______________A r e a ... D e s c r i p t i o n || ____The Hallowed Path is the only footpath leading out of the city of Tsukihara Hana, and has been claimed by the Wakeners in an effort to block of the Yokai's path out of the city, and provide a safe haven for those escaping. The entrances themselves are formidable structures. Of the walls that the hub has, the gates are the only ones made of stone, to provide an extra defense against outside elements. The walls are thirty feet high and about ten feet thick, with the gatehouses slightly taller and about twice as wide. They extend into cliffs on either side, blocking the path to the districts in between without traversing around the majority of a mountain. The gates are made of wood. Each is always heavily guarded. Without breaking in, these gates at the north and south ends of the hub are the only way in.
Original Description
A daytime delight, the hallowed path was a very well-populated route for both the beautiful scenery and the peaceful spirits that could be found quite commonly. Many shrines laid in wait on the path like checkpoints, where rest could be had or even trade could be done. It is now the most fearsome crossroad to date, every old shrine a battlefield between demons and the spirits who were too strong or smart to be captured. It's a forested region with a large stone pathway connecting one town to the other. There are dirt paths that lead over hills, where the scenery seems to change completely. Frozen lakes, pits of lava, ferocious thunderstorms and high wind speeds in areas seemingly separate form the rest of the world. The environments off the set path are molded by the Spirits or Yokai that dwell there, often providing clear indication to the element or strength of one of the beings before even coming in contact with it. Given that it's the main site of a war that took place hundred of years in the past, the restless souls that take the form of demons run rampant at their most raw and powerful. They're single minded, but that singular thought is a mind-numbing need for revenge on anything and everyone. As for where the path leads, it's the main travel line between Nagare Hyōgen and Tsukihara Hana.
______________D e f e n s e s // D a n g e r s || ____ • The walls are made of stone and stand thirty feet tall and ten feet wide. They are heavily guarded from atop the wall, and guards are always posted at the gatehouses. ____ • There is no other way through these, aside from going through the gates or over the walls without going around the mountain. From there, there are three ways to other districts. The first is a gate on the main road leading to the Academy District [north gate] or the Market District [south gate] to allow carts and other vehicles through. Foot traffic is discouraged. Likewise, connecting all of the districts is a series of bridges overlooking the road, and several zip-lines, though it only goes one direction for the moment: down.
______________R u l e s || ____ • Follow the laws as set forth by the claim holder. They can be found in the Administrative District. ____ • It is required to go through this thread first when entering Ikeinasu, regardless if you are coming from the north or the south end. Please specify which gate you are entering somewhere in your post, so RPCs and NPCs don't get confused. ____ • All carts and large bags will be searched before entry, in case of stowaways or illegal substances.
______________C l a i m i n g || ____ • Claim Holder || Musunde Hiraite [Tenshuyami] ________ • Sub-Claim Holders || ________ • Kaileer Cein'lys [Royal Taorito]
Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2017 9:36 pm
_______________The Narrator Whispers... ||
→→ Quiet solitude was the theme of this place, and hard pressed would any be to break it anytime soon. A storm must have swept the place long, long ago, for rain had flash frozen upon the buildings, creating thin pillars of frozen liquid that now provided more structural integrity than the splintered beams within. Here, where once a bustling town once stood, lay nothing but devastation that none had been able to come back from, not in all the years since. Ice and powdered snow covers all, struck by some unimaginable cold that most glass had spiderwebbed or shattered long ago, with only one or two buildings maintaining the smallest of windows able to keep their glass after all this time. A well lay in the town square, between nine buildings of different shapes and sizes but all designed in ancient Japanese tradition, yet where water may have once stood now stood one large mirror, facing a chrysalis that was even then beginning to crack as something inside moved. →→And from the mirror came a burst of fiery light moments before a human-shaped figure was launched from its depths, the mirror shattering in a spray that was quickly followed by the chrysalis as the figure plowed into it, sending them and the newly Wakened crashing into the cold, powdery snow below. →→The mirror, for one moment, seemed to have a depth to it that shouldn't have existed, for it bent the space within its confines. Yet as the figure that fell from it took breath the warped air vanished, the portal closing once more, leaving the two currently entangles on the ground beneath a grey, overcast sky and in the bitter cold.
It had felt like he had some sort of revelatory dream, the realization of a sudden and unexpected change in circumstances. However, like nearly all dreams, the details eluded him as his mind continued to slumber. today was a check-up day, so he could be lazy for the rest of the day. He'd just need to get up eventually to feed, but that could wait.
A chill wind intruded upon Jean's drowsy time, and he tried to pull the covers closer, prevent the warmth from escaping. However, his limbs could not find the space to move. They were restrained, encased. He couldn't before, but now he could feel some sort of hard surface holding his entire body in place without a single speck of room. He was entrapped, and as one would expect, there was no blanket to pull. Then, it crossed Jean's mind that cold like this was outright alien in and of itself.
His eyes snapped open in alarm, and he could see his time to awaken was not now. His eyes peered through some sort of opaque darkness, broken only by a thin sliver of light, too bright in this field of black to make out any details through. If the slivers of cold he felt through his body were any sort of sign, then these cracks had spread throughout whatever molded prison held him.
Jean began to fear the worst. The gears in his mind turned and twisted frantically before suddenly grinding to a halt. He remembered the revelation of his dream, or rather, his thoughts retread the same path that his dream had taken. Jean froze with surprise, not like he could move anyways,
To mull over this sudden turn of events, one several centuries in the making, Jean wouldn't have minded several more minutes... No, hours? Days? Just some length of time to process this new information and its implications.
Of course, convenience makes for such a dull story. Following the sound of something fragile suddenly breaking into a million tiny pieces, something collided with Jean's cocoon of solitude at the most inopportune movement, and without a single warning shake, not even a wobble, the impact from the now shattered mirror shattered Jean's own confinement, the one he had just started to appreciate, into its own million tiny pieces that each reflected the light and sent him tumbling backwards into a new world.
