EoR Wine Country - NNWM2k19 - 13
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Several years ago, a phenomenon known as the Devil’s Winds, the El Diablo, went through the very inland part of Wine Country. The right hellish combination of hurricane force wind, a drought, and late season hot weather made everything brittle, dry, and prone to sparking at a moment’s notice. PG&E had been neglecting repairs, instead paying themselves more raises and bonuses, and one of their poles fell in the wind onto the right hilly forest area. It’s all it ever takes is the one.
Nobody had learned from their past; an entire city had blown up in a gas line explosion directly related to their employee neglect and with that went enough money out of their pockets to make people forget.
It was forgotten too swiftly but from then on, with how constant it was, it would never again be forgotten.
The name of that hilly forested area was called Atlas Peak, deep in the heart of Napa, the more rich and upper class sister community to the rural, farmy young lass that was Sonoma, and the whole area stood since in a scorched, evil black and gray that completely erased the greens and golds and reds that dotted the scenery, with the occasional purple and orange blur from the grapes and poppies.
This was considered one of PG&E’s biggest stranglehold points in the entire region, now a blockade of soldiers and fried, sensitive equipment liable to spark again at a moment’s notice, making passage to their headquarters north of there nearly impossible. Atma, using Hoshigiri and her powers to cut through those bigger than life and with inflated senses of self worth (which is why divine, sky, and star servants hates this one trick) to slice down their accursed poles and wires without irritating them to the point they’d burst again into the Devil’s flames.
However, there’s only so much you can get down at once. Having her sibling be Nobunaga helped speed it up, adding in their anti divine properties, but there’s still only so much two servants can do.
Atma lead the others on and while doing so, began to talk about those that she was meeting up with, her and Gudako’s army looking pretty menacing at this point.
The two who lead the rebellion up on Atlas Peak were a pair of avengers. They figured if the enemy got two, they should at least have two, and Nobunaga hopping around made three, so that was bound to annoy the enemy somewhat. Avengers were a petty bunch at times, but it made the psychological warfare easy enough. One was a familiar figure, clad in armor as black as the land, her sword black too, as was her cape, and she’d probably make her eyes that too if she could alter her spirit origin. She waved a giant flag, this time emblazoned with a combination of her own sigil and the Oda symbol, allowing it only inasmuch as she didn’t need another five star Avenger on her ass this chapter. There were already several others and she could always swear at Nobu if they said anything.
“Jeanne d’Arc Alter, or Jalter...” Atma began on her way leading the group towards the mountain. “Has been up there manning the post alongside the last of the Wives, another Avenger.”
The other one near Jalter was a woman who looked just as unimpressed as Jalter did, in an Ushanka with Oda emblem on it above the Soviet hammer and sickle, an AK-47 slung across her back, and sitting near the turret on top of an old M67. This tank shot fire back at the enemies, which when everything is already scorched around you, the two could burn all they wanted without worrying about collateral.
“Though not without help. I put with them someone who was bound to stick around as a servant at least long enough to see this through to the end. She of all people wouldn’t want this state to go down. They call her the Saber of The Bay.” Atma grinned, unable to wait to meet up with them. “And they seem to get along well with the UFO and tank Nobbu so they already have that covered.”
Up on the Peak itself, the two Avengers sat in a deep, important conversation. Which is to say nothing at all was being said between the two. They could glare and snarl and stare at each other, communicating everything they needed in a passive aggressive way. The only actual words spoken were trying to get the Nobbus’ or the Saber’s attention.
“Hey. Hey you. The one in the bummer cap. The yet another Saberface, like we don’t have fucking enough of those.” Jalter tried to get her attention. It was almost fruitless. She was off detaining some low ranking military mooks and drawing up another list of crimes they had committed, using it solely to calculate a rather immense tab against them. “Like, you going to do anything else today?”
There was no response.
“I guess not.”
The Avenger of Moon Valley just watched, petting a tank Nobbu on the head and showing another one dressed like her how to fire their rifle better, as it kept trying to and was mostly shooting the ground and popping up in the air.
