[Oahu] A Hawaiian Vacation

Usually when an invasion or war is declared, the first responders are people who come from elsewhere to defend whatever is being attacked. This didn't really apply to Jian Yijun, a Chinese youth whom had somehow managed to become a Warden in the Vanguard. The reason he always seemed to manage to be on the front lines of battle is because of his own dumb luck, or in many cases lack thereof. Being in the wrong place at the wrong time seemed to be a specialty of his, explaining how he'd been able to be one of the first people to try fighting off the Monsuta forces in Djibouti a couple weeks ago or in the middle of a demonic war in the Sirsa Kingdom. In both instances Kai wasn't looking for a fight yet managed to get one. The same could be said for today.

Since becoming a Vanguard Warden, one of the organization's supposedly elite commanders dedicated to defending Earth, Kai had been on a sort of introduction tour by traveling to various bases and allied regions to meet those whom also dedicated themselves to a life of protecting others. Though still technically employed by Nidzen Corp., Kai was now dedicating essentially all his time to this new job of his. One of the benefits of becoming a Warden was being able to travel around the globe and meet new people even more often than he'd done under his other employer. Though unlike working in an office and securing business deals, being a Vanguard employee meant putting his life on the line so others wouldn't have to. This aspect of the job would be put to the test today, a reality Kai would quickly acclimate to.

Even from inside a building built specifically to keep out enemies Kai could sense the ocean of energy now washing over the islands of Hawaii. At first it all seemed to come from one source, yet within only a few seconds this changed to not just tens and hundreds, but well over a thousand individual points of energy pouring in from the sky above. Loud sirens immediately began going off, ringing out through all the islands as if a tsunami was coming. Kai knew better, this was no tsunami. It was a horde. Shooting up from the desk he'd been given temporary ownership of, Kai sprinted through the hallways of the Yayjuu's armaments and technology complex until bursting through a security door on the first level and into the shadow-cloaked night.

Though this was clearly an attack, given the death and destruction already accomplished by the Shadowfall forces, Kai figured his enemies would gladly assume control of the valuable Yayjuu assets located deep within Honolulu on O'ahu. Kai closed his eyes tight and focused his senses on figuring out which direction the incoming soldiers were coming from. South. Breaking out into a run again, Kai headed directly toward the danger though not without an interruption by an allied soldier running next to what seemed to be a large pod-like object heading directly toward the building Kai had come from. "What is that for?" "Sir it's an AEGIS, it's meant to protect the arms building." "Alright, get it over there quick. Quick!"

Now back on track, it wasn't long until Kai approached the first demonic Shadowfall soldiers hellbent on slaughter and destruction. The entire situation was giving Kai flashbacks to the battle in Djibouti, the knowledge of not being able to protect everyone still fresh in the Chinese youth's mind. This time I will defend everyone and everything! I can't let these barbarians succeed! Kai was steeled by his determination to succeed where others have failed, where he failed. It was high time Shadowfall suffered a blow they wouldn't quickly recover from. With this in mind Kai summoned his ancestral guandao Erphtal into the grasp of his right hand, his fingers wrapped tightly around the weapon's metal shank and prepared to do battle yet again.

The first demon Kai met that night seemed to be taking tremendous joy in chasing and killing random civilians still trying to heed the evacuation alarms sent out by the Yayjuu. Without even giving him a second look, Kai held out Erphtal and swung it in a small arc as he sprinted past the warrior, beheading it without difficulty. A fitting death for a demon who ran from the actual battle to harm the undefended citizens of Hawaii. It wasn't long until Kai could make out the sounds of battle between Yayjuu and Shadowfall forces, sounds which he followed until coming to a series of city blocks already devastated by the conflict. Though the demonic soldiers were powerful, Kai's allies seemed to be holding their ground against the horde. Regardless, the North West Warden would not sit idly by as his friends were killed.

Once within range of the front of a contingent of enemy soldiers the blade of Erphtal was coated in bright green flames of Kai's own creation. Swinging in a wide diagonal arc starting from his lower right. This caused the flames to erupt into a large inferno careening away from the Warden until it engulfed eight demon soldiers in fire hot enough to reduce them to little more than piles of ash. The arrival of Kai rallied the troops around him, increasing their morale and forcing them to fight harder than ever against the enemy who had come to destroy them all without a trace left. Though at first successful in driving back the attack in this specific area, nothing lasted forever.