He wasn't alone, either, not anymore. Although, it wasn't like he was conscious for most of his time in the crystal without any company. The last time he had seen his mother's face felt more like a few hours than a few centuries. However, that was neither here nor there. Jean, who had closed his eyes upon impact, blearily opened them to stare into a grey sky full of clouds, one so very different from his slice of life. He lay on his back with some sort of moving, be it squirming or just rhythmically breathing/beating, weight on top of him. It appeared he needed to accept that this uncomfortable weight was at least partly his fault. He could feel an antler in his left hand, something he had grabbed some time during the rough and tumble greeting. He sort of recalled being stuck in the gut with it. Not impaled, of course, but a strong enough poke to elicit his sharp grab at the offender.
the sheltered doll's mind took a moment to realize the danger he was in as he looked at what exactly lay on top of him, "OH GOD DEER!". Immediately, though not very effectively, the monster-person (all deer were monsters in Jean's book, same with octopi) was shoved off of Jean with a mass of less than coordinated tendrils. Well, to be exact, the tendrils tried. Uncontrolled, the golden appendages frayed into their far thinner golden threads, and while they certainly exploded from Jean's body with all haste, the absolute lack of focus in the placement of their force created a rather bothersome but not altogether very powerful mass of squirming threads. Arms and legs were quick to join the effort once Jean realized he had lost nearly all control in his threads. Of course, it was a given that Jean's hand had completely released the antler at this point. There was scrambling away from the innocent offender, of course, even while Jean was trying to push him away, which created rather conflicted motions. Nothing looked coordinated... It was a mess of movements... Although, hey, at least Jean looked pretty? [1/10 Tendrils]
Lanfaer
Taorito
Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2017 9:55 am
tab█ Shea Fal'nevan xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx What is this [ someday? ]xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx tabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabAnd frozen in the footsteps untaken, we stand side by side. What is it really, but a tomorrow or today? tabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabAnd frozen in the footsteps untaken, we stand side by side. ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
[x] I... remembered a blue sky, clouds on the horizon as the first storm of the rainy season rolled in from the far away ocean. Knee high golden fields stretched as far as the eye could see over rolling hills. The stone I sat on was warm in the afternoon sun. It was always that way, regardless of how hot or cold the day was. Just comfortably warm. We'd found it by chance after running away from one of our antics against one of the Elders. From there, it was where we always met to get away from the politics of life. Our own little paradise in an otherwise mad world. I wished it could have lasted forever, but everyone always faded into the background, moved on while I was stuck in place, wishing for a chance at the peace that they earned in their lives.
The sky flashed crimson. The world finally tore itself apart. Energy seared through my flesh, bubbling to the surface in the form of foreign blue symbols. I could only watch in horror as they slowly turned the same blood red as the sky. I knew what it meant, but here was nothing I could do to stop it.
Shea!
My eyes snapped open at the sensation of falling just before hitting a dark, hard material that evidently broke under my weight, shattering into thousands of pieces. I think I blacked out for a second from the impact, because the next time I blinked I was in a heap on the ground with another person, shards of smokey crystal and what looked like actual glass covering both us and the snow around us. I cast a wild glance around in an effort to figure out where I was, but the movement didn't get very far before I realized one of the short antlers that protruded out of the sides of my head was caught on something. More specifically someone, given the mass of cloth under me. I thought for a moment I'd managed to impale someone, and that moment of panic was only reinforced when he started shouting.
In an instant, I found myself upright, antler no longer stuck wherever it had been--which turned out just to be held in the other person's hand, thank the gods--as I was shoved off by a weird mass of shimmering gold. Still disoriented, I attempted to comprehend the brief line of dialogue that had been screamed in my ear, trying to recognize the words. It wasn't like I knew every language but...
"Ah..." After a moment, the words reorganized themselves into something I could understand, and as they did it was like I'd never not understood them. I didn't know how else to explain it. The young...man?--his voice said male, but his appearance was very feminine--before me, significantly taller than my small size with long, snow white hair, had panicked about a deer, which I assumed meant myself, but made me no less confused. He scrambled as far as he could away from me. Around him writhed a swarm of thin, tendril-like appendages that seemed to come from his flesh. "...What...?" It didn't necessarily bother me; it actually reminded me of someone, sort of. I was more concerned with the fear he expressed.
My head tilted slightly to the side, a habit of curiosity, and I looked up, and around. The sky above bore heavy, pale clouds that often covered the sky in winter. The air itself was cold, and, while I'd seen it already, it really only occurred to me when I could see my breath that we were sitting in snow. How I'd missed that until that point was beyond me. Still, nothing gave me an answer to how I'd gotten there, wherever that was. Some strangely designed buildings stood stoutly nearby, and a stone well sat at its center. A small village of some sort? The snow around us was mostly untouched, and the buildings themselves looked abandoned.
The cold was starting to get to me, which was weird because I wasn't usually fazed by cold. I pushed myself to my feet, rubbing my bare arms, and turned back to my companion. "Do...you know where we are?"
tab█.CHAKRA :100 / 100█.STAMINA :100 / 100█.STATUS :None tab█.EXP :000█.RYO :両000█.HEALTH :Fine█.INJURIES :None█.THOUGHTS :"Where am I?" ▀▀▀Suddenly I'm running slowly. Suddenly it all goes dark. ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
It wasn't always consistent, but this time at least, Jean's reaction to fear was to freeze... a proverbial deer in headlights, if you would. The only movement from him was that which he could not control, the shivering of his body in both cold and fear. His threads, even more susceptible to the chill that permeated the environment had reflexively withdrawn back into his body. Despite all the body bursting action, Jean's clothes were undamaged. It appeared his tendrils retained some muscle memory like how to reveal themselves without causing a need for a change in clothes. Although, not like Jean was in any sort of mindset to appreciate such a detail. One could say that he was currently experiencing a brain freeze, his thoughts stalled by massive fear and sudden exposure to too much information, too many new worries.
