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I-9

[Now Playing: Ito Override ~That Person's Name Is~]
With the rest of the party reeling from the meteor impact, Zoanthrope attack and what-not, it's up to Ito to protect the group from the approaching troopers. He focuses gently, calmly, preparing to rip and tear-

Then a giant dinosaur takes out about four of them, the robots exploding on impact with such powerful force, as Ai casually walks- almost saunters- down the street, the T-rex clattering into pieces as it smashes over a lamppost on the other side of the street. A car alarm or two goes off. Ai might need to apologise to the neighbours after this.

Oh, and then December starts ripping his way through another three, sprinting back in the direction they came. The dumplings were avenged, but his boss was going to be plenty pissed if they had to give up a free delivery.

That makes the moment less cool.

Back to work.

A layer of fine dirt starts covering the wounded as Agatha wrenches herself onto her feet, the dirt beginning to absorb the remains of the acidic venom. Spica groans, nodding as she accepts Sato's help and pulls herself up, mustering enough power to hold up barriers, though still clearly stunned by the explosion. Sato himself rushes into the fight to assist Ito, cutting a robot in half with his arrival.

Two of the groups, one of whom Sato just attacked, surge past the two, to get at the weakened back line, one aiming at Agatha and unleashing a hurricane of laser blasts, eating away at her defenses, the dust and barrier being eaten away as the intensity of the barrage continues and the other running for the downed Zoanthrope while Agatha is held down, picking up their unconscious ally. Before Ito and Sato can turn to assist, the two remaining groups, not too weakened by Ai's dynamic enttry, open a barrage of blasts upon Ito and Sato.

The force of the blasts begin to bruise Ito through his armor, though ever so slightly. He manages to reach out and slash one or two, but the others hold their assault up, coordinating their attacks to keep Ito and Sato unable to maintain their defense, encircling the two to pin them in with gunfire and leave them no room to attack.

The armor's time is running out; once your armor's gone, you've got no chance of surviving this barrage. These robots were surrounding you.

Time to come up with a better strategy.

---

Meanwhile, on December's adventure to retun back to the dumpling house, he encounters one final group of soldiers, training their guns on him, seemingly a straggling group of reinforcements to assist their brethren.

You got 21 minutes left. Maybe 20.

Those dumplings aren't going to deliver themselves.

Throw a hatchet at Assaulter C

24-14

[Now Playing: ~The cyborg fights~]
Sato doesn't even pause for a moment as he slices Ito's webbing open. It was tough and sticky webbing, but his sword was sharp. His sword does catch quite a bit of it though; might need a little shaking off and cleaning. That's just plain annoying.

As Ito wrenches himself to his feet, he takes a look at his coat. The venom, acid, whatever it was, is slowly fading away, leaving a rather unsightly cut in his coat.

This. Can. Not-you know the drill.

[Now Playing: Ito Override ~That Person's Name Is~]

The golden armor descends upon Hideyuki, transforming him into the Makai Knight of Touto, the defender of the night against the shadows of Horrors who prowled it for prey, to hunt down the weak.

It was time to bring an end to this fight.

A meteor descends from the sky, Agatha mounting it, screaming as she tries to drive it towards the Zoanthrope. The hospital is close, too close. Just a little bit closer. Just a little longer. Just a little faster, and the meteor would stop the Zoanthrope, would stop whatever it had planned, whatever it was trying to do. Maybe it was trying to regroup, or extract, or something, but whatever the case, it would not do it.

Hideyuki sprints up the side of the house, leaping up into the air to join Agatha, plunging his blade into the meteor to drive it straight into the Zoanthrope, two of its red beady eyes twinkling as the sheer weight of the world descends upon it. Agatha's screams, Ito's roar, the Zoanthrope's slowing pace and seeming fearful look as its end seems to descend upon it; it all made for a majestic image of triumph, one that came straight out of one of the better action-based anime. Even December is trying to join in, hopping across fences, his dumplings driving him on.

It's all over.

[Now Playing: Enhanced Zoanthrope Override ~Naming Sense Gata Boshi Gokuseifuku~]

Except that glint in its eyes isn't fear.

It's bloodlust.

Ito may not be fazed -he's faced many an insane, hungry Horror before-, but Agatha notices this.

Ito, however, does notice its arms growing back quickly and the arms that were hanging limply suddenly perking up. Too quickly. Far too quickly.

