revenance_rpg | (no subject)

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(no subject)

Who: Edge. Anyone else should join in!
What: The ninja explores the dream world and encounters Nightmares.
Where: Traverse Town.
When: Evening.
Warnings: Swordplay! Ninjutsu! Flirtations!

In a back street in Traverse Town, one man fought a swarm of Nightmares.

The strange Moogle people had given him a communicator -- not technology he was unfamiliar with, thanks to a lifetime in proximity to the Tower of Babil. Clearly, these worlds had other people out there he could communicate with. But he wasn't prepared to poke his head up just yet. He had no idea what the situation was, who could be trusted, or why he had been brought here, and none of these facts really supported a "barge in and scream hello" approach, even for a ninja as competent (and handsome) as he.

He had kept to the shadows of Traverse Town, slipping down the streets like the trained ninja he was, but so rarely actually got the chance to be. Admittedly, he'd had no idea what he was looking for, so he'd been hoping it was a "know it when you see it" sort of deal.

What he'd found was several Komory Bats and a couple of Pricklemanes. Now the ninja stood in their midst, a Hebby Repp clinging to his back as it sought its own way to help. Edge paid it no mind, watching the Nightmares with cold determination, ready to meet their attack.

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Sora did not have the abilities on his own to detect a well-trained ninja. Then again, the only ninja he knew was not as good as she thought she was, even though that wasn't really her fault given that her home world had fallen to darkness and anyone she would have learned from had not been available. And anyway, Sora was not aware yet that there even was a ninja in town.

Sora's Spirits, on the other hand, did have the means to detect a well-trained ninja. However, at the moment they were responding more to the presence of Nightmares. Bruce had perked up at something first and squeaked in alarm, a sound he pretty much never made unless he sensed Nightmares ~~or Sora chucked him out the window for waking him in the middle of the night~~. The cat (Sora wanted to name him Figaro, but he didn't seem to like the name) had simply followed the bat when he took off. Sora followed his Spirits, mildly annoyed because he wasn't actually planning to tangle with any Nightmares unless they attacked him directly. He changed his mind about scolding his Spirits for running off when he saw the newcomer staring down the pack of Nightmares.

Whether said newcomer wanted help or not, he was getting it. Sora wasn't the type to just hang back and watch. His Spirits got there first, Bruce swooping in to get the Nightmare bats' attention while the cat pounced a random Pricklemane, provoking it to chase him back towards Sora where it was taken out with a quick combo. He was going to have to have a talk with the cat sometime about his 'tactics' and how they really weren't all that helpful, but now was not the time...

"All right, you monsters, eat ninjutwhoa!"

On the verge of annihilating them all with his awesome power, Edge instead recoiled in surprise as a bunch of friendly monsters showed up to attack his foes.

"This just got weirdly complicated." He watched the fray with a faintly lost expression, not sure which one of these creatures he could safely attack at this point. The only one he was sure about was the lizard one still clinging to him.

A bat made his decision easy by swooping in for a bite; Edge dispatched it with a distracted slash of his swords. "Am... Am I supposed to befriends these or something?"

"The white bat and the cowardly cat are mine if you must know," Sora called to the newcomer as he properly entered the fray. He really did need to work with Lucifer some on his tactics, such as they were. At least the cat was getting the Nightmares' attention with his bad attitude. It made him a good decoy, but it was likely to get him killed eventually.

But it was a matter for another time. There were some Nightmares to fight.

"All right, then..." Edge turned his attention to the nearest group of Nightmares that didn't have an ally in their midst. He made a few quick motions of his fingers, then gestured at them dramatically. Forked bolts of jagged lightning split the air around them, racing through the Spirits and rendering them to Figments.

"Monster attacks common around here? Or am I just lucky?"

The lightning spell interrupted any remarks Sora might have had. It wasn't really a familiar spell but he knew, courtesy of Yuffie, that some ninjas had their own brand of magic.

The question about about monster attacks put his thought process back on track and he swatted another bat out of the air before answering, "No, they're common. The lucky part is that there's no bears in this bunch."

"Bears are bad, huh? I've fought worse than this... what's their story?" He talked as he struck with his blades, easily enough; these didn't require his full attention. "Corrupted normal creatures? Spawn of an evil tower?"

