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avalaughs2022-09-01 11:50 pm
test drive meme ⚔️️ 23 | FINAL
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ARRIVAL
The re-arrival of characters who were previously not here does not occur in the Bay this month. Instead, re-arrivals can appear at any time or place on the map as long as there is water. The Lady of the Lake is busy dealing with the situation in Atlantis (see the QuestBoard), so her magic isn’t very directed right now. Want to show up in the Red Spring? In someone’s shower? Stuck in the well the minotaur pissed in? Go for it! It’s time to get wet and wild. In fact, you could even show up underwater…
DARLING, IT’S BETTER
After the success at Dinas Emrys, the people of the cursed underwater town return to Camelot’s shores to offer a unique opportunity - to visit the town itself. It has only been seen in the distance before and this is the first time in many years that they have opened their gates to strangers, but all the hard work that the otherworlders have been putting in to fix the Calamity had not gone unnoticed even by them.
A few of the merfolk arrive at Camelot and ask people to put up notices for them. The following day they will be waiting for anyone who wants to make the trip down to the town, which they reveal is called Apkallun, and they will utilise the crown used to get everyone to Dinas Emrys to transform them into merfolk.
Merperson (fish bottom) - Merpeople’s singing voices are able to put people and creatures into a trance.
Cecaelia (octopus bottom) - Cecaelia can normally grant vengeance wishes, but per previous events, wish magic is not currently functioning as it should- so their primary features are the ability to ink and use their tentacles as additional controllable appendages.
Naga (serpent or eel bottom) - Naga have advanced strength and can extend their nails as claws.
The trip to the town is fairly uneventful, unless someone decides to wander off and gets stuck in some kelp or kidnapped by mischievous nymphs hiding along the route. Once there, it’s clear that the arrival of outsiders has been much anticipated by the town. They have put on a grand welcoming for their visitors and although many of the townspeople seem nervous to make eye contact with the strangers the atmosphere is not an unwelcoming one. Everyone is told that they may tour the town at their leisure and move about as they wish, and there is plenty to see.
OUTSKIRTS
It isn’t advised to linger around the areas outside the town, where the light of the lanterns quickly fades out through the water and leaves anyone straying wandering about in a murky darkness. For those more intrepid explorers, though, quick investigation of a noticeboard near the centre of the town will reveal a faded ‘dead or alive’ poster for something called The Wispmera, with a reward of twenty lavender pearls. Enquiring about it will draw laughs and puzzled looks from the townspeople, who will inform the enquirer that no one has ever gone after the creature in all the time the notice has been up. Further pressing will reveal, as they grow quiet and avert their gazes, that this beast will swiftly snatch up children who stray too far outside of the town unaccompanied.
However, all is not as it seems…
Hunting down the creature is no easy task and the descriptions of it are vague. It’s described as a barely-mer shaped thing that haunts the area around half a mile outside of town, occasionally drawing close only to be chased off by the town guard. Some people describe it as glowing, or having a massive head, and of being able to paralyse people from several metres away.
Even reaching the area where the creature is usually seen is fraught with dangers, including carnivorous fish and strong water currents, but persistent hunters will eventually come across the ‘beast’. It has the appearance of a huge jellyfish with poison tendrils wafting delicately though the water around it, but a moment of inspection will allow one to note that this creature also has a mer’s tail, and is simply sitting on a rock in the dark. If one can sneak up on it, it would be easy to kill. This first option would be the easy route to getting the reward and no one in town would fail to be grateful. The second, more risky option would be to engage it in combat, however those tendrils are able to paralyse a person within minutes should they hit. Anyone who is stunned by the creature will find themselves on the edge of the town after they black out, as if someone carefully brought them there.
There is a third option, however. Approaching the creature with no weapons will startle it, but it will not attack. This beast is far from the terrible child-stealing monster that those in the town would paint it as. In fact it has never stolen any children at all! All this poor thing desires is to be left alone, having never done any harm to anybody, and all of the stories about it have simply been passed down over time by frightened people who did not know what they were seeing out in the dark. If the hunter agrees to not kill the creature it will give them five pale blue-coloured pearls in thanks, but this will forgo the reward from the town. Unfortunately, no one is going to believe that you saw the creature at all.
