Great Dojo

[Kotomine_Rin]

Zeke

"D'aw. So you weren't going to let me go? How heartless." He sounded truly, genuinely hurt by the prospect. Really.

"I like that in a woman. And hey, how often do I get the special VIP treatment?" He sat down and stretched his muscular arms behind his back.

[Bern]

Amanda

She tilted her head in wonder, as if she was seriously pondering what he had just said. "I dunno...probably every day. You look like you'd be more than a handful to deal with,so I pity your master."

Then Amanda just stepped past the barrier like it was the easiest thing in the world, which it was. It wasn't meant to hold her after all. Then she kneeled by his side and pinched his cheek with seemingly no care in the world. Well there was care, all the wrong kind of care, the eyes madly sparkling with insane curiosity kind of care.

"Say how much mana do you really need?"

[Kotomine_Rin]

Yang

"Uh, hey!" He waved, blood and bruises and all. "Aruna's magic isn't doing its thing on me. You don't think she's in trouble, do you?" He asked her sort of casually, hiding his worry.

[Kotomine_Rin]

Zeke

Zeke frowned like something was wrong. She got way too close, and more importantly, he was starting to regain his sight.

And then she was right up his face, and his eyes widened. Only a bit after did he relax a little.

"No, nevermind. You looked like someone familiar. I gotta say, you've got pretty good entourage if you're already clued in on that. Hehe, now I feel like I'm on the losing track of the horse race." He looked away, hiding his flushing face. Now he was just getting actually embarrassed.

"Mana's really not an issue right now though. It's this little shell that's giving me hell." He pounded on his chest with his fist. "What good is rocket fuel if you're working on some vintage model? Besides, we probably don't use the same measurement system, so what good would answering do?"

But hiding behind all these expressive or unexpressive eyes, something similar to her mad sparkle. It wasn't unlike curiosity, but it wasn't a scholar's more than a cat's, who just found a city-sized mouse to play with. It was as if he were watching a tv show. He didn't see her as a person in the slightest. Just a novelty to throw off his boredom. Even that impromptu scare was a welcome addition to his collection.

"I could use a snack though. How about I just take as much as I need?" He grinned like a smug shark.

[Bern]

Amanda

"You're handling the charm pretty well too, curious." Her eyes flashed purple as her gaze trailed across his form, his true form, and nothing else. Her gaze pierced deep, deeper than anything had ever pierced him and as it did her grin got wider and wider until she was openly giggling.

"How cute."

She pulled up half a dozen vials from her pocket. How they fit was a mystery in of itself, one that would go unanswered as the mage immediately begun mixing them without a care for for his threat, did she even catch on to the threat?

"Eating me would be really inefficient, no I have something much better for you...here."

Amanda shoved the final mix into his mouth with the same mad care as all else.

"Have a taste of the old you~"

[Kotomine_Rin]

Zeke

The slightly blushing lad blinked when she popped the bottle in his mouth... only for his expression to wrinkle and sour. He drank the whole thing, of course, but then just spat the bottle away from him.

"Bleh. Have you ever had to eat your own leg girl? If you were going to go for that, you could have at least hidden the taste in something pleasant. This is just vile- and in more ways than one." He crossed his arms and pouted, clearly giving her the disappointed uncle stare.

"Eating my own kids won't nourish me in the slightest. Though I guess I should thank you for bringing them back home. Wait, hrm..."

He paused, perplexed for a moment. He wasn't able to connect to that the same way as with the others. And then it dawned on him.

"Wow, amazing. You actually managed to make something useful." He was actually genuinely impressed. He felt his self-healing in a more fundamental manner than before. With this, he processed and nurtured the wounds he wasn't able to heal physically... until a dark aura seeped from him.

He flexed his hand and grinned. "Woah, I get it. Pretty perceptive. The effect won't be immediate though." He got up and ruffled the crap out of her hair like she was his lil' sis or something, before pulling her in a bear hug and giving her a big smooch on the cheek.

[Panda]

Nanako

Nanako barely gave Yang any time to finish, quickly zipping up to the blonde and leaning in close, breathing a little heavier as she caught his scent again. Then what he said registered, the squirrel girl stopping short so completely that even her tail stopped moving.

"Wait, you were being boosted by magic?" Nanako said, despair encroaching on her for a moment at the idea that the man couldn't actually hit as hard as he had been. That lasted for all of a moment before she remembered that he'd only seemed to get faster in the middle of their fight and that he hadn't pulled out of the grapple even then until later.

"Hm, she looked like she could handle herself," the squirrel girl said after a short pause, "So can you still hit that hard without it, right?"

[Bern]

Amanda

"Of course I'm amazing, you should be thankful I a gave you that for fr--uumpfhh."

She didn't resist his bear hug whatsoever but the gaze from her cerulean eyes turned flat just then. The mage was clearly unimpressed with his behavior. "Stop fucking up my hair or I'll fuck you up. Just look at how easily I could fix you, now imagine how bad it'll be if I try to hurt you. I've seen you, all of you." She wasn't even whispering anymore, no Amanda was practically gloating at this point.

