Clara Hetzingberger's Missions

The Agents, Formac the Hotshot, Zahak the Thunderbird, and Clara and Talon, both Freerunners, ported in to the finish line station, situated high above the space in the ring between the tracks (aka the margin). They nominated Formac as their racer for the inner track and Clara as their racer for the outer track. The starting countdown went off, and the racers began moving forwards on their respective tracks, as a trapdoor opened in the floor of the station, sending nearly all the racers to their immediate death, but Zahak was able to fly and carry Talon down to the floor of the margin.

On the floor was a massacre, as thousands of sacrificial employees had plummeted to their death. Those who had managed to keep going were being picked off by Qaldi runners, foot soldiers formed out of lightning clouds, carrying lightning swords. One charged Talon, but he managed to take it by surprise, vaulting off of it and continuing ahead. Zahak flew amidst the icy comets, taking out several runners who tried to ambush him.

Formac summoned a Tron-esque motorbike, deftly weaving around the other racers and some Qaldi runners by activating a magnetic grip to cling to the side of the wall. This did, however, draw in the electrical energy from a few runners, but Formac activated his emergency brake, stopping his and the bikes' momentum, but sending his assailants flying.

Clara made use of some shoddy leftover construction to navigate her way over the crowd in her lane. There was a large group of Qaldi runners, some even on thunder motorcycles, but she managed to deftly knock them down with her shockwaves.

A large gathering of runners on an asteroid began moving in quick circles charging up a laser beam to fire at Zahak, but he charged it straight down, burning in the process but smashing the asteroid and the runners as the agents all reached the first checkpoint.

Clara was the first to reach it and the first to see this new area, with much more vertical racing lanes the margin filled with asteroids and inhabited by 40-foot tall titanic "Roc Hurlers" They made sport of supercharging the asteroids with lightning before throwing them at unsuspecting runners. One such impact landed behind Talon and the resulting impact sent him flying up into the asteroid field with Zahak. Talon managed to take down a Roc Hurler by stomping it in the noggin and then stomping it in the noggin again but harder. Zahak felled another with a well-placed axe to the eye.

Formac made use of the slopes on his track, using the hills to boost him over the valley, dodging rocks from a hurler that appeared above him. Coming up to the top of the last hill, he saw a barricade of Qaldi runners. Straining extra essence and making use of the electric currents refracting around him, he shifted his bike into a Tron tank while still maintaining control, bursting through the barricade.

Clara was pursued by three hurlers, flying through the air using wings made up of many Qaldi runners. Clara taunted them to come down and chase her and they took the bait. With her perk she enraged them even more, and they began infighting, attacking whichever of them was lagging behind. Eventually, the three of the hurlers were engaged in a full on Asteroid fight, and Clara managed to slip away to the second checkpoint, just a bit ahead of her teammates.

After the second checkpoint, the lanes gave out, as the asteroid field became more dense, streaked by lunar flares originating from Dharossi's surface. As the agents fought the last dregs of the runners and hurlers, Formac reached the end of his tunnel and found he could go no further, and was also beginning to hallucinate that he was in Mario Kart due to essence exhaustion. Nevertheless, he managed to activate the propulsion mechanism on his tank, allowing him to fly forward.

Ahead, agents encountered the Momaq Serpent, the foremost of Momaqaldiroq's aspects, wreathed in flame and lighting and over a mile long. An intense battle ensued with the freerunners jumping between the flaming asteroids and the serpent itself, Formaq firing upon "Bowser" with his cannon, and Zahak hitting it with lightning blasts. In the end, a combination of Zahak's "Fury of the Storm Dragon" combo and a... "Spiny Shell meteor missle" from Formac was enough to decapitate the beast, as the agents passed through the third and final checkpoint.

The tracks resumed after this, and it was pretty much a straight shot to the end... except for one thing. The agents saw a blistering light appear behind them, followed by a terrible roar, as Momaqaldiroq himself appeared, a draconic lightning phoenix deity more than a dozen miles wide. Clara booked it as fast as she could, crossing the finish line. She didn't look back as she kept running, beginning a second lap.

Formac was still lagging behind. As Momaqaldiroq approached, time seemed to slow for him. Nearly out of essence, he was heavily hallucinating, but managed to keep his foot on the gas, pulling of a cool maneuver to regain just enough essence to activate his boost engines, giving him enough momentum to carry him over the finish line. Talon ran ahead of him, barely holding on after burning through all of his energy drinks.

Zahak realized that if he didn't do something big, Momaqaldiroq would catch up to Formac. He turned around and revealed his hidden storm giant form, over a mile high and surging with near-godlike power. With determination, he charged Momaqaldiroq head on. Momaqaldiroq opened his mouth and revealed that his power (and hunger) came from the miniature black hole in his maw, bristling with electric energy. The bird god fired an iridescent beam at Zahak, tearing the legs from his body.

Still Zahak fought on, charging at Momaqaldiroq with another Fury of the Storm Dragon. This took the god by surprise as he was pinned to the floor of the margin before... it cracked, as the air drained from the tunnel and the pair, still locked in combat spiraled off into space.

Zahak managed to keep struggling, landing another mighty blow with his hammer, but as he looked down, he realized something horrible... he'd been stabbed through the heart by Momaqaldiroq's claws.

At that moment, Formac crossed the finish line
Badges Pinged

Even in Momaqaldiroq's clutches, Zahak Found the strength to power through the immeasurable pain and ping out.
Formac, finding his tank was driving without needing his legs, which had vanished from essence wounds, hit the "Return to Main Menu" button on his chest
Talon, without Clara's resilience, found five energy drinks to be too much. His heart gave out, and, certain he would die, he put his hand to his chest and pinged out.
Clara was already about halfway done with her second lap, and found the Roq Hurlers still fighting each other. She taunted them one last time and pinged out.