DOWNTOWN
In downtown, around something that looks like it used to be a fountain, a bustling market has been set up with various stands and stalls selling local produce and items. Even the native townsfolk seem to be excited about this as it isn’t a regular occurrence and was thrown together in quite the rush after it was announced that strangers from the land would be coming to visit.
The stalls are offering food and drink, as well as handmade wares. The food is mostly fish-based, but some care has been taken to make choices available for those people who don’t eat fish (though that selection is somewhat limited). Locally made items are made mostly of shells, stones and driftwood as well as glass, and the stall-runners will eagerly push things into people’s hands if they show the slightest interest.
There is one large stall supplying most of the drinks on offer. Rather than being in glasses or bottles, they come in small magical bubbles that you pop into your mouth and break with your teeth and boast a variety of interesting and ‘enlightening’ effects.
- BLUE - a cool flavour almost like plain water, but uniquely fresh. Consuming it will cause the person’s skin to glow faintly for several hours.
- RED - tart with a faintly spicy kick. Drinking this will make you hiccup multi-coloured bubbles when you try to speak and lasts for around ten minutes.
- PURPLE - unexpectedly citrus-flavoured. This one causes the water being ‘exhaled’ from the gills as the person breathes to be dyed several different colours and will last for half an hour.
- ORANGE - tastes like honey and ginger. This one will cause the drinker to speak in rhyming couplets for around an hour.
- GREEN - tastes very much like absinthe. Also acts very much like absinthe. This will just get you very drunk very fast. Good luck.
UPTOWN
Part of the town is clearly far more… ‘polished’ than the rest. The homes are fronted with shining opals and nacre, and although the people there seem friendly enough there is a certain aloofness to them that isn’t found in the bustling marketplace or the streets around it.
But no matter, that isn’t why people have been directed there. The reason for any outsider to be shown the way to this area (unless they found their own way there) is to attend a concert being put on at the theatre in honour of their esteemed guests. There is a buzz about this show, with the performer clearly being someone of some note, and though there are no posters or pictures on the front of the building everyone is urged that they ‘wouldn’t want to miss it’.
The lights go up, and the performer is an ethereal oceanid of exceptional beauty who has been living in the town since she was brought to Avalon as an outsider herself many years ago. Though she doesn’t sing in a language anyone would be able to comprehend the emotion that she sings with could be enough to drive those in the audience to tears. Indeed, several people are seen to be leaving before the show is even finished and once it is over the entire room erupts into raucous applause.
Those otherworlders who attended the performance will be able to see beauty in everything and may find their emotions to be somewhat off-balance, making them more prone to outbursts and also to blurting out the truth to those around them. This effect should wear off after a few days, but any dreams that they have in the meantime will feature the oceanid’s singing in the background.
—-----------
THE RING OF DISP(HELL)
Part 1: Hot in Herre
As the otherworlders passed the test of nobility, the dragons reveal the location of the ring: it is hidden deep in a volcano. They are able to provide a map, but not much information about what can be expected once people get there.
The volcano itself is not one that the otherworlders would be entirely unfamiliar with, but it is not one that many would have had reason to approach before: the northernmost Ash Mountain, a volcano with plume-hidden bluffs nestled between Mab’s Cavern and the Perilous Desert. Though the Elphame traders are not around to offer much in the way of gear or protection this time around the dragons themselves offer to teach people a special spell (Spell: Dragonscale) which they say will protect from the heat and fumes that will need to be dealt with to reach the ring.
It’s recommended to give this spell some practice due to how valuable it will be when going up towards the volcano’s summit and for the trials beyond, but be warned that overuse can cause stiff joints, inability to regulate body temperature, and chronic burping that makes it feel like you just ate a dozen ghost peppers.
