netherworld_academy | A little Bird sings her Feelings to the world...

Hmmm. Yeah, the minimum blast radius is kinda large on this thing. And I wouldn't want to try and takeoff indoors-my flight spell is a rocket pack made from other spells, so it has a tendency to hurt people that get too close.

[Mir drops her fake school uniform in favor of her stripper armor-clearly made from some sort of graphine-composite material, but with strategic cut outs that point arrows at her body. It's somewhere between a bikini and a plugsuit.]

Right. [Damn this girl was fixed up]. Let's go.

[Of course, even Mindy, who is far from a flagrant pervert, has to at least take a moment to appreciate the suit and shake her head.

Whoever her boyfriend was, he was lucky.]

Good idea.

[Fortuneately, because demons are lazy and the school is big, there are 'branch line' dimension gates all over the place. Through one and out through another, then up three flights of stairs puts them within sight at least of a nearby blasted wasteland.]

That'll do, don't you think?

[Mir closes her eyes and begins to sing-this one takes a while to warm up and the magic circle under her feet expands only slowly, a few inches a second at most. Unlike other ones Mindy might have seen, this looks more like an osciliscope, waves vibrating furiously within it in strange patterns.]

Yeah, that's fine. I guess I should get used to weird things that are awesome.

[Look under her feet at the expanding spell circle. it looked really awesome to begin with, but she was more fascinated by what was going to come out of it.]

[Mir took her sweet time building it up-but the circle just kept growing, swelling outward with a kind of patient inevitability, new patterns becoming evident in it's form, until it was nearly ten meters wide.

Then it collapses around Mir, snakes up her arm and she points at the tower of rock she selected as her target, sending it on it's way. A beat. Nothing.

And then it's like the sky broke open and light poured forth, a dazzling array of beams leaping out, as though there were another sun in the sky and it wanted to destroy part of the earth. It lasts for about five seconds before it ends-and when it does, the hill is a crater.]

[Mindy watched, shaking her head].

Man, I could have died. Did you want spare change that bad?

I was threatening people with a wooden sword. Not with the magic that made intercontinental ballistic missiles obsolete. I have some sense of proportion.

Why did you start with a wooden sword anyway? It's sort of a waste of time isn't it?

You have to understand, it's all about image. I'm cultivating the appearance of a very specific kind of bad girl, just like all my other outfits. I can also be a combat maid with submachine guns, but the guns are fake, or I can wear a swimsuit, even though I can't swim. The specific kind of teenage delinquent I was emulating had an affinity for that weapon.

Of course, by calling me out as unskilled with it, you issued an unspoken challenge to 'put up' as it is said. I had to go to my strengths after that.

So you're out to fool people into think you're a lot weaker than you actually are? Huh. I get that, actually: I mean, I miss it sometimes, but I get why you do it.

[She shrugged]. Honestly, even if you shook me down, I have no money. People would try to take it if I carry it I figure, so I don't walk around with it. I just really wanted the fight. I've been pretty bored.

Not so much faking them out as 'this is something that it is fun to pretend to be.' I'm trying to look on the positive side, this is the first spate of formal education I've ever had.

And seriously, no pocket change at all? As a mugger, I would be tempted to beat you up even more for wasting my time. Seriously though if you want a fight, I will let you tear into my robots anytime.

Yeah, its never fun the first time.

Well what did you expect? I'm in a world full of demons where you can do whatever messed up thing you want. You think I'd just carry my money around like a target?

Hey, don't go knocking state-run education, it's kinda a rarity back home for me.

As if they will know that your pockets are empty? It is more important around here to be respected, or failing that, feared. And if you can't come by such things legitimately...fake it. Be like a lizard or an insect that adopts the manner of a toxic look-alike. Act like someone who is beaten up for lunch money, and they'll come after you every day. Act like one of the bullies yourself, and you'll pass right through them. Confidence is key.

They have there ups and downs.

Dude, trust me, I would have come at you fist to fist if you hadn't mentioned you could actually erase my jacket. It's important to me. But no one is stupid enough to start shit, and likewise I'm not dumb enough to just let myself lose stuff I need. Hell, I didn't even know I would GET my money, since my world was supposed to be destroyed.

