[Carmim Clover]

❝ WORDS: 547 TAG: @next NOTES: aegle pls dont die frand TOTAL WORDS: 5523 HAVE YOU SEEN HER? HAVE YOU HEARD? THE WAY SHE MOVES, THERE ARE NO WORDS She didn't get too far, running towards Eva. For one thing, she recognized that she was unlikely to get too far, not nearly fast enough to help much, if at all. Kishka had launched moments after Aegle had, so her fight with Evangeline couldn't possibly take much longer than her own fight with her roommate. But maybe more pressing was the fact that she hadn't heard Aegle get back up. Granted, sometimes having your aura broken was a pretty hard-hitting experience. She knew that some people passed out when taken to that point. Hell, she was one of those people. But she had been running for a bit, and Aegle hadn't stirred. That didn't seem right. Hoping that Eva would be able to beat Kishka on her own, she stopped running and turned back around. Just as she'd thought, through the underbrush, she saw Aegle's small form, still crumpled on the ground where she'd fallen. The little redhead sprinted forward, running as fast as her little legs could carry her, back to Aegle. Maybe she was worrying too much, or maybe it was just a bad feeling. Regardless, she ran with urgency, immediately regretting the fact that for all of her time spent running in the gym, all of it was endurance training, not speed training. Speed would be very helpful here. After what felt like way too long, she managed to get back to where she'd hit her friend with her drum, and immediately began inspecting her. She looked so tiny, laying there, in a little pile. Something on her wrist was beeping like mad, and flashing brightly, through her sleeve, but she had no idea what it could possibly be. "Aegle?" Nothing. "H-hey, Aegle, wake up!" Still no response. If she was worrying before, she was panicking now. Had she just killed her roommate!? That story about how she would get As in all her classes was definitely just a rumor, right? Ahhh! Shut up, brain! T'is is serious!! Gingerly, she prodded at Aegle's bony shoulder with her hand, kneeling down in front of her to check her vitals. She didn't know much about first aid, but she figured looking for breathing and a heart beat was a good idea. Leaning down, she placed her head against Aegle's chest, listening for her breath first. It was slow, and ragged, which didn't surprise her too much, given how she'd looked moments ago. Her face reddened a shade or two as she realized just how warm Aegle was. Until she figured out why she was so warm. Her heartbeat sounded like a damn wedding dance- loud, fast, and skipping beats like a drunk cousin with two left feet. That was definitely not good. At all. But she had no clue what to do about it. She figured Professor Shadecloak was overseeing the fight, but she had no means of getting in contact with her, aside from her Scroll, and she sure as hell had no clue how to even go about figuring that piece of technology out right now. But she had to do something, so she just sat there, by Aegle, trying her best to get a response out of her, anything to let her know that her friend wasn't going to die.

LAIKA OF GS!

[Colton Deraine]

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Bravery is believing in yourself, and that's one thing nobody can teach you.

”Either way, it’s out of our hands.” the brunette would note with a shrug. ”Either way, it’ll be over here soon.” After all, there was nothing either of them could do to influence the outcome at this point without cheating – and cheating was frankly beneath both of them.

”Might have overestimated Carmim.” he’d continue, mostly thinking out loud. ”I figured her semblance would be strong enough to just knock Aegle out of the air right off the bat and then rush over here.” It was an easy conclusion to make. The redhead was supposed to be strong, and Aegle was the weakest out of everybody pretty much as the only one without an activated semblance. It was probably the most lopsided matchup anyone would ever see at least on paper in one of these exercises. The bald cripple shouldn’t have been able to last more than six seconds in a fight with Carmim, let alone anywhere close to as long as it has seemingly went.

”Even if we do win, it’ll just be because your team fucked up bad enough for us to overcome the initial disadvantage. If we ran this again you’d win with all three auras up like you should have this go around.” There was no spite or disdain in his voice, largely because the Argus native couldn’t give less of a shit about the outcome of this exercise. It didn’t matter because there were no rewards for him personally for winning or sanctions for him losing. There were no stakes whatsoever, so he had no reason to care.

One thing that Erytheia might find curious was the fact that Colton made absolutely zero movement and seemed content to just sit there. The thought that Carmim wasn’t going to barrel through any second now was unfathomable, because it never crossed his mind even for a moment that the redhead had somehow lost a fight to the biggest contender for weakest fighter in the entire school. While she should have won immediately, before Aegle had a chance to even land a hit, the fact remained that she would win regardless and indeed already had unless she was more incompetent than Colton was able to imagine at the present.

Since that was a given, it was also a given that she would run over in this direction in a very late attempt to help. Standing up was a fucking stupid idea, because standing up would get him blasted in the back without any aura to protect him. He had absolutely zero doubt that he could walk off fine after one, but an emotionally compromised enemy wouldn’t stop at one and would just keep firing them off. Without aura, Colton had zero ranged capability to defend himself. The fact that the very thought crossed his mind that a fellow trainee would actively try to kill him because they were too stupid to realize his aura was broken said a lot about his opinion of his current set of opponents. If the short redhead was incompetent enough to take this long to dispatch of Aegle, then she was certainly incompetent enough to try and kill him for the crime of standing up.

