Tyranny, meet anarchy

[aestrix]

The city of Eantasyl is fortunate in its placement, and is considered old for even an elven city. The streets are some kind of shimmery stone, the buildings neatly arranged and well maintained. It's pleasant, and generally considered a nice place for the rich to retire. There's a noticeable lack of greenery and foliage on the streets themselves - the place is kept very dense, and it's can be guessed that its citizens thought they had enough foliage already. It sits at the base of one of the very first world trees. One could be forgiven for missing the city for the tree - it's several thousand feet tall, and its branches bring shade to more than half of Eantasyl. They do not need gardens. They have enough to spare, up in the sky.

(The leaves are a pain to rake.)

Despite many of its flaws (and there are many) the Sunrise Empire isn't actually a horrible place to live. This place especially. Just steer clear of the government, keep your head down, don't join any rebellions, and don't break any laws, and you'll be fine. Probably. Unless there are dangerous criminals running around, causing trouble.

But that hardly ever happens. The Ministry has it all under control.

Comments

[aestrix]

They do have a network, actually! A lot of networks. And their defenses are no match for the powers of SCIENCE.

"- target has shrugged off the poison. Likely alchemist counter. Palini, give me a list of counters for it and where they could come from."

"Yes, ma'am," says another voice on the network.

"I don't think that was pre-prepared, ma'am. She was too taken by surprise."

"... Agreed. Arcanist, then, one of Inavet's?"

"Who else could it be?"

"We could have another rogue, this doesn't seem Inavet's style. I'd expect it to be less... Pointless and brute forced. And our little traitor's not one for chaos. This is someone else."

"Tervarys, alert squad Phi. I want this woman dead or wishing she was."

"Ma'am!"

"We might have tipped her hand. And it's obvious she has inside information, if she knew about the arcanist tracking device. Garenda! Find me the traitors."

"Ma'am."

Well isn't that interesting.

[itstandsforjinx]

Jinx could talk back, if she wanted to, but this is far too entertaining. She pops in her earpiece and keeps moving, a little more slowly now - it's a good thing these assholes jumped to conclusions, since she only has so much body to convert over to scrubbing toxins from her system.

She keys her ride on her own secure channel; she wants it dematerialized and ready to pick her up at a moment's notice if she needs to GTFO.

... Hmm. Wonder if these people have any secure information anywhere on what the giant tree does?

Let's find out.

[aestrix]

They do, actually!

The giant tree does the following:

Regulate the temperature of the planet

Monitor various ecosystems nearby and keep them stable

Prevent any natural disasters from occurring

Stabilize the sun so that it will never, at any point in the future, blow up

All in conjunction with the other giant trees scattered across the world. One being blown up would not take down the magic, but a majority of them being taken down would likely cause a lot of natural disasters. And probably a few collapsed ecosystems. And a blown up sun, eventually.

So, essentially, if she would like to cause a lot of havoc to Facet, this is the place to blow up.

[itstandsforjinx]

BLOW UP THE SUN.

Jinx lets out a little squeal of glee at that entry.

Okay, how does it work? What does she need to blow up?

(She pings her vicinity for this Squad Phi, just in case.)

[aestrix]

It works by... Very complicated magic. Very, very complicated magic. The water below her seems to be for feeding the tree so it can do its complicated magic stuff. The best way to kill it is... Actually, right below her. Do something to corrupt the sawdust water that's feeding the plant, or find a way to keep the tree from processing its food. It'll die in weeks if that happens and isn't fixed.

(Squad Phi isn't near her yet.)

[itstandsforjinx]

Jinx puffs air out of the side of her mouth.

Okay, blowing up the sun is cool, but weeks? She does not have that long.

Okay, where are asses in her earpiece? Better yet, where are their bosses?

[aestrix]

Asses in her earpiece seem to be mostly in a command center in the center of the giant tree.

Their bosses are in various places in the country, but a good number of them are in a building in this city.

[itstandsforjinx]

Okay, let's cut the crap: Where's the boss's boss's boss's boss's boss? Who's the person most responsible for the ridiculous state of order and cleanliness everywhere?

... Wait, wait, wait. Better idea. Get that, sure, but where's the local prison?

Also, ETA on Phi or whoever?

