The Trouble With Chims - Agonizing Merciless Exile

[XIII]

Keywords: Agonizing Merciless Exile
Area Level: --
Area Type: Dungeon
description: underground dungeon
weather: N/A
Area Mission: Beast Statues.

XIII hated all-underground levels. Agonizing Merciless, Exile. Agonizing is right.

Others praised these areas because of their multiple levels, and increasing difficulty the farther you progressed.
XIII just hated them because they were dark, depressing, boxed in, and boring.
Correction--they were dark, depressing, boxed in, boring, and had doors that required chim spheres.

Nearly half of the rooms she had entered had locked doors that required chim spheres to open them. As a result, she had run out of them very quickly.
And to think, the only reason I'm even in this stupid low level dungeon is for a business meeting. Why the hell couldn't they have us meet at the beginning of the level instead of the end?'

She was now at the point where the only direction she could still go in was down one long, dark hallway, broken by several openings into smaller rooms.
The only problem was that she had been walking down this hallway for a while now.
In fact, XIII had been wandering down the hallway looking for steam switch for a half hour now.

'I am going to kick the crap out of the next chim chim I find. I'm going to kick it so hard it won't know who it's mother is. I'm going to kick it so hard that it'll fly through the wall. I'm going to kick it so hard that my foot will go through it. I'm going to kick it so hard that--'

The sound of movement around the corner abruptly ended her violent train of thought, replacing it instead with a more relaxing, but no less violent train of thought.

'Oh good. Some monsters to kill. This will make me feel much better.

She pressed herself up against the wall of the hallway and slowly poked her head out around the corner. What she saw was so far from what she expected that she nearly squeaked in surprise.

In front of her, packed wall to wall, were hundreds of little chim
chims.

They were running around, bouncing into the wall and each other. Some where even bouncing around on top of other chim chims, like some sort of bouncy crowd surfing.
Even more amazing was that more kept coming.

Against the far wall was a little train track with a switch below it which would release steam from the pipe beside the track. At regular intervals a cart full of chim chims would go across the track. On the wall to her left was a switch that let a chim chim escape from a hole in the wall one at a time.
Both switches were stuck on. The pipe by the chim train track was constantly releasing steam into the air, knocking off all the chim chims that attempted to cross the track. Chim chims were constantly running out of the hole in the wall by the other switch, the switch beside it now glowing a constant green.

'Aha! I get it. It must be some sort of glitch or something. Somehow, nothing is stopping chim chims from spawning here. There must usually be some sort of limit on the number of chim chims that can spawn at one time, and so none of the other switches are creating any. Or maybe for some reason all of the chim chims are just making their way here...Hm... I should probably go report this...'

An absolutely wicked grin crept onto XIII's face

'Or I could let myself have a little fu--no. Therapy first.'

XIII quickly rounded the corner running as fast as she could to the bouncing wall of chim chims and proceeded to kick as many chim chims as quickly and hard as she could. She was now in a bouncing sea of dark blue and white, dotted with bits of yellow.
There were chim sphere collection animations where swirling around her head that it was dizzying, but she didn't stop. She kicked one chim chim so hard that it bounced into another chim chim. Which bounced off of another chim chim. Which bounced back and hit her in the face.

She was falling over before she even realized what had happened. About mid fall she managed to force out a squeak, but it was too late, she knew she was going to hit the ground and be trampled to death by a hundred tiny little bouncy feet. She began to curl up as she squeezed her eyes shut, not wanting to watch her HP drop in such a humiliating way.
Except the landing she was expecting never actually happened. Instead she just bounced.

By the time she cracked one eye open she was falling again, back down toward the bouncy sea of chim chims.
She kept her eyes open to watch as she bounced again, squishing a few chim chims underneath her before rising up into the air again.
She then spread her arms and legs open like a starfish, and proceeded to bounce her way around the room, laughing like a maniac.

Hands down, this beats RL moshpits any day.

Those chim chims unfortunate enough to get hit by her feet still ended up disappearing, but the majority of the chim chims just got squished for a moment, before running around doing...whatever it is chim chims do.
And more were still coming.

