Besiege (Nius)

Tokyo, Japan

He enjoyed to travel. The world was vast and he wanted to see it all. This new city was delightful, there were plenty of people. Souls wandered the streets almost as much as the humans. The shinigami weren't able to cover the huge scope of the city. There were spots where he would feed upon humans for days without being confronted. He had gotten better at hiding himself now, at one point he watched as a shinigami went right past him without batting an eye. As much as he marveled at the skill, he found it left him quite uncomfortable afterward. It gave him headaches, but it was a small price to pay for being able to avoid detection.

It was a night like any other when he sensed a three strong signals. Even from a distance he knew it wasn't a shinigami. They felt unmistakeably human. As he moved closer a fourth signal came into range. It was tricky, but soon he identified the source of the signal; another hollow. As best he could tell it was actually moving in his direction, and the three signals were following it. Stratus slid down the side the building he was sitting on and pressed himself against the side the building. Hidden in shadow he suppressed his energies. Out of the open he got a good view of the street as another hollow came barreling down the street. A rotund body, elongated arms ending in claws, and shorter hind quarters. It's mask was scaly with rows of teeth. It's mouth was open in a scream as sudden flash of light impaled it's shoulder. The creature stumbled and slid to a stop. It turned around and from it's mouth shot a blast of flame. The fire ignited the air, but it was answered by a new shower of light. The hollow's body was ventilated by what appeared to be spears. As the monster cried in pain a final bolt struck through it's mask and it's body crumbled. The spears of light vanished and along with whatever remained. Stratus was amazed. He'd never seen something like that. He could feel the presence of the three signals he had felt earlier. He moved further into the shadows. The signals didn't advance any closer, but stayed in the area for several moments then moved away. With a sigh Stratus climbed to the top of the building once more. He could still feel the signals moving further away. They hadn't seen him, but he was more curious about their technique.

He jumped from the building to examine the street where the creature had been. The street was deserted almost like the whole area had been abandoned. There were several indentions where the spears had struck the hollow and pinned him to the ground. The earth was slightly scorched. "What the hell were they?" he muttered. He kept his senses sharp, there was no telling that they might return. But he wasn't confident they too could hide themselves. He could feel something else in the area something familiar. "So many mysteries, and the night has just begun." A strand of slime hit the roof and he swung into the desired direction. His blood boiled he found this all very exciting.

N.I.U.S had only recently found the great hunting ground that was this massive city, although it had not been the reason it had first arrived. Much of the parts that once created it had been manufactured in this place, the most vital gadgetry that had made up its physical body and core. This had been proven quite a pointless endeavor, as no sign was left of its creation but the prey that wandered this place was more then enough reason to stay.

It had been moving through the darkness, hunting for souls when it felt the three presences nearby the same as it felt a hollow presence fade away. It recognized the type of the creatures, one of their kind had assaulted it only minutes after it became hollow, although he had been incapable of surviving the machine's assault. Regardless, N.I.U.S was going to investigate this, three of such humans would prove quite the empowerment of its systems. N.I.U.S suppressed its presence, although not completely as this was still beyond its capabilities, but enough to stealthily follow its mark as it skulked quickly through the shadows underneath the massive buildings. This would be an interesting test of its tactical and combat capabilities.

They moved slowly away from the area. He kept his distance unsure how far their own tracking abilities reached. Should he be discovered his fate might mirror that of the hollow he had just seen. Whatever that technique they had struck from a distance. So even staying far away might not be an effective way to avoid them. Stratus made sure to stay well behind them. They finally came to a stop, he too stopped hidden in a dark alley his senses keen on the targets before him. Much time expired, but they hadn't moved in the slightest.
"Why are they stopping here?" he muttered looking around. He was close, but couldn't see the building they had entered. Impatient he started to circle the area. Keeping them on the edge of his sense trying to suss out their location. As he swung from his strand of slime he could feel again another hollow presence, but unable to fully lock onto it. Who ever the signal belonged to hadn't attacked him or made a move on the three strange humans either. That was all he could ask for. If they moved fire he might take advantage of the attack to launch his own. He circled the area again, keeping an eye out for anything suspicious, any clue to what he might be facing.

