A Warrior's True Environment!

MeleeMan wondered into the steamy terrain, sweating underneath his heavy black jacket and armored gauntlets, but relishing the sweltering heat. "Ah.... This is the stuff. After being thrown into Sharo twice and that stuffy Electown Net all the time, this kind of air is refreshing. It's what a man like me needs: stimulating air filled with the sweat and toil of battle! I wonder what kind of opponents I'll find to duke it out with here?"

"They're only viruses, MeleeMan, don't get too excited. I don't think you're likely to meet your life's rival or anything," Rania sighed.

MeleeMan also frowned disappointedly, but then went on to think about the previous statement. "My life's rival... Rania, isn't there some kind of person in your school you consider a rival? Like, Abella or whatever her name was? She's kind of like a rival, right?"

Rania shook her head and laughed amusedly. "No, no!" she responded, shaking her hands in front of her to quickly disillusion her navi. "Amelie and I aren't rivals or anything. She's my best friend! We do all sorts of things together, like kendou and fighting and boxing and every other activity that I participate in at school."

"And... you don't compete in any of that?"

"Of course not, because I'm the best! I don't actually 'compete,' really, ha ha ha!" Rania laughed as if it was some sort of matter of fact.

MeleeMan smiled and kept quiet. "Yeah, definitely rivals," he affirmed with an astute nod of his head, walking forward into the net.

((Battle 1 please))
Virus Attack!

BighatA: 100
BighatB: 100
MelodyA: 80
MelodyB: 80
Brushman: 100

Meleeman: 300

Terrien: Normal 100%

Battle 1 Begin
"Well damn. These guys are a little wimpier looking than I expected. I thought your spirits were supposed to burn with fire! It's like they're all so..." he grumbled, rubbing his chin moodily before finishing his sentence, "...normal."

Rania nodded, making an attempt at visually verifying the identities of the three viruses but finding she'd yet to encounter the majority of them. "You can't always pick your battles, MeleeMan. If you're so eager to get to strong opponents, you should finish these ones off quickly."

"Heh. I'm not that stupid. Just because I like constant battle doesn't mean that I want to fight slowly. Rather than savoring the individual battle, I like to think that my pleasure is found in a non-stop flow of endless challenges by my inferior opponents," MeleeMan explained, feeling proud of himself for being able to put his feelings into such superior sounding words.

He was annoyed to find that his operator had basically ignored the explanation and had instead turned to picking out chips for him to use. "Alright, here's a nice one. We're going to try out your new kunai chips," Rania decided, slotting in the chip for him.

"Kunai? What's that? Aw dammit!" he grunted, holding the ninja weaponry between two of his greatly oversized fingers. "These things are puny. What the hell do I do with them? It's like tossing butter-knives or something equally ineffective and lacking in terms of masculinity!"

Rania laughed, giving him a sly look. "You must not realize the killer implementations of the weapons you're holding there, MeleeMan," she sighed, shrugging her shoulders coolly. "Those are the blade weapons used by ninjas, masters of stealth and assassination! No blade has greater throwing ability or more practical ability for concealment."

"Or, I could not act on that ridiculous, unmanly suggestion and instead opt to use these babies as punching daggers. Haha!" he growled, running in towards one of the Melodies with his fist held above his head. "Smash!" the giant navi roared, arcing his arm downward to crush his foe with the blades held between his fists.

Rania would ordinarily have laughed in good humor at his usage of the weapon, but she'd had her heart set utterly on seeing MeleeMan do something cool and ninja-like, so instead she simply felt ashamed and embarrassed. "That's not how you use kunai at all! That's not even how you use a punching dagger!" she exclaimed furiously.

The navi simply laughed. "Rania, please concentrate for now and send me more weaponry, okay?" he chuckled. "Firehits would be good."

"Firehits it is then," she sighed, slotting in her navi's favorite chips. "Next battle, can we please try out your new tankcannon? And can you try not to use it just like you use everything else, but, you know, put some strategy into it instead?"