Oh man, I never want this to end!

And so she continued for a time, bouncing around as though on a living trampoline.
Eventually though she began to see dark red spots appear out of the corner of her vision.

Aw, crap.

With no way to reach the right herself or reach the ground underneath all of the chim chims, she had no way to dodge the chim assassin, now rapidly dropping toward her.

Aw, crap, crap, crap!

And XIII quickly found herself stuck between a several chim chims, and one giant ninja chim butt.
Apparently the chim assassin had never been in this sort of situation before either, because instead of continuing to crush XIII, it was now bouncing high in the air, the force of it's jumping on XIII only making it bounce even higher.
To XIII's dismay, it gracefully turned in the air, as only a ninja could, and readied it's next attack from high in the air.
Oh, XIII did not want to get stuck under that things butt again. Especially not when it was falling from that height.
XIII tried to think quickly.
From where XIII was lying on her back, still bouncing around the room, chim assassin quickly falling toward her, she did the only thing she could think of: She forcefully shoved her hips downward, which resulted in one poor (or perhaps, lucky?) chim chim getting squished by her bum, which then bounced upwards bringing her legs with it.
When the chim assassin fell, it was right onto her boots. Making it disappear in a swirl of dark red.

XIII would have felt more pride over her victory against the chim assassin, if there wasn't such thing as momentum, which was still carrying her feet in an arch, but not her head and shoulders, resulting in her getting a face full of chim.

'Great, I just kissed a chim chim. I wonder if it will turn into a prince?'

Once her feet had finished their arch through the air she realized that she had somehow left a kiss mark on the chim chim underneath her.

Her feet and legs hit the chim chims underneath her, which only sent them bouncing into the air again.
Now flip-flopping out control across the room, XIII wasn't so sure that she was fond of this particular glitch anymore.
She was definitely sure she wasn't fond of it once her hip slammed painfully into one of the switches that had been left on, taking off a bit of HP.
She curled towards her legs and desperately clawing toward the switch sticking out of the chim sea so that she could right herself again.
Eventually she managed to grab a hold of it and desperately clung to it until wild flip-flopping ceased, replaced by a gentle up-and-down bouncing.
Still holding on to the pole part of the switch that was stickup up, she hit the switch, which cut the flow of chim chims from the wall.
The steam switch knocking chim chims out of the chim cart was still going strong, however, and still dumping chims onto the floor. If she wanted the chim chims to stop spawning here, that was the switch she'd really need to turn off.

XIII readied herself and pushed off from the switch she had been holding on to, trying to control the direction she bounced in so that she would be able to turn off the other switch as well.
Eventually, after bashing into the wall a few times, she even managed to make it to the general area of the second switch. There were just two problems she hadn't taken into account before bouncing her way there. First, the steam switch was on the ground, which was now completely covered by chims.
The second was the height at which she would bounce.

Ohnoohno, not so high--

During her time in this room, XIII had gotten a face full of chim butt, chim face, and now, steam. It hurt. Her HP took another small drop

And why would anyone think that sort of thing was good for your pores?

She tried to grab a hold of the wall to keep from bouncing up as high. It mostly worked, but it meant that she just kept getting bashed up against the wall. It didn't really hurt that much, but her HP couldn't keep it up forever.

'Ah, hell. I've already got a face full of chim butt, how much worse can it get?'

She flipped while bouncing so that she was now face down in a sea of chims. She reached forward with her arms and began to dig around, searching for the next switch. Eventually her digging caused her to go underneath the chim chims, turning the mass of chim chims from a trampoline to some sort of bouncy ball pool.
A bouncy ball pool that was bouncing on her.
It didn't really hurt like she was expecting it to, it was just really hard to move, crawling along the ground with a bajillion chims on top of her, searching for the switch on the ground. Through the bouncing bodies she spotted the green glow of the steam switch a couple of feet away.

This was the longest two feet of her life.

