Journal of Takaru Inara: October 2nd 2134

It's been a few days since we dealt with Haseo, but we managed to get Kouji back up in fighting shape thanks to the help of Saya’s Pseudo-Paras cells. But in the time after he finished the regeneration they degraded out of his system.

She explained that from her knowledge of the original research the ones inside her weren’t developed to the point where they could adapt and migrate from host to host like the Dark Gigas Cells. Kouji was a bit surprised to hear what Tallia had managed to accomplish with the Raging Dragon Gauntlets.

Sasuke, The AI that resided in the weapon reasoned that it was a natural empathy between the elements of wind and lightning that allowed her to do that since they are closely tied to each other on the elemental spectrum they can interact interchangeably with each other.

At the point of this writing we’ve left the remains of Haseo’s base to scout the terrain, the remaining staff left peacefully, most seeming more than happy to be rid of Haseo’s madness as opposed to living under it.

We’re heading out to some coordinates associated with another facility that seemed to be a relay point between Haseo’s base and their headquarters. It's not known what we’ll find there but I can only assume on the way we’ll probably run into more of the DG host troops.

We’ve been using Haseo’s old base as a short term base of operations mostly as a site to gather info on their projects since he seemed to be the head of most of their human experiments. During one dive into the log data we found an interesting entry regarding the experiments that they were conducting with relation to human cloning.

“Log ###3

According to reports from HQ the Admiral has recently run across the Valion Force, Apparently our little golden boy has joined their ranks. Kouji, one of my more interesting projects, years of psychological conditioning, Breeding to be the best at any athletic acumen, The perfect soldier by all rights, But I suspect his time separated from our forces and in exposure to the ideas of those Earthlings have managed to undermine all my work. No worries, there are others who will fill his place. “Project Shadow.” as the team who coined him will be my next attempt, he’s already in incubation far away in one of our more isolated facilities, he’s due to spend most of his life there being raised in the ideas of our Admiral’s. That being said, I believe that Shadow will be interesting. I've been plumbing the depths of his genetic history and there are some interesting connections, one of them being to one Sensui Kosoharra. a distant ancestor of the Admiral himself but far and estranged from his immediate family. It seems like our golden boy decided to take up the nature of his Isagarra heritage, him being only a few generations removed from the royal siblings on his father's side. The admiral has an interesting genealogy but that's not for me to discuss in these logs. I may address them in more detail in private logs at a later date.``

I’m not sure what to make of these logs but there were quite a few like this among his personal comms terminal. I may post excerpts of those I find of interest.

-----

“Log ##50

So it's been a while, the staff up at HQ have informed me that Project Shadow’s development is rolling along smoothly although with every passing day a slight burning sensation in my right arm flares up. The mark is an old gunshot wound, one from Hanjiro. The last time we ran into each other.

The fool overheard me conversing with some of my superiors and we came to blows and during the fight he shot me in the forearm. While my Dark Gigas Cells have long healed the physical wound, something always causes it to react to either his or Toushi’s presence.

I’ve heard reports from our advanced forces that Kouji and his people are on their way, I wonder if these reactions are a response to Toushi being with them. As he draws nearer the burn seems to intensify, I think he’s more powerful than I’ve given him credit for.

Toushi seems to be able to wield some form of energy that is amplified by the Valicite variation of the Citocrysitious family of isotopes of which Zoracite and other similar energy sources derive themselves from. The weapons that he and the others wield draw on this energy source and while I lack any data on it, I’ve heard it referred to as spirit energy by the people of the villages in the immediate area.

Though I don’t take much stock in such silly things, energy from within the individual. Simple existential hogwash they’ve probably adapted technology from those magia who seem to be causing trouble for the main fleet. My men have been getting antsy as they approach but I don’t have any reason to fear, I still have a trump card for dealing with Golden Boy. As far as Toushi, I'm sure if he’s anything like the man who raised him he’ll have a temper. I can set off and make him cause all kinds of fun problems for the others he’s bringing along.”

----

Journal -- Toushi “Dojiro” Nisaharra.

It's been a few weeks since our fight with that bastard I’m forced to acknowledge as my father, TK made me aware of some of the logs he’d made concerning us and our approach. Lately I’ve felt like a huge weight has been lifted off my chest with his death.

We’ve been testing ways to get into their comms systems and track back to their main base with little success. Their security is pretty tight but the few steps we’ve made forward I’ve managed to abuse my resemblance to my father to get past some of their security scans. With some help from Anya’s transformation spells we were able to get a solid up link but the equipment fired off a false positive and auto terminated the connection.

Kouji managed to heal from whatever the bastard did to him. According to the woman we saved alongside Hikari The kill command that he was using was designed to eat away at the victim at the cellular level and slowly cripple them. I’m not sure if I can get used to the prospect of calling the woman my mother. I can feel the connection between us, but it's strange because I’ve gotten accustomed to how things were back home on Earth with Han and his wife. It's hard to adjust to the sudden idea of coming in contact with my true mother.