His own role in this exercise, frankly, was over and done with. He was never overly concerned with the outcome since the odds were so stacked against him and thus his team at the start, and that perspective certainly didn’t change just because the odds changed from impossible to probable. If this match was repeated ten times after this, his team would lose ten out of ten of those times. Carmim grossly underperforming and being wildly out of position was cause number one, and while the first may just be her current skill level the fact of the matter remained that someone with a couple of brain cells to rub together could easily force her to stand somewhere more productive at the start of the match.

Erytheia might need some glasses or something, but he was much more willing to give her the benefit of the doubt since they came from the same primary combat school. Sanctum was the best one in the entire kingdom, and it wasn’t even close. Every single instructor either is or was a licensed huntsman, and many of them were even pretty good at it once upon a time. Anyone with that sort of training, even if it was a few years ago, could be accepted into any of the Big Four Huntsman Academies as long as the individual’s talent was at least mediocre.

Hers was at least mediocre.

※ 7070 total words ✎ 765 words ✉ D rank semblance, D ranked martial arts, D ranked durability, D ranked weapon, E rank weapon enhancement, E rank stamina

MADE BY MIZO

[Theloria Shadecloak]

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[attr="class","nikki101"]WE’LL RECLAIM OUR DESTINY

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[attr="class","nikki102"]WE’LL SET OUR FUTURE FREE

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[attr="class","nikki109"]Huh. [break][break]

This wasn’t supposed to be a possibility. [break][break]

There were multiple exercises going on at the same time, as per usual, but the most interesting one at the time was the absolute train wreck that the three against three escort mission ended up being. Before the exercise began, she defined the parameters for overperformance on the part of the attacking team would be to take out Kishka’s aura before she made it halfway through. An underperformance, then, would be if she made it anywhere close to the final stretch. Expected performance would have her get her aura broken at some point between the middle and the final stretch and would have been fine. [break][break]

It was not fine. The weeks away at the whim of the Council meant that she lacked adequate sample size to accurately judge the skill level of individual trainees. If nothing else, this exercise made that abundantly clear. [break][break]

Carmim, frankly, was not the blue chip prospect that the faunus had hoped she might be. It wasn’t fair to have thoughts like that, but when the incoming class was so bottom heavy there was this natural tendency to look for hope spots that would at least in theory be able to lift up the weaker students and prevent death on those early missions. She had a lot of potential, sure, but potential was only useful in the future. With how the Council was pushing, they needed people soon. She had a promising semblance but ran into the same crippling weaknesses that were common among inexperienced manipulators. Namely, she lost her shit when people got close to her because the redhead was completely helpless in melee combat. [break][break]

If that would have been any type of Grimm, Carmim would have died. If it had been any sort of bandit or other outlaw, she would have also died. The fact that they were sending someone of her skill level out on huntsman missions was a sure sign of desperation, and unfortunately extremely necessary for the foreseeable future due to how bottom heavy the incoming class was. Her combat skill was average, but she had high theoretical upside and could be expected to improve vastly over time if she survived long enough to do it. The professor would be signing off on that logic likely very soon, because even with her crippling weaknesses Carmim had a higher chance of survival than most others if those weaknesses were compensated for with good team selection. [break][break]

Erytheia, frankly, wasn’t ready and wouldn’t be put in that slot unless things were dire. Years away from formal training meant that the blonde was honestly about as good as one might expect for someone who manifested their semblance so late. Similar to Carmim, she had significant upside and showed leadership potential – but was mediocre at best at the present. She needed experience and room to make some more mistakes before she got enough confidence and reliability to become an asset, because leadership types were few and far in between with this group of students. It made sense to preserve the ones who did show those qualities at all costs, frankly, because they would be the ones that would be put in charge of preventing more deaths in Year Two onwards. [break][break]

Evangeline was either underestimated heavily or Kishka heavily underperformed due to not knowing what her opponent’s semblance was. There wasn’t enough data yet to determine which it was, but either way she had vastly overperformed the almost nonexistent expectations of the faunus. Her fighting style when not relying on her semblance was reckless, unsightly, and uncoordinated – but the fact of the matter was that she had actually given an effort above and beyond what Shade thought the girl was capable of. She was currently nowhere to being considered suitable for going out on missions except those unlikely to see combat, but again significant upside if she could become at the very least self-sufficient with such a support-oriented semblance. [break][break]

As a unit, they had done exceptionally badly. The plan they had employed was terrible and unlikely to work even at a basic level, but their performance within the framework of that plan was what really mattered and what they would be evaluated on for the most part. Erytheia’s plan was terrible, but she had shown initiative and took on a leadership role of her own volition. That in and of itself was commendable, frankly, despite the fact that the impact of that leadership was to significantly decrease her team’s chances of winning. Since this was a training exercise, the results didn’t matter so much as the component actions and mindset that led to that result. [break][break]

On the other side, Kishka either underperformed or Evangeline was better than everyone thought. The with the blonde, frankly, was extremely sloppy on her end as well. Both were at least theoretically trained at a proficient level before coming into Haven, but nobody would have been able to tell based off of that individual fight. If Evangeline was at least average in terms of fighting ability, that would immediately catapult her up the list in terms of students preferred for missions so long as she continued to slowly solidify that spine of hers. Going even with Kishka, though, might have very well just been because the purple haired girl had vastly underestimated her opponent and played the price. If it happened again the next time, it would be a pattern worth at least keeping an eye on. With a sample size of one, though, Shade was much more willing to chalk the result up to luck and focus on the sloppiness that got them to that result. [break][break]

