GTB I. Imported from live Gaia guild archive.
Saphen [Saphen] vs. Alchert Midward [Psychofish]
Match Ends: Next Monday 9 PM Central
A hallway with a rose-designed red carpet along the middle. Gold statues situated this esteemed estate. This is where the fighters start, yet there's an entire mansion they can explore which is three floors tall, and contains many other hallways and rooms.
Ready?
FIGHT!
Faces watched from every angle, frozen in mid breath, tensed and awaiting the show which was about to begin. Faces frozen forever.
Statues and paintings lined the hall, persons whose names would likely never be known nor cared about by anyone somehow watching, nor the two to clash within. Yet those statues stood silently in testament of just how grand a place it was they were scheduled to royally fuck up, gold eyes and faces of noble men and beautiful women timelessly watching. Not watching anything. Simply watching.
And so was the great carpeted marble floor lined, statues down the grand hall. Desolate.
Any persons who might not have been cleared out by the tournament officials were apparantly gone for some other reason, and all waited in absolute stillness.
There was plenty of space to get lost, and who knew where either contestant would come to. But there was the main hall, of course. The big, wide one, that fed straight in from the main door. Through some large ball or dinning room, no doubt. Into more hall. More big rooms. And finally into a long hall going straight until it ended at a wall graced with a particularly massive painting. Down this hall, statues stood in gold of men bold men whom had once stood, be it in life or imagination, and now forever would, cast with sword stood in hand upon the earth. Beautiful gold models of some men or other.
Yet at the end of the hall, one statue stood that was not in gold. In fact, it was made of some sort of awfully funky shit, green-ish brown and crusty and dried out. Perhaps a clay left out too long. After all, the statues probably weren't all gold through and through. Maybe they'd been shaped of this beneath. But in anycase, the statue standing before the painting was unique of the ones used simply to line the hallway. Far, far larger than any statue made on scale to its human counterpart. A larger model to end the hall? Not carved down small yet? It held a human shape, and the familiar sword in hand, similairly barely shaped and far too large.
And in silence like all the rest, the ugly statue stood in untiring wait.
Saphen's entrances were often amazing but only to those who were locked in their homes since their birth and have never seen the extraordinary.
Each step he took was mindful and absent all at the same time as he stepped into the main hall. There were no apparent weapons on his body but all who fight in these battle know not to assume anything upon a person but rather be ever watchful of the potential weapons they might be holding in their arsenal.
Taking interest in the scenery he followed the hall staring at the cryptic faces of people who never existed, frozen in moments that never happened. To assume that Saphen's mind was in the wrong place at the wrong time would be exactly that...an assumption. Careful study of his surroundings meant understanding of where he would be fighting.
Tapping the floor for a second he sighed with a smile, marble was such a beautiful floor design how he wished to have it in his own home some day. Lifting his gaze and fixing his beloved black hat he stared at the end of the hall. The cloak he wore bore no movement for there was no wind to summon it to life. The metal gauntlets which covered his hands were subdued in the pale light of the room and only darkened more by the black armored chest plate which adorned his body. With more of a careful study one might find a small pendant, a dragon wrapped around a blue marble resting against the hard metal.
This "Statue" was no statue at all but rather his opponent for the evening. Saphen only stood a minuscule 5'5 (well 5'4 and a half but he would never admit it) and his opponent who seemed motionless was apparently much larger.
Keeping a careful distance (15 feet) from his opponent he tipped his hat and spoke "I am Saphen your opponent for the time being, I do hope our battle will be an enjoyable event. Shall we begin before valediction is chosen by another?"
It would have been the perfect commedic effection if some loud mouth brawler of an opponent had stepped out at the end of the hall behind Saphen as he spoke to the object and started with the jipes. Of course, it could also have been a trap, to lure him in so the foe could take him unawares just so.
The case as it were, however, would be that Saphen assumed almost rightly.
No face shown, no clear details, nothing but the shape, and for a moment, none of it stirred, not a sound.
And then there was. A sound, as it were, a sharp sniffing, a serious of sounds, from somewhere within the mass, muffled almost beyond hearing. For a moment afterward there was silence.