The monster boy stood up, which caused Jean to tense completely, ceasing even his involuntary shaking. was all Jean could ask for. Anything else he was certain was going to end in utter and complete destruction of his body, There was no way that Jean could let something so dangerous out of his sight, so it was a given that his eyes were glued onto the deer at the expense of exploring anything else.
Jean's eyes flinched closed when, instead of leaving, the monster turned to Jean. That terrified, near panicked expression on his face pretty much said everything about what Jean thought of his current predicament. Even when he was asked a harmless question, one that he admittedly had himself even if he didn't realize it yet, the only change in Jean's demeanor was for him to crack one eye open and just barely lift his chin so he could trace his vision up the body of the speaker. Even that much progress was lost, though, the moment Jean's gaze reached the antlers, which cased him to shut his barely opened eye back closed and duck his head again. His body, however, seemed to make some progress... if it could be called that. The tension had loosened so he was back to shivering.
His words, as well, seemed to have returned to Jean. It was clear that he couldn't look at the terrifying sight of a 4'10" child with antlers, but with his eyes closed, he appeared to be capable of broken speech, "N-not sure..." Trying his hardest because there was no way he could suplex a deer, Jean once again opened one eye, but instead of looking up at deer boy, his gaze traced across the ground until it reached the foot of a structure, after which he looked up to study the structure before returning his gaze to the ground to find another structure. This repeated a few times as long as he wasn't interrupted.
Jean pieced together what little he knew, anxiety rising even higher as he realized how difficult it could get for him to find "food" if winter in the wild was anything like what the books told him. Despite it all, though, his book and crafting smarts did not fail him, Of course, whether or not this was really the Iron Country, Jean did not know. There were still plenty of reasons for it not to be. Iron style buildings were a popular choice in many places outside of the Iron Country. Cold and snow could have just meant winter instead of a particular region. Plus, Jean had never been outside outside. He was literally just pulling what he knew from books.
However, because all Jean wanted was an answer he could give to the human incarnation of his worst nightmare, he went ahead and said with as much confidence he could muster, "I would guess we are within Iron Country...," which wasn't a whole lot of confidence considering his voice was still shaking and he couldn't just say something with absolute certainly right after giving away that he didn't know.
Lanfaer
Taorito
Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2017 8:34 pm
tab█ Shea Fal'nevan xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx What is this [ someday? ]xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx tabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabAnd frozen in the footsteps untaken, we stand side by side. What is it really, but a tomorrow or today? tabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabAnd frozen in the footsteps untaken, we stand side by side. ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
[x] My size hadn't really occurred to me until then. I was... small, back to the age, somehow, of before everything went wrong. Before the madness of the world gripped me. My memories up until the age I evidently was were crystal clear, but everything beyond was hazy. Present, but... unclear. I had a splatter of colors on a canvas, where I knew what I wanted to see but couldn't quite see it. I knew the outcome, but not the process that led up to it.
The look my white-haired companion gave me felt almost familiar, like I'd seen that reaction before, but the moment I thought of it, it was gone, like a greater force had snatched the memory before I could think on it. Instead, seeing the look of fear hurt, and my ears drooped a bit in reflection, although I tried to hide it otherwise. Why was he afraid of me? At least I was pretty sure it was me he was afraid of. He'd cowered in response to my words, almost like I'd struck him. But after a moment, he did seem to build up the courage to respond, taking a guess that we were in 'Iron Country'. Iron? I tried to pull from what little knowledge I actually had of the map to figure out where he might be coming from. The snow sort of said the northern lands but the only 'iron' I could think of was to the east of that kingdom. So... maybe somewhere in between?
Unable to come up with an answer I decided to make my companion as comfortable as possible without flat out abandoning him. Besides, the cold was already starting to get to me; I was dressed for the heat of the plains, not for bitter winter. I moved away from him several paces, stepping up onto the front...deck? of one of the abandoned buildings to get away from the snow. The sliding door that served as its entrance sort of reminded me of some of the more permanent buildings in my hometown, a feature unique to it, at least on the plains. I glanced back toward the other boy, with a quick announcement. "I'll check in here for anything useful!"
I half expected him to leave while I had my back turned. I didn't necessarily blame him; if I'd managed to scare the pants off of him somehow, he probably wouldn't stick around.
With a mighty tug, the stuck door sprung open and almost off its track, the suddenness off it startling me. Regardless though, I carefully crept inside. The building was dark, of course, with the only light that lit the room I stood in coming from behind me, of course, and a couple of breaks in one wall. It looked like the building bore at least two or three other rooms as well. But aside from dust, there wasn't much of anything interesting in sight. So I moved to the other rooms.
Within one of the back rooms, I found a small, dark box of some sort. I'm not entirely sure why it drew my attention; maybe because it had hinges but there didn't seem to be any way to actually open it. I turned it over in my hands a few times before slipping it into the bag at my side, itself seeming to already be full of items that I would take inventory of later. Likewise, mounted on one of the walls, though faded, was a fairly large shield--or at least large compared to my smaller size--that hadn't completely rusted over like the swords that accompanied it. With a bit of effort, I managed to detach it from the wall, and carried it back toward the entrance of what I had more or less determined to be an abandoned home.
The shield was a little on the heavy side for me to carry around without strapping it somewhere, so for the moment I dropped both it and my bag beside the entrance to the building, taking that moment's reprieve to see if my companion was still there. Regardless, I headed for the second building next, still in search more for something that was useful for warmth. At least moving around was keeping me from freezing.
tab█.CHAKRA :100 / 100█.STAMINA :100 / 100█.STATUS :None tab█.EXP :000█.RYO :両000█.HEALTH :Fine█.INJURIES :None█.THOUGHTS :"Where am I?" ▀▀▀Suddenly I'm running slowly. Suddenly it all goes dark. ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
It was tragic, really. Everything the deer boy did, intentional or not, would have en-deered nearly anyone else, but was absolutely wasted on Jean. Jean saw not the drooping of the ears, and even the attempt to maintain communication even though Jean had done nothing to deserve it, was completely ignored, the traumatized grown man in a child's body too busy being afraid of a deer.
