Nightmare Challenge: Ice Mage's greatest work! [Riley l DragonPantsu ll Job]

"Behold, the intricate and subtle weaving of my cunning arcane . . . ah, screw it. Burn a lot!"

- Haretsa

The crisp morning air quickly filled Haretsa’s lungs as the young slayer made her way out through the open doors of the Sabertooth’s airborne guild hall. She stood in the open archway for quite some time, basking in the sun’s rather relaxing radiance. While other people would have considered the weather today to be rather hot and uncomfortable, Haretsa felt that it was quite the opposite. Due to being implanted with Fire Dragon Slayer magic, Haretsa was able to be completely comfortable no matter what end of the thermometer the weather was at. This ability would prove itself quite useful for a particular job that Haretsa had eyed the day before.

   Cracking her neck to both sides, Haretsa smiled as she walked down the pathway to the teleportation lacrima at the edge of the outer platform. “Alright, so who else is ready to kick some ass and get an ecosystem back on track!?” Haretsa asked seemingly no one, punching her right fist into the open palm of her left hand. “I sure as hell am! We’re gonna pop some fools in the head and watch ‘em burn to a crisp!!” Blamo shouted enthusiastically, earning her a heavy sigh in response. “Blamo, not EVERYTHING can be solved by simply shooting people. I swear, you have the most simple headed approach to everything.” “Shut the hell up, Scisara!! What difference does it make, they’re just hunks of ice!” “Yes, hunks of ice that happen to be animated  mages who were reported to have varying degrees of power and the ability to wield water magic as well as ice magic. In case you forgot, water hinders all of us severely, not just Haretsa. Honestly, do you ever pay attention when Haretsa reads things? “I… er…. I SAID SHUT THE HELL UP!!”

  Haretsa let out a small laugh as she reached out and grabbed the teleportation lacrima; sending her down to Sabertooth’s tavern. When she reappeared, she remained in the back room of the tavern for a small bit as she thought about this mission. The job did seem rather difficult for just one person to complete, even if said person happened to be a Dragon Slayer. This brought Haretsa to a bit of an impasse with the situation. She didn’t want to ask Tree for help with this job since the two of them had just gotten back from their previous one yesterday and no one else was around for her to ask. Haretsa continued to think on this problem as she opened the door in front of her. As she emerged from behind the bar, the first site she saw was a petite, black haired girl around her age standing in front of the request board with a flyer in her hand. Haretsa wasn’t expecting anyone else to be down here in the tavern at this time, so this was quite a pleasant surprise. Maneuvering around the bar, Haretsa noticed that the job flyer this girl was holding in her hand happened to be the exact same one the young slayer had read about just yesterday and was heading out to take care of.

“Hiya! I’m Ha- PUPPY!!!” Haretsa exclaimed, now able to see the adorable little wolf pup at the girls side. She remained lost in how damn cute the little guy was until she shook her head rapidly to regain her focus. “Sorry! As I was saying, my names Haretsa. I’m pretty new to the guild, so nice to meet ya! So, were you looking to take that job there? I was just on my way out to do it myself. You wanna do it together? It’d probably go better with a group, just no one else is really awake to ask right now…” Haretsa spoke, ending with a bit of a chuckle as her eyes moved incredibly slowly back down to the puppy before immediately looking back to the girl infront of her.

"Behold, the intricate and subtle weaving of my cunning arcane . . . ah, screw it. Burn a lot!"

- Haretsa

From the ridiculously energetic response of the puppy and the cheery, go getting attitude of Ms. Riley, Haretsa could already tell she was going to enjoy her time on this job. She was even nice enough to compliment Haretsa’s name, which was a first for the young slayer to hear. While Haretsa had her eyes amusingly glued to puppy as he seemed to dance with joy, Riley asked if there was anything Haretsa needed to grab before the two ventured off.