[aestrix]

Their boss's boss's boss's boss's boss... Seems to be a group of people, actually. Several tens of thousands of years old, all of them. The person most responsible for the ridiculous state of order and cleanliness seems to be a man named Hiarnas, who has organized most of the empire, or pushed for his companions to organize it.

The closest official prison is a correctional facility several hundred miles away.

The closest, most classified, secret prison, is... Actually several hundred meters below the giant tree Jinx is currently in. Most people don't even know it's there.

Phi will be here in about three minutes.

[itstandsforjinx]

Jinx looks around.

There is a metal catwalk. She is carrying grenades. She has a cutting laser. She has three minutes to build the biggest gun she's ever used.

She grins.

It's time for SCIENCE.

[aestrix]

SCIENCE!

... The assholes are alarmed by SCIENCE. They opt to A. Trap her in a tiny spot with several invisible walls, and then B. Immediately shoot her with as many poison darts as they have available at the moment. That is, twelve. They're getting more, but they have twelve right here, in shooting range.

[itstandsforjinx]

Pink light streams from Jinx's eyes; when the warning bleep of her scanner sounds, she smiles - then, with a single sweep of Pow-Pow and a torrent of destroying light, both the walls and the darts are gone.

!The work must not be interrupted!

[aestrix]

Well now they are kind of frightened.

They drop the walkway out from under her and send her and her work into the sawdust water below. Or, well, they try to, anyway.

[itstandsforjinx]

The work is self-supporting, by now. What, did they expect that she would build a gun the size of a car on a tiny little catwalk?

Jinx moves back and forth along the length of the cannon, tightening each bolt by hand, hammering in nails with her bare fists, the light inside her calling the form of the thing out into the world with the work of her body. It is almost complete, already.

[aestrix]

Now they are very frightened.

Phi isn't nearly close enough.

They... Do not have the resources to stop her. They try a few more invisible walls, but they're out of darts and out of options.

[itstandsforjinx]

Jinx has a cannon.

Jinx has targets.

Wall over to my right and up, please go away. There are things behind you I want to shoot.

If there was ever a gun that could miss the broad side of a barn, it would be this one. But it doesn't take much precision to hit a wall.

[aestrix]

Blam! There goes the wall.

The assholes find this alarming! They are alarmed. Watch how they call in more than just Phi.

[itstandsforjinx]

Ooh! What are they calling in now?~

Jinx puts a shell into the perimeter of the faraway prison. Let's see how she can make them dance!

[aestrix]

They are calling in some people that are not part of squads, but are apparently some of the best arcanists in the world. Some of these people are far away, but a few of them are very close.

Also, now people that are not directly involved are very alarmed.

[itstandsforjinx]

Oh dear, how close? That'll teach her not to do her research!

She dismounts from the cannon and unslings Pow-Pow, signalling for her ride as she does so. Prooobably about time to beat feet. At least for the moment.

... Then again, the underground prison is really tempting...

[aestrix]

Most of them are entangled in doing various things. Two think it's not worth their attention. One is busy with research and refuses to drop what he's doing until it's done, and it's nowhere near there. A fourth thinks that there's no one on the planet who could stand up to Phi.

Some of the people that are highest in the chain of command are worried that Jinx knows about the underground prison. They are planning to move the prisoners there, put them someplace far, far away...

[itstandsforjinx]

Jinx pokes her Apokalypsi scanner. Okay, update on Phi, when will they be here? Also, where are they planning to move the prisoners?

(Data security? What's that?)

[aestrix]

Phi's almost there. Thirty seconds to a minute, probably.

They don't know where they'll put their prisoners, not yet. None of the places they're talking about are easily accessible, though, and they plan to up the security by quite a lot.

[itstandsforjinx]

Well then, let's put the next shot in the general vicinity of Phi. If they're a minute away, she can probably aim for them.

(Hitting them is another matter, but if they're bringing a vehicle she might be able to peg it with a potshot. Which would nicely solve all her problems.

Because she doesn't really expect that to work, she pulls out Fishbones as she starts to back into her nice little transport-box.)

[aestrix]

They were likely in a vehicle before, but they're in one no longer. At the moment they are rappelling from above.

Hitting them might take out some of the ceiling. Is this a thing Jinx still wants to do?