storymasterb
Knight of RPGs
Characters:
Hiroko Shimizu (Kamen Rider Persephone) – Sengoku Driver – storymasterb
Samuel Ward (Kamen Rider Lambda) - Lambda Driver (555-style) - storymasterb
Kyle Mercer (Kamen Rider Komodo) - Drax Driver (Den-O style) - Solsabre
Miki Chihara (Kamen Rider Lucky) - OOO Driver - TheSequelReturns
Eleveno Five (Kamen Rider Amazon Delta) - Amazons Driver - Skeith
-
Hiroko's motorcycle roared through the streets of Paradox City. She had been riding now for a week, stopping only for short rests, quick meals, and to refuel the bike when she found a gas station. She wasn't afraid of the monsters crawling the streets, but dispatching all the ones she saw would take too long. If she were to reach the end of this seemingly-infinite city, she couldn't spend all her time fighting.
She brought the motorcycle to a halt, judging by the sun that it was roughly time for lunch. This street at least seemed empty, dusty as it was. The howls of monsters sounded in the distance, but for now it seemed safe to eat. Pulling off her helmet, she turned to recover some of her scavenged food from the bag attached to the cycle.
Three days of riding and the city still stretched out to the horizon, she mused as she devoured a sandwich. All the food she had was recovered from empty shops, whatever she could grab off the shelves. Part of her felt uneasy about just taking it, but no one ever came out to challenge her, and she needed it for the journey. If she was ever going to reach the end, it was obvious she needed to keep her strength up, not just for the riding, but for fighting those monsters she couldn't just ride past. As she ate, she looked around at the street. Store-fronts stared back, a hardware store here, a clothes store whose brand was identical to that of the one she'd taken her current outfit from after her old clothes had been ripped up in the struggle with that first monster. Before she had found the belt.
Finishing the sandwich, she took out the device in question. A plate of black metal with a silver fruit knife attached to the front, an indentation where she inserted her Lockseeds, and on the opposite side to the knife, a red and bronze panel featuring olive vines, with her armored form's helmet painted in a side-on view looking to the left. She hadn't heard of a belt like this when she'd heard the stories of the Kamen Riders, but this was hers. She had found it, and surely it had been meant for her to find it there, when she most needed it.
She devoured a second sandwich while staring at the Driver, before looking through her bag of supplies. Her food would still last her, but her water supplies were running low. For those three days of riding, the sun had shone down hot and bright, and she'd gone through the water faster than expected. With a sigh, she closed the bag and regarded the stores, trying to decide which might have a working tap from which to refill her bottles. In some places, the electricity and water just didn't work for no apparent reason, another strange detail of this very strange city.
But as she considered, the sounding of growling reached her ears, and she turned to see a monster stalking down the street towards her. It was a type she hadn't seen before, a humanoid tiger-like beast coated in bright green scales, its legs granite grey. Long, sharp claws adorned its right hand, and its red eyes glared at her hungrily.
Hiroko dismounted the bike and strode a few paces towards the monster, Driver in hand. She was smiling. Even if fighting distracted her from her journey, she relished the fights themselves and feeling the power of a Kamen Rider.
“Come to be my dessert?” she chuckled. The monster snarled, and she slapped the Driver to her waist, causing its yellow strap to quickly circle her body. Taking the first Lockseed from the holder on her hip, she held it up, savoring the moment before clicking it open.
“Olive!” it declared, causing the monster to halt. Hiroko slid the Lockseed into the Driver's slot and slammed down the lock, the belt announcing “Lock on!” for her and the monster to hear. Above her, a portal unzipped, an olive made of armored plates slowly floating through it. She took a deep breath of anticipation, the trumpet riff of her Driver ringing out as she spoke the word of a Kamen Rider.
“Henshin.”
She sliced the Driver's knife into the Lockseed, making it fall open. Her base armor instantly formed on her body, the bronze and red plates manifesting as the fruit above her fell onto her shoulders and unfurled.
“Come on! Olive Arms! Bright of Shield!” the belt sang as the plates aligned onto her body and snapped into place. Her sword and shield formed in her hand and on her wrist respectively, and she gazed out through her visor, smiling widely behind it.
