Silly Plots 4: It's not particularly silly, is it?

[Deathkeeper]

Summer Glade

"The hats make them stronger, right?" That seems like the logical assumption.
Rowan certainly seems unsure about his subsequent questions.
"So uh. Sage this is gonna sound dumb but you're totally sure that Peach just separated us and made you a gaiad, right? Because she did tell me that both of us were strong. And the same age. And called herself our mother. So uh."
It does sound like there could have been something which occurred which would give her the impression those things were true.
One does not often doubt goddesses. Or such things close to them.

[Recaiden]

[Blind Date]

As long as Mei doesn't squeeze too hard, Mei probably won't find out that June's hand is squishier and more boneless than the average human's.

"Seems unlikely I'm going to have the chance to practice for several hundred planets' worth of practice," June says as an aside.
"But it definitely seems like a good mountain, so it was a good choice!" Ignoring, of course, the obvious 'if this date goes badly, I might be stranded on a random planet with no way to get back'.

More accurately, how can you know a mountain isn't good if you haven't been there?

So.
Hiking.
June's pretty lightweight so if there's a good view, it's pretty easy to get both of them to stop.

You sure that the boneless thing won't come up? That sounds like it would be noticeable without even squeezing much at all. On the other hand, what does Mei know about what a human hand feels like? Very little. Next to nothing, honestly.

"Haha, no probably not. But there weren't a lot of other resources about it. It was either, you learn the hard way, or you don't." Mei tries to explain.

An interesting situation that June is ignoring. Obviously, the sooner they leave, the sooner he knows he's not stranded. But trying to leave sooner could raise the chances of being stranded at all.

"Thanks. Maybe the mountain should get a name early? What would you call it?"

[Seally Plot]

It is pretty frightening.
But, Zophiel trusts her.
Trusts both of them, actually. Definitely trusts them more than he trusts himself, so there's not even time for it to become 'increasingly' pushing, since he just goes.

But he doesn't have something that could be called his soul. Completely exposed to everything and with nothing that could help bind it or preserve it or rebuild it, it just wore away. The swords, since they became sentient were always with him, basically have his 'soul''s imprint, but that's really the only thing remotely close.

...
Well, that's not strictly true. Beneath the intersection of the four seals, there was another soul hidden there, and now that one of them is irrecoverably gone, it's exposed. It's not his but it's there, ripe to be snatched away.

It's not something that he was aware of.

Right away things are not going as well as they'd hoped.
Zophiel should just feel like he's falling asleep, with that awful music fading away. Except, he can't go down the cable with his soul, since he hasn't got one in his body. At this rate he'll probably get stuck in one (or both) of his swords, or floating around as a ghost or something.
Meanwhile, the other soul is getting snatched away, when what they actually wanted was for it to stay there!

But interrupting the spell-song at this point would just make things even worse.

Anchor is reaching towards the intersection of the seals, metaphorically speaking. She expects there to be something there of, course, something that was sealed away. Something that's more active now that the seals are so reduced. Something that (with some help that her 'sisters' have provided) she can contact. "Hello?"

[Rebonack]

[Peachy Weald]

"They get the hats when they murder someone," Sage says.

Actually Sage.

Because she just popped out of the tree trunk again.

"Murdering people and ruining things makes them stronger."

Well.

That isn't great.

Then time for dumb questions!

"I'm not sure? She stripped the fae mask off us and used that to make me, I think? She didn't really explain what she was going. We just kind of expressed that we weren't very happy with what happened to us. That might figuratively make her our mother?" Sage reasons. "Unless... there's something more to it? Grandma always did take that there was something magical about us."

[Deathkeeper]

Peachy Weald

Rowan continues to be kind of morbidly curious what he spent three days as. But he won't pressure Sage.
"I mean, I think there's a difference between being 2% something magic and having actual superpowers or being literally her kids. I don't think Peach is the kind of faerie that goes around having kids with mortals anyway."
Rowan is PRETTY sure his dad would have told him if he'd actually had children with a giant magic centaur. Or that he was switched at birth for some reason.

