The Return [Mod]

[Holly Mason]

This time,  Holly was a bit more prepared to explore the mines.  She didn't bring anything different, but she at least had a better idea of what to expect.  More importantly though, she wanted some payback for how little exploring she got done last time she was here.  Besides, this place was the only place that had strong shadows she could handle.  It's not like she was going to chicken out because the battles took a little while.

Entering the mines once again, she decided to take a different path this time.  It looked remarkably similar.  So much so that she actually felt pretty let down.  She noted it on her now gravy-stained notes.  Perhaps today she would have enough energy to find the barrier in this area.

[Erithania]

Beware, A FOOWISH SAMUWAI IS HERE.

Shiro Musha

Skills
Brave Blade
Blade of Fury
Tarukaja

Resists: Slash, Strike
Weakness: Light, Dark

[Holly Mason]

Of course, the nature of the place made any obstacles pretty hard to miss.  She would probably never get through this area without encountering a few shadows.  This side seemed to have less than the other side, since there was only a single shadow bothering her this time.  Was it stronger, brave, or did others just not happen to follow it?  It was so frustrating not being able to tell how shadows worked.  Were their actions genuinely random?  Well, whatever, this probably wasn't the time to be thinking about it.  Since there was only one there wasn't much point in increasing her own attack power.  In the long run, she'd probably do more damage by hitting it, so that's exactly what she did.  Her persona conjured a blast of glowing green wind above the samurai and it pierced through his armor a little bit she guessed.  The blast definitely hurt it, but it didn't seem particularly phased.  Too bad.

The samurai responded by increasing its own attack power.  How annoying, those kinds of skills were becoming increasingly common as she fought more difficult shadows.  It confused her on some level.  Her skills didn't seem that useful unless she was either fighting against groups, or fighting with large groups.  Otherwise it was better just to hit them.  Holly was pretty sure she wasn't underestimating her own abilities, so it always confused her when shadows took time to enhance their strength like this.  Well, she wasn't about to complain.

The next few rounds continued like this: Holly hit the samurai with wind, the samurai buffed itself and Holly continued to be confused by its insistence on enhancing its own strength so much before just hitting her.  By now, she had gotten 3 hits in and was getting ready to send off the fourth, and it was fully buffed with three layers of Tarukaja.  The next hit would hurt, but there wasn't much she could do about it.  She just had to keep hitting it and hope that it would die before it could get its attack off.  Unfortunately, the fourth shot wasn't quite enough to finish off the samurai, but it was hurt.  Holly braced herself for the incoming attack, but it was stronger than anything she could have predicted.

The samurai lunged towards her and started swinging its sword furiously around her.  A lot of the strikes were missing, scraping the walls and the ground on either side of her, but three hits connected on her and brought her to her knees.  Holy shit that hurt.  That hurt more than anything she had dealt with before.  Last battle she was confident that she could just outheal the damage these shadows did, but there was no way in hell she could take another hit like that.  Clutching her chest and gasping for air, Holly sent out what would be her final attack regardless of the outcome.  Fortunately for her, the outcome was the shadow's mask breaking and it disappearing in a puff of smoke.

[Erithania]

Eat more fish.



Fish can be located at your nearest retailer.

[Holly Mason]

For the first time, Holly couldn't even get up after a fight and it was against one damn shadow.  It was a struggle to even lift her arm enough to destroy the card to summon her persona so she could heal herself.  What the hell was that?  She had never encountered something that hit that hard.  Not even that reaper at the graveyard hit her that hard.  Just...what was down there?  She found herself both irritated at her performance, but incredibly excited and curious about what was further in the mines.  Today however, she was in no condition to fight even if it did piss her off.  She would have to explore another time.  It took her a few casts for her to heal herself well enough to walk at a decent pace, but once she did, once again she headed out of the mines without exploring much of the area at all.