SEALINJ FAILURES:
Hazō drifted throujh the Out for an eternal moment, the minor worries of the Paint fallinj away - he lost himself in memories of the Cracked Mirror and Flickerinj Sun. He dreamt of showinj them the peaceful land of D- the seventh Path; to feel safe in the natural world without killinj everythij nearby. He dreamt of evacuatinj entire peoples to that peaceful land.
His thoujhts twisted ajain t9 Ishihara Akane, the half-step Asura that anchored him to the Paint - 'ah, that's not quite correct yet, is it?'
Far below-turqoise-west, Hazō's meat suit finished its first chained substitution to hopefully escape any sealiNG failurres and obviously failed. Hazō noticed a part of his Self-Potential drift off, now fully separate from his control. The pain plateued after a moment, and drifted away slowly. A deep ache formed between Hazō and his Self-Potential.
The last Hazō could remember was ramen with Harumitsu, hours after his infusion demonstration.
Hazō took a moment.
'I'm still capable of thought, and clearly under some sort of time distortion. What would Sensei do here? Potential was only lost when I remembered.... huh.'
Hazō took a moment.
'Information that hurts usually isn't that daNGERouss'
Hazō took a moment. His eyes slowly betrayed his trepidation, even as some distant part of him watched the meatsuit. (It is SO COOL to see the Bloodline in his meatsuit spark in accordance with his Self, even it doesn't help here)
'I failed to correctly infuse a seal.'
Hazō took a moment, meta-physical brows narrowing in concentration.
'I caused a sealiN&&& failure'
Hazō took a moment. Fear turned to annoyance, and a need to double check.
'I'm still capable-- capable of thought, and clearly under some sort of time distortion. What would KaĢØMmme do here?'
Hazō took a moment. He idly flicked his 'eyes' towards his meats- body - as it finally starts his second substitution.
Hazō collected more of himself, and directed his intent.
'What would Sensei do? His maxim fails here, unfortunately.'
Hazō took a moment.
'I've stopped the loss, so just pass the time, huh?'
Hazō took a moment, and if a small smile infiltrated his face it'd be his secret. It's not often one has a perfect reason to dissacociate and soak in delusional fantasies of their paramours, after all.
(Hazō noticed a moment later that he was unkind to himself, and most people would call it a daydream. He decided to work on that later - who knows how much time he'll be here, after all.)
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I had fun with this, and sorry for the forbidden letters y'all, but I needed them for whatever narrative I scratched up. Most of the thought went into Hazō's memetic flowchart, lmk if you can tell me what he's checkinj for
(Couple fun thoujhts. I really like the parallel of Hazō dealinj with a memetic threat that hurts his soul when he remembers wronj, compared to Jiraiya who's facinj a memetic threat that is tryinj to ***eat his ability to remember***. Dad's a couple steps ahead, as always. Also, tryinj to fit in a "Jouketsu: we live in a society" joke in there somehow. I model his mental state jettinj prohressively worse, since he's subjected to ~300 hours of mild mental torture, costs him a couple xp but he's smart and lives.)