[Rebonack]

[Peachy Weald]

"Yeah but we have no idea who our mom was and dad never talked about her," Sage helpfully points out. "Maybe there was a reason. The faeries like their weird rules and ohmygod I've been chatting to you this whole time topless."

Sage flushes a deep red as she shields herself with her arms.

Uh uh uh she could... um...

She waves herself a top out of peach leaves!

Yeah.

That works! Problems solved.

Oh god she's such an idiot why didn't she realize she was doing that earlier what is wrong with her? Is this a nymph thing? This must be some sort of nymph thing. Stupid faerie rules!

[Deathkeeper]

Peachy Weald

"I mean we have some old photos- and yeah. I mean between you and Peach and the fauns this has been entirely my day." He shakes his head.
"Today I have met exclusively pixies and naked people with furry legs. I am the only exception and we don't even know!" And goblins but he didn't get into chatting distance of any of them. At this point there have been implications that some faerie queen is either literally or metaphorically his mother so for all he knows he could poof into a giant elk lady at any point. Faeries sure are weird.
"But what, do you think she expects me to just run at the goblins with this pole-hook and hope something magic happens?" It's not like that COULDN'T happen.

[Rebonack]

[Peachy Weald]

"Why didn't you tell me!?" Sage demands, her face still flushed despite the fact that she has attended to the issue.

She isn't really mad at Rowan.

She's mad at herself for letting the nymph stuff get to her head.

Rowan is just there and convenient to yell at.

The gaiad takes a few deep breaths to calm down.

Okay.

Okay okay she's got this just... breath. Everything is fine it's just your brother who is also sort of you everything is cool.

Okay.

Pruning hook stuff.

"I'm not sure.... I can control the Weald since it's part of me. I take after Peach in the obviously physical sense. But... if she is our mom in some sense then what would you have gotten from her? You're still human."

Sage is confirming that one. Rowan does not appear to be a faerie of any kind.

[Deathkeeper]

Peachy Weald

"I thought it was a faerie cultural thing! I was kind of busy with the other existential questions!"
That and he kinda figured she knew. Like, did she not feel the wind down there?
"I mean you're pantless too but I'm pretty sure you knew that." If she wasn't aware she was half deer he's going to be concerned.
He looks down as she confirms he's human. Good. Hopefully that's literal and she doesn't just mean Mortal. Though apparently things that are really not human can't be turned by Buttercups and other faeries so it probably wouldn't be so bad to be something different like those ponies and centaurs and talking dogs when all these faeries are running around.
"Well that's good. Being an elk would probably make it hard to fit into places. But are you sure you don't sense anything at all unusual?" he asks of Sage.
He closes his eyes and tries to focus. Has there been some power there he's not aware of? He doesn't think so. But he's never really looked.

[Rebonack]

[Peachy Weald]

"How would I know anything about faerie culture I've been one for a couple days, tops," Sage indignantly retorts. "The existential questions are pretty important, though. Did our soul get split in half or something? Is that even possible? I've got no idea."

They were studying agriculture not applied metaphysics!

"Does anyone even make pants that would fit me?" Sage wonders aloud, glancing back at her hind legs. "Who am I kidding, of course someone probably does. Inside is weird."

Possibly the weirdest.

"I... guess? I'm not really sure where I would start checking for unusual magic. I've never really looked for something like that in myself. Eerr... yourself."

There she goes voicing things Rowan is thinking about again.

Not because she's psychic or anything.

Just because they're so similar.

Then?

Rowan turns his focus inward!

He'll feel...

Like... a warm lump in the pit of his stomach. Or his liver? Somewhere down there. Like a little ball of bright summer sunshine. What the heck is that?

[Deathkeeper]

Peachy Weald

”You could always go to the city and ask the Ex-Buttercups what they do. They seem real nice.” Sage doesn’t seem quite as (slightly annoyingly) bubbly. But maybe that’s because she’s a Peach gaiad and not a Buttercup?