  The white haired girl tilted her head for a brief moment of thought before responding. ”Nope, I’m pretty sure I got the gang all right here with me!” she exclaimed with a smile. ”Yeah, the gang you forgot to introduce because of a puppy, YA MORON!” a brash, muffled voice cried out. ”There are other ways to remind her, you know. Honestly, Blamo, this is why she hates introducing you to other people…” said a much more calm and elegant sounding voice. Haretsa simply scratched the back of her head in embarrassment after hearing all of this. ”Right, sorry, sorry! Everyone just calm down now… Allow me to introduce everyone else!” she said, reaching for the holster at her right side and drawing her pistol. She pointed the gun directly at Riley with her finger far away from the trigger. ”Getting this one out of the way, this here is Blamo!” Haretsa explained, before causing the pistol to bob up and down slightly as if it was moving on its own. WHASSUP GURL?! ARE YA READY TO KI- H-HEY WAIT I’M NOT DONE WITH MY INTRODUCTION YE-” the brash voice from earlier spoke, before the pistol was shoved back into its holster forcibly. The voice seemed to come from the weapon itself oddly enough. However, if Riley had a keen enough eye, she would be able to see Haretsa’s mouth moving ever so slightly with a completely different voice coming out of it.


  Haretsa then reached around her back, pulling out a large, blood red rectangular contraption from its holster strapped behind her waist by a ring specifically made to fit Haretsa’s finger perfectly. With a quick flick of the contraption with her finger still in the ring, Haretsa caused the strange object to unfold and reveal itself to be a 7 ft long combat scythe, complete with a rifle scope and trigger; indicating that there was more to this weapon that it merely being a scythe. However, this was not the only oddity to the weapon. Strangely, there was no blade to this scythe at all. All there was to it was a large, empty slot where the blade should have been. ”And this here’s Scisara! Don’t worry, she’s a lot nicer than Blamo is.” she said, tipping the scythe ever so slightly forward as if it were bowing. ”A pleasure to meet you, Ms. Riley.” said the more elegant voice from earlier, before Haretsa flicked the scythe in the opposite direction she had earlier by the ring, causing it to fold back up and be placed into its holster once more. ”Well, that’s everyone except for Flect. I’d introduce him, but he’s kinda sleeping right now, as usual… she said with a sigh, lovingly petting the gold bracelet she kept on her left arm. ”Anyway, I’m ready to head out when you are! I hope it says where that island is on the flyer, cuz I ain’t got the slightest clue… So uh... I’ll follow you!”

"Behold, the intricate and subtle weaving of my cunning arcane . . . ah, screw it. Burn a lot!"

- Haretsa

  Haretsa watched in slight confusion as Riley walked over towards the guild bar, reaching up into the top shelf before pulling out a bundle of jackets that proceeded to fall on her. Haretsa would have easily offered to grab them for Riley if she had known what the black haired girl was doing, but it was too late for that. Shrugging, Haretsa took the jacket that she was handed and slung it over her shoulder before proceeding to follow Riley and her puppy out the door and to their destination; Snowfall Island.


  It was quite a long journey before the two finally reached the port city of Gallonstown where they would be setting sail from. Haretsa stood at the docks simply staring down the boat that would be taking them to Snowfall Island. The boat was filled with all kinds of scientists and thermal equipment designed to try and get the ecosystem of the island back to its original climate. Strange mages on the island were keeping the scientists from doing their job, but that’s where Riley and Haretsa would come in. The only problem standing in Haretsa’s personal way was the boat itself. Haretsa simply bit down on her lip before letting out a heavy sigh. There was no way around it, she HAD to get on the boat in order to get to the island. ”Well… this is gonna SUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK.” she thought to herself, before nervously taking the first step onto the boat.


  From the moment her foot touched the deck, it felt like the waves were washing up over her and making her sick. Slowly, Haretsa made her way to one of the sides before hanging half her body out over the edge with a look of absolute misery on her face. This caught the attention of the head scientist of this expedition, who walked over to the poor girl in curiosity. “Excuse me, but you’re one of the mages who took up our request, correct? Are… you alright? We have healers if you’re too...er, seasick.” he offered, surprisingly getting a response quite quickly. ”I’ll… be fine… just… get this thing… moving… The sooner we get…. to the damn island…. the better…. Ughhhhhhhhhh...Are...Are we there yet?“

"Behold, the intricate and subtle weaving of my cunning arcane . . . ah, screw it. Burn a lot!"