Colton performed almost exactly as he should have on paper. There was almost nothing worth commenting on with him, frankly. If he had shown the same leadership initiative that Erytheia had at the beginning of the exercise, it’s likely his team could have won pretty handily. He had no way of knowing it was possible at the time, sure, but part of the job of a huntsman was to persist even in the face of overwhelming odds. How one performed while under no pressure and no threat was irrelevant, because anyone could be brave when they were in absolutely zero danger. What really mattered was how one performed while under stress, and how someone performed when they felt nobody was paying attention. The first tested courage, but the second tested diligence. Most missions were not going to grab headlines or be very exciting at all, but even the most basic ones had ramifications that came down to the same thing – reducing the likelihood of innocent people dying. [break][break]

If a team is assigned to build up the defenses of a town, they were being ordered really to make the town be able to defend itself from attack. Bandits, Grimm… it didn’t really matter what it was, the fact of the matter was that the quality of the defenses built correlated closely to the likelihood of the people hiding behind those defenses dying in the next attack. Even when nobody was watching and even when the outcome didn’t change the life of the individual huntsman at all, their actions effected the lives of others. A shoddily built section of wall would crumble far easier, and threats from the outside could swarm in and kill everyone. It was just how it was. The villagers would have put their trust in the huntsman team that came in and trusted that their lives were going to be taken seriously, and sometimes that simply wasn’t the case. [break][break]

Aegle, frankly, was horribly misjudged at the beginning. The main concerns for her going in were mentality related, and Shade had quite frankly expected the girl to curl up and wallow in self-pity for the entire exercise. Reports of cowardice were there, and it appears whoever made those reports was an idiot who fed the professor bad information. It was a result of that bad information, frankly, that caused the current situation. The scenario was built around the fact that Shade was trying to push someone who was suspected of being more than a little spineless until they either decided to stand their ground or completely broke. It didn’t really matter to her which happened, frankly, just that the response would become a known quantity early on for better or for worse. [break][break]

She hadn’t expected suicidal stupidity. [break][break]

There was no indication of this in her file, or from the mission she had been on. [break][break]

This was either new or inconsistent behavior, but which one was correct didn’t really matter at this point. There was always a chance for a life-threatening injury to happen in any combat exercise, but aura usually lowered that risk to almost nothing. It was only really possible if someone kept attacking when their opponent’s aura was down or in the case of pre-existing health issues. Aegle had the latter and seeing that having her aura broken was enough to cause a medical emergency honestly just pissed the faunus off. [break][break]

The fact that she had accepted coming here wasn’t the issue, most people dreamed of becoming huntresses at some point and there were few that would turn down the opportunity to go to a Big Four Academy. The real fucking issue here was the fact that she was offered admission in the first place if her health was this unstable, which spoke to systematic failures in both scouting and medical teams. Right as Carmim was running back to Aegle, Shadecloak would have hit the emergency medical alarm that would bring whoever the doctor was on duty to the location that the camera was pointing – directly at Aegle in that case. [break][break]

While it could be nothing and an overreaction on both the part of Carmim and Theloria at this point, it was better safe than sorry when someone just fucking lost consciousness and became completely unresponsive. Pulling out her scroll as she left the control room to ring up the duty phone for whoever was the current medical staff assigned to the damn thing, she would rush out as quickly as she could manage. She was closer to the area than the medical office was, and she could cut the time it took for the girl to get proper medical attention in half or more if she went as fast as she could to transport Aegle physically to the doctor if it ended up being as serious as it looked. [break][break]

She was still some distance away, though. Two and a half miles, thereabouts, which meant that even jumping along as fast as the faunus could manage physically it would be approximately two full minutes before she was able to make it over there. The medical office was about five miles out, so a little over two minutes to carry the girl over to the Doctor if this ended up being an actual emergency. That was fast enough or at least should be fast enough to make things work so long as Aegle was breathing, and her heart was beating. [break][break]

If her health was this unstable and she was given a clean bill of health from the medical department, that shit was unacceptable. If it was something that wasn’t caught during medical screening for whatever reason, that was also unacceptable. Being unresponsive and unconscious was not a normal response to having your aura broken, and that was that. It wasn’t normal, and it certainly wasn’t going to happen again. The first death, when it inevitably happened, would not be in training if she could help it in the slightest. It would be on a mission where at the very least there would be meaning behind it and a purpose being served by having it happen. [break][break]

Not like this. [break][break]

There was no purpose to a death here, just criminal negligence combined with suicidal stupidity. At the very least, the usual suit the faunus wore was specifically fitted to not hamper her ability to move nearly as much as one normally might so she was making good time. With any luck, by the time she got there the trainees would be confused as to why she had stepped out and it would be noted as a gross and unnecessary overreaction on her end. [break][break]

If she was correct, though, the trainees might have their first case of severe survivor’s guilt thrust upon them for absolutely no reason whatsoever. It was selfish to come to a place like this with health that bad, but it was understandable selfishness and arrogance that almost everyone that age displayed. Nobody planned to die, after all, and everyone assumed that they would be the statistical outlier regardless of actual diagnosis or results before evidence to the contrary beat the absolute shit out of them.

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NOTES

Notes here

PHARAOH LEAP CREATES

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[Erytheia Hellebore]

The noble warrior stood, and the people looked to her.
For she was a beacon - hope given form, yet still only human.
Within that truth there was great promise.
If one could stand against the night, then so too could anyone - everyone.