She crawled toward it on her stomach, the weight of the chim chims not allowing her to even rise to her hands and knees. She struggled through the bouncing sea for a few minutes before she made it to the switch. She was just about to pull her arm up to push the switch when the weight of a rare chim forced her head down on top of the switch, making a nice thud through her skull.
Her HP took another hit.
On the up side, the switch was now turned off.

All was now fine and dandy. Except that she was still covered in a sea of chim chims.

[solieus]

Kimimela wanders down a long corridor. Man, this is taking forever! She kicks a rock and it clatters down the hall floor. For the next few minutes, Kim amuses herself with said rock and eventually she gets it to such a speed that she is speeding down the hallway with periodical boots to the rock in an overexaggerated manner. Too bad I can't actually exercise this way, I'd be in shape in weeks! She gave the rock a final kick, sending it careening off the sides of the walls of the corridor.

As the rock settled down on the dungeon floor and the echoes faded, she hears some curious sounds coming from an entranceway ten feet in front of her. Muffled squeaks and the poofing of chim chims came from the room. As she peeks in, she sees the situation in front of her. Oh, boy... She then looks further in, seeing a girl being helplessly engulfed and bounced around by the chims. Oh, jeeze.... I'd better help her. Good thing I've gotten good at chim kicking She thought, then yelled at the girl, “I'm comin' for ya!” and dove in.

She uses her feet and whips out her two fans to wreak maximum havoc to the chims. She finds the best technique was run-kicking, though kind of dorky-looking, for the given momentum was enough that when the kicked chims landed, they also poofed a few around them out of existence as well. Her chim counter was going wild at the edge of her vision, flying into the triple digits. Smiling maniacally, she swept around in a three-sixty creating an opening around her. She looked around. She must have gotten about an eighth of the chims just then. They weren't looking as much like an ocean now, they were more of a calm lake. She calls at the girl in the centre, “Hey there, Are you OK? You can probably stand up, now!” And, pushing her way through the chims, heads towards the girl to help her up. As she got closer, she noticed the intriguing ensemble that was her purple, black and white garments, though drifting in and out of view because of the chims crawling and bouncing over her. She admired her taste, thinking, Wow.. I wish I was that crazy with my clothing style. Maybe I'll get more attention at school if I start making my own clothing, kinda like that stuff looks custom... well, it's a game! Of course it's custom. It's still awesome. She then noticed that the girl's health bar was a bit on the low side, and figured she's better get her outta here before they crush her to death. Oh goodness, Pked by chim chims... not good for anyone's record.. “Hey there, I like your outfit. Want a hand?” Kim said, offering her hand.

[XIII]

This could not possibly get any worse.
She was below half health in a low level area without even running into any monsters, she was trapped under a bunch of chims, and she had no way to move or log out.
This could not get any worse.

"I'm comin' for ya!"

Correction. It just got worse.
If XIII had been able to move her arms, there would have been an audible facepalm right about then.
'Great. Somebody had to come see me. I wonder if it's my client finally come to meet me. Oh, this is so not good for business...' The rest of her inner monolouge, which was filled with thoughts of client homicide, character suicide, and chim chim genocide was accompanied by the sounds of a hundred chim chims bouncing out of existence via foot.
With the number of chim chims thinned, it was now possible for XIII to turn around and get up. For now she just flipped over on to her back, punching a chim chim off of her face, then backhanding another off of her shoulder.

“Hey there, Are you OK? You can probably stand up, now!”

'I could probably happily go jump off a cliff right about now too.' She thought miserably to herself.

As her unwanted savior got closer, she could see that this was definitely not her client. This character was a macabre dancer with clothing that moved around her gracefully as though it could float.
XIII was suddenly near filled with the urge to blow air in her direction and see if her hair and clothing reacted. Professionalism stopped her.

“Hey there, I like your outfit. Want a hand?”
'Oh dear god, I'm being offered help by a low level player, who just saved me from death by chims. I'm going to die.
At least she likes my outfit. Ha, maybe that's why she saved me, couldn't stand to let good fashion die by the hands of chim chims.

"No, I'm fine." While saying this, she finally pushed herself up, knocking off a couple more chims as she did so, and then dusted off her coat with one hand, still holding on to her cane with the other.
Her coat was covered in dozens of tiny footprints.
XIII sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose.
At least they would come off when she zoned.

