Ghostly Girls' Games

Eidolon didn't seem to notice anything confusing about how the battle ended. Everything died and they were no longer being attacked by sheep. That was all she cared about.

And...Anyis was shouting at her operator and support program again. Eidolon simply shook her head at this point. At least it was keeping Anyis from bothering her or Icaro with strange questions.

"Um..." Icaro started, apparently a little more concerned about it.

"Don't bother. Probably good for her," Eidolon said.

"You are...probably not a good judge of what is good for anybody," Icaro said back.

Eidolon simply shrugged.

((Battle 4))
Continuing through the deserted expanse of the network, Anyis, Eidolon and co. soon came across an interesting sight. A miniature model of the Colosseum, about ten feet tall, twenty feet wide and topped by a few hostile looking Beetanks on its walls. An aggressive trio of Swordy viruses stood at the foot of the construct, several Hellodies bouncing eagerly behind them. Finally, inside the Colosseum was a hulking MetalCragger, joined by a pair of Brushmen on either side. Most of the thing was filled with poison as well, possibly a result of the hazardous nature of the network. The viruses were doing their best to avoid it while the Brushmen slowly cleared the panels away, but that endeavor was abandoned when the Beetanks spotted a new target.

-- FRONT --
Swordy-N2A: 120 HP
Swordy-N2B: 120 HP
Swordy-N2C: 120 HP
HellodyA: 140 HP
HellodyB: 140 HP
HellodyC: 140 HP

-- ON WALL --
Beetank2A: 160 HP
Beetank2B: 160 HP
Beetank2C: 160 HP

-- INSIDE --
MetalCragger: 200 HP [Hardbody]
Brushman2A: 150 HP
Brushman2B: 150 HP

-- TERRAIN --
60% Normal (Wide path leading through closest entrance to center of Colosseum)
40% Poison (Surrounding the exterior/ringing the interior)
(All combatants on Normal unless otherwise specified)

-- OBJECTS --
Colosseum Model: 400 HP

-- ALLIES --
Anyis.EXE: 195 HP
Magna.SP: 100 HP
Eidolon.EXE: 200 HP
Icaro.SP: 60 HP

-- TEAM BATTLE 4 START! --
"... Seriously?" queried a genuinely surprised Anyis as she and the others approach the Colosseum Model. "God, this place is just mocking me now. I just so happen to be fighting viruses with the girl who absorbed the remains of the one Navi to beat me in a fight, and we have to come across a replica of where he defeated me?! Just... come on!" Her surprise quickly turned into exasperation, as their new venue seemed to be mocking her.

"The one Navi to beat you while you've been my Navi, you mean?" corrected Mill, finding it hard to believe Pianissimo was her first loss ever.

"... That's not important. There are a bunch of annoying viruses here, so we don't have time to count pointless things like that." digressed Anyis skillfully.

"Mm hm... It's true those Hellodies gave you a lot of trouble last time. Let's try focusing on the other types for now. Maybe Eidolon has a better matchup against all that bouncing than you." Not forcing the issue, Mill turned his attention to the current battle and started slotting a few Battlechips in to counter the Swordies and Beetanks. "Magna, could you protect Icaro again for now? I'm worried about how this initial wave might play out... given Anyis's luck with coliseums." He had to get just one last jab in, of course.

"Hey, I made it all the way to the semifinals! And how the heck are you acting like you didn't lose that fight too?" barked Anyis in her defense.

"... Understood, Operator, I will protect Unit Icaro to the best of my ability." responded Magna in a much more cordial manner. Having been... well, dead for the duration of that whole tournament, Magna really didn't have much of a clue what the Operator and Mother Unit were talking about. Poor guy.

Anyis just watched Magna shuffle over towards Icaro, unaware of how their Operator was teasing her, as he put together a fresh shield, and somehow... that made her chill a bit. She'd still mess up some of Mill's computer files later as revenge, of course, but at least for now she could maul some viruses instead. "Mm... First thing's first, though." thought Anyis aloud as she looked over to Eidolon and immediately made her the target point for a fresh downward current of ghost data channeled from the sky above. If Eidolon did in fact have feet, Anyis was going to see them this time. Maybe Eidolon could do some proper damage to the Hellodies with the power boost, too.

With that matter out of the way finally, Anyis went straight at the Swordies, giving a wide berth to those danged bouncing things. Being smart enough to not run straight into a sword point, Anyis stopped a bit short of the knightly viruses and punched the immediate ground with her gauntlet-clad fist. The WaterLine chip Mill sent erupted in front of Anyis, sending powerful columns of water right at the Swordies in a quick attempt to just wipe them off the battlefield in one shot. In the wake of the high-pressure water attack, Anyis backed away from her targets and then turned her attention upwards towards the Colosseum rafters.

