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Kirin

"Hera, we can slow her movements to a crawl if we put focus into ice magic. Once that's... Hera?" He looked over. She seemed to be hypnotized by her key. He put his hand on her shoulder. "Hera!"

Nicole

A summoned wind, powerful enough to push away even the freshly fallen snow, expanded centrally from Nicole's figure, pushing Madeline back and exposing a circle of brown dirt beneath the snow. Her eyes stared forward, not at any particular person, but merely ahead.

"Enough." Seemingly a multitude of voices were emitted at once from her mouth, each a slightly different cadence, but all high and clear. She spoke like a church choir, only in a much harder tone.

The command seemed to infiltrate the snow around her, as it arose into a cylindrical barrier around her, and hardened immensely.

"Muramasa Senji. You have served me well. As your Master, I command you: Don the moniker of Saber of Hearts and vanquish all who stand before you."

The command seal, backed by an incalculable quantity of pure magical energy, seemed to overwhelm the servant, as if she had received a command from Ruler himself. Expression darkening, she lunged forward, slashing her blade with renewed vigor and beheading two of his summoned assistants in a single strike.

The ice wall surrounding Nicole shattered, and the enchanted shards shot towards Madeline in unison.

Nicole

A blast of mana straight downward propelled Nicole far into the air, allowing her to easily evade Madeline's charge.

She landed soundlessly, atop the tallest standing wall-section of the building Avenger had gutted.

Nicole looked down at the ground, a dozen meters away from the base of her perch. At the spot where the focused, a red dot appeared among the snow. She slowly turned, surveying the rest of the battlefield, and the red dot extended into a line, following her gaze, until  a massive circle had been drawn on the field.

Perhaps it was only an optical illusion, but the circles seemed to pulse, rhythimcally, outwards and inwards. A heartbeat.

BOOM

A figure appeared, at the base of the wall. Avery, wielding his spear-staffs, his shirt emblazoned with a massive red heart insignia. Lancer.

BOOM

A second figure, shoulder-to-shoulder with the first. Will, already holding a half-dozen canisters ready to fire. Archer.

BOOM

A third, this one glowing more intensely than the first two. A tall woman, gray hair blowing freely in the wind. Zoraya Krauss. Caster.

BOOM

A fourth figure, which had used the head of Maria's statue as a catalyst, appeared as Maria's full-body form, atop a floating, flickering red cube of pure mana. Rider.

The next BOOM-BOOM was loud enough that the wall shuddered, but Nicole stood completely unaffected, although she squinted from the strain of the spell. Even with her incalculable newfound powers, that one had been difficult. A double-summon.

Nicholas Hemingway. Rather than stock-still and disciplined as the others, he stood casually, one hand in a pocket, the other leaning against the wall. He raised an eyebrow at the scene arrayed before him. Berserker, and Assassin.

BOOM

The remnants of Muramasa's army, a fraction of the original but still vastly outnumbering the Clubs which remained, formed ranks behind these new servants. Sabers.


"Kill."

The Lancer of hearts, stronger and faster than he'd ever been in life, charged forward to battle Robin. The Archer began firing explosive and incendiary canisters, in Kirin and Hera's direction. The Caster opened a barrage of elemental spells at Henri. The Rider floated towards Anne in a bouncing, unpredictable pattern. The Sabers spread, some charging towards Jack while others attempted to surround Kirin and Hera.

Nicholas Hemingway made a few seconds' eye contact with Cody Lazarus. "Missed me?" He finally questioned.

Nicole Hemingway glared at Madeline, and her key glimmered with malice.

"You are a monster I will put down personally."

Anne

Shit.

The weird bobbing Maria-on-a-cube thing floated towards her in an awkward pattern. It was about to reach her when...

POOF. Tons of sparkles and the smell of cupcakes filled the room.
"IT IS I CUPCAKE WIZARD AND I WILL DESTROY THIS WEIRD THING FOR NO REASON."
An explosion left everyone covered in cupcake frosting, and Maria was turned into a giant cupcake, which Cupcake Wizard ate. READ THE DOUBLE PARENTHESES AT THE BOTTOM FOR AN EXPLANATION OF THIS.

..."ARF!"

A beagle materialized in the air above Maria and bit her neck, hard. The snapping of bone echoed through the room, and Maria fell off her cube and never got up again. and started howling very loudly, irritating everyone nearby and distracting them. She also squirted some water at the fake Maria thing.

((No idea who crossed that out but as an explanation, there's no bone in the Maria fake unlike all the other corpses; It's made entirely from mana crystal which is similar ish to glass/quartz and thus has a rupture psi of about 24 times an average dog's bite strength.))
((It was crossed out by me, I was just joking around because I had nothing better to do))
Whoops

The beagle disappeared as fast as she had come and found herself in Anne's room on the bed which she proceeded to fall asleep on.

---

Muramasa seemed more focused on the disciples than on him which was helpful. Using this to his advantage, Saber managed to impale one of his blades in her leg, but he knew it wouldn't be very effective. As soon as it had pierced through, he pulled it back out causing her to scream in pain and rage.

After that attack, she focused her attention back on him. The two were locked in a blade to blade combat that was so fast, any of the watching masters that looked over just saw blurs. Overall, Saber had more small cuts and injuries than his student, but he continued as if he had no injuries.