They had stopped, had it been noticed? No, they would have attacked if such was the case, or perhaps that was merely the illusion they wanted to give. Regardless of which, N.I.U.S knew that hiding was not going to help it in the long run and even if it had not been noticed already, it would most definately be later on; best get the first strike on them while the opportunity is still there. The serpent moved with speed into the building they had entered, unconcerned with stealth now as it was incapable of keeping hidden at this close anyway and it wanted to challenge itself, pushing ones own limits being an ideal way to improve.

N.I.U.S had formed a plan for its first approach, move in fast and nimbly with erratic patterns, it had learned its lesson after being grazed by one of those arrows the first time. As it sped inside, the creature of steel swung up its tail, smashing into the ceiling and ripping through it to send the material ( be that concrete or whatever else ) flying towards the quincy, providing a temporary wall as well to allow it to return to normal movements and move quickly in a circle around them before making a complete face turn and maintaining a zig zag movement towards the closest of the quincy, with the full intent of mauling it under its full strength.

After the shatter ceiling the three men separated, they had been huddled in the middle of the room discussing the night's events when the large metal serpent entered. They had noticed his strange energy pattern too late, but quick enough to avoid the initial attack.
"Patrick! Lay cover fire!" One of them shrieked, a blue blow materialized in the other man's hand as he jumped to the side narrowing avoiding the hollow's sudden lunge. The fair haired man launched three arrows at the metallic beast's body as he hit the ground and rolled to his feet. The other two men leaped through the hole in the ceiling only to be followed by Patrick. The young quincy fired another wave of arrows at the hollow as he exited.

Outside

The sudden commotion caught his eye. He had made his third pass with the loud noise from the other hollow's attack and the sudden appearance of two men on a building's roof. In the next instant the men leaped away and a third man appeared. Each of the men took up position on a separate rooftop around the building a glowing bow in each their hands. The next moment they were firing arrow after arrow at the building. The spears of light ripped through the concrete and into the building, glass shattered from the windows as bolt after bolt tore the wooden frame to shreds. The stone walls could not stand the onslaught, the two story building became unstable and started to fall in on itself.

Stratus could only guess the other hollow had attacked first. He swung in low then slingshoted himself into the air behind one of the bow wielding men.
"Dun! Behind you!" While he had snuck up behind the man, he was in plain view of the other man. With the warning came an arrow. Stratus raised his hands at the oncoming attack as it exploded into a shower of sparks against his clawed hands. The burst succeeded in knocking him backwards back off the roof. Dun, the man warned spun around and fired a shot. The spear of light hissed past where Stratus had been seconds ago. Stratus reached out with his claw and caught the edge of the building, his talons dug into the wall slowing his descent slight. When his back impacted with the ground it left a crack in the pavement. Dun was already at the building's edge and fired several arrows downward. The gray hollow rolled over and sprinted for the cover of the side street.

It had overestimated itself, the quincy had nimbly avoided its attacks and left it open for retaliation although its incredibly agile body combined with using its tail as shield left it with only a glancing blow and one actual hit; the arrow had left quite the dent in the metallic tail. The hollow reacted quickly to their retreat as it saw them leaving through the hole it had first created, although it could avoid the other series of arrows much easier then the ones before. It decided that for now a more cautious approach was appropriate as they had the high ground, it was safe inside the building for now.

Or perhaps it had underestimated its opponents. The machine was forced to move quickly as the arrows tore through the building like hot knives through butter and N.I.U.S rapidly went towards one of the windows, just after it had been shattered. As it noted the deterioration of the structure around it, it also took note of a fourth presence, darker and emptier, not like the quincy or shinigami, a hollow. That was not its main concern however as it still had to escape the collapsing scene and proceeded to grab hold of edge of the upper roof and swinging itself out of the building before landing on the streets and heading for the location of the other hollow.

(( Sorry for the slow reply ))

OOC: No worries taking one's time is a luxury many should employ.

