The Battle for Her Soul

"I could say the same. I'm so glad to have met Anyis's new friends." said Grants with a charming smile as he grabbed Djinni's outstretched hand. A surprising amount warmth conducted itself from the white metal of Grants's gauntlet... well, perhaps not so surprising since the gauntlet belonged to the guy with fire spewing from his back. The atmosphere between them was rather positive, as this was two generally cheerful Navis shaking hands. Just shaking hands... Just shaking hands... Just shaking hands...

"Oookay, that's quite enough of that." interjected Anyis, cutting between the two to grab Grants's hand and drag him back over towards the Titan's core. She wasn't THAT concerned with Djinni and Grants, but, well... this was the last living moments of her husband, not Djinni's. Anyis felt she had the right to be a little possessive. There were still so many things she wanted to say to Grants, things she couldn't say to him or anyone else these past few months, but damn if she wasn't at a rare loss for words. She opened her mouth once or twice, hoping words would just come out of their own accord, but ultimately she just bit her lip and gripped Grants's hand tighter.

"... Anyis?" queried Grants, sensing his wife's distress.

"Let's... just get this over with. I don't even know what more I could say to you right now." sighed Anyis as she frustratedly let go of Grants's hand. He looked surprised for just a moment, but quickly switched over to a very know-it-all kind of smile. That did not help Anyis's frustration a whole lot. "... Mill, I'll need your help for this."

"Uh oh... You wouldn't be telling me in advance if there wasn't a problem." muttered Mill apprehensively.

"A little one... Well, you'll see in a second." replied Anyis, before looking back to Grants again and wordlessly conveying... something by the look in her eyes. Grants understood and nodded, and then the two of them... Crossed? Perhaps it wasn't so surprising that the long-time lovers had a Cross together, but...

"... Wait wait wait." interrupted Mill, as he stared intently at the information on his PET's screen. "You had a max level Cross and you never even told me?!"

"Isn't it obvious by now that it was a touchy issue for me?!" snapped Anyis in return as a shroud of white flame lifted itself to reveal her new form. She was clad in white armor similar in design to Grants's own, just altered to a more feminine persuasion. The metal of the armor was noticeably lighter, and somehow Anyis willingly put on a plated skirt instead of the usual leg armor. Her knee-high boots became armored while her normal gauntlets just turned white, and on Anyis's head was placed a circlet, fit around the same as was the flame laurel that Grants had previously placed. At Anyis's hip was a red scabbard, with a longsword tucked within. Her bare arms were visible between her shoulder guards and gauntlets, but it was otherwise clear that Anyis still wore her sleeveless blue bodysuit underneath.

"No need to hold back on my account, Anyis." said Grants with a chuckle, as he too finished Crossing, emerging from a veil of blue fire. "Oh, good, I still had enough data left for this to work." he added after a moment, looking over his body to check if anything was missing our out of place. His body armor had been replaced with a white robe much like Anyis's, just with the sleeves cut off entirely. His red bodysuit lost its sleeves too, exposing Grants's well-toned and tan arms. A single silver bracer was equipped to his right wrist, and instead of wielding full gauntlets like Anyis, Grants just had his knuckles wrapped up for padding. His belt was just like his wife's, but in addition to the robe it secured a dark red, slightly baggy pair of pants that reached down to his ankles. Grants didn't need heels on his shoes like Anyis, so on his feet were just a flat pair of white slip-ons.

"Meh... Doesn't matter, this Cross is about to get destroyed anyway. Mill, I need you to go to... here in my file directory." announced Anyis as she pointed a finger out in front of her and transmitted the filepath back to the PET.

"So this is where you were hiding it... What do you want me to do with it, though?" asked Mill, after navigating to the location for GrantsCross.

"Hack it. I need the protection on the joint attack broken." answered Anyis bluntly.

"... Huh?! That's not a little problem, it's illegal! And how would I know how to do that, anyway?!" retorted Mill.

"It's easy... when you're not concerned with the file's integrity after the fact. Just break the protection, let me use the function, and then wipe the Cross from my files. I'll guide you through it." explained Anyis, as her finger resumed movement to send instructions to Mill.

"Fine... Shame to waste something this powerful, but I guess it has to be done in this case." sighed Mill as he began mucking around with the needed data.

"It's either the Cross or me, and I think we've already made that decision. You ready on your end, Grants?" questioned Anyis as she turned her attention back to her husband.

"Just about..." responded a distracted Grants, whose hands were pressed against the Titan's core as he focused on... something. "This is pretty tricky since I'm a ghost now too. It feels like I'm about to split myself apart trying to collect the Titan's remnant data... Ah, hold on, I think I found it." With Anyis in GrantsCross, it was up to Grants in AnyisCross to play the part of the spirit medium and collect the loose bits of the Titan's body around his core. And... Grants did a good job of it, as a veritable waterfall of data fell from the sky and onto both the core and himself. "Ha ha, yeah, that's it alright!"

"Jeez... I've been chipping away at the Titan's data for months now, and there's still THAT much? Freaking monster..." groaned Anyis at the sight of the River-borne data mass. She then walked into it to join Grants at the core, adding "Well, there's more than enough now. Better just get it over with..."

"Yep. I'd say goodbye properly, but I don't think I can let go at this point..." observed Grants, who glanced back at his hands pressed against the Titan's core.

"You never were very good with my powers..." sighed Anyis who, after a moment of thought leaned in, gave him a peck on the cheek, and wrapped her arms around him in a hug. "I promise I won't forget you."

"Ha ha, I'd hope not. You're going to have all my memories after you patch my core in." laughed Grants.

"... Ergh... You've probably had some thoughts I don't want to know about..." groaned Anyis in response, having not given much thought to that aspect of this repair process. She then detached herself from him, and looked at the crack in the Titan's core. "Oh well, I'll just deal with that when the time comes. Let's get this show on the road." she said, drawing her sword from its scabbard in the process. "Everyone! Here it comes, get ready!"

With the announcement, Anyis ignited her sword in a plume of white flame and pointed it at the large core's crack. She paused there for a moment to gather even more fire on the blade, to the point that the blaze was starting to burn up the Titan's surrounding mass of ghost data. "Mill! I need the function now!"

"Alright...!" responded Mill anxiously, who fulfilled the last of Anyis's instructions, breaking the protection on the joint attack file.

The already intense fire on Anyis's sword turned into a true wildfire, so strong that she was likely to purge the Titan, Grants, and all of her chances at survival if she didn't do this immediately. "White Fire Revival!" shouted Anyis to trigger the hacked power, as she plunged her blazing sword deep into the Titan's core. A brilliant flash of light followed, and thus would come the Titan as well...

(Battle Start)

The moment Anyis plunged the sword into the core, the mass of data lit up with white fire and burned its way into the ground, taking Grants with it.

A few moments later, a rumbling noise could be heard as the earth began to shake. The shaking increased in intensity as the sound grew louder, and peaked as the ground a dozen or so panels ahead bulged, cracked, and gave way. Through the hole rose two enormous translucent skeletal arms that reached high into the sky. The ghostly fingers of each hand spread out as they slammed down onto the surface of the net, wrecking a swath of panels each on impact. A murky mass of junk data flowed up from out of the hole along the skeletal structure of the arms, causing them to fill out and bulk up into something resembling rough, jagged golem arms made of billions of oddly shaped chunks of glass. The thickened fingers of each hand dug into the ground, and the creature they were attached to began to pull itself up....

The ghostly entity known as 'Titan' rose ponderously from the hole, destroying even more of the Net's surface as its gargantuan shoulders broke through the ground. As the translucent creature assumed a standing position, only its upper body, which was clearly humanoid in form, was visible. Even so, the aptly named Titan towered dozens of meters above the surface of the net with just its upper body, which also happened to be endowed titanic muscle mass. Just one look made it abundantly clear that this ethereal creature could turn a Navi sized object into the data-equivalent of paste with very little effort. And as the Titan stared down at the gathered programs below with its two black, pit-like eyes, it made its intentions to do just that known with a mighty roar that caused the Net to quake and ghostly flames to briefly erupt from its body.

((Battle Theme))

====Summary====
----The Titan----
Titan: 3000 HP
Titan's Left Arm: 1000 HP (Resting on cracked terrain)
Titan's Right Arm: 1000 HP (Resting on cracked terrain)

----Allies----
Anyis.EXE: 220 HP
Magna.SP: 100 HP

MeleeMan.EXE: 420 HP
Damascus.SP: 70 HP

Djinni.EXE: 180 HP
Oasis.SP: 80 HP
Szand.SP: 80 HP

Eidolon.EXE: 200 HP
Icaro.SP: 60 HP

----Terrain----
Broken: 1% (The hole made by the core.)
Missing: 20% (Where the Titan is standing. Cannot be changed.)
Cracked: 20% (The 2 patches where the arms slammed the ground.)
Normal: 59%

Anyis didn't have long to watch her husband go up in flames, as the sheer force of the Titan's resurrection threw her backwards towards her allies. Magna quickly adjusted his position to catch her, although he couldn't soften the impact all that much with his metallic hands. "Oof!" grunted Anyis, before quickly regathering her focus as her GrantsCross dissolved permanently. Though she returned to her normal outfit, the white flame laurel around Anyis's head remained as Grants's power persisted through the Titan. Anyis then looked up over the gigantic monster as he let out a bellowing roar, comparing him to the Titan of months prior in her memories. "Well, no doubt it worked." she noted, seeing traces of Grants's armor scattered across the Titan's body.

"No kidding..." replied Mill weakly, his mouth left hanging after as he stared in awe of the Titan's size. He had never seen anything even close to the Titan in sheer volume, and that was considering the fact that his entire lower body was still stuck underground. "I really hope you have an idea of how to beat it, Anyis...?"

"He shouldn't be a whole lot different from when Grants and I fought him before, and he does have a few weaknesses. We've got him outnumbered better this time, so just follow my word and keep the chips coming. I don't have any plans of losing twice." answered Anyis assuredly before hopping off Magna's hands to stand on her own feet. "Everyone! Focus on his arms! His body structure isn't stable, so we'll break him apart piece by piece! If you can hit his arms and body together, do that too!"

Mill heeded Anyis's instructions and began picking through his chips, while Magna looked down at his mistress with a question on his mind. "Mother Unit, what should I do? Defend my fellow SP units?"

