Outside: Grass touch place

[Halae]

[Ruined Observatory]

Khannie nods, trying to keep a lid on her impulse to panic and run. "Yeah, that was it."

She knows this fear is irrational.

Whatever this thing is, it's gotta be using some sorta fear charm to to make her afraid. But even knowing that isn't helping shove down the desire to just turn on her hooves and bolt. Last time around she had managed to pick up those lenses before the... thing... showed up and she ran for it.

And speaking of the thing?

It comes straight through the wall.

Like darkness oozing between the bricks, the monster pours out. But it isn't some slimy, tarry thing. It looks like someone took a constellation and shattered it. It's all sharp edges and jagged lines grinding and scraping against each other, motes of light drifting it in refracted into ten thousand impossible and terrifying alien vistas.

As soon as the thing appears it reaches out and attempts to steal from our heroes.

A thought.

A memory.

A hope.

A dream.

[Ruined Observatory]

Shit. Hiep was expecting something bad to be hiding here, but not this. Ironic, too, given who she is. But appropriate, given where they are. Now she feels a memory of an old lover corroding. One she would very much like to keep.

"We need to take this thing down quickly," she says, as if she was a hardened warrior rather than a janitor.

[Ruined Observatory]

Skye doesn't even speak. Khannie and Hiep will get to see her burst into a riot of colors, all the colors of the aurora, subtly pulsing with a deep red heartbeat beneath. Her feet spark gold, and suddenly she's all but flying towards the creature spear-first, and a wreath of the same golden energy swims around the tip of her spear; she fully intends to stab this thing to death.

And the thing is, she has enough experience with the Uncreated and the Wyld that she very likely can. She'll attempt to stab it in whatever central star seems brightest; that's likely to be the core of its being, and if it isn't then it'll be important somehow.

She's protecting herself from the corrosive memory effect - a skill she perfected during her trek through the chaos outside reality - but she knows the others aren't so safe, and is acting as quickly as possible to try and dismantle the danger.

[Gold]

[Running]

TASBot watches as the pudu finally changes into a more humanoid form, and the little green bag in her hand doesn't escape his notice. While that bag could be holding stolen goods, it could just as easily be a wallet or contain an important item that needed to be taken across the forest.

"A forest god?" TASBot mused in response to the small woman's proclamation, a white '?' appearing on his screen for a moment. While TASBot accepted that, being entirely machine, he was nowhere near as spiritually in tune as everything around him and therefore much less likely to sense the presence of a god, he assumed a being of that caliber would want to make its presence known to every entity nearby, including himself. Still, he did nothing to challenge the pudu-woman on this claim past his intial musing.

When one of the larger figures approaches with intent to scare TASBot off, he stands his ground, unfolding his arms and tensing slightly but otherwise not moving. "Chase me away? I was kinda hoping to do the same to you, bud," he casually admits, not doubting for a second that he's faster than the shapeshifter in front of him.

Then, TASBot sees the swordsman suddenly move towards the frightened woman. Immediately and swiftly, the robot moves to slip past Riacan and try to help protect the pudu-woman, but the sight of a literal firewall separating the two causes him to stop dead in his tracks between Riacan and his mates. He remained silent after the wall of fire began to speak, wanting to hear the pudu-lady out properly.

One weakness that both computers and humans typically share is a vulnerability to extreme heat, and TASBot is no exception. He is surprised, then, to see that this lost-seeming child very well might be one - that, or the firewall was just an illusion conjured as part of the skaela's escape plan, which this child is inadvertently shattering. In any case, TASBot is in an uncommon situation of not currently having any words to complement the situation, so he stays silent and angles his blank screen towards the young lady, hoping for but not expecting her to be careful.

[bc56]

On the Trail of the Lair
"At the fundraiser?" Sekhmet remembers that. "Now that you mention it, I see the resemblance." Not much, but it's there. "We'll keep your secret safe!" Mary promises. Sekhmet nods understandingly. Neither succubus is sure why it would be necessary to hide Ambrosia's dragon identity, but they can do it.