Mission Success

The agents arrived at the Kitchen of Chef Christian, finding it wholly ransacked, with most of the ingredients, appliances, and the two other members of his kitchen staff mysteriously disappeared. The Chef told the agents that earlier that afternoon, he had come back to find his kitchen in this state, only seeing a group of figures shrouded in black cloaks running towards the lakeside. He also mentions a shady woman in a black dress he saw earlier. One of the shrouded figures dropped a pin shaped like a black orchid that Christian gave to Baalphas. Clara investigated a nearby market stall and found it similarly raided, save for a couple onions. The group decided to split up and hunt for ingredients, with Belatrix and Clara heading after the cultists towards the lake while Baalphas and Sir George embarked for the forest to forage.

Clara sped off towards the lake and Belatrix used a thruster rocket to pursue her, slightly overshooting and veering into the lake. After Belatrix got back to shore, Clara sipped an energy drink, picked up Belatrix, and with her in tow jumped an entire goddamn quarter mile to an island with a small stone shack. They found robed cultists meeting before they embarked out for some fishing. Clara managed to grab a couple fishes but drew the aggro of the cultists along with their pet Loch Ness Monster, Orchessie. They managed to defeat almost all the cultists, and managed to take one of them prisoner after they were bitten by Clara's pet snake. He revealed that he was Weston, one of Chef Christian's cooks who had secretly been working for Madame Orchid. He almost revealed more information, but died from the poison. The massive loch ness monster attacked the pair with vicious geysers and giant flippers but a well placed rocket from Belatrix supercharged with some gunpowder did the job. In the hut nearby, they also found some ginger and seaweed. They leapt back to the shore of the kitchen.

Meanwhile, Baalphas and Sir George ventured into the forest, where they had little trouble locating the giant "rice tree," with sacks full of rice at the top. Tied to the tree was Tyler, the other missing cook. Unfortunately, it was surrounded by giant spiders who nearly attacked the agents, but Baalphas showed them the pin cultists had left behind, and the spiders assumed they worked for Madame Orchid. Feeling a bit lazy, they still made one of the non-spiders climb the tree-- Sir George bravely volunteered, with some magical assistance from Baalphas. He managed to climb, get the rice and get back down with some difficulty. The spiders urged them to bring the sack to the stadium for Madame Orchid. Sir George created a warding circle around the cook, gave the sack to Baalphas to deliver and unleashed the vengeful forest spirit Itlimoc from within him. In a savage fashion, he brought the wrath of the jungle upon the spiders who attacked him. Baalphas calmly strolled back to the kitchen.

Upon arriving back at the kitchen, the agents pooled their ingredients: all the components for a fine poke bowl except for Chef Christian's secret ingredient-- spaghetti! They found out that there is one Spaghetti plant left near the stadium, nearly two miles away through the forest. Clara ran to the stadium, dug up a "spaghetti bush" and brought it back to the kitchen in under two minutes. Belatrix pulled out her famous Everything Stove that comes with every single kitchen appliance one could possibly need! They prepared the ingredients and, by Baalphas's suggestion, they boiled the plant into spaghetti. They made a pretty good poke bowl. Baalphas puts a "delicious" sticker on it which turned it into one of the best poke bowls of all time. They received a call from the stadium to head there and present their dish.

The agents entered a crowded stadium with two tables. Chef Christian set down the poke bowl, as a mysterious woman in a flowing black dress and a cape with a black orchid appeared through the other door. She introduced herself as Madame Orchid before setting down the most revoltingly disgusting poke bowl in the known universe on the table. She then revealed that she had not only been behind the sabotage of Chef Christian's kitchen, but also had killed both the other team and the judges. She attempted to declare herself the judge and winner of the competition, but the agents pointed out that she had overtly broken the contest rules and was disqualified. She did not take kindly to this and attacked.

Belatrix launched a rocket at Madame orchid but she rose above it with a flower platform, so Belatix followed up by taking Orchid's revolting dish and smashing her upside the head with it. She retaliated with a spore attack at the party, but Baalphas returned it back to sender with catalog. (This gave Baalphas enough essence exhaustion that he was basically out of commission for the rest of the fight) Cultists swarmed in, attacking Chef Christian and the party but Clara deftly fended them off, sending many of them flying. Two came for Sir George, he was able to fend one off but the other landed a stab in his arm, prompting him to once again unleashed the wrath of Itlimoc! Together, Itlimoc, Clara, and Belatrix dogpiled Madame Orchid and Itlimoc dealt the final blow, sinking his ephemeral jaws into her throat.

That wasn't quite the end of things, as Itlimoc then turned against the party, but Clara managed to dash around him and create a circle of protection, subduing the malevolent spirit until it finally dissipated. As the fighting quelled, there was a moment of silence and then the crowd went wild! A descendant of one of the murdered judges came out from the audience, tasted the agents' poke bowl, and declared Chef Christian and his team of cooks "The winners of the 23rd annual Poke Bowl Extravaganza by every metric possible"

Badges Pinged.

Zahak, Barnaby and Clara join forces with the Knights Stellar in charging deep into the Mistake to fight their way through the demon hordes, so Sir Gemma can have her duel with the Solaris Knight, and preferably kill the demon general. Despite their best efforts, her injuries took her out of the battle and the surviving Knights had to withdraw with her. From the death glare Zahak shot at the Solaris Knight before he joined his allies in the retreat, he might decide to go after him himself if Sir Gemma doesn't cross blades with him again.......