Ugh, please, no fist fighting. I'd have had to break out Miros, and even I don't know how much of that is costume and how much is forcing crystals to grow out of my body.

On the world destruction front however, that sounds like an interesting story. Come on, spill the details and I'll give you free grenades. They look like adorable bunnies until you twist their little heads off.

I'm talking about a regular fist fight without crystals and crap! Jeez, everyone is powered up...

Basically, there were these alien fucks whose whole thing was destroying worlds. But people chosen from parts of the world were taken away before it happened, and they had to live with a shitload of other people from other worlds whose worlds were destroyed. Since I was good enough to be saved, well, I figured I had to be the best that I could be. So I learned a little magic, some speed, and even got a mentor. That was actually how I met my girlfriend.

[They could hopefully avoid talking about parents].

Hey, I don't know how to break it to you, but I am not good in close. Like, at all. I almost got killed once by a...well, it was like getting attacked by a housecat. You wouldn't know the specific thing, but it was damn embarrassing. So without crystals jutting out of my body like claws, yeah, I kinda can't fight hand to hand.

Are we talking like entire universes here, or just planets? How many places did they take down, anyways?

Good to note. So I'm going to have to make sure I fight people up close if I have the chance.

Oh, they were definitely aiming for a whole universe, but they were going for planet to planet at the time. We were aiming to eventually destroy them, but...I got brought here, so much for that. Still wish I knew why my cash followed though.

That's what the robots are for. And my boyfriend, when he's available, is much better than them.

Hmmm. Sounds like a serious threat, you should tell me more about them. But I think you've earned that grenade. Swing by room 101 some time, I should be trying to hurry those penguins up and get it done.

I want to know why they sent my son's swords here-those things were left at a memorial in Elmenia, not in my possession. I mean, that's a real puzzler, isn't it?

Sounds nice. My girlfriend's...well, she's a viking. You don't really need to know more than that.

They were, and they weren't the only thing that you had to deal with on that ship. People had troubles adjusting, you know: no day and night, a living ship. It wasn't always pretty.

Heh, thanks. Let me know what I owe you then. Yeah, that is pretty messed up, why would they do that? To mess with you on purpose?

Well, I think I would need to know what a viking is.

Yeah, I can see how that would be a problem. Of course, had that been my world that got toasted, I wouldn't have been rescueable. Must have been a real pressure-cooker.

I can sort of understand their logic. Kind of. It's pretty twisted though.

Oh. Yeah, that makes sense. They're kinda like, pillagers, I guess? They're really boisterousness and loud and will o whatever for a thrill. That just appealed to me, and she's the kind of person that will charge into battle even if she could get fried for it.

Honestly, she should have been killed awhile ago.

Huh, why not?

I don't like the idea of them doing that.

Ahh. Well, that type is usually canon fodder or heroes-it all depends on skill and how the enemy reacts to the crazy running at them screaming. Sounds like you have the later.

I'm a Reyvateil Beta. On the upside, I've got a hundred and twenty years of my life left, and I'll always look this good. On the downside, if I'm cut off from my server for more than about an hour, I die instantly. I've got a built-in kill switch.

She can seem like that, but she's actually pretty damn versatile. I'm the planner usually though.

What do you mean server? When I hear that, I just think of a computer or something.

Ahh, this is where my story gets complex. I am a computer program, for certain values of programs and computers. Magic in my world requires a certain amount of high-technology to work, and I am made of magic. In fact, my body was made by casting the right spells on a tank of special salt water and creating a five-year old me. And when my body was destroyed, I was able to survive for a time inside the equipment that creates my power. A significant portion of my soul is stored on a computer, and if I can't 'dial home' regularly, my body will shut down and dissolve.

The really crazy thing is that this body is realistic enough despite all that to be able to carry a child to term. I'm not sure if the scientists who designed that feature were total creeps or geniuses.

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Sorry, not much to say here!

It's a slow building spell.

Re: It's a slow building spell.

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