Hiroko, or rather Kamen Rider Persephone strode forward, drawing back her sword ready to strike, raising her shield ready to defend. Probably cowed by her transformation, the monster had hung back, but now it came at her with claws ready. She met it on the dusty street, shield batting aside the claws, blade carving sparks across its chest.
Persephone punched the monster with her shield arm, her enhanced strength making it stagger back and enable a follow through stab of her sword that made a gout of sparks pour from its chest. A second thrust of the sword followed as she pressed the attack, a punch hammering the beast away.
And through it, she was still smiling beneath the helmet, alive with the thrill of combat and the power of her armor.
-
“Food's running low again,” Yuto reported glumly from across the room. He spoke Japanese, but everyone else understood him regardless. Language wasn't a barrier here. As always, the gazes turned to the corner where Samuel sat. It was always him who went to get food now. But he didn't mind, after all, only he could do it safely. All thanks to the belt that sat on the floor next to him.
“Okay,” he said, rising to his feet with the belt in his hand. “I'll see what I can find.” It was the least he could do for these people. They couldn't go out and gather safely. Not with all the monsters out there.
“Ah, can you see if you can get grandma some medicine?” Saheeli asked. “Her cough's getting worse, I'd like to nip it in the bud if I can.”
He nodded, avoiding their gazes as he crossed the room to retrieve his satchel. “Do we need anything else?”
“Nothing else for me,” Yuto said.
“Me neither,” Antonio reported from his perch by the window. Saheeli's grandmother was asleep in one of the bedrooms of this apartment they'd claimed, so no reply came from her. The four of them were here when he'd arrived and, grudgingly in Yuto's case, allowed him to stay with them, however uneasily. But that unease had faded once he found the belt, replaced by awe and happiness that someone could be trusted to get supplies and come back.
Yuto talked about the Kamen Riders and he never made them sound like errand boys.
Regardless, Samuel left, careful to shut the apartment door and hear it bolt behind him. It wouldn't help if a monster decided to get in, of course. It just provided a little peace of mind and might deter one. Most of the time, monsters never got to the door, he'd fight them on the stairs to keep them at bay. But he needed to get food for the group as well as protect the others, so they needed the small comfort of a locked door while he was gone.
The stairs were empty, as was the building's lobby. He wasn't sure how old the city was, because it seemed modern and still-functioning, yet everything seemed deserted apart from monsters and the odd person who appeared just as he had. He had the street to himself as he walked toward the street of stores where he usually foraged for food. He'd pick them clean eventually, and then he'd have to look further afield. That thought lingered at the back of his mind, the awareness that all they were doing was surviving, that sitting around and waiting to go home wasn't likely to get them anywhere. But he was too shy to begin that conversation with the others and they never seemed to approach that train of thought. If they did, they didn't talk about it.
The sounds of battle made him pause. A monster's roars. The sound of a blade tearing sparks from monstrous flesh. He'd heard rumors from those passing through that he wasn't the only Kamen Rider in the city. Could it be true?
He turned the corner cautiously, and there she was. Red, bronze and olive-green armor gleaming in the sunlight, a brilliant sword and shield in her hands. Her belt was different to his, radically so, but the silhouette of a Kamen Rider was unmistakable.
She sliced a knife on her belt down and the belt's voice sang out. “Come on! Olive Squash!” With a cry, the Rider lunged, and an olive made of energy engulfed her sword's blade as she stabbed it into the tiger-like monster she battled. The monster roared in pain before exploding, wisps of flame rushing around the Rider, who didn't react to them.
But as she straightened and her gaze passed over Samuel, he heard growling. From both ends of the street, monsters began to approach, a sizable number. On his side, a band of grey advanced, most of them identical bulbous creatures with flailing arms. But one stood out, an armored knight-like figure wielding a large trident. It turned its gaze to Samuel and hissed, brandishing its weapon.
Samuel shrugged off the satchel and slung his belt around his waist, locking it into place. Drawing the associated phone from his pocket, he flipped it open, seeing the reminder of the code printed beneath its screen.
