Stormbringer

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**Stormbringer** is the eigth episode of Mainstream.

## Synopsis

> *Colonel Walker and his new colleague pay a visit to John Mason. While searching for the Nova-Class Reactor, they are unable to put aside their differences as they become entangled in a massive case.*
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## Appearances

* Jaina Kropel
* Maria Antonov
* Replacer King
* John Mason
* Jake Walker
* Zhang Wei
* Raúl
* Rojo
* Machine Collector
* Glitch A and B
* Sysop
* Sylvia Lena Cooper
* Mass-market Automaton
* Rosaria le Friede
* Frederick Doma
* Rivet
* Clareth El Arcadena
* Count Martinez
* Allen Birmingham
* Na Yubin
* Lee Jisoo
* Amy Strickland
* Maria Antonov
* Shin Jia
* Ray
* Lucrecia

## Plot

### Act 1

Maria Antonov visits a regenerated and amnesiac Jaina Kropel at the Manta Ray Prison. Jaina says she doesn't want to be associated with the Replacer Syndicate anymore, though she can't get Dominic King Reginald and her former identity as the "Replacer Queen" out of her mind. Maria digresses and states she needs information about the Nova-Class Reactor from her, arguing that Jaina can potentially redeem herself by helping out. She also gives her the Replacer King's dice and tells her that, if she wants to know what Dominic meant to the Replacer Queen, she'll have to figure it out herself.

Despite his general disdain for mercenaries, Jake Walker comes into Mason Mercenary Office and asks John Mason to find the reactor. John is still spiteful towards Jake due to their last operation together but agrees when Jake says that pay will be bigger than what he and his company made for the Replacer Incident. John and Jake drive to a Corrupted Area where a former supply depot used by the Replacers is located. Although the place should be clear of Corrupted Objects and at a low CSE Level, they unexpectedly encounter numerous Category 2 C.O.s and discover that the CSE Level is in fact nearing three. John deploys his drone (which he renamed Jane Killer) to scout the area and discovers that the Scavengers are digging around for the Nova-class Reactor nearby. The Scavengers battle John and Jake but are forced to retreat after Jaina Kropel, Jake's new partner, arrives and nearly destroys their dimensional ship. The Machine Collector subsequently requests the Sysop for help, but the Sysop says that finding the reactor is not too important so as long as a certain group "more dangerous" than either the Administration or Coffin Company end up retrieving it.

John is baffled and alarmed at Jaina's presence as well as Jake's indifference toward her when Sylvia Cooper comes online on their comms and explains the situation: the Jaina who is present right now no longer carries the personality she had as the Replacer Queen and lost most of her memories due to the severe damage inflicted on her brain neuron system during her last battle. Out of desperation, Delta Seven recruited Jaina to find the Nova-Class Reactor, which they need to power their experimental Tech Level 5 Gear, as their intel predicted that a calamity greater than the Replacer Incident is very imminent.

John, Jake and Jaina proceed to enter the abandoned facility and discover a secret passage below the elevator. There, Jaina, while almost experiencing a nervous breakdown, recalls that the Replacer King told her that the Nova-Class Reactor needs to remain secured until they can mass-produced it. She then uses her credentials as the Replacer Queen to unfreeze the reactor. Before the three can return to Delta Seven's HQ, though, a young girl enters the room alongside several knights and forcibly takes the reactor away from them. The three are unable to go after the girl and the knights after the ceiling of the room collapses on top of them. John, having barely survived thanks to Jake, deems the mission a failure until Jaina remembers that the reactor can be tracked down as it has a small transmitter installed in it in.

### Act 2

Yoo Mina and Joo Shiyoon are assigned to assist a client named Carlota, who turns out to be the girl who ambushed John Mason and Delta Seven earlier, reach the Lighthouse within the Counterside. As they are fighting off C.O.s inside a dimensional storm, they receive an odd distress call from an unknown party. Yoo Mina opts to go search for the signal's origin on her own, but Carlota joins her as well because she wants to get to know more about Mina, who reminds her of her friend she calls "The Wolf."

Mina and Carlota find the supposed castaways, Rosaria le Friede and Frederick Doma. Carlota immediately becomes uneasy around them until Rosaria tells her that she does not intend to interfere in Carlota's mission before the Game begins. Feeling reassured, Carlota instantly turns on Mina, but Shiyoon arrives in the nick of time to deflect her attack. Carlota reveals herself to be one of the Knights of Redemption and the last heir of the disgraced Martinez family. She resumes battling Mina and manages to extract her Qliphoth Factor before the arrival of John, Jake, and Jaina forces her to retreat into the storm. Afterwards, John explains his and Delta Seven's predicament to Mina and Shiyoon, and Mina realizes that Carlota's search for the Lighthouse was not a ruse just to lure her and Shiyoon in. Mina says she'll evacuate the castaways before she rejoins everyone else in finding Carlota but quickly notices that Rosaria and Doma have mysteriously vanished.

### Act 3

Frederick Doma asks Rosaria if she was content with leaving Mina behind, and Rosaria answers she will wait to see her again when the time is right as the Game is about to start.

At the Lighthouse, Carlota contacts Clareth El Arcadena to inform him that she has the Nova-Clas Reactor and the Wolf's crystallized Qliphoth Factor. She also asks him if starting the Game will really help to rebuild the Empire of Arcadena as well as save her lost family, but Clareth contemptuously replies that the Knights are playing this Game because it is their inescapable duty.