In her hand the warrior held a Rose. And her aura burned bright.

❝

“That is true,” the blonde nodded as Deraine mentioned that things were out of their hands now. There was a slight pause from the heiress as he continued to think aloud about the scenario, which for the most part she agreed with. Since she had a better gauge of Deraine’s capabilities now that they had actually crossed blades in combat and wasn’t relegated to watching his battles off of a screen, she would definitely adapt to the situation. While she wasn’t confident that she could take him on, or even delay him, it would be easier to force him into a more defensive fighting style with Carmim and Eva both in range and flanking instead of having their heavy hitter too far back to support the rest of the team. It was her tactical error in placing Carmim too far to the rear, but it was also one easily rectified on a second attempt of the scenario. And yet, something nagged at her, in the back of her mind - something that she wasn’t sure how to give voice to.

The truth of the matter was, she wasn’t quite sure if she should change her overall strategy all that much. Growing up, Erytheia had always been told to attempt any practice as though it were the real thing, and this attitude she carried across to Sanctum, and later Haven. It was indeed true that in this scenario, they had the advantage of knowing the opposing team would have no choice but to cross over the barricades and travel towards the end point on the far side of the arena, but in the field, that probably wasn’t going to be a luxury that any aspiring Huntress or Huntsman was going to have. If they had been bandits with no rules of engagement, boxing them into a kill zone made good sense, ensuring that none could escape the trap and either learn from it or spread the news to their fellows. And with Carmim bringing up the rear and her and Eva defending the front, it would have a simple matter to wipe out any stragglers from their offense.

Perhaps her mistake here was assuming that opposing forces would be as undisciplined as the bandits she’d often seen on the news, but it was clear from the fairly recent mission on the Argus Limited that bandit forces were just as capable as their Huntsman counterparts - or at least, the trainees’ level. In hindsight, that would have made more sense to assume, especially with a powerhouse like Deraine on the other team to simulate threat. It was worth keeping in mind going forward, especially if she was to rise to prominence among Haven’s ranks as she was supposed to.

“Well, that is debatable, since both parties are armed with the foreknowledge of the situation. You might yet be able to pull off another close victory, knowing our plans and how we might react,” was the mild response to Deraine’s assertion that her own team would be victorious come a second round, the heiress slowly getting to her feet now that she had gotten most of her breath back. While she certainly hoped that she could bring a team to victory if another attempt was made at the scenario, it was clear to all involved that her tactical skill was inadequate as of yet, and would need time to improve.

We all have that in common, at least, she thought to herself, looking back to the battle in the distance.

I wonder how Aegle is doing.

@ ● 591 words ● 6207 total words

MADE BY MIZO

[Kishka Burzanova]

KISHKA BURZANOVA

Damn. She'd missed. Not entirely, but enough that she figured this fight wasn't going to end in her favor. She hadn't turned around to see what had happened, but she could hear a thump as Eva hit the ground, and she could feel, through her semblance, the sloppiness of the umbrella's strike. Not a direct hit, that would have been much harder hitting. Fuck. The worst part was, now she couldn't even use that trick again, at least not against any real students who posed a threat to her as combatants. It was all on tape, as most combat classes tended to be, so no doubt Colton, Theia, Rose, and any of the other genuinely worthwhile students at Haven would go back and watch it. She sighed audibly as she sprinted for the cliff. This was pointless. But it beat lying down and accepting defeat. Had she not been so cocky about the umbrella trick, maybe she could have just soundly bludgeoned the pipsqueak into the ground, but the fact was, she was already running for the objective, and if she backtracked any now, that would just be wasted time and effort, in either direction. Better to stick with one thing, and go all in on it than to try running and then double back to hit Eva. Almost at the ledge... If she could just make it down easy enough, she could pull this off... It wasn't meant to be, though- she could already hear Eva's footsteps behind her, and the mechanical clicking of the blonde's crossbow unfolding. Dammit. Right as she got to the ledge, she swung around, firing her cannon directly behind her, where she was damn sure Eva would be, poised to take her shot, and immediately opened Lucky 13, hoping to catch the bolt in her shield-like weapon. Unfortunately, she underestimated the marksmanship of the pipsqueak, who caught her, through the chainmail mesh, on the shoulder, throwing her off balance just as the shot smashed her aura into tons of little black shards. She didn't even have time to process the loss as she shouted, "Whoa!" and stumbled backwards, right over the cliff's edge. Fortunately, she had turned to face Eva, so she skidded down the cliff on her heels, digging her weapon into the ground to slow her descent some. Luckily, she landed at the bottom of the cliff, not seriously hurt, but definitely scraped and sore from trying not to fall off the cliff entirely. Damn. And she wasn't even sure if her cannonball had hit the little shit. Hopefully it had- a draw wouldn't be much better than a loss, but at least she could save face a little bit. Gods, this was going to be awful when the video was uploaded... It was downright embarrassing, having her aura broken by her. Still, she had to give credit where it was due- that semblance was nasty, when applied well, and Eva's batshit crazy strategy had actually worked in the end. Something she had to respect, no matter how begrudgingly. And, of course, at the very least, she could always blame Deraine for the defeat. Was his idea, after all, to throw her at Eva. Arguably, in fact, it was his strategy that cost them the match- for someone so dedicated to being the very best, he sure hadn't done his homework on blondie. Honestly? She was disappointed in him.