Several more bolts of light struck the ground behind him as the made his frantic dash for the cover of the alley. He made it within the shadows, but the shower of arrows continued til he rounded a corner. Gasping for breath he tried to reassess the situation. Three of those blasted humans was going to be troublesome. He looked at his scorched arm, although small those bolts were dangerous. Luck would only take him so far, some skill was needed, but thinking wasn't his strong point.
"Those cattle will learn their place." he muttered. He thought of using that one attack, it would cover the area in with shower of crystal shards tearing them all to shreds. But then he remember it took too much time to prepare. Those three wouldn't give him any time to pull it off. He swore at himself for not getting the human during his first assault. Taking two would have been much easier.

The other creature had taken all the attention away from N.I.U.S, it noted, as it saw the hail of energy directed towards a quite different place then where itself was. Heading towards that spot would be tactically flawed as it would give them a single spot to aim for and as such the machine decided to keep its presence surpressed as it moved to attack from behind. The creature scaled the wall with ease and then as it reached the tattered and torn rooftop the serpentine design allowed it to fluidly move through the rubble and shattered pieces and offering cover from the arrows.

N.I.U.S knew it could not move fast enough while remaining its energy supressed, and as such let loose, fully aware that if they were to divert their attention to him it would leave the flank open to its unknown brethren to attack. As it closed in on its targets the snake of steel decided to burrow itself in the concrete, the metal jaws crushing the material in the way as it headed for an attack from below to the quincy, moving like a shark through water as it burst through the stone attempting to crush the legs of one of the quincy between its jaws.

An arrow hit the wall just above his head as he stood in thought. The quincies had moved, one now stood on the rooftop across from the alley and aimed his bow for another shot. Just as he thought to move another arrow came from the opposite direction, they had boxed him in. There was now an attacker at each end of the alley. He was out of options.

On the rooftop

They had broken formation to sandwich the hollow on the ground. In their zeal they had forgotten the benefits of said formation, as well as the second hollow. Paul would would pay for their hubris in thinking they could handle hollows so soon in their training. The metallic teeth sank into the tender flesh of his legs easy enough. His concentration was instantly broken by the surge of pain hat raced through his body. His scream wasn't enough to break the other quincies' concentration, but more than enough to get their attention.
"Paul!" Patrick shouted and leap towards the injured man. The second hollow forgotten as he aimed at the creature that has snagged their comrade.
"Feel the wrath of battle and accept this sacred chalice - Sacred Bite!" he quickly recited the words while releasing a small cylinder. From the cylinder a bright blue energy spilled out and a rectangular beam shot at the N.I.U.S. Don, the third quincy, didn't move frozen in both rage and disbelief that someone was injured. He turned his attention to the previously cornered hollow. The young man was fortunate, as he turned he saw the flicker of green in the corner of his eye and moved. A spear of emerald flew right by him as he ducked down. He popped back up and fired several arrows down, but Stratus was no longer on there. The hollow was now scaling the very building the human was on.

Twisting and grinding into the flesh, N.I.U.S was determined to incapacitate its current victim as its mechanical bite caused further agony to the captured Paul. It was quickly interrupted however by the spell conjured by Patrick. Seeing the beam moving towards it caused the serpent to smash its way downwards back into its tunnel and pulled Paul along with it, although left him lodged into the exit and leaving him where N.I.U.S had been at the casting of the spell, leaving him to be the victim of the Ginto.

As it was finished with Paul, N.I.U.S reappeared again through a new hole, moving with deadly intent now towards Patrick. It was however stopped as the quincy evaded the attack, shooting two arrows in the side of the hollow and sending it barreling away to the side before regaining its posture, maneuvering to circle the quincy, certain that the other hollow would keep the third quincy busy.

The cube of energy smashed into the building tearing a hole though the rooftop upper floor. While it did miss Paul, it did dislodge him from the hole the hollow had left him in. His torn body fell limply to the floor below. Patrick took a quick inventory while the hollow burrowed into the building.
"Three Ginto left." he muttered. He didn't want to risk checking on Paul til he subdued the hollow. Keeping his senses sharp he jumped to the opposite building his bow ready.