- Haretsa

The very moment that the boat made landfall, Haretsa grabbed hold of the jacket Riley had given to her earlier and made a beeline straight for land. She cared little for whatever kind of environment she ended up on. Right now, the only thing that mattered to Haretsa was that she was off that nightmarish boat ride. ”LAAAAAAAAAAAAND!!! SWEET, GLORIOUS, SOLID LAND!!!” she shouted at the top of her lungs as she ended up sliding across the ice and right into a giant pile of snow. The young Slayer popped her head from out of the snowbank, shaking the snow off it as she realized just how cold this island actually was. Normally, Haretsa wasn’t bothered by even the most extreme of colds. However, here on this island, even the young Fire Dragon could feel a slight bit of a chill.

”Huh, I guess this jacket’s gonna be more useful than I thought…” she thought aloud, raising her body temperature to melt the snow around her effortlessly before throwing the jacket on over her tank top. She walked over to where Riley stood as the boat retreated to a safe distance away from the island. Looking towards the island itself, all Haretsa could see every which way she looked was snow. A gust of cold wind blew, causing both of the mages to shiver involuntarily before Riley made a comment of how fitting the island’s name was. ”Yeah, tell me about. I’m not even sure where we’re supposed to begin looking for the source of this whole problem…” Haretsa said, puzzled as to where the two should start looking.

This was until Haretsa’s ears perked at the hint of a strange sound blended in with another howl of the wind. It sounded like a females voice had said ”Lucrecia’s Spear” before a set of four long, sharp ice spear rocketed out of seemingly nowhere straight for Haretsa. Reacting quickly, Haretsa ducked down, causing the spears to fly over her head, though one grazed through a bit of her hair. As the ice spears went into the ocean behind them, Haretsa drew Blamo from her holster and aimed it straight for where the attack had come from. Her eyes widened as, strangely, she didn’t see anything in that direction. ”Where… the hell?” she asked confused, before she heard the same womans voice again. ”You don’t belong here… Leave…” the voice said, as Haretsa could see the outline of a figure approaching the two mages. Yet that was all that she could see; the outline. It was as if the rest of the figure was made of a crystal clear ice that made it pretty difficult to see in this particular environment. Regardless, Haretsa now had something more concrete to aim at, pulling Blamo’s trigger twice to propel two bullets straight into the figure. They definitely hit their target, as Haretsa could hear the impact and see some very small cracks on the formerly clear being that continued to approach them. The problem Haretsa had was the fact that the cracks were that small and that the figure was still proceeding towards the two Sabertooth members despite Haretsa aiming for what she perceived to be the head. Out of curiosity, Haretsa quickly pointed Blamo down at the ice that she and Riley were standing on and fired at it once. The impact was much more to the effect that Haretsa was expecting the figure to now have. ”Well… I guess the reports weren’t kidding… ”TH-THIS BITCH IS MADE OF SOME DAMN STRONG SHIT! THAT REALLY PISSES ME OFF!!” ”Took the words right out of my mouth, Blamo..”
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Blamo's Ammo count: 9/12

"Behold, the intricate and subtle weaving of my cunning arcane . . . ah, screw it. Burn a lot!"

- Haretsa

Haretsa looked on with curiosity burning in her eyes as Riley began to attack the figure that stood before them. She was rather shocked when Riley announced the name of her attack. Riley called out the words “Ice Dragon” before her attack, so that meant that she was a Dragon Slayer just the same as Haretsa. Being so inexperienced, Haretsa only knew one way to become a Dragon Slayer; by having a lacrima implanted inside of yourself. Haretsa assumed that Riley must have undergone the same kind of process that Haretsa had, so did that mean there were other groups out there turning kids into Dragon Slayers or could Riley be linked to the same group that escaped Haretsa’s outburst when she was younger? There were so many questions Haretsa wanted to ask, but all of them would have to wait.  


