And stretching Sumer out like that doesn't even get us all the way to any of the candidates for the Fall, so we still need an explanation for a multi-millennium gap between the Fall and the reinvention of cities. An explanation that Polyhymnia's already provided us, with the people who lived through the Fall being too broken to do more than survive and leaving their descendants to figure the basics out on their own.
On the other hand, Polyhymnia's talking about a period when Pandora was creating, for instance, the dwarves as a race of builders, and the Muses themselves as tutelary deities of art, culture, and knowledge. And the construction of the shrine on Samothrace. Now, we know Pandora died roughly 3000-3500 years ago, and Polyhymnia's talking about a considerable span of time there, so all in all I'd say that her own birth almost has to be pushed back to, say, 1500-2000 BC. And the Fall was "thousands of years" before she was born. The main question is whether it was many thousands of years, or only a relative few.
You know, there was a point in human history (based on DNA records) where the population significantly dropped, possibly as low a 10,000. Happened 70-90 thousand years ago.
On the other hand, Polyhymnia's talking about a period when Pandora was creating, for instance, the dwarves as a race of builders, and the Muses themselves as tutelary deities of art, culture, and knowledge.
Not the part I quoted. Pandora did that after the descendents figured out the basics on their own. The pyramids and brick cities and the war in India inspired her.
Not the part I quoted. Pandora did that after the descendents figured out the basics on their own. The pyramids and brick cities and the war in India inspired her.
Ah, right, sorry. On the other hand, I looked and we DO have a rough time for the construction of the Senshi memorial site on Samothrace. After Usagi asks about the Iúpatar statue, which is strikingly prettier than the others:
"Why is that one… um… different?" You point to the statue of Iúpatar.
"Oh? Well, Mother said that's Iúpatar. And… that statue's about fifteen hundred years younger, for starters. It was… some time after Mother died. Dionysus the Liberator- he was one of the Firstborn too- had always been especially sentimental about her memory."
...
Polyhymnia then goes on to reveal that the statue was made by Praxiteles of Athens. Praxiteles was a historical figure who lived around 400-350 BC. This in turn suggests that the memorial itself was constructed in the general vicinity of 2000 BC, which is also in line with both (1) Pandora having spent some time thinking and laying groundwork before having the first generation of dwarves build the place and (2) Pandora being inspired by the rise of early civilizations in the Bronze Age, because by 2000 BC, the Great Pyramid of Giza was already several hundred years old.
Princess Serenity's old battleaxe of a Protocol and Comportment teacher who will see about redressing the senshi's current lack of proper behavior.
A Lunarian supremacist that loudly advocates that the 'mongrel' powers currently on Earth need to be removed and that the planetary royal families (Senshi, Usagi and Endymion) need to take control.
Somebody that was sick with the SM's equivalent of a head cold that turns out to be far more debilitating to people without active magical cores/magical health care treatments.
Princess Serenity's old battleaxe of a Protocol and Comportment teacher who will see about redressing the senshi's current lack of proper behavior.
A Lunarian supremacist that loudly advocates that the 'mongrel' powers currently on Earth need to be removed and that the planetary royal families (Senshi, Usagi and Endymion) need to take control.
Somebody that was sick with the SM's equivalent of a head cold that turns out to be far more debilitating to people without active magical cores/magical health care treatments.
Well, Usagi should probably just blast them all with healing magic anyway as a precaution against any long-term cryo damage, hopefully we can nip that last option in the bud.
Yeah, pinning this stuff down is going to be near impossible by us in part, I feel, because we're hypothesizing about a world where the likes of Graham Hancock of Ancient Apocalypse are correct, while living in a world where they're considered pseudo-archeologists. The Fall had scoured the Earth so thoroughly that any evidence of an ancient advanced precursor civilization can be easily* covered up by a comparatively tiny fraction of people compared to the global population. There is (was, anyway) actually a more or less global cabal of shadow governments dead set on hiding any such evidence from the general public.
*I say easily, because up until we as Sailor Moon show up and start making noise about it, literally nobody outside of the in-group knew anything about magic or gods or any of this.
I personally would put the Fall as occurring sometime before the Younger Dryas period, a transitional period between the Pleistocene epoch and the current Holocene, roughly 12,900 to 11,700 years ago. Largely because the Neolithic period of prehistory is so long, which leaves time for any survivors of the initial attack and collapse to die out and for knowledge to be generationally forgotten as those who remain focus on immediate survival rather than rebuilding.