But aha! There’s something! Maybe that’s what Peach meant when she said he already had tools. That feels an awful lot like summery magic.
Rowan pulls at the ball of sunshine. Yes, you down there. We need you. Sage needs help at her border. Rowan just needs to figure out what exactly that sunshine feeling is and how to use it. For now he just tries to mentally tug at it…

[5a Violista]

[Blind Date]

At this point, June is just assuming that Mei already knows, and is just politely not mentioning anything.

"I see. Well, admittedly, there are an awful lot of scarcely-livable planets out there." It'd make sense if lots of them were practice runs by terraformers-in-training. "And after you make enough good ones, then it's just a net positive from then on out." Assuming you have enough time to just infinitely make more.

Anyway, hiking.
And naming mountains.

"I would probably call it...Tim," June says after some amount of thought. Mount Tim sounds a lot better than Mount Timothy, after all. But it's very much a pun. "Or maybe something more literal, like Neblina Peak...but I guess that would be really weird if the cloud cover doesn't form as hoped. Maybe something more fanciful, then, like Devil's Pride."

Naming something is extremely important.


[Seally Plot]

It's okay!
Because they know what they're doing. Even if something goes wrong, it'll be fine.

The Paladin feels pretty sleepy.
Normally, falling asleep during a ritual is pretty bad. But with no torture devices set up, it's pretty clear that closing his 'eyes' isn't a problem this time, or otherwise they would have done more to stop it from happening. Or at least would've told him to not do that.

So, he's okay with that.


In the (metaphorical) intersection, there absolutely is something there.
In fact, even though everything seems to have gone oddly wrong so far, this part seems to be going right. If that not-his soul hadn't been sucked into that gem, this might have been much more difficult than it is right now.
...
Honestly, there's the sense that this not-his was a back-up...thing. If you're going to seal away a supposedly-evil goddess, you'd want some sort of backup plan to give you time in case something goes wrong. Probably. That's probably what it is.

The 'hello' is met with a moment of anger so intense that it burns up the very moment itself. A hunger for revenge so wanted that it makes time feel like it's dragging on so far that the universe will end before revenge can be attained. A wave of desperate need to be worshipped and even just acknowledged, tinged with the tiniest bit of hopeless hope that the 'hello' was intentional and not just an accident that just happened to reach through, like so many other things have done recently. "Hello?"

[Rebonack]

[Peachy Weald]

"Maybe," Sage muses, but whatever she's saying falls away as Rowan turns his attention inward.

There is a ball.

A ball of summer.

Not to be confused with a summer ball which would be... what? A beach ball or something?

No, this is different.

This is the idea of summer in the form of a ball. Or maybe not even a ball. A lump?

It's all the feelings and expectations and dreams of summer, ancient and modern.

Rowan reaches in with his mind's eyes, seizes it, and pulls. At his touch it-!

[Deathkeeper]

Peachy Weald

Rowan pulls at the essence of summer and it bursts, filling him with his glow. It feels...warm. Warm and heavy and slightly damp but not necessarily in an uncomfortably cloying way. More in a recently rained way. He opens his eyes.
"I think I got something!" he excitedly exclaims to Sage, who will likely take notice at his hair becoming lighter, like the color of fields of wheat. As well as his ears turning and becoming long, hairy, and quickly very reminiscent of hers. The antlers extending from his head are very much not like hers.
"Peach must have left me this power for when I needed it. Feels really funny, though." he says with a flick of his huge ears.
Um. Should she tell him?
She has a few seconds to do so before things get even more extreme.
Namely, Rowan blows up.
Well he rapidly increases in size as his legs and backside swell into the mighty flanks of a young adult elk as a long cry escapes his lips. Several nearby animals of Sage's weald respond in kind.
Hail, the Prince! Son of Queen Peach!
He isn't quite as towering as Peach but with that look Sage might realize just how much he does resemble her. Especially with that glow of Summer that surrounds him like a mantle. And of course as she does, by extension.
"Um."
Yeah that about sums it up.