She seems like she’s a nice woman, I’m guessing in her current condition she must have been held in pretty ratty conditions because normally at least as far as I’m aware Valinians don’t visibly age at the same rate that normal Terrans do so long as they keep themselves well maintained and healthy. As she is she looks like she’d be the same age as Han and TK’s parents but they don’t seem like they aged as hastily as she did.

I’ve spent some time trying to catch up with her, but it's a bit awkward due to the differences in how we lived. She was curious as to how well Han and his wife were when I left from Earth and if the people she was with at the time the camp was raided got out to safety. I told her what I could but many of them I couldn’t answer because I just didn’t have a good answer for them.

She somehow knew I’d been letting my emotions take over. As we spoke it felt like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. Seeing her safe made me feel at ease with how things turned out in spite of my outburst.

Hearing what she had to say about Haseo’s experiments left me shocked at what some people would do for personal gain. Between betraying his family, friends and the woman who loved him and selling out Valin to the Admiral. It left me disgusted but the feeling was kinda short lived in light of being with her and Hikari.

“Toushi,” she said “While I agree about Haseo being a vile disgraceful being I will admit I am proud I had the chance to see that son.. no Sons that I brought into this world as a result of his actions.” she corrected herself as she glanced over at Kouji, acknowledging the fact that while she didn’t birth him she was still the one whose eggs were used to rear him. “I can only hope the last one they took from me will turn out as well as the two of you.” she told us, this third one she referred to I’m guessing is the “Project Shadow” mentioned in Haseo’s logs. A genetically enhanced fighter who will likely be a host for those Dark Gigas Cells that enhanced the robot we trashed and his troops.

I’m kinda curious how far the Admiral has things plotted out for, If Haseo had any kind of inkling that Kouji would eventually defect I have concerns about how far into the future he has plans for.

I think I’ll sign off. It's getting kinda late at this point but I’m gonna try and keep a bit more up to date.

----

Chapter 12

Master and Commander

It had been a long few months since they’d taken out Haseo, while they’d been using Haseo’s old base for an outpost it was clear that they needed to infiltrate the Separatists and find those willing to defect from the army so they could weaken their defensive network and maybe gain some inside assets.

With Tallia’s help they’d managed to hack into the separatists unencrypted comms channels that were used for point to point relay between “Subcritical” facilities and operators. They’d spent the time gathering information on low level channels by reverse engineering the terminals to passively sniff any signals that were being relayed over the on site comms automated forwarding.

Aside from the research Haseo was in charge of the facility itself acted as a large-scale communication hub for facilities over the immediate area. Any time the equipment picked up an encrypted signal passing through the transmission would be passively recorded by the terminals and stored on local memory while letting the normal relay protocol proceed as normal.

Tallia had previously pointed out the flaws with their lackluster comms security to her superiors during her tenure under the separatists but due to the rapid movement and escalation of the conflict the higher ups refused to heed her warnings.

The only relatively secure signals on the network were the advanced systems used by the command and control network beyond that the comms between ships and between physical bases on site was just scrambled in transmission with no actual data encryption aside from the signals being scrambled between an array of frequencies and reassembled during parsing at the point of connection.

Within a few days of sniffing the channels they managed to pick up some signals from a few nearby bases where troops were bickering amongst themselves on the notion of bowing out of the army while they mentioned the isolation from what was going on outside of Valin’s orbit they seemed well aware that they were in the last days of the conflict.

---

“We’ve heard intel that the Valion Force may be present on the surface but we’re unaware if that's accurate.” stated one officer to another

“Rumor has it that Haseo finally met his end.” said another seeming like his voice was teeming with apathy for their compatriots death “Good to see the madman finally put to rest, his death was a sign of light still being present in the world.” another officer’s voice said.

Tallia listened to the logs and felt sorrow and dismay in the voices of the soldiers as she struggled not to break into the channels and broadcast an open order to defect, She knew the way to handle broadcasting it while avoiding detection by the C2 channels but she was hesitant about the potential for fake defectors who would try and undermine their progress.

After spending some time filtering through the logs and forwarding the important ones to the rest of the team she convened with Kouji and Genichi with regards to her sentiment toward infiltrating the connections and giving a defection order.

“I can see why you're so conflicted, it's not easy coming to an absolute decision on something like this I’ve heard it myself, they want to break off but with Valin as it is they’d be killed on sight by those DG-Troops. They’re perfect combat machines but they lack the human element, we can’t underestimate the possibility that he could force through an order to have the bases forcibly treated with DG cell injections to ensure loyalty. So if we do consider doing it we’d have to do it before he’d have a chance to force through such an order.” Kouji stated as he went through all the possibilities he could think of as to how to approach this scenario.

Gen thought to himself for a few moments before responding, “Well based on the logs it's reasonably evident there’s some dissension in their ranks, it just comes down to how to exploit it without being intercepted.”

“Well from the look of things we could easily broadcast the message, the issue is timing, we have to make sure the transmission goes out when none of those who are in range to receive it are uplinked to their command and control network. So long as we can assure that It shouldn’t be that difficult to distribute the signal, the only consolation is we’ll have to rely on the will of the people to actually see if they follow through with defecting.” Alicia said as her sister began to filter through some data.

