Mishiro

Shifting her bags to one arm, she looked about the empty shop. No one else was here. She slowly approached the counter, where a black cat was yawning and kneading its paws quite harmlessly on the stack of papers. Order forms and a bell. The owner seemed to have changed the manner she ran her shop. Turning her attention back to the feline, Mishiro held out her hand for it to sniff.

The cat inched forward, decided the new customer was friendly, and rubbed its head against her fingers. “Hi, sweetie,” she said, her voice lowered to a whisper, “If I give you this, can you go and retrieve those earrings for me?”

//
BUYING: dioscuri [#210452-2]
500 col sent.

"I'll never forget that order!" An gasped. "Come on, put that down." She still did that adorable thing – her voice went up from excitement and then she turned pink and raised her hand to cover her lips, conscious of speaking too loud. The next words then, as Sybil passed her, were more subdued. "All those favors and it still turned out so bad. Have you been using that all this time, Mish?"

"No."

They had both been here more times than they could ever count, and An liked having friends over. Nothing changed much from having three people populating the stools beside An's workbench rather than two. A half hour for a favor turned into five. It was well into the afternoon by the time Mishiro finished tossing away the empty cups and plates she'd used to serve the menu samples she always carried around. She reached down and placed her hand atop An's arm. "An, we–"

A mistake. Her merchant girl nearly fell out of the chair with an surprised squeak. She spun around to face Mishiro, her face red. "S-sorry, sorry! You're leaving, right?"

"I think we kept her waiting for too long," Sibyl said, watching Mishiro, amusement plain on his face. "How'd you find the weapon?"

"It wasn't even a hard choice. I've wanted a Vampiric right from the start."

"A Vampiric…" Red eyes wandered off to some empty space at Mishiro's side as An frowned in thought. "Oh, I think I remember. You've gotten half of what you want on your weapon already. Um, I don't need them at all, so I promise I'll keep an eye out for Gleaming Scales! And something to change an item's name and appearance."

They soon saw themselves out, with An rushing after Sibyl to wrap up their conversation. As the latter had observed, despite her best efforts, Mishiro had started to tune out the moment the subject turned to player gossip. An bid them goodbye and Mishiro pressed another drink sample into her merchant girl's hands despite her protests. When the door swung shut and they had walked a few blocks down the road, she turned an accusing glance at her brother.

"We spent five hours," she began. "And you got your display case back. What did you even want to put in there so badly? You never said."

His pace was lazy, matched with hers. It was a cool autumn day. He'd gambled off that single shot without even batting an eye. "No idea? I just wanted your stuff out."

Mishiro stopped walking.

"My turn to change the plans. Let's go back to the training grounds. I'm going to actually kill you."

//
CLAIMING: Jack's Lament

Her merchant girl’s crumbling shop, buried in a backstreet in Floor 1’s overpopulated trading sector. She knew this route like the back of her hand, the twists and turns of the narrow roads that one took if they wanted to avoid the rush hour or if the merchant herself was at their side and she was feeling a quieter midnight stroll. Some time last year, Mishiro had asked for Sibyl’s map and traced three lines, one for each direction he normally came from. He cut into that route today, leaving her bewildered at the crossroads.

Their business with An could not be any more different; they never went this way together. Mentally readjusting her plans to accommodate a half hour detour, maximum, she hastened to catch up. She lost her place beside him as he led them down a gangway that curved from the back of an apartment building and ended at the lowest area of the sector, home to the town’s least popular establishments. “Forgot something?”

“Your business, actually.”

“I just cleared out the shop’s unwanteds the other day. Let’s go back – if it’s one of mine, I set appointments. She won’t have anything ready for us.”

“Did you know you have an item that’s still pending a reroll?” 

The railings ended, though the path continued to the left, because there was a part where players simply hopped down onto the street as a shortcut to the other side of the town. Sibyl waited for her, and once again her eyes fell on the package in his arms, one end of his cloak wrapped tightly around it. He was wearing his gauntlets on a rest day, she thought.