[Rebonack]

[Peachy Weald]

"You did?" Sage asks excitedly. "What is... it."

Oh look.

Deears.

And antlers.

"Umm... Are you-" Sage begins to ask. That was going to be 'are you feeling alright' but then DEER BUTT and ELK YELLING.

What.

Why?

Sage looks between her brother, the tree, and the forest floor far below.

"...are you going to need help getting down?" she asks, otherwise at something of a loss for words.

[Deathkeeper]

Peachy Weald

Rowan looks down at the ground, then back at his legs dangling loosely from the boughs which creak under his weight. He looks back as best he can though his range of movement is limited by his antlers getting caught on the branches.
"Yes please." he mumbles.

[Rebonack]

[Peachy Weald]

"Okay, I can do that," Sage says as she slips back inside the huge tree.

Then?

There's a groan from the wood that sound suspiciously like 'Going down!' as the large bough Rowan is standing on begins descending down toward the ground.

Somehow.

Thankfully it isn't just falling off.

It's just... moving. Down. While still being attached to the tree. No doubt because of faerie nonsense. Once it reaches the forest floor Sage will be popping out again to observe, "This is really strange I'm pretty sure you still aren't a faerie."

So...

What the heck is he, then? Just like an elk centaur person or something?

[Deathkeeper]

Peachy Weald

Rowan does not seem happy about this situation. Nor his fate of never climbing anything again.
”Well I guess the matter of family heritage makes a lot more sense now. Do you think I should ask for child support from a faerie Queen?”
Who knows what she would even pay in?

[Recaiden]

[Blind Date]

At this point, June is just assuming that Mei already knows, and is just politely not mentioning anything.

"I see. Well, admittedly, there are an awful lot of scarcely-livable planets out there." It'd make sense if lots of them were practice runs by terraformers-in-training. "And after you make enough good ones, then it's just a net positive from then on out." Assuming you have enough time to just infinitely make more.

Anyway, hiking.
And naming mountains.

"I would probably call it...Tim," June says after some amount of thought. Mount Tim sounds a lot better than Mount Timothy, after all. But it's very much a pun. "Or maybe something more literal, like Neblina Peak...but I guess that would be really weird if the cloud cover doesn't form as hoped. Maybe something more fanciful, then, like Devil's Pride."

Naming something is extremely important.

Dangerous assumption...if anything depends on knowing how bone-filled your hands are. Which is probably a pretty rare occurrence. No need to straighten this out.
"Yeah. Very particular places, or for particular people."
"I think, well, nevermind."

The suggestions get Mei to laugh.
"Mount Tim, what a daring name. I think I like 'Devil's Pride' even if, you know, currently no devils are proud of it."
Names are very important. That's why naming people has so many rules. Mountains, though, you can do almost anything. Since anyone can name a mountain, no matter how many names it already has.

[Seally Plot]

It's okay!
Because they know what they're doing. Even if something goes wrong, it'll be fine.

The Paladin feels pretty sleepy.
Normally, falling asleep during a ritual is pretty bad. But with no torture devices set up, it's pretty clear that closing his 'eyes' isn't a problem this time, or otherwise they would have done more to stop it from happening. Or at least would've told him to not do that.

So, he's okay with that.


In the (metaphorical) intersection, there absolutely is something there.
In fact, even though everything seems to have gone oddly wrong so far, this part seems to be going right. If that not-his soul hadn't been sucked into that gem, this might have been much more difficult than it is right now.
...
Honestly, there's the sense that this not-his was a back-up...thing. If you're going to seal away a supposedly-evil goddess, you'd want some sort of backup plan to give you time in case something goes wrong. Probably. That's probably what it is.

The 'hello' is met with a moment of anger so intense that it burns up the very moment itself. A hunger for revenge so wanted that it makes time feel like it's dragging on so far that the universe will end before revenge can be attained. A wave of desperate need to be worshipped and even just acknowledged, tinged with the tiniest bit of hopeless hope that the 'hello' was intentional and not just an accident that just happened to reach through, like so many other things have done recently. "Hello?"