It would be another while before the Saber came back, pleased with herself, sweeping a cape over one shoulder and tapping the actual saber at her side. At least one of them finally had one. Her uniform was decorated with bright and wide epaulets, a massive feather in her cap, and a great big belt buckle resembling the Golden Gate. Her boots had spurs on them and her hair was as radiantly golden as the sun and the gold of California legend was.
“I’m pretty sure they owe us about another $500 today.” she huffed happily.
“Is this on top of the rest of the tab those idiots owe us for, you know, almost burning us down several hundred times? Or did you just not include inflation again...” The Avenger teased.
“Well, this is each, and there’s five, so carry the two and add in about a century’s worth of inflation and recessions...”
“Nevermind. I started her up again. My bad.”
Another Nobbu appeared by this Saber, counting chocolate coins she had in her pocket. The Jalter style Nobbu poked at the others’ feet with her little flag, slapping it in their faces and insisting she was the most important one there. A UFO Nobbu would usually be by to retaliate by picking her up and dropping her on her gotdang head.
The enemy front was unusually quiet today, even more so than usual. There was rarely ever this little of activity and even then, there was usually something to burn. Lunch came and went without a single enemy making their faces known.
Both Avengers were too exhausted from life and knew right away this usually meant trouble.
They were right on target, because not a short while later, a familiar enemy face showed up with a gaggle of the RUNEZ goons and the antivaxxer troupe, alongside a couple of Surtr. It was the Assassin of Marin, trying to give himself at least one victory before this story was done and out, marching to a line that stood nothing but a few trees dividing him and the Avenger club. With him was a new face, someone who had not been rightfully introduced yet, waiting to make the time right for his ugly mug to show and pointed themselves at the Saber.
“Saber of The Bay, I’ve finally come for your side of America!” It was Columbus, in all his horrible bearded glory, his sword out as if to challenge the Saber to a duel. “Your useless and succeeded rule of this land will end!”
“Guess it makes sense this complete fucking idiot is here too...” The Avenger sighed, getting in her tank and positioning the Nobbu around her. “Of course they’d pick every single greedy bastard that’s ever walked any land, huh? Too bad for them hair burns, so we can at least shave that horrifying thing off his face.”
“It’s a parade of assholes.” Jalter chimed in. “I think two Avengers and a Saber, only one of us actually named, can go up against one unnamed servant and a named three star though. Do they really think we’re that stupid or weak?”
The two exchanged words for the first time in days, knowing it works better to piss your enemy off if you’re insulting them in tandem.
“I dunno why they thought to bring all this to an area where I have a tank, but whatever.”
A battle ensued, with just the two Avengers and Saber in a row, hacking down enemy after enemy, several rounds of about nine of the guards and antivaxxers each, mowing through them easily with the help of the tank they somehow thankfully had. The Saber kept them locked down enough with her case of debuffs and her one Charisma the lot of them like to have and using her hit count to generate enough crit stars for her two bulky Avenger friends.
It really couldn’t just be that easy could it?
~ END OF CHAPTER 7 NODE 1
Of course, it wasn’t going to be that easy. You don’t hand out two Avengers in one go and not try to stack the odds against them. Another wave happened, almost identical to the first, them bringing out a group of Shadow Servants shaped like Nobukatsu and Akechi, followed up by Dosan and Zhou, but the battle still ended in a pretty impressively sized victory to the heroes.
Something was rapidly becoming Very Up about this area.
~ END OF CHAPTER 7 NODE 2
Third first same as second and first.
They were peppered from all sides now by the Shadow Servants followed up the Surtr, proving them an actual difficult fight. It turns out you can only fight literal fire with literal fire so long, before things start looking dire and desperate. They were actually breaking a sweat, and not in the way you can use to brag about to your friends for looking cool over.
And it looked like there was an endless source of all of them.
Atlas Peak may fall.
~ END OF CHAPTER 7 NODE 3
“Have you figured it out by now?” The Assassin taunted. “Thanks to my Noble Phantasm, I have an endless array of faceless victims that won’t stop at anything to crush you. You’re trapped so long as you don’t go after me, and good luck even getting to me!”
“I can’t believe I’m doing this a third time...” a voice shot off from the distance, coming up from the western flank of the Avengers. “I mean, are you kidding me?”