“No,” she said honestly. He waited, long enough for her to check if the jump didn’t leave her skirt ruffled, then they walked, side-by-side now that the path allowed for it. Continuing, with the tiniest hint of accusation, “Why were you going through my stuff. How about something more productive, like sorting through the mess in the study. You keep telling me not to touch that.”

“It wasn’t your ‘stuff’, you’ve had it displayed in the living room for two years. Why would you even put that in the living room? Anyone walks in, and it’s your weapon, not the paintings or the art pieces or the furniture I chose, that catches the eye. It’s sucking all the color out of the place. I was taking it out earlier–” 

“–I like it. I was not only considering the aesthetics. It’s Cursed. No one could ever steal it. We have a decoration that we could not possibly misplace–”

“–Then how about you take that function over form argument all the way and actually use it as intended? The smithed weapon you’re using now can’t possibly be any better than this.” The conversation winded down and they walked in silence for a few moments. At the corner of her eye, she could see that the bundle was now partially unwrapped, the weapon’s chill unfurling into the air. Sibyl's own gauntlets had a silvery sheen to their surface, the beginnings of a layer of frost.

“The display case was able to contain it,” she said. “And believe me, I did give it a shot for a while. The wielder isn’t immune. I’d put in a request at the guild for something to change it – at least three, if it rolled into something more unpleasant, but they’ve had me at the lowest priority.”

Sibyl nodded thoughtfully. “The system patched in an additional line of specification on those favors you used. You get as many shots on a reroll until it gives you something different. Some of them are still in circulation and their prices in the market are sky high.”

“But it’s just one shot. I’m not guaranteed… ” 

She never finished the thought. They were at their destination and he was already pushing open the door.

[Standing in as flavor text for: [link]]

The shadow of the 25th floor that swallowed up all of Aincrad. The revolution in the 26th whose success directly impacted the battle at the frontlines.

What was in the books for the 27th?

A group of rogue apprentice knights from Braso, motives unknown, set out to cause chaos. In the north, a cave collapse. In the east, the aforementioned fire. In the south, the most daring: an attack on the presidential estate as well as attempted theft of classified documents. All three received considerable aid from players who happened to be there on account of a request from the Lapis Society to unearth phrases -- words of power -- that they believed related to the division of the 27th floor's regions. Now, the representatives were gathered under one roof. The strained ties between them were present. Where were the other elements? The terrorist remnants? The phrases, the supernatural divide? Which part of the puzzle was the frontliners', and what was left to the rest?

She stopped, setting her thoughts aside as the angle of her glance changed. On the seat to her left, Pinball shrugged down his hood.

...Oh.

Surprise momentarily overtook her expression, then followed the half-turn to hide her face, the shift of her skirts. She scooted closer to their shared armrest, but not so much that her posture was affected; and her hand pressed gently on the juncture of his shoulder and collarbone, fingers bent inward, urging him to tilt his head down to her level. "The people on the stage, from left to right..."

It was easy to guess the introductions she had missed, furthermore she knew them all by physical description. As quickly and accurately as possible, and a pause somewhere in the middle in time with Oji's question, she recounted everything that had happened before Pinball took his seat. And then the bits of lore she thought was relevant. When she was done, she pulled back, hands folded on her lap.

Sometimes he had that weary look in his eyes whenever they came across a reminder of the frontlines. Now they were in the thick of it, even if it wasn't involvement in the traditional sense. She wanted to know if something within him had also changed, but this wasn't the time and place for that conversation so she couldn't point him towards the way out if she could not count on herself to leave either. The most she could do was respect his decision and untangle some of the complexity for him so he wasn't going in blind.

Her thoughts turned back to the shadow. Ladonia. She'd hit a roadblock with her thoughts if she kept flipflopping between them. Attack from the one perspective. Assume the scenario mirrored the latter. Assume they had agency. How was this meant to affect the frontlines? "If we consider that this is the whole of it," she started, tilting her head toward Pinball, though her full attention was on the stage, waiting for the representatives' first answers. "Then what could be the end goal?"

//
skeptical. was considering the worst case scenario. pinball came in late -- gave him relevant info. still observing.