Notes// blame 100 | Tagged// u know who u r | WC// 570 | TWC// 5078

✬

[Aegle Verdant]

Skin turned the color of slate, Aegle did not and could not answer Carmim's questioning pleas. Her body moved easily with the red heads efforts. Loose and light, there was practically nothing to Aegle, despite the billowing bulkiness of her clothes. Having always resisted getting close to anyone, being held or touched, or even being seen when she was getting dressed, her sudden inertness made it clear just how shrunken and frail Aegle was. It was as though some important part of her had been taken away, excised so violently that what remained was left shrunken and withered. It was her face which was most changed by the extremity of her condition however. Though usually quite gaunt and pale, her accustomed deathly pallor seemed almost vital and full of life when compared to the flat dearth of color in her lifeless face. Gray as a gravestone, her skin seemed as thin as parchment upon cheeks sharp enough to cut, while the usually dark circles around her eyes had turned practically black in their sunken sockets. Though she'd been disoriented and plainly exhausted while she'd been fighting Carmim, there could be no missing just how sharply her condition had deteriorated with the shattering of her aura.

Perhaps the most noticeable of Aegle's new qualities, more so even than her deathly coloring, was the sweat pouring off of her. Her hoodie was damp with the stuff, causing the orange fabric to cling and clump up, and even further outline the emaciated body beneath, while her head practically dripped with wet, all of which was horribly at odds with another distressing detail; Had Aegle but recently been pulled from the frigid flow of some frozen over lake, she could not have been shivering any worse than she was at that moment. Her fingers quivered, her jaw chattered, and her heels drummed a quiet staccato on the dusty earth. Beneath her sodden clothes, quiet mechanical clicks and motorized whirs accompanied her trembling, seeming confused and distressed and giving the impression more of some malfunctioning machine than that of a flesh and blood girl.

Her breaths came in quick, shallow gasps and irregular wheezes, like there was some great weight upon her chest making it difficult to breathe. It was from the staggered, bellows action of her breast that the most movement could be seen and, with her body now clearly defined beneath her sweat-wet clothes, it was clear just how much she was struggling for each and every gasp of air. For most of her breaths, her chest barely moved, while others made it seem like there was something inside of her ribs struggling violently to escape, all of it hideously irregular and unnatural. Her skin no longer looked like skin, but like wax which had been molded into some parody of a face.

It seemed like she couldn't go on that way, like something must surely give out, but nothing did. Aegle went on like that, struggling for every breath, sweat pouring off her face and pooling in her clothes, skin the color of freshly poured concrete, fighting desperately with some unseen foe. Fighting and, as her lips went slowly from pale pink to an even paler and chalky blue, plainly losing.

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[Carmim Clover]

❝ WORDS: 914 TAG: @clockandnext NOTES: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA TOTAL WORDS: 6437 HAVE YOU SEEN HER? HAVE YOU HEARD? THE WAY SHE MOVES, THERE ARE NO WORDS Oh gods. Oh gods. Oh fuck. Oh no... Her friend was completely unresponsive, and it was finally dawning on Carmim exactly how grave the situation was. "Aegle!" She was now shaking her a bit more frantically by the shoulder, as her friend lay there, limp, in her arms. "Aegle, please! Please wake up..." This would definitely not look good on the school's video records, but she wasn't thinking about that right now, or anything else. Tears were welling up in her eyes, and she was as powerless to stop them as she was to force Aegle's heart to stabilize again. She didn't even know what was happening. She'd never seen someone have a heart attack before. She didn't, couldn't, know that that was what was happening to Aegle, because the little redhead simply had no frame of reference. So any common sense knowledge about how to handle such a situation was absent from her mind. She barely even knew how emergency first aid worked. Checking for breathing and a pulse was about as far as she could go. Vaguely, she remembered seeing in movies that the person doing the first aid had to kiss the other person? But that was just... Nope, looking at Aegle's pale, lifeless lips, she couldn't bring herself to even think about it. Literally the worst timing. And plus, that had to just be some movie stuff, not a real thing that real people really did, and she felt really red in the face all of a sudden, and that was just a bad idea, so yeah, nope, not doing that, but there also wasn't anything else to do. "AEGLE!!" At this point, she was practically screaming the girl's name until her voice was raw and hoarse from the crying, which was only intensifying, and from the panicked shrieks. Someone had to be coming soon... Someone who could help... But, unfortunately, Shadecloak was still minutes out, and Carmim had no way of knowing she was on her way. She was, at this point, just slumped over Aegle's unconscious form, trying desperately to get her to wake up, but it was no use. Of all the people in the world for the little boxer to be stuck with right now, Carmim was by far the worst, and she knew it. She wasn't strong enough or fast enough to carry Aegle to safety, and wouldn't know which direction help would arrive from anyways. And she had no knowledge of anything health-related, so she couldn't even do that much. One of her best friends was about to die, in her arms, because she didn't know what to do. And here she was, a trainee at a Huntsman Academy, sobbing like a sad child in the middle of a combat class, scared, confused, and miserable, because she had definitely just killed Aegle. She should have just let Aegle win. She almost did, anyways. Her own aura was so low it felt like a strong breeze could knock it clean out. At least then, she would be the one laying on the ground, unconscious. Were people really supposed to get knocked out for this long from an aura breaking, though? Or had Aegle's aura been broken when she hit her? Oh gods, what if it wasn't? "Aegle!! Wake! Up! Please don't die... Oh no, please don't die, Aegle..." Feeling horribly useless, she rested her head on Aegle's chest again, dejectedly trying one more time to hear if maybe her heartbeat was going to be okay... It wasn't. It was shaky, wildly unpredictable, and still way too fast. But as close as she was to Aegle, she realized how much worse off she was than she'd imagined before. The poor girl was shaking like she was in a blizzard, and sweating like she was in the desert. And looking at her, all of a sudden Carmim noticed just how tiny and frail her friend looked, beneath the hoodie she always wore. She needed help, and Carmim couldn't do anything to help her. She tried in vain to shake her awake one more time, before resigning herself to the fact that there was only one thing left for her to try. Her own body was trembling too, now, because she was absolutely terrified, and didn't even know if this was how first aid was supposed to work. But dammit, if it was something that might help, she would force herself to try it, even if her stomach was doing flips in her chest. Figuratively, fortunately. Stomachs did not belong in chests, and there were enough girls having organ failures at the moment anyways. Gulping nervously, Carmim leaned over her friend, eyes still filled with huge, sad, teardrops, as she poised her face above Aegle's, about half a foot away. She looked awful- she was literally dying, of course she looked awful. She closed her eyes, and started to lean in, wincing back an intense blush. Hopefully Aegle wouldn't be mad, when she woke up. If she woke up. But then, she couldn't bring herself to do it. Her lips drew a few inches closer, then stopped, and she froze there, shaking, and trying to force herself to do it, right up until Professor Shadecloak (eventually) arrived. It would have been a funny sight, if the situation weren't so horribly dire. Why did it have to be a kiss!? Whoever came up with CPR was an absolute jerk for causing her so much internal conflict, for real.