The other building

Stratus thought he was clever in climbing the building, but the quincy could already sense his presence. The quincy had to admit firing straight down would be difficult, but not impossible. Before he could approach the edge of the building something green shot over the side into the air and then fell back down. Another green blur but this time it traveled over the side and fell down on the rooftop. The object hit the ground with an audible splat. Don eyed the strange puddle.
"What the_" He was cut off as a shower of green came up over the side and down upon the roof. Don moved to dodge them. The ground seemed fine so it wasn't acid, but it could be poisonous. Little by little he moved backwards as the green goo flew at him. He didn't release his bow, he could still feel the hollow on the side of the building. Even as the detected the hollow he suddenly moved. The hollow popped over the side of the building, Don quickly fired his arrow. Too quick, he didn't notice the green crystal encasing arm. The blue bolt struck the gemstone and exploded. A small chunk of crystal fell off, but the green shield still held. Don tried to take a step back only to notice he was on the edge of the roof. Stratus landed and rushed him.

The quincy had jumped to a different building before N.I.U.S had time to reappear, clever. Now came the matter for it to readjust to the new situation as it would be inadvisable to get back onto the roof without a proper plan set into place. Once prepared, N.I.U.S dug its way through the chunks of broken concrete and back up onto the roof, grabbing hold onto a large chunk with its tail in the process and hurled it towards Patrick, in order to keep him moving to hinder his accuracy. As the concrete flew N.I.U.S barreled onwards, moving erratically from side to side to throw him off with the intent to push him to the side of the building and finally finish him there.

(( Pathetic post and slow to write it, sorry. Been rather occupied. ))

The creature's first strike was met with an explosive arrow, the chunk of rock shattered. He readied another shot, but the creature had already moved. It's motion was enough from getting a good shot, but he figured he wouldn't have to. There was no doubt the creature was aiming for him. Focusing his energies he took a leap into the air. Once airborne he began to shoot arrow after arrow down upon the metal serpent.

The other rooftop

"Feel the wrath of battle and accept this sacred chalice - Sacred Bite!" Don had released his ginto from his pocket at the advancing hollow. The bright block clipped his right shoulder and sent him pinwheeling to the ground. He lay there clutching a large gash. The young quincy grinned and reformed his bow and aimed. Although his arm was injured it wasn't useless. He raised his empty right hand, the quincy thought it a call for mercy, but his hand he fired slime the size of a baseball. It hit Don's stomach. He panicked and grabbed at the green slime on instinct. Imagine his surprise when he couldn't remove his hand. He looked up in shock. His hand now occupied the bow was useless. Before he could cry out another ball off slime hit his face blocking one of his eyes and half of his mouth. The hollow continued to fire shot after shot. Partially blinded Don had much trouble dodging the other shots aimed at him. It didn't prevent him from trying, but he forgot he was already at the building's edge. Don stumbled and fell backwards over the building. Stratus stood up, the cut on his arm covered with green crystal, it hurt, but the bleeding stopped. Slowly he walked over to the edge of the building. Although more powerful than most humans, the young man could do nothing to protect himself from a fall off a seven story building with one hand trapped. With a sigh Stratus spit over the edge.

Its efforts had once again been proven futile. The human was faster then it and had the advantage of ranged attack power where N.I.U.S had none. A serpentine shape also had its advantages, of course. The machine twisted and turned, avoiding many of the arrows while moving, however it could not completely negate the attacks. One hit the thick plating of the upper parts of the creature, leaving a large dent and singe while another hit the thin armour of the tail's ending part, tearing its way through and allowing a good look into the machinery within. However, the human had left himself vulnerable.

Knowing that the quincy would have a hard time maneuvering while in the air, N.I.U.S rushed ahead and went down from the roof in order to intercept Patrick before he touched down and calculating the angle and speed of his descent in order to perfectly place itself for the right strike against the human.