That being said, the child with the strange markings on his face wasn't wrong with his assumption that Jean would make a run for it once he was out of sight. As soon as the other party entered an arbitrary building, Jean scrambled up to his feet and frantically looked around for the best direction to run in. was terrifyingly all he could see, Well, to be specific, there appeared to be more buildings past the initial ring of eight, but so what? The chill wind that spirited away every ounce of heat Jean's body tried to generate, causing his teeth to chatter and his everything shiver while his hands gripped tightly to his sides in search of the slightest bit of warmth, encouraged a more pessimistic view than an optimistic one. Again, struck by the unfamiliarity of the landscape, he couldn't believe that there was really anywhere safe to hide.
In such uncertainty, it appeared that his curiosity had set out to be the death of him. In his survey of his surroundings, he had noticed the translucent cocoon he had been so rudely awakened from, or at least what remained of it. What appeared to be some sort of supplies lay among the broken shards, so he was going to have to walk back to the shards either way. However, when he knelt besides the shattered ruins of his long-time bed, it wasn't for the backpack and other miscellaneous items Jean reached for but one of the almost clear but definitely gray, glass-like shards. The surface, smooth and clean to the touch felt alien in Jean's hand, the warmth that suffused it taking him by mild surprise. He had to wonder if this broken piece was generating heat by itself or if, even after so many minutes in the freezing cold, it had retained whatever heat it had somehow collected. Whatever the reason for the heat, the shard did not grow colder as Jean held it between his palms. He initially just appreciated the small object of warmth. It wasn't long, though, before he observed the other properties of the shard. The edges, sharp as a knife, glistened in the light reflected from the clouds above and the snow below. It was these edges that prompted Jean to handle the crystal piece carefully, and to the extent that his strength and trust in his own hands would allow him, he could neither bend nor break the glass-like piece in his hand. No amount of throwing the shard into another or even stomping it could even chip away at the sharpest of edges, where it would have been the most fragile. An interesting material indeed, so because of that interest, Jean of course took some with him.
Taking the supplies laying among the fragmented pieces to be his own, Jean searched for something he could use. There were a lot of both normal and weird things, both inside and outside of the backpack, which appeared to be the main storage unit. This included a satchel within the backpack and an even smaller satchel within the satchel, like some sort of storage unit version of a matryoshka doll. Jean took the smallest of the satchels and chose to dedicate it to the carrying of the shards, handpicking two of the largest ash-colored pieces he could find and a handful of smaller ones that either had a well-defined point or had at least one long, sharp end that could be used for... well... a variety of things.
Spending all this time kneeling in the snow to pick through materials really drove it home the extent to which the cold took a toll on the body. It had felt like it had gotten a little warmer, but even that slight warmth was nearly unbearable. Ruined as they might have been, the buildings provided some shelter from the cold at least. It was just that... the deer was here and, Jean's body stiffened with fear again when he saw monster boy come out of the house he had gone into. well, look at that. Jean had actually found logic while he was studying the shards. He just needed some a lot of so far unsuccessful self-convincing. To his relief, after dropping his belongings, the part fearsome animal boy went into his second building.
Jean, in the meantime, reconsidered his options as he rubbed his hands together and blew warm air into them. he severely exaggerated the threat of being in close quarters with a deer, and he knew that he did, which was why in the end he chose to not leave in the futile hopes of finding some place warm. Taking his belongings, Jean haphazardly brought them all to the nearest house that still had a single, tiny glass window. For the time being, he left them at the front as he checked out the inside of the house. How structurally sound did this place look? Did it look like there was anywhere that could be used as a shelter of sorts? Was there anything Jean could use? Particularly something warm? He didn't want to bring out the blanket in his backpack only to have it get wet with melted snow.
Royal Taorito
Posted: Wed Dec 13, 2017 2:00 pm
tab█ Shea Fal'nevan xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx What is this [ someday? ]xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx tabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabAnd frozen in the footsteps untaken, we stand side by side. What is it really, but a tomorrow or today? tabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabAnd frozen in the footsteps untaken, we stand side by side. ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
[x] To my surprise, the older boy was still there. Although he froze in panic again when he realized I'd exited the house I searched. More than aware I'd slighted him somehow, I gave him a half grin and entered the second house anyway.
This particular one was home to almost nothing. No furniture, no discarded objects, not much of anything. At least it was also home to no broken walls or spaces for cold air to reach in. It was still chilly, but at least the wind was gone. One of the back rooms held a little more life in it. It bore what looked like the remains of an old bookshelf, except it had several diamond shaped slots, within which sat scrolls. Most of them were moth-bitten to the point they fell apart into dust when I touched them. But a couple of sections of two different scrolls survived contact. I held them delicately so they wouldn't disintegrate further.
It was too dark in the room to make out anything on the scrolls, so I moved back to the entrance.
Similarly to when I'd first heard the other boy speak, the words on the parchment in my hands didn't make sense at first glance. But I blinked and suddenly I could read it clearly. That didn't mean I could make heads or tails of what I was looking at though. One scroll, which had broken into two pieces, had a little bit of information on something called 'Oni', and something about 'techniques', as well as a description of how to use said technique. So was this... part of a scroll to learning yuunin? Most beastlings were taught by word of mouth and demonstration, because our way was much more simple, but I'd seen books the do'vra used to learn their elements. If that were the case, and this was something similar, then maybe it could be helpful later. The second piece of scroll I had was called 'Saiketsu', and talked about manipulating blood. That was as far as I read it before moving on.