There will be plenty of time to gather supplies and kit, though some of the more unscrupulous merchants in Avalon are taking advantage of the rush as well as the lack of traders from Elphame, and are raising their prices. Some of the gear being sold may not quite be up to the task, either…
Part 2: Feeling Magmanimous
Arriving at the volcano is a trial in itself. The dragons will take those willing to go most of the way, but will drop them near the foot of the mountain to let them make their way up on foot. Their reasoning for this, they say, is to ensure that everyone is able to acclimate to the environment on their way up… but it might just be that they have better things to be doing.
With everyone loaded up it doesn’t take long for things to start becoming difficult. The heat rises swiftly around the travelers and there is very little movement in the air to offset it. Foul-smelling gasses rise up from vents and deep, narrow chasms along the edges of what appears to be a lightly-trodden path, if one could say it is a path at all, between slow-moving lava flows. What vegetation there is at the base of the volcano quickly gives way to the occasional tuft of dry grass and sickly-looking tree that has dared try to grow in this location. There is the constant, unsettling sensation of being watched despite the land around them appearing utterly bereft of any fauna.
Going too near to the edge of the path, woefully under-marked as it is, will put all but the most sure-footed in danger of slipping on the loose, shale-like ground beyond and sliding off down towards one of the oozing rivers of molten rock snaking their way down the side of the volcano. ‘Dragonscale’ won’t be enough to keep anyone from injury if they hit it, so watch out for each other!
A half day’s journey is what it takes to reach a mark on the map which seems to show the entrance to a large tunnel system, and though the entrance itself will be a tight squeeze for some it opens up initially into a spacious cavern that is somehow several degrees cooler than outside.
No doubt a few people will want to make up a camp and get some rest here. That’s probably a good idea. Beyond the cavern itself are several dark tunnels, shown on the map as Labrinth y Brenin, and some preparation is advised before heading into those passageways…
Part 3: Turnkey Toasted
When everyone is prepared, the final and most vital part of the expedition can begin. It is advised to take some kind of light source into the tunnels, as once the glow of the base camp is left behind the darkness is almost absolute. It quickly becomes hot and stuffy as progress is made through the winding passages and anyone who decides to lean on one of the walls to take a breather will quickly realize why - the tunnel walls are warm, almost hot, as if molten rock flows not too far behind them.
Occasionally the tunnel opens into small open spaces, like pockets in the mountain, where lava flows slowly in lazy rivers below the path as it precariously bridges over and edges around it. It might be tempting to linger in these spaces, where the pressing sensation of several hundred feet of rock above and around you is not so keen, but lingering for too long will have an unpleasant side-effect.
The fumes rising from the lava in these small caverns can cause powerful hallucinations, driving people to see their worst fears - real or perceived. It will be up to those who remain unaffected to make sure that their companions make it to safer ground, where the effects will wear off after a few minutes. Until then, it will be up to friends and strangers alike to make sure that those who are under the influence of the toxic gasses don’t cause harm to themselves or others.
Finally, hopefully without too much incident, the final cavern is arrived at. This is a large space, refreshingly cool despite several waterfalls of molten rock rolling slowly down the walls, and the ceiling glitters with geode clusters. In the centre of the cavern is a transparent, locked box inside which a simple ring can be seen. Underneath the box is an inscription.
You cannot prove, but you always know:
The apple falls, the wasp stings, a friend comes, the keys turn.
But what does this mean? The number of lava-falls in the cavern match the number of required keys to open the box, but surely the instructions can’t mean what they seem to?
Close examination of the falls will reveal the faint glint of gold behind them - the pieces are indeed behind the molten rock. Though it seems impossible, those who put their hands through the lava with faith that they will not be harmed will find that rather than burning, they only feel a pleasant warmth as the lava-fall parts around their hand and arm and allows them to pluck the key piece from behind it. Without faith… well, why would you stick your hand in lava if you really think your hand will melt off?
Once all the pieces are gathered by the faithful (and brave), the box can be opened and the simple ring is no longer quite so simple-looking. It can be taken without further trial, and the only task that remains is to make it back to base camp without accidentally falling off a bridge.
With the final item retrieved those who ventured out are free to return to Camelot, where they will need to hand the ring over to Merlin so the final preparations can be made to end the Calamity once and for all.
• This is the final "test drive meme," to welcome returning characters and wrap up the journey to get Lancelot's Ring of Dispell. |
no subject
We're on the same page, as usual. Let's let ourselves in, hm?