And with the same lack of preamble the previous sound had come with, there was a low, long groan as the head and shoulders of the nearly nine foot tall object leaned forward as if bowing.
And the right foot lifted, placing itself ahead of the other, cracking off where it had attached to the ground and leaving remnants of the crusty green-brown stuff that made it. Lumbering forward, that first step covered a lot of distance, slow and clumsy as it was. The second was a little less so, as the left leg pulled around the object stuck into the ground, arms coming off from its top, all likewise leaving trace. Yet it didn't seem to be getting smaller.
If anything, its surface seemed to slowly swirl, gradually grow larger as the texture shifted and folded to expand but maintain shape.
And that's all. It advanced mainfully slowly with no sound but that of its own motion, slowly growing less awkward in its motions even as it grew larger and thicker.
Saphen took slow steps back watching his...or rather he hoped the opponent he would be facing. It could be a moving object which the opponent could control or something of that nature but Saphen could only assume what he could see. The being was tall and lumbering, made little to no sound and moved like a Neanderthal. Taking that into account Saphen guessed that his opponent was more of the primal kind, probably using wild attacks and brute force to reach this far but to beat out intelligent opponents only meant one thing...this was strength almost beyond comprehension.
All of this processed in only a few seconds as Saphen continued taking steps back defensively watching the lumbering object move forward. Saphen considered options carefully, when you provoke an animal it goes into a wild state. The crazier they get often times the stronger they become so it might be best to use a more cautious attack. Watching each step carefully he calculated when the next step would be. As the assumed beast took his next step (with the right foot) the marble that his foot touched cracked easily the stone underneath it was apparently cracked as well as a small fissure was present beneath the floor.
As deep as the fissure was it would have brought his entire leg in up to his knee (do to the tall height) which was enough of a distraction to make some sort of offensive. Several other marble slabs cracked but flew up in jagged spikes aiming for soft areas of his body (neck, eyes, face, and the groin.) but this was more of a test then anything else.
To determine exactly how strong it's body was Saphen had to test it. But if one took closer note they might notice some type of dust surrounding Saphen's body. Marble dust to be exact as each step Saphen took back a thin layer of marble was being shaved off the top of the floor floating around him for at the moment no reason at all.
The mass was picking up grace as it went, but even so, it was on the sloppy end. And so, though the footfall slowed for a moment as it came down on the effected part of the floor, as though noticing the lack integrity, curious or uncertain. But it plunged through just the same.
And as Saphen acted quick to mystically yank up portions of the floor and fling them at the golem of sorts, it began to snarl, another sound muffled. And the mass that made up its body began to rapidly grow, rapidly building into a domed head instead of a structure where the head was a clear part in and of itself. The arms, the shoulders- they expanded rapidly as well, taking off in a great burst of growth.
With all that mass, and the creature bent forward in front of his left leg as his right wenth through the ground, it might be difficult to notice for the moment that the even growth had been sacrificed for the expediency in specific locations.
There was no dodging. No blocking. Both massive mitten like hands, well large enough to engulf a normal man's head and neck and growing, slammed to the earth as the stone slabs flew at the stuff.
Everywhere they struck, they'd make violent sounds as the cracked and shattered nearly as much as the green-brown mass they struck into. And were rapidly enveloped.
He wouldn't have time to watch this or try anything further with them though.
Because right around the moment they resolved, the beast pulled forward, slowly for about a second as the leg came much of the way clear of the floor.
And then flung itself forward, limbs tucking in, and rolling head over heel like a great boulder down the hall upon Saphen.
Saphen watched in horror as the massive being raised it's hands to slam the ground. As the stone slabs flew at Saphen he raised his hand quickly his fingers moving in weird configurations. The pieces of earth, jagged edges of marble, even the now powered pieces of stone from impact seemed to move away from Saphen like the opposite poles of a magnet would push away from each other. They passed in all directions or merely hit an invisible wall and fell to the ground. To the trained eye one might believe that Saphen has control over the element of earth. But at the moment Saphen did not have time to ponder whether the beast understood or not.
