle made for a very noisy event.

    It was also quite destructive, as Va'Ul was now forced to jump around on a patchwork of islands that remained of the nearby ground. Lava lakes were ruined, many ancient machines fell into the void below. There were civilian casualties as well, the weaker creatures simply falling into oblivion as ground opened beneath their feet, more powerful ones torn apart by the blade when they tried to interfere.

    Va'Ul was now forced to defend himself, the blade dominating him with it's incredible speed and power.

    Dark shadows gathered above the ruins of the destroyed castle, a powerful roar echoing across the plain announcing a visit.
     
  20. Dark Elf

    Dark Elf Administrator Staff Member

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    Suddenly, there was a change in the sky, evident to anyone who bothered to look. Slowly at first, the firmament darkened to an impenetrable darkness, only disturbed by a sickly patchwork of glowing crimson, writhing like the cadaveric spasms of fallen angels.

    The shadows gathered in legions to witness the carnage, their whispers of insanity growing to a frenzied cacophony that was felt rather than heard.

    Abruptly, the voices were stilled by the migthy sound of a wicked clarion, and men turned into gibbering fools as the Lords of Hell gathered around to watch the battle unfold.
     
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