[It's been only lately during the summer months that Hijikata gained halfway decent control of metal magic, but it certainly comes in handy now. He summons a small amount of iron - he practiced this as a priority, given how many fae creatures dislike this metal - infused with fire magic to keep it soft and pliable. Pushing it into the small backdoor's keyhole, letting it assume the right form after some twisting and adjusting, cooling and hardening it, and then turning it in the lock, it all goes so smoothly that he's a little surprised himself. He opens the door and lets Shoto and himself in.]
We just need to follow the clanking... if they're even wearing armour. I'd be surprised if there were still any night guards on the job after what happened to that one poor bastard.
[Everything is quiet at first, but as they move out of the storage area and into the museum proper they encounter the first animated mannequin sooner than expected. It's bent over something in the 'Extinct Fauna of Avalon' section... on closer inspection it's one of the giant bats of Lestari. This specimen was likely brought here and taxidermied for exhibition, and now the mannequin is pulling all the stuffing out of its opened stomach.]
I'll take this one.
[He sweeps in, Muramasha drawn, and casually beheads the mannequin that barely managed to turn around in time, then grabs both its wrists and cuts its hands off too, and finally slices through its (luckily armourless) torso. The pieces clatter to the ground (though the lower body only falls after a kick from Hijikata) and aimlessly squirm around there, all without much noise.]
One down, eleven to go. I think we'd best put their grabby little hands in a big vase or something, just to be on the safe side.
no subject
Whuh—
["What can't you do" he wants to say. As he drifts behind cautious, his mildly curious apprehension trades its slot for pure wonder, taken aback at first. He's never seen a real museum before; and if matters weren't so pressing, he might be wandering almost wide-eyed, sort of noiselessly poking about at every detailed old exhibit, but— this is the worst timing, isn't it? An added urgency to their mission now. A flurry of movement follows next, and eyes are following Hijikata, watching the mannequin slit to pieces with nearly a too-clean efficiency. The elder swordsman's much quicker, and equally sudden realization's striking him hot as lit matches; that this is the strength he'll need to mimic echoing loudly in his thoughts instead. His always-awe's ever present, and though he's taking steps backwards, not quite certain where those legs can move, his jumping heart lifts emboldened.]
I- [He's on it!] I'll go find one.
[Now where's a vase big enough?
Off he goes, with only minutes allowed to pass before he's sprinting across the halls instead, his searching eyes catching shadows. A creaking, swinging diorama hangs suspended in the air this time, a suit of armor on a wing mount, its weight in full dropping down on him, ice like spear-tips erupting in aerial-Heaven Piercing Ice Wall. The boy's raised spikes with just fingers, twin momentums in violent meeting, in shattering mess of severed limbs and armored parts raining down on him, pieces splitting from golden ragdoll noisily bouncing along the marble's top. Bloodless, though no less shocking while nerves collect themselves.
He's picking up doll hands. Furious.]
What did you think you were gonna do there?
[As if this scolding means anything. But what a waste of its perfect armor! Whoever's responsible needs the beating... But still he does spot the vase, though, and boy has fairly expensive bisque before he's rushing to Hijikata—one pair rattling about inside it when Shoto hands it off shyly,]
I think it might be 10 now...
1/2
When Shoto runs off so readily he smiles after him. Ever so helpful. While the boy is gone he investigates the "crime scene", trying to figure out if the mannequin was using any tools - after all he doubts that they gored the unfortunate night guard with their bare fake hands -, and finds a historical knife, likely taken from elsewhere in the museum, next to the stuffed bat. Apparently the mannequin just started using its hands once it had cut it open. He attemps to understand why it even went for this exhibit... weren't they said to only take apart things that move? But after a few moments he realises that the mannequin must have caught its own moving reflection in the glass pane the information about the bat is written on and gotten curious.
When he hears the noise in the distance he immediately turns and goes sprinting towards it, but Shoto meets him halfway with the vase in his hands. He cracks a smile - there's no disbelief on his face, just pride.]
We're making good headway, aren't we?