9-1-1-Enter, he typed. Calling for the emergency services. Or, in this case, for a superhero.
“Standing by,” the phone announced. He took a breath, remembering what Yuto had said a few weeks ago.
“Oh, Kamen Riders have this word they say. Henshin.”
“Transform?” He heard the word in Japanese but understood its meaning via whatever magical property of the city let him understand the languages the others spoke.
Yuto shrugged. “It's just what they say. I guess it's like a symbol of being a Kamen Rider. They say 'henshin' before they transform.”
“Henshin!” he called, slotting the phone downward into the belt, then sliding it to a horizontal position.
“Complete.” Lines of blue light expanded outward from the belt, wrapping around his torso, running down his legs and arms, and running up his face. After a moment, the space between the lines was filled by armor, the black and silver of his suit covering him as the blue lines stopped glowing. Samuel stood transformed, Kamen Rider Lambda unveiled.
The monster snarled and rushed at him, but he didn't move until it was nearly upon him. Once it was, he dodged around the trident and began punching it in the chest repeatedly. Each blow hammered it back a step, and he advanced after it. After a few punches, he reached to his belt and pulled his blade from it, gripping it by the handle in his right hand.
Lambda slashed with the Edge, slicing a trail of sparks from the monster's chest. It drew back and the bulbous creatures pressed in towards him. The Rider struck at the first with his weapon while retrieving the phone from his belt, flipping it open and typing 1-0-6-Enter, then folding the top half of the phone sideways to form a pistol shape. Pressing the trigger on the side of the phone, he fired bolts of blue light from it, each burst striking one of the grey monsters and hurling it away in a spray of sparks.
He lunged forward, firing a few more bursts before laying into the monsters with the Lambda Edge. Each blow made one of the bulbous creatures explode, but when he struck the trident-wielder again, it only produced sparks. The creature snarled at him, stabbing with its trident, but he deflected it with a swing of his weapon. Striking past the creature, he whirled and past it he saw the red and bronze Rider fighting more monsters.
It was as though their presence was drawing the creatures in.
Hiroko Shimizu (Kamen Rider Persephone) – Sengoku Driver – storymasterb
Samuel Ward (Kamen Rider Lambda) - Lambda Driver (555-style) - storymasterb
Kyle Mercer (Kamen Rider Komodo) - Drax Driver (Den-O style) - Solsabre
Miki Chihara (Kamen Rider Lucky) - OOO Driver - TheSequelReturns
Eleveno Five (Kamen Rider Amazon Delta) - Amazons Driver - Skeith
-
Hiroko's motorcycle roared through the streets of Paradox City. She had been riding now for a week, stopping only for short rests, quick meals, and to refuel the bike when she found a gas station. She wasn't afraid of the monsters crawling the streets, but dispatching all the ones she saw would take too long. If she were to reach the end of this seemingly-infinite city, she couldn't spend all her time fighting.
She brought the motorcycle to a halt, judging by the sun that it was roughly time for lunch. This street at least seemed empty, dusty as it was. The howls of monsters sounded in the distance, but for now it seemed safe to eat. Pulling off her helmet, she turned to recover some of her scavenged food from the bag attached to the cycle.
Three days of riding and the city still stretched out to the horizon, she mused as she devoured a sandwich. All the food she had was recovered from empty shops, whatever she could grab off the shelves. Part of her felt uneasy about just taking it, but no one ever came out to challenge her, and she needed it for the journey. If she was ever going to reach the end, it was obvious she needed to keep her strength up, not just for the riding, but for fighting those monsters she couldn't just ride past. As she ate, she looked around at the street. Store-fronts stared back, a hardware store here, a clothes store whose brand was identical to that of the one she'd taken her current outfit from after her old clothes had been ripped up in the struggle with that first monster. Before she had found the belt.
Finishing the sandwich, she took out the device in question. A plate of black metal with a silver fruit knife attached to the front, an indentation where she inserted her Lockseeds, and on the opposite side to the knife, a red and bronze panel featuring olive vines, with her armored form's helmet painted in a side-on view looking to the left. She hadn't heard of a belt like this when she'd heard the stories of the Kamen Riders, but this was hers. She had found it, and surely it had been meant for her to find it there, when she most needed it.