[Kotomine_Rin]

Zeke

The jovial man stopped short entirely, freezing like a statue. If she could see it, she'd recognize that oh so very disappointed look.

"Yes, yes, never heard that one before. Very original, great delivery, keep it up."

He flipped her upside down without a care and just stared straight into her eyes.

"And honestly, it's not like I'm hiding my nature. Good job I guess? Here, why don't we test your theories a bit?" For a moment, something in his eyes lit up.


And Amanda's spirit felt like it was searing. RIght in the middle of a dragon's jaw. A terrible star forge from beyond. There was no pain, only the heat of the old world's flame.


"Who am I?" He asked her calmly, perhaps even genuinely curious on what she figured out.

[Bern]

Amanda

Amanda looked equally bored even as she was flipped around and brought into the jaws of the cosmic dragon itself. Surely this man didn't expect to be frightening after she had seen him through so thoroughly. Oh that's right, she was getting ahead of herself here. He wouldn't yet know what she knew, and she he didn't know what she knew then there was no way for him to know how he was the one actually under the microscope now.

 Her cerulean eyes flashed purple once more as she looked up at him, past him, through him. All the way to-

"Which one of you? The dragon? The stars in the night sky? that black abyss crying out to be filled, the voices in your head that won't ever stop and give you the silence you so utterly crave. You are the one who are many, yet you are one. But as the sun sets, you aren't even you anymore."

[Kotomine_Rin]

Zeke

His eyes narrowed menacingly, and he did something oh so terrible to the poor damsel.

He dropped her.

"Not bad, not bad at all!" He crossed his arms, looking a bit surprised. No, it was more fair to say he had the chills. "That's exactly right. I'm not a single form, but a composite life form drawn from the force of many. You could say that I am the death of individuality. But really, there's an even simpler way to put it."

He held a hand up, fingers stretched out to the horizon.

"Five."

He held out a fist, shut like a hammer.

"One."

And he peered riiight into her pretty eyes.

"Which one's stronger?"

[Bern]

Amanda

Unsurprisingly he dropped her, she'd been prepared for something like this though and before she even hit the ground a gentle gust of wind picked her up. The winds flipped her over and put her down just as gently on her feet, and through it all her skirt clung to her legs and preserved her modesty.

She made a show to brush her jacket off, even though there was no dust on it. Perhaps it was part of some ritual she wasn't divulging, even a calming charm may be a charm unto itself. only a fool would disparage systems that seemed trivial or simple in nature.

"Five is stronger than one."

When he meet her gaze she stared back without blinking, and her eyes glittered with appreciation, the slight changes in color broadcasting her mood.

"But two is stronger than five."

The nuance shifted once more.

[Kotomine_Rin]

Zeke

"Hah. Sounds like something one of your chiefs would blabber." He snickered, looking down on her like a kid. No, he didn't underestimate or belittle her. He simply found such an innocent way of thinking charming.

"One. One army, a real army, under one leader, following one flag to the end of one dream. A purpose." He raised his fist to the sky and flared like a star. His eyes... they looked truly ravenous then. "Your purpose died years ago, girl. Protecting people? Keeping the peace? Don't make me laugh. This... peace has done nothing more than divide and weaken this citadel. If you were one, you could have already reached beyond the stars. There are things out there far more interesting than dusty old library books or dissecting mice."

It was a tragedy, really. He never could see with the people eye to eye on that. He hoped at least a little, she might.

"But you are right. Two would be the best hand right now. What do you want to play it for?"

[Kotomine_Rin]

Nanako

Nanako barely gave Yang any time to finish, quickly zipping up to the blonde and leaning in close, breathing a little heavier as she caught his scent again. Then what he said registered, the squirrel girl stopping short so completely that even her tail stopped moving.

"Wait, you were being boosted by magic?" Nanako said, despair encroaching on her for a moment at the idea that the man couldn't actually hit as hard as he had been. That lasted for all of a moment before she remembered that he'd only seemed to get faster in the middle of their fight and that he hadn't pulled out of the grapple even then until later.

"Hm, she looked like she could handle herself," the squirrel girl said after a short pause, "So can you still hit that hard without it, right?"

Yang

"Oh, yeah. Totally. It wasn't a major difference anyways, the dirt sandwitch's still getting served." He took a fighter's stance. "Hope you got room for dessert." And so he rushed at her, ready to unleash a machinegun flurry of jabs.

[Bern]

Amanda

"Hah...."

The breeze picked up just a tiny notch to match her rising laughter.

"Ahahaha..."

The shadows grew, the darkness darkened beyond the limits of comprehension. A trap had been sprung.

and he was the one who had sprung it.

"..Ahahahahahaahahahahahahha.."

"To think you ideas would be so....so limited. The one will fall before the five every time, it's fist will never punch through. But two, two will cut it."

Her eyes were fully purple now, lit up completely as strange patterns swirled through them.

"Do you have the strength? to grasp that which lies beyond power and become the two that will cut through the five?"