"Maybe, Rania. Maybe," MeleeMan laughed under his breath, rushing in to pummel his opponents with his ignited gauntlets.

1. Kunai1 to MelodyA [30 x 3]
2. Firehit1 to MelodyB [75]
3. Firehit1 to MelodyB [75]
4. Dodge
5. Dodge
With ninja skills previously unseen by anyone before, Meleeman annihilates the first Melody. He then readies a set of beefed-up Firehits; the first leaves the second Melody barely alive. Somehow, it still manages to bounce out of the second punch's way, still for the most part alive.

Then things start to get a little hairy. One of the Bighats chuckles under his oversized chapeau, then throws an ominously glowing orb onto the ground. The Brushman, on the other hand, spends his time painting the ground around the other Bighat; the one that hadn't done anything. With a flash of light, the panel starts glowing and bathing the Bighat with an angelic light.

BighatA: 100
BighatB: 100 (Holy)
MelodyA: NINJA'D
MelodyB: 5
Brushman: 100

Meleeman: 300

Flashbomb: 20 (1 turn until boom)

Terrain: Normal 99%, 1% Holy (under BighatB)
"Ha! You think some kind of stupid panel is going to protect you? Fat chance. That panel will do you about as much good as that damn fedora will, chump," MeleeMan laughed, shaking one arm as smoke spewed strongly from his gauntlet, expelling the heat generated from the fire hit attacks he'd launched. "I've only just started. You viruses will taste the full pallet of my masculine cuisine!"

"Masculine cuisine? You evoke some pretty terrible images sometimes, you know," Rania sighed. "Now, back on focus. What kind of... er... 'masculine cuisine' did you have in mind for these guys anyways?"

MeleeMan cracked his knuckles, then set his sights back onto the enemies. "Heh, wait and see."

"I can't 'wait and see,' dummy," she scolded him, her fierce eyebrows lowering into an unamused scowl. "I've got to send you chips, don't I? Which ones were you thinking of?"

"How about magbolt and those bubbles? Normally, I wouldn't request the bubbles, of course, but I kinda need em this time to stop a pressing issue," he told Rania, looking at the flashing yellow grenade with distaste. "I don't know how much longer that thing's gonna be just laying around, but I don't wanna find out what happens when it goes off."

MeleeMan clenched his hand into a fist, almost disappointed as it shifted forms to become a bubble launcher. "Dammit, that's a terrible feeling. Squishy and wet. Disgusting," he mumbled, pointing it forward towards the enemies. "But anyways, let's make sure that thing doesn't go off." Concentrating, he fired the bubbles out, trying his best to aim so that they'd catch both the enemies and their bomb in their pattern of bobbing. Moving forward himself through the cover of the bubbles, he readied the magbolt onto one of his arms, then crouched, holding the shaking arm forward. "Get over here!" he yelled, trying to draw one of the enemies forward to smash them with his muscled fore-arm. Hopefully, this would allow him to draw the enemy off of the protective sanctuary he'd been given and destroy him.

"Look out, there's still a lot more of them! You're going to be vulnerable if you just sit there!" Rania told him, slightly upset.

"Pshaw, these things no better then to cross me," MeleeMan laughed, delivering a swift backhand strike for the enemy Melody he'd bypassed. Getting back up by springing off of one hand, he started to strafe hard to the right to get out of the way of the attacks the enemies might launch to counter him, moving with a boxer's bobbing step.

1. Bubstar1 to BigHatA, Bighat B, and Flashbomb [20 aqua and bubble]
2. Magbolt1 to BighatB [90, try to pull enemy off sanctuary]
3. Buster to MelodyB [8]
4. Dodge
5. Dodge
Meleeman's masculine cuisine strategy achieves partial success. Two bubbles go to their intended targets, the glowing orb, and the hiding Bighat. The third bubble misses its mark only because the other BigHat dodged it. The orb blows up, but doesn't affect anything. The brawler grunts as he drags the BigHat in with magnetic energy, shocking it to a crisp, thanks to the bubble trap.
He then BITCH SLAPS the remaining Melody into extinction, the force so great, that the virus is sent smashing into the wall of the battle routine before exploding in cloud of data.
The Brushman, scared out of its mind, beckons the other BigHat over as it wipes the floor, generating some more Holy Panels. The top hat virus sighs, obviously displeased at the situation, and lands on one such panel.
Apparently, the BigHat wants to fight like a man, but really can't in this situation.

