A New Threat - [ Conquest ]

The better part of a month had passed since Azuki had arrived on Plant at her parents' request. The impromptu trip had taken a great deal of effort to set up from Namek given that, as far as Tsuna and Sukeru knew, she was simply on a different part of Earth. Azuki had insisted that she could take her own separate pod just for convenience's sake. An excellent little excuse that meant she wasn't necessarily lying to them. The ring? Well... they didn't ask, so she didn't tell. Visiting what was essentially her ancestral homeland was one thing, but knowing that her family was now officially ROYALTY was another. Tsuna's sister, Alpinia, had ended up married to the man who had recently taken the Saiyan throne. Taori's meeting was brief, the man making preparations for war.

As much as Azuki despised the thought of getting dragged into Plant's conflict, it was luckily a non-issue as their main plan was to march on the enemy capital. The threat of bodily harm and death made their visit less happy, as Alpinia was forced to stay behind as her husband went off to the battlefield. Azuki liked to think that their presence helped cheer the petite woman up, but it was hard to tell. It made the hybrid feel a tad more guilty about her severe aversion to even the THOUGHT of fighting here, but this battle wasn't hers. Azuki may have Saiyan blood, but she was an Earth citizen through and through. So, naturally, fate had decided that her chosen path of pseudo-pacifism just wasn't going to cut it. And what better event to kickstart her than a small ARMY showing up at the capital out of nowhere!?

"Stay here!" Azuki snapped with unusual authority, Tsuna glancing up at her in concern. "Find Sukeru and Alpinia. Get out of the building and to somewhere safer. You don't want to be in here if it collapses." The Saiyan's mouth opened as if to argue, Azuki's face shifting into one of pleading: "Mom, please. You guys aren't strong enough. I don't plan on playing Hero; I just don't want you to get hurt." With the ring empowering her, Azuki was more than confident that she could handle any sort of average mook involved in an underhanded sneak attack like this. Rushing through the palace's corridors, the hybrid's heart pounded in her chest as thoughts raced around. Who was doing this and why? The Tuffles HAD to be occupied with the Saiyan attack, didn't they? The foreign feeling of battle armor weighed heavily upon the girl, orange-hued tail flicking nervously as she finally heaved open the front doors into the open air.

It wasn't that hard to tell that the massive flagship spewing energy blasts everywhere belonged to Arcosians. The proud symbol of the Empire emblazoned on the ships was quite clear if the villainous follow-up announcement wasn't already clear enough. Some of the populace had been injured or killed from the swiftness of the assault, though far more managed to transform themselves in time to mount resistance. It didn't make any SENSE; Azoth was supposed to be a Hero, wasn't he!? That tournament on Earth, his distanced involvement in the Plant war, and now suddenly a detachment of his comes to attack hapless civilians while most of the soldiers were out?! "Shit..." Azuki's throat tightened as her stride faltered, staring up at the looming weapon with no small amount of trepidation. She didn't HAVE to get involved, right? These weren't her people. Still... what would happen to Alpinia if she was left behind?

"I need your power now," Her whispers rolled over the smudged and scratched surface of her ring. If she was going to do SOMETHING, it'd need power. "Please..." Nothing happened still. No transformation, no hair color shift, no surge of energy. Nothing. "This isn't the FUCKING time to lock up on me-!" Azuki blinked, a few stray tears falling to the ground. "No no no..." A hoarse roar erupted from the girl's throat as she leaped from the marbled pavement, soaring towards the massive cannon and unleashing a relentless barrage of energy blasts. The first order of business HAD to be disabling the weapons battery before anything else. There were no doubt Arcosians aboard that would MOST certainly exit to confront her directly, but all Azuki needed to do was buy time - not defeat them.

It didn't take long for Azuki's desperation to shred through the majority of the mounted guns. The invaders likely didn't expect heavy resistance from someone as strong as her and thus left their main tools lightly guarded. Of course, doing so had attracted the ire of what the hybrid assumed to be the commander judging by his immense power. A six-armed mechanical freak armed with a colorful sword-like weapon approached, the visage giving Azuki a horrible case of deja vu. "I didn't want anything to do with this fucking stupid war! And you-? You're bombing CIVILIANS, Saiyans that actively selected not to fight either. Women, children, elderly... at least the damn Tuffles get to defend themselves with an actual army!"

Azuki passively rubbed the ring again, hoping desperately that it'd awaken and give her the power boost she so desperately needed. There was no way she could wish to contest this guy for long at her current level! "You're nothing but a liar! I remember you now... from Earth. Remember when you killed those bandits? I... I went with you back to the ship, and you claimed to follow Azoth's view of justice. Why!?" Ensuring that some distance was kept, Azuki would suddenly jet backward as her palms unleashed another barrage of weak energy blasts directly towards the Arcosian. She could only hold off Blizzard for so long before getting overwhelmed, and Azuki would prefer to be ALIVE over dying as a damn martyr for these Saiyans.

The slow reveal of the remaining plasma blades was intimidating (and also admittedly cool as fuck). However, Azuki had little time to appreciate the gravitas, given that she was the upcoming target for the blades. "If you were here to SAVE people, you'd be at Hatchi City, attacking soldiers. There's nothing good about what you're doing here! Look, I get it; the Saiyans aren't clean either. I know. And I'm not trying to say that they're better... but I have people here I care about, and I'd die before I let someone like you kill them." It was why Azuki was wholly focused on Blizzard, too preoccupied to even spare the nameless Saiyans below a passing thought. Civilians dying in war was always tragic, but this war wasn't hers.

