Re: This Isn't the Best Cult Thread

[Forceaus]

"That was supposed to go through your side, not your arm." Shoka said as the rock spear struck Bliss in her arm rather than go straight through her. She was hurt though, perhaps enough so that the arm would be unusable, at least for a moment. This was what Shoka hoped was the case and intended to take advantage of if it were. She pulled the spear in her right hand back and once again attempted to plunge it into the woman's side. Shoka nearly lost her grip on the spear made of solid rock when Bliss grabbed ahold of it to use her telekinesis on. Her hand would lose its grip and slide forward just as the telekinetic force that went through it caused it break in half, with each of them holding a separate half of it. The concussive force of the blast would catch her and send her backwards and to the ground.

Momentarily stunned, Shoka would notice that Bliss and Tsukimi were leaving her behind and cursed at this realization. They were just going to leave? The fight wasn't over, not even close. Shoka got back up to try and pursue them to prevent them from escaping. She quickly lost sight of them but still kept trekking forward in hopes of intercepting them. The shrine was just up ahead, and one of them was in there. Did they split up or something? What was going on? Shoka walked forward with two spears in hand to try and sneak up on this one and attack her from behind.

In the middle of a clearing in the forest outside the temple, the cultists had regrouped along with their new captives. They had somehow, someway actually managed to capture all four of them and relocated them to this spot in the forest, and believed they did so without anyone witnessing their abductions. The issue they were having now was how to keep them there.

"Not sure those are going to hold for long." The African-American man said, indicating the makeshift binds they had the captives tied up with.

"It's the best we can do. We were told to capture them and that's it." The French-Canadian man replied.

"We just have to wait until mistress Shoka or for-" The Japanese woman started to say before they heard a phone ringing. "Don't answer it." She shouted, but too late. The French-Canadian man answered the phone call.

"Hello. Who are you?" he said, then stopped the moment he heard her yell.

[Bliss]

Sara woke up first. The smell of the surrounding trees felt nice and the sun just dipping beneath the canopy of the park sang in the evening. Then she noticed her arms were wrapped up with a garbage bag holding her back to back with Mitsuko. Her shoulders dropped as she looked down to she a jump rope wrapped around her wrists, tied in front of her body. "You guys are really good at this. Don't change a thing about your strategy at all." Even though the jump rope looked pedestrian, Sara struggled against the tightness around her wrists. "Are you going to answer that phone. It could be very important." A chorus of descent tried to stop him, but he answered Abby's phone with no problem.

"Uh, yeah, who the Hell is this and where's my fiance? Also, those other people?" A ruckus sounded out down the hall. Tsukimi and her dumbass could handle it. Bliss needed to find out where this cult took the rest of her crew before she could think of anything. And, then she thought of something.

"We're in the forest! They captured us and took us out here! I think we're still close to the temple! Yeah, I can see the top of the temple!" Sara found her words giving her a workout, moving Mitsuko with each one of them while the crumbled trashbag refused to give way. This cult bought the industrial strength bag. Those monsters.

"Bliss! Hurry!" Abby yelled while her hands were saran wrapped to her chest with Ashley wrapped to her back. The towels still managed to hold Ashley in check with one also holding sway in her mouth. "I need to check my text messages. This guy I met was totally into me!"

A forest clearing near a temple would take little time to find, but probably a great deal of effort to infiltrate.

Down in the lower sections where Tsukimi kept herself busy in prayer, Whatever god, goddess, or otherworldy being happened to inhabit this shrine smiled upon Tsukimi and laid the tomb to a hush for long enough to hear Shoka sneak up on her. The slight to her honor fueled her attacks, blocking, parrying, trying to rip the spears from Shoka's grip. Anything to attempt to defeat this woman with the endurance of a mountain.

Bliss pulled herself from the catacombs and to the streets of Mexico City. Finding a forest would not be difficult if she knew where she could find a forest in Mexico City. One tree. Two tree. No trees. Definitely not a forest. One tree. Two trees. Three trees. No trees. Probably not a forest. Another turn of a corner and the temple fall ducked down enough for her to see an open forest. "Got it."

[Forceaus]

"I told you not to answer that." The Japanese woman practically screamed at the French-Canadian man because he had answered the phone of one of their captives.

"I didn't mean to. I'm sorry." The French-Canadian quickly said as he hung up the phone and dropped it. "There was a woman on the other end. Had to be one of the other two from before." he told them to give them warning.

"What do we do now?" The Hispanic woman asked the whole group as they attempted to ignore the captives as best they could and try and figure out how to react to this new development. They all seemed to be at a bit of a loss as none of them were exactly prepared to deal with a situation. A few of them were still surprised they even managed to capture all four of the captives they currently had.

"We could try to grab whomever's coming before they get here. Ambush them while they're in the forest." The Japanese man suggested, and got a few approving nods.