With no one left to view it, the display window idly lit up a small corner of the kitchen before it dismissed itself at the two-minute mark. A soft click from the turning of a key on the front door, and the house slumbered once again.

So she was going mad and none of the mechanisms she had thoroughly built up over the last eight years were soothing her. In fact, upon her own assessment, she was just adding fuel to a fire that was growing uncontrollable by the minute. What better way to deaden it than to break her routine in a way that even she had not expected just hours prior?

She was in Floor 27, Ronbaru, and the greater part of its residents had their interest pointed in one direction. She followed it, briskly taking in the anxiety that pervaded the non-living persons in her surroundings, until the crowds thickened and she beheld the sight of the magnificent crown jewel of the central region: a theater currently housing a forum with all four representatives of the surrounding territories in attendance. Any other day, securing permission to enter would be an issue, especially as an outsider, but today she walked past the gates and claimed an aisle seat a few rows down from the back unhassled. 

Her source would make a killing as an information broker. News traveled to her fast. Mishiro had arrived just in time to hear the latter half of the introductions (and the immediate break in decorum), enough to guess what the discussion was all about. The first speaker stepped back and offered the floor to the public, and she remained seated in her chair, in deep thought. The stars of the show were all lined up on the stage but really, she had her eye on the audience, searching for the next lines in the script, the next movement toward the podium. What was this anyway -- a scene true to its setting, just a play meant to unfold before the eyes?

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I Am Bored. this is Not A New Character. i am never making this character. everyone look away.
1: bio / 2: tl? / 3: relationships/misc (familiar, residence) / 4: stats, etc. blended mish/ara journal format.

//

this is ara. pray for my muse. :')

::: ::: :::

It was still snowing in [Delilah].

White dusted the outside of her windowsill, and the black cat that haunted the corridor outside her room pawed at the door until she let it in. She lowered a lamp to the floor beside her desk and stroked its head with the back of her hand as it curled up next to the warmth and stretched its mouth open in a soundless yawn.

"Staying here again?"

The feline's eyes blinked up at her, twin circular flames, one after the other, then it bowed its head, tiny pink nose tucked snugly beneath its tails.

She returned to her sketchbook. Fingers skimming through the binder's pages, she caught glimpses of her own compositions and the oft faceless people she drew within them as passersby to her carefully rendered scenery, the distance between the dates of each entry growing further as she went from one to the next. She didn’t owe it to a lack of leisure time. Five years bereft of a typical player's burdens, too many more awaiting her; she had a silver spoon in her mouth and she thought of biting down on it until blood dripped past her lips, yet she also thought she had gradually turned indifferent.

She found the last entry, began months after its previous.

'DEC 25, 20  ' had nothing but a few faint lines to its name, a portrait of her own scattered thoughts as she rested beneath the branches of that mistletoe. She didn't remember any of them. Discarded drafts had no place in her binder, and as easy as it was to erase the penciled outlines, she had written the date in ink. But once the girl lifted the page, ready to tear it off from the rest with a slight tug, she paused -- a picture stubbornly forming before half-shut eyes.

Cold day. Snowflakes falling onto a quiet street.

Him.

Their aimless stroll had taken them to almost every corner of the winter fair, hadn't it? She'd had her gaze sharpened, a couple paces between them as she walked ahead (close enough to reach him if they had any trouble), and she respectfully withheld any questions when he disappeared at one turn only to reappear at her side the next. She couldn't turn her thoughts back to the time between noon and sunset of December 25, 20   without seeing him in her periphery -- and when she had him in the corner of her eye, months after watching him turn his back and walk away from her, she found that she was still chasing him despite standing perfectly still.

The page fluttered back into place. Candles at her desk blown out. She pulled a glowstone out of her inventory and settled it on a ledge above her.

He had been so close, and she had greedily committed too much of it to memory.

Late into the evening, Mishiro began to draw.

The light from the crystal flickered, the warmth from the lamp at her feet disappeared, the black cat hopped onto her desk and rubbed its head against the back of her hand and gave a soft questioning 'mew?' of concern when she picked it up and set it down on her bed where it made a small nest among her pillows but refused to sleep; the cat kept silent vigil throughout the night, until the light from the crystal burned out an hour before the crack of dawn, and it pawed at the door until she let it out, and she returned to her desk and found another glowstone to light.

