Mosaic City, located along China's coast, is quite large city sometimes called the Crossroads Between Nations due to its diverse population. While it was once a large tourist spot, the city was placed under a blockade as the military appeared claiming there was a radiation leak. The true hazard, however, is much more sinister.
A deep breath to allow the oxygen to fill his lungs and a steady exhale to carefully release the pressure from within. Twice more, calm one's self down into something more manageable, visualise the task and parameters, and open your eyes. The therapeutic manner that Vice went ahead with his systematic start up for all of his explorations continued on for a moment more as he stood in front of the same entrance that he had left not too long ago. He was surely more prepared this time and for a rather rare opportunity, Arondight seemed to be quite cooperative for today as well. Oh the persona was usually as such but today seemed to be something more, more in sync as it were.
Still, no matter how good a connection he had with his persona the fact that he still had quite a well worn piece of equipment helped. The fondness he had for his current weaponry also made a point that his hands pretty much knew how it always felt to have them on his person. Shoulders loose, clothing fixed, and eyes set straight with a vengeance, Vice continued on for his second expedition through the floating castle.
Fingers weren't feeling, or rather they were pretty numbed out by this point. His left leg was twitching every time he applied pressure unto it but there was no choice but to keep on moving. His coat was torn in places and was miraculously still clinging unto his person despite the damage it's taken. An ethereal fist flew over his head, barely missing his skull by an inch and Vice had to roll down and away from where he was to avoid the incoming attack that he knew was coming. Not a moment later and a black explosion appeared in front of him before leaving a crater behind.
A sword finally flew from his side, a gurgling scream from the opponent and finally the goddamn librarian fell. That freak of a shadow had some kind of spell that kept reflecting all of his physical attacks and was fortunately Null to every form of magic he had on him. Needless to say, the first few rounds of exchanging attacks left him more battered than he'd be comfortable with. Still, with the more problematic opponent taken care of, the remaining Assistant Maya didn't need much more effort to deal with. A fortunate dodge of those goddamn needles of doom and Vice returned his own volley of attacks that had more or least destroyed his opponent. Looking around his surroundings, black ichor splattered all around with the numerous craters and gashes formed by the attack, Vice finally released his breath when there was nothing else forthcoming for this encounter.
Slowly but surely, his body finally began to get feeling again and the biker managed to put in some speed to what had been a crawl not too long ago. Having to move with half of your body more or less numbed out and hopping around like an idiot towards the exit wasn’t as dramatic as the movies made it out to be, hell it wasn’t as damn easy as those shows made it out to be.
Then again, Vice already knew about it. Nonetheless, it was still a burdensome challenge and he was lucky enough that no worthwhile shadow had decided to go against him during his not so short moment of vulnerability. Again, he was damn well wondering just why he wasn’t bringing in a partner for this before reminding himself that he wanted to get stronger without their help.
Battered pride took a lot of pain and time to reform after all.