Thats right kids our hero has to pull an Indiana Jones and fast! The boulder, enforced with flesh, bone, and muscle came crushing down the hall leaving Saphen little options left. Saphen quickly raised a hand and what first appeared to be a stone obelisk shot out of the ground upward but in mere seconds smoothed out into what appeared to be a ramp starting from the ground and gradually changing direction to the roof.
Saphen was quickly backtracking as he continued to make the ramp, words were uttered by muffled by the sounds of a monstrous sphere rolling towards him. The logic was simple and only from past experiences (and maybe some street fighter) he had seen an attack like this before. If you make the ramp too steep the beast merely barrels right through it. Make it too long and the sphere loses momentum and they have time to unroll and react. The ramp it self was about ten feet long and Saphen could only hope this was enough of a middle ground to make the attack or rather counter attack work.
In theory he would go up the ramp and slam into the next floor hopefully causing some damage. Saphen continued to back peddle down the large hall watching both the roof and in front of him considering his next move...with dire caution.
The ball hit the ramp with enough speed for it to go flying up into the air, and meet not violently, but still with a loud thud and more of the material encompassing it breaking off.
What would make a violent crash was an arm swinging out and slamming through the cieling in rapid response to the lesser impact. Hooking the hand through the cieling into what was above, it twisted, redirecting weight, swinging backward, and kicked it's feet up through the ceiling, pulling itself up and through, and scrambling out of sight.
Onto the next floor.
For a few seconds, it'd be near silent, as the beast waited up above, surely still growing gradually.
And then the roof came down.
Not the roof actually, but the cieling further down the hall toward where Saphen was retreating would begin to crumble, steel beams and stone and wood and everything else holding the cieling in place would begin to fall into his floor, blocking further retreat. The ruckus continued as something demolished one side of the floor where it met the wall below, as if neatly cutting out the shape of the hall below in the ceiling above.
In fact, as it would continue to do this until it met the hole it had previosly come through and connected this line of destruction to it, and continued to cause small chunks and bits of the ceiling collapse from above as it started onto the other side, it became apparant it had every intention of continuing to remove the support for that section of hall until all of what remained of the ceiling and floor right above toppled down.
Saphen could certainly interrupt as, while the beast was making rapid progress punching and dragging massive fists through, bending beams and smashing stone, it wasn't a particularly quick thing it was doing. Even if he returned to where the beast had initially stood to take refuge before it toppled the rest of the cieling to block passage further that way or came up to the second floor, or somehow else escaped, it'd continue smashing.
It was going to bring the ceiling down, and for whatever reason, it was very set on this.
Saphen had assumed right, the entire reason he was back pedaling was to try and get a view of the hall if the beast came through by breaking the roof...but wait Saphen was not entirely right. Assuming the beast would come smashing through the roof at him was wrong instead the beast was smashing the roof down to fall on top of him but his defense was similar...just needed some tweaking...quick tweaking...
Looking up he could only guess that the beast was right above due to the cracking sound and the powder of the ceiling that came down before the roof would. Taking what would only be a lucky reaction his body was suddenly launched across the room. It was an awkward sort of flight it seemed like his chest was pulling the rest of his body. Could Saphen fly? Wrong! but he could control metal, which was what he was wearing... a metal chest piece.
As his new found speed launched him at the ramp he raised his hand and cracked the ramp in half allowing him passage through. Landing with a slight skid moving his eyesight towards the hole his opponent made he quickly made a rash decision.
If he wanted to bring the ceiling down Saphen would be happy to oblige. Raising his hand in a gripping motion he gripped the air and pulled his arm down in a vertical motion with one word of command. Suddenly the first metal beam in front of the hole (that is Saphen is looking up at the hole and the one past that closer to your character) suddenly fell breaking what was left of the ramp. Repeating this over and over the metal beams began to fall each making its own chorus of destruction as it slammed into the marble floor...a pity for such beautiful artwork.
As each beam came down a scraping sound could be heard as the metal was drawn to crawling towards Saphen at a slow and steady pace. Keeping an ever watchful eye on the falling ceiling Saphen hoped that with out the supports the next place where the beast slammed down would send him down to the first floor again...where he hoped his next idea might be effective.