"No, you get in on the fight too. You and MeleeMan have the most brute strength among us, so you've got the best chance of keeping him off balance. Keep yourself protected, and start throwing punches. Got it?" Anyis's orders were quick and decisive, since she figured the Titan didn't care to wait for them all to coordinate much.

"Understood, Mother Unit." nodded Magna, before efficiently equipping himself with both his shield and barrier.

"Good, let's go!" said Anyis, with Mill having sent an array of strong chips for her to wield. Being just naturally faster than her SP (having legs helped), Anyis charged the Titan first, and with his fists still pressed into the ground she triggered a WaterLine. The high-pressure aquatic pillars erupted underneath the Titan's body and his hands, but that was only the start of her assault. "Remember me, you giant pile of garbage?!" shouted Anyis at the Titan as she invoked her channeling abilities. She had been harnessing the Titan's data for a couple months now as her primary attack function, and just because the monster was alive again didn't mean Anyis was any worse off at the task. She opened her palms and pointed them at the Titan's left arm, and just by force of will tried to rip some of his composing ghost data asunder. "I'm still your worst nightmare, and the only reason you're back is so I can kill you all over again!" jeered Anyis, somewhat for strategic reasons but otherwise just as an expression of the true hatred she held for the Titan. "Magna, go!" she added right at the end, backing away a bit to make room for her SP.

"Understood!" acknowledged Magna, who leaped forward at the Mother Unit's command as Mill slotted in the GutPunch registered directly to Magna's protocols. Yellow armor assembled itself around the golem's free right hand as he extended it outside his barrier. Magna's fingers rolled together into a fist as he twisted his arm back, before unloading a strong uppercut on the index finger of the Titan's left hand to try and knock it up and clear off the ground. It seemed like there was a little extra... oomph in Magna's punch compared to normal, perhaps spurred by this being the do-or-die moment for the Navi he had sworn to defend.

"Stay back Anyis, here come some ranged attacks for you!" announced Mill, signaling the upload of two more chips. "Magna, you get back too, before this thing retaliates!"

Magna complied and started hopping back away from the Titan as Anyis set up her new chip data. "I was damn desperate to bring your ugly face back! Be grateful that I even accepted an abomination like you as my last option!" Anyis lobbed a LilCloud at the Titan along with her flurry of venomous insults. "Can you even understand that I'm mocking you?! You can't, can you?! You don't think, you have no soul! You are a collective flaw with the entire Net, and nothing else!" All this anger at the Titan must've been pent up for a long time, because Anyis was really letting loose against the monster. She punctuated all her verbal bashing by chucking an IceWave crystal at the Titan's left hand. Feeling her processes starting to cap out for the time being, Anyis relented finally and turned her attention back to the rest of the team.

"Let him have it! Go all-out! He won't stand a chance if we cripple him early!" commanded Anyis, letting all her motivations power her words, whether that be her desire to win this fight and live, to not let Grants's sacrifice be in vain, or simply to avenge her wounds from the first encounter she had from the Titan. Whatever the case may be, Anyis and Magna backed off from the fight, taking to their evasive stances while MeleeMan, Djinni, Eidolon, and all their SPs took their best shots at the monstrous Titan.

Anyis's Actions:
1) WaterLine2 (145 Aqua damage [b], Ground Attack, Wide Attack) @ Titan's Left Arm/Titan/Titan's Right Arm
2) Titan Revival (140 Aqua damage [A], Phasing, 4TCD) @ Titan's Left Arm
3) LilCloud (85 Aqua damage , Wide Attack, 2 Turn Duration) @ Titan's Left Arm/Titan/Titan's Right Arm
4) IceWave1 (105 Aqua damage [A], Freeze) @ Titan's Left Arm
5) Dodge
6) Dodge


Magna's Actions:
--Reinforced Golem's Buckler (Passive 3-Hit Shield)
1) Core Field (80 HP Barrier, 2TCD) @ Self
2) GutPunch (70 damage [A], Impact, Knockback) @ Titan's Left Arm
3) Dodge

Cooldowns:
Titan Revival - 4 turns
Core Field - 2 turns

While MeleeMan and Damascus prepared for battle against the most gigantic foe they'd ever seen (and they'd seen a hydra monster in the desert before), Rania found herself focused on the relationship between Grants and Anyis. In her whole life, she'd never really seen what true love was like... her parents left her when she was born and she'd never found someone she was so fond of. Two digital beings were intimate in a way that she'd never even considered... here she was, worrying about which swimsuit would fit her when she went on a date while Anyis bid goodbye to her husband forever. Although Mill's navi acted a lot like MeleeMan sometimes, Anyis was actually more mature than Rania had ever realized.

MeleeMan nodded in response to Anyis, then started revving up his boots and gauntlets. "I like how she handles things. Healthy, directed anger is my favorite way to take care of a problem," he smirked, extending both fists out in front of himself. His body soon became a streak of fire, bursting across the net and towards the Titan's chest. "Why don't more navis have problems that require beating sheer walls of rock into rubble? The net would be a better place with that kind of simplicity," he joked.

Out of his gauntlet, a fiery blade extended from the holes that ordinarily allowed his jetfire out. It was a great sword, to be sure, but it wasn't nearly wide enough to slash across the titan's entire body. "So what? I'll hack one place till the thing's arm falls off," he reassured himself. It was bad enough that he was being lumped in with that golem as one of the strongest brutes on the battlefield; he was getting damn tired of being relatively small in comparison to Anyis' acquaintances and he meant to remedy that condition quickly.

"MeleeMan!" Rania called out, although if she was worried, it was far too late. MeleeMan was already trying to hang onto the rocky body of a giant, malevolent spirit. "I don't want you dying over this either, okay? Try not to play it too dangerous."

"Uh, I can't really fight this thing any other way. If you're really worried, though, I'll make my muscles extra hard," he responded, as if tense muscles could be relied upon to stop an avalanche. His free hand and legs groped for a good hold on the creature while his free arm attempted to drive the fire blade mercilessly into the creature's body. For the average man, it would be a little like trying to stick a pick into the side of a mountain and maybe dislodge a boulder, but so strong and dogged was MeleeMan that he intended to cut away the entire mountain if he could.

Damascus didn't particularly look forward to chipping herself against a sheer slab of rock, but the situation definitely called for it. Her glare remained focused on the giant creature, but would it even notice such a tiny detail? Sighing, she transformed herself into a steel blade, lengthening out to obtain her nodachi shape. "If there was ever a time for a sword long enough to cleave a horse, it's now... Maybe a longer sword, even, but I don't have any such weapon in my repertoire," she thought to herself, spinning through the air to aim at the creature's shoulder. She made certain, of course, to avoid her master. Also important was her trajectory; if she shot herself past wrong, she would find herself plummeting below into the hole the creature's body had come out of.

"Djinni! Sand! Fire! Whoever you other two girls are!" MeleeMan roared out, trying his damndest to hang onto the creature's body and provide a distraction. "You can't beat a monster like this without getting angry! Scream all you need to!" he advised them, then clenched his teeth to avoid biting his own tongue off as the monster would inevitably either buck or smash him with its hand.

MeleeMan
1) AreaGrab onto Titan [Teleport + Accuracy UP]
*) Melee subtype Bash [Add impact to next action]
*) Survivor's Code: Red Rage [strengthen next attack 30]
2) FireSword1 @ Titan and Titan Left Arm [130 fire melee, boosted A accuracy + slashing + impact]
3) FireSword1 @ Titan and Titan Left Arm [100 fire melee, boosted A accuracy + slashing]
4) FireSword1 @ Titan and Titan Left Arm [100 fire melee, boosted A accuracy + slashing]
5) Soul Fist: Iron Grip @ Titan [20 damage melee, boosted A+ accuracy + hold + self hardbody, 3 TCD]

Damascus
1) Stepsword @ Titan Left Arm and Titan [120 damage melee + teleport + slashing + wide attack]
*) Variable subtype Debuff [Buff-based debuff 24]
2) Steel Skin [self-ironbody]

"Hahaha..." Djinni nervously laughed, one corner of her mouth raised higher than the other beneath her face mask, "Hahaha... She's serious about this, isn't she?" Realizing her own reaction, she looked over to her SPs and noticed they had little to no reaction whatsoever.

Szand, noticing Djinni's gaze, glanced back. "One glance at its core and I pretty much knew about it. He's comparable to Efreet," Szand said, "Remember he didn't have his own core back then."

"..." Oasis remained quiet, but while she kept a stern and serious face Djinni could tell the little SP was shaking on her legs. "Evil..." she muttered. A caring hand was placed onto her head and she turned her head upwards. "We save," she said to Djinni, which was met with a nod.

But for Djinni there was a different thing that made her programming feel a desire to destroy this opponent. "At first I thought we only had to save Anyis," Djinni said as she stared up at the Titan, trying to lock eyes with it, "But now there's another life." Her sight passed the pieces that once belonged to Grants' armor but had become part of the Titan's exterior. Like a gunner preparing for a quick draw duel, she swung her hands backwards and into the exterior of her cape. "I won't let you taint the memory of Grants!" she exclaimed and pulled her hands back, now encased in solid magma in the shape of cannons. Seeing her allies focusing their attacks onto the left arm, she turned to do the same. Two streams of lava emerged from the cannons, aimed at the left arm, after which the magma cannons crumbled and dissolved as the parts hit the ground.

But as MeleeMan had performed his attacks, his mouth performed a mental attack as well. On his allies. "Yes... I understand my name," Szand said, "But does he have to say it so crude..."

"Oasis!" Oasis exclaimed at MeleeMan as loud as possible while waving her arms, "Oaaasiiis!" She sighed out loud and turned her head at Szand. "We act?" she asked, figuring that Djinni and the Support Programs would not perform any moves together.

From Oasis' and Szand's view it looked as if Djinni was not doing anything in particular, but in reality she was moving her mouth so little it was not noticeable from the facial mask. If anyone would've listened to it closely it would've sounded like an unknown language, one only recognizable by Djinni and Efreet. "I know you're there... It was just like with Fhyre," Djinni thought as she stared at the Titan and kept moving her mouth, "Total control is almost impossible. You have to be there... Grants. From what I've heard and seen, I know you can't resist helping."

