Masquerade Ball - Totally not an ambush

[hiken]

Who: Anyone going to the Corsair Island Masquerade Ball!
Where: ...IDK?
When: April 26th - 27th (Early AM)
What: The Masquerade Ball + Ambush (12am)
Warnings: D for dancing, V for violence, A for Ace, L for Luffy
Style: Action or prose.
Status: Open to anyone attending!

There are going to be two main threads. One for the ball itself and the other for the Ambush! There will be an obligatory third thread for FASHION. Just remember to tag your muse in the subject header and OTA or 'Closed to ???' as you comment.

Comments

[lazyjustice]

[enough was enough. Interfering. Not interfering. There came a time when a man had to do something. So for now he is heading toward the chaos, doing nothing more than spreading ice at his feet, trying do disperse the fighting in the most peaceable way possible. Though he will have no quarter for those who he knows are pirates and unashamed of it]

[hiken]

[Ace's small little scuffle with a handful of soldiers died down immediately when he felt Kuzan enter the fray. Though his presence wasn't dangerous straight away, simply knowing who it was lent him enough caution to put himself between that man and his crew. As two soldiers came down to cleave him in two with their sabers, Ace's body turned to flame and they passed harmlessly through him.

He walked along the charred, broken floorboards and advanced towards the Admiral, his body licked by flames.]

You waited awhile, Ao Kiji. Finally ready to have some fun?

[lazyjustice]

[he had heard the man's voice, and intellectually had come to realize he was alive here. But seeing him is an entirely different matter. He can smell Marine Ford again, can hear it in his inner ear. Killed justly or not, the man is dead, the battle is over, and yet he's here fighting on.For what purpose? To cause more destruction in his wake? Or is there something else he has in mind?

Whatever the reasoning, here and now he is a force to be reckoned with. He braces his stance, folding his hands in his pockets and letting the ice spread around him, reinforcing it against the young man's heat. No matter how hot the fire, it cannot stand forever against a glacier.]

Don't you think you've caused enough damage for one night?

[even for Whitebeard Pirates, there was a limit. Now that Portgas was unfettered, it was worth watching what kind of man he came to be. What the dissolution and death of Whitebeard really meant for this world, and their own]

[hiken]

[Ace didn't even bother pushing his fire against Kuzan's ice. In terms of basic strategy, it would be a waste. Fire would only melt the surface of his ice and work its way to the center as if boring through. If Kuzan threw ice at him continually, it would eventually get past some of his flames. That was the difference between a logia with much more 'mass'.

Well, it was the problem he had initially. Against someone with heavier fire than his like Akainu, Ace would have had to attack from far for his power to do anything useful. So, he really had to weigh his options. Ace reached to his belt, lifted his shirt and handily unclipped his knife from it. He swiped the tip of the knife across the back of his arm, a thin rived of blood running down it.

The air around Ace's arm immediately began to boil. He used his blood for a reason--because it was where the warmth in the human body was usually the densest. For his own blood, that was a telling estimate.]

Not yet. Anyway, you gave me plenty of time to check if any of my crew was behind you.

I guess now's a good time to try something new out.

[lazyjustice]

[he supposed it was natural for Portgas to want to test this against him--whatever ability it was-- and left his haki on full, only intending to do just the barest minimum he could get away with to either absorb the attack, stop it or dodge if he absolutely had to. Hopefully it would be enough to engage him to exhaustion since Aokiji didn't have the resources he'd need to take down the Spades crew or their allies short of freezing them solid and things were more complicated than that.

Still ideally he was hoping to spur a retreat or something close to that. Pacify the threat and get him out of the area without unnecessary sacrifice. So to that end...]

I'd expect better from an protegee of Newgate. [The man had been a scourge of the seas but he knew what fights were worth picking and what was best left alone.]

[hiken]

You're not the only one who's disappointed. 'Never underestimate pirates!'

[Ace pulled back his right arm--though, it didn't make a difference if he grounded himself. He quickly found himself off balance as his body began to swell, his skin turning blue and rippled into flames that kept moving and shifting between yellow, red, blue and orange. Within moments, he stood as tall as the base itself. The constant shift of colors came from Ace's haki--which was impossible to control properly when it was mixed in the fire, itself. As Ace's flames were constantly moving and building and burning up, he would have wasted effort trying to keep up with it all. Instead, he focused his will into one point all at once--his right arm.

Ace's face shifted, taking on the classic appearance of a demon's wide and twisted smile.]

Holy Mountain--Oni!

[lazyjustice]

[that had been completely ineffective. Kuzan managed to throw up an ice shield just in time, strengthening it as the fire raged around him to dampen as much as he could. He couldn't help but think of it as substandard. Was this the face of the new pirate age? Yes and no. Better and worse. His own recklessness would cause him to burn himself out soon enough as had already been proven. So he remained there, blocking and absorbing the attack, his hands in his pockets, and not striking back]

[hiken]

Heh. You sure you wanna take it easy, Ao Kiji? I haven't even attacked, yet!

[The twisted face of the demon didn't so much as flinch, but its shape did shift, slowly moving back to gain a foot-step of distance. Its right arm tightened and flexed, taking on a much more solid shape than the rest of the body.

Ace's demon came forward, throwing its right arm forward to punch Ao Kiji's wall of ice. The stone walkway under his feet exploded, the pressure of his swing sending up a cone of heat and air pressure that cleared the clouds above in a circle above his head. As if it didn't make things iconic enough, the moon became much more visible as a result and awesome moonlight shone down as the guitar solo kicked in.]

This isn't just for show, either!