Now for her next problem: insuring that news of this never reached anyone. She stood and regarded the macabre dancer for a while.
'Probably one of those hero types to just come in and save me without demanding a reward right away. Polite too. Must not have heard of me either. I wonder...

"Hey, uh...thanks. She began. 'I can't believe I just said that,' Her thoughts screamed. She kept her thoughts to herself as she continued, "You've got a much stronger kick than me..." 'Not that that's saying much' "Look, I was wondering if you could keep this little incident on the DL? I...uh...could give you something. A little reward for helping me out and not telling everyone, you know? Your pick."
'Ha! It'll be easy for me to give her something that should impress her, she's a lower level than me. I'm a genius.'

XIII stood and waited for a response, hand on her chim footprint covered hip. Around her chim chims milled aimlessly, bouncing into each other.
Not exactly an impressive picture.
I need to get to the karaoke guild and have a drink or five...

[solieus]

Kimimela withdrew her hand after it being rejected. humph. Though, this girl did thank her and now she was considering the options in front of her. She could agree to cover it up, and take a reward which would at least give her some cash to spend on much needed items. Or she could not take anything and be a good Samaritan. Or, lastly, she could laugh her new acquaintance out of the place, leaving with her a permanent fear that She'd babble to everyone about her embarrassing accident. As much as that malicious idea appealed to her apetite for adventure and power in this, she didn't want to live her life in this game as a bully.

“Well, really, this whole little incident has been enough to keep me amused for some while, so really there's no need to give me further incentive to keep me quiet. Getting mauled by chim chims, I wouldn't want that to be the label stuck to anybody's forehead in this game, grudges and the like aren't exactly lost in a few days.

I am kind of short on cash, but I'd rather train so I can earn the cash myself. Really, I need someone I can party with since though I've been managing by myself I am supposed to be a supporting role. Right now the only one I've been supporting is myself and, quite frankly, it's been a tough road. Half my spells are useless since they're supposed to be buffs for others! I'm only what, level 6 and a bit, and I've been going at this for a good few weeks while other newbs I've seen shoot past me because they have a group to level with or they're a class that is actually supposed to hit things.”

Her eyes flash and she smirks a bit as she says, “You also seem like you might need a hand every now and then for unseen circumstances and unexpected turns of events. Why don't we exchange addresses? I mean, I'm pretty pathetic myself right now I know but you never know, you seem like a solo kinda gal but so was I for a while. I know now the best way to get stronger is with strength of numbers. That's why I'm looking for friends and not making an enemy out of you.”

She thought for a moment, and the look on the girl's face wasn't exactly welcoming. She doubted her little speech will do much good, so added, “Or, if not, we don't have to party to be friends. I wouldn't mind just having someone to chat to when I'm online. I'm finding myself talking to myself so much in these dreaded dungeons and endless plains that I creeped my brother out when he came into my room the other day. That's when I knew...” she smiled and shook her head, "That's when I knew I needed some real friends."

[XIII]

Behind her glasses, XIII's left eye twitched.
Of course. She doesn't want any items I could give her, she just wants to make friends. How pathetically cute.
Mentally, XIII was placing her face firmly against her palm.
Really though, what choice do I have? Maybe...this isn't the end of the world.

It was funny how "not the end of the world" still made her want to jump off a cliff.

XIII tried to keep the disappointment out of her voice while she talked.
"Hehehe...I don't know if I can help with getting you many friends on an online game, but I can help you through this dungeon I suppose..." She struggled to keep her eye from twitching again. "I was making my way toward the end of the dungeon to meet someone anyway. We can party and you can just follow me I suppose..."
'I'm offering to let her mooch off me. I hatehatehate moochers...Oh, the things I do for my reputation...
"How about this: We party, you buff me, I kill stuff, you get the exp for it since you're in the same party as me, you keep all the items. I have no use for anything in here.
All you have to do is keep an eye out for any other glitches."