Having been completely focused on sending wave after wave of foot soldiers back, Kai hadn't noticed the arrival of a significantly more powerful combatant. After sending a particularly large blast of Jade Dragon's Flames at his enemies Kai smiled because he was actually fighting them off. However once the fire dissipated the body of a two and a half meter tall behemoth-like robotic demon appeared, barely charred by the raging inferno. Kai's eyes widened as he realized just how much more powerful this individual was than anything he'd faced so far in this battle. Before he could even react the Knightslave demon lifted it's arm and fired a powerful, sinister blast of energy to Kai's right. Looking over, all Kai saw was nothing. Nobody and nothing had survived the elite warrior's attack.

It was evident to Kai even if all the nearby Yayjuu forces focused their firepower onto this one individual demon the chances of success were abysmal. For this reason he immediately called out to his allies and ordered them to leave the area and focus on evacuating civilians and defending the Yayjuu facilities up the road. "I and I alone with delay this thing as long as possible! Go!" With this last command Kai was left alone to face a significantly stronger foe.

Shifting to his Ranger Stance, Erphtal was replaced by a beautiful jade bow held firmly in his left hand, his knuckles white from the tight grip. Kai fired arrow after arrow, each imbued with the green flames he'd been blessed with by his bloodline, which exploded upon hitting the Knightslave demon in green infernos. Waiting and biding his time, Kai knew there was very little his arrows or flames could do directly to his opponent. It wasn't until the beast lifted it's arm did Kai see his opening. Right before the demon's cannon rifle fired another powerful laser Kai shot a jade arrow directly into the weapon's barrel, causing both the weapon and the entire demon to be engulfed by a massive explosion of its own making. The resulting damage of the blast was enough to destroy the Knightslave's arm all the way to the shoulder and cause significant ruin to the surrounding environment as well. Ducking behind a corner of a nearby building, Kai took a few seconds to catch his breath. At least there won't be any more lasers...

When he'd made his way to Hawaii courtesy of some lax security measures aboard a freight ship, the last thing Alex had really thought about had been the potential for demon invasions. Sunburn? Yeah, sure, no biggie. Drowning? Not likely, he was a good swimmer, but that riptide could get you something fierce. But nah, not demon invasions, those were probably the last thing he'd been too worried about. Yet here he was, downing the last bits of his mai tai and lighting up a new cigarette, his grip on the lighter tightening a bit as he tried not to stress out too much about the whole ordeal. No sense in flipping out, he was here now.

The real shame, he figured, was the fact that the very sweet and very lovely lady friend he'd made was now no longer a whole person, closer to two or three pieces of a whole person that if you stuck them together might equal most of a full woman. Really, what a fuckin' waste. Taking a deep pull from the now-lit cigarette, Alex slipped on his shirt and, before anything else, looked for a good place to hide his bag. The last thing he wanted was his pants getting stolen, nothing was worse than sleeping in trunks. With a half-hearted shrug, he stuck it between a few bushes that kept the sand on the beach from getting too far onto the sidewalk or into the street. Odds were that everyone would be too busy closer to the city to take his shit anyway, but you could never be sure. With that little detail handled, Alex ran a hand through his hair and flicked the ash from the end of his cigarette. These demons were really cramping his style, and the last thing he was gonna let fly was an abrupt end to his vacation.

As he heard a rather immense explosion from closer to the city, Alex briefly reconsidered this course of action. “Well, this oughta be a good time. Ten bucks says that wasn't a confetti cannon.” After a few seconds more thought, he shook his head and made his way in that general direction, though at a pace that one might only call a casual walk. Of course, that casual attitude didn't last long, as it took barely any time for him to be confronted by a few more demons looking to ruin his day. Great, cool, awesome, just what he wanted. “Yo, listen, can we not? Can't you just, like, leave?” The attack in response was enough answer for him, though, and if he hadn't been able to defend himself with a quick handful of Maiden Masher, it might have been a more serious problem. “What the fuck, I even asked nicely.” Guess that answered any other questions.

Luckily, Alex wasn't a total schmuck. Not exactly a god either, but you know, he could hold his own. Drastically increasing Maiden Masher's size, Alex drove it through the demon in question, wincing ever so slightly as he felt his body warm up just a bit. Never fun, that, but he'd be fine for now. He followed that up with a flurry of strikes, a brutal assault of slashes and kicks that lacked any real definition, and before long he found himself grinding the demon's face into the ground with his heel. “Hey asshole, we could've avoided this whole thing, you know.” With a final series of stomps finishing the demon off, Alex continued making his way toward the source of the earlier commotion. It was personal now, he'd just been here to have a good time and these fuckin' guys had the audacity to come along and try to kill him.

