Cursed swords and five-letter words...

[prunedworlds]

WHO: Ritsuka and Gil
WHERE: Fantasy Costco
WHEN: Sometime early August-ish
WHAT: Side quest time!
WARNINGS: Gil's ego Property destruction, accidental arson

All things said and done, Ritsuka should probably be relieved that she was one of the first people Gil contacted when he suddenly acquired (re-acquired?) superhuman strength and reflexes. That is to say, he asked the one person who'd probably actually know a bit about handling it, rather than going off and trying out his newfound might willy-nilly according to his whims. On the other hand, when he proposed taking up one of the one-off job postings that popped up on the app as a means to test his new limits, it meant she really couldn't say no.

Admittedly, she probably wouldn't have, anyway, there was very little she was unwilling to do to help out one of her Servants and friends if asked, but the point remained.

In any case, that was how in short order she found herself standing outside an otherwise ordinary-looking store called "Costco", wearing her sole Mystic Code and doing her best to explain to Gil just how to use his new-old abilities.

"I'll let you know if I see an opening, or warn if there's something that needs your attention, of course. But I'm sure you can just use your best judgment for most things."

Comments

[throwmoreswords]

There's an order of operations for contacting people. Gilgamesh has already spoken to his family for his full allotment this year, so they're out; Vergil was the first to know when the stress of shattering a glass shower was still wound up in the small of Gilgamesh's spine, and now that he's settled into what all the possibilities mean for this new-old strength, the best person to contact, of course, was the person who claimed to have known him in another lifetime.

(He'd always been curious about some of these 'job' postings--odd that some of the tasks seemed so trivial, so foolish, the thought of the weird sandwich e-mails that Ms. Takamaki had a running count on at the back of his mind, and then others of them seemed rather. Dangerous?

Exciting.

But Gilgamesh had been an ordinary man with an ordinary man's strength until very recently, so he'd put the idea out of his mind--

but when life gives you tempered glass shattering strength, why not make a mosaic?)

The sword(le) feels familiar in his hand, as he plays with the hilt while they walk, flicking his thumb over the letters as he tries to think of a good word (sharp? shiny? glass? razor--) and then keys in R-A-Z-O-R, looking over the blade as it hones and sharpens. What a Costco was, Gilgamesh was unsure.

But a battleground felt familiar--and fighting things that weren't flesh and blood felt a touch better for whetting one's appetite for destruction, given that bloodshed isn't a skill Gilgamesh is acquainted with in this life. He slides a side-long look down to Ritsuka, giving her an easy smirk. "I do some of my best thinking in motion. It can't be too hard to outmaneuver reanimated, brainless objects--but keep your eyes keen all the same."

As if her offer had been his idea. As if Gilgamesh would ever change his way of speaking, rolling his shoulders and loosing a breath he hadn't known he'd been holding as he moves to proceed Ritsuka into the Fantasy CostCo.

Whatever that was.

[prunedworlds]

Ritsuka can't help a bit of a smile, herself, albeit for very different reasons. He might barely remember her, but Gil was still, well, Gil, and that was oddly reassuring in its own way.

"I'll tell you if I spot anything."

By which she means, of course, that she'll probably be shouting out directions regularly, possibly even rapid-fire, but that doesn't need to be outright said. Gil's ego would never allow it to be overtly acknowledged, even if he does end up listening in the heat of battle anyway. The man had his pride, like some overgrown, golden-haired cat.

Which, frankly, it's probably quite a good thing Ritsuka doesn't share that attitude, because as it happens, they have all of about five seconds to appreciate the swirling chaos of armed animated oddities before a suspicious movement catches her eye and--

"To the left!"

She's darting away to the side even as she shouts, because that sure is a rather thick tome hurtling through the air at them. Ganbare, Gil~

[throwmoreswords]

No matter how much things change, they stay the same, right? Even in another lifetime, with another origin story, the King still found a way to be the King, unflinching and unbending, unbowed and unbroken.

Fantasy Costco is sure-ass having a time, isn't it? Gilgamesh can barely comprehend what he's looking at--animatronic decorations gone rogue, a scene out of some childish fantasy where armor and floating bric-a-brac act as soldiers in place of the moral quandaries that come with fighting men. It's like level one of a video game, and it almost feels like some sort of elaborate joke--

And then Ritsuka's voice pierces the air as a book comes hurtling towards them, the teenager darting for safety as Gil snaps back into the forefront of his mind, certainly about to catch a book to the face.

But then gold glows over Gilgamesh's shoulder and a chain springs to meet the tome, piercing through it and driving to the ground to crack the tile and pin the book, Gilgamesh dodging as a second book spirals after it, and finally swinging on a third, rending a good chunk of... whatever the covers magic books are presumably made of (magic cardboard?) and yellowed pages away from the rest of the body of the book with his razor sword.

