Swole City

[YOLF]

Yusho

Starting there? Better than ignoring it. At least they weren't scraping the bottom of the barrel again.

"Respect's difficult to appraise. There's different kinds, that justify themselves in different ways," Yusho spoke, closing his eye. He brushed his beard as he continued, like pondering on an ancient koan.

"But respect is the feeling of being recognized. It's the quality we show towards a value that deserves to be seen, and admired, or aspired to, and the care we should keep in our actions for it. Towards work that draws wonder and enchantment. Towards the indellible miracle that something is, even beyond reason. Towards mutuality, and cooperation. The respect for life and the respect for those willing to fight for something good are not the same, but they spring from the same source."

He took a deep breath. "Self-respect's just the same, but you don't seem to spare a thought towards it. That's a problem, if you haven't noticed."

[SINIB]

Valerie

"Ehh!"

Suddenly the Vampire King felt her limbs be pulled in different directions, her grip on Sakura broke after a few seconds struggle as the direction of the new assault made it impossible to resist.

She had no grounding nothing to brace herself on, if she tried pulling her arms back then her legs got spread and vice versa. This was so annoying, it's shy she hated magic, it just broke reality however it wished it was so damn unfair, she'd worked so long for her skill, longer than any mortal could comprehend and then this happened. Her annoyance flared through their bond in Tha tmoment even more clear than the arousal.

She bit her lip and glared at the purplehead. "Cheater, I would totally have won if you had not used magic."

Sakura

Sakura's exhileration and joy flowed back through even through it. She flipped Valerie over and pinned her against the sand while straddling her stomach. Her red eyes shimmered with lust and desire for the other woman, but responded with a frown. "You're acting like it's a fair fight without it-without my wand, you're way stronger than me, and I didn't want to rely upon somebody else's power." She tightened her grip on Valerie's shoulders. "I worked for my magic fair and square, and it required a lot of pain and sacrifice for me to get where I am today."

Her hand slid down and palmed Valerie's modest chest. "It's not cheating, but if you want another go at it, I'll let you up so we can go at it for real. Hohoho~"

[yinsukin]

Roman

"I don't know," he said.  "If I didn't have any self respect I don't think I would feel this shitty."

At last Roman stood up and stared at Yusho.  "You don't really buy that crap about cooperation do you?  That other stuff makes sense, but how does respect give rise to cooperation.  It doesn't make sense.  Everyone is always competing with each other..."

[YOLF]

Yusho

This time he did strike the back of Roman's head. Lightly, for his standards.

"Idiot!" He barked. "You know so little of the world and you act like you've seen it all. Competition brings about cooperation, and then cooperation furthers competion, and after that comes cooperation to keep making it through where one alone can't! Look up! There are constructions higher here than I've seen anywhere in my world but ravaged Chiaoroscuro! Do you think individuals racing each other out of spite made them? Are you going to tell me that's actually the case, here? Are you going to lie just so you don't need to admit you're being ignorant?"

Yusho pushed himself up, frowning, as sparks flew off his face. "The way I see it, you just want to become someone else and be spared the pain of changing, because you expect nothing of yourself, and you think no one else expects anything of other people, you coward!"

[Bern]

Valerie

"I have no interest in getting into a fight at this point since I have been in too many as of late. What I
... I was merely playing around and testing your strength, having magical tentacles show up cheapens the outcome completely, now please get of me before I truly get angry."

Her annoyance remained as she levels another glare at her spawn that was straddling her, her fangs were pulsing so hard now with the restrained arousal but she wouldn't allow herself to be taken in such a haphazard way. Sakura had not truly earned it and her emotions should be easy enough to grasp for the other girl.

Still her arousal needed to be dealt with in some way and there were few that could deal with her when she was this riled up.. . If she actually went along with Sakura she'd probably rip her apart.

[yinsukin]

Roman

"GODDAMN IT OLD MAN!"

Roman slammed his threw a punch at the air, towards no one.  "Shut up!  I expect something of myself damn it!  I just... don't think its anything comparable to what everyone else has!"

Sakura had her wealth, access to magic training, Valarie her vamperic biology, Mira an entire culture of muscle heads.  But he was just an ordinary man from an ordinary background with an ordinary life.

"Competition is still the desire to destroy the other, to dominate them!  You can't tell me that this is a cooperative thing!  I don't care what I have to go through in order to change but I....."

Tears began to well in Roman's eyes, the stress of the day finally getting to him.  "I WANT TO CHANGE!  I WANT IT NOW!  GODDAMN IT OLD MAN.  Do you have any idea how annoying it is to be average?  Even if I had something bad happen to me, at least that would make me unique!"

[SINIB]

Valerie

"I have no interest in getting into a fight at this point since I have been in too many as of late. What I
... I was merely playing around and testing your strength, having magical tentacles show up cheapens the outcome completely, now please get of me before I truly get angry."

Her annoyance remained as she levels another glare at her spawn that was straddling her, her fangs were pulsing so hard now with the restrained arousal but she wouldn't allow herself to be taken in such a haphazard way. Sakura had not truly earned it and her emotions should be easy enough to grasp for the other girl.

Still her arousal needed to be dealt with in some way and there were few that could deal with her when she was this riled up.. . If she actually went along with Sakura she'd probably rip her apart.

Sakura

"My magic is my strength as much as my body is." She insisted, but still let Valerie up. She could feel her annoyance blossoming into anger and mixing with her intense arousal, and Sakura's own interest flagged along with Valerie's-it wasn't fun for her to force Valerie down anymore, not like this, at least. The purplehead frowned. "Still, I'm sorry for pissing you off. I was just trying to play around a bit."