“Thankfully the rather simplistic way the communication protocol works makes it easy to differentiate between over the air comms between bases and connections to their C&C network. So we can just sniff the channels for when there aren’t any uplinks to HQ and put out the message as a forged high security notice to the commanding officers of bases we can confirm are wavering.” Tallia said as she started to do a network scan

-----

Over the next few weeks they managed to reach out to several officers who while not openly willing to defect, or at least make it known over channels that could leach back to the command and control. A few of them had made their way to a meeting point where Tallia and Kouji had set up to determine their trustworthiness.

The meeting took place on a large plateau near where Haseo’s base was but above where it would be visible due to the area’s geographic layout.

“So you all have intentions of defecting?” Kouji said, looking over the four officers who’d gathered there with an analytical glare seeming to peer through into the depths of their psyche. The four officers looked on at him with mouths agape.

“I take it you assumed my; for lack of a better term father killed me back on Maridia, or maybe that Haseo’s gene lock managed to do me in. Well I’m not as weak as you’d guess if that's the case.” he said, glaring at them down knowing they were looking at him as though they were seeing a ghost.

“Commander Isagarra? Is that you?” one of the officers stuttered out through the sight of Kouji’s glare. Kouji silently nodded as he conjured the Raging Dragon Gauntlets and arcs of electric spirit energy began to flash in his eyes.

“Yes it's me.” he said, “Although I’ve gone through a bit of an electrifying evolution,” he said as he cracked his knuckles and eased off his glare. “So what proof do you have of your intentions? Until you provide me with some fair evidence of that, I have reasons to be skeptical. “

One of the soldiers, someone who was somewhat younger than the other three, something closer Kouji’s age than the other three elder soldiers, spoke up with a noticeable stammer in his voice “C-C-Commander, I know you may not remember me, since it's been a few years since we worked together in the Corp of Engineers but I can tell you’ve come a long way since those days.” he peeled off the embroidered jacket he wore as an officer and revealed his old envirosuit from the corp of engineers.

And in plain script his old identifier badge still read “Arthur Williams.” Kouji’s jaw dropped as he remembered one of his older friends before he began his expedited climb through the ranks to the advance unit that eventually got stationed outside orbit of Earth.

“Arty, is that you?” Kouji responded as he smiled for the first time since he’d been there in the rather tense environment of the meeting.

The young officer nodded. “It's interesting how going down two completely different paths still leads people like us to meet like this.” as he leaned in and gave Kouji a firm handshake before Kouji pulled him in and gave him a friendly hug

Tallia sat off to the side observing the whole exchange while keeping an eye on the other soldiers. Her years in the stealth corps before coming to work for Kouji’s unit had left her with an uncanny sense of perception when it came to reading people

As she watched she noticed a strange look in the eyes of one of the soldiers, it wasn’t how he looked at them but rather how his eyes looked she saw a faint metallic glimmer in them. In a few moments she noticed his hand taking on the same glimmer and within mere seconds his hand had reconfigured into a blade which he drew up as though he was going to strike Kouji and Arty intending to run Arty through to get at Kouji.

She began to concentrate her spirit energy as a tornado whipped up around her and she faded from view. When she faded back in behind the soldier she grabbed him and pulled him around with a single motion and kicked him into the air as a tornado of wind lifted him upward.

“Furyu Ken Ougi! Reppu Seiken Zuki!” she shouted as she launched into the air behind him, splitting the soldier in half with a punch whose force was magnified by a ripping gale. The soldier’s bifurcated body fell aside gushing blood as his skin tone faded from a human looking color to a pure metallic gray look.

“Any other traitors..” she said, looking onward at the other soldier as Kouji and Arthur fell over, knocked off balance by Tallia’s tornados. She gave the soldier a death glare as she waited for their response

The remaining soldier spoke up after several minutes saying “I had suspicions he was a plant but I never thought about how much of a risk it would be. I’ve heard of mutant strains of the DG project that include properties more similar to the Techno-Paras organisms on which they’re based. Including abilities like biomass assimilation and the ability to steal a person’s identity by absorbing them into your own being. This is probably the first instance I’ve seen of it in action.``He walked over and helped Kouji and Arty to their feet as the other soldier examined the bifurcated corpse.

“So that's the power you lot wield?” he said as he looked both Tallia and Kouji over. “I’ve heard a great many things about how the Valion force uses some supernatural force to empower themselves. Most of them brush it off as energy to strength amplification via Valicite but I can see that you both exude an aura unlike that of most.” he brushed his chin and sat down reclining against the ground propping himself up with his head on one of his arms.

“So you can see our auras?” Kouji replied as he dismissed the claws. “Have you studied martial arts before?” guessing that he must have studied in the village they trained in at some point.

“Before the war had started and I had joined up with the Separatists I was a student at the dojo where you studied when you landed on Valin. How was Hiroshi, I’d guess he’d probably have kids by now.” he replied as the others stood there kinda surprised about his knowledge of where they’d arrived.

Kouji looked back at him rather surprised at how casual he was considering the state of his knowledge. “So how did you know we were here and why didn’t you report us to command?” he said with a cold glare.