LAIKA OF GS!

[Evangeline Lys de Verre]

tell me pretty lies

template by Punki of Adoxography

Erytheia Hellebore Colton Deraine -x- 430 words -x- TWC: approx 4602 words

It took a while, but Evangeline finally managed to flop over onto her stomach, before planting her hands on her soil and pushing herself up with visible effort. She raised herself up like she was doing push ups, getting her knees underneath her to support her so she could push herself up to a sitting position. Her memory was foggy, her mind bogged down with exhaustion and the stun from the landing, and her ears were ringing from the cannonball that had narrowly missed her face during the flight. She looked around, blinking and softly shaking her head to remove the daze from her fall and exhaustion, before her vision landed on Kishka, lying on the ground a several feet ahead. Defeated.

It took her a bit of time, as Evangeline visibly started to puff up with joy. "YES! I DID IT!" She squealed in pure joy, laughing out loud as she raised her hands to the air. She had done it, she had won the class! She had won for her team! They had depended on her and she had not let them down!

She got up, walking over to gather her dropped weapon before going over to Kishka. She offered her hand to the purple haired girl, a bright smile on her face as she said, "Sorry. I don't know how I did it but you were really cool!"
Once she had helped Kishka up to her feet, or if the girl decided to pass on Evangeline's offered hand, Evangeline would turn around and begin to run back towards the rest of her team. Despite the exhaustion weighing her down from the fight, the exhilaration of the victory gave her a burst of energy and excitement to run.

Passing through the choke point as she scrambled over the tree they had dropped, she turned her head towards Erytheia and Colton. She paused, grinning, saying in a rapidfire way, "Ery'zeia! I did it! I beat Kishka! We won! Are you two okay? Colton are you okay, do you need medical help? I actually did it!"

And then screaming. She could hear Carmim screaming. Evangeline turned her head towards the noise, before turning her head back towards Colton and Erytheia, horror and shock now evident on her face. "Some'zing is wrong. We have to call the professor. Scroll! Scroll! Call her!" Evangeline urged, her voice urgent and somewhat shaky. She didn't have her scroll on her, she couldn't do it. She looked around wildly, trying to see if Shadecloak was nearby somewhere. "Quickly!" She urged once more to her friends.

[Colton Deraine]

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Bravery is believing in yourself, and that's one thing nobody can teach you.

When Evangeline made her way over, giddy with excitement and gloating about winning Colton deadpan turned his gaze over to meet Erytheia’s in a clear expression of disgust and disbelief. Kishka had seriously lost to Evangeline of all people in a straight up one versus one duel. She had lost to someone competing for the weakest trainee in the entire school after being given the best possible matchup. It was so absurd that Colton wasn’t even mad, frankly, because he had done absolutely everything that he could have.

This was Kishka’s failure, not his, and he didn’t have a problem with mentally filing this loss away as something that didn’t really affect him in the slightest. It was an incredible amount of effort that went into that loss, and his former classmate choked so hard at the end that it would become a meme quite similar to #Warface if there was any justice left in this world at all. At the end of the day that was all there was to it.

Then all of a sudden, they heard the distant sounds of screaming. What the fuck? That wasn’t normal. He was almost concerned for a second, until he realized who was over there and how unlikely it was for it to be anything close to serious. Aegle and Carmim were the only options and seeing as though he didn’t know either of their voices very well it took him a few seconds to identify the screamer.