And they both notice the Zoanthrope leaping directly to meet the meteor, razor-sharp talons glowing with energy-

The meteor explodes as the Zoanthrope slashes through it with all eight of its arms, a crackling noise (was that laughter?) emerging from its mandibles as it cuts straight through the heavy rock like a hot knife through so much butter. Four of its arms are torn off by the effort, incinerated in the blast, holes torn into its body by the shrapnel, but it wasn't done yet, not by a long shot. No, it wanted more.

More.

Agatha and Ito are thrown aside as the meteor explodes, Agatha taking the brunt of the explosion, Ito catching her lightly and dropping her on the ground as they land, flaming rocks showering the road. Even Spica is hit, thrown off her barrier platforms and thrown to the ground by the sheer force of the explosion, sent tumbling away from her safe post.

The Zoanthrope stands there menacingly, two of its arms already growing back. It now occurs to Ito that this beast is taller than he is, by a long shot, but this shouldn't intimidate him. No, a true Makai Knight is not intimidated by a mere monster.

So he rushes at it, trying to bring his blade down on it, but the Zoanthrope goes all in too. Its four remaining arms smash directly into Ito's gut as he raises his blade, throwing him back. The acidic venom on its talons seems to be mitigated by the Soul Metal, but the sheer force of the attack manages to ring Ito straight through his armor (which shouldn't be possible, what the hell WAS this thing?), forcing him to stagger back, shaking his head, completely vulnerable-

-And then a blade slices its torso open, sheer explosive force blowing out a chunk of its side, forcing the Zoanthrope to stagger back before it can finish what it started as-

[Now Playing: Sato Override ~Til When?~]

-Sato appears, the red fading from his blade, the explosion of the meteor having been captured in his blade and directed into the Zoanthrope's body.

The Zoanthrope screeches in pain and lashes out with its remaining arms, raking Sato, Ito, December and Agatha across their fronts, acidic venom burning them and Sato barely being spared as Spica's barrier shatters. Ito wastes no time, taking the opportunity to end it now; the Zoanthrope was already regenerating its wounds from Sato, taking the meteor on and lashing out, but Agatha isn't quite done yet, as she forces a large chunk of the shattered meteor to smash into the Zoanthrope, crippling its remaining arms.

Now was his chance.

He rushes forth.

[Now Playing: Squad Override ~You Say Run~]

He steels his mind.

He clenches his hands around his blade's hilt.

His allies had set the perfect mark. It was time to finish.

The Zoanthrope's arms grow back quickly, too quickly, but Ito didn't have time to notice such petty distractions as he evaded their blind lashes.

Now was the time to end the fight decisively.

He drives his sword directly into the Zoanthrope's gut, twisting up to cripple it. The Zoanthrope screeches, flailing as Ito wrenches his blade out, clutching at its stomach as it kneels to the ground, the wounds regenerating but not fully, not even close. All the bloodlust is gone from its eyes, replaced with a burning, seething hatred, but Ito didn't care as he whipped his blade to the side, cleansing it of blood like the samurai of old.

His job was done, with sixty seconds to spare.

The Aranea Zoanthrope has been defeated.

---

As for Ai? Well, her part was very, very simple. Hardly worth mentioning, really.

One moment, the robot troopers were blasting her with lasers and an explosive or two.

The next, they had all mostly exploded. A giant robotic T-rex's corpse ripping their torsos apart may have had something to do with that.

As Ai puts down the T-rex to bar any further soldiers from getting past her, she hears the sound of footsteps....behind her. She looks behind and, well, she sees soldiers piling in right where the group had just run off to. And there were more of them, too.

Oh bother. More thugs to deal with. And she had to move too.

Oh well. Better deal with it now than later.

"Haruko! Careful! You're going to set someone's HOUSE on fire! If you can, get under him and fire up!"
Of course, Maki couldn't worry about that right now. In any case, she couldn't exactly stop Haruko's collateral damage.

At this point, they would've lured the Zoanthrope elsewhere; an empty, large space, where Haruko could do as much as she liked, and Maki could go all-in; after all, Maki's power was equally as destructive, but whereas Maki's strength was concentrated into her fists, Haruko's.....wasn't. Indeed, Maki had to take care not to pulverise walls with her punches unless absolutely necessary.

In any case, a Zoanthrope needed taking down right now. The newcomers had the smaller Zoanthropes handled, so there was just the big guy.

And like that, she just got an idea.
"New guy, hang on. It'll get bumpy, but I think I have a way to take this thing down without burning the place down! Brace yourself!"
Rising Voltaic Charge onto the Zoanthrope and start wrenching it up. Alter to 5.
[2 [4] [5] 5 2 4 5 5 4 3]

Minato just reverts to normal form, trying to get away from the inevitable chaos.

”....you’re kidding.”