He breathes and doesn't wait for the next volley, slicing a broom that divebombs him in a messy 2/3rds sort of configuration, stance widening as his eyes cast around the room--ready, waiting, flying by the seat of his pants.

[prunedworlds]

His reactions are slow, a part of Ritsuka's mind dutifully notes, even as she has to scramble to get out of the way of a broom. This sort of fight is always the trickiest, when there's no truly safe place for her to stay and command from. Instead she has to constantly move, keeping as close to her Servant--or whatever Gil can be considered right now--as possible, without getting so close as to be in the way. It's difficult and more than a little dangerous, but she's done it before, and under worse conditions.

Because as bad as the swarm of walking armor and flying objects is, it's still just a mindless swarm. Incoherent and individually weak, with no apparent strategy beyond haphazardly throwing everything it's got at the intruders.

"Behind!" she calls out as a broom suddenly streaks toward her, dropping down and to the side to keep herself out of the way for Gil to counter-attack.

"Try to keep moving! There's gotta be a source somewhere..."

[throwmoreswords]

It's like he's mimicking something he saw once, like he'd dreamed up his swordplay during an idle fantasy--and there are odd moments where he pauses, as if he should be bolstered by something, and usually, a bladed chain leaps to his defense in that moment.

(His body feels--odd. As if he's stuck between being fluid, being swift, knowing what he's doing with a bladed weapon, and yet, at the same time, he feels like he should be still, unbothered, movement unnecessary.

Movement is incredibly necessary in this moment, as he swipes and sweeps and cuts his way through brainless bric-a-brac, that chain handily making up for gaps in his footwork, but he makes a note to address this with... someone, somehow. He's good, but he's not good enough, and not being good enough is basically the same as being bad, and that can't stand, now can it?)

Ritsuka ducks and Gilgamesh slices, cleaving the broom in a messy twain as the cleaning implement misses her. He moves closer to her at a quick clip, continuing to hack and slash his way through the mindless, unwavering hoards of marching, mindless decor, trusting Ritsuka to see to herself for the most part--though some. Instinct? In him moves him to be between her and the danger more than once, and then (Enkidu) leaps to save them both, fighting fools that they are.

"What sort of source are you looking for? Something glowing and obvious, or a small, irritating button?"

He doesn't have much attention to pay, but he'll try?

[prunedworlds]

There's a certain awkwardness to this. Ritsuka may be fighting as she's always done, and Gil may be almost moving like she's familiar with, but that's just the point. It's almost the same, but not quite. She needs to be mindful of that, to not put herself in danger beyond what Gil can presently guard her from even if her reflexes want to say otherwise.

"It could be anything," Ritsuka admits, speaking quickly inbetween dodging and scanning the room, herself. "If the attacks start getting worse, then we're probably getting closer, so just keep on the move and I'll try to watch for something."

Because Gil's instinct is right, his focus should be on the immediate battle. It's the Master's job to keep an eye on the bigger picture; Ritsuka just needs him to keep on the move so that she can better survey what's going on around them.

[throwmoreswords]

When he's alone, later, and left to think on his own performance, he'll find himself wanting--like his body knows what it's meant to do, in some sort of loosely sketched practice, in the sort of visualization one has when they daydream about themselves completely some sort of athletic act, but when he actually tries to go for it, he feels slow. Unpracticed. Almost clumsy.

They're in the thick of it now, though, so Gilgamesh has no time to overanalyze the way his limbs feel wrong, the heaviness to his swings--all he can do is swing and swing again, carving their path in busted wood and fluttering strips of paper and dented, sheared metal like he's fighting a modern art installation that's meant to mimic a writhing, pulsing jungle, strands of decorative lights reaching like creeping vines as armor-suit leopards leap from between shadowy, half-covered shelves as he and Ritsuka fight their way into the thick of it.

The strange chain leaps from that glittering gold portal to protect them both in fairly equal measure, trying to give at least a little breathing room as Gil carves and breaks and changes his Sword to 'SMASH', because sometimes you have a knife when you need a club, and the steel rod may not cleave things in twain like the honed blade might've, but Gilgamesh has strength enough to make up for that. "Would being up higher give you a better view, girl?"

[prunedworlds]

Enkidu, at least, is a familiar, even if Gil himself doesn't seem to know how to fully utilize the chain. But it's still a little more room for Ritsuka to maneuver and still be covered, making up for some of what Gil's currently ability seems to be lacking.

That said, the attacks definitely do indeed seem to be getting more intense. On the one hand, experience tells Ritsuka this means they're most likely on the right track. The defenders tending to get, if not tougher, at least more desperate, the closer one got to whatever was being defended. On the other hand, unless she missed her guess, any worse would probably begin to quickly push the limits of what Gil's currently capable of, which would do neither of them any good.

In other words, time is also increasingly of the essence.

"Maybe, if there's a way to pull it off..."

She doesn't want to make things harder for him, but perhaps he already has an idea in mind?