The brunette turned his gaze from Evangeline to the direction it was coming from. It definitely was Carmim, considering whatever word she was trying to yell was muffled by whatever sand she had managed to ingest that day. He couldn’t make out the word, frankly, it just sounded like glee. Crying and screaming about glee? The fuck kind of weird shit was this? Eva was the first to visibly panic, and order that someone called for help. The brunette would do so, shrugging, as he got the emergency number that they were supposed to call if someone got hurt during the exercise. He set it on speaker phone so everyone nearby could hear, but it just kept ringing.

”Go.” he’d order, ”I’m slow, so I’ll just cycle through all the faculty numbers right here.”

With his aura broken, he had no way of moving at any sort of decent pace and by the time he got anywhere it would be too late. It made no sense for him to move over there logically, and he wasn’t emotionally invested enough in either combatant over there to really bother to check despite that. Knowing them, it was probably a stubbed toe, or a surface level cut or something similar. There was a possibility that it was a little beyond that, but not anything that the Doctor couldn’t fix with her semblance.

Well, on the bright side Carmim being so audibly over there meant that he could get up without fear of someone attempting to murder him, so he did so. He’d continue to hold his scroll in his right hand while he’d walk the opposite direction of the screaming to retrieve his gear, completely nonplussed about the entire ordeal. Picking up his scattered gear, frankly, was the concern first and foremost on his mind. The medical office wasn’t picking up either, which was kind of usual, but he also realized there was nothing else he could do from there so wasn’t really concerned about it.

Aura protected everyone from physical injury. Both trainees up there were unskilled and were more than capable of breaking an arm or a leg of someone else in a blind rage or panic. Such an instance, frankly, was just nature at work and not something for others to be really concerned about. The Doctor had a semblance that would heal the injury anyway, and the pain would just be a painful lesson to not be so fucking careless the next time. In many ways, getting injured like that would be a beneficial experience for all involved moving forward.

Natural selection was bound to take its course eventually if they didn’t improve, so might as well learn that now in a training environment rather than out there for real. In a place like this one could learn from even critical mistakes, whereas out there a critical blunder just meant instant death. Nature’s way of solving problems, in other words, was always effective eventually.

※ 7812 total words ✎ 742 words ✉ D rank semblance, D ranked martial arts, D ranked durability, D ranked weapon, E rank weapon enhancement, E rank stamina

MADE BY MIZO

[Theloria Shadecloak]

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[attr="class","nikki101"]WE’LL RECLAIM OUR DESTINY

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[attr="class","nikki102"]WE’LL SET OUR FUTURE FREE

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[attr="class","nikki109"]Two and a half miles. [break][break]

The Doctor would be rushing out about now and would likely be in some sort of vehicle to make the trip faster. One of those loud little carts that could haul along medical supplies, the faunus imagined, and would book it towards their location. Medical attention started off five miles away, and with any luck Shade would meet that medical attention at roughly the halfway point to speed up the process. While she might not be twice as fast as that cart going at full speed, she was absolutely going to try to be.[break][break]


Medical emergencies in training exercises were not unheard of. They happened more regularly with first years than with anyone else due to the wide range of experience and skill levels, but something like this was unusual. She didn’t have time to double check the footage, but Carmim didn’t seem like the type that would continue attacking when someone else’s aura was down. That was the result of most of the typical injuries, frankly, some hotheadedness and one or two hits too many. This could be due to anger, lack of concentration, or such a huge skill gap between two students that the stronger one assumed they’d need more than one attack to wipe the floor with the lesser skilled student.[break][break]


Two and a half miles took roughly two minutes for Shade to traverse if she went full speed – which she was. Two and a half miles back would give a similar timeframe, which would lessen the faster the little golf cart that Doc was likely to be driving went. The time from the falling down and going unconscious to medical attention, therefore, would be roughly five minutes total at maximum and four minutes ideally. It was a delay, but small enough of one to be more than passable in almost any situation. Unless it was a cessation of breathing or heart activity completely, that would be enough.[break][break]


And frankly, if it was either of those things someone along the line was probably going to lose their job – and it might even be the Doctor the faunus was bringing the girl to if she was the one who signed off on Aegle being well enough physically to attend Haven Academy in the first place. This was a Huntsman Academy, not a god damned day care. Certain risks were inherent and accepted by each person who applied to come, and the same logic should have been applied the other way. In this case, then, the faunus would be less concerned if it did end up that Carmim had for some reason gone berserk and attacked past the point of Aegle’s aura shattering because it was a lot more fixable than the alternative.[break][break]


Luckily for everyone involved, regardless of the cause of the emergency, speed was always something that Shade excelled in. Faster than anyone might have expected, she made it onto the training area and blitzed her way over to Aegle’s location. It wasn’t hard to find where she was exactly, especially with all the beeping. A heightened sense of hearing made it easier to pick up for the faunus than it would have been for a human, and before long green eyes would survey a scene that would have been funny in almost any other situation. Carmim’s face was about half a foot away from Aegle’s, lips extended as if to kiss the girl but hovering back to a degree that suggested either intense panic, deep embarrassment, or both.[break][break]


Unfortunately for Carmim, however, there wasn’t exactly time to deal with teenage angst. There also wasn’t time to wait for redhead to naturally react and move away when someone who could jump thirty meters at a time bounded in from out of view in almost complete silence. The scene that would follow, then, would also be comical if circumstances had been different. The lion faunus would pop into view with absolutely no warning and just shove the redhead backwards on her ass with no warning whatsoever to clear the way for the one having the medical emergency to be picked up and hauled out just as quickly as she came in.[break][break]