Morning came, and she gently closed her sketchbook. Mishiro rubbed her eyes and rose from her seat, almost expecting to feel a dull ache in her limbs from staying in one position for so long. Yesternight's lack of sleep shouldn't interfere with her work for today -- turning down vanity craft requests made for the purpose of celebrating the holidays meant her commissions winded down around the days between Christmas and New Year's Eve. Still, she had her own little list of things to do in her free time, and she didn't like lazing about in her room. She tidied up her bed, dropped the dulled glowstone into her hoodie's pocket, and made for the door, pausing briefly midway, a hand rested on the knob.

Torn shreds of chalk white paper, vanishing one by one into the sunlight.

thread summary

The girl remained where the stranger had left her.

She tilted her head forward, lowering her gaze to where she held up her hand, the back of her right’s wrist against the phalanges of her left, and she curled her fingers inward as she would have if she'd caught that phantom in her grasp.

Mishiro still could not feel even the faintest whisper of a breeze.

A small step forward, closer to the small lamp fixed to the end of the balustrade, and she glanced over her shoulder. Everywhere the palace did not claim as its grounds was covered by a dark forest that stretched on for miles. 

She walked up the bridge, with only the sound of her footfalls reaching her ears. And the infinite stagnant loop continued to play -- until she reached the last step.

[♬]

withinablinkyouadvancepastit,awarmtoastyatmosphereinsidetogreetwakinganddreamingvisitorsalike.Within,staffofvariousracesbustleabout,haulingclothanddonning--

Ambience. Light exploding into her eyes, like fireworks in a night sky.

Warmth.

It was too much.

She wasn't in complete control of her actions -- she was reaching up to press her palms to her eyes, she was veering away from the stone path and straight into another player, and then she felt herself stumble and she was trying to catch herself with a surprised gasp when she felt a pair of hands on her shoulders. Steadying her. They didn't feel... unfamiliar. Mishiro placed a hand over one of theirs and tilted her head up, wide gray eyes meeting blue.

"...Pinball?"

it's... light.

and it doesn't even struggle much, really. bringing it to the shore is an easy task, even for an absolute beginner like you, and the only possibility you can envision at this point is that you've somehow failed so hard that your hook didn't snag a fish but some floating piece of trash someone tossed in earlier. on your haunches, your gauntlet wrapped around the line, you try to peer beneath the surface of the water, then you chew on your lip and yank.

what meets your eyes is a splash of color. the creature wriggling slightly at your hook is shaped like an ordinary small fish, but has scales that glimmer like glass prisms under the light of the sun -- and you think you can safely assume that it's something that doesn't exist in the real world. 

could it be?

you reach out to unstring it, but before the tips of your fingers can touch its scales, the fish falls limp and bursts into little white flecks, and while you stumble back in surprise, a square window appears at the center of your vision.

[quest requirement fulfilled.]

"use the rod next time."

you jolt. "but i am...?"

from her seat above,           tugs a broken branch from a small pile of leaves on the ground behind her and lightly taps one end to the surface of the water, indicating the point closest to the hook at the end of the line. then she draws her arm back, slowly enough for your efforts to visualize the movement of the line to catch up. her swing ends with the implement at an obtuse angle from the ground, and she pauses to tilt her head and confirm if you're still watching before she snaps the branch forward. your eyes follow the trajectory of the imaginary hook. "you'll get more distance. the rod is not just for reeling in, it's also for casting the line. though the system will recognize that [there is a line in the water] no matter what a player does prior -- real world rules still apply." she repeats the motion faster this time, and once the demonstration is done, she tosses the branch over her shoulder. "one of them is that fish are bigger and in greater abundance the farther you get from the shore."

"oh," you say, lamely, "...i threw it with my hand earlier."

your brain is short-circuiting for a better response from the earth-shattering fact that 1) you've apparently forgotten everything in that book; 2) hermes's youngest and most sheltered member knows enough about fishing to lecture an absolute beginner; and 3) you are getting lectured by hermes's youngest and most sheltered member.

perhaps if you had better reconciled yourself with the fact that there's a tier-wide level gap between you two earlier, this wouldn't've come as much of a shock.