BighatA: 100 (Holy)
BighatB: ZAPPED
MelodyA: NINJA'D
MelodyB: BITCH SLAPPED
Brushman: 100 (Holy)

Meleeman: 300

Terrain: Normal 95%, 5% Holy
"Heh. Big man, huh? You guys are the last ones left, right?" MeleeMan snickered, cracking his knuckles threateningly with a wide grin spread across his face. "Well this is looking a little unfair, still. If you wanna be a real man, you should get off of those glowing panels." Sprinting forward, he skid to a stop close to his opponents, then leaned down and pointed to a spot on the ground. "Come on, right here, chump."

Rania sighed impatiently. MeleeMan's gloating had always rubbed her the wrong way. "Quit fooling around. For all we know, these viruses can't even understand what you're saying to them," she muttered. "Which chips do you want?"

"The lava zone. Gimme that one," he smiled, looking over his shoulder.

"What? Lava zone?... Oh! I see the plan now!" she smiled, happy to see that maybe he was finally using his head. "You realized that the viruses were going to use those panels to reduce the damage they incurred, so you decided to override it to your own advantage. That's pretty clever, you know," she congratulated him.

"Well, I just thought they were pretty damn girly looking. Hotter, bubbling with excitement... that's a man's battleground! A man doesn't need bright lights or smoke and mirrors!" he exclaimed. Still leaning over, he drove back his fist like a piston, baring down hard on the ground with his left palm to keep balance. "If you want to be a man, step into the kitchen!" he roared, smashing his fist against the ground, creating a surge of lava around him in a wide wave, covering the surrounding area.

"Step into the kitchen?" Rania asked dubiously.

"Step into the kitchen."

"The kitchen?"

"Wait, the kitchen's a place for a woman," he muttered, his mind suddenly running to his usual chauvinistic cliches. "Okay, nevermind. Step out of the kitchen... and into this frying pan!" he bellowed with a wide grin spread across his face. Rania just gave another sigh of disapproval. "That one not a winner either?"

"Hardly."

"Dammit. Oh well, just go ahead and slot me in some more weapons. A firehit ought to do," he told her, breaking his lean to rise back to his full height. As Rania complied, he charged back in the virus' direction. "One!" he roared charging towards the top-hatted enemy. "It's been fun, man. Maybe you'll be blessed with godly muscles like mine in the next life!" In a stream of flames and smoke, he rocketed his fist briefly downward, then upward like a rocket to uppercut his opponent. "You too, pal!" he cried out, lunging to his right and swinging his fist like a tremendous club towards the remaining enemy.

Assuming it was all over now, he adopted his strafing stance, getting ready to dodge any possible retaliation. "You guys are big if you're still alive after that. Real big."

1. Lavazone [zone of panels to lava]
2. Soul Fist Uppercut to BigHatA [60 + lower accuracy]
3. Firehit1 to Brushman [75]
4. Dodge
5. Dodge
Meleeman sprints forward, taunting the enemies. The Bighat grins and throws a orb of light at the spot the brawler had indicated, before gasping at horror at the firey warrior's next action.
The battler grunted as he slammed his fist into the ground, cracking the panels and sending a gush of lava frothing forth from the crack that soon covered most of the field. The effects of the newly created panels wiped out the ones the Brushman and Bighat were on, and eradicated the ball of light.
Too shocked to say a word, the BigHat was promptly uppercutted in the chin and sent flying to the edge of the lava field, burning quite a bit.
The Brushman took the initiative to try moving away from Meleeman's next attack, but the punch caught him in the side, and so the virus was sent flying to the edge of the ring as well.