With the probably-back-up-soul out of the way - what a concerning thing to have! - Cleo will have to divert a little time to investigating it.

Hopefully removing that back-up doesn't end up being a disaster that leaves them with no time to respond to things going wrong. Although in this particular case, it would be easy to run out of time, wouldn't it?

What incredible anger, so hot that it's burnt itself away to inaccessibility as fast as it appeared.
"Wow. Yes, hello, I hear you."
"I think the people you want revenge on are mostly all dead?"
"I mean, well, I'm hoping we can help anyway."

[Rebonack]

[Peachy Weald]

"I don't think you can get child support as an adult," Sage points out, well, sagely?

God that's going to be a stupid pun.

Hopefully it never occurs to dad.

"So... what does-" she waves a hand at Rowen. "-this... mean exactly? Peach thought we could chase off the goblins on our own. So...?"

Sage can root-whip them.

But...

What about Rowan?

What did he get out of this deal aside from an inability to wear pants?

[Deathkeeper]

Peachy Weald

Yeah but he has a backlog!
”Well if nothing else I’m pretty sure I could break a boulder between these muscles and this bronze hook.” See this is what happens when you fuse someone to an elk. The solution is hitting it really hard.
”I could maybe try burning the brambles away. Fire is summery right?” He’s pretty sure he could maybe turn the heat up with the power of the SUN.
He’s also fairly sure that there’s a tree with his name on it somewhere in the Forest now. He’s already 1/3 gaiad and directly related to the Queen. He’s going to try not to think about that.

[5a Violista]

[Blind Date]

Bone-knuckles are only necessary in very few situations, but they're very important situations. Like playing the game Bloody Knuckles or using wooden spoons as a musical instrument or something. Technically you could still do it in that situation, but it'd be harder and give a different sound.

"Yup, pretty good name over all, June says. "Normally, I'd assume a mountain called 'Devil's Pride' would be a lot more dangerous or steeper than this mountain, but since coming to the Nexus I've met a couple devils" or whatever else they called themselves, it's confusing, "who weren't really all that bad. I mean, they had tails and wings and everything, so they were completely different from what I'd think a 'devil' was. So with so much variety, it'd make sense that some kind of random devil would have pride in a mountain like this one."


[Seally Plot]

The probably-back-up-soul is completely different from Zophiel in lots of different ways. After all, if one fails, it would be really dumb to have a back-up that's susceptible to the same cause of failure. At its core, it's more demonic, more female, more self-centered, less knight-in-shining-armor, less Paladin...
Actually, it could be argued that Zophiel would be more accurately called a back-up, because it definitely seems pretty old - even possibly hundreds of years older than Zophiel.
Plus, during the trip to rescue that Sekhmet's soul in the frozen hellscape, Zophiel absorbed an awful lot of ambient demonic Despair magic, or whatever was in the air there, in order to get those wings that he still has. This soul appears to have been feeding off that energy.

Luckily, it seems just as likely to have extra stretched-out time as it would be to run out of time.


Revenge isn't complete just by killing some people. It requires total deicide. Casting them down from their high places, slaying them in front of their sycophants, and then letting the worshippers tear apart whatever remains in a desperate frenzy, and then finally finishing the...
...
Also there's a large feeling of relief.
Actually being heard.
Actually being acknowledged.
Actually being...
"How." Less of a question, more of a statement-of-fact that Anchor will explain what she means by hoping to help. And an actual question, asking what 'we' refers to: "Who?"

[Recaiden]

[Blind Date]

June, you might want to reconsider what counts as a very important situation.
"Oh, what'd you think a devil was? I mean sure, most of them don't have wings, but plenty do. Most of the exciting ones, if we're being honest."

"You're right though. Somewhere out there is a devil who'll be proud of this mountain. And one day, I'm going to find them, and tell them that the mountain's named after them, and- probably at that point they'll be very confused." But that will be delightful too!