“You brat.” The Avenger scoffed. “Of course you’d make it here and try to steal the show, pbbt.”
“I was about to say that! Your girlfriend is a damn glory hog.” Jalter pouted. “But I wouldn’t be telling the truth if I said it wasn’t useful about now...”
> “Two of them, again…”
>>> “Two of them, again!”
“I brought friends! That Master I said I saw landing in the distance as well as everyone else we’ve been sending out. The Master even brought us one really gay pirate and one really gay amazon. If you want some mooks cleaned out in now time, I’m sure you could put some good teams together and have them attack those formations as we head for the leaders!” Atma grinned. “I mean, there’s a fucker here who keeps trying to have his racist holiday on my birthday, we at least need to win here for that!”
“He what?” Jalter balked. “Are you serious?”
“You’d never think you’d be upset to have a day off on your birthday by government mandate, trust me, Jalter.”
“I overheard this punk, thankfully, and I can guess who he is and what his deal is. He tried to cut us off a while ago, like, start of the singularity length while ago.” Atma pointed at the Assassin. “Besides, he actually already revealed his true name. You just weren’t around to hear it. It’s the goddamn Zodiac, like who else would be able to put himself in a literal position of power above his victims and make it so we remember him but not them? Besides fifteen seasons of a certain cop show that will remain nameless. We will not be sued.”
“Oh, pff.” The Avenger smirked.
“How dare you catch the plot up to them!” The Zodiac steamed up. “If it’s going to be that way, then I’m going to let my thieving friend steal even more of the show. Want to tell us all what’s going on with that Saber?”
“Oh, you mean Emperor Norton?” Columbus scoffed. “Couldn’t get anyone to succeed her rule to save her life. Nor her own holiday. Most actually remember her as a useless man, while my name is still celebrated despite the odds!”
“So you’re saying we need some kind of day to remember a genuinely useless man?” The Saber, now Norton, dismissed him. Not like it mattered. She was more powerful the more people were aware of her history.
“Shall we blow them away?” Jalter beamed.
A quick team was set up, throwing Atma up front with the two Avengers, backed up by Norton and a couple of the other girls set up in various ways. If they had put any thought into this whatsoever, this might be a difficult fight, because this time they had to go through their first round of nine enemies, a second of two of the Surtr, and one of the actual bosses this time. A full round for one chapter.
Columbus went down like a ton of bricks. Bringing a three star in this point of the game was almost a pointless endeavor, but it gave the Zodiac enough time to try to one hit kill the hero team.
A good counter was actually Norton, who kept using her skills to “fine” the enemy, building up a random debuff every turn for 3 turns, each lasting for 5 after, giving the middle of the fight enough to buff anyone up and blow the enemy away.
And it began again.
“To reach for the stars…”
“Hmf, it’s no matter if we pass here. We’ve stalled you long enough for our bosses to complete their finalizing of their plans...” The Zodiac grinned. “Go on, do it. Cut me, who cut others, down.”
“So that I may cut even them down! Oh, rays of Amaterasu, guide my blade where it needs to cut! Hoshigiri – The Star Slaying Sword! One small slice for me, one giant cut for womankind!”
Atma ran through and cut him to ribbons, just as he had requested. For all the young women he killed, maybe some sense of justice could be had for them, may their afterlives be more comfortable.
“Well, the gang’s all here!” Atma smiled after the battle.
“About friggin’ time!” The Avenger frowned. “Also, bah, I don’t like this whole title thing much. I’ll just get it out of the way. I’m Koshka. Hi.”
>>> “Holy shit her mount is a tank!”
> “It’s an honor to meet you, ma’am”
“Yeah I dunno why nobody else but these brats have one yet.” Jalter poked one of the tank Nobbu before glaring at Koshka. “Oh great, I’m starting to talk like you! We’ve been allied far too long! Gross.”
“So, there’s really nothing left but to try to storm the castle?” Nobu asked. “I like taking castles, but this one could do with a makeover.”
“Not like that’s ever made the story shorter or easier, but yes.” Atma replied. “Let’s get a move on. I don’t know what that was about, but I don’t trust their words about the enemy Avengers being up to something vague and mysterious. Vague and mysterious never ends well.”
