Masks of Meaning
3nd of October 2006 A.D.
Mind roiling, a thousand questions rise from it like ravenous fish from the dark sea, beneath it all a cold current.
I could just kill her, it is too much, a fool's errand to redeem one of the dark lords of Yomi and I don't have the time. Sarah, Deborah and her little girl, they do not have the time. Yet you let the seconds pass in silence one after another. There is something in those pitch dark eyes you cannot name. A soul damned asking her to save her master from the hell that he rules with an iron fist and is caged in with iron bars. In the depths of her heart, where sublime certainty had planted itself in a moment where she was anything but, something familiar.
Hope is not a plan, but it is a start. "To each grain of rice, it and its closest fellows are as precious as any flower." You are almost surprised at how light your tone is, as though all this is nothing more than a riddle, a distraction and not a negotiation on the eve of bloody war. "So to is it for the sun, moon, and even the brightest stars. It is to their detriment that their sorrows blind them to those of others. Who knows what might be possible, if rice can reach heaven or a star can taste the secrets of the earth"
"None may know the whole of the path from the first step, but some twists can be guessed, some turns can be seen and with great good fortune some might reveal themselves unbidden. The sage man does not seek to put her head under the water to see what lies beneath, but learns the nature of water that she might craft a sound that can pierce it and listens for the echo..."
Is she talking about sonar? You wonder startled, the most technological thing she had mentioned before now had been a mechanical watch, but it's the only thing that makes sense. What she seeks would be the restoration of Emma-O and that would make the sea the endless night of Kakuri, the corruption of Yin.
"Yet rare is the vessel that can holds water pure, drawn from the depths.."
"She wishes to study the power within your majesty that she might understand how her lord has been corrupted, a reflection of Kakuri's might that is not of Emma-O and thus which she might freely observe and ponder as she cannot do to the face of her lord directly," Usum whispers the sly excitement of the conspirator in his 'voice', he's enjoying this a lot more than you are obviously.
But he is not the only one who had caught on to something to judge from the way Lydia's eyes abruptly widen. "You say sage when you mean scholar, I think. One would be unwise to trust a lone scholar, particularly if they are
under contract."
As ways of asking if Eiko has any help go that one is really blunt, almost dismissive, but apparently the way to go. The sudden hitch of in drawn breath for one that does not need to breathe and fingers snapping closed upon a lock of black hair that she is quick to tuck behind her ear, the akuma is worried you will say no,
afraid.
"Many there are who walk the path, one close by who weaves it tight."
"What...?" you breathe before you can bite back the words. Eiko had spoken to Smiling Jack, gained his cooperation, you would not put it past him of course but you had seen no sign of that at the meeting. She must have swayed him tonight. That does make an odd sort of sense if there are other shen on this conspiracy of redemption then they could be used to make contact with one of your known allies and establish a means of uncensored communication before the scheduled meeting on the fifth. Then of course things had started to move at breakneck speed leaving you here having a conversion in code.
While you had been furiously thinking the akuma does not speak again, instead her gaze seems to wander. Following it you see that it had come to rest on a wooden mask set above the reception desk. Round metallic eyes stare out from a bony face. Black wind-swept eyebrows and mustache lend the mask vital energy, and the brownish ochre color gives an impression of vigor.
Ayakashi, the mask that marks a cruel god, or a vengeful ghost in
Noh, the oldest form of traditional Japanese theater, and thus most concerned with theological themes.
A fair representation of Emma-O to be sure or any of the damned souls in his care, but what does that have to do with...?
"Dawn is breaking soon," Eiko says, her words cold and distant. "The time had come to arm ourselves for battle."
For one jarring moment you think negotiations had somehow broken down, but then like an optical illusion dispelled by tipping your head to the side, Noh plays end at the break of dawn and in the case of the warrior plays the scene just before that is a rendition of the battle which landed the protagonist in Shurado, the Realm of Fighting and Slaughter, a mock battle.
She is offering to fight you alright, but she is also offering to lose on purpose as long as you let and presumably her underlings live or unlive... whatever the term might be. If that is the case... the reason she had told you about coming into contact with Smiling Jack s was so that you would have a line of communication after all this ends.
'Look at my power and hope it helps' still isn't a plan though and you are not minded to let her slip the noose on that alone. "The sea which stretches between us us vast, beyond knowing, beyond bridging?" The question in the tone is subtle, it sounds still like negotiations breaking down
"So it is, so you shall pass into the long sleep of mortalkind." She rolls the tip of her tongue, into a soft melody, meaningless words, that have all the meaning in the world. That sort of music isn't Japanese at all it is Ainu the people to whom the dread lord of the Night Realm was once the fair and honorable judge of the dead. Eiko has allies, not just among the shen, but also among those mortals closest to whatever might remain of Emma-O's heart and they are working to restore him.
What do you do?
[] Agree to a mock battle before dawn which leaves Eiko 'unable' to aid the Will of Kakuri yet which leaves her in shape to recover rather than leaving her out in the sun or worse
[] No, it is not worth the risk of leaving such dangerous foes at your back, these akuma, like the others shall perish, unable to return to their master even in spirit
[] Write in
OOC: There are a lot of rolls and I have to run so it might be a bit until I post them 