As he neared, however, he found himself thinking it might be best if he tried to hide rather than just walking out on the sidewalk. Upon spotting what looked to be some chick ready to kill a man of his station without even trying, the decision to stay sparse only proved more appealing, and so Alex made the executive decision not to be an action hero and just wait things out for now. He figured he'd have his shot to help out and show 'em what they got for ruining his trip, and if he didn't, well, he wasn't gonna die trying.

Behind cover Kai could stay safe for at least a few moments to gather his thoughts and figure out a plan of attack against this still-functional behemoth of a demon. Despite having its entire arm blown off, the Knightslave demon didn't seem all that bothered by the injury. In fact disregarding the absence of the arm cannon Kai had destroyed, the beast hadn't really reacted at all from sustaining such a serious wound. The Chinese youth figured if he wanted to take it down he would have to cause a lot more internal damage to stop it from functioning, or at the very least lop both its legs off to at least prevent anymore movement from the powerful robotic demon. Thankfully all the Yayjuu soldiers and civilians in the nearby vicinity had successfully evacuated. At least it doesn't have anything to target right now...

Even from behind a concrete wall Kai could sense the arrival of a new individual, someone he figured would be another dangerous adversary given it didn't seem to attack or fight the Knightslave. Wanting to get a good view of his opponents Kai turned into the building he was hiding next to and located the closest staircase, of which he sprinted up until reaching the roof's door. After opening the half-destroyed door, Kai exited through it and quietly made his way to the edge of the building to look down on the battlefield. Standing close to his previous enemy was a seemingly young girl clad in crimson clothing and hair whom, from appearances, did not seem all that dangerous but Kai had learned not to judge a book by its cover. The idea of the newcomer's appearance belying a more fearsome foe was reinforced by the level of energy he could sense coming from the individual. Just what I need, another enemy stronger than I am. His own thoughts were less than confident about the situation he found himself in.

Steeling himself, Kai knew he was the only real defense standing between his enemies and the nearby Yayjuu armaments dump. The only possible plan of action involved using everything at his disposal to stop these two in their tracks. After quickly looking around and taking in his surroundings Kai was able to come up with a few ideas to cause as much damage as possible to the robotic demon he'd already clashed with. Observing his opponent's actions, all Kai could surmise was she had done something to aid the damaged cyborg creature in some way though clearly not to heal it. Quickly nocking an arrow, Kai took aim at the Knightslave as it turned and began moving away much faster than he expected. About ten meters before passing a large stone pillar, a remnant of a collapsed building, Kai released the arrow which whizzed through the air even faster than his target was moving before lodging itself a few centimeters in the beast's shoulder where its arm used to be. Before the arrow had reached its destination Kai had already shot another at the still-standing wall behind the pillar, which promptly exploded into an inferno of green flames strong enough to send said pillar flying into the side of the Knightslave. The blast from the arrow had sent the pillar flying so quickly it hit the demon so hard he smashed into a wall on Kai's side of the street which had the effect of pushing the arrow in its shoulder all the way through its torso to the point of only its jade fletching still being visible. Now embedded deep within the demon, Kai caused the flames sealed into the arrow to explode as the other had, scorching and incinerating the less durable innards of the demon. His plan had so far gone without a hitch.

With one enemy now unable to move due to being burned to its core, literally, Kai stood a better chance at trying to deal with the other individual wielding a spear. Her request for him to come out would be answered by Kai leaping from the building from which he'd dealt significant blows to the Knightslave. While in midair Kai had switched Stances again, this time back to Standard, and summoned his guandao Erphtal upside down in his hands. Using the momentum from falling, Kai slammed directly into the back of the Knightslave demon and impaled the now-weakened beast with his weapon's massive blade, locking the creature in place against the ground. Just to be sure it wouldn't be standing back up any time soon, Kai funneled more of his jade fire through Erphtal and into the abdomen of the Knighslave to cause as much damage as he could as quickly as possible in fear of being attacked by the other enemy commander before he was finished.