"i'll give it a shot after this one?"

with how much you've done wrong, your first attempt is probably a fail anyway.

it takes a couple more miscommunications and hurdles (none of which           decides is her business to intervene in), but eventually, it's over. 

you flee from the encounter at the quickest possible pace that one can still consider polite. fortunately, the quest doesn't entail having the npc follow you around for the entirety of it. unfortunately, the only place to possibly fish, in your eyes, is the dip in the steep rock encircling the lake, where one could manageably make their way down towards the fishing boat -- or to seat themself by the water. hassling           to take you somewhere else just out of personal preference is out of the question. 

the unwanted third party is still there, resuming his programmed routine of making rounds about the area...

you plop the tin onto the ground, and           seats herself further up the incline. she doesn't say anything about the exchange earlier, only adjusts her position to dangle her feet just above the water. "take your time," she says, bringing up her interface once again, "i'll be here."

will you, now?

this is fine. you simply have to turn your back and pretend nothing else but you and           exists in the here and now, so long as they are not within your sight. 

189917: LD 14

Spoiler level seventeen. Mishiro | HP: 340/340 | EN: 52/52 | DMG: 16 equipped -- battle-ready inventory -- skills Spoiler ● 2H Straight Sword V     -> Stamina     -> Ferocity EXTRA 01. First Aid V MASTERY Damage III buffs Spoiler

and--

"here; don't trip."

         . you blink once and pull the lens closer, to the spot just in front of where the steep descent before your feet leveled into flat ground, and the girl occupying that space, her hand held out to yours. probably, she mistook the pause in your steps as hesitation and wanted to personally ensure that you wouldn't hit your head on the rocky ground beneath and fail your quest before it even began. there are such things as accidents from overestimating simple distances -- though they are rarer than the counterpart.

even the smallest leaps make you hesitant, though had you been more attentive earlier, you would have followed the erratic whispers of your pride and tried to make your way down yourself anyway. you take her hand, unsure if you're grateful, mortified, or just both, and the cold armor of her gauntlet wraps around your wrist.

you nearly bowl her over as you jump, but somehow she rights you both with ease. the act brings you close, you realize -- too close, and you try not to pull back too quickly.

"...sorry."

3.

2.

1.

Spoiler Mishiro | HP: 340/340 | EN: 52/52 | DMG: 16 equipped Vanguard's Timepiece Trinket T1E3  |  LOOT DIE III [ref] “Time after time. Meine Zeugin.” A silver pocket watch. Within the circle of its chapter ring is a facade of clear glass, revealing the timepiece’s inner mechanisms. | [❄] item#2 item#3 battle-ready inventory item#1 skills Spoiler ● 2H Straight Sword V.     -> Stamina.     -> Ferocity. EXTRA 01. First Aid V. MASTERY Damage III. buffs Spoiler     [The First Lesson]

| UNDOCUMENTED LOCATION, APR 07 20XX.

She cracked one eye open and snuggled against the soft brown plush in her arms with a faint sigh.

Dawn was long past; the sun had risen to a particular point far above the horizon where its harsh midmorning light spilled past a gap in the buildings that framed her window's view of the sky. Bright yellow burned into the backs of her eyelids, and the girl disentangled her legs from the sheets, twisting around to face away from the glare in protest. She didn't have any pressing matters to attend to today. She pulled a blanket over her head, a wish for the comfort of sleep to reclaim her floated about lazily in the fog of her mind.

The place they had claimed for themselves beside an unnamed lake in Floor 3 had longer eaves that hung just above her window. Light never intruded upon the places where she slept, and mornings were a familiar solace — like the feeling of a hand rested gently on her head. She thought of the café downstairs, still and quiet, an unending queue of custom orders from Hermes, and the insistent thumping of a cat's paws outside her door, and how she could tell with near-pinpoint accuracy if Claude had decided to stay a little longer, despite never actually hearing him.