    Getting her mind back on track, Haretsa watched as Riley performed her Ice Dragon’s Roar; an attack that instantly froze the incoming blast of water magic the figure had sent their way and turned into a statue. ”A roar, huh? That looked like a dragon’s breath attack… And since most dragons breathe fire, that must mean I can do something like that too!” Haretsa thought before noticing more figures of the same shape as the first one approaching them. Oddly, one of the figures looked quite a bit smaller than the others; meaning it was possibly one of the figures considered to possess powers equivalent to a mage classified as D Rank based on its looks. ”I guess they’re rolling out the welcoming committee… Well, I’ll take 3 of the big ones on the left, you take the other 2 and the small one. Oh and you might wanna keep your distance from me when we’re fighting….” Haretsa advised with a nervous laugh, her gun aimed at the oncoming figures that were still a reasonable distance away. ”Things tend to get a little… burnt, when I start using my magic, if you catch my meaning...” "SHE MEANS WE MELT THINGS WITH FIRE A LOT!!!" "PRETTY SURE SHE COULD FIGURE THAT OUT ON HER OWN, BLAMO!!"

 

"Behold, the intricate and subtle weaving of my cunning arcane . . . ah, screw it. Burn a lot!"

- Haretsa

   As Riley agreed to keep her distance, the two mages set about dealing with their individual opponents. ”Ok.. as long as she keeps her distance, everything will be fine… I have plenty of fire, the only problem is that they have water magic… I’m gonna have to get creative for things to work. And I think I’ve got just the plan…” she thought to herself, catching the ice figures assault on Riley out of the corner of her eye.  

   Haretsa began to spin Blamo rapidly in circles around her finger as flames began to gather around the pistol’s barrel. The figures slashed their hands through the air at the young Slayer in a similar fashion to how they attacked Riley. Waves of water magic shot toward Haretsa as she continued to spin Blamo around, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. When the waves were about halfway between Haretsa and the ice figures, Haretsa stopped Blamo’s spinning and aimed the pistol straight at the oncoming attack. ”OVERRULED!” she shouted, squeezing down on the trigger and launching the large gathering of flames. The flames stretched out to be around 4 meters in diameter and in the shape of a judge’s gavel as they rocketed toward the oncoming waves. The resulting collision caused the waves to evaporate immediately; causing a large cloud of mist to form between Haretsa and the figures.

 ”Alright, lets hope that this will actually work..” Haretsa thought aloud, taking a deep breath and concentrating a bit of magic into her mouth as she did. She could feel the flames building up in her lungs and mouth before she exhaled loudly ”FIRE DRAGON’S ROAR!” The very moment she exhaled, a cylindrical blast of fire 1 meter in diameter erupted forth from her mouth; tearing through the mist and consequently through the three ice figures as well. When the mist cleared due to the flames, one of the figures was missing half of its entire body while the other was missing an arm. The one figure that had been in the direct path of the attack was now a harmless puddle in the snow. ”HOLY CRAP IT WORKED!!!” Haretsa exclaimed in excitement. Having never done such a thing before, Haretsa was half expecting the spell not to work at all. Now knowing that it could, Haretsa was confident in her ability to deal with these figures from here on out; though she doubted the same trick would work twice on them.

------
Signature Spell used so 110/110% mana remaining

Fire Dragons Roar 3 post cooldown

 

"Behold, the intricate and subtle weaving of my cunning arcane . . . ah, screw it. Burn a lot!"

- Haretsa

     Haretsa kept her focus on the two remaining enemies in front of her as Riley dealt with her own. The young slayer had no idea how exactly the figure that was missing half of its body was still standing, but she knew that it would be the one that was easy to dispose off. Noticing that the other figure with one arm was preparing to attack, Haretsa quickly holstered her pistol and withdrew the box like contraption holstered behind her waist and flicked a switch on it, transforming the box into its sniper rifle form.