~ END OF CHAPTER 8 NODE 1 OF 1
Several years ago, a phenomenon known as the Devil’s Winds, the El Diablo, went through the very inland part of Wine Country. The right hellish combination of hurricane force wind, a drought, and late season hot weather made everything brittle, dry, and prone to sparking at a moment’s notice. PG&E had been neglecting repairs, instead paying themselves more raises and bonuses, and one of their poles fell in the wind onto the right hilly forest area. It’s all it ever takes is the one.
Nobody had learned from their past; an entire city had blown up in a gas line explosion directly related to their employee neglect and with that went enough money out of their pockets to make people forget.
It was forgotten too swiftly but from then on, with how constant it was, it would never again be forgotten.
The name of that hilly forested area was called Atlas Peak, deep in the heart of Napa, the more rich and upper class sister community to the rural, farmy young lass that was Sonoma, and the whole area stood since in a scorched, evil black and gray that completely erased the greens and golds and reds that dotted the scenery, with the occasional purple and orange blur from the grapes and poppies.
This was considered one of PG&E’s biggest stranglehold points in the entire region, now a blockade of soldiers and fried, sensitive equipment liable to spark again at a moment’s notice, making passage to their headquarters north of there nearly impossible. Atma, using Hoshigiri and her powers to cut through those bigger than life and with inflated senses of self worth (which is why divine, sky, and star servants hates this one trick) to slice down their accursed poles and wires without irritating them to the point they’d burst again into the Devil’s flames.
However, there’s only so much you can get down at once. Having her sibling be Nobunaga helped speed it up, adding in their anti divine properties, but there’s still only so much two servants can do.
Atma lead the others on and while doing so, began to talk about those that she was meeting up with, her and Gudako’s army looking pretty menacing at this point.
The two who lead the rebellion up on Atlas Peak were a pair of avengers. They figured if the enemy got two, they should at least have two, and Nobunaga hopping around made three, so that was bound to annoy the enemy somewhat. Avengers were a petty bunch at times, but it made the psychological warfare easy enough. One was a familiar figure, clad in armor as black as the land, her sword black too, as was her cape, and she’d probably make her eyes that too if she could alter her spirit origin. She waved a giant flag, this time emblazoned with a combination of her own sigil and the Oda symbol, allowing it only inasmuch as she didn’t need another five star Avenger on her ass this chapter. There were already several others and she could always swear at Nobu if they said anything.
“Jeanne d’Arc Alter, or Jalter...” Atma began on her way leading the group towards the mountain. “Has been up there manning the post alongside the last of the Wives, another Avenger.”
The other one near Jalter was a woman who looked just as unimpressed as Jalter did, in an Ushanka with Oda emblem on it above the Soviet hammer and sickle, an AK-47 slung across her back, and sitting near the turret on top of an old M67. This tank shot fire back at the enemies, which when everything is already scorched around you, the two could burn all they wanted without worrying about collateral.
“Though not without help. I put with them someone who was bound to stick around as a servant at least long enough to see this through to the end. She of all people wouldn’t want this state to go down. They call her the Saber of The Bay.” Atma grinned, unable to wait to meet up with them. “And they seem to get along well with the UFO and tank Nobbu so they already have that covered.”
Up on the Peak itself, the two Avengers sat in a deep, important conversation. Which is to say nothing at all was being said between the two. They could glare and snarl and stare at each other, communicating everything they needed in a passive aggressive way. The only actual words spoken were trying to get the Nobbus’ or the Saber’s attention.
“Hey. Hey you. The one in the bummer cap. The yet another Saberface, like we don’t have fucking enough of those.” Jalter tried to get her attention. It was almost fruitless. She was off detaining some low ranking military mooks and drawing up another list of crimes they had committed, using it solely to calculate a rather immense tab against them. “Like, you going to do anything else today?”
There was no response.
“I guess not.”
The Avenger of Moon Valley just watched, petting a tank Nobbu on the head and showing another one dressed like her how to fire their rifle better, as it kept trying to and was mostly shooting the ground and popping up in the air.
