Dying Memories [Mod]

[Layla Amare]

Layla was standing in a world of gold. There was no movement, no shape, and no sound. There was only a golden haze which hung over the world and stretched as far as the eye could see, and shades lingering at the very edges of what was visible. Then, a man appeared. A giant of a man, wearing a crown bearing the Sanskrit word for "king." He spoke in Sanskrit, a language Layla was familiar with and learning but not fluent enough in for her hazy mind to follow everything said. To move on and start again, was all she managed to get out of it. Then, the golden haze swallowed up everything. The world disappeared, and she woke up in a hospital bed.

Layla was lying in a hospital bed now, too. She hadn't been unconscious...or at least, she didn't think so, but as her thoughts cleared it still took her a moment to figure out where she was. Slowly, it came back to her. She had been exploring the abandoned hospital in the outer circle, and after climbing several flights of stairs began to feel dizzy. She'd run for the nearest room and, after checking to make sure that there were no shadows inside, fell on top of a mostly intact (the sheets were torn up but otherwise it was fine) hospital bed. Then she ended up lying there for several minutes while her brain completely locked up on her. As she slowly recovered, she mentally revisited old memories from the last time she woke up in a hospital bed like this.

"I guess even strength of will isn't enough to beat this," Layla said, sitting up and sliding off the bed. "Either that or I'm just not there yet." "Yet" was the key term. She would beat this, somehow.

"That said, I should probably just head back today. This wasn't the best place to have a seizure." She made her way back to the door and stepped out into the hall.

[Erithania]

Behold, no rest for the dead appears!

Supportive Dancers

Skills
Heat Riser
Twin Shot

Weakness: Physical

Healing Dancers

Skills
Mediarama
Holy Arrow

Weakness: Darkness

Killing Dancers

Skills
Twin Shot
Viper Smash
Fatal End

Null: Physical
Weakness: Lightning

[Layla Amare]

A trio of dancers were standing in wait just outside the room where Layla had hidden herself. No...that wasn't quite right. A trio of dancing pairs. There were six in all, but they were clearly paired off, each body with its arms around another and a single heart bearing a mask floating over both. They were clearly waiting for her to leave, as evidence by the fact that the third of the pair, dressed in black, pointed a rapier at her the moment she had opened the door.

"Sorry, I'm not in the mood," Layla said, bracing herself against the doorway for a second. "I'll deal with you quickly." An immense amount of power flooded through her body, seeming to collect in her chest before bursting forth. The blue-skinned, bull-headed form of Vajrabhairava Yamantaka appeared, taking up so much space behind her that only its many legs were visible through the door. Its skills worked just fine, though, as a series of lightning bolts came crashing down in the hallway, striking each of the dancer pairs. Two of them took normal damage from the electrical storm, while the third, the pair in black, stumbled over each others' feet while desperately trying not to fall over. It eventually fell straight into Layla, recovering just enough to turn its fall into momentum for a slashing attack directed at her. The other two followed up in turn, one with a single thrust, the other with two. Another lightning storm followed, wiping out the black-clad shadow while badly damaging the other two.

With their companion now gone, the remaining two pairs of shadows looked (or at least, Layla assumed they did. The lack of heads made it difficult to tell for sure) across at each other. Then one, dressed in labcoats and scrubs, raised its own rapier high and healed the two of them. The other, dressed in nurse uniforms, did the same, but instead of healing it empowered them in a way that Layla recognized from the fights under the full moon.

Ohh, that wasn't good.

Lightning clearly wasn't doing enough to the two of them, so Layla changed tactics as well. Behind her, Vajrabhairava spread his thirty-four arms as wide as the room would allow. Light erupted from cracks on the ground as they appeared, tracing a mandala pattern across the floor. Layla had to shield her eyes as the attack went off and a brilliant light filled the hall. But at the end of it, the two remaining pairs were still standing. The nurse dancer lunged forward for another two-thrust attack, while the doctor dancer did another single thrust. Layla twisted her body to minimize the damage from multiple stabbing attacks, then pushed in straight past the nurse uniform's rapier, swinging her own weapon at points on their bodies where vital points would be on normal humans. The attacks knocked the dancers off balance, allowing Layla a chance to close even more distance between them. They managed an awkward counterattack, poking at Layla from the side, but it wasn't enough to keep Layla from striking again and finishing it off.

Meanwhile, after one more thrust from the doctor dancers as Layla was finishing off their last pair of companions, Layla turned her attention back on it. She summoned Vajrabhairava again to call down another thunderstorm, which it responded to by healing itself again. ...Great. Was it really going to stall Layla out until she was exhausted? ...Well, she could handle that, at least. She dismissed Vajrabhairava and quickly closed the distance between herself and the shadow again, opting instead to use physical attacks. A few more exchanges later, the shadow finally fell.

"Suddenly I...don't feel rested at all," Layla said, dropping to one knee as the battle finally concluded.

[Erithania]

Behold!



Nothing.

[Layla Amare]

That...was a rough battle. The enemies she fought weren't even much stronger than what she had encountered in similar areas, but their tactics of buffing and healing themselves still drew the fight out for far too long. On top of that, because of the sheer length of the fight she had taken heavy damage in the process. Summoning Vajrabhairava again to heal herself took most of the energy she had left.

Pulling herself to her feet, Layla made her way back into the hospital room and locked herself in. She took slow steps back to the bed where she had managed to land and not quite pass out on earlier, then climbed back onto it and waited for her breathing to even out. She would have to rest for awhile longer before trying to head back.