Today—

Neither the shop, nor the cat, nor the scout were there.

The half-formed dream spat her back out onto the shore. Mishiro stared up at an unfamiliar ceiling, disoriented, wondering why the residence's owner would paint a guest room such an uncharacteristic blue. Two fingers pulled down her menu, and she blearily skimmed through the messages she had received only moments prior.

—A cheery 'good morning;' he'd left at the usual time, and the consumables he'd taken from her emergency storage were marked down on the record book...

| [11:29] Mishiro tq.
| [11:29] Mishiro & mrnin.
| [11:30] Claude Sorry, did I wake you?
| [11:30] Mishiro ntofi turne fit self back on.

"—Mmh."

Everything was covered in fog. The girl's head once again disappeared beneath the covers.

Current Level: 17
Current SP: 44
Link to SP Tracking: [link]
Item Upgrades:

Her eyes followed the parcel as Pinball tucked it into his pocket. The hand he held it with was trembling — terribly, Mishiro realized, as though a particularly cold draft had swept into the alley at that very moment, but she didn't feel the December chill was any different than it was before, and besides, any slight drop in temperature wouldn't have bothered him so; he came back to her wielding a weapon forged from ice like it was nothing, and as she often dwelled on his growing finesse, she just as often had to face her own foul envy.

"Then, we should leave separately." An uncertain smile flickered over her face; if he hadn't been looking then, he'd have easily missed it. She didn't understand such complexities. "I'll go back the way we came. And... I don't think an orange player should stay here any longer."

If it were up to her—

It would be impolite, to ask Pinball to open the gift right then and there so she could tell him all about how the trinket was meant to be opened and that the empty space between the glass was for the owner to drop in little charms of selection and how she had something similar back home, and throughout all four years of owning it, it held nothing more than a dulled orange glowstone carved to resemble an oak tree. Gifts were traditionally meant to be opened on the twenty-fifth, and maybe the possibility where she thoughtlessly talked his ear off about her jewelry anyway lied only in the past. Mishiro tucked her hands behind her back, trying to think of something else to end with. She spoke the first thing that came to mind.

"Thanks. For staying." 

And she was pushing gently past him on her way to the narrow street's exit, saying the rest over her shoulder.

"I liked your company."

Placeholder.

| 180377: LD 2

"Did you catch that?"

There was no time to stop and listen; the unnamed player had taken the lead and it was all she could do to match her pace. She was fast, despite the cloth covering her eyes, and somehow she could pick apart portions of ruin that wouldn't immediately crumble at their feet. What if it was a player? The idea was considered, then discarded -- she buried it along with the harsh well of emotion that was beginning to stir in the depths of her consciousness. If they hadn't been climbing upwards, she would have long lost her way.

As Mishiro hauled herself up a ledge and found the girl already crossing a gap with a small leap, she cast a glance towards the trio in her periphery. Lightning pierced the weeping skies in that same moment, and it illuminated the pack of spooked silhouettes rolling down the road, directionless in their terror. If they didn't move, they would be trampled over. She sped back down the collapsed gables. There was a section where the incline wasn't so steep: portions of rock jutted out of a felled wall in a way that could be used as holds for a player who needed to climb over. She stooped down in front of it and called out to the players who weren't attempting to calm the horses. "Here-- climb up over here!"

| 180256: LD 14

"I'll put it this way."

Mishiro laced her fingers together behind her back, the windowless facades that rose on either side of her cold and bleak and stately in their feel as the light ebbed from the skies above. There was a saying that the walls had ears. She had gone as far as her limited ability could allow to ensure that no one had been looking their way, but she didn't have her brother's eye for the shadows. Was this feeling reserved for only these hidden places or did it follow players like him unto broad daylight?

"I've thought about it a little -- how things like these aren't so uncommon. Whether it's so necessary to unearth every truth of the matter. I'm sure you'll have questions for me too, if you didn't have them already, and..." she tilted her head up slightly, as though she were about to peer over her shoulder then thought better of it, and the clasp of her fingers tightened, "I think I wouldn't be able to answer most of them. In that same sense, you also have your reasons. So, it's alright. Everything as it is now -- it's fine. One can have a little faith that that knowledge isn't enough to destroy the sanctity of the present moment."

