The Last Poster Wins! [v8]

[Sir Sivelos]

Keep it up, and you'll damage your thumb. Or finger. Whichever...

[The Nonexistent Tazz]

*You reach the top of the mountain. You see a door leading into the top of the Glowing Fortress, probably the keep of the Mountain King. You see a five-foot-six tall man with much resemblance to a rat, as well as a Deoxys that WAS presumably his...WAS, as they're both dead. Being Elder Souls, they're not coming back. Also, Bloodhound standing atop them with a cocky grin on his face.*

Bloodhound:...Before you even think about it, they were dead when I got here...But...I realized you idiots would go into the dungeon because you're obsessed with your freaking loot that much-

Lillith-Tazz: L00T!! IT IS CALLED L00T! GET IT RIGHT!

Bloodhound:-and thus I just sat here. Waiting for easy prey, because I know that fancy machine wouldn't work to distinct I from you.

...Now!

*Firemen teleport in en-masse. This isn't part of the Dungeon, so yeah. Also, a second Elder Soul-a girl who looks a lot like a Zoroark. Alternatively, an adult-age Iris with stealth gear and a tiger claw. At least all of your abilities are now in-play.*

Bloodhound: Though I do not find their methods...Appealing...*Glances at the other Elder Soul*...Eh, it tips the scales and helps clean out the most hideous scum in existence.

Storm: *looks at the female Elder Soul, then to Bloodhound, in absolute disgust*...That is absolutely abominable...You should be put lower than the man we're defending for it. And I know full-well who we're dealing with here. Do you think there's any way we can...Reverse that? *Points at the female Elder Soul, who's eyes look quite empty and distant.*

Lillith-Tazz: If we subdue her, yes...

Bloodhound: That you even dare claim to defend him and know who you deal with at the same time is proof of your arrogance. But, I hate talking. Always did. I'm a general at heart, and that means that I have faced countless enemies...I hate no special enemy bar one: The Dark Soul. And I will not rest peacefully until his life is extinguished! ATTACK!

Lillith-Tazz: *Summons Dark Aura clones* Pretty cheesy.

Rin-Tazz: *Same as Lillith-Tazz* Yeah, made of cheese.

Storm: That man is unreasonable...*Ready*

*Meanwhile, Ecrivain's group leaves the defensive tower to head to the main castle. The courtyard's defenses are pretty solid, though...The first gate has no lock nor key.*

Etna-Tazz: That just means we blow it up. It's made of lilypads...

*And that is not at all counting the guards who are going to attempt to kill you. They also attempted to dump hot oil on you in true medieval siege style, but they sprung this trap on Ecrivain, rendering it useless due to his intangibility.*

Etna-Tazz: Pandora, you can handle the gate, right?

Pandora: *Sighs before she starts destroying the gate with Arbitarian Energy*

*The rest of your party has to defend her. It would be...Hideously bad if she died.*

[Ganyu]

*looks at the hot oil pooling around my "feet"*

Hey free loot!

*manipulates the hot oil to form a moat around the party*

*summons three wrights in addition to guard against any aerial offense*

[The Nonexistent Tazz]

*Mercifully, flying frogs don't exist, but those Wrights pull their weight pretty good. On the hot oil moat, however, because frogs hop, they just jump over. Well, what few frogs manage to get past you initially, anyways. Also, anyone stupid enough to dive into the moat dies very fast-a weakness to fire is quite evident.*

*Pandora is 1/10th of the way done!*

[Ganyu]

*rips open a portal to suck in any frogs that had safely bypassed the moat*

*proceeds to start up Chrono Code: Double Alter. The overall speed of all party members will be doubled in 11 minutes*

[Sir Sivelos]

'Sup Matchstick. *SIVELOS gives murderous glare towards Bloodhound*

[The Nonexistent Tazz]

'Sup Matchstick. *SIVELOS gives murderous glare towards Bloodhound*

Bloodhound: Good day to you too, ashpile! *He rushes at your face and nearly throws you off the mountain with a punch. Keep in mind, being thrown off of the mountain is kind of negligible, because there's no bottomless abyss below you, and you can fly.*

Female Elder Soul: *She's somehow gotten behind you and slams you forwards to Bloodhound*

*The duo initiate a really brutal zero-to-death WOMBO COMBO, ending with Bloodhound attempting to give you the knee that ended Zhu. Oh, the poor fate, to be given the Captain Falcon Knee! You can also see that the Firemen and Blackfire are also attacking almost all at once, unleashing a fiery armageddon on the rest that seems far too fast for their likes.*

Storm: NOT ON MY WATCH! RAIN EPOCH!

*Time seems to have frozen, your mind is racing at a far faster pace than usual-nowhere near enough as fast as Temporal Marathon, but you can't really spam that trick and you didn't do this. You recall the Elder Souls saying something about an 'Epoch' before...*

Storm: I don't have time to really explain this now, just get ready!