"The bears are the strongest Nightmares wandering around this area." Talking and fighting wasn't that hard for Sora either, under these circumstances. "Dream Eaters are naturally found in the dream world. The Spirits are the friendly ones that help us and the Nightmares are the hostile ones trying to kill us."

A Pricklemane got a taste of Sora's golf swing and took a flight into a nearby wall. Sora followed up with a small Fire spell to finish it off before it could get its bearings.

"Right, but, where do they come from? Or is this a literal thing about Nightmares in dreams?"

He slashed through the next one, and the Hebby Repp on his back knocked away its upper half with what almost looked like a grin.

"Also, what's with the blade-and-magic combination? That's a bit unusual." Said the ninja, but that didn't make it less true.

"It's kind of a literal thing. Dream Eaters actually do eat dreams. Nightmares eat good dreams and attack people in the dreaming worlds, Spirits eat bad dreams and protect people in the dreaming worlds."

The question about his tactics was a new one. No one had ever really asked him about mixing in magic and melee before. He cut down another bat and checked how many Nightmares they had left before answering.

"I guess it is a little uncommon. Magic is useful, but I am bit better with the blade. Magic is still kind of new for me." Which was very true. He'd only started learning to use magic a bit over year ago.

"I'd been wondering how a 'Dream Eater' could be a good guy," he said, glancing over his shoulder at his own companion. "That makes sense, though. Hope you won't starve if I'm not the sort who has nightmares, though," he added cheerfully.

"Now that's weird. Never heard of anyone who picked up both, and especially not at the same time. Of course, most black mages stick to just the magic, generally."

"They can eat other stuff too. Regular food and the treats that the Nightmares drop."

Sora wasn't entirely certain that his Spirits were not sneaking off at night to go Nightmare hunting on their own.

"Yeah, I've noticed. I don't actually know a whole lot of people who use both."

"Not back home, either. Of course, we're ninja, we're the elite, but outside of that it's a rare thing indeed."

He glanced at his Hebby Repp again. "So, treats, huh? What's good out of this pile you like, anyway?" He held up the handful of stuff he'd scooped up for the Dream Eater to sort through, while he turned back to Sora. "They're not like summons, are they?"

Ienzo had headed out; his conversation with North had made him realize he really had been staying in too much lately. He paused when he noticed the person surrounded by dream eaters; it looked like the man might need some help. He seemed to be new as well, so Ienzo stood at a distance to call to him. "Hello. Do you require assistance?"

"If people can just wander around offering to help other people against these things, probably not," Edge said with a cocky grin that only communicated through the lines of his eyes. "You guys normally have monster problems, or am I just lucky?"

He made a few swift motions with his fingers, then gestured at the largest clump of Nightmares. Flames raced along the ground towards them, blasting upwards in a torrent that engulfed the spirits, leaving only Figments behind.

"They're a common occurrence here," Ienzo said. It looked like the man had decent elemental spells at least. "Though I don't know if the moogle informed you that this place isn't really home to any of us." Aside from the moogles, and that was an oddity that Ienzo preferred not to examine too closely.

"World of dreams, right? Except clearly not my dreams. No offense, but you're not what I normally see when I close my eyes at night."

Compared to the monsters of the Lunar Subterrane, these Nightmares aren't much. His flashing swords dispatched the majority of them swiftly as he banters, while the helpful Hebby Repp on his back swatted away a bat that had circled around.

"Unfortunately this is the nature of the world here, it seems." Ienzo shrugged at the latter part of the statement; whether the new person found him attractive or not was immaterial.

"That was more a question." He slid the twin swords back into their sheaths, then bend to gather up the Figments curiously. "I bet those creatures didn't tell me everything. What's the story here?"

"This is the realm of sleep. Thus far everyone's goal has been to wake up; we don't know how we got here, as generally coming to the realm of sleep should be an act of will." Ienzo crossed his arms. "It seems as if one or more entities are taking an interest in what we're doing here, but the messages they've offered so far have been cryptic to the point of being totally unhelpful."

"Ah ha. Entities. Now we're into something new. Messages?" Edge glanced around, as if expecting some sort of sentence to appear in great flaming letters at the very mention.