"Not all of us can go though. We still got to keep an eye on these four." The Japanese woman said, indicating the captives.

"How about four stay and three hide in the forest." The African-American man said and eventually that would be what they did.

Back down in the catacombs, Shoka was aiming to sneak up on the woman that was praying in the shrine and take her out from behind. Unfortunately, like everything else today, it didn't go as she had hoped. The woman turned around in time to fend off her sneak attack. Now fighting toe to toe with this woman and her spears not proving that effective, Shoka decided to try something different that she would probably come to regret. She tried to cause the shrine to fall on Tsukimi while she was busy trying to fight off Shoka.

[Bliss]

The first thing Sara decided was she needed to get her hands free. The second, she needed Mitsuko off her back. Third, Abby and Ashley needed to do something useful. If she wanted three of those things to happen, she would need to get off her ass and put this plan into action. "Mitsy, you have to do something."

"I'm thinking." Mostly Mitsuko just gazed around at the foliage of the temple. "I have ideas. And plans." Wires wrapped Mitsuko's hands and feet together. "And goals. Like getting-"

"Okay, stop talking." Putting plan one and two together divided to much attention from using an earthen knife to saw through the jump rope around her hands. "Here's what we're going to do. I'm going to cut us free from this trashbag and then I'm going to try to save us."

"What do I do?" Mitsuko looked down at her predicament without much of a plan to get out.

"Nothing. Just lay on the ground and don't get in my way."

Walking up the path into the temple grounds, Bliss tried to keep towards the sides of the wall once she saw a densely forested area. Out of mind, out of sight could do her a lot of good if the minds of these cultists still possessed the same mentalities that caused them to up and run at the first sign of trouble. Bliss planned on giving them enough trouble to put those mentalities to the test, and god help them if four people jumped out to ambush her, she would deliver a retribution normally only reserved for Zeta.

Bad things happened to Tsukimi. Rocks fell on her, spears took pokes at her with their faded blades, and dirt began to entomb her. The amount of rocks and fallen soil caused the ground to buckle under, dropping Tsukimi down to a lower level, but giving the image of her grim demise.

[Forceaus]

"Hey, keep an eye out for anyone coming towards us." The Japanese woman told the French-Canadian man whom she was still not happy with. "They might slip by our brethren or you know, fend them off and keep heading this way. We got to at least try to keep these people captive."

"I know, I know." The French-Canadian man said apologetically.

"Hey." The African-American man said to the others that were still here. "Somebody should go check on them. I think they're up to something over there." he said to the others quietly as he pointed over at their captives. Suspicion kicked in almost instantly at those words. They all looked over at the tied up captives with a sense of worry. There were four of them still here, and four captives. They didn't have the numbers advantage at the moment.

"Watashi wa sorera o chekku shimasu." The Japanese woman whose English was very poor boldly said. She then quickly walked over to where they captives were, and as carefully as she could, began checking to see if they were still tied up and was hoping that she did not just walk straight into an ambush.

The Hispanic woman spotted the apparent leader of the intruders nearby. She was still hidden, but was too far away to properly ambush her. An idea of sorts struck her and she let loose a bird call meant to both signal the others and distract the woman. Maybe it would cause her to do something foolish that would allow them to capture her as well. One could only hope. She would lie in wait just as the Japanese man came rushing in and tried to tackle Bliss from behind. His chances of succeeding would have been greater if he hadn't screamed as he got close to her.

Shoka looked down the hole she had created when she dropped the shrine on top of the woman she was fighting down here in the catacombs. Down below was just a pile of wreckage that Tsukimi was buried under. She was most likely dead, but Shoka herself had previously buried her and some of the others beneath a pile of rubble earlier, only for them to survive and escape. True, Shoka was pretty good at burying people. Literally, not figuratively as in bury their reputation in the eyes of others, but that didn't mean they would stay buried. Shoka shook her head and sighed as she dropped another layer of rocks atop the pile that contained Tsukimi before leaving the room that once contained a rather majestic shrine to exit the catacombs and return to the surface.

[Bliss]

It took a number of minutes, but Sara finally cut through the trash bag holding her and Mitsuko back to back. "Get them free. I'll hold off the rest." Mitsuko scrambled off to get Abby and Ashley freed up from the saran wrap and towels. The three of them would make their way out while Sara set off to put Bliss to the test for HBIC cred. She would test it out against a Japanese woman, not the one currently holding HBIC title, but a Japanese woman. The throw down would break out, but it would be fairly one sided until others joined.

Keeping up with stereotypes, the Japanese man yelled before charging Bliss. The dumb move made Bliss think flipping him would be simple enough. The problem came when he jumped on Bliss' back. Bliss fell to her knees with the angry man pulling her hair and swiping at her face. This level of immature MMA fighting threw Bliss completely out of her element, but finally Bliss shot the man against a tree with a telekinetic blast. "What the Hell!" Bliss could feel the scratches on her nose. "That is not cool! You suck! You suck so much!" Anger swelled so much in Bliss' eyes, it blinded her to everything around her.