The beeping suggested some sort of mechanical failure, but the fact of the matter was that the blonde faunus was bad at technology to begin with and only had basic first aid training largely dealing with external wounds. This was outside of her ability to deal with, so the best that she could do is spirit Aegle away to someone who could deal with it as fast as possible. Shoving Carmim on her ass might have been inconsiderate, but in a situation where seconds counted, she didn’t believe that sparing the redhead the indignity of being pushed was worth risking Aegle’s life. The same reason was why she didn’t bother to stop to apologize or explain herself, because those were very secondary concerns that didn’t matter in the slightest in that moment.[break][break]


The breathing of the girl was shallow, sharp, and irregular. Aegle was also absolutely drenched in sweat for some reason, but the fortunate part was the girl was small and weighed very little. Shade had expected the brace to weigh more, truth be told, but she was barely slowed down from the added weight and was able to blitz her way towards where she knew the Doctor to be coming from. All she needed to do was keep her ears open to find the sound of an engine and follow that as quickly as possible. After that, it was out of her hands and she would have done everything she could have. That was all that could be expected of someone with her lack of skill in both the medical and technological department, and then she would go back to deliver the news whether good or bad to the other students in the exercise – and if the situation was bad enough to the entire class as a whole.[break][break]


With any luck, though, it wouldn’t come to that. The Doctor’s semblance was top tier in terms of her job and role at the school, and honestly, they were lucky to have someone with that skill set on campus. If Aegle was especially lucky today, she would have even been on a smoke break when the call went through so she wouldn’t have even had to have run outside. That would have shaved off about ten, twenty seconds and made this just a bit easier on everyone involved.[break][break]


That would be nice. Preferred, even.

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[attr="class","nikki103"]1092 words

[attr="class","nikki103"]CLASS

[attr="class","nikki103"]5133 TOTAL WORDS

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NOTES

Notes here

PHARAOH LEAP CREATES

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[Carmim Clover]

❝ WORDS: 506 TAG: @slimshady NOTES: D E D I C A T I O N TOTAL WORDS: 6943 HAVE YOU SEEN HER? HAVE YOU HEARD? THE WAY SHE MOVES, THERE ARE NO WORDS Fortunately for Carmim, there wasn't exactly time for Shadecloak to deal with teenage angst. The time between her hearing the professor's rapid approach, and being floored by her exit, was practically nothing, given Shadecloak's incredible speed. Thus, Carmim went from hovering over Aegle, trying desperately to attempt what she firmly believed was CPR, to sitting wide-eyed on the ground, a few feet away from Aegle, who she only saw for moments before Shadecloak took off again, a green blur. "Aegle, wait!!" Maybe it was just adrenaline, or the slurry of emotions confusing her and making her do stupid things, but she was back on her feet as quickly as she could stand. She was tired, but luckily, sitting around, waiting for Aegle to wake up had given her body a few moments of respite- she took off after Shadecloak as fast as her little legs could sprint. Which is to say, not fast at all. The opposite, in fact- Carmim was by far the slowest runner in the class, which only really served to make their original ambush plan look even worse on paper, though she wouldn't realize that until someone brought it up. Regardless, she was single-minded in her mission, now. Forget class. The objective of stopping Kishka from crossing the finish line was so far from her mind, it was like nobody had even told her about the class today at all. The only thing on her mind was Aegle, who for all she knew, was dead. And so, stumbling haphazardly through the undebrush, over rocky terrain, she did the only thing she could think to do: One foot in front of the other, she ran, and ran, and ran. She couldn't have dreamed of catching up to Shadecloak, even if the professor were stupidly exhausted, and she was in peak form. The woman was too damn fast, even while hauling Aegle along with her. There was no hope of clearing that gap, but for a moment, she could see which way she was moving, and could, at least for a short time, keep her ears peeled for movement beyond that. Once Shadecloak escaped her field of vision, and made it out of earshot, though, she just barreled forward, in hopes that on the other side of the training area, she would find the professor with Aegle, hopefully with Doc treating her and figuring out exactly what the hell had happened. She definitely had a lot of questions, herself. But those questions just had to wait; now, she just lurched on, propelled by nothing but concern for her friend's well-being. Maybe she couldn't do much, if anything, but she knew she had to stay with Aegle, no matter what. If nothing else, she needed to see for herself that she was going to be fine. Because she was going to be fine. There was no alternative- Carmim simply refused to accept that somehow, in the middle of their fight, she'd accidentally killed one of her closest friends... Don't worry, Aegle... I'm coming.

LAIKA OF GS!

[Wolfe]

XP Distribution

Colton: 78 x 120% (Class Bonus) = 94

348 + 94 = 442 XP new total

Eva: 46 x 120% (Class Bonus) = 55

91 + 55 = 146 XP new total

Aegle: 60 x 120% (Class Bonus) = 72

90 + 72 = 162 XP new total

Kishka: 50 x 120% (Class Bonus) = 60

44 + 60 = 104 XP new total

Erytheia: 62 x 120% (Class Bonus) = 74

26 + 74 = 100 XP new total

Carmim: 69 x 120% (Class Bonus) = 83

267 + 83 = 350 XP new total

Shade: 51 x 120% (Class Bonus) = 61

61 x 150% (DM thread with 4+ people to completion) = 92

73 + 92 = 165 XP new total