Cross Effects 3.0 - June 23, 2016—April 02, 2018

[Elf]

Forest of the Present

Forest watched the short young man's reaction to her question, his goading her into trying to eat it.  The blond raised an eyebrow at his manic reaction and canted her head.  In her vast experience with people over the centuries, she didn't have to be a telepath to know he was afraid to try the pie.

Anastasia said, "This 'The Tops' place claims to offer the best pies in this city. They seem to be fine, at very least."

"I have a bit of a food allergy so I have to be careful, but if you say it's so good . . ." Forest made eye contact with the punk, smiled, and then leaned forward.  The bit of pastry and filling met her lips and she chewed.  There was a hint of garlic; it stung her lips in an oddly pleasant way, and she kept eye contact with the annoying brat as she swallowed.


Gabriel

Gabriel stepped away from Annabeth and took off his shoes, kicking them to the side, and then shed his socks.  The carpet underneath his feet was fairly soft.  He studied Annabeth and placed his hands on his hips.

"Why don't you strip for me?  Get me in the mood," he said with a smile, wanting to see her blush.


Rin

"Ugg,  I couldn't live with a roommate," Rin said with a grimace and a shake of her head.  "I'd need my space to do my work.  Plus my home also doubles as my workshop so I'd have to be careful of who I let in."

[yinsukin]

Joe

Joe leaned in a little bit.  "Wow you have enough space that you can turn your house into a workshop?  Shoot, I should have done martial arts or something, gotten good enough to bust supernaturals."  he retorted.

[Elf]

Rin

Rin eyed him and said, "You know, it takes a lot of hard work to practice a martial art, but it's rewarding.  I've always had space; it's one of the few perks of my birthright."

[yinsukin]

Joe

You kidding me?  Magic AND martial arts?  Welp, might as well see how far this goes. he thought as his posture weakened once more.

He raised his eyebrow.  "Birthright? Are you like a magic princess or something?" he asked genuinely curious.

[Kotomine_Rin]

Lorenzo Remei

A long time ago, or perhaps in a not so distant past, there was a cottage. In that cottage, two people lived, or rather, two corpses.

"_____, I can't see. It's cold..." An elderly voice pleaded, almost like her soul was freezing. Aside the two corpses, there was the silence of a once lively home, that and the crackling of flames.

"I know. Don't worry, rest. I'll go make some soup for you." A younger, hesitant voice answered. While it seemed more rigid and healthy than the woman's, far  less frail in comparison, it was troubled. Just because one had danced with death once didn't make seeing someone being taken by it pleasant.

And yet, he couldn't weep.

A cold, dying hand clasped down on his skeletal one, and despite its frigidness, it still felt as warm as ever.

"______, please tell me... another story..." She asked softly, perhaps even beautifully. Yes, even an old dying hag like her must've been a beautiful woman once. In that case, how could he refuse?

He'd live, no matter what. If not for himself, if not for them, at least for her. Lorenzo smiled.

"Did I tell you about the time I met my best friend?"


Huh!? A barbecue?!! Where!?

Lorenzo blinked at the sudden interruption, or would’ve if he had any eyes or eyebrows to do so. She was cute, and seemed helpful enough! She was soaring with wings like an angel. Odd.

Well, she could be his devil! Bwahahahah!

She had brought him a strange bottle containing some sort of sauce as tribute, possibly mixed with valuable spices! Aaah, he sure loved a lass who knew how to treat a man right. Grinning, he slooowly held his arm out to her head, almost like he wanted to pat it. Yes, sloowly, and suddenly-

-snap-

Indeed, he would have loved to, but there was no joy in rushing things. Instead, his hand stopped just in front of her forehead and he snapped his fingers cooly before snatching the bottle away. This wasn’t just some senseless gesture, but an expert movement performed by what could only be called a magician!