She devoured a second sandwich while staring at the Driver, before looking through her bag of supplies. Her food would still last her, but her water supplies were running low. For those three days of riding, the sun had shone down hot and bright, and she'd gone through the water faster than expected. With a sigh, she closed the bag and regarded the stores, trying to decide which might have a working tap from which to refill her bottles. In some places, the electricity and water just didn't work for no apparent reason, another strange detail of this very strange city.
But as she considered, the sounding of growling reached her ears, and she turned to see a monster stalking down the street towards her. It was a type she hadn't seen before, a humanoid tiger-like beast coated in bright green scales, its legs granite grey. Long, sharp claws adorned its right hand, and its red eyes glared at her hungrily.
Hiroko dismounted the bike and strode a few paces towards the monster, Driver in hand. She was smiling. Even if fighting distracted her from her journey, she relished the fights themselves and feeling the power of a Kamen Rider.
“Come to be my dessert?” she chuckled. The monster snarled, and she slapped the Driver to her waist, causing its yellow strap to quickly circle her body. Taking the first Lockseed from the holder on her hip, she held it up, savoring the moment before clicking it open.
“Olive!” it declared, causing the monster to halt. Hiroko slid the Lockseed into the Driver's slot and slammed down the lock, the belt announcing “Lock on!” for her and the monster to hear. Above her, a portal unzipped, an olive made of armored plates slowly floating through it. She took a deep breath of anticipation, the trumpet riff of her Driver ringing out as she spoke the word of a Kamen Rider.
“Henshin.”
She sliced the Driver's knife into the Lockseed, making it fall open. Her base armor instantly formed on her body, the bronze and red plates manifesting as the fruit above her fell onto her shoulders and unfurled.
“Come on! Olive Arms! Bright of Shield!” the belt sang as the plates aligned onto her body and snapped into place. Her sword and shield formed in her hand and on her wrist respectively, and she gazed out through her visor, smiling widely behind it.
Hiroko, or rather Kamen Rider Persephone strode forward, drawing back her sword ready to strike, raising her shield ready to defend. Probably cowed by her transformation, the monster had hung back, but now it came at her with claws ready. She met it on the dusty street, shield batting aside the claws, blade carving sparks across its chest.
Persephone punched the monster with her shield arm, her enhanced strength making it stagger back and enable a follow through stab of her sword that made a gout of sparks pour from its chest. A second thrust of the sword followed as she pressed the attack, a punch hammering the beast away.
And through it, she was still smiling beneath the helmet, alive with the thrill of combat and the power of her armor.
-
“Food's running low again,” Yuto reported glumly from across the room. He spoke Japanese, but everyone else understood him regardless. Language wasn't a barrier here. As always, the gazes turned to the corner where Samuel sat. It was always him who went to get food now. But he didn't mind, after all, only he could do it safely. All thanks to the belt that sat on the floor next to him.
“Okay,” he said, rising to his feet with the belt in his hand. “I'll see what I can find.” It was the least he could do for these people. They couldn't go out and gather safely. Not with all the monsters out there.
“Ah, can you see if you can get grandma some medicine?” Saheeli asked. “Her cough's getting worse, I'd like to nip it in the bud if I can.”
He nodded, avoiding their gazes as he crossed the room to retrieve his satchel. “Do we need anything else?”
“Nothing else for me,” Yuto said.
“Me neither,” Antonio reported from his perch by the window. Saheeli's grandmother was asleep in one of the bedrooms of this apartment they'd claimed, so no reply came from her. The four of them were here when he'd arrived and, grudgingly in Yuto's case, allowed him to stay with them, however uneasily. But that unease had faded once he found the belt, replaced by awe and happiness that someone could be trusted to get supplies and come back.
Yuto talked about the Kamen Riders and he never made them sound like errand boys.