Tsukimi pulled herself out of the rubble. She did not die. Instead, a spirit stood before her. "Tsukimi." Armored in a spectral suit of blue and red armor, a featureless entity with a female voice boomed before Tsukimi. "You have a courageous warrior's soul. You will destroy the evil of this world and drive it from the places that protect goodness. Now leave this place and find the true warrior of this generation. The one called only 'Elaine'." The spirit left, leaving Tsukimi alone in the darkened corridor with only a glimpse of light peaking in through the ceiling, with only the thought of whether this happened, or if the toxic air of the sewage caused her a deep hallucination.

[Forceaus]

All four of the captives had gotten free of their binds. Now that's just not good for the cultists, even if those binds were rather lackluster. One of the Japanese women had walked over to where they were tied up to make sure they were still being held captive, only to find out that they had gotten free. "Karera wa jiyūdesu, Karera wa jiyūdesu." She yelled out in a panic as one of them immediately started attacking her. She would start fighting back and fists would fly until she got caught right in the face and it knocked her away.

"Shinpaishinaide kudasai. Ima okonatte imasu." The other Japanese woman shouted out before she rushed over to help as fast as she could to join the unexpected fray. The others would follow and things would more than likely turn into an all out brawl between the two sides.

Yelling right before trying to attack somebody from behind was not a good idea. The Japanese man could have had the jump on her, but blew it when he decided to shout. With no real other option available to him, he went with the whole jumping her thing and was a lot more successful than he would have imagined. The Japanese man begin attacking her as much as possible until he got hit with some kind of power that sent him flying into a tree. He hit the trunk of the tree hard and slumped up against it in pain.

The Hispanic woman was still hiding nearby and trying to edge closer while her fellow cultist attempted to take down their enemy. Half wishing they would do the work for her, the Hispanic woman crept ever closer as the intruder from before managed to defeat the cultist, leaving her with the task of taking out the intruder. Seeing that she seemed distracted and so angry she couldn't focus properly, the Hispanic woman would rush out of the bushes and attempt to choke her from behind.

The passageway that led from the catacombs to the main floor of the temple was still in good condition despite everything that had happened down below. Shoka was walking up this passageway as she aimed to put the catacombs behind her. There was nothing left of value down there anymore, and no reason for her to be there. With this temple now being of no use to her, Shoka left it behind. Now if only she had a clue what she should do next. With no idea if the cultists had captured the other intruders, or where anybody else was, Shoka was effectively left without direction.

[Bliss]

Ashley rallied up Mitsuko and Abby from the throngs of the cult, leading them out of the temple. The chaos of the fight turned into the everlasting sounds of the city and the everlasting taste of the smog filled air. "We need to get the extraction ready and get out of here."

Abby knelt over, the exertion of so much exercise would catch up with her faster than the cultist. "Agreed."

"I want to drive." The moving of the group filled Mitsuko with a few goals. "Sara said I needed to do it."

"Fine by me." The number of events thrust upon Abby in the course of an hour made her perfectly fine with passing the torch over to anyone else. "I get to set the radio though."

Ashley left the two younger members behind to search for a means of extraction for the rest of the team. No rental cars, no faith in a bus get away, and from the looks of the area, very little room for a quick get away through traffic to begin with. "Yeah, you two go find a car and I'll-" Dust picked up down the road, catching Ashley's attention. "I hope this isn't bad."

"It's always bad. Everything is bad." Abby put on a brave face by going invisible.

A flat bed truck pulled up next to the three women. A pair of flats stepped from the cab onto the railing of the running boards descending down to the surface. Tsukimi stood in front of Mitsuko and Ashley with a brown coat of dust over her lapel. "I found a truck. I need to find someone to train me how to embrace my warrior soul."

Ashley stood in a moment of silence. "Okay."

A wild melee broke out between Bliss, Sara, and an assortment of losers who pulled hair, chocked people, and refused to stay down. Bliss fought against the woman on her back, but could not get her down. Every time she fought further, she felt her airways close down. Once the melee grew closer, Sara threw a rock at the woman's head to get her off Bliss and put up a shield of earth to keep the others from encircling Bliss and Sara. Bliss threw a blast at the wall, shattering it towards the cultists Sara blocked off.

[Forceaus]

Despite their best efforts, it seemed inevitable that the captives would escape and the cultists would fail. One of them had already gotten away and was attempting to lead them into the forest while the other three went off in a completely different direction. They were left to decide who they should send after who, and were taking too much time to decide. By the time they were able to agree on who should go in which direction, the ones that attempted to pursue the three that were heading towards the city would find their efforts to be in vain. They lost them, completely.