Whether her whispers reached their intended goal or not, she continued her whispers. "MeleeMan..." she thought as she shifted her sight to the burly man, "Well, he is a guy... So this should be strong." The barrier she was initiating to protect MeleeMan was shaped by the words of 'evil deeds', so in order for the barrier to be strong the deeds had to be something MeleeMan could be persuaded to do. In her mind she tried to imagine all the perverted things MeleeMan could be doing with her body and whispered these into the shape of a barrier around the muscled Navi. A blush surfaced across her cheeks as the whispered words slipped over her lips.

Szand nodded and raised his right arm as sand formed around it. "If you'll be my shield, I'll be the weapon," he said.

Oasis simply nodded and ran in front of Szand where she'd put up a defensive position. Streams of water emerged from the shell on her back and connected with the ends of her ponytails, which in turn formed large bubbles which she wielded like shields. "Finish!" she exclaimed.

"Very well!" Szand exclaimed as he tossed a javelin of sand at the left arm of the Titan, followed by another one thrown with the same hand. Once the sand particles settled down he walked over to Oasis' back and crouched slightly. "What about- What are you doing..." Szand asked as he looked at Djinni, his third eye keeping an eye on the Titan's actions and clearly noticing the blush on Djinni's face.

"Shut up!" she shouted at Szand, put her hands over her cheeks and closed her eyes to regain focus. "I'll just stay on my feet for now," Djinni said as she spun around, letting her cape flow through the air, and once the movements had died a second Djinni was standing by her side. "Disperse!" she shouted and both Djinnis shot out into opposite directions while the SPs remained in place. But as Djinni was moving across the ground, she realized she had now presented two of herself for the fantasies she had whispered into MeleeMan's barrier. "Stupid stupid..." she whispered to herself, as if hoping it would grant her a barrier against the embarrassment.

Eidolon again tried to tune out the goings on between Grants and Anyis as they said their final goodbyes and prepared to revive the monstrosity they called the Titan. She would have to sort out what she thought about the whole thing, not to mention the memories she had managed to re-awaken, later, when she was by herself and not about to fight a giant monster that they were bringing back to life to repair Anyis. For all of Andrew's complaining about the apparent simplicity of the attack...beyond fighting and defeating the thing, at least, Eidolon couldn't help but feel a bit of amazement at the idea. Perhaps she would take a piece of the Titan with her as well. Anyis only needed the core, so it couldn't hurt to borrow some of the rest of it, right?

And then it appeared, smashing up through the ground of what had already been a crater and rising up to tower over all of them. It easily dwarfed any sentient entity that Eidolon could ever remember seeing, despite only its upper body rising out of the ground. Titan - she could see why it was given such a name now.

Behind her, Icaro trembled at the sight, clearly thinking the same things but with much more emotional range and capacity to be appropriately terrified at the situation. Though Eidolon knew it was the appropriate reaction to being faced with such a juggernaut of its sheer size and power, she could not feel such fear herself. She wondered if she had simply forgotten how.

"We...we have to fight that," Icaro asked.

"Just keep everyone else alive," Eidolon said. "Or try to." Icaro was still freshly created and inexperienced, and she wondered if tasking her with playing healer to the entire group against this thing was asking too much. But there wasn't much choice. She extended a hand toward her, creating the faint outline of a large, hemispherical shield in front of her.

Andrew's reaction, meanwhile was very...well, very Andrew. "Ho-ly shit that thing is huge," he said, having the benefit of not actually being there to tremble at the sight of it. Then "But it reminds me of you in a way, Eidolon."

"Am I a monster now?" Eidolon responded.

"No, no, that's not what I meant," Andrew stammered. "It's just that...no, never mind. Chips, you'll need chips, here, take some chips." He jammed a series of battlechips into the PET to distract Eidolon and make her focus back on bringing the Titan down.

And fortunately, whatever Eidolon thought of his words, she did focus on it again. She opened her palms toward the Titan as her gauntlets began crackling with electricity. Bolts jumped between her hands, originating from the cap over Pianissimo's shattered emblem but settling themselves in volatile, sparking balls of energy in her hands. Eidolon clenched them into fists, crushing the intangible orbs and sending them toward the body of theTitan as a single lightning bolt, which then spread out in three directions upon reaching it to target the arms as well.

As sparks flew, Eidolon was momentarily distracted by the shouting of...Meleeman, wasn't it? Something about getting angry and screaming. "It's Eidolon. But...um...no, trust me, you don't want to hear that." she called back, sparing him from the unearthly, distorted electronic howl that would have been her take on 'screaming'.

She watched long enough to see her allies all go after the left arm. She doubted there would be much left of it by the time she was able to fire off more attacks at it, so she turned her focus toward the right instead. Then, she vanished entirely, only to rematerialize over the gargantuan ghost monster's right arm. Red wires snaked out of her gauntlets as she fell onto it, aiming to plunge themselves into the glassy flesh of its arm. The wires then attempted to siphon some of the junk data within back into Eidolon, while simultaneously feeding corrupting junk data of her own out of her body and into it. While the wires did their work, Eidolon turned her hands themselves on the arm as well, drawing from internal energy to fire a blast of corrosive spectral energy at it in hopes of locking up the right arm's attack problems.

The wires retracted back into her gauntlets, and Eidolon half jumped, half glided away from the massive golem arm to avoid its inevitable counterattack. In her place, she expelled more spectral energy to summon a ghost of sorts of her own from the hole the Titan was rising out of. The shadowy form normally associated with Nightmare viruses brandished a wickedly curved blade and slashed through the space between the Titan's arm and body, attempting to hit both in a single cut.

Meanwhile, Icaro did not run at or teleport onto the Titan like the others, but hung back where she was hopefully not in immediate danger of being crushed in a single blow. She did, however, send a spiritual curse of her own at the towering ghost monster, aiming to momentarily steal its sight, or whatever form of perception it used, away.
___

Eidolon:
*Spectral Shield: Passive 1-hit shield, given to Icaro
1. ElecReel: 80 Elec +Spread3 to Titan Body, spread to both arms
2. Reappear: Teleport onto Titan Right Arm
*Hack: Add Glitch to:
3. Data Vampirism: 80 Lifedrain to Titan Right Arm
4. Corrosion: 80+Freeze to Titan Right Arm
5. Dodge
6. SummonBlack1: 160+Wide+Slashing to Titan Body and Titan Right Arm, summoned from Missing

Icaro:
1. Stolen Sight: Blind to Titan Body

As Anyis rushed forward, Djinni and Eidolon fired off a volley of high powered ranged attacks at the massive Titan. The barrage of high powered ranged attacks and Anyis' geyser attack damaged and sundered the Titan's armor, leaving the creature seemingly open for any follow-on attacks. Icaro took the opportunity to blind the creature from a relatively safe distance while the rest of the team went to work. It was at this point that the Titan took a swing at Eidolon with its right fist, only to miss as she teleported atop the Titan's enormous punching arm.

Anyis capitalized on this distraction, and used her powers to tear a chunk of junk data out of the Titan's left arm. This angered the Titan, and made Anyis an immediate target. The Navi ordered her SP, Magna, forward just in time for the Titan's massive fist to crash down upon the two of them with panel smashing force. The far taller Magna successfully defended 'the Mother Unit' as he took the brunt of the attack against his barrier, and proceeded to counter the attack with a powerful return upper-cut that pushed Titan's hand... not at all. The Titan generated a large ball of white hot witch-fire as opened its hand above the SP, and sent it blasting downward soon after. Anyis managed to skip out of the blast zone, but Magna could only rely on his damaged barrier to stop the point blank attack.

MeleeMan shot to the Titan's chest like a comet while it was occupied with trying to turn Anyis and Magna into messy floor graphics. Once there, the fiery Navi began hacking away at the creature with his gauntlet's flaming blade. Damascus soon followed suit, and delivered a flying drop cut of her own to the Titan's left shoulder. And, between the two of them, they managed to grab the Titan's attention in short order.... Luckily, Djinni was on hand to lend MeleeMan a little defensive support in the form of a barrier.

The Titan drew its arms in closer to its body, and began releasing swarms of eerily glowing phantoms from its ghostly body. The phantoms issued unearthly wails and piercing shrieks as they swooped upon Damascus and MeleeMan with a vengeance. The majority of them flew past erratically, as if half blinded, but enough of them hit MeleeMan to destroy his barrier and sap some of his energy as the malicious specters passed through him. Still, the stubborn pugilist Navi clung to the Titan in spite of it all.

And then things got a little weird(er)....

Eidolon had just executed a glitch-laced data draining attack upon the Titan's right arm just in time for MeleeMan's barrier to overload and go nova all over her, Damascus, the Titan, and Magna. The ghostly Titan suddenly shifted colors from vaguely transparent monochrome to the strawberry pink, chocolate brown, and vanilla white of neapolitan. It now stood as an impressively towering and twisted monument to frosty triple scoop deserts everywhere. As a comparative afterthought, its vanilla white right arm turned to something resembling solid stone beneath Eidolon.

Eidolon, herself, felt strange, but showed no outward signs that she had been affected by the wave of corruption. Unsurprising given it was Eidolon. However, her problems would soon manifest along with her openly broadcast thoughts. How this would affect her would remain to be seen.... In the meantime, she zapped the arm again with an attack that would disrupt the Titan's ability to fight.

Magna, who, as the point man, just happened to be too close to the Titan at the time, found his body turning transparent. In just a few moments, the golem SP's body had become just like lightly color-tinted glass, and the glowing orange energies within began to shine out. What Magna did not know just yet is that he had also become the cyber equivalent of a plague bearer. All it would take for him to corrupt a data form and induce glitches was to touch it with his hands.

At the same time, Damascus found her sword form starting to lose its rigidity as her body turned to something akin to pudding. Her sword-form body flopped over limply and started to tumble down the Titan's arm. However, before Damascus could come to terms with her situation, a pair of javelins struck the Titan's left arm, and the outer layer of (currently pink) junk data disintegrated. Damascus immediately fell towards the ground below, but used her steel skin ability to avoid taking unnecessary damage. This did not prevent her from crashing through a cracked panel, and falling down into a two meter deep hole, however. On the bright side, the rain cloud summoned by Anyis did not bother Damascus in the least, even when it rained on her.