I just hope there aren't any more glitches like that, no matter how amusing they might be initially...If this level has no limit to chims, there might be no limit to monsters either...

XIII closed the distance between herself and the newcomer, kicking another chim along the way. She reached out her hand.

"Here's my member address. Don't expect me to be much of a chatterbox though."

'What did I do to deserve this?'

[solieus]

Kimimela noticed that it seemed this girl in front her, well... lady – she looked somewhere in the mid-twenties but her outfit was so extravagant it disguised her age. So anyways, this girl seemed to be suppressing a lot of emotion right now, probably anger.
Right. I'm a newb, and I've just came off as a little kid who says to everyone he sees, including birds, “Will you be my friend?” Maybe I can recover from this after a few battles.
She made a little smile, instead of an overjoyed one which would have anyone say “Oh, please,” and said “All right. Let's see what this glitchy place has in store for us. Once we get through and meet up with your friend I'll leave you to your own business and be on my merry way.”

She indicated with one hand towards the exit of the chim room and started walking, or more precisely, wading towards it. “Shall we?”
As they headed towards the front she reasserted, “And, really, you don't have to worry about the chim thing. I keep my promises. As long as nobody else was around, we're as good as if we'd never been here.”

[XIII]

With their member addresses exchanged, XIII finally got to find out her savior's name.

'Kimimela....How do you even say that?'

“And, really, you don't have to worry about the chim thing. I keep my promises. As long as nobody else was around, we're as good as if we'd never been here.”

XIII spoke as she followed Kimimela out of the room, leaving the last remaining chims behind to mill around aimlessly.

"Good. I hope no one else hears about this. You should too."

XIII decided to let that unspoken threat linger for a moment, turning and walking down the hall. It was an empty threat, but, of course, no one else would know that. While she walked, she began to talk again.

"So, what spells and arts do you have to work with? How do you usually fight? Does your weapon have any sort of elemental strength that I should know about?" XIII began barraging the dance macabre with questions. If we're going to party together, we're going to do it right. Now, is there anything else that I should know? Does any of your equipment give you any elemental weaknes--"

XIII whirled around, hearing footsteps behind her. Quickly scanning the area, she soon found the origin of the sound. It was a chim chim.

It had a kiss mark on it's face.

"Don't tell me that chim chim is...blushing?!"

The chim chim continued to follow XIII, keeping a constant distance from her. Its normally blue cheeks now a purplish red.

XIII smacked her forehead and groaned.

"Ok, nevermind the questions. Answer those later. Right now I just want to kill something."

XIII stomped ahead toward the nearest room, the echoing of her clicking heels trailing behind her as steadily as the blushing chim chim.

[solieus]

Kimimela tried to surpress a giggle, but unfortunately it was to no avail. She remembers what had just been said to her about anybody hearing about this little incident, and she quickly apologized, “ Sorry... but... I can only imagine how... well, actually, the real question is how so many odd bugs are in this dungeon. Weird, huh? ... Oh, by the way, if it's too hard to pronounce Kim-eee-meh-lah you can just call me Kim for short.”

The corridor continued on for another while then took a gradual bend to the left. “What a boring dungeon. The agony must really be from the sheer length of this bloody thing without seeing so much as a single item or monster. Well, since you asked about my spells, I'll tell you I only have my first batch of them. I don't have much special stuff yet. Only one of my spells is damaging, and of course you are a warlock, so I'll leave the nuking to you. I'll buff you up and then worry about keeping the guys distracted since, hilariously enough, I made this dress so sparkly it sometimes distracts monsters and allows me to get in surprise blows right in front of their eyes.”

She finished, figuring too much talking is going to just irritate this irritable character even further. I wonder.. she seems so scared that her reputation may be damaged. She must either be a really serious gamer or she is some sort of businesswoman... but who would do business on an online game? I've only heard of some guys who farmed gp for other players and sold it online. She doesn't seem the type for that, though. They turned the bend and saw a room in front of them. There was another chim steam switch, thankfully turned off, and a group of monsters at two opposing corners of the room. There were eight adversaries total, a typical dungeon scene in front of them. Everything seemed like it was going to be all right from here on. There were even a few treasure chests, though one was a trap chest: its wooden, boxy thumping echoing off the dungeon walls.