   Dropping down to one knee, Haretsa steadied the rifle and gazed through the scope with one eye closed and her tongue sticking out; aiming at the head of the assaulting ice figure. ”Lucrecia’s Spe-” was all the figure got to say before Haretsa pulled down on the trigger and shattered the figures head into pieces; causing it to collapse to the ground as the rifles shot echoed despite the prevailing winds of the island. ”Hah! I knew you’d do better than Blamo would, Scisara! That’ll make life a little bit easier when dealing with these things.” Haretsa exclaimed, after recovering from the massive amount of recoil that had just blasted against her shoulder.  ”THE HELL!? WHY DID YOU MAKE HER STRONGER THAN ME!?!” ”That’s probably because a sniper rifle is naturally more powerful than a pistol, you twit.” ”Yeah, I didn’t design you that way on purpose. Besides, you’re still powerful, Blamo! I couldn’t have distracted them without your help!” Haretsa explained in the middle of the conversation, folding Scisara back up into her compact form before taking Blamo out once more and firing a shot at the remaining figures head. While it didn’t explode and the winds put the bullet off course, the impact did manage to make the half of the figure fall over backwards.

     ”See? Look how much impact that had!” Haretsa exclaimed, walking up to the fallen figure and smashing its head repeatedly with her boot until it finally shattered. ”YEAH, BUT SCISARA WOULD HAVE BLOWN IT RIGHT OFF!!! DAMMIT I’M PISSED OFF NOW!!!” ”So nothing else is new then, I take it?” ”THAT’S IT BITCH, FIGHT ME RIGHT NOW WE’LL PROVE WHO'S THE MORE USEFUL GUN!!!” ”You’re both useful, dammit! Stop fighting!!!”

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Blamo Ammo: 8/12
Scisara Ammo: 9/10

Haretsa Kill Count: 3 Strong Enemies/5 required.

"Behold, the intricate and subtle weaving of my cunning arcane . . . ah, screw it. Burn a lot!"

- Haretsa

     Haretsa glanced over towards her partner who was keeping one hand on her sword hilt; leading the way off towards the mountain at the center of the island. Riley seemed to be rather cautious as she lead Haretsa through the ever howling winds, so Haretsa trusted her partner’s judgement and gripped Blamo tightly. There was no real reason not to trust Riley’s instinct; she was the Ice Dragon Slayer after all. Since the two Sabertoothian mages foes were constructs made entirely out of ice, Riley probably had a much easier time sensing their presence than Haretsa ever would.

    The young Fire Dragon took in her surroundings as they drew closer and closer to the mountain. She couldn’t even see the ocean anymore thanks to the white void of snow that the winds were continuously kicking up. It was getting harder and harder for Haretsa to see much of anything in their surroundings now, so she stuck closely to her black haired companion until Riley came to a complete stop and drew her sword; noting that the mages had company. Raising her pistol up, Haretsa began to look around trying to find the enemy with her eyes alone. Taking note of her struggle to see, the three smaller constructs moved around Riley and ignored her entirely; using the howling winds to veil the declaration of their attack. Three, eight inch long icicles were thrown at Haretsa; two of them slicing off the sleeves of her jacket and the third thrown for her head. She managed to avoid the last one by ducking the moment her sleeves were cut off.

  It was in this moment that the three constructs then slid across the frozen tundra, all aiming for Haretsa at once with a punch. Two came from her left  left and one from the right. Haretsa quickly threw her arms up and out to her sides to take the brunt impact of the punches; which triggered something rather unusual. The moment that the ice constructs punches connected with her arms, Haretsa felt a noticeable surge of power to the points of impact. This power built up and caused three small explosions to occur from her skin; blowing off the hands of the ice constructs that punched her. ”WOAH! Have… I always been able to do that?! No… I’m pretty sure that’s new… but holy crap that’s kinda cool!” she exclaimed looking at her now baren arms, disregarding the three enemies to revel in the discovery of her new ability.