The peice much cut out, and the supports removed, Alchert in his great shell would come down along with the cieling and floor of the second story immediately above.
Saphen's method would, though, help make it less of a massive plate of stone and other materials falling, and more of an avalanche of things breaking aparat without proper support structuer, and collapsing in.
And with it all falling together, the beast, came down. Having grown larger and larger while up there, the legs had caught up, into massive columns, but it's upper body still dwarfed the lower in an odd gorilla like manner. The beast itself was gaining on fifteen feet in height.
And as the fall began it tucked the upper body down, arms bent out and curled down, legs drawn up. Just before and into it striking the lower floor along with the wreckage accompanying it, it would fling it's arms up and torso striaght, legs kicking out straight and together. Into a position like a man would assume diving into water feet first.
And crashed through the flooring into the basement, or whatever empty area of supports would be below the mansion's first floor, broken bits of marble flooring and shattered off peices of the shell encompassing the body flying out in each direction. The entire flooring wouldn't come down. But with what was above collapsing down, and the great hole in the floor where it struck before anything settled...
...it would turn into a great sinkhole, slowly growing larger as it was forced open, more plunging down after and pulling the edges larger.
It wouldn't take long for the beast to get up and start wrecking the floor above him in and effort to climb back up, bringing down more ruin.
Watching the beast fall Saphen eyes looked concerned as beads of nervous sweat trailed down his cheek. There were no...for lack of better words yelps in that descent. The absence of pain was more of a concern than one might imagine. Even as the monster (though it may not be evil as the word is often assumed) crashed through the first floor Saphen listened and heard nothing. Something was terribly wrong with this situation and deep down Saphen knew that. The thought crept up his neck like a plague cursing every inch it took on the battlefield of his mind.
What can I do... The metal beams continued to crawl towards Saphen screeching as they sang their cryptic song, he only had 5 support beams but he could get more. Standing on one of the beams it lifted off the ground along with the other four. The others began to bend and shape themselves into a metal sphere (5 foot diameter). Saphen flew up on his beam along with the metal sphere through the area that the hole his opponent broke through first and up to the second floor use to be.
Away from the crumbling and unfortunate first floor he began to rip the rest of the support beams out of the second floor which was half gone anyways (though some where in his mind he felt bad for destroying such beautiful architecture). Each beam flexed and formed to the sphere making it larger which each that would connect with it. The sphere it self was smoothing out and weird scraping sounds could be heard within it. The cryptic song was now wails of challenge as they warped to their summoner's wishes.
Saphen's eyes watched below him as he continued to work out a plan, calculating odds, considering techniques, wondering about weaknesses...ever mindful that his opponent would soon take boredom from being alone and return to find a playmate.
This time, Saphen's fear from when the mass had gone above him would ring more true.
A massive hand, grown big enough to engulf most of the man's body, cracked and broke up from the floor beneath his feet, seeking to do just that- grasp him tight.
If he was in it's grip, he'd get pulled down, and smushed against the floor beside him, away from the hole, so as to be sturdy enough that it'd support the creature's weight as it pulled itself back up.
And even if he did get away from the quick grab, even still, it'd pull itself back up with that hand, pushing the flooring aside and forcing its way.
The floor wasn't gone- but it was less than completely sturdy, and there were of course, two large holes in it.
The hand moved with rapid pace and would surely be a shocking experience if he did not act quickly. Being only human Saphen's had to use other abilities to sense the presence of movement. That being loud crashing sounds coming from below him (well it was a hint anyways) that something was coming at him and it was most likely a good time to move.
Saphen launched him self backwards using his chest plate as his personal passport out of hell. The air whistled past his ears as his dark blue hair fluttered slightly in front of him but his hat never moved. Unfortunately he did not predict the wall behind him and crashed into it with a decent amount of force but it was partially absorbed by his armor.
Before this occurred Saphen tried to launch some kind of counter attack. As he flew through the air he still had his metal sphere (now about 8 feet in diameter) at his control whirling his right hand in desperation to the left as the hand would have gripped the metal beam he was standing on the object now known as a cannon ball barreled forward aiming for the hand that tried to assault him. If it made contact it would sing it's melodic echo of victory possibly breaking bone, causing cuts, hopefully do something!