Regardless, Samuel left, careful to shut the apartment door and hear it bolt behind him. It wouldn't help if a monster decided to get in, of course. It just provided a little peace of mind and might deter one. Most of the time, monsters never got to the door, he'd fight them on the stairs to keep them at bay. But he needed to get food for the group as well as protect the others, so they needed the small comfort of a locked door while he was gone.
The stairs were empty, as was the building's lobby. He wasn't sure how old the city was, because it seemed modern and still-functioning, yet everything seemed deserted apart from monsters and the odd person who appeared just as he had. He had the street to himself as he walked toward the street of stores where he usually foraged for food. He'd pick them clean eventually, and then he'd have to look further afield. That thought lingered at the back of his mind, the awareness that all they were doing was surviving, that sitting around and waiting to go home wasn't likely to get them anywhere. But he was too shy to begin that conversation with the others and they never seemed to approach that train of thought. If they did, they didn't talk about it.
The sounds of battle made him pause. A monster's roars. The sound of a blade tearing sparks from monstrous flesh. He'd heard rumors from those passing through that he wasn't the only Kamen Rider in the city. Could it be true?
He turned the corner cautiously, and there she was. Red, bronze and olive-green armor gleaming in the sunlight, a brilliant sword and shield in her hands. Her belt was different to his, radically so, but the silhouette of a Kamen Rider was unmistakable.
She sliced a knife on her belt down and the belt's voice sang out. “Come on! Olive Squash!” With a cry, the Rider lunged, and an olive made of energy engulfed her sword's blade as she stabbed it into the tiger-like monster she battled. The monster roared in pain before exploding, wisps of flame rushing around the Rider, who didn't react to them.
But as she straightened and her gaze passed over Samuel, he heard growling. From both ends of the street, monsters began to approach, a sizable number. On his side, a band of grey advanced, most of them identical bulbous creatures with flailing arms. But one stood out, an armored knight-like figure wielding a large trident. It turned its gaze to Samuel and hissed, brandishing its weapon.
Samuel shrugged off the satchel and slung his belt around his waist, locking it into place. Drawing the associated phone from his pocket, he flipped it open, seeing the reminder of the code printed beneath its screen.
9-1-1-Enter, he typed. Calling for the emergency services. Or, in this case, for a superhero.
“Standing by,” the phone announced. He took a breath, remembering what Yuto had said a few weeks ago.
“Oh, Kamen Riders have this word they say. Henshin.”
“Transform?” He heard the word in Japanese but understood its meaning via whatever magical property of the city let him understand the languages the others spoke.
Yuto shrugged. “It's just what they say. I guess it's like a symbol of being a Kamen Rider. They say 'henshin' before they transform.”
“Henshin!” he called, slotting the phone downward into the belt, then sliding it to a horizontal position.
“Complete.” Lines of blue light expanded outward from the belt, wrapping around his torso, running down his legs and arms, and running up his face. After a moment, the space between the lines was filled by armor, the black and silver of his suit covering him as the blue lines stopped glowing. Samuel stood transformed, Kamen Rider Lambda unveiled.
The monster snarled and rushed at him, but he didn't move until it was nearly upon him. Once it was, he dodged around the trident and began punching it in the chest repeatedly. Each blow hammered it back a step, and he advanced after it. After a few punches, he reached to his belt and pulled his blade from it, gripping it by the handle in his right hand.
Lambda slashed with the Edge, slicing a trail of sparks from the monster's chest. It drew back and the bulbous creatures pressed in towards him. The Rider struck at the first with his weapon while retrieving the phone from his belt, flipping it open and typing 1-0-6-Enter, then folding the top half of the phone sideways to form a pistol shape. Pressing the trigger on the side of the phone, he fired bolts of blue light from it, each burst striking one of the grey monsters and hurling it away in a spray of sparks.
He lunged forward, firing a few more bursts before laying into the monsters with the Lambda Edge. Each blow made one of the bulbous creatures explode, but when he struck the trident-wielder again, it only produced sparks. The creature snarled at him, stabbing with its trident, but he deflected it with a swing of his weapon. Striking past the creature, he whirled and past it he saw the red and bronze Rider fighting more monsters.
It was as though their presence was drawing the creatures in.
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