[Seally Plot]

Well, all that really proves was that it was old when it was installed as a back-up.
But, there was something about how Zophiel's seals weren't the first thing they tried for this sealing, wasn't there? That must be what this was. The original, less seally sort of seal center.
It's not good that it's so full of demonic despair magic. That almost never helps; Zophiel did great to get usable wings out of it.

"No, I, uh, it was pretty thorough revenge. Anyway, that's beside the point."
And then that relief - really a wonderful feeling, to have people no longer burdened by lonesomeness, silence.
"You can call me Anchor. I'm working with my self and my father and with Zophiel."
"Now, I could just undo the rest of these seals. But that would be messy, right? So, tell me about you, and I'll tell you the better ways this can go."

[Arkhosia]

Mountain Trip

Spoiler

Show

Mountain Trip

Saint Lazarus lowers her weapon and frowns. A broken robot can still be bad news if it powers back up and goes haywire, but this one looks like it was looted of anything even resembling a weapon long ago. Should be safe enough to approach, especially since Fi could just bend its iron parts in half or whatever her powers let her do. Just like Fidelia, she's also aware that the robot isn't exactly a priceless relic, but it's probably polite to not explain exactly how wrong Calm Reed is. She's very, very, very wrong, but she doesn't need to know that.

"My guess is someone stole it, and was hiding it here while they sold off the important parts. There's a lot missing here," she remarks, gesturing with her sword towards the holes and the absence of a weapon.

"Or maybe it decided on its own that it didn't like shooting people and ran away until it ran out of power," Saint Laz also suggests, looking all about the remote cave. She supposes if she were on the run from her creators and just wanted to escape society and all of its senseless killing and be at peace, a dark cave in the middle of the wilderness is probably an appropriate place to hide and be all philosophical until the batteries run dry.

[Mountain Trip]

Upon closer inspection, it does appear as though the mech was thoroughly but crudely stripped for parts. Most useful or valuable parts have been removed. Which would point to St. Lazarus' first guess.

"One way or another, there seems to be little for us to do. Some drama played out here that we will never know. If this construct was sentient... I admit I do not know what the proper way of paying respects to its body would be."

Fidelia nods sagely, as if there were some great wisdom in Calm Reed's words being processed within that brain of hers. "I uh, can't say I really know the first thing about constructs either, but- I mean, I'm not sure we'd really be capable of doing that?" A beat. "Like, we didn't bring any shovels, and I'm not sure how well I trust my ability to summon any for you?" The woman shrugs. "But, could it be worthwhile to keep exploring later? Could be more of these deeper in, after all."

[Rebonack]

[Peachy Weald]

I've got no idea what you might be able to do, whispers the crickets in the grass. But I've shoved all the goblins out of the woods. I think they're just lurking around in this ghost town being gross? Maybe you can do something to convince them to leave?

Hmm...

What might something like that be?

They're the sort of creature that prefers the cover of darkness, but they don't require it by any means.

Maybe...

If it was very very hot and sunny they would decide it isn't worth the effort to hang around here?

Can Rowan DO something like that?

[5a Violista]

[Blind Date]

Hey! It's...it's just hard to think of situations where you need your finger-bones on the spot! There's almost definitely some very important situations that you need them, but it's just that June can't think of any at the moment.

June answers what a devil is supposed to be. "Well, it's supposed to be a spirit that was, um, so awful that it lost out on the chance to become a person, and...um...y'know." It's hard to describe something that doesn't exactly match the commonly-accepted thing, anyway. Since coming here, June's found it pretty hard to have the words to describe pretty basic things. Like, why does June have so many names, anyway? and things like that.

Anyway.
Conversation.
Yeah.
June laughs: "It would be pretty hilarious to see someone's reaction to being told that news."


[Seally Plot]

Not to mention, Zophiel has already proven to be somewhat unreliable when it comes to actually knowing things about himself.