He responded by saying “I knew if I mentioned anything it would cause trouble for the village and I have friends and family there I’d rather not endanger. Besides, I personally loathe the way that things have become since the forces have started expanding. That's why I’ve been keeping myself involved in resource management rather than going into combat.” he smiled warmly at Kouji and as their eyes locked he could tell he had an unusual sense of sincerity about the situation.

“So what resources would you bring to us if you defected aside from access to their supply chains?” Kouji asked, still unaware of how this partnership would work out.

The soldier brushed the dirt off his dress attire and said “Well due to our proximity to several large Zoracite mines we have a lot of material traffic that goes between the immediate area and Command and Control so we could easily work out a way for you to stowaway with a shipment and infiltrate HQ and deal with the Admiral, it’ll be good to see him put to rest.” he said the words seeming to echo in the back of Kouji’s mind

He blinked over to the soldier and grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and yanked him off his feet. “I knew you sounded familiar, I’ve heard your slights over the comms channels. I want to trust you as a person. But the cold and callous way you carry yourself, you're no better than the man we’re trying to undermine. You may not have his power lust but you are just as apathetic to the damage this war has caused to this planet, much less those that have been destroyed by it.” he said as he reared back and punched the soldier in the face.

The soldier drew back his arm and punched Kouji as he recoiled from the hit. Kouji’s eyes flashed with lightning as he stared into the eyes of the soldier. They fell back from each other and traded another pair of punches

As they made impact Kouji noticed a glint of spirit energy going between him and the soldier “You said you’d studied at the dojo in the village? What school did you train under? I saw a glint of your spirit energy just now and it seems similar to mine.” he asked as he braced his chin from the soldier’s punch.

The soldier swayed back and spun around drawing his arm back into a stance Kouji immediately recognized from his training, “I guess I should preface this by stating my name. I’m Ryoma Hajime-Hisanarra, the son of Tajiri Hajime and Lynais Hisanarra.” he said as he clenched his fist and drew it in toward his body

“I don’t give a damn what your name is. If you're going to fight, then fight.” Kouji replied as he spun around and kicked Ryoma in the jaw. Kouji saw him reel back but barely break his stance. In a heartbeat he saw arcs of lightning come up off the ground.

“Too late!” Ryoma said as the air flashed with light and the plateau around them cracked open. “RaiRyuken! Inazuma Reppa!” he shouted as he threw a flurry of punches that knocked Kouji around before knocking him into the air with a fierce uppercut punctuated by a spinning torrent of electricity.

The arcs of electric spirit energy surged up forming a pair of spirals which launched Kouji off his feet. Kouji managed to recover when he landed but he was surprised to see an attack like that from a soldier.

“Tajiri Hajime.” the name echoed in the back of Kouji’s head, he’d heard the name but he had no idea where. Ryoma smirked “You may know my father as the current operator of the Thunder Dragon Dojo. While he doesn’t act as the grandmaster of the dojo, He still handles maintaining the facilities and he’s also the next in line to inherit the grandmasters rites. Back in the village I heard rumors of some people who were planning to try to mend the bad blood between the Dark Dragon Village and The Blue dragon village.” Ryouma said

Kouji’s eyes glanced over Ryoma, for the first time since they’d been there and he took that moment to observe him. “Yeah I remember now. A student named Sage mentioned he was planning to head off into the jungle to see if anything remains of the Dark Dragon Village since it had been a really long time since anyone had heard much.. You asked about Hiroshi earlier.. He’s doing alright at least last I heard though it's been a while.” Kouji replied

“While I don’t exactly trust your line of thinking or your motives, something in the way you struck that blow makes me think you’re more than you let on at first impressions. I’ll give you a chance, Ryoma, but I will expect you to prove yourself to me. As Grandmaster said “The warrior’s words aren’t spoken through his voice, or his body language. But through his fist, his weapon, his very strikes will tell his story better than anything he could put into words.” So until you’ve proved yourself and your intentions to me I have my reasons for not trusting you to just use us to serve your own means,” Kouji said as he stepped away, still rattled from the blow.

“Wise words from one of a dying breed.” Ryoma said as he reached in and shook Kouji's hand attempting to show his willingness to cooperate, “The old man always had a way with words. While I never spent any significant time with gramps I still can tell his words have that sense of clarity that you rarely hear anymore. I’ll go along with you for the time being but if you cause any issues for the village I won’t hesitate to beat the lot of you senseless.” he continued giving a concerned look to Kouji.

After coming to the terms of how they’d work on infiltrating Separatist HQ they decided to convene in Haseo’s old base to catch everyone up to the events.

“So he claims to be the grandson of old man Tajiri?” Takaru asked in a casual tone as he caught offended glares from both Ryoma and Kouji. “Grandmaster Tajiri.” He corrected himself as he noticed how upset the old man's comment seemed to be making Ryoma.

“Never, Never insult my grandfather like that, While it's true I’m not exactly running in perfect lines with his personal way of looking out for the village. I don’t take kindly to his name being taken in such terms. Yes he is up in his years but he’s still one of the most skilled martial artists of the past few generations. I only hope that Sage will make a good successor in his stead.” Ryoma said as he threw a punch at Takaru intentionally stopping short of connecting almost as a warning.