"So, left or right?" Kim murmured to the black-white-and-purple-clad girl beside her.

[XIII]

XIII gave a quick glance around the room before answering the question. Both groups had the same set up. Three goblin rookies and one goblin mage.

"Left, that way we might be able to sneak up on the group to the right after we're done. Get the items in the treasure chests last, they aren't going anywhere. Follow me."

Instead of heading inside the room directly toward the group of goblins to the left, XIII instead walked against the wall, almost hugging it. Not waiting to see if Kimimela was doing the same, she snuck against the wall as quickly as she could, trying to get as close to the monsters as possible without alerting them to her presence. Around her several transparent screens popped into existence. She reached forward touching one of the screens, which then began to give off a slight green glow. She then selected her target, the goblin mage in the group, and readied Zan Rom.
Turning behind her, she whispered,

"You know, you'd probably be better at sneak attacking them than me, even with your outfit. My physical attack isn't the greatest. Just be sure to stay out of their line of vision until the last second. If you don't think you can do it, I could always just try and magically snipe the mage for a sneak attack."
XIII refrained from adding the fact that she hated goblin mages with a passion.

Stupid goblin mages. No monster is going to out-mage me!

Around her, the screens slowly rotated around her, one of them still faintly glowing green.

[solieus]

“I can do it. I invested in speed especially for this.”
As Kim considered which goblin to attack, the one in front of her moved its head slightly away from her to stare dumbly at the nothingness in that general direction. A target appeared and circled the goblin's head on her screen. She quickly whispered, “Get ready,” and, crouching slightly, launched herself off the wall. Pulling out her fans, she hit hard and fast at goblin right in front of her. The goblin rookie had enough time to just see the fan flash before she hit and he flew away from her. The battle area was established just in time to catch him and bounce him into the goblin mage near the back.

“Now there's a good first strike!” She said to the Shadow Warlock behind her. “Catch!” she called and, flicking her right fan as she would a boomerang (or, at least, how she would imagine she would flick a boomerang,) she cast Ap Corma. The glowing blue circle quickly hit its target, and gave her friend a magic boost that should last at least half the fight. She then touched her hands to each of her fans, embuing them with Dek Corv, a debuff that lowers the foe's physical attacks. She didn't mention to her buddy that she was doing this. I really shouldn't tell anybody about this, now that I think about it. I want to keep it a surprise. It's a very unique ability and nobody'll know until it's too late. Good little trick up my sleeve.

She turned around again, and with a flash of her dress, found her original target. She quickly engaged and fell into her typical fighting style. She would continually circle her target, flashing out with her fan. This allowed the other foes only to follow her but rarely get a decent hit in unless they were doing a ranged attack or something charged. She was careful to look out for such, and she'd been working on blocking those. Her hits didn't do that much damage, but the combos added up fast. She was already seeing her rapid attack option flash on her screen. She took it and, after a successful second, the goblin was thrown back.

This was her chance. She charged and leaped, plummeting down and hitting the 13th combo. Those beautifully satisfying black and purple rings surrounded her taget. She yelled “Rengeki!” like any excited noob would. She saves her damaging spell for such an occasion. She crouched and, in an elaborate spin jump, cast Zan Rom. The red circles spun out of her in a spiral and then tornadoes filled the arena with wind. A few seconds of torrents ended and she got her footing again. It always amused her how that spell, fun as it is, throws her almost completely off balance each time. Few other things made such an impact on her.

She looked around. Her main target was still alive, about half HP, and the others were hit too but they didn't matter to her much at the moment. She liked focusing on one at a time. Wait a minute... Half HP? Bloody mage must've healed him when I wasn't looking... grr.. Oh, well. She slided to the left to dodge a swipe of her target's sword and, with a ruffle from her dress, started her barrage of attacks once more.

[XIII]

XIII was a little surprised to find that Kimimela was not just throwing herself into the fight, but actually taking the time to raise her magic attack.

Hm. Maybe she's not as useless as I thought...