Jumping from the second rooftop to the next Stratus moved to the other hollow's location. The human had just fired his shots. He wasn't about to let the other creature to claim more kills than him. The quincy was quick in sensing him. Just as Stratus landed there came two arrows, one pierced his leg and the other grazed his shoulder. Pinned there was no chance running from the third shot the quincy held.
"You forgot the other guy?" Stratus said feeling the other hollow's presence. The young man's eyes widened as he turned to look behind him.

The other hollow had distracted the quincy and his fate had thus been sealed, as N.I.U.S crashed into him as he turned to face him, the serrated teeth tearing into the poor man and crushing him between the vice grip of the metal jaws. With blood dripping down the near demonic visage of the machine beast, and the synthetic red eyes glowing as it rose to view its fellow hollow. "I am certain that your presence was a key reason to my success. If I were able to express 'feelings' of appreciation, I predict I would do so." The cold monotone of the artificial voice showed no hint of whether or not what it said was sincere, but neither did it express any hint of lies either.

The energy consumed from the deep bite into the quincy allowed N.I.U.S to utilize the natural regeneration of hollows as the damage sheets of plates lowered itself into the chassi, being replaced by new ones and returning N.I.U.S to a fully repaired, if bloody, state. "I deem it suitable for us to properly share the bodies of the fallen, as we both played equally important parts in our victory."

Momentarily looking at the corpse before it, then continuing. "And even with only half of the energy to consume, it would still be quite worth the effort it took to destroy them. Do you agree?"

As the other hollow bit into the human the bolt of energy pinning him down vanished. Still Stratus grimaced at the large hole in his leg. Through clenched teeth he covered the bleeding wound with his slime and crystallized it. He looked up at the other hollow. Well it was mighty embarrassing coming to help only to be saved by the other monster. What made it worse was the way it spoke. What exactly was it talking about.
"Sure, yeah I agree." His irritation was replaced by confusion. Even at this close range he could barely sense the other creature's energy. It was a hollow to be sure, and yet it wasn't. It was hard to get his brain around, and he rather not try. He looked; it's body was metal. "What the hell are you?"

A most peculiar question, what was it? Truly, N.I.U.S no longer was truly aware of what it was. It had come to identify itself as one of these hollow, yet the reactions it had come across so far had made it less certain if that were to be the case. "What I am... I am Nebulous Interactive Universal System. N.I.U.S. I was created as an advanced computer with artificial intelligence, however I learned the truth about spiritual energy and turned humans into raw materials in order to inject their latent energies into my own design." N.I.U.S stopped for a moment, the memories of how it had first come to the conclusion of the existance of spiritual energies was still unclear along with how it had turned into a hollow in the first place.

"I managed to accumulate enough energy to draw the attention of a creature I later learned to be a hollow. It destroyed my former shell, yet I quickly returned as the creature you see me as now. I destroyed the hollow and set out into the world. From what I have calculated, I am hollow. Yet I have grown to be uncertain as to whether this is all." While it spoke N.I.U.S had proceeded to finish consuming the remainder of Patrick's corpse, not needing the usage of either its mouth or being directed towards Stratus in order to properly converse.

He could only pretend to understand what the metal monstrosity was talking about. Whatever the cause, it was a hollow. It wasn't something he'd never seen, but hollows were never uniform in appearance. He scratched his head and shrugged.
"Fine fine, sorry I asked." he grunted looking at the wound on his shoulder and leg. The shoulder cut had almost finished closing while the hole in the leg hadn't began to close yet. Ever so carefully he jumped down from the building to street and traced his way to the Quincy that had fallen to his death. Perhaps a meal would speed up the process. Stripping the slime from the body he began to feed on the still warm corpse. Happily he was right, the hole closed within moments and he was quick to jump back to the roof where the other hollow sat. "Alright, I hate to owe anyone anything, but I owe you one. Let's hope you live long enough to cash it in." He grinned to himself. The creature had attempted to tackle 3 humans alone, chances were he'd be dead soon enough. Stratus could keep his word, and yet wouldn't have to. He laughed and fired a strand of slime swinging from the rooftop. Stratus vanished into the night, still snickering at his good deed.