Returning to my bag and the shield discarded outside of the first house, I flipped open the satchel to look for a safe place to store the scroll fragments. Among the variety of items--a coil of rope, an empty waterskin, a potato, and other things--I found more partial pieces of parchment. I didn't spend much time on them aside from a glance at any sort of titles. Fire, Earth, and Ice. This definitely sounded like it had to do with yuunin. I wasn't sure about the first ones, but these for sure. Regardless, there were other houses to search, so I stuck all of the gathered scroll pieces in a journal from the bag, where they would be safe until I got a chance to copy them onto paper before they vanished completely. I didn't know if they were important, but they looked it, and they looked very old.
Exiting the house, it seemed my companion may have finally left. Or maybe he was investigating the buildings as well, though I was doubtful of that until I spotted disturbed snow leading to the building farthest from where I stood. At least I knew which one to avoid then. Rubbing my arms, I headed for the third of nine buildings to see if it held anything interesting.
Unfortunately, this one was emptier than the last one. It didn't even have a bookshelf inside with more decrepit scrolls. Whoever once lived there--or the people who found this place after--left nothing in their wake.
The cold was really starting to get to me, which was something I wasn't used to. I'd traveled days before with little more than what I wore now. But if my body really was back to before everything happened, then maybe resistance to cold had less to do with me personally than I thought. At twelve, I'd never experienced a cold winter before, and by the time I had, things had changed. I rubbed my arms, shivering hard as I considered what to do. Finding firewood was a good option. I needed to build a fire if I was going to keep myself from freezing to death. That first house with the hole in the wall was probably actually a good option because I--we, if I could get the other boy to calm down--wouldn't want to leave the door open and smoke needed a place to go.
Then I remembered the ground was covered in snow as I made my way back outside. I didn't really want to dig around in the white powder for sticks I wouldn't even be able to use because they were wet, especially without gloves. So I gathered a few broken chunks of wood and furniture from the couple of buildings I'd already visited and made my way back to the first house.
I didn't have anything green enough to do my usual trick of lighting a fire, so I resorted to the flint and steel found in my pack. Of course, I didn't have much dry enough to start a fire either, except for an old, ratty piece of what might have bee a sheet at some point. The next problem was something to build the fire on so I wouldn't burn down the whole place. Maybe the bricks from the well would be loose. I frowned slightly at the concept of touching the probably ice cold stone, and decided to check out the next house for something helpful instead.
tab█.CHAKRA :100 / 100█.STAMINA :100 / 100█.STATUS :None tab█.EXP :000█.RYO :両000█.HEALTH :Fine█.INJURIES :None█.THOUGHTS :"Where am I?" ▀▀▀Suddenly I'm running slowly. Suddenly it all goes dark. ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
The inside of the house, Jean wasn't sure how he felt about it. It was pretty bad, like really bad, but he had lived in a nice, comfy home all his life. Nothing here could possibly compare to that, which meant that maybe he was expecting too much. Anyways, aside from sucking with his amateur architect review, Jean found some rolled paper and a burner. In whatever light managed to get into the building, he squinted to read the words on the side of the burner. There were some sort of instructions for charging it with friction. Well, that was interesting, Jean studied the copper contraption, trying to figure out where the friction should be applied. The most likely culprit was the stick that extended from where the dial would have been on a normal burner, which made Jean wonder how he was to turn on the burner... He supposed by twisting the stick? Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
Jean knelt down with the burner and created friction on the extended rod. His hand twisted on the supposed friction gathering mechanism and just kept on twisting. Round and round, Jean generated friction. [1 copper burner friction]
After what felt like an usable amount of friction had been generated, Jean started to look for how to turn on the machine. He didn't stop moving his hand, though, continuing to charge (at least, he thought it was charging) the burner while he figured out how to turn it on. Anyways, he figured that turning the rod was the way to turn on the burner, so his hands were moving over the rod either way. [2 copper burner friction]
Jean found the valve switch and he flipped that to open. Then he tried twisting on the rod. A spark rewarded his efforts, but nothing more. Well, that was a little anticlimactic. Did he need fuel in that case? Opening the chamber where the gas can would have been placed, Jean found no fuel, .
At a bit of a loss, Jean carried the burner and the scrolls to the front of the house where he meant to plop it down with the rest of the belongings, but before he stepped out of the shadows of the entrance, he saw the deer boy come out of his third house. Jean, as before, froze and watched warily as the other party seemed to enter and exit buildings rather quickly, bringing out piles of wood. He eventually returned to the first building he had searched and came out without all the wood he had gathered. Jean, hidden by the shadows of the house he yet stood in, was easy to miss by the fawn focused on his work, or maybe not and he just hadn't been given a reaction. It didn't matter much other way. Once the boy entered a house and stayed in said house for a while, Jean stepped outside and dropped his load as he intended.
he pitied himself as he hugged his body and shivered. Looking around, he saw that, surprisingly, the kid didn't leave hoof tracks. Just normal shoe tracks. In no mood to think too hard in this kind of extreme discomfort, Jean simply turned and entered the next house, choosing to work in the same direction as the boy so that he could avoid meeting him.
In here, Jean repeated much of the same thing: getting a feel of the architecture and trying to find anything that could warm him up. apparently, Jean really was in no mood to think too hard if it took him this long to realize, He learned, again, just how hopelessly lost he was. For the time being, though, Jean stomped his feet to generate some extra warmth and added dry wood to the list of things to keep an eye out for.