Yeah, pinning this stuff down is going to be near impossible by us in part, I feel, because we're hypothesizing about a world where the likes of Graham Hancock of Ancient Apocalypse are correct, while living in a world where they're considered pseudo-archeologists. The Fall had scoured the Earth so thoroughly that any evidence of an ancient advanced precursor civilization can be easily* covered up by a comparatively tiny fraction of people compared to the global population. There is (was, anyway) actually a more or less global cabal of shadow governments dead set on hiding any such evidence from the general public.
*I say easily, because up until we as Sailor Moon show up and start making noise about it, literally nobody outside of the in-group knew anything about magic or gods or any of this.
I personally would put the Fall as occurring sometime before the Younger Dryas period, a transitional period between the Pleistocene epoch and the current Holocene, roughly 12,900 to 11,700 years ago. Largely because the Neolithic period of prehistory is so long, which leaves time for any survivors of the initial attack and collapse to die out and for knowledge to be generationally forgotten as those who remain focus on immediate survival rather than rebuilding.
It's even worse than that, because we've got solid examples of magical people who know Silver Millenium stuff only as legends and tales and recovered relics. The shadow goverments haven't been hiding the evidence, because there's so little of it to find that even they can only vaguely gesture to 'a lost golden age' in ancient myth.
Somebody that was sick with the SM's equivalent of a head cold that turns out to be far more debilitating to people without active magical cores/magical health care treatments.
Well, Usagi should probably just blast them all with healing magic anyway as a precaution against any long-term cryo damage, hopefully we can nip that last option in the bud.
Yes, hit them with the LHB, but from a fridge horror thought I had reading through all the posts (~3.5 pages, Holy F* guys) from last night, I think we should still probably quarantine them, at the very least until we can do a study on which Modern Earth diseases they need to be inoculated against, and which SM diseases they Have been inoculated against and/or are otherwise entirely indifferent to while being carriers, but would be absolutely Lethal to modern Humanity on Earth.
Yes, hit them with the LHB, but from a fridge horror thought I had reading through all the posts (~3.5 pages, Holy F* guys) from last night, I think we should still probably quarantine them, at the very least until we can do a study on which Modern Earth diseases they need to be inoculated against, and which SM diseases they Have been inoculated against and/or are otherwise entirely indifferent to while being carriers, but would be absolutely Lethal to modern Humanity on Earth.
Yeah, the Dean of Medicine might be another one on the short list of people to thaw out first. Don't want to risk introducing new microbes in either direction without someone who actually has a PhD in the field who can hopefully prevent a pandemic.
Homemaking Studies
I wonder if it's more "Using your magical sewing machine to repurpose old clothes" or "Yes, Feng Shui is real, and it improves mana circulation in your home."
I think it's all of that and how to perform (or hire the right contractors for) various home construction/repair/improvement tasks and how to care for children (and adult guests or non-homemaker adult members of the household) and how to manage and balance the budget of a household of any size from a one-person apartment to a palace with a staff of thousands. It's everything you'd think of and even more things you don't think of because modern society has relegated all the "women's work" of homemaking to invisible labor.
It is to Home Ec what a particularly broad Engineering department is to Shop Class. This is a major for a civilization where being a homemaker really is every bit as respected as being a doctor or a rocket scientist or whatever.
Some other professor: "Do you want to create an animated spirit of the Market that hates us all? Because this is how you get a Market that becomes self-aware and hates us all!"
Human Culture Professor: "A lot of these nations look like they're headed for Late Stage Capitalism, and some may already be there. If there's no divine protections against it, then malicious market spirits may already be forming."
I don't think that'd be a "worst case" option, actually. There's been at least one Naru POV segment where she considered that Usagi would need to learn the sort of etiquette required for having tea with the Emperor. The etiquette this teacher would teach is ancient, so there'd still need to be supplemental lessons from modern teachers, but some things - like Not Losing Your Temper or How To Move Gracefully In Any Gravity - are useful no matter how out-of-date the rest of the lessons are.
More a worst case for Usagi.
After all she'd finally managed to get away from the woman even if it took their entire civilization being destroyed and reincarnating into a new life and family. But now, despite everything she's back.
Much depends on the kind of etiquette, as well as whether it allows code switching or if it's one of those "how dare you ever not behave exactly as directed" systems.
Judging by Serenity's behavior it shouldn't be too onerous, but just to be safe we should consult Luna and Selene before thawing anyone who looks like they might be an etiquette coach.
