[X] Pump it for more information, then...
-[X] Tell it who you are
--[X] A brief summary of your history since your last visit to the shrine(Hinamori Amu, Age 8) Including an explanation of your Exaltation and the charas, as best as you are able. Get Exa/Dia to help find a way to explain your new abilities adequately.
---[X] Allow it to verify this by mental contact, if, and only if, you can extract assurances that it won't make any changes beyond communication.
[X] Pump it for more information, then...
-[X] Tell it who you are
--[X] A brief summary of your history since your last visit to the shrine(Hinamori Amu, Age 8) Including an explanation of your Exaltation and the charas, as best as you are able. Get Exa/Dia to help find a way to explain your new abilities adequately.
---[X] Allow it to verify this by mental contact, if, and only if, you can extract assurances that it won't make any changes beyond communication.
[X] Bypass the 'bolds.
This seems solid enough, though we should probably come up with a decent stunt...
Has no-one else noticed that the Kobolds are sleeping in as circle around their children? That may be a deliberate choice by the spirit to make us hesitate, but it should still be considered.
Has no-one else noticed that the Kobolds are sleeping in as circle around their children? That may be a deliberate choice by the spirit to make us hesitate, but it should still be considered.
[X] Pump it for more information, then...
-[X] Tell it who you are
--[X] A brief summary of your history since your last visit to the shrine(Hinamori Amu, Age 8) Including an explanation of your Exaltation and the charas, as best as you are able. Get Exa/Dia to help find a way to explain your new abilities adequately.
---[X] Allow it to verify this by mental contact, if, and only if, you can extract assurances that it won't make any changes beyond communication.
Well, after full day of waiting it seems like it's at least 40 hearts. 37 likes of confidence and for each ten registered there is at least one unregistered...
Third of population for very popular quests that is around 100-120. With MegaTen being kinda obscure excellent result IMHO. Well, except for number of actual votes but we already discussed that part.
PS. After week milestone I suspect some more votes from casual readers.
It probably doesn't help that we keep running in to new mysteries... Well that's also what makes the story good to an extent, as there are probably mysterious players around for a situation like this. And the author managing to even present a few of them is pretty neat. But it does leave one reeling a bit trying to get ones footing.
Quite possibly, but as you say... we have no clue what the standard is. Thinking back on it though... none of the 'attacks' seems to have been actually harmful in any way though, or atleast no damage was done. Even when the goblin got through it only seems to have pinched her. Admittedly that might just be the speed of it all... but it's kind of unusual.
Well we know:
Yukari - Passes, had a tea party. Already knows the supernatural, and I think she made her peace with things?
Younger Amu - Not eligible due to being a mundane. Will be memory wiped.
Magical Girl Amu - ??? Should be around Yukari-ish?
Solar Amu - Unreadable OCP.
Burn Everything Io - Throw her fears at her.
Well that brings up an interesting question, was she really not eligible?
Didn't one of the Amu sections of this arc imply this temple was connected to Chara? Exo also seems to have increased activity since connection attempts were tried, and Exo is connected to the Chara.
This leads to a speculative idea that maybe she got her Chara potential here? It would be a potential explanation for why Chara users started showing up. And due to memory wipe, why no one remembers that.
Well that brings up an interesting question, was she really not eligible?
Didn't one of the Amu sections of this arc imply this temple was connected to Chara? Exo also seems to have increased activity since connection attempts were tried, and Exo is connected to the Chara.
This leads to a speculative idea that maybe she got her Chara potential here? It would be a potential explanation for why Chara users started showing up. And due to memory wipe, why no one remembers that.
It doesn't really make sense to speak of them being a particular age, as the correct number would be anything from eight--when the snapshot was taken--to twelve, depending on what they're trying to do and how well they get along with Amu at the moment--to forty, considering their Lore score.
[X] Pump it for more information, then...
-[X] Tell it who you are
--[X] A brief summary of your history since your last visit to the shrine(Hinamori Amu, Age 8) Including an explanation of your Exaltation and the charas, as best as you are able. Get Exa/Dia to help find a way to explain your new abilities adequately.
---[X] Allow it to verify this by mental contact, if, and only if, you can extract assurances that it won't make any changes beyond communication.
[X] Bypass the 'bolds.
-[X] Io steps quietly, measuredly placing a foot where the debris of the cave-floor leaves an empty spot in the shadows of the kobolds' fire. She steps, and steps, and just catches herself before her toe knocks a pebble aside, before placing it safely on a safe location. Just a bit further to go...
A soul that loses its colour will descend into oblivion.
A landscape of black and blue, speckled with green. A landscape of swords, shining metal continually clashing against itself, raw and rusty iron holding back the fog of the outside. A world that held an edge.
All the easy routes only lead down.
"I've never been much for the easy path," she said.
If that were true, you would not be here. Blue is the colour of the shattered soul, black that of damnation.