Well, trapped in that gem(?), that soul can't really do anything at the moment.


Just being told the revenge happened probably isn't enough, because it doesn't feel visceral enough.
Now, there's the feeling that something was wrong: more specifically, something Anchor said is being disagreed with. Possibly more than one thing, but, it could be any number of things. Anchor did say multiple things, after all.

Speaking of seals, upon being mentioned they start to creak and groan and crack, like an old door being pushed against. The magic seal feels like it's aging and growing old. Zophiel's forearms grow slender to match the hands. And, centered around the wings, black cracks spiderweb out form the wings' attachments to the shoulderblades and hip.

And on a related note, 'tell me about you' is an odd sort of question, according to the being at the intersection of the creaking seals. What is supposed to be said? 'I'm so-and-so and my hobbies are such-and-such'? "I am Zophiel," is one of the things said, along with other such introductions such as "Thirteenth daughter of the First," and "This was an experiment" and "Goddess of the night" "shadow" "beauty" "insanity" "light" "murder" "disease" "undeath" "demons" "love" "deceit" "war" "seduction" "protection"

But, really, how is this thing supposed to know what to say with a question as generic as 'tell me about you'? Seems a little broad of a question.

[Deathkeeper]

Peachy Weald

Rowan is still pretty bothered by being a massive elk guy. But goblins are bigger bothers so he should probably deal with that.
Rowan trots over to the side of the Weald with the highest density of goblins at the border since that might be where they're coming from.
And then about twenty minutes will ensue of a REALLY big guy with a faerie polearm bellowing exceptionally loudly while it suddenly gets REALLY hot and sunny in this one particular spot.
He wonders if that will be enough to scare goblins away. He has basically no fighting experience so while he does whack the first goblin that gets smarmy about his appearance he'd probably not do well if they actually all ran at him.

[Rebonack]

[Peachy Weald]

Yeah that'll do it.

The goblins aren't huge fans of sweltering sunlight.

They aren't huge fans of getting absolutely clobbered by a swol elk dude, either.

As it happens, nailing that one gremlin with a golf-swing from the pruning hook actually set in on fire.

It smelled like burning garbage.

It was terrible.

Regardless! That seems to have been enough to drive them off! They didn't really like it here very much to begin with, what with the fact that there aren't any people around to torment.

"Wow that was actually pretty impressive," Sage comments as her sibling returns. "Hey, I think I'm probably going to be okay on my own for a bit. You should probably get back home before everyone worries too much."

He has been gone for several days.

[Deathkeeper]

Peachy Weald

Rowan pats Sage (who hopefully remembered to re-make that shirt after going in and out of her tree) on the shoulder.
"Okay. You keep in touch. Um. I don't know how faeries do that but I'm sure we'll figure something out. And sorry about the whole...whatever I did before. I'm glad you're settled in. I'll try to send folks your way so you don't get lonely."
Specifically people who can't get their names stolen easily but still...

[Gullara]

[Frescot Residence]

With the rescued children bundled up inside with blankets and something to drink, Adir is waiting right beside Cassie when the family arrives. He gives a little 'oof' as Kissa climbs into his lap, and lowers his hand (with one freshly splinted finger) onto her.

"Hey, kid. Hey, everybody," says the tired man. He tries to keep it lighthearted, but his voice is near to breaking. He swallows and, with a shuddering breath, centers himself. His eyes slowly settle on Laurana and the Cassie-shaped creature. "Laurie, come here." He doesn't add a 'right now' to his command, but the slightest edge in his voice should make that clear.

"This, here, is your sister." He whispers to her when she comes, after a quick hug. "That's... that's... another little girl that someone made to look and talk like your sister. It's like a magic trick. Okay? I know this is... hard."

He leans over briefly and squeezes the real Cassandra's shoulder through the mass of other Frescots crowding around her. He tries to comfort Kissa and guide Laurie over so she can hug the real Cassie too... his eyes on UnCassie all the while, searching. There's something chilly in his gaze.