"... How the heck did those fat bomb bugs climb all the way up there...?" muttered Anyis rhetorically as she observed the perched Beetanks. Not expecting a good answer to that, Anyis didn't wait long to throw the black cloud of her LilRain way, way up there. The piercing rain started falling almost immediately, and the cloud producing it began its march back and forth across the line of bomb-launching viruses. Not content to just leave that be, especially with one more chip still to use, Anyis triggered her last weapon. "Make it a thunderstorm!" she shouted suddenly, pointing the ElecReel's launcher up to the rainy top of the Colosseum. Anyis pulled the trigger then, sending bolts of lightning arcing up towards the Beetanks to create some rather nasty weather up at that height.

With no chips left to use after that display, Anyis created some distance between herself and the viruses to take an evasive stance and watch Eidolon's fighting.

Anyis's Actions:
1) Channel Surf (200 Strengthen, 5TCD) @ Eidolon
2) WaterLine2 (145 Aqua damage [b], Ground Attack, Wide Attack) @ Swordy-N2A/B/C
3) LilRain (85 Aqua damage [c], Wide Attack, 2 Turn Duration) @ Beetank2A/B/C
4) ElecReel (80 Elec damage , Spread 3 (Side + Behind)) @ Beetank2A/B/C/Colosseum Model
5) Dodge
6) Dodge


Magna's Actions:
--Reinforced Golem's Buckler (Passive 3-Hit Shield)
1) Protect Unit Icaro
2) Dodge
3) Dodge

Cooldowns:
Channel Surf - 5 turns
Eidolon noted that Anyis was bothered by their newest destination, as though the net itself was mocking them. She didn't have much idea of the details of what Anyis was complaining about this time other than that it apparently involved her tangentially, so she chose not to dwell on it beyond the fact that it bothered the ice navi. She didn't quite blame her, as there were some memories of her own associated with the colosseum. Well, not her own, but they were a part of her now, winking in and out of existence behind a mass of broken data with taunting hints about what was and what could have been. Eidolon normally ignored those thoughts and memories, but occasionally they were brought to her attention against her will. Like right now. Letting out a heavy sigh, she turned her attention back to more immediate matters. Viruses. Viruses that were distracted from what could have been constructive work because a couple of navis happened to pass by.

"Really now?" she asked no one in particular.

"You should probably do something about the bouncing ones, or this battle is going to be hell," Andrew remarked.

"You're hilarious. How long did you spend thinking that up," Eidolon remarked sarcastically. "Send me the web thing, I have an idea."

"The web thing has a name, you know," Andrew said, though he got the hint and sent it along with a few more chips. "What if I had more than one 'web thing'? What would you do then?"

"Expect you to know what I'm talking about," Eidolon answered. She looked over the field in front of her, searching for a good spot. And as it happened there was one, right in the entrance. The bouncing...things would have to bunch up to try to get at her there.

In an instant she was gone, reappearing just as suddenly in the entrance of the colosseum model. Poisonous terrain had pooled around the base, but that was of little consequence to her. The faintly glowing outline of a shield formed around her, swinging around her body to protect her from behind while she focused on the viruses still on the outside of the model.

Then she had a large amount of ghost data dumped on her. This time her body had a better idea of how to process it, immediately redirecting it to the gaps in her programming. Her legs below the knees filled in, leaving her walking atop the hazardous mire with a barrier of foreign data protecting her from its effects. Her gauntlets and scarf vanished, allowing the large tears in her body that they covered to be patched over with shifting television static. With some semblance of a solid, complete body again the rest of the ghost data ran out of holes in her program to cling to, and the rest hovered around her body as a floating cloud.

Once in this state Eidolon laid out her web trap in the poison moat in front of her, then added in a little extra 'incentive' for the Hellodies to fall for it in the form of a sudden windstorm. Sharp wind currents combined with telekinetic force flowed toward her and, by extension, the webbing, stirring up the data cloud into a small storm of its own in the process. Once the storm died down, the ghost data formed into a set of large data spikes of its own accord, hovering in the air around Eidolon.

Eidolon propelled herself away from the traps, kicking off of the surface of the poison to float briefly in the air inside the colosseum, only to fall back to the ground after the needles shot out from under her toward the traps.