With the left arm out of commission, Anyis turned her attention to the right, and let loose with an Icewave. At the same time, the Titan began to retaliate for the loss of most of the functions of its left arm by striking out at Djinni's crew. Djinni took off, and sent a decoy in the opposite direction to try the confuse the Titan, but she was not the intended target. Oasis moved to stand before Szand, and held up one of her shields in an effort to ward off the incoming blow, but to no avail. Titan's megaton fist shattered the shield and smashed both SPs into the pavement while doing considerable damage to the network. Eidolon then responded by summoning Nightmares to flay the Titan, and was rewarded with repeated strikes against the enormous enemy.

However, the Titan still stood, and it appeared to be growing a suit of armor....


====Summary====
----The Titan----
Titan: 1460 HP (???) {Glitch: Brown Color/Subtype Roulette}
Titan's Left Arm: Damaged {Glitch: Pink Color/Random Panel Changes on-hit}
Titan's Right Arm: 460 HP {Freeze; Glitch: White Color/Poisoned(5/Action); RockBody/Second Chance}

----Allies----
Anyis.EXE: 220 HP [Normal]
Magna.SP: 100 HP (3-Hit Shield) [Cracked] {Glitch: GlassBody/Plague(touch)}

MeleeMan.EXE: 390 HP [Titan]
Damascus.SP: 70 HP (IronBody... sorta) [Broken] {Glitch: JelloBody/AquaBody}

Djinni.EXE: 180 HP [Normal]
Oasis.SP: 30 HP (1 Hit Shield) [Cracked]
Szand.SP: 30 HP (Cover) [Cracked]

Eidolon.EXE: 200 HP [Titan] {Glitch: Inner thoughts are broadcast aloud/Chip damage fluctuates based on mental state (RP).}
Icaro.SP: 60 HP (1 Hit Shield) [Normal]

----Terrain----
Broken: 2% (The hole made by the core. And another one where Damascus fell in.)
Missing: 20% (Where the Titan is standing. Cannot be changed.)
Cracked: 39% (4 large patches where the Titan slammed the ground.)
Normal: 39%

"What the hell..." muttered Anyis in reaction to the glitchy apocalypse. Eidolon went and bugged up the Titan's right arm, but Anyis was prepared for that much since Eidolon herself was buggy. What Anyis didn't expect was the barrier that Djinni gave MeleeMan, and how it was set to explode in a code-breaking armageddon. Her attention was immediately drawn to the more obvious defects, being the Titan's fruity recolor and the strange metamorphosis of both Magna and Damascus. The latter turned into... pudding or something, while Anyis's own SP had his body reconstructed out of glass. The purple tint did NOT blend well with Magna's core energy that shone through. "Ugh... Magna, you can still fight, right?"

"... Yes, Mother Unit." replied Magna after a moment of uncertainty. He quickly ran a scan of his systems, and discovered one other quirk 'granted' to him. "I seem to lack the containment processes for my defects."

"English, Magna." said Anyis curtly.

"I can retransmit this glitch via a direct transfer, otherwise known as touch. I cannot ascertain as to whether this is beneficial." explained the golem.

"Ugh... Magna, you just hang back for now and I'll help you figure it out." sighed Mill in response to his SP's plight. "You just keep up the attack, Anyis, since you didn't get a glitch. I'll send more chips right away."

"Don't be shy with the good stuff. If this is a situation to be holding back on, then I'll never go all-out the rest of my life." added Anyis quickly.

"Right, right. It's a problem for me too if you die, you know." nodded Mill as he picked out a new quartet of chips to slot into his PET.

"Yep, god knows what you'd do without me." teased Anyis as her new weapon supply arrived. "Alright... One arm's down, and maybe this'll do to get rid of the other one. Come get some, Titan!" With that shout, Anyis materialized a BigHammer in her gauntlet-clad hands and charged towards the monster's right hand. She hoped this was a good opportunity to strike, as the giant clenched fist had just pounded Djinni's two SPs and left quite a dent in the ground. With that, though, Anyis's earlier IceWave attack took hold as a cold crystallization wrapped around the arm and left the Titan unable to retaliate further.

"Everyone stand back!" announced Anyis suddenly as she swung the BigHammer at the Titan's knuckles. It was a very strange proclamation, given that she both had already attacked and not really used anything with a wide attack range... until the air around her exploded, anyway. The second chip in Anyis's arsenal was a Burner, and since she was already in melee range because of her hammer strike, she triggered the Fire chip immediately, sending an intense burst of flames out from the white laurel on her head.

Given that she had already assaulted the Titan's frozen right hand with blunt force trauma and fiery explosions, it would seem like she didn't really care about preserving that ice. Maybe she didn't, and was aiming more for the arm's destruction. Regardless, though, she was still an ice Navi, and she had some Aqua chips lined up to make that whole problem worse for the Titan. She backed up a few steps from the phantom monster, only to thrust her fist forward and project a dense cloud of water particles. The vapors condensed rapidly into a solid form, and the resulting MistConv hand jumped forth and crashed into the Titan's own hand. Anyis's LilCloud from before continued to rain on the beast still, and just then it looped back around to pour water down on the Titan himself and his remaining arm. Not even stopping there, Anyis conjured a trio of icy spikes in front of her via an AquaNeedle and launched them in unison at the Titan's hand. After that, Anyis finally did back down, retreating further away from the Titan as to not interfere with anyone else's attacks. "How's Magna doing, Mill?" asked Anyis offhandedly as she kept her attention on the Titan.

"I really have no idea. He's fine, himself, but there's no telling what'll happen when he touches something." answered Mill uncertainly.

"Should I initiate a test, Operator?" queried Magna.

"You have an idea?" questioned Mill of his SP. "I guess go ahead if you want."

"Understood." said Magna with a nod as he tossed away his shield. With his right arm still occupied with the GutPunch's extra armor, the golem raised his left and pointed his palm forward at the Titan's body. Magna then gripped his left forearm with his right, triggering the glitch imbue into his buster palm. With the fresh distortion in his systems, Magna fired at the Titan, letting loose... god knows what. After that, Magna constructed a new shield to replace his discarded once, inadvertently glitching it too just by virtue of him holding it. With his defense re-established one way or the other, though, Magna stood aside like Anyis and braced for what the Titan might bring.

Anyis's Actions:
1) BigHammer1 (160 damage [b], Impact, Break) @ Titan's Right Arm
2) Burner2 (130 Fire damage [A], Nova 2) @ Titan's Right Arm
3) MistConv (125 Aqua damage [A], Impact) @ Titan's Right Arm
--LilCloud (85 Aqua damage [b], Wide Attack) @Titan/Titan's Right Arm
4) AquaNeedle2 (45 Aqua damage x 3 hits ) @ Titan's Right Arm
5) Dodge
6) Dodge


Magna's Actions:
1) Grip hand (Plague)
2) Buster Palm (??? damage [???], ???) @ Titan
--Glitch Reinforced Golem's Buckler (Passive 3-Hit Shield)
3) Dodge

Cooldowns:
Titan Revival - 3 turns
Core Field - 1 turn

MeleeMan had no way of telling everything that was going on, given his vantage point. He could at least tell that the arm he'd been hacking at had come off, which he attributed to his own power. The combination of his position and the noises bursting around him, as well as the dizzying effect of being pounded by ghosts and all sorts of crap he couldn't see, was making it impossible to focus or make conversation. He could distinctly hear Djinni's voice nearby... Her voice, saying some very interesting things...

But just as it got to the good part, some ghost wailed in his ear, overriding the sound entirely. "Daaamn you!" he roared, clenching his fists in preparation for another assault. "Firehits, Rania! All of the Firehits, let me have em!"

Rania was having a difficult time following the action on screen herself, but at least the vitals of both of her players seemed to be in the green. She slotted through her two best firehit chips, then let MeleeMan continue the fight. In the mean time, she turned her attention to Damascus. "Are you okay? Your sword's blade looks like it melted..."

Although she was pleased to find that she could transform back to her humanoid form, Damascus found that she was stuck into the ground in a way that did not seem possible. Upon further inspection, she realized that the ground was half stuck into her body and that, furthermore, the skin beneath her skinsuit was transparent. Her whole body seemed to have become liquid metal. Looking up, she inspected a raincloud beating down on her and half marveled, half panicked as she noticed no rust overtaking her body. Turning to Magna, she saw that he was afflicted with a curse even worse than her own. "Such bodies as ours, reduced to gel and fragile glass! This is a powerful foe indeed," she grunted, trying to free the oversized breadth of one of her womanly dimensions from a hole for the second time in just a few minutes. She gave the titan a deadly glare, blaming the situation on him.

"... I think that was actually one of your allies who did that one," Rania muttered under her breath.

"What the hell?" MeleeMan grumbled, realizing that the unyielding gray body he'd turned onto now looked like ice cream. "What kind of crap is this? It's all ice cream! I hate ice cream!"

"Impossible!" Rania interjected irritably. "Nobody hates ice cream!"

"Yeah, well I do!"

"But you said you liked cream pies ear-"

"That was entirely different!" MeleeMan defended. "It's making me so angry, I'm going to melt it all with my fists!" he roared, expelling heat from his fists with rage as hot as his fists. What kind of mockery was this, his great opponent reduced to a bowl of ice cream? He wouldn't let anything on the net make him look like a fool, not without getting a significant beating in return...

... Except, as he thought about it, the creature's toughness didn't really feel all that different from how it had earlier. Only the color had changed. "Damn it all! I'm just going to burn it until all that's left is milky slop!" he roared, raising one fist to try and smash repeatedly into the titan's body in a graceless, aggravated motion.

Rania shook her head, then held it in one hand and lurched forward. "I'm sorry, Grants... It feels like all of this is dishonoring your memory somehow," she sighed. "Wait, MeleeMan! Can you hold on?! M-Maybe you should use this rageclaw to make sure you don't fall!"

"I am not falling, Rania. I am not letting some stupid fight with a stupid ice cream giant end in such a stupid way!" he reassured her, but accepted the rageclaw to help him hold on all the same.

MeleeMan
*) Red Rage to next attack [30 strengthen, passive]
1) Firehit2 @ Titan [145 fire melee, A+ boosted accuracy + impact]
2) Firehit2 Double Attack @ Titan [115 fire melee, A+ boosted accuracy + impact]
3) Firehit2 @ Titan [115 fire melee, A+ boosted accuracy + impact]
4) Firehit2 Double Attack @ Titan [115 fire melee, A+ boosted accuracy + impact]
5) RageClaw1 to hold onto Titan

Damascus
1) Try to get free
2) Try to get free
*) Variable subtype Debuff [Buff-based debuff 24]

"Szand! Oasis!" Djinni shouted at her allies as they were pancaked underneath the giant hand of the Titan, "Are you two alright!?"

