• Nobles of Null is a forum based roleplay site where sci-fi and magic collide. Here, Earth remains fractured and divided despite humanity reaching out to the stars. Worse still, the trans-human slaves of one major power have escaped, only to establish their own Empire, seething with resentment at abuses of the past. Even the discovery of aliens, though medieval in development, has failed to rally these squabbling children of Earth together with its far darker implications. Worse still, is the discovery of the impossible - magic. Practiced by the alien locals, nearly depleted and therefore rare, its reality warping abilities remains abstract and distant to the general populace. All the while, unseen in the darkness of space, forces from without threaten to press in. For those with eyes opened by insight, it is clear that an era is about to end, and that a new age will dawn.

IDS Yīnghuā - Log 2.0: "If you are far from the enemy..."

"Welcome," Reina's avatar says giving a smile and a polite bow, "Thank you for your support Aitana." Space distorts and the cafe table is suddenly slightly larger. An NPC server comes by with a new chair and waits to take the rooster woman's order.

Reina blushes slightly at Hoshiko's remark and fake coughs into her fist, "That's beside the point... and no, I don't feel ashamed of my body... at least not now anyway. My only qualm comes from the fact that most of my augmentations comes commissioned at the direction of the head of my now defunct clan." She sighs, "When we have less pressing things to worry about, that will be on the list of things that I talk to you about."

-----

In reaction to Lady Nimue's explanation, Reina remarks "Outer God? That's news to me... That might explain the energy issue... Why would a god be interested in us or even the convocation in the first place?"

Reina's avatar flicks her wrist and a few books spawn on the cafe table, mostly journals and written works about what the Daqinren know about magic and the Aos'si, with a sprinkling of some of Reina's personal journals on the matter. She seemingly picks up one at random and starts to flip through it. "Gods? Guess when magic is on the table, most things just aren't just fiction anymore." She seems to take particular interest at something in one of the books and then shakes her head, just to set it down and pick up another book, "The energy problem... too much energy is being expended by those creatures in such a short amount of time. Beyond all the useful things you can do with it, magic still follows certain rules. One important one is that the energy has to come from somewhere in order for it to do anything." She gives a frustrated hiss and sets another book down, "I wish I could see what the local mana looked like..."

Something grabs her attention and she flicks her fingers to bring an image feed toward her and looks a the glow coming from the being's center, "Is that a core?... A Heartstone? Wait! Infrared!" The image changes to an infrared overlay, showing different colors for different temperatures. The Ruby show's a bright red/yellow on the overlay in contrast to the rest of the creature's body. "With all that energy being used, there has to be heat somewhere. Guess we don't have to understand it for now... just maybe how to stop them. Aim for the hottest parts of their bodies. If we pinpoint strike them, maybe their regeneration capabilities will get disrupted."
 
Xian didn't need to think too much about what to do next. The Daqin had plenty of beasts that were difficult to keep down. Two more bullets went to the head, two more to the upper chest, another two to the glowing core.

This was perfect range for her sword, but there was no time to pull out that tool.

Even as her right hand was firing, her left hand was pulling out a new grenade and loading it into her weapon From here she could get side-shots on the nearest attackers that were charging towards the central group. She'd start by firing at the creature, looking to determine where bullets were impacting real flesh before following it up with the grenade launcher.

She could have warned the others that their opponents were getting closer but rather than slow them with fire, Xian wanted to see if the Aoi Si wards would hold.



Elsewhere, Jun had turned completely monochromatic and had a dark rain cloud above her. "Maybe it can regenerate my serotonin." Jun said, somewhat proud of herself for not cursing right there because that is how a princess should conduct herself for sure, "I'm not saying we crush the red thing up and do lines but like, this stuff is red. Health potions are red. The synergy is there."

Also she remembered she was a geologist.

"Rubies tend to need intense heat and pressure to grow. These are magic or whatever so I doubt they are just crushed Corundum. Maybe it is compressed Health Potion?"
 
"Ah, thank you... Doctor, I presume," Aitana replied to Reina, as she took her seat. She politely ordered a black coffee and sipped on it while she listened to their conversation. Despite being fairly tall herself, the albatross looked rather tiny seated between the viper and the bull. The near-permanent smile on her face at least brightened the room a little bit. As Reina and Jun called attention to the hot crimson cores of the monsters, she spoke up. "These are good points... and those stones provide convenient spots to target, if nothing else. One moment, please."

In VR, del Valle simply leaned back in her chair and continued drinking her coffee. In meatspace, she switched the gunship's optics to IR vision, and circled around to the flank that Wen and Xian were holding. Prioritizing her targets, she fired the pulse laser intermittently at the creatures that were closing on the two bodyguards, aiming for the hot spots in their bodies, and hoping to at least slow them down to give the ground team some relief. She made sure to not overwhelm the two of them with the whine of the gunship's engines or the snapping heat of the laser, but she still hovered quite close to the battlefield to ensure that she wouldn't miss.

"Right, Captain Sun and... Guanxi? Is that you?" She looked up again in the virtuality, taking a closer look at the individuals around the table, before her eyes settled on the tiger form warrior. "It is! It's wonderful to see you again, mija. We should really catch up once this is over. Anyway, I shall assist you two from here, please feel free to direct my fire." Once again, Aitana's demeanor remained calm and pleasant, as if she was making small talk with old friends, rather than defending royalty from unknown attackers.
 
*BLORP*

In the virtuality, Xian would partition off a small sub-Xian. The Chibi-like Xian sitting on the original's shoulder with a call center headset on as it focused on relaying her own awareness of 'things to hit with a laser' to the gunship with 'the laser'.

"As soon as the Princesses are safe Commander Del Valle." Xian replied.

The situation for Xian had changed. She didn't wait to finish reloading her weapon and moved from a flanking position on their antagonists to a full sprint directly at the enemy. Her free hand would switch up from reloading to going for her sword that had previously been used to cut through the jungle.
 
With Xian taking over the target designation, Wen focused on his own ground performance. He gave a quick nod to Captain Del Valle, before he returned his virtual form to the task at hand. Staring down the enemy beast closest to him, he reprogrammed his gyrojet rounds to a delayed fuse, ensuring that they were explode a few milliseconds after they pierced the target's body. Then, he fired off a burst of the gyrojets vertically down the best's body to make sure all of its vitals were going to be met with explosive force.

At the same time, part of his brainpower noticed Xian charging into melee range. "Xian, fall back, your rifle is more capable than your sword!" He admonished her, at the same time perplexed that the officer was making such a suicidal tactical move that went against tried and true infantry tactics.
 
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