She did not remember how she had come to be here. She could not remember where she had been before. She was standing on a sword—a skyscraper-sized sword, thrust through the centre of the world—and she was the sword, and she was the world itself. She felt its conflict as a part of herself.
"Who are you?" She asked.
Green is the colour of protection. The mother's embrace, and the wall of isolation.
It was still fragile, but the viridian green branching through her world was nothing as tiresome as isolation. It had answered her question. Where was it coming from?
The living colour spread towards the edges, joining the blades in their war against nothing, and as it passed blackened rust was replaced with new growth. Clashing once more, fighting it out on ever smaller scales, but joined together against the world outside. Conflict was always her nature.
She followed one vigorous root backwards, only to find it stretching back to herself. She raised one hand—
Pasty white, scarred, but a little less so than before.
An enormous eye blinked at her from the sky.
— — —
Beep.
Hmm?
Beep.
White ceiling, fluorescent lights, a comfortable bed and she no longer felt like corned beef… This was obviously a hospital.
Beep.
It was much quieter than in the movies. She felt cheated. Weren't hospitals supposed to be busy places, with doctors running around everywhere? Even the heart monitor was muted. Though, did she even have a heartbeat anymore…?
Beep.
She pushed the covers down, sitting up, and ended up staring into the eyes of the policeman that was sitting in the chair next to her bed.
Beep—
"Um." What did you say, at times like this? The heart monitor, she now heard, was beeping from the other side of the curtains. A rustling caught her attention, and to her mild relief she saw a known face resting in a padded chair. Irino-sensei looks cute when she's sleeping…
Her cheeks heated a little, but before she could decide how to deal with that thought the policeman broke the silence on his own.
"Kuroi Mato?" He raised an eyebrow. "The doctors assured me you'd stay asleep for days to come, but I think we both know that they have no idea what they're talking about. You're a fast healer." He leaned forwards a little in his chair. "Do you know why you're here?"
"I—tried to stop the bull-demon from hurting anyone, and—" She winced at the memory. Inspecting a shaking hand, though, she looked as good as new. No, better than new; there was just the faintest hint of a healthy flush. So that wasn't all just a dream. What happened to Rock?
"Well, you did distract it for long enough that Yagami Yui was able to dispatch it. Ugly business, that, but she was adamant that you'd only tried to help. I'll tell you the truth, there were some at the station who wanted to put you in a cell, but the chief was able to talk them around." He barked a laugh. "Order them around, more like. It helped that you were so badly hurt… until your limbs started uncrinkling, anyway. The doctors were terribly confused.
"So what are you, girl? That's your teacher on the chair over there. She took one look at you and paled, but she didn't seem nearly as surprised as I'd have expected."
"Guidance councillor," she corrected automatically. "What happened to my brother? And Yui's friends?"
"Your brother is fine. He's at home, resting," he said reassuringly. "But as to the Yagami girl… well, I suppose there's no harm in telling you. The rumours are all over town already, but it's an ugly business, as I said. Have you heard of the Nicaea website?"
She half-shook her head, then shrugged. "A little. Some sort of shock site?"
"If only." He frowned, looking displeased. "It appears that, by using it, it lets ordinary people use their cellphones to summon demons. Sounds bizarre, but I've seen it in action—so have you, come to think of it. But…" He sighed deeply. "It only makes them follow orders if the summoner can first defeat them in combat, otherwise they go free. There have been a few soldiers about with their own version of the system, using it to clean up afterwards and make sure we don't get overrun, but they can't be everywhere and people keep using it, so… things happen. The Yagami girl, for example."
Yui's phone, giving off a quiet ping as the bull was defeated.
The bull, fiddling with that same phone.
She closed her eyes, her lips twisting into a grimace despite not really meaning to. Was she trying to block out the world that would do a thing like that, or just feeling overwhelmed? She didn't even know anymore. She felt like Rock, as much as Mato, but getting used to—everything—would take more than just a day or two.
"You're a clever girl, I see." There was nothing but exhaustion in his voice. Opening her eyes, she saw that he was nodding, but his face was grim. "The girl summoned that thing, apparently in an attempt to impress her friends. She had no idea what she was doing, and she's been practically shouting about what happened, to anyone who would listen—which is why she's now in custody, charged with manslaughter and aggravated assault. She 'confessed', you see." You could practically hear the sarcasm dripping from that sentence. "The mayor wants to charge her as an adult."
"But—" Horror filled her voice. "She's the one who killed it!"
"You'd be surprised how little the details matter when people are scared. She's also ten, which makes that sort of trial outright illegal. It doesn't matter too much; whatever else happens, she's still in prison, and likely to stay there for the next couple of years. Or until the end of the world, maybe. I'd give it about equal odds."
She stared mutely at him.
"So, friend of yours?"
What. "Yui?" Oh. "Yagami-san? No, she's one of my brother's. I didn't remember her family name. What happened to her friends? Can you tell me?"