Both Szand and Oasis had fallen underneath the immense force of the Titan's hand, now both on the floor amongst the cracked surface. Szand was the first to get some movement into his body, standing up and glaring at Djinni with his three eyes. "Do we look OK?" he groaned at her, but thinking she couldn't hear him he just waved at her.

Oasis also stood up a short moment after that, rubbing the top of her head with her hands while maintaining balance with the aquatic hand that once was a bubble. "Is big hand. Does ouch," she muttered under her breath. One of her bubbles had burst, but the other was still fine.

"Good," Djinni told herself as she saw the two getting up just fine. With her two Support Programs being on their legs again, she turned her attention back to the Titan and began to speak to Na'im, "What do you make of this thing?"

"It's weird," Na'im commented, "Mostly it means that there are still unidentified things in the networks." And despite being fully aware that Szand and Oasis were attacked, he felt that the impact didn't really leave an impact. "But whatever it is, as long as it abides to the law of the digital we are capable of deleting it. I'm sending you the Meteor chips, Djinni."

"What about Szand and Oasis?" Djinni asked as she started the loading procedure for the battlechips.

"There is little they can do aside from attacking bit by bit," Na'im commented, then switched the audio channel to that of Szand and Oasis. "You two should move away from that location," he said, making the two properly notice the cracked panels, "But he's big, so his attacks are big as well. Don't get close to Djinni."

"But..." Oasis started, twiddling her thumbs together, but eventually got pulled away by Szand.

"I prefer having some distance between her and me," Szand commented and ran away from Djinni and off of the cracked panels together with Oasis. He let go Oasis and made a step towards her back. "Same as before, right?" he said with a grin.

Oasis raised her hands and moved the remaining bubble at the end of one of her ponytails to her front. "Set!" she shouted, "Your move!" Szand had already raised his hand with a spear of sand hovering above it, even before Oasis' words, and quickly threw it at the right arm of the Titan.

"You know..." Na'im's voice sounded after switching back to Djinni's audio channel, "This could be fun." And he slotted another chip into the PET.

While the loading of the new battlechip had only just started, the three Meteor chips were now prepped. Djinni's cape billowed upwards, fluttering in a non-existent breeze, and three rods plummeted out of the ruby surface. A glittering ruby was embedded at the top of each rod and, once Djinni pulled her cape away from them, each sent forth a fading light towards the sky. Djinni's smile stretched beneath her mask as twelve little dots of fire appeared in the sky.

There was, however, a fourth chip. Djinni took hold of the right of her cape and fluttered it upwards, causing another object to fall out of it. Once again it was a wand, but this one had a circular audio speaker on top of it instead a ruby like the others. "What is this...?" Djinni asked as she went through the battlechip data while investigating the object with her eyes. Hanging at the back of the speaker was a microphone and after putting one to one, she realized the usage of the chip. "Oh, I see!" she exclaimed and took hold of the microphone.

"She's not going to..." Szand commented, his right eye twitching at the sight of Djinni holding the microphone.

"Ohno..." Oasis merely whined, granting herself a quick glance towards Djinni while keeping her defense up.

"I'm sorry," Na'im stated in the Support Programs' audio channel, then muted the sound of his PET for the time being.

While Djinni's appearance was something that could make women jealous and she had the dancing skills of a professional, there were simply things she did not excel at. Singing, however, was not one of these. Djinni was actually a great singer, back from the days where she was going to be an idol, and she still enjoyed doing it in her free time. However with the effects of the chip, every word she uttered sounded like pure madness including those allied with her. The speaker wand blared out the worst sounding 'music' paired with Djinni's now unrecognizable words, which seemed really awkward as Djinni happily moved along the rhythm she could seemingly only hear in her own head. At least there was still eye candy behind the insanity of sounds.

Eidolon drifted back toward the Titan's arm in the wake of her attack, surveying the damage done. The other three had taken the left arm of the Titan out of commission while she had done a number on the right, meanwhile turning the whole thing into... Ice cream? What the hell? It didn't taste like ice cream, so maybe it's just the color. But why do I feel so-
Why can I hear myself? Am I really hearing myself? I'm not just imagining things right that's really my voice saying things but I'm not saying anything... Eidolon looked down at her hands, still only half-believing that her own voice was being broadcast without her saying anything. It continued to fade in and out of a static noise as she audibly worked out what was going on. ...must've fed back into me after I bugged it...hasn't happened before but who knows what this thing can do...stupid Andrew can't write a decent protection program to keep me from glitching myself-oh shit he can hear this sorry Andrew no offense but while you're listening you really should do something about that-yes I know it's probably my fault-no it's not I didn't ask for any of this-augh damn it there is no way I am going to get used to this can I get a bugfix over here?

Andrew stared open-mouthed at the mess that Eidolon's glitch attack had unleashed. For a moment, he wasn't sure whether he should be more alarmed at the sheer cascade of bugs that it had caused, turning the Titan into a ghostly triple-scoop and then spreading back into Eidolon and two of the support programs on the battlefield, or the fact that he was now hearing Eidolon's thoughts. Hearing them, as in they were clearly audible through the PET's speakers. He double-checked the code on his computer to see if the write-protection had been broken, but saw that the error was a more immediate and less severe one that nonetheless wouldn't be fixable until after the battle. "Just a glitch, then," he said, then immediately turned red when Eidolon called him out in her thoughts. She apologized in short order, but it had already been said. Well, thought. "Damn it Eidolon, I've been doing what I can," he shot back. "And no, I can't fix anything while you're still fighting. Speaking of which you should proabably get back to that before you get smashed into the ground or something."

Distinct thoughts came in over the sheer indiscernible noise that was beginning to fill the cracks in Eidolon's internal monologue again. Well fine I'm sorry for thinking without thinking-that was the stupidest thing I've ever thought wasn't it-makes no sense at all-but he's right I should do something-smashed into the ground was it I think I can do something about that. A spectral outline of a shield formed around Eidolon's body, swinging around to position itself to deflect what she thought was the most likely angle she could be knocked off from. That shout do the trick-hope it doesn't just smash through it though. Eidolon's thoughts dissolved into noise again as several lines of thought picked up at once. She thought to herself for what may have been the first time, may have been the fifty first, it's not like she would distinctly remember a passing thought that wasn't being broadcast to the world, that her shield didn't look solid at all, and that it was only through experience that she knew it wasn't completely worthless. Another train of thought had her plotting out another course of attack, to take out the right arm as well and do as much damage to the body while trying to not get hit.

Another still mused over the sound of her voice, ending in a perfectly clear Do I really sound like that? I wasn't aware my voice had so much static in it.

She was snapped out of her thoughts by the sound of Djinni...singing? There was no way that was singing. I've heard worse though. I've probably made worse.

But it was enough to get her to focus, and to remind her that it still urgent to actually do something. Eidolon vanished again, carried by another teleport. This time, however, there was a very clear indication of where she went: a blue streak of light trailing up the Titan's arm to its shoulder where she reappeared. More glitched data exploded from the tip of her damaged sword as she thrust it at the Titan's body. At the end of her thrust, the blade exploded as well, leaving her weaponless and with no way left to stay on.

Knew that would happen-why did I forget to plan for it again-Andrew, this would be a good time for something to hold on with.

"Got it," Andrew said. "You might want these two, just in case. No idea if they'll work though."

Magbolt? Airstorm?-not exactly in much danger of pulling this thing out of the ground.-maybe I can use them to hold myself on at least. First thing was first though. Red wires extended from her left gauntlet, materializing barbs from the end as she directed them toward the Titan's body. If they succeeded in piercing it, she would pump spectral energy through them to strengthen them, allowing her to hold on. Or better yet maybe I should do something like that anyway. The wires then magnetized, creating a strong draw that normally would stun and drag enemies toward her. There was nowhere to drag the Titan though, and at any rate she would be hard-pressed to move it at all. On the other hand, she was still on the other end of the pull, hopefully allowing her to stay on.

Unless someone down there knocks me off. But maybe they'll have better aim than that.

The same spectral energy then created winds leading from below in toward Eidolon, creating a localized ghostly airstorm that would, in theory, be enough to cut through the Titan's body. And in theory I should have been fixed enough to be stable by now.

With the wires she normally used for draining attacks already extended, she focused on getting them to siphon more energy as well. Might as well-either stuck in place here or about to get thrown off.-but while I'm here Andrew do you have a fix for this yet?

"I already told you. I can't do anything while you're fighting," Andrew answered.

Fine. Doing this my way then.-there is no way this is going to work but I've got nothing better. Eidolon gripped her chest with her free hand, feeding corrupted data back into herself, in an attempt to cancel out the glitch currently afflicting her systems with another one. Yeah this is a really stupid idea.

Icaro, meanwhile, could only watch on with something between awe and confusion at the glitch party currently taking place. She thought to try and heal her, but other than the bug that was making her spill her thoughts to the world Eidolon didn't actually seem injured yet. So instead she focused on one of Djinni's support programs, the one that had been defending the other. She sang as well, in a much less discordant tune than whatever Djinni was doing. Rose petals spread out from her outline of a body, carried by an imaginary wind to surround Oasis and transfer their healing energy to her.
___

*Spectral Shield: 1-hit shield to self
1. Ghost Sword: Gain two instances of Strengthen40+Glitch
2. Stepsword to Titan Body and Titan Right Arm: Teleport to shoulder over right arm, 120 Wide (+40+Glitch to both targets)
3. Rageclaw1 to hold onto Titan
4. Magbolt1 to Titan: 90 Elec+Stun+Magnetic Pull - use pull to hold onto Titan better
5. Airstorm2 to Titan: 60+Pull to up to three targets
6. Data Drain to Titan: 40+Drain
*Hack: Glitch self

Icaro:
1. Song of Healing: 30 Healing to Oasis

Anyis hit the Titan's right hand hard while it was still on the ground, striking it with both blunt force and fire. The ice surrounding his hand shattered almost instantly, allowing the Titan to raise his arm up out of the ghost-hunting girl's reach. Before the beast could retaliate, though, Szand's spear pierced the Titan's forearm while Eidolon teleported up to his shoulder to cut deep into it with a sword. Those extra attacks sent the Titan past his limit, causing the chunks of data around his remaining good arm to burst apart and leave behind just a skeletal frame. The Titan let out a pained roar as his arm momentarily went limp, allowing MeleeMan and Eidolon a chance to attack from atop the monster's shoulders.