Suddenly Takaru felt a gust of wind pushing him back and within seconds he was skidding along the ground being pushed by currents of air. “That was a sample of the power our line carries, while my family specialized in the Thunder Dragon arts, they exist as part of the larger Dragon Fist Storm Arts school which encompasases both wind and lightining based techniques. I’m aware from her aura that Tallia studies at the other school, the Hurricane Dragon school. The two styles are so intertwined that one who can wield the power of both styles with enough training.If you dare insult my grandfather like that, your heritage be damned I’ll put my fist through your face!” he said glaring at Takaru with a very ominous intent.

“Alright, I meant no offense but that's a little overkill for just calling him an old man. I assume you have a bit of a sore nerve in relation to him, maybe you left the dojo on some kind of bad terms with him.” Takaru replied, trying to think his way through what he’d seen. “For you to have made such a knee jerk response as that I’d guess while you have legitimate reason to be defensive about it there’s no reason to take it out on people you just met. I know Kouji would have probably slapped me upside the head for that comment but he would have at least done it mostly as a joke and not made a death threat.” he continued as he picked himself up off the ground.

“Don’t act like you can read me you son of a bitch.” Ryoma shouted as he reared back and punched Takaru in the face. “I don’t have a damn problem with how I left the village. And under the circumstances both Grandpa and my father agreed it was the best compromise for the safety of the village.” he continued as he drew back and started to throw another punch but Kouji stepped between them and intercepted it.

“Woah! Stop right there.” Kouji said as he wrenched Ryoma’s arm behind his back. “Calm down, I know Takaru has a bit of a childish mindset but he’s a good person. And he’s good at reading people as well. Partly natural intuition and partly a minor study in psychology.” he continued as he tried to hold back Ryoma who seemed like he’d flown into a rage. Kouji tripped Ryoma and knocked him to the ground as he struggled to get to Takaru.

“Go take your psychology bullshit and shove it. I'm perfectly fine with how I left things. I would have rather left it under those terms and left the village a slave to the Separatists.” he shouted with a slight hesitation in his voice as he thought about it. After a few moments he stopped resisting and Kouji let him get back to his feet.

“Ryoma, I don't mean any offense but I think a trip back to the village may serve you well, Grandmaster Tajiri would probably like to have some assurance his grandson is still in good shape.” Kouji said trying to let cooler heads win out in the midst of the argument.

Ryoma reluctantly agreed as he gave Takaru a glare as he started to make his way out of the base.

-----

Meanwhile elsewhere in the base Arty was already busy laying out his plans for how he’d assist in undermining the command and control network.

“While in my current role I don’t have any direct influence over the corps of engineers I still have a few close friends who have high ranking positions in that branch and from personal experience I know they’d jump ship at the first proposition. The Corp is treated like crap compared to the rest of the main Separatists Forces so I could probably talk to some of my contacts and see if we could organize a mass blackout of their com systems on the day of the attack.” he said to Hikari and the others there in the briefing room with a devilish grin crossing his face that surprised Dojiro.

“You sure you’re ok little guy?” he asked Arty who seemed to be channeling some kind of inner evil genius.

“Sorry about that, I’ve got a lot of pent up aggression against the high command so it kinda bleeds out now and then.” he said with a smile getting a little less pronounced. “As much as I’d like to say I have faith in Ryoma’s infiltration plan there is the matter of us needing to cripple their protections to give us the chance to break into their base in a larger capacity,” Arty replied as he pondered the possibilities of how they’d accomplish that.

“Hey some of the people in that unit work on demolitions and explosives don’t they?” Alicia asked. As she noticed his eyes seem to light up,

“Yeah there are a lot of grunt work jobs they’re stuck with, including clearing land for structures and building them as well as wiring up communications. So it wouldn’t be hard to set up some of the demo guys with thorium detonators and have them plant them under the perimeter defenses and blow them out. We could also have some troops inside the base hack the main auto turrets he has set up on the mountainside above the base. If we could get them firing on some of the other bases nearby that would do a lot of dirty work for us as far as eliminating any hostility.” he said as Hikari started to access the comms terminals and began to sniff through the recent logs.

“Shit! Shit Shit! Their coming there’s a huge detachment of DG troops on the way with back up from some of their mech units I’m not sure if we have the gear to take on this kind of stuff. It's apparently a thousand men strong detachment with backup from about 500 of their mech suit units with similar mods to what Haseo’s had.” Hikari said as she barely stopped herself from punching the terminal in frustration at the situation.

“Oh this sounds fun.” Arty said with a little bit of a sadistic grin. “Time to work out some of that aggression, There should be a cache of Zoracite enhanced thorium detonators in the sub basement. I could make quick work of some of those mech suits with them.” he finished as Dojiro walked up behind him grabbed him by his shirt collar lifting him off his feet

“Settle down, while I know you have good intentions you do realize what exposure to Zoracite does to people, especially in an overly emotional state like what you’re in right now. No matter how well shielded it is it can feed off emotions and slowly turn someone into a monster. Hikari, TK and I all witnessed that first hand during the early days of the conflict when Kouji was still attacking Earth with Zora Mutants. And for that matter if it hadn’t been for TK going into a rage during his fight with Kouji in desperation to save Anya, Kouji would have become one of those freaks.” he said trying to put emphasis on the dangers of Zoracite exposure.