It would be another while before the Saber came back, pleased with herself, sweeping a cape over one shoulder and tapping the actual saber at her side. At least one of them finally had one. Her uniform was decorated with bright and wide epaulets, a massive feather in her cap, and a great big belt buckle resembling the Golden Gate. Her boots had spurs on them and her hair was as radiantly golden as the sun and the gold of California legend was.
“I’m pretty sure they owe us about another $500 today.” she huffed happily.
“Is this on top of the rest of the tab those idiots owe us for, you know, almost burning us down several hundred times? Or did you just not include inflation again...” The Avenger teased.
“Well, this is each, and there’s five, so carry the two and add in about a century’s worth of inflation and recessions...”
“Nevermind. I started her up again. My bad.”
Another Nobbu appeared by this Saber, counting chocolate coins she had in her pocket. The Jalter style Nobbu poked at the others’ feet with her little flag, slapping it in their faces and insisting she was the most important one there. A UFO Nobbu would usually be by to retaliate by picking her up and dropping her on her gotdang head.
The enemy front was unusually quiet today, even more so than usual. There was rarely ever this little of activity and even then, there was usually something to burn. Lunch came and went without a single enemy making their faces known.
Both Avengers were too exhausted from life and knew right away this usually meant trouble.
They were right on target, because not a short while later, a familiar enemy face showed up with a gaggle of the RUNEZ goons and the antivaxxer troupe, alongside a couple of Surtr. It was the Assassin of Marin, trying to give himself at least one victory before this story was done and out, marching to a line that stood nothing but a few trees dividing him and the Avenger club. With him was a new face, someone who had not been rightfully introduced yet, waiting to make the time right for his ugly mug to show and pointed themselves at the Saber.
“Saber of The Bay, I’ve finally come for your side of America!” It was Columbus, in all his horrible bearded glory, his sword out as if to challenge the Saber to a duel. “Your useless and succeeded rule of this land will end!”
“Guess it makes sense this complete fucking idiot is here too...” The Avenger sighed, getting in her tank and positioning the Nobbu around her. “Of course they’d pick every single greedy bastard that’s ever walked any land, huh? Too bad for them hair burns, so we can at least shave that horrifying thing off his face.”
“It’s a parade of assholes.” Jalter chimed in. “I think two Avengers and a Saber, only one of us actually named, can go up against one unnamed servant and a named three star though. Do they really think we’re that stupid or weak?”
The two exchanged words for the first time in days, knowing it works better to piss your enemy off if you’re insulting them in tandem.
“I dunno why they thought to bring all this to an area where I have a tank, but whatever.”
A battle ensued, with just the two Avengers and Saber in a row, hacking down enemy after enemy, several rounds of about nine of the guards and antivaxxers each, mowing through them easily with the help of the tank they somehow thankfully had. The Saber kept them locked down enough with her case of debuffs and her one Charisma the lot of them like to have and using her hit count to generate enough crit stars for her two bulky Avenger friends.
It really couldn’t just be that easy could it?
~ END OF CHAPTER 7 NODE 1
Of course, it wasn’t going to be that easy. You don’t hand out two Avengers in one go and not try to stack the odds against them. Another wave happened, almost identical to the first, them bringing out a group of Shadow Servants shaped like Nobukatsu and Akechi, followed up by Dosan and Zhou, but the battle still ended in a pretty impressively sized victory to the heroes.
Something was rapidly becoming Very Up about this area.
~ END OF CHAPTER 7 NODE 2
Third first same as second and first.
They were peppered from all sides now by the Shadow Servants followed up the Surtr, proving them an actual difficult fight. It turns out you can only fight literal fire with literal fire so long, before things start looking dire and desperate. They were actually breaking a sweat, and not in the way you can use to brag about to your friends for looking cool over.
And it looked like there was an endless source of all of them.
Atlas Peak may fall.
~ END OF CHAPTER 7 NODE 3
“Have you figured it out by now?” The Assassin taunted. “Thanks to my Noble Phantasm, I have an endless array of faceless victims that won’t stop at anything to crush you. You’re trapped so long as you don’t go after me, and good luck even getting to me!”
“I can’t believe I’m doing this a third time...” a voice shot off from the distance, coming up from the western flank of the Avengers. “I mean, are you kidding me?”
“You brat.” The Avenger scoffed. “Of course you’d make it here and try to steal the show, pbbt.”