Feeling the hits against his body, the Titan regathered himself quickly enough to lash out at the most immediate threat, in this case MeleeMan. To his defense though was Damascus, who managed to whittle away the damage from the Titan's bony fist until it was little more than a bump against MeleeMan's side. Quickly shaking off that debuff, the Titan was about to make a more worthy strike against the gnats pecking at his body, Djinni brought down a rain of meteors and interrupted his motions. This was especially effective with both the Titan's arms damaged, as the firey pelting had nowhere to go but square into the Titan's chest. With the beast forced to try and swat away the meteors, MeleeMan and Eidolon continued their shoulder-mounted assault while Magna charged up his glass palm buster. Something was bound to be off with that shot given that Magna, who himself was glitched, just glitched his buster, which again itself was already glitched was corrupting the attack with errors at an exponential rate. The aim, luckily, was about the one thing left alone as the orange blast of energy shot out and struck the Titan in his stomach.

It would forever be a mystery how hard that shot actually hit, but whatever that number was, it was apparently past the tipping point. The chunks of ghost data composing the Titan's body gave way, exposing the full basic frame of the monster... and his all-important giant red core. By all rights the Titan should've been defeated, but the skeletal creature flat-out ignored the HP readings on all of the Operators' PETs and burst into a rage. White fire began spewing from the point of Magna's bugged buster shot, quickly engulfing everything left of the Titan, purging all the beast's ailments, and flinging MeleeMan and Eidolon off and to the ground. As it was before, that effectively left them and the rest of the group outside of the Titan's reach, but...

Well, with the meat of his body effectively destroyed, the hole that the Titan's lower half had been stuck in was suddenly not as much of an obstacle as it once was. Thus, the flaming remains of the Titan rose up out of the hole, and the giant that was already from waist-up the size of a decent building now towered over the immediate world at a more mountain-like type of height. The blaze quickly consumed the Titan's now exposed legs, effectively shrouding the entire skeleton and turning the monster into a creature of pure white flame. No one could really tell what the Titan's attention was on with the flames coating his face, but a low growl rumbling through the battlefield as he reached a burning hand down towards Anyis probably gave enough of a clue. Though he had no particular intellect to speak of, the Titan could still recognize the girl responsible for his last death.

Rather than cast a shadow down over its prey, the Titan's giant hand drowned the area around Anyis in light from the burning white flames, blinding the Navi almost entirely. The raw destructive power of the fire repelled everyone else away, leaving Anyis to fend for herself against the Titan's grasp. While she could've probably fought to the death in an epic battle of ice versus fire, that... wasn't necessary. When the Titan's burning hand closed in, its destructive white flames got mixed with the curative white flames from the laurel on Anyis's head. Being the original and true form of Grants's fire, the few embers resonated strongly with the rest of the blaze and sent the Titan's entire flame body into a chain reaction. The destructive white flame that fueled the revived Titan was converted fully back into the curative white flame that Grants killed the Titan with originally, and the effect was just as potent the second time. The Titan began writhing immediately as the flames around him ate apart his skeletal body, making the ground quake with each stumbling step he took. Despite his colossal size, the Titan burned away in just a few moments as the huge volume of flames around his body rejected everything about the monster's existence.

And, amazingly, just like that all that was left of the Titan was a soft rain of white embers and ash. For a moment it could've been wondered if the Titan actually burned too well and left nothing of his core, but thankfully one of those embers ended up being larger and more solid than the others, falling in front of Anyis as what closely resembled Grants's old core. With the source properly dead, the rain of white fire embers soon halted entirely, and as a result the laurel around Anyis's head put itself out, leaving her again exposed to the mind-bending pain she suffered from. Perhaps it'd be best if she got this over with quickly.

====Summary====
----The Titan----
Titan: DELETED
Titan's Left Arm: DELETED
Titan's Right Arm: DELETED

----Allies----
Anyis.EXE: 220 HP [Normal]
Magna.SP: 100 HP (3-Hit Shield) [Cracked] {Glitch: GlassBody/Plague(touch)}

MeleeMan.EXE: 388 HP [Normal]
Damascus.SP: 70 HP (IronBody... sorta) [Cracked] {Glitch: JelloBody/AquaBody}

Djinni.EXE: 180 HP [Normal]
Oasis.SP: 60 HP (1 Hit Shield) [Cracked]
Szand.SP: 30 HP (Cover) [Cracked]

Eidolon.EXE: 200 HP [Normal] {Glitch: Inner thoughts are broadcast aloud/Chip damage fluctuates based on mental state (RP).}
Icaro.SP: 60 HP (1 Hit Shield) [Normal]

----Terrain----
Broken: 2% (The hole made by the core.)
Missing: 20% (Where the Titan stood. Cannot be changed.)
Cracked: 39% (4 large patches where the Titan slammed the ground.)
Normal: 39%


==BATTLE END==
All GET: 1000z, 20 Bugfrags, 10 FXP
Anyis GET: Grants's Core (Repaired)

All of that happened a bit too fast for Anyis to understand right away, leaving her to just stand idly as the warm rain of embers fell from above where the Titan once stood. Without a doubt, the Titan was swallowed whole by the white flames he had just been attacking with just moments before. But why? The Titan had gone completely berserk, releasing all of his power to rebuild a body out of Grants's flame, and yet it was that same flame that destroyed the monster once and for all. Anyis put two fingers on her temple to think, and that action made her feel the warmth from the laurel Grants had placed on her head. Since the Titan had corrupted the white fire into a power of pure destruction, that parting gift to Anyis was the only instance of the healing fire left...

... Ah! The healing flame could purify corruption, which is what made Grants so helpful in Anyis's ghost hunting for all those years. Despite being a tiny candlelight compared to the wildfire the Titan was wielding, the healing flame laurel was the complete antidote for the destructive blaze, and must've restored the Titan's fire to its original purpose. And since the Titan was just one gigantic ghost, being enveloped in a purifying fire... well, the result was fairly visible. Who would've thought that Grants fusing himself into the Titan would become the monster's greatest weakness, instead of his greatest strength?

"Anyis! What are you waiting for? Grants's core is right in front of you, isn't it?" shouted Mill suddenly, noting the holy prize that had fallen at his Navi's feet.

"... Oh. Ah, right..." replied Anyis absentmindedly, with her mind still sorting out this finale. This, however, was right about when the ember rain stopped, and as a result so did the white flame laurel. That little accessory that kept Anyis from feeling the effects of her AI getting purged as it currently was, in other words. With that suddenly gone, her mind immediately began to rip apart with all the pain she had felt before, plus the damage that had been inflicted on her AI since wearing the laurel. The shock was so intense that Anyis didn't even make a noise, only instead falling flat to the ground, with an outreached hand falling right next to Grants's core.

"...!!" Mill's eyes widened as he watched Anyis drop, with him having no idea that the purge had advanced that much during the battle. "Hey, come on Anyis! Just pick up the core and begin the merger! I'll take care of the rest!" he commanded, but to no avail as his Navi didn't move an inch. "Ugh... Magna, pick up the core!"

"Understood, Operat-" responded Magna initially, before being interrupted by his left arm falling off... again. With the white flames gone, so was the adhesive that was keeping his busted arm in place. Perhaps that alone wasn't much of a threat the second time, but unfortunately Anyis's suffering was catching up to her SP, as multiple new cracks spread throughout Magna's body, regardless of whether it was metal or still glass. Orange energy began seeping out of the breaks, giving the golem an appearance akin to a nuclear reactor running critical. "..."

"Oh damnit..." swore Mill frustratedly. "Can anyone else-"

"That is unnecessary Operator, I will fulfill the order..." said Magna finally, having just recovered his focus from that partial breakdown. Since he was already standing next to his Mother Unit, Magna simply reached down with his one remaining arm, touched the core, and... watched all his fingers break instantly. Damnit. Magna just looked at his lump of his arm, muttered something like, "Processing...", and after a moment punched the ground very, very hard. The force mostly recoiled back into his broken body, shattering whatever was left of his right hand and causing a large amount of energy to spill out. Before anyone could properly react to that sudden (and extreme) action, Magna pointed the energy leak down at Grants's core, and properly picked it up this time.

... Huh. "Since when could you do that...? I guess it's just sorta like your barrier... Whatever, just give the core to Anyis now!" mumbled Mill, before focusing back in on the task at hand.

Magna quickly obliged for both his and the Mother Unit's sake, pulling the captured core to her. Anyis remained unresponsive, so Magna flipped her over on her back before placing the core onto her chest, in a rather deft maneuver for a golem with no hands. As if to signal the end of his task, a chunk of Magna's base gave way to a particularly large crack, wrecking the golem's balance and sending him toppling to the ground with a rather loud thump. If this wasn't resolved quick, Magna was liable to break even before Anyis finished.

Thankfully, Magna falling to the ground seemed to jar Anyis back into enough of a reality to understand that Grants's core was sitting between her breasts. Somewhere in the recesses of her mind, Anyis wanted to bemoan the fact that even in death her husband managed to find his way there, but given that she was about 50% conscious at best... Well, yeah. Anyis initiated the install, absorbed the core into her body, and promptly fell asleep to allow Mill to work his end.

Much to the Operator's relief, install notices did begin popping up on his PET window. "Finally... Yes I want to install, yes I know I'm altering her core, yes her core is the destination folder..." After going through that another 10 times or so, the merger commenced, before stalling in light of a new question. This was one that Mill expected and wanted, though. "File already exists, replace... That should do it... I hope." said Mill without a whole lot of confidence, after clearing that for all the pending files ahead. From there the merger continued without a hitch, and finished within the next few moments. With that done, Anyis's restart procedures ran and she was made to wake up.

"..." Anyis was slow to stir, but she ultimately did. She cracked one eye open, then the other, then announced after her vision came into focus: "... Bleh..." Perhaps it was to be expected that she wasn't going to wake up at 100% right away. Without elaborating much further than that, Anyis pushed herself up into a sitting position, and began to rub her eyes as if some crust managed to develop in the whole minute she was out.