//Water or Ice Affinity Attacks Grant more Logspace in Rain Epoch
Rain Epoch{
.....ActionLog-SirSivelos[Fly9999UP;Fly9999DOWN>*Bloodhound;MachTornado9999, BladeRush9999,WindSoulSlashXXXX>*Bloodhound];
.....ActionLog-LillithTazz[Blizzard9999^9>Firemen]
.....ActionLog-RinTazz[Sweetzard9999^6>Firemen]
.....ActionLog-*Storm[Calypso Blade>Firemen^9, 40DGAN]
}

ActionLogs=Valid
Exectue? Yes
Executing Phase 1

*You really did not just get what you just saw, and you are very aware you didn't see all of it at once-there were more on the generic troops-but you know what's going to happen next. Kind of.*

*Your body kind of feels like its on autopilot, but that's a good thing as first, you spread your wings and at breakneck speeds, fly up, then down at the air-suspended Bloodhound, who is unable to react due to his midair position not offering that luxury. You then do your strongest Mach Tornado, catching him in a frenzy of spinning sword strikes in midair, and comboing into another, more generic but equally brutal rush of stabs, ending in you collecting all your available power over the winds (and considering that elecritc attacks fall under wind magic, you have a lot) and attacking Bloodhound in a singular slash, unleashing it all. All of that in the space of about a second. Bloodhound lands, very wounded but alive, on another floating mountain nearby, and teleports out of sight.*

*You turn aruond and see Tazz and company, equally confused but equally victorious-not a single Fireman is standing, with a coat of ice and mint (mostly ice) covering the area, and the Firemen brutally slashed up with icy blades. You could probably take those corpses and study up on those guys and their armor...On another note, Light Chaos is holding 'Blackfox', who, though not unconscious, is definitely restrained.*

*Whatever the hell that was, it was awesome. Temporal Marathon didn't let you use anything other than (a lot of) basic attacks, but whatever just happened let you combo into five.*

Storm: Sorry about the lack of a warning, but if Bloodhound continued that, well, we'd be royally screwed...Plus, he was using it himself. I don't know who he is, but mastering the Epoch is not a common thing...And it's not easily taught.

*Lillith-Tazz instinctively punches out Blackfox before she can inevitably break loose of Light Chaos'es grip. The corpses of the Elder Soul and his Deoxys are also kind of mysterious.*

*Meanwhile, the frogs which bypass the moat that didn't get sucked in by the portals take aim at Pandora. They're lousy aims but they have WAY more Dakka than you.*

*Pandora is 20% Done!*

[Sir Sivelos]

I seriously hate Bloodhound. And was that your Epoch project?

[The Nonexistent Tazz]

Storm: Our epoch project is to give you that power...Kind of. You see, that crazy trick Blackfox and Bloodhound did was probably done chaining multiple Epoches together-mostly Blackfox, though. Hopefully mostly Blackfox. Anyways, where we come from, me, Teal, Gear, Blackfox, and several others, have undergone training to unlock and unleash the full possible power of the Epoch, which is essentially thinking out a plan then acting on it REALLY fast, and making everyone of your allies ALSO think and act really fast in accordance with that plan. It's kind of comlicated.

Lillith-Tazz: and how did this training work?

Storm: It requires powers in a form that, as of right now, does not exist. So, we're making a facsimilie with the fragments of the Ring of Knolwedge. The result would be considerably weaker; unlike us, who can indefinitely chain Epoch, you'd only get exactly one use of the power in before you'd have to, erm, break from thinking that hard that fast. As the accelerated thought is powered by psionics, keeping such thought going beyond one iteration- is bad without the training, and the training itself typically takes years. This is easy to trick if you get someone else to activate their Epoch, of course...

Lillith-Tazz: That would take, like, billions of posts to even convey years...so, how far have you guys come?

Storm: Um...We're closing in on a definitive solution.

Lillith-Tazz: Excellent!

*Rin-Tazz inspects the Deoxys and the dead Elder Soul. Nothing of interest comes up. You don't know who he was in any way.*

Lillith-Tazz: It's quite a bummer that he died...Ah well, we can de-brainwash-

*Blackfox teleports away in the same fashion that Bloodhound did*

Lillith-Tazz:...Or not...

Rin-Tazz: Boo! There was no point in coming here at all!

Storm:...Maybe...Oh f***, maybe this isn't the only trap?!

Lillith-Tazz: No, it can't be. This is the one unlucky spot. I mean, we got here first for certain. How could they do that? Let's just get out of here...

*Meanwhile, in the Massive Fireplace, after a brutal sticking of Bulbasaur...*

TNTazz: You are?

???: You are?

TNTazz: YOU TALK FIRST!!

???: NO, YOU!!! YOU TALK FIRST!!! *Sets himself on fire*

Sita-Tazz:...Dude, you're on fire.

??? I NOTICE!!!!!!!!!

Ominous: *KO's the mystery man with a quick LV. 9999 MEGA Kick* I think we can explain everything later...

TNTazz: Yeah, let's just get out of here, one of my other selves got caught in a trap, and there isn't one here, so I have a bad feeling about the Lilypad castle...

Ominous: Please tell me you're others are safe now?

Sita-Tazz: Yep. Safe.

Flonne-Tazz: The ones at the Lilypad Castle haven't breached the castle itself yet, either...Best head over there ASAP.

[Sir Sivelos]

Light Chaos: This Epoch power of yours is quite interesting... I'll have to look into it.

So, uh... Are we done here? Anything else left to do, or what?