Turning to face Himeko, Kai dusted his hands off and placed them on his hips as a soot-covered smile spread across the young man's face. "Hey I'm Kai! Sorry about your friend but to be fair he wasn't a very nice guy. Since you don't seem very happy we'll skip the niceties. If you surrender now all that'll happen is you'll be imprisoned, which is a far cry better than what the other guy got. What do you say?" As he finished revealing his offer of a peaceful resolution, Kai switched to Ranger Stance and summoned his jade bow with which he immediately nocked an arrow and aimed squarely at his newest opponent. Kai may have hoped for an agreement but he prepared for the worst.

“Well...shit, alright.” Deciding to just roll with it for now, mostly for his own immediate well-being, Alex stepped out with his hands in his pockets. “Yo, hey, how are ya?” Now, normally Alex would have just tossed Maiden Masher and gotten to work, but he was already well into the belief that there was pretty much no way in hell that he'd be beating this chick's ass with anything resembling ease. Eyeing the girl over, he found his pride at least faintly wounded at the fact that she clearly had the upper hand here even though she looked like she was...what, eight? Who knew. With a profoundly disappointed sigh, Alex finished off his cigarette, tossed the butt to the ground, and lit a new one, rather casual about the whole affair in spite of the circumstances.

Moving on from that, Alex took a long pull, ran a hand through his hair, and turned his attention to the guy who'd just jumped off a God damn building. ”Yeah, so uh, cool beans with that trick there. Said you're Kai, right? Nice to meet you.” Taking a seat on a curb, Alex shrugged at the whole ordeal. He figured there wasn't really much for him to do at present, and standing really wasn't doing him any favors. The way he saw it, he was pretty much just biding his time until chicky-poo over there was distracted enough that he could smear her face across the concrete.

Was he afraid of her? Nah, not in the slightest. A little concerned, sure, but fear was for losers, and he sure wasn't a loser. Alex's every action, from the way he casually let the cigarette hang from his fingers to the idle tapping of his foot on the street, suggested a total lack of worry for anything resembling his well-being, and were one to make that assumption, they would be entirely correct. When things went this way in life, you just had to roll with it, simple as that, and Alex would rather keep his own hide intact to relax another day than make some huge principled stand against fate or whatever.

”So how about we just get a drink or something while this tides over, eh? Talk this whole thing over, work out our issues, all that.” It wasn't some big gambit he was planning here, a turnabout where he drugged the drink or used it as a distraction. Really, he just figured there was enough total chaos that he could snag a free drink, and he wanted to keep his hide intact. Of course, if it did work as a distraction, well, that was a nice bonus if nothing else.

Though his new enemy insulted him repeatedly, Kai didn't take offense. Her words may have been barbed but they were just words, and in a war zone it was guns and bombs and explosions which could harm him or innocents. Though she spoke of accomplishing goals, the girl hardly seemed excited about being there. Compared to those Kai had already fought on this day being able to speak to an opposing soldier was at least somewhat a breath of fresh air. Regardless Kai was a bit surprised by the arrival of another individual, this time a young man either relatively weak or skilled in hiding his power. When the newcomer greeted him Kai nodded his head in acknowledgment and watched his movements with curiosity. Despite the war and chaos currently raging in the area he seemed relaxed as if nothing bothered him, an interesting attitude all things considered.

Kai kept his aim trained on Himeko, unflinching and unwavering no matter the words any of them said. Though for a second his mouth twisted downward into a frown, right before speaking again he was once again smiling. "My kindness is never mocking. I'm not sure why you are who and what you are, but I'm no patronizer or liar. My words have meaning, and when I say this is your last chance to surrender you can trust I am telling the truth." While keeping his arrow aimed for Himeko's heart his gaze set itself on the seemingly uncaring individual on her other side before speaking again. "As for you...I don't know who you are but if you aren't aligned with these murderous invaders I recommend you leave. If there's anything I've learned about people like her it's they are far more than their appearances may imply."

After giving both individuals a chance to respond to his statements Kai turned his bow slightly and loosed the arrow, shooting it at the gap between buildings behind Himeko. On impact the arrow exploded into a large enough blast of fire to block off the street, a symbolic act to place emphasis on his statements. Immediately after, Kai slung his bow around his torso and walked over to a nearby parked car which had been heavily damaged in the prior battle. Once in reach he placed one hand on the left side door and the other on the vehicle's roof and tore the door off its hinge, easy breaking the metal attachments. After gripping the chunk of metal and plastic by one of its edges Kai lifted it up and turned to Himeko before chucking it like a frisbee at the woman.