BighatA: 30
BighatB: ZAPPED
MelodyA: NINJA'D
MelodyB: BITCH SLAPPED
Brushman: 30

Meleeman: 300

Terrain: Normal 70%, 30% Lava (Everyone)
"Dammit. Persistent, aren't you?" MeleeMan grumbled, trudging through the lava with a tough swagger, his huge shoulders moving back and forth as he approached the remaining opponents. "Okay, we're gonna finish this off the old fashioned way. Give me the rageclaw, Rania, and I'll take these punks out for good."

Rania nodded, giving MeleeMan the chip. It was odd, seeing MeleeMan standing in the scorching hot magma ramrod straight. Any ordinary person would have been lucky to run across it without severe burns; her navi's fire-type characteristics and affinity for heat, however, made it so that he had no trouble at all wading through it as slowly as he wished. "Are you okay in there, MeleeMan? Isn't it uncomfortable walking around in that? I'd sort of had this image of it only sprouting around the enemy... I didn't really expect you to walk around in it."

"Rania, I'm a guy that can spew flame from his eye-sockets. You think stepping in lava is going to hurt me?" MeleeMan laughed, proceeding onward confidently across the hellishly hot terrain. Bringing his fist up beneath his jaw with a pumping motion, he replaced the gauntlet with a gold, bear-like claw. "I'm not sure how well you viruses are handling it, but I'm gonna make sure your heads go under! Only a real man can survive a test like this!" he shouted, making a dash for the brushman.

"The lava's not deep enough for that one guy's head, you know," Rania commented, but was mostly ignored if not altogether unheard.

Far too enthralled in the moment of violence to listen to someone insult his one-liners, MeleeMan attempted to grasp his large hand crushingly around the Brushman's extended handle. Once that was accomplished, he had the full intention of wielding it like a club and using it to smash in the Bighat. "If that doesn't work... well, I'll try again, now won't I?" he thought to himself, smiling widely.

MeleeMan was absorbed, but he wasn't stupid (well, that stupid). The navi kept his full wits about him, ready to bob and weave if the enemies were foolish enough to try to retaliate.

1. Rageclaw to Brushman [20] into Bighat A [20]
2. Rageclaw to Brushman [20] into Bighat A [20]
3. Rageclaw to Brushman [20] into Bighat A [20]
4. Dodge
5. Dodge
Meleeman grabs the Brushman and begins beating the crap out of the already hurting Bighat. With the force he uses, the brush snaps after just the second swing, which shatters the Bighat as well. Of course, perhaps caught up in the moment, Meleeman swings one last time, assuring that they would stay down.

BighatA: DELETED!
BighatB: ZAPPED
MelodyA: NINJA'D
MelodyB: BITCH SLAPPED
Brushman: DELETED!

Meleeman: 300

Terrain: Normal 70%, 30% Lava (Everyone)

Rewards: 800z
"Bah, over too quickly. I should have just used my fists; they don't break nearly as easily," MeleeMan grumbled. "Well, this isn't arousing my spirit nearly as well as I thought it would. What say we go grab a match at the arena or find some way to get a real challenge? This place you dragged me to turned out to be too much of a drag."

Rania shrugged, giving another sigh. "It was your idea to come here, remember? Don't sound like you're accusing me or something."

MeleeMan gave a frown, but seemed otherwise unaffected. "Nevermind that. What's important is that we get my blood pumping again. I feel like my blood's frozen in my veins. There's no excitement whatsoever. Smoke is not releasing itself from my gauntlets. Sweat is not pouring down my forehead! My bones do not rattle with the excitement of challenge!"

"You're standing in boiling lava but you're not sweating?" Rania noted with confusion. "Well, fine. We'll see if we can't get you something more interesting to do. C'mon, I'll jack you out of the net."

"Only waiting on you," MeleeMan smirked, then was quickly jacked out of the Netfrica network.

((Leaving))