Quickly recovering from the slight shock of hitting the wall behind him marble dust that was now everywhere began to surround the air around his body once more as he watched to see if his attack had any sort of effect. Calculations continued to race through his mind as he considered the new information given to him...it was growing larger than he expected...then what opponent's had expected before him but he did not plan to join them.
The ball struck the hand with a boom-
-and an ear splitting crunch. Thanks to its solidity, the mass of steel would come off without scars to show for it's victory over the hand. Large plates and chunks, layers and shards of a hard, shell like material flew in every direction, making nasty shrapnel for the little man as soon as impact occured. The walls and floor only showed superficial damage where they struck them, but stone walls had a bit of an advantage over a man, even armored. Pieces the size of fingernail clippings wouldn't be much of a problem unless they struck exposed flesh. The chunks the size of fists or bigger would pack a bit more of a punch though.
Even so, the Beast didn't stop.
The hand was splintered down to a fraction of the size it had grown to, but even still, the half that was left was pretty big. Slapping down on the ground beside where it had gone in ne'er a care, it dragged the body up as the cannon ball lodged itself into a wall somewhere. As far as what had come off, there was no bone, flesh, or blood, which was to tell Saphen pretty clearly- the living shell was growing, but if there was anything inside, it was not.
Pulling the dome of shoulders and head up through, the other arm snapped up, pressing to one side as the thing twisted its upper body to face Saphen, bracing against the ground with each arm.
And here the man was going to be caught before he had time to regroup again. See, as much as it was evident the cannon ball had done its duty, taking off a good half of the hand, it hadn't paused the creature in pulling itself up as more growing gradually made the left hand look whole again and started into filling out the mit like features. He'd had a pause hitting the wall, with his body if not his mind- one that his attack hadn't caused.
And so, when the legs promptly kicked up together, supported by the creature's arms spread out in a bracing across the first story floor, he wouldn't have much a chance as the floor exploded upward from underneath him with a bit less warning, launching him and bits of the floor and wall he was on up into the air, past whatever cieling was no longer there. And just maybe, if he was good dead 'n center of the hit, into the cieling of the floor above that.
Saphen only had time to hear the crashing of the wood below him before he was kicked. While Saphen could take a blow he could not handle many of these or he would surely be killed in the process. Since Saphen was floating in the air when he bounced off the wall his chest was slightly forward and that is exactly what got kicked (I am assuming with the large feet you arent going to have any problem slamming me in the mid section and since this is all happening at once the body tends to lean forward after bouncing off of something straight on with the back.) Through the ceiling he went through but his cloak was acting weird.
Annoyed at the sudden movement the cloak stretched out slightly into a arch protecting his back as he flew. How on earth (ironic) was this possible? The blue pendant around his neck glowed for a moment as the cloak took some of the blow but it only helped prevent his back from cracking in half. Opening his eyes after his body floated in the air, slowing down just barely before the second ceiling his hand suddenly raised to return the favor.
Wait wait wait... that still does not explain how the cloak is alive. Well lets get back to that for a moment shall we?
The cloak it self was metal of Mythril, a nice sturdy metal but how did it dance with out Saphen's permission? To put it simply Saphen is a schizophrenic. Residing in his body during battle is an earth spirit which he can release into an object if he wishes privacy (a gem usually the best catalyst.) but it allows for a second opinion during battles.
We need the sphere! Saphen thought but the spirit was already working on it. One of the few reasons why as a human Saphen was able to make it this far was due to the nature of multiple thoughts reacting to his body. While he was being kicked the metal sphere hit the wall but dislodged it self shortly after Saphen flew through the ceiling. The sphere suddenly opened in the middle into a big gaping mouth of metal teeth flinging it self at what he assumed to be the head (between the shoulders) it would clamp on to the area and push down sinking large jutting spikes and once it had a grip it would pull back forcing the beast to follow it's head where ever it went.
Saphen on the other hand was moving his hand clearing stone dust from the air to react if the beast followed ready to dodge but breathing heavily from the blow.