“We have a way to deal with them without resorting to that but it just pisses me off that they still have this place on lockdown to where they can move mass units of troops that quickly across the planet. If we had access to a way of killing that shield that the Tsukuyomi fleet has up around the planet we could get some fire support from the Arc Evolza and the Magia Royal Fleet.” Anya said as she raised Shining Lancer and pointed it at the faintly visible barrier above that distorted the view of the sky above them

“Well I know a way we can mitigate that barrier, the shields that cover the bases across Valin use special antennas to project them over the perimeter of each facility. That being said with the right modification to the projection equipment the ultra high frequency radiation that is causing that visual distortion can weaken the shields and even punch through it if enough antennas were amplified. I could probably have my buddies in the corp sneak a few amplifier modules into a couple of the bases near HQ and wire them on to the transmitters and we could coordinate a mass discharge and blow the shields out for a bit if you could get some kinda signal out to that cruiser you mentioned they could blow the rest of the way through it from their side.” Arty replied as he started to draw out a rough diagram of how his plan would go down in a data pad.

-----

A few days later the first signs of the enemy unit arrived, mostly grunt foot soldiers enhanced with DG cells but it was easy enough for TK and Kouji to dispatch them due to the small numbers of the scout party. They knew this was only the beginning of it though.

Arty stood on the observation deck on the top level of the base and much to his dismay it appeared the Separatists were willing to destroy the base if they needed to to flush out the Valion Force. The mech units were equipped with large flame throwers and were trying to set fire to the forest.

“Guys you may want to find a way to deal with those mechs they’re trying to torch the forest. This is one of the few areas nearby that still has any semblance of greenery and it would ruin the environment if what’s left of it got destroyed.” He said over their communicators

Anya smirked as she listened “No problem, I should be able to do something about that.” she replied. While she lacked the ability to naturally process mana from Valin she was still able to cast spells and fight albeit at a more limited capacity compared to how she could on Earth or with the assistance of the mana amplifiers granted by the Magia main fleet. In addition she’d also modified Shining lancer to use similar mana/spirit energy hybridization to what the Fierce Dragon Blade was capable of.

She pulled her hair pin out and shouted “Shining Lancer Set-up!” as her weapon unfurled into its staff form and her barrier armor formed around her. Once it formed she gave it a telepathic command to go into its flight mode and she began to ascend trying to get a better view of the enemy force and offer air to ground support.

Looking off into the distance with her Watcher’s eye she noticed a line of what looked more like bipedal tanks than the typical mecha units they’d seen before trying to tear through and burn the forest down she could only guess that their main units couldn’t navigate the forests heavy overgrowth effectively so this first wave was meant to clear a path.

“Lightning and Storm make their way a few clicks north and you’ll hit their siege line. They've got drones trying to clear the forest and take care of those first and it should help block their bigger units off for a while so we can stall until we can think this whole situation through better.” She said to Koiji, Tallia and Alicia using their unit code names as radio shorthand rather than calling them by name.

Kouji and the sisters flew off with a streak of lightning and a pair of tornados against the sea of flames in the horizon. While Tallia and Alicia both lacked the armor that the others had, their natural aptitude with spirit energy was still rather impressive for what short time they spent training at the dojo compared to the training Takaru, Kouji and the others had received under the Magia guard before leaving Earth.

Anya had thought about trying to make hybrid arms for them to wield but she lacked the needed raw materials and the equipment to properly forge them.

-------

Meanwhile, off in the distance Takaru was fighting with a mix of the grunt soldiers and a couple of the smaller mech units. As he stepped up to face them the unit’s commander said “Who are you and how do you think you stand a chance of opposing the Separatists? We've taken over this world completely and we have the manpower and resources to quash any little rebellion you have planned.” as Takaru sheathed his sword and turned around facing the commander.

“Oh me, I’m nobody. Just someone who saw you wreaking this forest and ruining what's left of this world and refused to stand around and let this happen idly. Guess you could just say I’m a wannabe hero, just passing through.” he said as he slipped the blade out of the sheath and raised it into the air “Gekiryu Henshin!” he shouted as a glint of light pulsated up the blade and a great visage of Ysurill in dragon form flew into the air above him letting out a thunderous roar before descending to him forming his armor.

Within seconds the officer closed up the cockpit of his mech and began to open fire. “You impudent wretch, the separatists will stand tall. The admiral will bring about a glorious evolution of mankind.” he shouted as he watched Takaru weave and dodge around his fire and that of his troops with the occasional shot plinking off his barrier armor.

Takaru cut down the foot troopers with next to no effort, while under normal circumstances he prefered to disarm normal soldiers rather than killing them in cold blood the almost uniform expansion of the Dark Gigas troopers forced him to kill them since their regeneration, when in proximity of a power source to substantiate it could heal them from most non lethal injuries faster than they could deal damage.