Mill tried tapping his foot repeatedly against the floor, but his patience wore out anyway. "Hey! Anyis! Are you okay or not?!" he barked, before realizing something and backing off. "You... are still Anyis, right? Not Grants or the Titan, or some weird mental fusion of all 3 of you?"

"... God that'd suck... Yeah I'm me, I guess." mumbled Anyis before giving a halfassed answer. "I feel... weird. The migraine's gone, though, so I guess that part worked. Did the patch cover your problems too, Magna?" she queried, turning her head to her SP who was still lying sideways on the ground.

"I believe so. The internal damage seems to have ceased. I do not think the superficial structural damage will repair itself however, so Operator will have to manually restore my body upon return to the PET."

"Great, there goes the rest of my day..." sighed Mill. "Oh well, neither of you are dead, so that's mission accomplished. How about I jack you two out so we can call this mess over?"

"Mm... Sounds good. I'd kinda like to go back to sleep, honestly..." sighed Anyis, who genuinely did seem tired. Maybe the patch was stressing her out a little. "...?! Ow ow ow ow ow! Wha... Agh! What the hell...!" yelped Anyis, as she immediately clutched her ribs and doubled over in pain. Okay, so maybe the patch was stressing her out a lot. Magna started writhing around too, albeit in silence as he never really responded verbally to pain. "Mill...! Did you... mess up the... install...?!" groaned Anyis, as she rolled onto her side and curled into an agonized little ball.

"Of course not! Maybe adding the Titan's data was just a bad idea... Oh crap..." retorted Mill, who quickly started thinking of worst cases with this situation. Yet, just as quickly as this install recoil occurred, it vanished, as the pain left Anyis and Magna after about 15 seconds of torturing them.

"Shit...! Well I'm awake now!" complained Anyis, who stood upright and stamped her boot in anger. "That had better not happen again! Ugh... Crap, my chest is feeling tight again already..." Anyis gripped her robe and bodysuit in response to the dulled pain, only to have her gauntlets break under the light pressure. "...?!" Chunks of silver clattered to the ground, and Anyis's surprisingly slender arms were left bare for all to see. "The hell is this?! And why is my hair dangling in front of my eyes all of a sudden, for that matter?!" She was definitely starting to get annoyed.

"Anyis, uh..." began Mill, "... Nevermind. Magna, are you okay?"

"I am fine, Operator. Mother Unit, perhaps you should initiate in internal scan. The core merger may have left residual damage from the forced replacement of several of your critical files." advised Magna, as he pushed himself upright... with his two arms? Well he was repaired, great. No questions asked.

"... Okay Magna, what the hell." pressed Anyis, getting distracted from her own concerns by... Well.

"What is the problem, Mother Unit?" questioned a confused Magna.

"You. You're standing." answered Anyis bluntly, before brushing her suddenly long bangs out of her eyes.

"... Correct?" Magna was still confused.

"On legs. Two legs." stated Anyis.

"... I lack data on this." responded Magna, who remained confused, albeit for an entirely different reason. Indeed, Magna was standing on his two legs that he had all of sudden. Sure, his lower half had been a lot of things, but legs were not one... two of them. As a matter of fact, when Magna became self-aware of his new limbs, he realized he didn't have the drivers for maintaining balance at his height, so...

*thud*

"God... I get it now. It's adaptation... Magna must've replicated some of the Titan's design." groaned Anyis, after becoming aware of the less-than-seamless patch. "So... that means..."

"Uh, yeah, Anyis? I'm just going to bite the bullet and say it." announced Mill bravely. "Your clothes do not fit."

"... Wha?" said Anyis in response, before looking down. There was something in the way of her vision. Two somethings, in fact. Two somethings that were being very strained against her bodysuit. "Oh goddamnit... I should've known absorbing Grants would do this! That damned pervert..." whined Anyis as she wrapped her arms around her newly-pronounced chest and curled back up into a ball, only out of self-pity instead of anguish this time.

Mill... just scratched his head. Everything was fixed... right?

MeleeMan's last thought before everything went momentarily dark was that Djinni's pillow-talk sounded a heck of a lot better than her singing.

The Titan's vanish was unseen by MeleeMan, who ended up face-down in the dirt. It wouldn't have been so bad, only his helmet had gotten stuck in the ground, much as Damascus had found herself stuck earlier. The ground around these parts really wasn't too stable. Finally, he agreed to break even and reclaim his head without his helmet, leaving it stuck in the net floor. To his surprise, the big guy they'd been fighting had disappeared entirely. He performed a quick check to make sure that it hadn't just gone underground, but nobody really seemed panicked any more... Well, nobody but Anyis and Magna, who both looked like they were having a mixture of blackouts and seizures and, in Magna's case, engineering failures. For that matter, it'd be pretty hard for that golem to look "panicked," exactly.

Damascus had lost some of her panic when her body started to get its rigidity back, then regained some of it when her favorite metallic golem had started falling to pieces. Such a splendid body, lost! She was pretty used to dealing with loss and tragedy, but she had to admit that it hurt her right in her sex drive.

Luckily, his body didn't stay gone too long; in the place of what he'd had were two similarly solid legs. She decided that she could deal with that and began to make her way over to check on him.

In the mean time, MeleeMan was back over to do the same, but it didn't take him nearly as long as it took Anyis herself to find out what had changed about her. MeleeMan found that he didn't really have to roll around the change in his head to decide whether he liked it or not, like Damascus had. The titan hadn't dropped much when it had died, but at least there was one long-lasting reward to come out of all of this. After finally affirming that she was conscious and aware enough for the outburst to be at all appropriate, MeleeMan burst out laughing. "Ha ha haaa! Looks like that guy's core had some kind of limiter removal or upgrade or some crap in it, huh? I'd have helped you out a lot sooner if you'd have let me know about it!" he guffawed.

Further unfortunate was the fact that without his helmet, the fact that his eyes were locked onto her new assets wasn't nearly so well hidden as it ought to be. Damascus stood quietly by, knowing that even if she tried to talk to Magna, their voices would soon be hidden by the ensuing outrage between Anyis and her antagonist.

Somehow, in the midst of the chaotic battle, the Titan went down, and Eidolon managed to shut off the broadcasting of her thoughts by corrupting the programs that made it possible. Satisfied more at her renewed silence than the fall of the ghostly monstrosity, she chose to simply lie on the ground for awhile as the Titan was consumed by white fire, leaving no residual data beyond the core for her to absorb. A shame, but she was too happy to no longer be bleeding thoughts to worry about it.

As for the transformations of Magna from a purple golem into a walking purple golem and Anyis into...well, herself but more filled out...Eidolon didn't know what to say. Anyis seemed upset, so it must have been bad, but Eidolon couldn't quite figure out why. And even if she could, her own self-glitching would have prevented her from putting any response into more than a few distorted words.

"They seem to be fine...I think," Andrew said. "I guess we should...uhh...check up on them later just to be sure?"

"We should, yes," Icaro said, gliding over. "I'd like to help them now, but other than that...transformation I don't think there's anything wrong."

"Hmph. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't just a little bit disappointed by that," Andrew grumbled.

"BITter," Eidolon said, trying to speak for the first time since being glitched. Her voice came out distorted, and very sharp and loud on one end of the word then diminishing into almost nothing.

"So what if I am?" Andrew asked defensively. "Would you like to see several years of work trivialized like that?"

"WOULdn't know."

"Of course you wouldn't," Andrew said, still grumbling. "Also what'd you do to your voice?"

"BROke it," Eidolon answered. "TO SHUt myself UP."

"I can fix that," Icaro offered. "...I think."

"No you can't," Andrew said, sighing. "I can, once I jack you out, but I'm tempted to leave you like that just to remind you what happens when you do things that mess up your systems. Maybe then you won't let yourself fall apart as much."

"STIll bitter."

"I was joking." Andrew thought for a moment, then added "I'll need to do it anyway, because you're going to need to talk properly. I've finally got an idea that may be able to fix you properly, and as much as I hate to admit it, you can thank Anyis here for it. But you're going to need to tell me what you remember."

"TELl you whAT?"

"Everything I don't already know. But especially anything that may have come up during this little incident. You were flipping out over Grants earlier and I need to know why." Eidolon didn't answer. Pulling her visor off her eyes, she stared blankly back into the massive pit that had once trapped the Titan.

"Hey...call on us again later and we'll see how you're doing," Icaro said, gliding back toward Anyis and Magna. She then shifted her attention toward the other two navis that showed up to help and their support programs, her focus settling on the one that appeared most distant from being associated with fire: Oasis. "And the rest of you, I guess we'll run into each other again sometime? I'd like to stay around since we didn't get much of an introduction, but Eidolon broke herself again and Andrew was talking about working on her, which means..." She glanced back to see Eidolon's body absorbed into a blue beam and disappear from the net. A similarly colored aura appeared around her immediately after. "...yep," she managed to get out before she was jacked out as well.

((Exit Eidolon and Icaro))

From upon his newly-existing ass, Magna waved goodbye to the Unit Icaro as the translucent SP was dragged offline by a grumpy Navi and Operator. Unit Damascus then approached him, but without any verbal acknowledgements, so Magna just watched her for a second before saying, "Thank you for assisting the Mother Unit in her time of critical need, Unit Damascus." Naturally, he didn't even make note of how his own life was also in danger this whole time. "The Units MeleeMan and Rania were also indispensable in their efforts. Should you require assistance in a similar capacity at any time, I will render all aid possible." So he promised, with heaps of glowing praise added on top. Sadly, it all sounded very lifeless in Magna's voice, even though he was grateful.

Anyis, meanwhile, found herself looking up at some sneering bastard standing in front of her. Oh wait that was MeleeMan without his bucket helmet. His brown hair was kind of the disaster one would expect to find trapped in that pressure cooker for a few eons, and his beady orange eyes were... the same color as Anyis's own larger eyes. That was creepy as all hell. Almost as creepy as the creeper hovering over her right now. "Oh shut it, no one asked you!" shouted Anyis in retort, letting go of her chest long enough to summon her gauntlet and thrust a fist at MeleeMan's gut.

... Or, she tried to, anyway. Anyis's hand stopped a few inches short because she realized that was in fact just her hand. "... Um...?!" Her gauntlet had broken just moments ago, and seemingly that was permanent. Come to think of it, the same thing happened to Euthenia when her core got patched. The younger sister's powers otherwise remained intact, though, so Anyis figured she still had options. "Fine then... Boogeyman, knock MeleeMan down a few pegs!"