She'd never voiced that sentiment before, but she wouldn't have let those words leave her lips if she hadn't believed in them herself.

--So why was it that they suddenly didn't feel enough?

She stopped walking then, when it became obvious to the player following her that the corridor only led straight to a dead end. Shadows draped over the snow-white frame of the girl who finally turned to meet Pinball's lapis blue gaze. The vanity effect must have completely worn off at some point; she couldn't tear her eyes from his face, the clear emotion that met the perfect blank canvas of her expression in turn, and when she finally did, it was to turn her head toward their reflections on the glass of a curtained shop front.

"I won't ask for an explanation."

There was no quieting the traitorous beating of her heart as she closed the distance between them and took one of his hands in both of hers. "And you're still on a wanted list somewhere, so I won't tell anyone about this either. I... won't tell anyone." Mishiro squeezed Pinball's hand; as much as the gesture fulfilled its purpose, it also quelled most of her urges to run past him and disappear into the thinning crowds. If she just left everything about them behind now, she wouldn't need to face the truth that she was turning into a stranger in her own mind. "You know, I was there last year," she said softly. "We were keeping an eye out for you. If we did find you, we would have gone off the assumption that you didn't know how bad the entire situation was and convinced you to leave quietly somehow. But in the end, I wasn't even there to see what happened."

Mishiro slid a small white box out of her coat pocket and placed it on the square of his palm. "I may have mischaracterized you. I thought you were at least a little materialistic, but I'd already placed the order." She lifted her gaze, then dropped it back down, a small white cloud of breath escaping her as she curled his fingers inward to close around the parcel. "Part of what I liked so much about Christmas was the presents. Maybe people only do it as an established custom, but it's a nice feeling to receive something someone else put at least a little thought into. So forgive me if this sounds presumptuous, but--"

The corners of her lips lifted into a small, sincere smile as she released his hand and stepped back.

"I hope this would mend your memory of the season, even if it's just a little."

It was the whispers that reached them first. Twisted with mirth, clear as bells amid the torrents of wind and rain, the corrupted mass shifted beneath them -- shadowy globules emerging, threatening to break through its surface. When the first sphere burst, a creature bearing the tainted blood of the storm tore itself from the fold.

She backed further up the ascent, lips parted in a soundless gasp.

Aniki— wherever you are, are you seeing the same thing?

Dozens more followed in the first's stead, and they raced up the mountain where the tides could not yet reach. Mishiro summoned her invisible weapon as one of the beasts appeared before her, but in the moments that spanned between now and the inevitable outcome of the spectre's claws closing around her, dragging her back down to the shadows -- she knew she had been too slow, too unfamiliar with her weapon --

The small girl disposed of the target, and Mishiro lowered her axe. 

--She was shivering.

 "Mm. Let's pick up the pace."

They just needed to make it to the top of the mountain, and then—

| 179780: LD 7 -- Received [8] from Setsuna.

"we're already in a group, so we take full advantage of it. stay close, and keep an eye out for at least one other person," the pure blank canvas of her expression bore a hint of concern as she glanced at Lessa, then at what remained of the lower districts of Nimbus. "our objective's the nearest mountain peak. that should be sufficient? if storm hasn't stopped by then—"

Mishiro carefully tested her weight on the next step.

"—we can talk about it when we get to it."

she pulled herself up, and fortune's wheel spun. first, it was a clearly pronounced crack. her heartbeat skyrocketed; she nearly tripped over herself in her effort to find a foothold more stable above until the part of her mind that still retained its sense of her surroundings realized the sound hadn't come from the collapsed section of wall she was on top of, but from the structure in front of her. rain and wind wore down what remained of a watchtower on Nimbus's border, and its foundations crumbled in a landslide.

the others were within her sight, but she was the only player who'd taken that path upwards.

Mishiro made one last bid for her survival, and her answer was the outstretched hand of a small player in blue.

| 179478: LD 4 -- Received [3] from Setsuna.