"Behold, the intricate and subtle weaving of my cunning arcane . . . ah, screw it. Burn a lot!"

- Haretsa

     While she was busy marveling at this new discovery of her abilities, Haretsa was assaulted once more by the small ice figures. Now knowing of the Fire Dragon’s new ability of oddly explosive skin, the figures knew it would be best to attack from a range. The one to her right swiped its remaining arm through the air quickly, sending a torrential blast of water straight for Haretsa. The white haired girl turned just in time to have the blast catch her off guard and hit her right in the face, knocking her back on top of the other other two ice figures. Landing on them and bringing them to the ground, which cushioned her fall to an extent, Haretsa looked over her shoulder to notice something. Her arms were laid out against the two figures necks, melting away at the ice until their heads were completely detached from their bodies.

    ”Holy crap, I’m hot! My whole body is like freaking fire… So that meaaaaaaaans…” Haretsa mumbled to herself, turning her attention to the figure that had blasted her in the face. The enemy quickly swiped their hand through the air again, sending another blast straight for Haretsa. Quickly rolling out of the way, Haretsa jumped forth towards the figure, gripping its head firmly in her hand and smashing it to the ground. Planting her foot firmly on the figure’s other arm, Haretsa simply held her hand to the figures head and watched as it slowly melted into a harmless puddle. ”That’s freakin awesome! I don’t even have to use my magic, I can just touch these things and melt them! Maybe this whole magic thing isn’t so bad after all…” the young Slayer reasoned to herself, turning her attention to the fight Riley was currently having.

   As the howling winds continued to prevail, Haretsa’s ears perked up to what sounded like the crunching of snow beneath one’s feet coming from directly in front of them. ”Either that’s just the wind playing tricks on my mind or we’re about to have a lot more of these things to deal with…” Haretsa thought to herself, keeping her eyes peeled dead ahead with her hand at the ready to bring Blamo out once more.

"Behold, the intricate and subtle weaving of my cunning arcane . . . ah, screw it. Burn a lot!"7

- Haretsa

     Now things were starting to get a lot more interesting. Haretsa’s assumption was indeed right that there were more of the bizarre ice figures coming towards the two mages; quite a few more of them. ”I guess they’re taking off the kid gloves now… There’s quite a number of them this time if my ears are hearing things right.” she thought to herself, lost in these thoughts as she was hit in the face by Riley tossing her jacket backwards. Pulling the jacket off her face, Haretsa now witnessed Riley completely clad in a rather elaborate, icy looking suit of armor as she was surrounded by five of the ice figures at once. ”Holy crap, that armor looks freaking AWESOME! ”

    Haretsa then caught the movement of several figures surrounding her that all varied in size from more of the small ones, to one of the medium sized ones, to one that was even taller than that. Without wasting any time, all of the figures stretched out their hands and unleashing torrents of water at Haretsa from all sides. This would be easy enough to dodge for the first three, but it was the fourth stream of water that had caught the Slayer off guard. This blast was quite a bit bigger than the rest, slamming into Haretsa’s legs to knock her over flat onto her face into a pile of snow. ”CLEVER LITTLE BITCH!” Haretsa yelled at the figure, hopping to her feet and inhaling the air around as she had done earlier; gathering up a large amount of flames within her mouth and lungs. ”FIRE DRAGON’S ROAR!!” she shouted as the cylindrical beam of fire magic shot forth from her mouth once more and straight for the tallest ice figure. The figure shot out another blast of water at the roar, but the flames simply turned the water to steam and continued onward; melting the arm the figure tried to defend with clean off before it ended.

     Seeing this filled Haretsa with quite a deal of confidence as she withdrew Scisara, flicking the switch to completely unfold and fully activate the beam scythe. ”Well, that’s another thing this magic of mine is good for I guess, making your water completely useless!” she exclaimed, firmly gripping Scisara as she ran towards the large figure; completely disregarding the other three figures.