Instead of attacking right away, XIII watched Kimimela for a minute longer before entering the fight. Looking at the way the goblin's hp kept going down, she could see that she wasn't really needed here.
And while she wasn't sure, she thought that the goblins weren't really hitting for as much as they should have been

It's been a while since I was her level. She probably just has a higher defense than I did back then.

While XIII mused on this, she watched as the battle area became a sparkling tornado from the combination of her attack, and Kimimela's costume blowing around.

While Kimimela regained her footing, behind her the goblin mage targeted one of his friends, healing their HP.

Pretty good for her level too.

This time the goblin mage readied a different target--Kimimela. XIII could see the red circle stalking toward her on the ground

Alright, enough of this. My turn.

XIII swung her cane, the top of which was now glowing brightly, in an arc until it was pointing toward the mage. Her spell and target had been readied before the battle began, so there was almost no wait after the words left XIII's mouth.

"Zan Rom!"

At that moment yet another tornado hit the poor goblins.
The animation was almost the same as Kimimela's. The damage definitely wasn't.
The goblin mage, as well as a goblin rookie that had been too close, was sent flying in a tornado of green.
The mage was still barely alive, however the rookie that had been hit went dull and faded away. Getting caught in both Kimimela's and XIII's AoE's was too much for it.

Behind her, the goblin that Kimimela had been pummeling, while at half health, was still alive and so was the goblin mage, now healing himself as quickly as he could. In front of her another damaged goblin rookie still stood.

XIII was readying another spell to finish off the mage, when she heard the whirring of a charge attack. XIII quickly stopped and crouched in a defensive stance as the other goblin rookie charged toward her. Her block kept her from getting knocked over, and the monster was too low level to do too much damage, but it kept her from casting another spell before the goblin mage healed himself again.

I really hate mages.

XIII swung out with her cane toward the goblin rookie that was still attacking her. Even with the monster being a lower level, her attack was the equivalent of a small bop on the head, but it made the goblin flinch for a moment. That moment was all XIII really needed.

"Rue Kruz!"

The goblin rookie was suddenly carried upwards by a surge of water, dealing several blows as it was thrown into the air.
XIII quickly turned toward the remaining mage, who had managed to heal itself to almost full health by this point. She stood, still scowling at the mage as the goblin rookie that she had sent into the air landed painfully on the ground in front of her, turning dull and fading away.

I really, really hate mages.

[solieus]

The second Zan Rom whipped through the battle area, but Kim was ready for it this time. As soon as she heard the name called, she went into a defensive stance and braced for the impact. One goblin was taken out, and the one right in front of her was knocked down. As soon as the winds stopped, she powered up and pounded her fans onto her target, knocked him away into the wall. She then quickly let out a flurry of attacks and finished the guy off with a rapid attack, her fans' blades eating into the goblin's belly. She gave him one last quick boot before he disappeared. Now... Who's left? She looked around. She saw the last goblin rookie disappear with a quick spell from XIII, but the goblin mage was at full health. Tricky little buggers... can't leave em alone for a second... She ran over and started attacking, distracting the mage in order to prevent him from healing himself or casting in general. She kept at it, dealing slash after slash. The mage was losing health at a good rate, even with Kim's low attack stat. She figured XIII would be more than happy to deal the killing blow now that the mage has become an easy target.

[XIII]

Alright. Just one of you little maggots left...wait, why do I care? This place is way too low level for me to get angry at the monsters...

The glowing screens around XIII rotated once again, this time a screen appeared directly in front of her, glowing purple. She reached through it, extending her arm toward the last goblin.

Ani Zot!

Suddenly, four claws reached up out of the blackness that now surrounded the lone goblin, swirling violently around him, dealing damage as it churned.

And as the darkness faded, so too did the goblin mage.

In destiny's ear, the victory fanfare began. Her EXP gain was so minuscule it wasn't worth having a song play.

One party down, one more to go.

XIII reversed direction, heading back toward the wall that she and kimimela had pushed themselves off of, walking along it again toward the group of unfortunate goblins, not waiting to see if Kimimela was following.