[He accepts the vase, pleased with its contents, and carries it back to where they left the first mannequin. Its parts are still wiggling across the ground, and he collect the hands and puts them with the others (having to shake one off rather fiercely when it grabs on to his own hand).]
Without these they'll have a way harder time using any dangerous items.
2/2
Hijikata simply engages in combat, partly because the attack came so fiercely and decisively, partly because he knows that his usual elemental attacks won't hurt or slow down the mannequins (fire magic would destroy them, but they'd probably keep fighting while burning, and that might cause more harm than good in the worst case). He can stand his ground, but damn, they aren't half as bad as he thought after the first one went down like a log! He's going to need a moment to come up with a solid counteroffensive here - unless Shoto is incensed enough to take the lead on that.]
no subject
Hell Spider!!
[Bringing crossing arms down this time; fire fine as any laser's cut, his own maneuvers less chaotic, far more delicate than his father's threads. A near-entirely different precision leaving a "doll" in split pieces, shelled extremities all detached within its superheated matrix.
The way he's promised he'd be flames again; now he also thinks of Hades, an oath to never lose his will to light; to glow himself for Hijikata's sake. He isn't fooling around in slightest here, determined he'll absolutely ruin anything close to approaching the other, all the youth's indignant fury raised in his rushed surge of water, ice extinguishing flames like wicks inside a small, rising tidal crest. And yet the boy is barely scheming, his overwhelming will to guard a quickly rising gauge for months by now.
He is not about to let these emptied armor dolls trouble him. In passing time between first and second, the former wriggling about too much to stay, he's darting quick before it frees itself, rushing in follow-up to Flashfreeze, ribboning flames around his fist and slamming his palm against his ice instead, heating his skin beyond its normal glow. His Heatwave's magma's blowing limbs apart, explosions same as burst crystals, sharp ice splintering into glass in shards.
Forgetting himself a while longer. Dropping his palms to wet floor now, wide eyes following Hijikata, ice sprouting across his hands should he be needed to intervene at all.]
no subject
With two of the adversaries taken care of he ensnares the last one in what looks like thorny vines, keeping its limbs locked in place - but it's really iron he summoned, not any living material. As the mannequin struggles he infuses the metal with fire magic, and the red-hot glowing thorns twist and tighten and burn through the weak segments the armour doesn't quite cover - the neck, the joints. It would be a gruesome thing to do to a living creature, but with the mannequins they can be unscrupulous.]
Five down. Shoto-kun, you turned them into difficult puzzles for the restorators.
[His tone is playful, just gently teasing the boy about his methods - not that the outcome of his own was all that different. Once again he collects the hands to toss in the vase (if he can even find those of the mannequin Shoto blew apart).]
I wonder where the others are. Haven't they heard that this is where the party is?
no subject
He could teach him that, honestly. He wants so much to mirror the knight still, and yet he hardly feels adequate, doesn't compare in all his youth to one who was far more experienced, knowing his magic's limitations, his newest abilities fallen short of the limitless Quirk they're made to mime instead. Only past-inspired echoes lingering in mind as last remnants. Much as he wants to be a knight here, he feels at heart he's still chasing, his rigid refusal to see his growth creating its tiers raised beyond that.
It isn't enough to give his flames for this.
But he's ruined a lot of armors, and lowering eyes dip embarrassed, a little ashamed to have used such force so immediately at the outset. Praise and teasing warm the same in him; and since he's flustering a little quietly, it's hardly obvious when he straightens, calmly announcing his own intentions before he's frosts and white all over again. It's nearly a mumbling when he answers.]
We should bring the party to them, I guess.
[No use in idling around here.] I'm going on ahead, sensei. [Though to where, he hasn't considered, hasn't determined or planned or anything else; his one objective all he cares about; another test made his mission, another chance to prove his worth beyond all he'd once been ordered to be—if even he's worthy to stand beside him. So once again he grows restless, and youth seeks trouble before it finds them waiting to spring its new ambush. Drawing his sword in preparation, his Amaryllis blooming with ice before he's buried its edge again in things.