"That should do it," she said, turning her attention inward toward the cleaning crew. So long as they were going to attack as well on the word of the tank viruses, they were targets too, and she would deal with them as such. And so she did, focusing the remaining ghost data out of her body and into her hands, where it burst into flames. The spectral fire quickly spread, engulfing a solid line in front of her, in line with the brush viruses and the golem. The remaining ghost data quickly burned itself out in the flames, leaving Eidolon's body damaged and only partially whole once more. The gloves and gauntlets quickly began to re-form to cover the damage, but her feet were left just as nonexistent as they had always been.

Back outside, Icaro stood on watch for any stray attacks that would get past Magna's shield, and for anyone to get damaged enough to need healing.
___

1. Reappear: Teleport to Colosseum Model entrance
*Spectral Shield: 1-hit shield, facing behind
2. WhiteWeb1: 40+Snare to three, laid as trap in front of entrance
3. AirStorm2: 60+Pull to Hellodies, attempt to pull onto WhiteWeb trap
4. Dodge
5. AquaNeedle1: 20 each to Hellodies, +20 Strengthen to A and C
6. FlameLine1 70 Fire each to Brushman2s and MetalCragger, +80 Strengthen to each Brushman hit

Icaro:
1. Dodge
Anyis' blast of water had cleaned off the Swordy viruses even before they had a proper chance to evade, while Eidolon began to prepare her little traps near the front of the gate. As this was going on, the Beetanks began to line their barrels on the two navis who were in close proximity with one another at this point, but Anyis had begun her attack on them.

By some ungodly luck, one of the tank had evaded two attacks in a row without a ding on its metal body, continuing its attack despite the loss of its comrade. Firing two rapid shots, the large blast caught the two navis by a surprise! [-45/-45]

Moving on, Eidolon began to drag the Hellodys towards herself and the trap, wounding the viruses with the small whirlwinds in the process. The plan didn't go as the navi hoped it would, as only two of the viruses was trapped by the web while one was free to jump around, and ultimately, attack Eidolon at a dangerously close range. Though the navi was able to quickly jump away from the Hellody's first attack, and even managing to fire three shots that deleted one of the trapped virus, the Hellody's second attack had crushed Eidolon with its soft body. [-60]

Eidolon was quick to recover from the attack as she continued her attack towards the three, inner viruses, turning the Colosseum into a temporary furnace with her powerful flames. All but the sturdy Cragger survived the attack, and it tried to swing its mighty fist against the pale navi...But it was just too too slow to even reach Eidolon!

-- FRONT --
Swordy-N2A: DELETED
Swordy-N2B: DELETED
Swordy-N2C: DELETED
HellodyA: DELETED
HellodyB: 20 HP [Trapped]
HellodyC: 40 HP

-- ON WALL --
Beetank2A: 160 HP
Beetank2B: DELETED
Beetank2C: DELETED

-- INSIDE --
MetalCragger: 165 HP [Hardbody]
Brushman2A: DELETED
Brushman2B: DELETED

-- TERRAIN --
60% Normal (Wide path leading through closest entrance to center of Colosseum)
40% Poison (Surrounding the exterior/ringing the interior)
(All combatants on Normal unless otherwise specified)

-- OBJECTS --
Colosseum Model: 320 HP

-- ALLIES --
Anyis.EXE: 150 HP
Magna.SP: 100 HP [3-hit Shield]
Eidolon.EXE: 95 HP [Within the Colosseum]
Icaro.SP: 60 HP
"You gotta be kidding me..." groaned Anyis as she wafted away residual smoke from the bomb blast, "How the heck can that thing dodge up there?! I am so going to... Ow...!" She started stomping towards the Colosseum model, far from any plan on how to actually climb it, but perhaps as a favor to her, Anyis's shoulder suddenly gave out after having taken the brunt of the blast. After some unintelligible grumbling to vent her frustration, Anyis gathered some ghost data into her still-functioning hand and jammed the fist into her bum shoulder, fixing the whole issue quickly.

"Hey Anyis, I was thinking- Wait, wait, you're really going to try and climb that?!" exclaimed Mill as Anyis paid little heed to her Operator talking, favoring instead to start approaching the Colosseum.

"Well, yeah, the hotshot up there thinks he's so good at dodging that I might as well go see how he handles the personal treatment." said Anyis with what sounded like little emotion, but the venom in her words could be figured all the same.

"And you're really going to climb up there one step at a time when I can just give you wings?" queried Mill, waving the DropDown chip in front of the PET screen exaggeratedly.

"..." Anyis came to a halt at this proposition, but found herself grating her teeth and unwilling to respond. "... Fine, okay, I wasn't thinking about that. Just give it to me, and something to smash the virus's face in with."