It's even worse than that, because we've got solid examples of magical people who know Silver Millenium stuff only as legends and tales and recovered relics. The shadow goverments haven't been hiding the evidence, because there's so little of it to find that even they can only vaguely gesture to 'a lost golden age' in ancient myth.
And if places like Atlantis were real and may have ceased to exist since the time of the Fall rather than during it, it's entirely possible that authentic Silver Millennium relics on Earth are getting misidentified as relics of some terrestrial culture.
Amendment: Luna and Artemis haven't introduced a cat plague serious enough for us to notice. The girls have been busy enough that a moderately serious cat flu could probably sweep through Tokyo without them even hearing about it.
Human Culture Professor: "A lot of these nations look like they're headed for Late Stage Capitalism, and some may already be there. If there's no divine protections against it, then malicious market spirits may already be forming."
Amendment: Luna and Artemis haven't introduced a cat plague serious enough for us to notice. The girls have been busy enough that a moderately serious cat flu could probably sweep through Tokyo without them even hearing about it.
Artemis has been active for a year, and his travels with Vee make him whatever the opposite of quarantined is. That's plenty of time to hear about a massive cat flu before Usagi's schedule started waxing.
And if places like Atlantis were real and may have ceased to exist since the time of the Fall rather than during it, it's entirely possible that authentic Silver Millennium relics on Earth are getting misidentified as relics of some terrestrial culture.
I meant divine protections against malicious market spirits forming, specifically, with the implication being that you don't need magic for spirits like that to form under late-stage capitalism. Though protections against late-stage capitalism itself are also a thing that'd be good to have.
And if places like Atlantis were real and may have ceased to exist since the time of the Fall rather than during it, it's entirely possible that authentic Silver Millennium relics on Earth are getting misidentified as relics of some terrestrial culture.
Amendment: Luna and Artemis haven't introduced a cat plague serious enough for us to notice. The girls have been busy enough that a moderately serious cat flu could probably sweep through Tokyo without them even hearing about it.
IDK, a massive cat flu sounds like the exact sort of thing we'd have heard about as a potential Dark Kingdom/Pretty Cure villain plot. Even if it sounds unimportant that's the exact modus operandi of a lot of our villains, so if our advisors ignored something like that they're not doing their jobs.
I meant divine protections against malicious market spirits forming, specifically, with the implication being that you don't need magic for spirits like that to form under late-stage capitalism. Though protections against late-stage capitalism itself are also a thing that'd be good to have.
Corporate Stooge: Look, I don't know what Dark Kingdom or whatever is behind this, but there are monsters wrecking things with my company's logo etched on their chests! You need to find whatever's making these things and put an end to them! Ami: Ah, I see the problem. Tokyo has reached a level of mana saturation that makes it easier for spirits to visibly manifest and interact with the physical world. Corporate Stooge: But which "incursion" or whatever is making these things? Ami: This isn't any sort of enemy action. The spirits are yours; your company is making them. Corporate Stooge: ...Listen, lady, I think I would remember if our company had decided to start making ghosts. Ami: Oh, I believe that your company isn't intentionally making these spirits. You're just intentionally subjecting your workers to abject conditions and subjecting your customers to paying more and more for lower quality products. The misery and desperation you generate eventually reaches critical mass and coalesces into a malevolent spirit. Honestly, these spirits have been forming for centuries, but the whole "international brand" paradigm has made it much easier to assign culpability. So, if you want the spirits to stop forming, all you have to do is reform your business practices. Corporate Stooge: ...Look, can you just make a spell that covers up the brand- Ami: Not for all the money in the world.
Artemis has been active for a year, and his travels with Vee make him whatever the opposite of quarantined is. That's plenty of time to hear about a massive cat flu before Usagi's schedule started waxing.
If it were outright killing half the cats it infected or something, then clearly so, yes. But like... I've actually never given this a moment's thought, but if "COVID for cats" had emerged some time in 1990-91, I'm sincerely unsure whether any of the Senshi would know about it or have given it thought themselves on screen.
Or it could be Luna, only Luna, who had such a bug.
The fact that none of the girls have noticed it happening places an upper bound on how serious a problem it can be, though, even in theory.
IDK, a massive cat flu sounds like the exact sort of thing we'd have heard about as a potential Dark Kingdom/Pretty Cure villain plot. Even if it sounds unimportant that's the exact modus operandi of a lot of our villains, so if our advisors ignored something like that they're not doing their jobs.