After he’d cleared the ranks of foot soldiers he stood there with what appeared to be about 5 of the full scale mech units not unlike Haseo’s along with the one that was assisting in the process of torching the forest as he sheathed the blade of his sword and cleaned the blood and bits of flesh of it the officer in the torch bot poked out.

“What are you?!” he shouted as he watched his troops falling to Takaru’s sword seemingly astounded by how effortlessly he was shearing through them and the accompanying mecha unit.

“I’m the shining light in this planet’s darkest times, I’m the fang of the blue dragon who watches over the heavens. But most importantly I’m Takaru Inara, the vanguard of Ysurill and chosen wielder of the blue dragon armor. Remember that.” Takaru said as he blinked forward and cut the mech suit in half leaving the pilot to die in the explosion

Takaru flew over the breadth of the enemy unit and as he blinked between anti-air fire he raised his sword and turned it with the AI core facing inward as an amplification glyph appeared beneath him and he began to call out an invocation.

“Sword of Light, Free yourself from the bonds of the depths below! Become one with my spirit, one with my body so we may walk the Path of Justice together! Power that can slay the likes of Immortals.. Slash sword of light, Slash through all!” he shouted as the blade began to radiate a blinding light and a shimmering field of energy, a combination of mana and spirit energy enveloped him and the sword as he dived through the glyph and dashed through the enemy lines slaying the large immobilized robots with single strikes clearing almost the entire area within a few moments as a line of explosions dotted the horizon in his wake.

---

Back at base Anya saw the explosions and could tell Takaru was letting loose on all cylinders as the early morning sky lit up with various flashes of light among the flames being put off by the torch drones.

“So he used that technique.” she said as she thought about how he’d trained to develop it alongside Ysurill. It was an adaptation of a technique that Ysurill had developed as one of the core abilities of the Blue Dragon Fist

“Seiryu-ken Ougi! Shinryu Issen!” was its name. It drew on the ultimate power of Ysurill’s draconic form discharging a massive blast of spirit energy that can cleave through most physical barriers and seemed to be at least modestly effective against the shields the separatists used on their mech units since their run in with Haseo’s mech he’d been practicing the technique on the shields of the mostly scrapped Master Gigas which they’d repurposed as a training target by converting its power source to Valicite they’d managed to gather from the immediate area around the Dragon Fist Village.

Due to the nature of it they removed any sort of control hardware from it so that it would remain docile while still retaining its regenerative capabilities so that it would be able to survive taking the brunt of their techniques and not be a hazard to them while allowing them to have a means to hone their powers.

That technique was a perfect test of its regenerative capacity and shielding the first time he managed to use the perfected form of it he managed to shred the shields and almost destroy it entirely if it weren't for that healing factor he would have.

Anya had theorized the idea of using it along with some of the equally powerful techniques that Kouji and the others had developed could be used to overload the planetary shields and weaken them if used in tandem with the plan Arty had came up with to disrupt them but the issue was in their current configurations the barrier armors they used couldn’t survive space travel since they weren’t equipped with internalized life support systems and protections against the lack of atmosphere out in open space.

And the needed modifications would take resources they didn’t have on hand. So that left them hoping they could get word out to the Arc Evolza before the shields manage to return to normal and have the bulk of the Magia fleet unload on the shields all at once.

----

A few hours later as the sun began to set they cleaned up the last of the enemy units in the surrounding area and regrouped back at base to strategize.

“So where are we going from here?” Arty asked as he watched Ryoma coordinate with some workers he’d brought in to load up the detonators and take them somewhere to be disarmed. He’d seen from what had happened through the course of the day that it was clear the Separatists were aware of their presence and it wouldn’t be safe to hold up here much longer without making their move.

“Well kid, It looks like we’ll be pushing our operations forward a little faster than anticipated. I was only briefed on my way in but it seems like the plan is to start working on gearing up to blow that shield out in space and then once it's down we’d probably be getting some heavy reinforcements providing the admiral’s flagships don’t cause them too much hassle. Once that's taken care of Takaru and the others will be infiltrating the master command center in the hopes of tracking down the admiral and putting him out of our misery.” Ryoma replied as he finished waving out a few trucks that were loaded with bombs that had their detonators disabled but still needed their payloads neutralized by the Corp of Engineers

Arty sat there looking at Ryoma “Hey I’m not that much younger than the rest of you..I’ll admit I’m a bit less seasoned than you but I’d like a little more respect than being called a kid.” he said with a little bit of an annoyed inflection

“So what did you do during your little trip to the village a while back?” Arty asked, seeming interested in the circumstances and noticing it seemed Ryoma seemed like he was much more at ease than before he left.

Ryoma sighed, sounding like a bit of a weight had been lifted off his chest. “Well while I was there I found out from Gramps that the village isn’t exactly in the best of shape, while no one’s come into harm’s way. The leaders of the village were approached by one of the commanders who served under the Admiral back at Command and control, much to their dismay he forced them to agree to harbor Separatist troops in the event that the Federation did manage to run them out. And it worries me that if the village is forced to harbor them the federation will take out the village to flush out the sympathizers.” He said with a heavy sigh as he launched his legs hanging off the pallet he’d been standing on while he surveyed the extraction of the explosives.