“Heheh, sure!” He grinned from ear to ear, which was easy considering he had no mouth in the first place. “Aye, that will be a fine addition to my treasure. Than-“

Suddenly, a voice stopped him short. He stopped, and there was a sort of unnatural pause to him. Even the fire of his ship and around him seemed to have frozen for a second, and yet the only expression the skeleton could bare was a blank smile. Perhaps it was better that way. But that voice, he wouldn't mistake it even in a thousand years.

 “Medaka…?”

[Elf]

Rin

"No, I'm not a princess," Rin said with a laugh, "It's not like that.  There is a line of succession though, and things a magus needs to pass onto her heir to make sure the family line's work is maintained."

[yinsukin]

Joe

"Wow.  So you have to get married huh?" he asked, maintaining his lowered posture.  He looked her in the eye for a moment as he spoke.  "I think im starting to get why your so disciplined.  It sounds like you have a lot to live up to.  Do you ever get tired of it, maybe wish that you could leave it all?" he asked, taking a sip of his bubble tea as he rested one hand on the table.

[Elf]

Rin

Rin looked at her tea, suddenly wishing it was something stronger.  Something that Duke mixed up behind the bar and put an extra cherry in it just because he liked her.  Not the tea wasn't good, because it was, but it wasn't a good Rob Roy.

Joe's words brought up one of several things she struggled with as a magus, but one she couldn't bypass like she could with Sakura.

Even with the "super special magical womb" that apparently all women in Rin and Sakura's mother's family line had, Rin couldn't let the father be . . . an average Joe.  Back home she would probably had a marriage of convenience, marrying the second kid of some magus family who didn't inherit their crest.  A possible loveless marriage where both parties had a lover on the side.

"I like the magecraft part of it, but yeah, there are somethings I'd like to leave behind," Rin answered with a shrug.

[yinsukin]

Joe

She didn't expand on it much, meaning she didn't trust him that much yet.  Pretty fair considering that they only met a few hours ago.  His eyes darted away from hers, still looking at her but more in her general direction rather then directly into her eyes.

I can't put my finger on it, but there is something she is not telling me.

He pushed the straw around the opening, playing with the bubbles as he spoke.  "Yeah it sounds like more than just a hobby or even a job," he said, gazing out the window for a moment before returning his attention to her.  "It sounds like a culture."

[Elf]

Rin

Rin picked up her cup and swirled the straw around, causing the ice to clink slightly.  The straw was drawn up to her lips and she took a long draw of it.  She tasted the sweet berry tang, savored it, and swallowed.

Joe wasn't quite looking at her, and she knew he had questions.  Which wasn't surprising.  However, she only met him a few hours ago and despite showing off a little bit, she wasn't comfortable sharing all of her torrid family secrets with a stranger.

"You wouldn't be far off," Rin said as she studied her cup.  "A 'hidden society' would be an accurate description."

[yinsukin]

Joe

Deciding he wanted to taste the bubbles, he sipped some up, chewing them as he listened to her.  "A hidden society huh.  You know, Ive been trolling some discussion boards.  A lot of people say that a good percentage of our residents are from other worlds, transported here against their will. I bet there are a bunch of those within the city."  he said.  At this point, he was just thinking aloud.

[Aiden]

Neptune

"Hiiiyaaaaa!"

She swung at yet another dogoo, their numbers seemingly endless. After Kicking a dogoo hard enough to send it flying, she took off into a sprint, spinning around wildly to thin the herd. "Maybe I'll tell you if you do something cool Gaddy~"

Just as she finished speaking a large chunk of the dogoos suddenly started converging into one large mass as they fused with each other. The blue blob grew larger and larger until it was twice as tall as a man and five times as wide.

Neptune ran up next to him as she saw what happened. "Watch out, that's a giant dogoo, they are really hard to kill. I mean like really really hard to kill like you wouldn't believe it just by looking at them, but they can take a whole lot of pain and they heal fast too."