Item get: Talent scrolls x3; Copper burning that is powered by friction x1
Royal Taorito
Posted: Sat Dec 16, 2017 7:55 am
tab█ Shea Fal'nevan xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx What is this [ someday? ]xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx tabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabAnd frozen in the footsteps untaken, we stand side by side. What is it really, but a tomorrow or today? tabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabAnd frozen in the footsteps untaken, we stand side by side. ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
[x] The next house, like the rest, was mostly bare, having been emptied out either by its owner or looters when this little village was abandoned. Regardless, there wasn't much to find, although it did bear a few treasures. Under an old desk in what might have once been a bedroom I found a small box that held what reminded me of a lock picking set. Just... with more tools than recall ever seeing. Most of them were rusted but a couple survived. The handles were made of a hard material that didn't seem like either wood or metal. But puzzling over it didn't help me figure anything out so I pocketed the small box and set about searching.
The only other thing of note in the bedroom was a strange rock. It wouldn't have caught my attention if it weren't for the fact it had moss on it while nothing else around it did. Almost like it had been placed there recently. That was disconcerting since, until that point, the only signs of life I'd seen were from the older boy who was afraid of me. I carefully picked it up and headed back toward the entrance.
On the way back out, I noticed for the first time a difference in part of the floor. I'm not sure why I hadn't noticed, but I heard it when I stepped onto it, the difference in sound when it shifted slightly under my foot. Most of the floor was wood, but part of it was made out of... stone? I knelt down to place a hand on it. It was definitely cold, and with a quick rap of my knuckles, it certainly sounded like stone. It was broken into small slabs sort of like bricks but the noise it made reminded me of roof tiles. Did these people put roof tiles on their floor? It was harder than clay, though, or it may have shattered when I stepped on it. But if it meant I could build a fire on it for warmth, I didn't particularly care. I set off with a goal in mind.
The only other object that brought attention at this particular house was a small sack outside, beside the door. The items inside it weren't of as much interest but they could still be useful for something. Especially because I seemed to have a small tent in my inventory but no way of pinning it down if it got windy. The little bag was filled with a handful of metal stakes, so I grabbed them.
Out in the light of a winter sky, I inspected the rock I'd picked up. The moss was arranged oddly on its surface, and it was only when I realized there was a mouth inked onto it and a pair of beady eyes that I put the pieces together. It was a face! And the moss attached to it made a mustache and beard. That was kind of cute. It sort of made me feel bad for taking it, but now that I could see it clearly, it had a thin layer of dust on it, and the moss was drying out. It had been there for some time untouched. So, for now, I decided to keep it, and made my way back toward the first building, where all my stuff lay.
I packed my new belongings with everything else I apparently owned and moved all of it into the house. Leaving the door open for a moment for light, I more closely inspected the room. And, much to my relief, this home had the weird floor, too. With a grin, I went about setting up a fire.
Actually starting the fire was the hardest part, since I'd never really been good at doing it manually and mostly relied on my yuunin to start one. I had a trick with grass or plants that I'd always been able to do that started a fire by altering them slightly. I wasn't entirely sure how it worked, but it worked, and it usually shocked people because, well... it wasn't something most beastlings could do. Then again, I had always stuck out from other beastlings. My wandering thoughts returned to the present when I finally managed to catch the dry sheet I was using. Or at the very least it was smoking, so something was burning. I blew gently on the embers until it caught flame, and piled on some smaller chunks of wood I'd found. From there, all I could do is wait and hope it didn't go out.
Scooting back a pace, I wrapped the blanket I'd found in my bag around my arms and then remembered I wasn't alone. I wondered if the other boy had found a source of warmth yet. I needed to close the door anyway, so I decided to check and see if my companion had made a reappearance.
The door of the house a couple buildings over was open, and I could see his stuff laying outside, but couldn’t quite catch a glimpse of him from where I stood. Glancing back at the fire to make sure it hadn’t gone out, I pulled my blanket tighter and braved the snow once more. "Hey," I called softly, not sure if he could actually hear it. When I continued I spoke slightly louder, stopping a good distance from the home so as not to spook him. "I have a fire going, if you want to warm up." The offer was there, and he could take it or ignore it as he wanted. I wasn’t going to pressure him. Waiting a moment to see if he responded, I headed back to the warmth of the fire. Assuming he didn’t follow, I shut the door gently behind me.
tab█.CHAKRA :100 / 100█.STAMINA :100 / 100█.STATUS :None tab█.EXP :050█.RYO :両000█.HEALTH :Fine█.INJURIES :None█.THOUGHTS :"I need to get warm." ▀▀▀Suddenly I'm running slowly. Suddenly it all goes dark. ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
There was nothing of interest in Jean's second house. Although, for everything it lacked, it seemed to be in better condition than the first house. At the very least, Jean's every step didn't cause it to creak and moan. Granted, this only applied to the first floor, which was a complete mess. The second floor seemed to have come crashing down long ago, leaving a pile of rubble to litter the first floor. The walls and roof, as noted before, were still standing, though, creating a very nice, open indoor area if one ignored all of the safety hazards on the ground.
Jean took his time shifting through all of the rubble. After all, this was really the only way to tell for sure if there was anything in the house worth any note. He missed Shea passing by the front door of the house in this time, which had been left open because it wasn't like closing it was going to warm up the place any, so when he heard a soft voice come from outside, Jean froze in shock. he almost hissed his thoughts out loud. Unbeknownst to apparently even himself, some part of Jean had accepted that he was going to have team up with the, deer and pray that all went well. When Jean turned to the source of the voice, he saw only an empty doorway. However, he didn't need to see Shea for his suspicions to be confirmed. Shea spoke again, talking about a fire this time, and Jean was sure.
Jean needed a moment to muster his courage. Surprisingly he had some, untested as it might have been with his sheltered life. "Wait..." Jean spoke clearly, catching Shea just as he passed in the sight of the door to the house Jean had been searching, "I'll be right there after sorting my belongings... and thank you for your invitation." Jean took care in making sure something like stutters or a lack of manners did not mar his words. Even more care, though, was placed in where he placed his eyes. They were firmly planted on Shea's shoes, had been there since Jean caught sight of him. If he just focused on the completely human feet, Jean could somewhat talk normally.