Hm, a fair point. On the other hand, if it was associated with Artemis, then it might have faded into the hum of the background noise by now. If you're looking for "cops are reporting a sudden surge of missing person reports from those living within a half-mile radius of this one address," then you may be looking in the wrong direction to catch "oh yeah, there's been this cat flu going around and has been for a year, and it's about 4% fatal." People's ability to cover the news is finite.
I'm not saying this happened, but I wouldn't call bullshit if Lunaryon said "yeah this has been happening the whole time and you didn't know." Though it'd seem kind of cruel for the genre.
Relax. The most that will happen is the Mau-native virus interacts oddly with Terran-native felines and over a few generations gives them opposable thumbs and near-human-level manual dexterity. What's the worst that could happen?
Kore (maximum sarcasm mode: engage): There are also several rather oppressive or excessively corrupt governments across the globe that are experiencing much the same problems, so take heart, it isn't just you that is experiencing this hardship.
Relax. The most that will happen is the Mau-native virus interacts oddly with Terran-native felines and over a few generations gives them opposable thumbs and near-human-level manual dexterity. What's the worst that could happen?
Just like always, the words burn as Chris says them, like acid on her tongue, and fire running through her veins. Chris may not know the name of the artifact that she is using, but she knows that it doesn't like her. And she doesn't like it. But that doesn't matter compared to trying to help the Master of the Mountain.
Lord of the Mountain = 1d10 + 60 = 1 + 60 = 61
[NAT ONE!] CRIT FAIL CHECK BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD ACTIVATES
Berserker Lord = 1d10 + 60 = 6 + 60 = 66
Tako = 1d10 + 26 = 9 + 26 = 35
Takeda and Onogoro Forces = 1d10 + 23 + (18 x 0.25) + (17 x 0.25 x 0.37) + (16 x 0.25 x 0.37 x 0.37) + (16 x 0.25 x 0.37 x 0.37 x 0.37) = 1 + 23 + 4.5 + 1.6 + 0.5 + 0.2 = 31
NAT 1!
1d4 = 1
CRIT FAIL CONFIRMED!
As the final syllable of the strange incantation the government rebels casts leaves her lips there comes a flash of bright, deep blue light, and a discordant, painfully off-tune screech.
As the last syllable leaves Chris's lips, there is a flash of deep blue and a discordant, almost painfully off-tune screech. Chris can feel her clothes disappearing, even as they don't. The closest thing she can describe to the sensation is like shucking off a pair of gloves that have been tied to the sleeves of her coat. The clothing isn't there, she isn't touching them, but she's still wearing them all the same. Then, at the same time, different clothing - the thicker, tougher, and heavier body suit - is pulled tight around her.
Almost like she's a small child being dressed by her first mother again.
A mother that Chris knows that she'll never see again.
Instead, she's swaddled in the warmth and the protection of her new, adopted mother. The core of the Symphogear system that Ryoko worked so hard to develop.
Next, in the space between one blink of an eye and the next, the Cerebroenergetic Limiter Rig awakens - A lattice of overlapping magical enchanments and barriers, all woven into armored plates and reinforced by the crystalline constructs that the gear system created out of notes and harmonies and… and…
And all those complicated musical terms that have been bandied around her mother's lab. Not that they matter right now, as the pieces of heavy plated armor begin to layer themselves onto the already heavy undersuit. The sudden influx of weight and mass is nearly enough to break her stride.
Nearly, but not quite enough.
Chris might keep her footing, but she still winces. Unfortunately, despite everything that her mother has tried to do to fix the design, Chris's rig is still painfully uncomfortable. The bodysuit clings tightly to her chest, and the armor pieces squeeze tighter still, the edges of the plates digging into the gaps between her ribs. The boots are loose around her ankles and feet, leaving her footing unsure, even as it clings wrapper tight around her shins.
The rig's helmet is large, heavy, and unwieldy, weighing down on her neck and making it hard to look around. Any time that she's forced to wear the armor for more than an hour, the strain on her neck starts to become painful. Worse still, the glass like visor that is supposed to protect her eyes only comes down halfway over her eyes, leaving a semi-clear edge in the middle of her vision.
The armor's gauntlets are also massive and heavy, and have clamped themselves painfully down on her arms. Worse still, the sheer size of the gauntlets means that they stick out past the tips of the girl's fingers, even when she stretches her fingers as far as they will go. That makes it near impossible for the girl to use her hands with any kind of finesse while wearing the rig.