“I was about to say that! Your girlfriend is a damn glory hog.” Jalter pouted. “But I wouldn’t be telling the truth if I said it wasn’t useful about now...”
> “Two of them, again…”
>>> “Two of them, again!”
“I brought friends! That Master I said I saw landing in the distance as well as everyone else we’ve been sending out. The Master even brought us one really gay pirate and one really gay amazon. If you want some mooks cleaned out in now time, I’m sure you could put some good teams together and have them attack those formations as we head for the leaders!” Atma grinned. “I mean, there’s a fucker here who keeps trying to have his racist holiday on my birthday, we at least need to win here for that!”
“He what?” Jalter balked. “Are you serious?”
“You’d never think you’d be upset to have a day off on your birthday by government mandate, trust me, Jalter.”
“I overheard this punk, thankfully, and I can guess who he is and what his deal is. He tried to cut us off a while ago, like, start of the singularity length while ago.” Atma pointed at the Assassin. “Besides, he actually already revealed his true name. You just weren’t around to hear it. It’s the goddamn Zodiac, like who else would be able to put himself in a literal position of power above his victims and make it so we remember him but not them? Besides fifteen seasons of a certain cop show that will remain nameless. We will not be sued.”
“Oh, pff.” The Avenger smirked.
“How dare you catch the plot up to them!” The Zodiac steamed up. “If it’s going to be that way, then I’m going to let my thieving friend steal even more of the show. Want to tell us all what’s going on with that Saber?”
“Oh, you mean Emperor Norton?” Columbus scoffed. “Couldn’t get anyone to succeed her rule to save her life. Nor her own holiday. Most actually remember her as a useless man, while my name is still celebrated despite the odds!”
“So you’re saying we need some kind of day to remember a genuinely useless man?” The Saber, now Norton, dismissed him. Not like it mattered. She was more powerful the more people were aware of her history.
“Shall we blow them away?” Jalter beamed.
A quick team was set up, throwing Atma up front with the two Avengers, backed up by Norton and a couple of the other girls set up in various ways. If they had put any thought into this whatsoever, this might be a difficult fight, because this time they had to go through their first round of nine enemies, a second of two of the Surtr, and one of the actual bosses this time. A full round for one chapter.
Columbus went down like a ton of bricks. Bringing a three star in this point of the game was almost a pointless endeavor, but it gave the Zodiac enough time to try to one hit kill the hero team.
A good counter was actually Norton, who kept using her skills to “fine” the enemy, building up a random debuff every turn for 3 turns, each lasting for 5 after, giving the middle of the fight enough to buff anyone up and blow the enemy away.
And it began again.
“To reach for the stars…”
“Hmf, it’s no matter if we pass here. We’ve stalled you long enough for our bosses to complete their finalizing of their plans...” The Zodiac grinned. “Go on, do it. Cut me, who cut others, down.”
“So that I may cut even them down! Oh, rays of Amaterasu, guide my blade where it needs to cut! Hoshigiri – The Star Slaying Sword! One small slice for me, one giant cut for womankind!”
Atma ran through and cut him to ribbons, just as he had requested. For all the young women he killed, maybe some sense of justice could be had for them, may their afterlives be more comfortable.
“Well, the gang’s all here!” Atma smiled after the battle.
“About friggin’ time!” The Avenger frowned. “Also, bah, I don’t like this whole title thing much. I’ll just get it out of the way. I’m Koshka. Hi.”
>>> “Holy shit her mount is a tank!”
> “It’s an honor to meet you, ma’am”
“Yeah I dunno why nobody else but these brats have one yet.” Jalter poked one of the tank Nobbu before glaring at Koshka. “Oh great, I’m starting to talk like you! We’ve been allied far too long! Gross.”
“So, there’s really nothing left but to try to storm the castle?” Nobu asked. “I like taking castles, but this one could do with a makeover.”
“Not like that’s ever made the story shorter or easier, but yes.” Atma replied. “Let’s get a move on. I don’t know what that was about, but I don’t trust their words about the enemy Avengers being up to something vague and mysterious. Vague and mysterious never ends well.”
~ END OF CHAPTER 8 NODE 1 OF 1