"One's dead, the other—" He nodded towards the beeping of the heart monitor. "Doctors tell me it's a miracle he's alive, much less as healthy as he is, but the Sakamaki family has always been tough. I've had dealings with them in the past. It's a real pity about the Kinomoto girl, but—" He sighed. "They say she tried to cover the others, and paid for it. I suppose she'd be happy she succeeded. Now, I've told you a lot, so I'm hoping you will answer some of my questions."
"You mean, what I am?" She asked, shakily.
The girl drew a raspy breath, staring at where the bull had disappeared, then walked unsteadily towards the corpses of her two friends.
One of them was alive. That should have been a good thing, but she felt unshed tears burning in her eyes. One of them was still alive, and—the other one wasn't, and—a girl who might as well have been her own brother, only a little older, was sitting in a jail cell.
"No…" He eyed her sympathetically. "No, I think I've learned all I needed to know about that. Besides, your teacher wasn't as quiet as I made out. You're lucky, you know; it's half her doing that you're here, and not in a cell next to the Yagami girl. Here, look at this." He held his cellphone up, showing her own image next to some numbers.
"Kuroi Mato… unique, race 'Fury'?" She asked incredulously. "What's this?"
"Hmm? Let me see." He turned it around, raising an eyebrow at the screen. "It didn't show your name last time I looked. Interesting. Regardless, this is another function of the Nicaea app; it shows the statistics of any demon you point it at, and according to this, you're just about the most powerful one we've seen so far. We have to assume that will change, but there were a lot of voices saying we should hand you over to the military, presumably for extermination."
"But I'm human," she said, weakly. She probably wasn't.
"I believe you." He nodded. "Well, it helped that you have a family, a mother who sat her until she had to get your brother to sleep, school records and official photographs from less than a year ago. Not to put too fine a point on it, it also helped that you were half-dead and it would have looked far too much like kicking a puppy. It doesn't change the facts on the ground, namely that everyone is deathly scared. Your teacher came running the moment she heard what had happened, but she couldn't explain why you look like this. I'd be curious to know that myself, but it doesn't really matter. The real question is—"
He looked at her shrewdly.
"Tell me, would you have been able to kill that demon if you hadn't been bogged down protecting your brother?"
She nodded. If she could have jumped out of the way… "Easily."
"The police is only barely holding on as-is. None of us have demons, you see; even if I have the app, I haven't wanted to risk it, and officially I'm not even supposed to have that much. We're a police force, not a paramilitary unit, but it looks like we'll need some of the latter. There's also the Yagami girl to consider. It would take every favour I've saved up over the years, and the chief's cooperation, but I believe I could arrange to start a special tactics unit consisting of, to begin with, the two of you as well as…" He smiled uncomfortably. "Some of Sakamaki's relatives who proved both skilled and motivated in a couple of skirmishes yesterday. It would get you out of any possible trouble, and it could be seen as a form of punishment duty for Yagami Yui."
To… What? She blinked.
"Of course, that isn't a threat. You're a minor, so I'll do my best to help you either way, but in the case of Yagami-chan I don't think there's much chance of getting her out of her cell without someone on board who can theoretically ride herd on her, in case she goes berserk. We both know that's not likely to happen, but…" He shrugged. "Politics."
Nn…
She bit her tongue, glancing towards Irino-sensei. Fast asleep.
"I'll understand if you need to think it over, but please don't take too long. The irregularity of her case is the only reason we can do this at all, and the longer we give them to cover their tracks, the harder it'll get. If you want to talk with your parents, or your teacher…"
What was he asking her to do, exactly? Help the police to keep order, by killing demons? Help out a girl that… well, she'd only seen Yui in passing a few times, but she'd seemed like a nice girl. Help out herself?
What had happened to Yui was unjust, and it'd feel good to help her, but Mato felt… uncomfortably excited, at the thought of killing things that deserved it. She thought she should have felt scared, but she didn't. It might even be fun…
"What time is it?" She asked, trying to distract herself. The constant red glow outside didn't give them any hints.
"Four in the morning. Tuesday."
So he'd been staying awake, waiting for her to wake up. That put a bit of a point on things.
{ } Yes. I'll do it.
{ } No, sorry, I can't.
{ } I have to talk with Mom—
- About what, exactly?
{ } Wake up Irino Saya. Ask her to help you decide.
{ } Or, y'know, anything else you feel like doing.
But why am I using maximum-grade security to protect pictures of anime characters? Here, try now. And if it still doesn't work, then I can't help; try Chrome or something.
{X} Yes. I'll do it.
--You couldn't help but feel that things were going to get worse, before they got better... If this kind of thing was happening elsewhere, if she could do her part to help keep things under control... She didn't think she'd be able to sleep well at night if she simply ducked her head down and let it pass...
But that didn't mean Mato had to do this for nothing, that she couldn't afford to be a little selfish. "My family, if you can make sure they're protected--if you can do that much... Then yes, I'll help."