The Martinez family had lost its honor within Arcadena after Carlota's father sided with the Empire's second prince and rebel against the ruling party during the last Game. Though Carlota was destined to be executed alongside her father, Clarteh recognized the girl's unique fighting prowess as well as her sword, the Sapphire Prison, and offered her a chance to absolve her family's name if she agreed to serve under him. Allen Birmingham warned Clareth that bringing in a traitor into their ranks would deeply upset the Emperor, but Clareth appeases him by letting Ray take the entry test for the Knights of Redemption. Clareth also claims he wants to see if Carlota can "break out from the curse of her family" and realize what she wants for herself.

Carlota proceeds to use the reactor and Factor to amplify the Lighthouse's power output and shines a beam strong enough to pierce through the dimensional storm. As Fenrir Squad and Delta Seven make their to the Lighthouse as well, Jaina tries to destroy the Lighthouse under Jake's orders, but Carlota deflects her attack. Mina and Shiyoon are deployed and battle Carlota, but Carlota proves to be a strong opponent. As the dimension beings to break up because of the Lighthouse's immense power, Jake deploys as well and has a one-on-one fight with Carlota while Jaina uses her own body to block the light so Mina and Shiyoon can destroy the Lighthouse. Unfortunately, they destroyed the structure too late, and soon a Category 6 Corrupted Object emerges from the sky.

Coffin Company HQ detects not only the Category 6 C.O.'s appearance but also the ruptures of multiple dimensional rifts. Hilde and Lee Sooyeon hastily prepare to deploy before more C.O.s of its type come out of the Imaginary Dimension but are interrupted by an attack by the Six Wings. Na Yubin confronts Hilde and tells her that this world needs to grow stronger on its own, and thus he can't allow Hilde and the others to keep cossetting it.

### Act 4

Shiyoon sends everyone to Normalside by tearing a hole in spacetime but stays behind to stall the Category 6 C.O.. The remaining team is then rescued by a fleet sent by Delta Seven. Jake had heavily wounded himself as a result of maximizing his CRF output during his battle with Carlota and is sent to the Enterprise's infirmary; Jaina also sustain severe injuries but is otherwise in much better condition than Jake; everyone else managed to survive mostly unscathed. But before Maria can brief everyone on their next plan, the Category 6 C.O.'s intense Corruption rays cause the Counterside to collapse and turned into Imaginary Space, allowing multiple Category 4 C.O.s under its command to burst into the Normalside and attack the fleet.

With the situation becoming dire, Maria deploys herself into the battlefield, activates Garguantia—a time-space accelerator capable of de-aging her and strengthening her Counter powers—and fights the Category 6 C.O. head-on. Though she is able to push the C.O. back, Maria struggles to even damage the Category 6 C.O., and the Garguantia rapidly loses power. Mina tries to join the fight as well but is stopped by Shin Jia, the new president of Alphatrix Group. Having been informed by the Coffin Company CEO, Jia explains they are up against Khamimael, a C.O. that belongs to a special group known as "Hollow Gods"— these C.O.s are created outside space and time where the universal laws of nature don't apply to them. A Hollow God is virtually immortal and cannot be killed through conventional means, but Jia reveals that it can still be killed by stabbing its heart specifically with Mina's Wolvesbane. Though Sylvia is skeptical, Mina sees no other alternative and prepares to deploy with Jaina. John wants to follow them, but Jia tells him he needs to stay here and help.

Jia and John visit Jake at the infirmary. There, Jia shows them a piece of Alternium, an artificial variant of Eternium that can produce immense amounts of energy when used as a fuel, and provides them with a prototype Alternium Reactor that they can use to complete Delta Seven's Tech Level 5 gear; additionally, she says Alphatrix will use the exhausted Nova-Class Reactor as a base to develop and mass-produce a proper Alternium Reactor. Not wanting to let his comrades and friends die, Jake gets up and convinces John to help finish the Tech Level 5 gear. codenamed "Stormbringer". As soon as the gear is euipped onto him, Jake drops down from the Enterprise and begins tackling the Hollow God. With Jake's help, Mina is able to strike Khamimael's heart and kill it.

In an instance, Mina suddenly finds herself in a Shadow Palace and is confronted by Rosaria, who says she couldn't let Mina die and she also rescued Shiyoon out of Imaginary Space. Another Hollow God also enters their domain, but Rosaria effortlessly destroys it with a single blow. Amazed, Mina asks her who she is, but Rosaria merely answers that she's an old friend of Hilde before sending her back.

Mina returns and is met by Hilde and Shiyoon. Meanwhile, Jake is immobilized because the Stormbringer experienced a system failure— he and John briefly bicker but end up laughing with each other.

In another dimension, Carlota approaches to Clareth and requests for her family's name to cleared now that her mission has been completed. Clareth, however, refuses because he doesn't believe that is what she truly wishes and entices her to consider her own desires. After reflecting on her past, Carlota breaks down and decries her own family, blaming them for ruining her life. Pleased with her answer, Clareth grants Carlota the title of Marquise and declares her a true noble. Afterwards, the Knights of Redemption gather around as Ray asks Tammiel to start the Qliphoth Game.

## Gallery

Maria Antonov meets with the former Replacer Queen.Maria shows Jaina Kropel the Replacer King's dice.Khamimael, the Hollow God, emerges.Jake Walker and Yoo Mina attack Khamimael.The Knights of Redemption gather.Tammiel initiates the Qliphoth Game under Ray's request.