Gadreel

He quickly put more bullets into the blue monstrosities, but their numbers were seemingly endless. Though he could turn and respond with seemingly instantaneous alacrity it made little difference. Or so it seemed; protracted conflicts often distorted one's perception of time, even for an angel like Gadreel.

Then the creatures foolishly gathered into a single foe for him to face. "That makes things simpler."

First he reached down and tore the bench out from the sidewalk with strength belying his true inhuman nature. It was quickly turned into a projectile, crashing into the large mass of azure goo and displacing much of its form. That was part one of his strategy. The so-called giant dogoo was a foe worthy of the risk involved with drawing the demon weapon Dainsleif, and so with a smile of growing enthusiasm he drew his blade out with his free hand. This was the second part.

He struck forward quickly, cutting across the places the bench had struck with his blade's edge to inhibit the giant dogoo's regenerative capabilities.

[Umbra of Chaos]

Meti

The dark haired girl gratefully accepted her belongings and tested them out a bit. Her swords were still comfortable in her hands and as her modesty was now preserved the blush that was on her face began to dissipate. "Hmm. Not really different. Is immortality supposed to feel special?"

She had begun examining her body in the meantime. Trying to spot any differences from before.


Lucy

"Yep. You definitely need to learn a thing or twenty." Lucy smiled up at the redhead. "I could teach you a thing or two about it if you want. I'm always willing to help the noob if they pay up."

[Aiden]

Sakura Matou

Sakura smiled at Ron as he got into the car. "Hi there~~~" she sung out to him. "You seem a bit surprised, hehe."

As soon as Ron shut the door, her driver began taking them to their destination at a leisurely pace. She'd told him to give them some time, after all.

Ron

"Heh, yeah, I guess I do. You weren't kidding about money earlier..." He took a closer look at the inside for a moment, just to get a sense for what he had to work with in here in case things went ugly. Not that he expected it, but it was a good habit to get into and the wolf in him appreciated the effort. "So, where are we heading?"

[SINIB]

Mordred

"Yeah. Though the thing is I'm not really a human. Or, at least I used to be. How to put it, I'm more like half and half. I normally hide it from people with a really potent illusion for the sake of convenience, but I really shouldn't keep it secret from someone dear to me." Ah, screw hiding. Breeze would surely didn't mind how she was. She unraveled her illusion right then, revealing her armored looks with a tail, wings, horns and red skin.

Auspicious Breeze

Oh! Oh. Ohhhh...

Well, Mordred really made scales look better than Breeze did. No doubt there! Whatever her girlfriend here was didn't have the same sort of twisted, craggy and ugly-colored hide that lurked under the skin that her mistress had conjured up for her with magic. So after a moment to adjust to it the former gladiator did something she'd seen since coming to this Nexus place.

She held her hand out and pointed her thumb up at the sky, smiling. "You make that look work, Mordred!"

IRON=SAKURA

Sakura sighed as she watched the man disappear, shaking her head as he swiftly made his escape. She shrugged, picked up his two remaining milkshakes, and downed them herself. After all, she couldn't let them go to waste.

Afterwords, the girl carefully rehinged her jaw, opening and closing her mouth to make sure everything was done properly, and slapped 40$ onto the table before she left as well.

After she left, she noticed that her two new friends were gone! She glanced around for a bit, until she saw Breeze leaning against a wall on a nearby roof. She briefly wondered why they were on a roof, but ended up shrugging. It didn't really matter to her why.

So she lept up off the ground and in one effortless leap, jumped up onto the top of the building, landing a foot above it on a conjured platform which she stepped down off of.

"Hiiii, sorry I took so..." She began to say, before she noticed her pretty and red Mordred was now. With her eyes sparkling, the girl excitedly bounded towards Mordred, faster than the human eye could see, stopping only inches away from the girl's face.

"Wow, why didn't you tell me you could look so beautiful!" Sakura exclaimed, grabbing ahold of her friend's hands. "You're so cute I just want to hug you forever!"