Alchert was a simple creature, large or small as he became- and as the ball struck and more of the carapace shattered off and the golem like mass he had become stumbled in its rising from the blow, his reaction was hardly that. The growth of the shell was increased overtop of the head and shoulders as the spikes sunk in, putting more distance between the steel ball and the vulnerable bits.
And beyond that... it was ignored.
Instead, the golem quickly grabbed what remained of the wall to the second floor beside itself, ruined by slamming into it, and removing of the second floor's actual floor over head, too, of course. Just slightly taller than where it would have been, it sunk it's hands in and stomped into the wall, climbing up roughly to the second floor, which seemed to just barely support its weight.
The golem didn't really seem capable of jumping. It hadn't done so to get to that floor, and the body build of it just really did not seem appropriate for such motion.
Yet that couldn't be thought to stop it. Sure, it was probably tall enough to lean way out and swat at him. But that wasn't in its character. The blow Saphen took, obviously, would have been outright monstrous. Of course, massive as the golem was, anything it did could be expected to be so. The saving graces were probably the slight- important that the "slight" be noted- clumsiness of its motions and the long acceleration time for any motion. It was by no means slow, as many people assumed of anything powerful. Rarely was anything strong while being slow. However, due to sheer mass it took a little more time to gain the speed, though a massive force output reduced that so it didn't seem to be in slow motion. Had that force been great enough, it could have been every bit as agile as him, minus that any arc of its body would be so much larger.
But that was a little too much in depth. The other point to be noted was the area of the strike. Big as it was, it could hardly hit just a part of his body- chances were, it'd strike most or all of him any time it struck. Which was good in that, had that same force been concentrated into the area of human fist, it would have positively annihilated whatever is struck. Bad, of course, in that evading a larger objects was more difficult, and it'd be laying the hurt over most of him with its blows.
That typical anime pause where fighter and narrator analyze the forces in motion mid battle done, time could resume.
It didn't jump.
Rather, legs pumping as the arms moved in dual flinging sort of a motion, already down on the forced corner and causing more wreckage with the force, it projected itself in something that required a much different sort of verb.
It pounced.
The arms came up quickly enough, spreading to either side to grasp at Saphen if he moved aside and wasn't simply smashed into the cieling above him by the large steel ball now serving as a sort of a battering ram's head for the beast.
It had no doubt despite everything and anything, and didn't intend to allow him that luxury either. Not to survive taking it, at the least. The chances to stop and think were growing shorter, and soon Saphen would probably be forced to think solely as he acted.
But "what does not kill you, makes you stronger", said some man who obviously was not an amputee.
The hands would extend intent on grasping Saphen as the metal ball once his weapon might very well become his demise. But Saphen had other intentions than death by irony. If dodging left and right would not work he would go head on. The beast attacked and Saphen's eyes narrowed back in retaliation, intent on surviving, intent on defeating, and intent on ending the battle in due time.
Launching him self downward the air whistled past his ears as he waved his right hand in a swiping motion downward. The metal ball that grasped Alchert's head would suddenly fly forward into the wall allowing Saphen to past Alchert moving down his back unharmed. With the decent speed he went he should be able to past him with out complication as the beast's thought process might not be able to comprehend what hit him. (though it was an assumption.)
While Saphen was falling back to the first floor he turned his body around twisting his right hand like one would open a jar. The metal ball attached to his opponent would begin to grip harder and turn counter clockwise in an attempt to break flesh and bone. Never being one to want to kill his opponent Saphen had little to reason with and even worst little time to reason his own survival.
We need to pierce the beast the spirit mentioned but Saphen already knew such things. Sweat beaded down his face as he watched for signs of pain or reaction, his body would slow as it reached the floor that the beast had dropped into to begin with. Everything seem slowed and almost tranquil at this moment. The whistling of the wind, the floating of dust in the air, the fluttering of his hair, and falling pieces of wood dancing in what little wind there was as they descended to the ground. All this music would hopefully be shattered by the bellows of pain and the yelps of agony. All concepts he hoped to inflict with his new tactic...hopefully.