... Nope. An increasingly distressed Anyis looked from side to side for her ghostly servant, but for the first time ever he was not heeding the call. "Oh no... Ice! Ice, then! Eat frozen retribution, MeleeMan!" declared Anyis, before waving her hand in front of her to conjure... nothing. Absolutely nothing.

"Ahh... This is bad... This is really, really bad...!" moaned Anyis, who clutched her head with her hands, pushing up her overly-long hair as she panicked. One thing Anyis had yet to notice during her fidgeting, though, was that she actually was 2 inches taller than before. That in itself was fantastic for the previously 5' 4" girl, but her robe did not get the notice. The lower edges of her white cloth barely reached her hips as it was, so... yeah, it was a good thing Anyis had her bodysuit, regardless of how tight it may be at the moment.

"Oh man, I'm going to have to re-tune you too, Anyis...? I might have to drop by the shop for some parts..." sighed Mill as he watched his Navi's powerless plight.

"Get over it! You're the one that wanted to save me, so do it right!" snapped Anyis back at her Operator, before immediately returning her attention to MeleeMan. "And don't you DARE think you can pull anything! I may be weak now, but I will come back to turn your life into a frozen hell if you... Argh!" That wasn't a scream of pain, for the record. Just unbridled frustration.

"Umm... She means to say she's very grateful you helped save her life. I think." translated Mill for Rania, albeit with a bit of an optimistic twist. Mill then generalized his statement and added, "Really, I owe all of you a ton for this. If you ever need any help, just give me a call... starting tomorrow. I think I'm going to need all day today to get these two back up to speed..."

While the others had gone to investigate what was going on with Anyis, Djinni was still singing with the musical Discord. The sound the Discord produced shrunk more and more as time progressed, eventually becoming mute and executing its stage exit. With Djinni still in trance of singing, she did not notice that the head of the Discord wand had started lighting up and eventually exploded right in her face. "Aaah!" Djinni exclaimed as she fell backwards, soot covering her face and part of her clothes. In her hand she now held a broken microphone and in front of her was a broken Discord. "Wait, what just happened?" she asked herself while staring up at the sky.

"You rest!" Oasis yelled at Szand who was edging towards the location the Titan had been, "You injured!" Despite also having been attacked, Oasis was feeling much better due to Icaro's song. She tried reaching for Szand's shoulder, but her hand was swiftly smacked away.

"Don't worry. Danger's gone," Szand said to his sisterly companion, "Just need to do something." Oasis followed him as he continued to walk towards the Titan's 'resting place'. Once he had reached the place, he balled his right hand into a fist and smacked it into his opened left hand. He closed his eyes and took a bow towards the Titan. "May you rest peacefully," Szand said, opening his eyes again when he straightened out his body.

Oasis, looking at Szand, joined him by his side and did the same motions with her hands followed with a bow. "And Grants too," she added to Szand's words.

"OK," Szand quickly followed up with, "We're done here. Carry me to Djinni. I'm injured, right?"

Oasis frowned, but in the end it was the truth. Forming large aquatic hands at the ends of her ponytails, she picked up Szand with them and started to run towards Djinni. She had now grown much more used to her legs and it was hardly a problem to traverse from point A to point B.

Quickly sitting up, Djinni looked around herself while taking her cape and wiping her face clean. It was only then she noticed the Titan was missing and that Anyis was playing, from her point of view, with MeleeMan. "Ah!" Djinni uttered and noticed Eidolon had left already, "What a shame... I didn't really get to know her." Djinni stood up and noticed her two children arriving at her location. "Are you two alright?" she asked, remembering the Titan smacking down on both of them.

"Agony and misery, Djinni," Szand said sarcastically while keeping his face void of emotions and giving his voice the same treatment, "I have never felt pain as this. Ending my life would be more soothing than this."

"Oh stop it," Djinni commented and walked over to them. She gently patted Szand on his head, following by him groaning and growling at her. "Let's go see what's up with our friends," she said and kicked off against the floor to float over to MeleeMan and Anyis.

"Not my friends," Szand remarked.

"Friends nice!" Oasis exclaimed happily as she ran after Djinni, still carrying the woefully pained Szand.

Once the trio had reached the beauty and the beast, Djinni pretty much instantly noticed the differences between pre-Titan Anyis and after-Titan Anyis. She, however, had not yet realized the powerless state Anyis was in as from a distance it just looked like the two were simply playing around. Curiously Djinni started to circle around Anyis.

"You legs too!" Oasis exclaimed excitedly as she pointed at Magna, "We all legs now!" Enthusiastically she ran around in circles, while Szand was just staring ahead of him with a straight and annoyed face.

"Excuse me," Djinni said as an announcement of her privacy breaking motions as she pushed her chest to Anyis' back and swung her arms around to place her hands onto Anyis' chest for a personal 'check up'. "Hrm..." Djinni hummed as her fingers moved around slightly before they were taken off and Djinni took a step back. She then proceeded to circle around Anyis again and looked down at her with a mocking look in her eyes. "You still have ways to go, Anyis," she commented, but her eyes quickly returned with kindness in them as she proceeded to talk, "I'm glad you are alright now, Anyis. If you need help again, feel free to ask us." Djinni then turned her head to look at MeleeMan. "You fought well and I'm glad you came help Anyis too with her situation. Maybe you're a nice guy after all," she spoke to him with a smile behind her mask.

((Written from phone))

"Hey, who do you think I am?!" Meleeman grumbled, frowning down at Anyis despite her newfound height. "Don't flatter yourself. I know the meaning of the word 'restraint' too. I wouldn't go after you unless you're at one hundred percent." Despite his reassurance, the statement "go after you" really felt like it might bear more clarification. "Can't say I'm going to miss either the ghost or the ice, though. I will be happy if some of these changes stick around..."

Damascus returned her friend's sentiments with just as much failure to convey emotion as he experienced himself. "A shield needs not thank a sword. We both serve our masters and need only strive to perform that duty efficiently. Although one could certainly question as to whether such splendid weapons as ourselves could not find more fulfillment in each other's company than with our given masters," she responded. There was that sex drive coming out again. Despite her better senses and Oasis' focus on legs, she found herself wondering if the golem's transformation came with any other new equipment...

"Yeah, I'm pretty nice when it comes to a lot of things," Meleeman agreed with Djinni, smirking with unhidden self-pride. "And I dunno, give the kid a break. She was already doing a lot better than Rania was..."

An "ahem" rang loudly through his receiver, but he didn't flinch. "It was our pleasure to help," Rania assured the others. "I'm just glad it worked out in the end... I hope. I feel like I could write a paper for my advanced AI theory class regarding Anyis now..."

Anyis's thoughts were racing as she grappled with the fact that all her powers were dysfunctional. Her thoughts continued to race, albeit for different reasons, when Djinni sneaked up from behind and suddenly began groping her breasts. "Fwha...?! H-hey, Djinni!!! What the hell are you doing, you... cow!" yelped Anyis in surprise, who quickly swatted the other girl's arms away and put a few steps between the two of them. "Since when were you making a competition of this?! I don't even want this extra dead weight!" Anyis wrapped her arms up back up around her chest in defense, and actually for good reason. One other effect Anyis forgot about from Euthenia's changes...

*snap*

And there went her emblem, and as a result her belt. With its restraint gone, Anyis's robe fanned open to leave her overly-tight bodysuit as the only thing between her body and prying eyes. "...!!" When was this ever going to stop, Anyis wondered. As if to answer that, Anyis's long bangs fell over her eyes again, effectively obscuring most of her vision. Surprisingly, her temper was actually starting to waver, if only because all this stress and frustration was getting really exhausting. She still had the fuel to snap back at least one more time, though. "Augh... Wait, where do you get off calling me a kid, MeleeMan?! I'll have you know I'm...!" Whoops, almost let her age slip there. "... A-anyway, those are some pretty big words when you've probably never ever had a girlfriend. You don't even have a clue what being an adult is really like, do you?" A sly grin spread across Anyis's face as she came up with that counter.

Between what the Mother Unit just said, and what Damascus had told him, Magna felt compelled to raise his hand and speak up. "Mother Unit? Should I edit my definition of 'kid', given this new information? I believe I would qualify for that status under those changes."

"Uh... No, you don't need to worry about it Magna. I'm not even sure what to call you in that regard, frankly." answered Anyis honestly, unknowingly in spite of Damascus.

"Understood, Mother Unit." replied Magna, who promptly lowered his hand and resumed his quiet sitting.

"... *cough*" interrupted Mill, who didn't want to see this discussion continue much further. "As much as I'd love to question how you can suddenly brag about Grants after keeping him a total secret for months, I should probably get the two of you jacked out. You're running out of extra layers of clothing to break, Anyis."

"Mm..." mumbled Anyis as she took another look at her bodysuit. "... Yeah, not going to risk that. Magna, get over... Ah, wait, you can't walk two steps without falling over. Nevermind, I'll come to you." So Anyis walked over to her SP, albeit cautiously as she continued to hug her chest and dart her eyes back over to Djinni every few seconds. "Oh, and Rania? Just talk to me if you really do need me for your class. It wouldn't be the first time I was the subject of literature." she added nonchalantly. Mill raised an eyebrow at the cryptic comment, but ultimately chose not to inquire before finally pulling his cohorts off the Net.

(Jack Out)

Even though Anyis had applied some seriously intense burns before taking off, Meleeman found himself fixated on the changes she was undergoing. If only she had stuck around a bit longer... Hers was not the only suit getting a little tight for its wearer. "Dammit... I've been a man since the day I was born!" he proclaimed in his defense, but Djinni was likely the only one around to hear it. On that note, he kind of wished he could be Djinni for a bit so he could pull some of that junk off without getting a ColdPunch in the jaw.

"Magna is still young?" Damascus pondered with a thoughtful frown.

"I guess that makes you a cougar, huh?" Rania said in a voice that was intentionally too quiet to hear. "Anyways, let's get back to the house."

Meleeman gave Djinni another stiff nod and Damascus gave her SPs an even stiffer bow. "Be sure to let me know if any crisis ending in a top bursting breast expansion comes up for you too, alright? Although damn, I wouldn't be surprised if I already missed that one," he concluded, remembering who he was talking to. With that the two vanished off of the net.

((Jacking out))