The thing is that Chris's new mother is a genius. Genius among geniuses even. Something that she's proven a hundred times over, but what matters in the moment is that her skill and intelligence allowed her to make dozens of different adjustments to Tsubasa's Rig with ease. She shifted pieces back and forth, all in order to make things easier on the sword wielding girl. Tsubasa's rig never reacted to the changes, but every time that Ryoko made a change to Chris's rig, the armor would instead shift something else back. She could loosen the rig from around Chris's chest, only for the gauntlets to grow so large as to entirely trap Chris's arms inside of them, locking off the use of her hands completely.
There is something different about Chris's rig.
Mama doesn't agree, but Chris is certain that the armor, and the piece of the ancient artifact that it uses, hates her.
Chris knows all of this. She's suffered through the discomfort of attempting to summon the rig over and over and over again as her mother worked out all the issues with the Hidden Armor system. She was there, wincing in pain as her mother adjusted settings and altered limiters in order to try and make the rig as comfortable for Chris to wear as she could. So Chris doesn't have to think about any of it. She knows it all already.
The sound is sharp and loud enough that it captures the attention of each of the fighters. Takochi watches carefully from where she hides in the trees around the edge of the compound.
There is something cruel and hungry in the magic that wraps itself around the girl for less than a moment. It flashes by fast enough that Takochi isn't entirely sure what it was, but it reminds her of the horrors back before she joined Lord Zoisite. Back before she signed up with the Dark Liberators.
That horrible, cruel hunger reminds her of the eons that she spent in Point Zero.
Then the flash fades, revealing the rebel to now be wearing armor. Heavy armor, given the way that the girl nearly stumbles over the next step from the shift in weight and balance.
Not that it stops the rebel. She rushes forwards, and Takochi watches with a careful eye. Is she here to defend the Cryptid? Is she here to fight the Oppressors? Or is she here to help them oppress the Cryptid?
Supposedly, according to the few reports that Lord Zoisite received from the Glass Sisters, the forces of the government organization MCAT are enemies of the Oppressor state known as the Onogoro Ministry.
The only problem is that Takochi doesn't trust the youma that Cendrellion and Drella put their faith in. The Glass Sisters were fools. They hated organic youma, dismissing and even at times killing off allies just because of how they were born. The sisters were more interested in faith and loyalty over competence, supporting youma who bent the knee over youma who managed to achieve their goals.
It really isn't much of a surprise that the sisters were taken down, even if Takochi herself wasn't sure how it happened yet.
For now… She needs to wait. She needs to watch.
She spares only the quickest of glances down to the communication cube at her side. There are so many things happening right now, and they are happening faster than she knows how to handle.
The young rebel throws herself into the air, rocketing towards the closest of the oppressors.
Lord Zoisite has only just been given the authority to start operating in this theater of the war to free the Youma. In fact, this reconnaissance mission is the very first action that the Dark Liberators have approved for the eastern hemisphere.
Strangely, the girl doesn't move through the air in a straight line, the way that one would expect from a powerful leap, but instead she starts to arc off to one side. Something that the girl clearly wasn't expecting, given the confused look that flashes across her face.
At this point, Takochi isn't sure exactly what approach Lord Zoisite wants the Dark Liberators to take towards any of the different factions warring against each other.
Well, no. That isn't entirely true.
Oppressors such as the Onogoro Ministry are enemies. Enemies of the Dark Liberators, enemies of the Cryptids, the native humans, and seemingly even enemies of the Senshi.
But it is everyone else's status that is still up in the air.
As the rebel starts to pass by the oppressor closest to her, she twists around in the air impossible, lashing out with a hand. For a single moment a series of hooked, serrated blades sprout from across the girl's armor - They exude out along her spine, and spring from the gauntlets on her arms and from the guards protecting her shins. The weapons lash out randomly, with different levels of curves and teeth and reaching out different distances before they recede back, like waves lapping up against the shore before the tides pull them back into the ocean.
At the very least, seeing the girl attack an oppressor means that the MCAT organization does appear to be enemies of the Oppressor Onogoro.
But is MCAT allied to the Cryptids? Some sources say yes, others say that MCAT is simply taking advantage of the oppressed cryptids.
Is MCAT allied with the humans of the Japanese government? Given what information that Lord Zoisite has managed to retrieve from the leadership of the humans, it just isn't clear.