Blizzard came dangerously close, his weapons hissing dangerously as they attempted to BISECT her clean through. With a small yelp, the hybrid's arms flaring up with a vibrant red glow, Azuki using her Ki as a shield to deflect the sabers from making contact. She zipped away again, vainly hoping that she could keep some distance from the behemoth she was up against. "You can't just condemn an entire species like that! People all across the galaxy gave Arcosians a chance and thought that things had changed with Azoth at the helm. And now what? You justify this with racism? These people, my FAMILY, are innocent. They don't deserve to die by your hand solely for how they are born. You see a nail and try to pound it down with a sledgehammer. That's something I can never stand behind!"

"It's..." Azuki's lips curled into a frown. Blizzard wasn't lying when it came to the Saiyan's origins. At the end of the day, they were invaders who had been persistently trying to take over the planet for themselves. Formal war or not, they are the aggressors. "Generations have passed since the Saiyans first came here," Her voice was steady, if not a bit quiet. "The people alive now have only known Plant as their home. They were born here. Raised here. Loved and died here. To be honest, evicting them at this point would... ring hollow. You're right about one thing: they shouldn't be trying to conquer the Tuffles anymore; that sort of behavior is still egregious. Hell, I'm even the King's extended family now by sheer coincidence." Blizzard had thankfully paused in his assault, Azuki floating aimlessly as she tried to catch her breath.

"If this is truly about trying to do the right thing and stop this pointless war, then prove it. Deactivate your weapons, subdue the resistance non-lethally, and make amends for the lives and infrastructure your Empire ruined today." She gazed at the Arcosian, shoulders sagging a bit. "...I don't want to stay here and risk my life for them. My moms might encourage me to use my power for the good of others, but I just can't." Rubbing her face, Azuki's expression soured even more. "Do that and... and I won't stand in your way anymore. Just tell me something else. Is this all really under Azoth's agenda...?"

It’d been… Quite a while since Vocado had been in the fray. Those migraines, deep and debilitating, had been infecting his mind for quite some time now. Hospitalization was out of the question, more due to pride than anything else, but he was far from a frontliner these past few months. Was this really how his career would end? Beaten by Azoth and mentally fatigued? No way. He had to do something. Anything!

That’s when he heard it. The screams and terror. Energy being tossed this way and that. It send his cranium off the deep end. Pounding beyond belief. The pain grew and grew and grew until suddenly… It was gone.

Gone was the wrong word. Easier to ignore was the proper description, but the dramatist Vocado was liked more striking imagery. Something about the chaos outside calmed his nerves. A familiar Ki bubbled outside. Was that the cause?

His feet moved on their own, pushing past rushing crowds as he spilled onto the street. Eyes traveling up, he saw the culprit; Arcosian.

Blood boiled. Whatever semblance of head aching he had remaining was pulverized. Replaced by a fury unfound in Vocado for nearly a year. His power rose, billowing up and out in a wave of Ki. Subtlety was out the window.

From the street, he punched up and out, loosing a ball of Ki into the sky. Whizzing through the air, it aimed to strike at Blizzard’s chest.

”Taori left us behind to protect this city. Let’s make him proud!”

---

"Sesame?" The assassin's name was naught more than a whisper escaping through Azuki's lips, her eyes blinking in surprise at his sudden arrival. It seemed as if Blizzard had conceded with her request to take her family and leave, and NOW the Arcosian was under attack! How the hell was he gonna react to this!? "Inform-? The... Arcosian. He attacked." It'd be harder to phrase it any lamer than she had, but to be fair to the girl, she was still trying to process the utter bullshittery around her. "What are you doing here? Did the Saiyans hire you? Then why aren't YOU at Hatchi?" Nothing made sense right now, and Azuki was essentially powerless to do anything. Her damned power was still LOCKED.

A Saiyan she did not know arrived, his power excellent but still dwarfed by Blizzard entirely. "What was that?" Azuki's voice was nearly imperceptible. Aside from the Demon solely based on sound, it was unlikely that either Blizzard or Vocado would be able to hear her whatsoever. "My power..." The girl's head twitched slightly as her hands went to her head in pain. "Please give it to me. I need it now. ...What do you mean you can't?" It hadn't been an issue before! Why was it such a problem now?! "...Alright. I trust you. Save them... my parents, and Alpinia. Whatever it takes to do so." Without warning, her body convulsed, a shrill scream escaped Azuki's lips as a pitch-black color began to race across her body, clothes included.

Amid Blizzard's attempt to tear his Saiyan opponent apart, Azuki fell silent. Seconds passed before a low gurgle was heard again, head snapping up as a snarling bright white expression stared out among the battlefield. "Do you have ANY fucking idea how much you've made a MESS of my plans!?" Translucent white claws sprouted violently from the girl's hands, hissing with immense power. "And now the proverbial bastard cat is out of the bag. Congratulations!! Fuck you." Without further words, a massive orb of colorless energy soared straight for Blizzard, full malice behind the attack. "SESAME! My boy. My amigo. My buddy chum pal. Can a gal ask you for a quick CHAT on the side?"