Once Shea passed, Jean released a breath that he didn't know he had been holding. No, more than that, he staggered a little bit, expected tendrils to prop him up, but of course that didn't happen because he was strictly not using them at the moment, and ended up falling to the debris-covered ground. Deep breaths were taken as he recovered from the taxing encounter. Deer... Traumatic incidents aside, Jean never liked the way they looked, specifically their antlers. Too much like tentacles for his taste, hardened tentacles that he had once had the displeasure of seeing the destructive power of.
After recovering, though, Jean set to work. He had a lot of items he could bring with him. Although, bring too much and it'd give the impression he wanted to stay, which he definitely did not despite realizing the advantages of sticking together. However, the problem was that Jean didn't know what he would need. He could make use of nearly everything, so he ended up leaving less behind than he took. His tent, bedroll, shovel, and axe were the only things he left in a neat pile in front of the second house he had entered. Everything else found a place in the backpack or, in the case of the burner, under Jean's arm.
With the majority of his belongings in tow, Jean rapped at the door to the first house he saw the child explore and then let himself in. Trying really hard to calm his quickening pulse and the feeling of panic, Jean closed the door behind him. Eyes focusing on the fire and then turning away from even that to look at some random spot on the wall, Jean stood near the entrance for a probably awkward moment. Then, he started talking, "I am rather... uneasy around deer, so you'll have to forgive me for being so... disagreeable," explaining himself and his purpose, "Still, I can see that we will need to help each other out, or else we'll probably just freeze to death here... so I would like to offer a... partnership? Yes, that might be the term for it," and finally holding up the burner he found to try and show that he was most definitely not going to do something ugly like freeload, "Regarding fire, I know you have one made already, but I found this burner. It reads powered by friction, and I've created some sparks with it, but I think that's all it does. Nonetheless, it might be convenient if we need a somewhat portable flame." No doubt, it didn't look it with his averted eyes and distant words, but Jean was certainly trying his hardest to make amends and come off as someone who was willing to and could work together... just as long as he didn't need to look at antlers. He certainly had a ways to go before he could make a remotely convincing argument for himself.
Royal Taorito
Posted: Tue Dec 19, 2017 8:39 am
tab█ Shea Fal'nevan xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx What is this [ someday? ]xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx tabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabAnd frozen in the footsteps untaken, we stand side by side. What is it really, but a tomorrow or today? tabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabAnd frozen in the footsteps untaken, we stand side by side. ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
[x] A smile lit my face, ears perking up, when I heard my companion respond. Evidently he was in a different house than I'd thought. He'd likely had the intention of ignoring me, but somehow built up the courage to confront me. I guessed it was just the mutual need for warmth, and he likely still wanted nothing to do with me, but this was a start at least. Happy, and a bit more optimistic, I retreated to the house with my little fire.
Sitting beside the fire, which was, thankfully, catching the larger pieces of wood, I took a moment really focus on myself. I was younger. I knew that, but wasn't entirely sure opposed to what. And the energy I was used to coursing through my veins was gone. Something I'd experienced before but... different. There was still something there, but it felt different, foreign. I focused on my hands, holding them slightly apart as I tried to form any of the elements between them, but... nothing seemed to work. Maybe it had to do with my age? If I was around twelve, it was before I gained any of my yuunin, but I still had the beastlings' form of it. There were no plants around to test it on. During winter, the roots retreated or died, so they were too far away to pull from the frozen ground. I let out a small sigh of frustration.
My attention was diverted not a moment later when I heard a knock at the door. I dropped my hands and pulled the blanket tighter around myself once more, trying to focus anywhere but to door and the boy who entered in hopes of helping him relax. He spoke, though, without moving from the entrance, which drew my gaze back to him. He was uneasy about deer apparently. Since I had antlers, although they were short, that why he had been so afraid. Unfortunately, without my yuunin there wasn't much I could do about it. I'd hidden as do'vra before, so it wasn't impossible, but without access to my abilities I couldn't so anything to alleviate the fear. Regardless, it seemed like a necessity at the time to stick together until we could figure out where exactly we were and how to get back to civilization. Wherever we'd found ourselves was abandoned a long time ago. The small ring of houses we were in was only a small portion of the abandoned town. It made me wonder who had lived here, and what happened to make them leave. Because, while very old, the buildings were still mostly intact.
My companion offered a partnership, a temporary agreement that I imagined he would break off the first chance he got, and-- burner? I looked at the device in his hands. It was a box with a coiled plate on top of it with a small rod sticking out the side. He mentioned it being a portable flame. Technically all fire was portable, but I guessed this was something to put the fire in so it wouldn't burn anything else. Maybe. I examined it quizzically as he explained, before tearing my blank stare away and looking at my own pile of belongings. "Um..." I shuffled through the pile in search of anything of similar value. "I found a weird box, a rock with a face, a big shield that looks like its in good condition, and a bunch of scrolls with weird yuunin on them. One even had something about blood." I gestured to or picked up each item in turn as it was mentioned, unrolling one of the pieces of parchment when I came to them to see which one it was. One of the ones titled 'Oni'. "And this bag was with me when I woke up."
Frowning slightly in thought, I tried to remember what led up to the moment I woke up, but not much came to mind. It was like trying to see the bottom of a lake through murky water, and even brought the same sense of suffocation, so I quickly retreated. Shuddering--which I passed off as just a cold chill--I turned away from the pile of belongings and tucked myself into the blanket once more, staring at the fire. "I'm Shea, by the way. Sorry for spooking you. I'm not really sure how I got here."
tab█.CHAKRA :100 / 100█.STAMINA :100 / 100█.STATUS :None tab█.EXP :050█.RYO :両000█.HEALTH :Fine█.INJURIES :None█.THOUGHTS :"Why can't I remember anything?" ▀▀▀Suddenly I'm running slowly. Suddenly it all goes dark. ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
When Shea began speaking of his own findings, Jeanings eyes looked over to inspect what was displayed. Deliberately, his gaze followed the ground so that he would not accidentally catch sight of Shea's antlers. Out of everything displayed, it was the box and shield that caught his interest. However, he recognized that it was the scrolls that were possibly more important. Though, he had never heard of this "yuunin" before. Was it another way of saying fuuin? Or maybe it was some unrelated category of ninjutsu?