“So as well meaning as you were at the time you inadvertently sold the village out to the Separatists who are probably banking on the idea of whether the Federation would be willing to cause harm to the village in the action of finding the Separatist holdouts.” Arty said as he stretched his arms behind his head and started to walk back into the base from the loading dock area.

“Yeah much as it pains me to say it, Takaru was right, a lot of my pent up aggression had to deal with my worries regarding the fate of the village. To his credit Kouji was right about TK’s ability to read people. Hope I can make up for my little explosion when we first met.” Ryoma replied as he saw Arty fussing with his communicator reporting on the success of the export of the explosives.

Arty’s expression changed from a relaxed one to a somewhat distressed one as Anya’s voice began to blare over the communicator saying “Takaru and the others hit a bit of a snag, it looks like while they managed to stop most of the torch bots and their accompanying units there are a few really beefy MG units that managed to combine with each other and their causing them trouble we need some extra hands because we don’t have the firepower to deal with them as it is. Since Takaru managed to burn himself out earlier so he can’t fight for a while.” Hearing that Ryoma cracked his knuckles and smirked.

“Guess it's time to show off my skills and help turn things around.” he said as he started to head out toward the battle seeing the giant monstrosity off in the distance from the loading docks.

Ryoma started to walk out into the forest nearing where the fight was taking place “Let the power of the great dragon Raiga Lord of Storms become one with mine as I join this battle.” he said to himself as his body began to give off a mixed aura of gold and white.

As he walked out he formed a few symbols with his hands and began to dash toward the battlefield.seeming to blink out of view in a rapid series of flashes as Arty lost sight of him against the tree line.

When he met up with TK and the others he could tell they weren’t exaggerating the power of the monstrous robot they had been fighting. He looked over at Kouji who seemed to be one of the worse off out of the bunch along with TK. “Hey Kouji, let me borrow your armor. I think I could put a nice dent in this thing. You may have trained at the dojo for what time you were in the village but what you know is pretty limited compared to what I’d be capable of. Wanna let me show ya?” he asked as he stepped up before the robot.

Kouji nodded and the armor dissolved into traces of light before appearing on Ryoma’s body. Ryoma thanked him and said a quiet prayer to honor the spirit of Raiga the Thunder Lord before asking about the current status of the fight.

“It seems to be taking a pretty solid amount of damage from Kouji’s attacks, it seems like the electrical nature of his spirit energy and attacks disrupts the regeneration of the DG cells. The problem being that Kouji’s been fighting alongside the others for most of the day and he’s almost as worn out as TK.” Hikari said as she fired off a few volleys of shots at it trying to provide suppressing fire.

“Well if that's the case then I should be able to deal with this thing with a little help from you guys.” he replied as he struck a fighting stance and to everyone's surprise the armor responded instantly by generating an amplification glyph

“Now to finish this thing in one blow! With the shining light of heaven and the striking force of thunder at my command let the power of the Lord of Storms be one with mine. Let this blow smash it into atoms!” he said to himself in a low droning tone as the glyph became more pronounced and arcs of electricity began to shroud his body. As this was going on the armor generated the Air Road and he began to jet around the monster on the track of energy. “Lightning Annihilator Punch!” he shouted as he flew above his target and descended at blistering speed with a trail of lightning behind him.

While he fell the gauntlet on his right hand began to glow and grew to almost the same scale as the monster as he impacted it. The giant gauntlet smashed the monster into the ground, smothering it in arcs of electricity which seemed to shred it faster than its regeneration could heal it.

“Now Raiga's Fury vanish into light.” he said calmly as the energy enveloped the robot and it began to dissolve into particulate matter. As the light show ended Ryoma walked over to Kouji and thanked him for the chance to wield the armor as for him and his family it was a highly regarded honor to wield it even for a short time

Takaru and the others sat there surprised at the sight of what they’d just seen “So this is what the Legacy Arms were capable of back in the day.” Takaru said as they stood there marveling at the sheer power of the armor in the right hands.

Raiga came out of the gauntlets and assumed a humanoid form which seemed to bear a strange resemblance to Ryoma; it wasn’t a perfect replication but there was a distinct familial similarity. As he stood there between Kouji and Ryoma while the gauntlets dissolved and reformed on Kouji’s hands taking their more knuckle duster-like storage form. Raiga smiled and said “It appears as though you both have a bit of common heritage with me although Mr Hajime has a smattering of the Inara blood mixed with his interesting so truth be told he could probably wield the power of Ysurill’s blade as well as he wielded my gauntlets while on the other hand this young man traces back closer to the Isagarra family that the previous wielders descended from.” He said as a holographic image of Sakura projected itself from the AI core.

------

After the fight they gathered back in their improvised base. The group gathered around in the central hub and began to discuss their findings.

“From what I can tell the DG project is advancing a lot faster than I’d anticipated from the deployment among the troops. Looks like we’ll have to push our plans forward to compensate. I've got some mole agents in some of the nearby bases ready to install the shield amplifiers and get things rolling to take the planetary shields out. We need to strike before they can build up some kind of response.” Ryoma said to himself as he prepared to organize the attack while Takaru and the others rested.

====