[Frescot Residence]

Laurana takes a step towards Adir, but then stops and looks back toward... her sister? She looks confused an conflicted.

Cassie, on the other hand, the Cassie Adir is referring to, is filled with despair. "N-no." She protests weakly. "I'm Cassie." She insists more strongly. What is daddy saying? She can't understand it.

Sakura pulls a small ways away from the other Cassie, still holding her though, and looks up at the first. "Come here, sweetie." Cassie looks at her mom then Adir again, tears welling in her eyes. Then she runs full on to Sakura, who pulls her into the group hug. "Don't worry, you're my little girl." Sakura reassures and kisses the top of her head.

Finding some reassurance, Laurana slowly walks over to stand next to Adir. She's still very confused...

[Recaiden]

[Blind Date]

Hey! It's...it's just hard to think of situations where you need your finger-bones on the spot! There's almost definitely some very important situations that you need them, but it's just that June can't think of any at the moment.

June answers what a devil is supposed to be. "Well, it's supposed to be a spirit that was, um, so awful that it lost out on the chance to become a person, and...um...y'know." It's hard to describe something that doesn't exactly match the commonly-accepted thing, anyway. Since coming here, June's found it pretty hard to have the words to describe pretty basic things. Like, why does June have so many names, anyway? and things like that.

Anyway.
Conversation.
Yeah.
June laughs: "It would be pretty hilarious to see someone's reaction to being told that news."

You know? Well, the thing is, she doesn't know. If only June has the words to tell.
A lot of these things, she doesn't even know that she doesn't know that June doesn't know the words. So probably it'll never get figured out.
"Ah, that's backwards, how funny. Where I'm from, Devils are people who were so awful - in a certain way - they ended up as spirits."

Looking up at the mountain peak overhead, Mei says "We're quite a ways up here already. Should we take a break?" That should be in time not to overheat any boneless dates, right?

[Seally Plot]

Not to mention, Zophiel has already proven to be somewhat unreliable when it comes to actually knowing things about himself.

Well, trapped in that gem(?), that soul can't really do anything at the moment.


Just being told the revenge happened probably isn't enough, because it doesn't feel visceral enough.
Now, there's the feeling that something was wrong: more specifically, something Anchor said is being disagreed with. Possibly more than one thing, but, it could be any number of things. Anchor did say multiple things, after all.

Speaking of seals, upon being mentioned they start to creak and groan and crack, like an old door being pushed against. The magic seal feels like it's aging and growing old. Zophiel's forearms grow slender to match the hands. And, centered around the wings, black cracks spiderweb out form the wings' attachments to the shoulderblades and hip.

And on a related note, 'tell me about you' is an odd sort of question, according to the being at the intersection of the creaking seals. What is supposed to be said? 'I'm so-and-so and my hobbies are such-and-such'? "I am Zophiel," is one of the things said, along with other such introductions such as "Thirteenth daughter of the First," and "This was an experiment" and "Goddess of the night" "shadow" "beauty" "insanity" "light" "murder" "disease" "undeath" "demons" "love" "deceit" "war" "seduction" "protection"

But, really, how is this thing supposed to know what to say with a question as generic as 'tell me about you'? Seems a little broad of a question.

And they had such high hopes for this other Zophiel. But it seems they're tragically alike it lack of self-knowledge, huh?

If the revenge getting done isn't enough for you, your standards might be too high. It's so much more efficient to get 'the visceral thrill of hurting people' and 'getting those who wronged you hurt' separately. The combination is harder.

As for the demonic back-up soul, it went through the gem, but now it's in a hard drive.
Not being able to do something is part of the point. If they just let all the souls someone had in them do whatever they want, it would be chaos!

She should have said "What are you?", that would have gotten more to the point.
"Yes, yes, I know your name and, well, that is a lot of things to get the goddess of."
"Anyway, what are you made of? For that matter, where did this body come from? How'd it get like this?"
Anchor shakes her head. She has a sense that even now she's asking the wrong things.