With very little in way of plans in place (assuming his steps should draw the eyes of anything half as much eager), making himself a moving target, bait as flesh and blood and focus thoroughly sweeping each exhibit through; not entirely unimpressed with all the gleaming, ornate arms inside. An almost armory tucked away at far-off end of dimmed passage. Eyeing the maces set in glass first; then polished knives with jeweled handles, broom-length axes framed to stand beneath a wall of worn crossbows; a set of armors posed in kind in each of their corner ends opposite. Each arranged to wield its weapons, he's barely surprised to hear the subtle, metallic sound of joint's movements. Without a knowledge of proper horror, he isn't remotely aware of old cliches, that he truly is naive for having wandered through such a scene himself. But rising frost consumes him first; and moving armor taking aim erodes in streams of iced fragments, glaciers splintered on a wind in parts.
Though, even if only from a distance, Hijikata may hear the battle, an audible struggle in ceaseless clamor which echoes loud of glass, metals: his student arched with sword to axe this round; four more mannequins in the room all told; one bursting at its seams with ice—another crossbow in its grip and speared in his Iced Iron Maiden; a white sword flashing away like lights with winds and water-laced crescents; a half-moon scything its way through torso, head and hands in how he'd observed reflecting the swordsman's own coldness; another two mannequins wriggling to life next.]
no subject
If he knew that Shoto worries about his perceived shortcomings again he'd tell him not to. The boy's control of his core elements, ice and fire, is so much stronger and more versatile than Hijikata's will ever be, and he himself is still far from a master of metal and wood! Instead he grins at his squire's cheeky response, and ensures that there are no mannequins sneaking up in the rooms behind them while Shoto moves on ahead.
As soon as he hears the clash in the distance he sprints towards the noise. That boy attracts those knights like months to a flame! He barges into the battle, quickly scanning the scene - one knight immobilised and impaled in ice, another contending with White Amaryllis, gleaming like the wind itself - before ensnaring one of the other armoured mannequins in the same iron vines as before, forcing the ornate knifes from its grip with unrelenting prying thorns. The enemy that moved out of the next corner, raising its mace in Shoto's direction, gets a different taste of the samurai's metal magic: its armour dents itself inwards from all directions, bends and twist, making it fall to the ground, hand guards breaking the doll's fingers in the wrong direction so its weapon drops from its grip.
The mannequins would be terrifying and dangerous to any unarmed civilian, or just any poor person caught by surprise, but he and Shoto came prepared and with so much experience under their belts. He crunches the armour of the mannequin on the ground even more, like a soda can, so it can't possibly get up anymore. He'd love to put his other elements to the test on the vine-entrapped one, but given that these are not living beings lightning and water won't shock or drown them, and since his ice magic doesn't pack quite as much of a punch as Shoto's he ends up pondering, looking at the squirming enemy like at an artwork.]
What should we do with this one?
[It's an opportunity! Sure, there are 4 mannequins still at large, but this corridor is a dead end, so there's only one direction they can come from, if they aren't in a different part of the museum altogether. Also, yes, he totally expects that while he was busy with these two his squire soundly finished off the others... to be fair, in his book they already were as good as finished off when he entered the room.]
no subject
What did you do? he means ask him, but, it's Hijikata who fills the silence first, who draws his interests towards the next things said.
What to do with it, he's asking now.
Though Shoto wonders what he means at first... why he hasn't drawn his sword just yet, seemingly hands him something more to break. If he's urging him to "train" here, too. But something unreadable stirs in his eyes, and he looks to the man beside him with curious, fixed deliberation. If his opponents were merely human, there isn't a question he'd be more lenient, say, "we'll be leaving you for the authorities", but... since magic "knights" are just puppets, he only stands in place, wonders: if he's as strong a boy he used to be; why he's restless with his sword in hand, can't stop looking to Hijikata as if he'll calm the storm inside himself, not yet grasping how it's the swordsman affecting him most in learned manners; whose fiery, influence still ignites in him. With most his lessons involving violence, assuming he's worse and grown reckless, his lingering bits of hesitation falling further and further away by now. Where once he'd normally seemed more passive, the swordsman's words extend roots in him—aggression breaking along his surface so long as sign of threat's provoked him first. It's why he looks to him one last time, to peek, and fingers lift like pale daggers, to hover in place with answer back and suddenly bitter, cold decisiveness.]