"Is that all? Eidolon got hit pretty hard, so I was thinking you might go support her." suggested Mill while fishing out an attack chip as requested. "She almost got clocked by that MetalCragger, too."

"She's capable, and I finally saw her feet. We can probably clean this up separately." explained Anyis, surely weighing the latter reason far more than the former in her lack of desire to help her ally.

"... Metal... Cragger...?" piped up Magna all of a sudden.

"Oh boy..." sighed Anyis, sensing where this was going.

Mill shook his head and sighed much the same as his Navi, but then admitted, "Yes, Magna, there is a Cragger here. And it's made of metal."

"... It is imperative that I be directed to the location of the MetalCragger Unit, Operator." informed Magna very formally.

"Inside the Colosseum..." answered Mill reluctantly, before going aside to Anyis. "Hey, could you transfer this to Magna before you take off? He's going to go fight that thing no matter what, and I don't think he can win on his own..."

"Alright, alright... Last thing I need is my servant losing to a lone virus." replied Anyis, waving Mill off quickly as she accepted the task.

"Is that what he is to you...?" asked Mill quietly to himself as he slotted in the chip for Magna ahead of what Anyis had already ordered.

After the first chip in question arrived to Magna, the golem wasted absolutely no time in charging the Colosseum's front entrance, potentially way-laying a few of the bricks with his hulking frame in the process. Next thing anyone knew, Magna was between Eidolon and the MetalCragger. How the heck did he move that fast...? With his shield in one hand and the power of a GolemHit in the other, Magna did not attack with the same speed he moved at, instead staring at the virus... silently. This was... golem communication? Maybe. Magna then punched the MetalCragger with its own chip. Now THAT was golem communication.

"Well, hopefully that's out of his system for a while now..." muttered Anyis as she now finally had an opportunity to fight for herself. She triggered the DropDown and, as a result, her icy wings, which quickly assisted her in taking flight off the ground. Now, given her violent history, any time Anyis flew at something, that something probably ought to be scared. However, as she ascended up the side of the Colosseum, the hefty bludgeon that was the BigHammer materialized in her gauntlet-clad hands. So now she was flying right towards that Beetank, armed with a hammer that could smash its face into the back of its head... body... thing. If the theory of that wasn't scary enough, Anyis wasted little time in taking that to practice, as she rose to level with the virus and swung the hammer right at it. Both of the fighters took to evasion from then on, with Magna within the Colosseum and Anyis from the air.

Anyis's Actions:
1) Soul Riser (90 Heal, 3TCD) @ Self
2) Transfer GolemHit2 to Magna
3) DropDown (High-Altitude Flight, 3 turns) @ Self
4) BigHammer1 (160 damage [A], Impact, Break) @ Beetank2A
5) Dodge
6) Dodge


Magna's Actions:
1) Advance on MetalCragger (Movement)
2) GolemHit2 (190 damage [c], Break, Panel Break, Wide Attack) @ MetalCragger
3) Dodge

Cooldowns:
Channel Surf - 4 turns
Soul Riser - 3 turns
"You're annoying," Eidolon muttered at the Hellody that had escaped her trap, giving it what might have been a sour look if she had eyes that could convey proper expressions. Stupid bouncing thing hit pretty hard for being so squishy. "Andrew, get Icaro to do her healing thing now that I actually need it."

"What, you can't tell her yourself?" Andrew asked. "Communication with people other than me is good for you, you know."

"Do I look like the shouting type?" Eidolon asked, indicating the distance she had put between them to set up her trap where she did. While it was certainly not so far that it prevented communicating, Eidolon could not remember a time in her new life when she had raised her voice beyond the soft, dull tone she always used. She wasn't even sure she was capable of doing so anymore.

And as it happened, neither was Andrew. "...fair point," he said, conceding. "Icaro, Eidolon needs healing."

"On it," the plant spirit said. Her body turned from green outlines to pink outlines as she began her ethereal song, and rose petals carried healing energy along the wind and across the battlefield to Eidolon. Icaro added a little more to it as well. An extra verse, a little extra, lingering power, just for insurance.

"Much better," Eidolon said as she felt the song of healing take hold. Then she vanished entirely.

But not for long, as a pair of flashes issued from thin air nearby, just far enough away from her starting point for Eidolon to have preemptively dodged to avoid any attacks aimed at where she had been floating seconds before. The first was followed up by a nearly invisible beam, traceable only by the way it distorted the air around it as it targeted the trapped Hellody. The second was a more sustained light, resting on Eidolon's visor for the half second it took to lock onto the remaining bouncing virus. A brighter beam then shot forth at its targets.