"The first one mocked us for still being present in this world, or so it seemed. The second seems to be a voice trying to get a message across; the voice is tied to an object and subsequently another object has appeared. It seems as if the voice may need help." Ienzo waved a hand. "In addition to these, people begin having dreams along certain things. There's clearly something we need to do, but we don't know if doing so is for good or ill."

"Sounds like too much worrying to me," Edge said, waving one hand in cocky dismissal of consequences. "You do it, and if it turns out bad, you fix it. Since the other option sounds like doing nothing, and that never got anyone anywhere."

Ienzo tends to be a bit more wary, given his experiences. Edge reminds him a bit of Sora, and look where that got Sora. Though Sora also got out of it, he supposed. "It seems to be the case. It's better to have the hints than have nothing, at any rate."

"Exactly! Being completely stuck would be the worst thing. It's not an adventure unless there's something to do!"

Edge was cheering up rapidly; this whole adventure was working out to be a lot better than sitting on the throne trying to keep things together.

"I'm sure there will be ample opportunity to find out; the clues have been slow to show themselves thus far." Ienzo hummed thoughtfully. "A different perspective might help."

"Just when this was starting to sound like fun. So besides fighting Nightmares and waiting for clues to show up, there's no hurry?" How disappointing! There had better be a bar and some cute girls around...

"Well, you're free to try to find things on your own, of course." It was possible they'd missed something, despite the population being fairly large.

"I'll keep an eye out, but the way you say it, the clues are being fed to us slowly, right? Probably there's not much we're allowed to see till the time's right... whenever that is."

"One never knows if things will change," Ienzo admitted. Though the pattern seemed to be holding thus far.

"Things change when something makes them change! Maybe that's something we don't know, but maybe that's us." Edge thrust out a hand in a way that made his cape flare out melodramatically. "I look forward to figuring it out!"

Oh wonderful, another one of this sort. One thing Ienzo hadn't missed at all was Xemnas's grandstanding. "That's a good attitude."

Whoa, hey, there's a world of difference! Edge is a cape-flipper, not a giant-cow-milker!

"I've always thought so. Anything I ought to know about the place? Good or bad."

Somehow it looks the same from this angle.

"The moogles can usually get more or less anything you need, but you have to pay quite a bit if it's rare."

"That's... good to now." He nodded abstractly, caught by the phrase 'anything you need'. "Am I getting the right impression, that there's more technology here?"

The device the Moogles had given him, he'd tucked into a pouch -- suspicious, because technology had an alarming history back home.

"Yes. Some of the people who have arrived here come from worlds with little to no magic, and they have advanced technological equipment. Most of the technology you'll find here is a combination of machinery and magic, however." Ienzo still found machinery's working without magic to be quite an interesting thought.

"...That's strange. Though with some of the machines I've met, I was never sure how to tell the difference anyway." Any sufficiently advanced technology, after all...

"It's difficult to differentiate at times, I admit. Generally speaking you have to ask the makers, if they are available." Hopefully North or one of the others from his world could explain things someday.

"Are they?" His voice has a certain note that only experience with technology intended to inflict genocide on humanity can really inspire.

"The moogles seem to run most of the technology here and I believe they consider it trade secrets. Obviously you can ask."

"The moogles, huh."

With some effort, he released his deathgrip on the hilt of his swords, flexing his hands to work the stiffness out of them. "I suppose if they weren't all right you'd have had some sign of it by now."

"One hopes, but assumptions can be the death of you. At any rate, I have never known moogles to have interests outside of their own crafting and businesses in this particular universe." Ienzo shrugged slightly. "It would be very strange for them to take a side."

"The Lunarias were a lot more open about their intentions. Or the evil faction, anyway," he said, finger tapping on the hilt of Masamune.

"We can only hope that eventually the power keeping us here will be as clear." Ienzo paused. "I you are well enough on your own, I hope you'll excuse me; I must be on my way."

"Hey, thanks for the talk!" Edge grinned, though it was only visible in the way his eyes wrinkled. "Good to know I don't need to worry about the people here TOO much."

"One hopes," Ienzo said, smiling faintly. He took himself off; he did have places to be.

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