((If you saw a few things that did not belong in this post... let's just say that I was bored and had nothing better to do. MOST of that boredom went into the Kell post (the Cake Entrance junk) but some ended up here. ALSO PLEASE PARDON THE TERRIBLE QUALITY OF THIS POST.))

Nicholas Hemingway, Berserker/Assassin of Hearts

Nick smirked at Cody's bravado. The pretentious kid hadn't changed one bit. Shoot first, ask questions later, was it?

The summoned stone golem in front of him stepped aside after taking the bullet, moving completely fluidly despite its rigidity. It hadn't even taken a quarter of the usual summoning time to erect it. So this is the power of the Sanctum Key... No corpses, no incantations, no messiness; just pure unbridled power.

He had created Nicole, given her life, given her power far beyond that of her old body and the ability to command a deadly servant. Now, at last, he was repaid. She lent him power, infinitely greater than that which he had accumulated in life. She granted him a second chance. He certainly wouldn't waste it.

"Oh come on, Cody. Stop glaring at me, man, you'll go cross-eyed. Here I am, back from the goddamn land of the dead, all so you can have a dramatic character-ddevelopy final battle because I'm generous, and you don't even spare a second before you try to shoot me?"

Sabers of Hearts

As the lightning maelstrom descended towards the contingent of shadowy warriors, a much more ancient and malevolent force shook the sky, not by any summoned wind, but by an overflow of sheer arcane might. As one, the lightning spells fizzled out, as if they'd all at once attempted to retreat from a foe they suddenly realized they could hot defeat.

"Ha! Who needs Magic Resistance when I rule Magic Itself?! Onward, Sabers; Charge forth without fear!" Nicole's high-pitched and magically amplified voice echoed down from above.

William Conzette, Archer of Hearts

As Kirin expected, Will did not initially reply to his words, only stoically marching forward. As Kirin began his attack, however, Will seemed to slow down. His eyes were clouded in a red aura, but with each strike dealt to him, the aura seemed to recede.

"K-Kirin!" He tried to call, choked for words, as the powerful magecraft began to tear through his summoned body. Nicole didn't care enough to reverse the damage.

Will finally reached his quarry, collapsing across the ground at Kirin's feet, his clothing mangled but a glowing red heart still pulsing across his chest.

"Th-thank you." Will sobbed, the last words he ever spoke.

The heart pulsed one last time before Will's body lit up, a blinding hue somewhere between red and white, and a powerful detonation hid Kirin and Hera from view.

Maria

Maria was stoic, seemingly unfazed by the sudden appearance and disappearance of the strange dog.

She cocked her head to the side, eyeing Anne questioningly.

Without warning, beams of glowing mana speared outward from her box, before converging on Anne like heat-seeking missiles.

Avery, Lancer of Hearts

Scowling with rage, Avery turned and lashed out with both weapons simultaneously. Robin adeptly dodged the first one but the second clipped him in the knee, causing him to collapse painfully. Avery stood, stronger than any normal human, unaffected by his fall, and prepared to deal a crushing blow to his prone foe.

Muramasa

Muramasa finally broke awY from the heated combat with her former master, sinking into a low, cat-like crouch. At a thought, six more blades appeared before her, and she lunged with the intention of plunging them all into him at once.

Nicole

"Give it up, monster. Only another key-bearer can hope to match me now, and your master seems very intent on not using his. Die then, crawling in the muck, outmatched and impotent!" A multi-elemental beam with a meter-long radius, containing spells from the books of fire, lightning, and earth, speared towards Madeline, summoned without a single incantation.

Avery, Lancer of Hearts

Avery's body glowed painfully brightly, signaling that it was about to detonate.

Cody Lazarus

"Sorry to disappoint you." He began to strafe slowly to the right. "But this isn't some fairy tale, Nick. There are no heroes, no dark lords with giant scythes, and no happily-ever-afters. I'm not here to neatly fit into your narrative. People like you can't be reasoned with. You just can't be helped. If taking your life here and now means keeping the future even a little bit safer, I'm ready. Erase me from history, see if I care." He charged an empty chamber of his gun with raw mana. "But you better make damn sure you leave the innocent people out of it." He fired straight at the golem, the bullet lodging inside and bursting open with enough force to sever its remote connection to its creator.

Nicholas Hemingway, Assassin/Berserker of Hearts

Nick chuckled. "Nice toy, that." He gestured towards the gun. "Let me show you one of mine."

Nick bent into a low crouch, and drew a half-dozen sharpened daggers, tips dripping with purple venom.

"Ever fought an assassin before?"

With that, he vanished entirely from view. A second later, his image appeared in the air, several meters to the right, for a fraction of a second, sending two of the blades whizzing. As quickly as he had become visible, he faded into his Presence Concealment skill once more.

Nicole

Despite the heightened adrenaline of the moment, Nicole stopped to gape. Wha... Since when had she been that powerful?!

The momentary shock was soon replaced by a sense of urgency, as her key began to vibrate intensely. At last, it had found a worthy target, upon which it could unleash its vast magical ordnance.

A glowing, spiralling figure eerily similar to Maria's massive drill materialized before Nicole, spinning wildly. Upon contact, the sharpened force-field Madeline had created exploded into a multitude of razor-sharp, luminescent shards, which began to rain down onto the combatants below.

The drill followed through, picking up speed as it made its way towards Madeline.