Then Eidolon was silent again, gliding around to throw off any remaining viruses aiming at where she was before.
___

1. Vanish: 1-turn Invis
2. Dodge
3. Point Shot: 20+Seeking to HellodyB
4. MarkCannon2: 100+LockOn to HellodyC
5. Dodge
6. Dodge

Icaro:
1. Song of Healing: 30 Heal to Eidolon
*IV: 5 Heal per action to Eidolon (before Eidolon's first action)
With only few viruses left, Anyis and Eidolon (and Magna, can't forget him) put in one final effort to snuff them out, leaving nothing but piles of zennies, bugfrags, and friendship within the colosseum. What a find!

-- FRONT --
Swordy-N2A: DELETED
Swordy-N2B: DELETED
Swordy-N2C: DELETED
HellodyA: DELETED
HellodyB: DELETED
HellodyC: DELETED

-- ON WALL --
Beetank2A: DELETED
Beetank2B: DELETED
Beetank2C: DELETED

-- INSIDE --
MetalCragger: DELETED
Brushman2A: DELETED
Brushman2B: DELETED

-- TERRAIN --
60% Normal (Wide path leading through closest entrance to center of Colosseum)
40% Poison (Surrounding the exterior/ringing the interior)
(All combatants on Normal unless otherwise specified)

-- OBJECTS --
Colosseum Model: 320 HP

-- ALLIES --
Anyis.EXE: 220 HP
Magna.SP: 100 HP [3-hit Shield]
Eidolon.EXE: 155 HP [Within the Colosseum]
Icaro.SP: 60 HP

-BATTLE WON!-
Anyis: 3,600z + [CrossBomb] Battlechip
Eidolon: 3,500z
Static: 44 Bugfrags + 9 FXP + 1 Bonus FXP [Strength Coordination]
CrossBomb
Damage: 50 + Blast 3
Accuracy: C
Description: Lob a bomb that blast the enemy area in a cross shape.
Duration: Once
Element: Null
Having asserted his superiority as the alpha-golem by punching the MetalCragger in the face, Magna exited the Colosseum without a word and returned to the Mother Unit's side.

"... Wait, that's it? Seriously? No victory pose, no battle cry, no nothing? What were you even worked up for, then?" groaned Anyis over how anticlimactic that all was.

"My apologies, Mother Unit. Such actions are... extraneous in a golem fight." answered Magna frankly.

Anyis looked up and down her SP's frame, and... "Yeah, okay. If being a golem means acting as aloof as you usually are, I can believe that." concluded Anyis, before turning her attention to the just-reappeared Eidolon. A puzzled look spread across Anyis's face as she observed the other girl, realizing that...

... Well, this was pointless. She had challenged Eidolon to a virus fighting competition because a rematch with Pianissimo was wholly impossible now. As it would turn out, though, the two of them ended up working together against the viruses, so there wasn't much of a score to tally. In fact, Anyis had mostly forgotten about the competition and was more curious about Eidolon herself now that she had a chance to see the other Navi in action. She was kinda... ghost-ish, but not really. She was definitely patched with the remnant ghost data of Pianissimo, but it didn't seem like that was all. Anyis had seen more means of addressing ghosts between herself and her siblings than most Navis, but what Eidolon did, repairing her own body permanently with ghosts...

"... Hrm." She'd have to think more about this later. "In any case, we're done here. Pianissimo aside, you seem pretty capable yourself, Eidolon, so maybe I'll fight you at some point after all. Say goodbye to your new SP friend, Magna."

"Goodbye, Unit Icaro." said Magna obediently, before he and the Mother Unit vacated the Net.

(Jack Out)
Eidolon tilted her head to the side quizzically as Anyis addressed her one last time and then left the net with her golem support unit. She still wasn't quite sure why Anyis had been so interested in her, beyond once knowing one of her "fragments". Her patched together, broken state, inconvenient but necessary as it was, didn't strike her as a topic of fascination. Apparently other navis didn't agree. Or maybe Anyis was just special in that respect.

"Bye Magna. Bye Anyis," Icaro said cheerfully as the two left, then added "Eidolon you should be more sociable."

"Sorry," Eidolon said, shrugging.

"Well with those two leaving, I'm pulling you out too," Andrew said. "That little run's given me a few ideas."

"Why do I suddenly have a bad feeling?" Eidolon asked as she and Icaro were jacked out.