Whatever the case, Jean started walking closer to the fire and sat down... Initially, he was going to sit as far away from Shea as possible, but as he began to sit himself on the opposite end of the fire, he realized that he would be facing Shea from this position. That prompted him to stand back up and... hesitate. He ended up sitting down opposite from Shea in the end because that was his limit. All he could do was promise himself to be careful whenever he looked at the fire.
After setting down his luggage, Jean took a cursory glance of the house he was in. Well, excluding the side Shea sat in. Then he looked at the items Shea had brought out. While looking but not touching at the mysteriously closed box and the oni scroll, Jean reciprocated Shea's introduction, "The name is Jean," in a stiff, unfriendly manner, "Don't be sorry. You can't help it. As for how you got here, didn't you come flying out of that mirror? I didn't see any other broken crystals out there, and that broken mirror is suspiciously in the right position to have crashed you into my pod."
Jean still wasn't sure what yuunin was, but he could swear the scroll Shea showed him was bloodline jutsu for the oni line. Granted, he didn't know anything about the oni line, but it was sort of implied throughout the scroll that this was a bloodline limit. Jean shrugged away the yuunin mystery.
However, it did remind him of what else he had brought with him. Thinking to just follow along with the pace the deer boy had set, Jean started to bring out the other things he'd found. "Scrolls," he explained as he rummaged through his pack, "I found some myself. Some were in my bag and I found one in one of the houses..." Before the scrolls were found, a few more items of interest were pulled out without explanation: a pineapple, a potato, some rod, and a turkey-shaped kitchen timer. The last item, Jean tried to work with a frown when he pulled it out, turning the little dial. His frown only deepened when the dial didn't tick back to the 0 mark like it was supposed to. he complained, Sorely disappointed, Jean set the timer down with the rest of the items.
Finally, he pulled out the scrolls he mentioned and set them out on the ground, rolling open each of them because he actually didn't know what was written within each. It didn't really matter which way they read when he opened them, so they probably didn't all read in the same direction. "..." Jean had a short pause between scanning each of the scrolls and explaining anything, "Well, this is what I have." Yes, Jean. Superbly helpful. Recognizing it himself, he forced himself to add, "Some... it looks like bukijutsu and eiseijutsu..."
tab█ Shea Fal'nevan xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx What is this [ someday? ]xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx tabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabAnd frozen in the footsteps untaken, we stand side by side. What is it really, but a tomorrow or today? tabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabtabAnd frozen in the footsteps untaken, we stand side by side. ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
[x] Mirror... I must have missed that somehow. Or maybe I did vaguely remember it. And why would I have come through it? Was it something like a source gate? But what would I have been doing on one of the planes? It was a difficult journey but most of the planes could be used to travel across the world. That just led to the question of where 'here' was. Jean, as my companion was apparently called, had mentioned Iron Country, which I was no closer to figuring out. I'd originally thought it to be one of the kingdoms, but the more I thought about it, the less likely it seemed. With how their kind worked, I felt like they would have known we were there already in the short time we'd been there.
Jean also mentioned a pod, and crystal. What pod? I recalled the glass, pale and dark, scattered around in the snow where we'd landed. Had I broken something? Maybe he had been protected from the cold and my apparent appearance shattered that protection. I was clumsy in general, but that made me feel terrible on top of spooking him. I dropped my gaze to the fire, resting my head on my knees.
However, when the pale-haired boy spoke up again, my attention was brought back to him. He mentioned finding more scrolls, and proceeded to dig through his belongings in search of them. In the process he pulled out a fruit and a tuber, both of which looked vaguely like things I knew but completely different. Both of which I also had for some reason. "Ah..." The sound escaped me before I actually thought about what I wanted to say. I buried the lower half of my face in my arms to stop myself from saying anything else regardless of my curiosity. Should Jean look in my direction, I averted my gaze elsewhere to let him know to continue with what he was doing. I wanted to know what they were because, at the very least, the fruit looked tasty, and I was a bit hungry. But I could wait.
The variety of scrolls were retrieved and laid out in varying directions. He looked over them for a moment before proclaiming bluntly that that was what he had found. Realizing how unhelpful that was, he continued, explaining them to be two things I had never heard of before. "Bukijutsu and Eiseijutsu...?" I tested the words more for myself than an actual question, but it was still there even if it was rhetorical. Reaching out slowly, I just as gingerly took one of them to have a closer look. The particular piece I'd grabbed mentioned things like cleansing wounds, and massaging areas of the body to increase 'chakra' flow. Chakra? That word was mentioned on some of my scrolls as well. I had always been bad at connecting dots, but this was beyond me altogether.
I returned the parchment to the others laid on the floor. It seemed I had a lot more questions for this young man that was terrified of me than I originally thought. So I started with what I thought would be the simplest to answer. I could guess he had at least some knowledge on what the scrolls bore, but because there was so much information that I didn't understand, bombarding him with those questions was just going to make him more uneasy than he already was. Instead, I returned to the question that started all of them and dug through my bag in search of the fruit I didn't know the name of. At least, I was pretty sure it was a fruit. It was colorful like one, but had a crown of leaves and was kind of pointy. I picked at the shell-like rind for a moment before holding it toward Jean. "What is this, anyway?"
tab█.CHAKRA :100 / 100█.STAMINA :100 / 100█.STATUS :None tab█.EXP :150█.RYO :両000█.HEALTH :Fine█.INJURIES :None█.THOUGHTS :"What kind of fruit is this?" ▀▀▀Suddenly I'm running slowly. Suddenly it all goes dark. ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