Somewhere in the forest, the Hispanic woman was trying to take out the Asian woman that pretty much led the intruders by choking her from behind. She held on for deaf life despite the endless struggling that Bliss was doing to save herself. She kept her grip on her neck as tight as possible as she could see them fading away. Just a few more seconds and she would fall unconscious. The Hispanic woman tightened her grip to try and put an end to this struggle when something struck her hard in the side of her head and knocked her right off of the person she was trying to strangle.

The Hispanic woman was a bit stunned after getting hit in the head with what turned out to be a rock. A couple other cultists showed up a few seconds later and would find a wall formed from the ground surrounding the two intruders. Well, that was not something that they would be able to get through easily. The wall then broke apart and pieces of it came flying in their direction. They both quickly dove out of the way as the Hispanic woman's husband came out of the forest and rushed over to check on his wife. The two cultists quickly ran around the wall of dirt and made their way over to help. "Alright, enough. You win." one of them said and they would slowly leave the area, having resigned these efforts to keep anyone held captive.

Back in the city, four women were climbing aboard a flat top truck to head off somewhere. Shoka had decided to reenter the city because she felt like that was the best place to check out first. She could see them not too far away, and would lift a portion of the ground around her up into the air and sent it careening towards them at high speeds. Whether or not it hit the truck was not of too much concern to her, though she wouldn't mind if it did.

[Bliss]

Blowing up a barrier put a damper on the cult's reckless attack against Bliss and Sara. A number of options came to Bliss' mind. "What do you wanna do?"

"I think we should follow this cult through. We have had good luck with cults in the past and bad luck, but we've never died." Sara crossed her arms and looked as the cult began to disappear into the forest.

"After you." Bliss would usher her arms as Sara chased off into the forest, trying to spot any of the cultist- or any traps they would attempt to snare the two women in.

Tsukimi wandered off towards god knows where, leaving behind Mitsuko and Abby to pull the truck around. Rocks began to move around the area, dislodging large portions of trees from the ground, splintering their roots. A large boulder hurled through the air, breaking the day to day noise in the air with a destructive action set upon crushing the truck. A quick burst of telekinetic energy flew from Ashley, sending the boulder back towards Shoka. "Go." Ashley gave a wave and placed herself between the fleeing truck and Shoka. One burst of energy shot through Ashley towards Shoka, hoping to break the earthen boulder into enough pieces to overwhelm Shoka's ability to meld the pieces back together again.

The truck shook with the release of the break and jarred after the initial application of the gas pedal. Mitsuko put no gentleness into her foot as she drove the pedal to the floor, shooting the truck towards the roadway. Abby braced herself with the armrest while they bounced along the bumpy road. "Do you know where we're going?"

Determination took control of Mitsuko's eyes more than anything. "Everywhere is a good place to be. Let's go there. Or Las Vegas. I always wanted to go there."

[Forceaus]

The fragments of the ground that Shoka had compounded together into a makeshift boulder flew through the air towards the truck that the intruders were escaping on. It came very close to hitting the back of the truck and probably causing it to be wrecked, but didn't quite reach its target. Shoka wasn't aware of this up until now, but one of them apparently also had telekinetic powers much like Bliss and somebody else did. The boulder was stopped in midair before it could hit the truck, and then sent in a completely different direction. It was flung right at her.

Shoka saw the incoming boulder that she had created and remained calm despite its approach. She then began to essentially sink into the ground and it flew overhead and crashed into the ground, knocking a stop sign over in the process, and causing quite a bit of damage to the parts of the street that it hit. Feeling that victory was completely unattainable, Shoka gave up in her pursuits and headed back into the forest, but in a completely different direction from where any of the others may be.

Shoka's journey through the forest was cut short by the sudden reappearance of the creature from before, in the form of an eagle this time around, carrying a scroll between its talons. The bird that was not a bird flew downwards and landed on the branch of a tree in front of Shoka. They both stood there in complete silence for a moment before a voice spoke directly into Shoka's mind. "Are you done here yet? I'd say you are." the voice would say.Another moment would pass before anything was said again. "This place was of no loss." the voice issuing from the creature disguised as an eagle would say before letting go of the scroll and having it fly over to Shoka. "Your next tasks are listed in the contents of that scroll."

Shoka would open the scroll to view the contents inside. It was a map with a couple of locations marked that came with instructions. She spent some time proofreading the instructions before she began to talk. "So you wish for me to stop by New York before heading across the sea to Japan. Are you sure?" Shoka asked as she looked up from the scroll, only to see that the eagle had disappeared. "Empress Remiela, where did you go?" She asked to no one as nobody was around anymore. Shoka was just left there alone with only instructions as to what she's supposed to do next, and no clue how to best carry them out.


((Thread concluded))

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