We add it with the others.
[Placing a palm against its armor, his raised hand shifting to spill its cold across its plates of thick iron, a wide step further beyond his Flashfreeze, a number far below its zero falling with too-quick a sharpness, his fingers splayed across its surface shimmering pale with white crystal. The armored doll itself eroding in wintry, rapid disintegration. Whatever malice was sealed inside it lost to biting cold's decay in turn; a little justice for someone else for once: the innocent guard who's died for little all his thoughts appear to cling to, still. How it won't be killing more, he thinks. I won't let you hurt another, clear in his eyes and words and actions next.]
Wasn't one enough for you? We won't let you take more lives here.
[With almost a venom, whipping his arm to send his flames alight, leaving only dust of ash and air in clouds of blue embers, the squire's anger siphoned out with it. His next words paired with his dull expression; all hostility in him closed and sealed inside again, neatly. Eyes on dimly fading ashes, his voice and tone a little softer since he's spent a little flame this time.
No hands in charred remains, of course; though Shoto brightens, urges softly,]
What do you say we find the rest of them? [Tugging his gauntlets up, sort of defrosting himself with gold-flame's spells.] It's better we're not on our own for too long.
CW: Torture Exhibition / Mannequin Body Horror
He doesn't have to verbally praise him this time; Shoto can see his satisfaction on his face as he turns to address him, along with a faint little smile at his ask that they lose no time finding the remaining mannequins.]
Do you think it's getting too lonely? Well, we can't have that.
[He really shouldn't joke around so much, maybe, but compared to the last quest they went on together to arrest the would-be coup instigators in Elphame this is more... well, fun. Unlike those rogue mages the mannequins are driven by nothing but simple curiosity and have no agenda besides that, even if they did end up taking an innocent person apart whom they're here to avenge, and more importantly, they possess no magic! As he leads the way (not bothering to collect any doll hands this time, given that he didn't take the vase along and they destroyed or permanently incapacitated this set of mannequins anyway) he notices Shoto's interest in the exhibitions they pass once more. Maybe he should take him here during the daytime before the final mission...
After crossing multiple rooms without seeing any knights they hear a noise from the direction of, as it turns out, the torture- and execution instrument exhibit. As they enter the area it becomes obvious why the mannequins would be interested in it: one of them must have turned on the dim, mostly red-tinted lights illuminating the various set-ups in this windowless section of the museum, and many of the scenes are animated by magic to demonstrate the use of the instruments on other mannequins (which only ever repeat the same movements they've been enchanted to perform). So there's a lot of movement! A guillotine chops off the head of a doll over and over (it reattaches magically each time), a torturer mannequin extends the rack the prisoner doll is tied to, stretching its body, before resetting it, and so on. (Look, this definitely draws more of an audience than a more typical still exhibition would!)]
Well, if this isn't a great place to give them ideas!
[As if on cue a torturer mannequin standing in front of an iron maiden turns around to look at them. It's not wearing armour, but is dressed in distinctly nicer clothing than a torturer should be wearing... and the finely stitched emblem on its chest identifies it as one of the 12 rogue knights. It moves in to grab one of the new arrivals - they should be a lot more fun to shove inside that spike-covered box than the quiet prisoner mannequin!
Hijikata draws Muramasha and simply chops it apart, this time again picking up the doll hands and, after looking around for a vessel, putting them in a cauldron that has smoke rising up from it but no liquid inside.]
You'd think the last few of them would be the toughest, but--
[Before he can finish the sentence he and Shoto have to react fast as something barrels towards them in the near-darkness on all fours. It turns out to be another knight mannequin that somehow managed to lose its legs from the knees down, probably by getting too curious about one of the instruments on display, and, not feeling pain like a living being would, simply resorted to running on its hands and stumps. Hijikata almost yelped; he got spooked!! But as the mannequin turns around to come at them again he braces himself to take this one down too - if Shoto doesn't beat him to it.]