And where do the Sailor Scouts fit into all of this?
The Sailor Scouts had been the fangs of the Oppressor Moon Kingdom in the time before the Great Hunger. But the Tyrant Queen Selene is dead now. The Abuser Princess Serenity fell on the Traitor Prince Endymion's sword.
So who do the Senshi serve? Do they serve anyone at all?
Completely unaware of the thoughts ringing around inside of Takochi's head, the rebel girl still manages to lay a heavy punch onto the oppressor, knocking him back hard enough that he drops the heavy hammer he had been wielding. It is strange however, because for all that the rebel's armor has been impressive so far, the fact that she refused to use the blades that came out of her…
Why?
Wouldn't it have been better to put down the oppressor permanently, to make sure that they never oppress anyone ever again?
The rebel darts forwards again, this time targeting one of the oppressor mages that is carrying the binding magics that they have attached to the Bound Cryptid's arms.
For the moment, everything seems to make sense. The rebel is supporting the bound. Both of them are fighting against the oppressors, but…
But Lord Zoisite knows more of what is going on than Takochi does. And it wouldn't do for the Dark Liberators to open this campaign by siding with someone who will be an enemy before too long. She needs his approval before she can commit to aiding anyone.
It is in fact, entirely possible that he is going to order her to stay out of all of this. To wait and watch, until he can figure out where all the lines have been drawn in the sand.
Reaching her next target, the Rebel twists about, snapping her leg back in a heavy kick that sends the oppressor flying even further back. Back to the point where they crash into the wall of one of the buildings that have acted as a prison for the bound cryptid.
For the time being, it seems that the rebel and the cryptid are on the same side. And they do seem to be individually stronger than the oppressor units, but the oppressors have the advantage when it comes to weapons and tools and numbers.
Takochi isn't sure that they are going to be able to keep the advantage for long.
She glances back down at the communication cube again.
Still. No answer.
…
The massive cryptid takes the time to grab hold of one of the other oppressors, throwing them off to one side as well. But the movement caused the glowing binding chain that the other oppressor is using to shift around, twisting and turning and wrapping around him in impossible ways. Flicking like cheap light bulbs when it needs to pass through the limbs of the massive cryptid.
For the moment it doesn't seem to be stopping him in the least, but neither binding as broken. Both are still wrapped around his wrists… There is something more to them, but Takochi isn't sure exactly what.
She can't tell from this distance.
She isn't supposed to interfere. Not yet.
But…
Preparing to interfere is not yet interfering. And more than that, getting closer would allow her to see more. To hear more. To learn more.
The more information that she has, the more that she will be able to report back to her superiors.
And the more that the Dark Liberators will be able to plan for what is to come.
Honestly, the only shame in all of this is that she can't see anyone related to the Senshi being here as well. That is the only faction that Takochi is aware of that she still needs to learn more about.
Because… Without Selene, and without Serenity…
It might even be possible for the Senshi to become allies of the Dark Liberators!
And if they become allies of the Dark Liberators, then the future for all of Youmakind would be bright indeed.
So Takochi leans forwards, allowing one of her arms to dangle down from the treetops for a moment, before she clenches her shoulder tight.
A brief, blinding surge of pain, and the tentacle drops to the ground below. It hurts. But she can bare it. Hitting the ground, the tentacle seems to bounce for a moment, before it springs up. New eyes open, and Takochi's mind expands.
She's both the greater Takochi, and the smaller Takimoto.
Both up in the trees, and down on the forest floor.
The first of the Takimotos starts to dart across the ground, hurrying closer to the ongoing battle as Takochi brings forth another tentacle, now another arm, and leaves it hanging.
Another clench, more pain.
And another Takimoto.
Again and again and again she repeats the painful process, until there are eight Takimotos down on the forest floor, the whole of the greater Takochi spread across them.
This is… Difficult for the youma. Spreading herself across eight bodies like this is a real challenge, remembering which arm is part of which body, and whose legs are whose.
But spread apart like this, it will become all the easier to escape if things go sideways, and all the better to be able to hear.
Eight sets of ears are better than one after all.
Scurrying across the ground, seven of the Takimotos hurry towards the fight, while the last of her many selves instead heads back down towards the shore. If absolutely required, Takochi can abandon the other parts of herself… but that would mean days, if not weeks of slowly regrowing. Cashing in vacation days for paid leave, and spending her hard earned cash on extra Life Energy to assist in regrowing what she would be forced to leave behind.