Her shadows disappeared back into the sand, and she hopped back and forth nervously between her feet. "I wasn't trying to offend you."

[YOLF]

Yusho

The wind stilled, and the lightning muted. Like the whim of the atmosphere, anger and disappointment flipped in Yusho to a sinking calm and a familiar cold, winding inside of him rather than outside. That long-forgotten drive to be someone in the endless coils of death and reincarnation.

"Shit, kid." He sighed. "Aren't you confusing the means and the goal? Why do you want to be unique? Why do you think uniqueness can only be made from selfishness?"

[yinsukin]

Roman

Roman's face got red.  "Because I want to be remembered!  I want to go down as someone great!  Everyone special in this place, the nexus has something special about them.  The legendary Yamada mastered chi and ki, Valarie is the oldest vampire, Elizebeth is a goddess, the citidal has sorcers!  Everyone has something!  So I thought maybe if I could be like them then.... maybe I won't be forgotten..."

Roman paused.  "So yeah I think it comes from selfishness!  You can't tell me those people got power for other people!  That kind of bullshit only happens in anime, superhero stories and fairy tales!"

[YOLF]

Yusho

Yusho shook his head like he was trying to throw off a hangover, throwing words back down his throat until the right ones came up. After a moment, he sat down, legs crossed, and huffed.

"That may be so. I would be a fool to claim any of them lacked selfish motives. I would also be a fool to dismiss your desire to be remembered as pitiful," the Chosen of the Dragons spoke. "But does Yamada not have students, as a master does, and do his students not have their own students? Does Elizabeth not have worshippers and her protected people, as gods do?"

"Let me tell you a story of my land. There, ten thousand dragons rule the world. This world is beset upon by fangs and claws, and witchery and death - and by the greed of these dragons themselves. They have pulled the silver and the jade from the bones of the land in the name of their empire, and even now they displace the nameless and the misfortunate for their own designs. They are pillagers. But they are also heroes. The scions of legacies unbroken for hundreds of years, matches and cousins to one another. Do you know why they have held on to power for so long?"

"Because they are not alone. Because they seek glory and peace too, for the good of their kin and their family, and the prestige they have been entrusted with, from branch to branch and generation to generation, that they in turn will pass on to the next. Or for the people beneath them, that they have united, that they swear to drape themselves in honor and victory for. All humans are like that." Yusho paused, tilting his head at Roman. "If you reach the summit alone and never descend, then no one will remember you. There is more than one way to make your life matter."

[yinsukin]

Roman

"GRAAAAAH!"

Roman grabbing his hair and shook his head.  The man was speechless.  In truth, no one had ever spelled it out for him like that.  And yet, he couldn't just accept that answer and move on.  After all, he was already in too deep.  It was at this moment that Roman understood why it was so difficult to take the first step towards something grand.  To go in the wrong direction, to take the wrong step was an overwhelming anxiety, the consequence of that decsion had his heart in a vice, forcing it to pump and beat.  All the while, another yet unseen hand grabbed his lunges, forcing it to breathe harder and harder.

Then it stopped as his mind cleared and he simply stared at Yusho.  "Is... is that why your teaching me?"

[Bern]

Valerie

The Vampire King sat up, yet she didn't didn't get up on her feet, instead choosing to remain seated on the hot sand of the beach. "Why did you come Sakura? If you were so interested in casually hanging out with me then you would not have been so silent for days. But all of a sudden you want to be seen as my equal..... Just what are you trying to accomplish here? It does seem to me yo are allowing your emotions to guide you to an undesirable extent... Although I suppose I should have expected such from your youth. It appears even I have lessons to learn from this..."

[SINIB]

Sakura Edelfeldt

"I... I, well..." Sakura began to respond, but bit her lip and stopped speaking. It was a hard question to answer, for some reason. The young magus found herself lost for words. "I don't have a good answer for that. Valerie." She sat down across from her crosslegged, staring right into her master's eyes. "I, well, Edel wanted to see my 'patron', as she put it, but that wasn't really why I came." The fledgling vampiress frowned. "And I didn't mean to ghost you, I've just, well, I've been busy helping Edelgard. She's in a rough spot, and she's been needing some help adjusting."

Sakura took a deep breath. This, this wasn't elegant at all. She wanted to be more like her sister, able to easily handle any situation and to not just follow, but to lead. But, even in a new place, she'd simply sought employment, and made a complete fool out of herself. It was just pathetic.

She clenched her fist and slammed it into the sand next to her. "I was jealous, and I don't know why. It was stupid, but really, I just want to get to know you better." Her emotions roiled, and the girl curled her toes into the sand. She felt lost, confused, and more than that, she felt like she didn't know what to do.

[YOLF]

Yusho

He smushed one of his palms onto his face, leveling his one-eyed gaze more calmly at Roman. "I'm teaching you because you wanted help, and because I think you needed guidance, and because I believe in these things I've told you."

[yinsukin]

Roman

"Thats not true," he said with a grin.  "Admit it old man, you just wanted company."

Weird.  When did he start referring to Yusho as "old man?"  It had a nice ring to it.

Roman walked to a tree and sat down, enjoying a cool gust of wind filtered by the shade.  The leaves rustled and for a moment the earth felt still.  He smiled at the old man and sighed.  For the moment at least, he considered how silly he might have been, thinking in such absolutes.  Maybe that is why the vampire king was able to take him so off guard.  A monster, thats all he was willing to see her as, all until that moment she....