[solieus]

Kimimela jumped at the realization that, as soon as the battle wall disappeared, her fellow party member was already halfway to the next group of enemies. She quickened her pace, edging along the wall as before. This group was going to be more fun: it was three goblin mages, this time. She has trouble with them alone, but with someone else helping her out, she can distract the mages while her partner provide the heavy damage. And, heavy, it is. She's at least five levels higher than this area's level – her spells, with the same relative power as hers, did much more damage. She used the same spell as her and did almost three times more damage.

She edged up, behing XII... well, thirteen, to call her by her “name”... and saw that “sneak attack” icon on her screen. She waited for the mage in front of her to turn, and, making sure she knew XII was paying attention, she tiptoed up to the mage and snap-kicked him in the small of his back followed by a spinning attack. The slash, slash of her fans hitting the mage started the battle. Already, one of the other mages was powering up a healing spell. She dashed over and decided to distract the back ones for a while. As she continued dashing back and forth in between the two mages she managed to get off her magic-buff for XII and her physical buff for her own attacks. She then loaded her fans with magic-debuff to keep all the mages in check during the rest of the match. Unfortunately, her combo metre was staying pretty low but wasn't bothered with that. She looked back to XII to see how she was doing.

[XIII]

((sorry for the hugelong wait, but hey, now I have time, and the site isn't running suuuuper slow.
I'm also just going to blow through the next fight. It's kinda just grinding. Besides, I have something else planned.))

The next fight had actually gone by even faster. Because Kimimela kept hitting the different enemies, keeping them from healing themselves, they had gone down easily enough. A couple zan roms each later, a familiar victory fanfare could be heard.

I hope the exp is worth it for her at least. I don't think I've ever willingly fought for so little before.

Remembering what was at stake, XIII decided to distract herself to slightly more pleasant thoughts.
All potential positive thoughts were completely ruined by the soft pattering of little blue feet a short distance away.

The chim chim was still following her.

It would have kept following her the entire time, except it had been locked out of the battle fence when the fight began.

Whether because kimimela had so far, proven herself to be worthy of staying in her company, or just complete frustration from everything chim related, XIII struck up a conversation.

"Ever just know that you're going to have a long day? Or ever just wonder how an online game can sometimes manage to feel like a chore?"

XIII shook her head and walked toward the middle of the room, where the trap chest was.

"Let's just get this over with..."

XIII gave the lid of the chest a kick, opening it. As expected, a gun popped out.
What was not expected was the size of said gun, which a bit larger than usual for an area of this level, the fact that it was aimed at both members of the party, nor the black dots that surrounded it.
XIII thought it was odd, but that it was, ultimately, nothing compared to a chim chim stampede, and so she quickly input the keys required, with plenty of time to spare.

Instead of going away, another sequence of keys appeared on her display. Frantically, she input the new keys, only for a new one to appear. A couple seconds later, the timer ran out.

"Shi--"

From behind her, there was a frantic pitter-patter as the lovestruck chim ran over to the two girls, bouncing in front of them.

The only things that would have made the scene better was if there was a slow motion option, and if the chim had been able to yell "nooooooooooo"

There was a screen cap option though, which XIII did remember to take advantage of, after having a chim blasted backwards into her, bouncing her a few feet back, landing her squarely on her ass.

That was just too weird not to cap.

Ahead of them, the chest disappeared in a cloud of dust, leaving only a small collection of black dots on the ground.

XIII sat up, and looked down to the poor chim chim that was now laying on the ground in front of her. Fearing the worst she quickly crawled over to wear it lay, only to discover that it's eyes had been replaced with spirals. It's "head" moved back and forth as though it were dizzy. It hadn't disappeared when it had been hit, because only a player's kick could do that. Apparently bullets were just dandy though.

At least it has spirals instead of X's for eyes. Still, what is going on in here?
Without even really thinking about it, XIII picked up the chim chim, like she would a baby doll. It began to turn red from blushing.

"...I'm pretty sure that this is just about the weirdest shit I have ever seen happen in this game. You sure you want to keep going on here?"