[quillpleasant]

Sudden Cave

It's not too long before the cave opens out again into the large space Lia first appeared in, though unless she's got lost she's not on the same wall. She hopefully has continued around the dead end to come out on the other side, so the same tendrils are touching the wall as before. It's sloping down, still, but sticking to the wall may well be the smarter play. The stone is terraced a little, and Lia may stumble on hidden rises and dips, limestone ridges running along the floor and walls.

Lia has indeed followed the dead end around. Even though this isn't an ideal situation, she's still pretty good at navigating through caves. She carefully continues along the wall, dropping to all fours and creeping for extra stability. Every few feet she pauses, listening briefly for any hint of wind, any new drip of water, or any movement in the darkness.

[Shadowcaller]

On the Trail of the Lair
"At the fundraiser?" Sekhmet remembers that. "Now that you mention it, I see the resemblance." Not much, but it's there. "We'll keep your secret safe!" Mary promises. Sekhmet nods understandingly. Neither succubus is sure why it would be necessary to hide Ambrosia's dragon identity, but they can do it.

On the Trail of the Lair

The dragon nods, showing more human-like mannerisms. "The very same. We discussed Mary among other things." Which makes it especially awkward that she threatened to eat her earlier.

"But with that sorted out, there was something else I wanted to tell you about Mary's new 'condition'. Since as I already told her she will need to eat more than just meat as a dragon. Spirits needs to be on her diet or she will have to sleep more than usual." And considering some teenagers sleep habits that might either mean that Mary won't have to change her sleep schedule at all or a lot.

"This place is set up so I can feed on them without any fear of them running out but she's unlikely to have that luxury." She indicates the fort at the center at the town with her head.

[Ironsmith]

[The Silent Sepulchre]

And so the fourth door, but perhaps not the final door, is opened.

Stillness without.

Tahara finds anything but.

In this tiny closet of a room she can feel the atoms vibrating. She can feel the world spinning below her feet. She can feel the planet screaming through the void as it relentlessly chases the sun. She can feel great teaming schools of stars churning around a cosmic whirlpool that's spinning so fast it rends the fabric of space.

Bigger and bigger.

Wider and wider.

Further and further until she glimpses a glimmer of the Motion that drives it.

It's too much.

It threatens to overwhelm, to wring her out like a towel being twisted to squeeze out the water.

[Silent Sepulchre]

That's probably bad enough for single-entity beings, but for the sapient swarm of roaches that is Tahara, it leaves "unbearable" as a threshold so far behind that it isn't really even worth talking about.

She isn't just a tiny speck in the grand cosmic scheme of things. She's a bunch of even tinier specks in the grand cosmic scheme of things. Which is true for anything, but being able to feel it isn't an especially pleasant experience.

...No, wait. That's the key, isn't it?

This isn't all just noise. The vibrating atoms are made up of simple parts that obey simple principles. The atoms themselves build up into molecules, into structures, into vast systems that look and sound so much more complicated but always come back to individual parts doing what they're supposed to do. She is many things joined together as one. So is this room. So is everything. All the way down, and all the way up.

The turbulence she sees around her is the natural flow of events. It's all one image, of which she is a part. She just... needs to find the right focus for it. Watching one particle tells her nothing. Watching a galaxy spiral, just as much. She needs to see just what's in front of her.

Here and now. Her part of the picture.

Greater Sattleborough

Samantha yelps as the carriage careens around the corner, potentially scraping its sides against the alleyway's walls. She's avoiding the blade of the scythe mostly through chance than any effort on her end. She'll scramble back up and around to look out the rear window, to see if the Juggernaut takes the bait or if it's continuing to follow.

Fortunately, it seems to be working; the Juggernaut rumbles past the end of the alley and doesn't turn to follow. Indeed, it gets quieter as it travels further away.

[Greater Sattleborough]

skrrr-tnk!

The carriage lurches yet again, this time throwing Samantha and company up toward its front.

But, more importantly, all the noise associated with its motion- the clatter of the wheels against cobblestone, the clop-clop-clop of the horses' hooves, the rattle of the axles- have all gone silent. The carriage itself no longer swaying and bobbing like it's been doing throughout the whole ride, instead coming to a complete and abrupt halt.

A quick glance out the window reveals why. The alleyway was never designed to accommodate a vehicle of this size... and now it can't. The gap between the buildings is simply too narrow, leaving the carriage, its driver, and its contents stuck firmly between them.

There's no way forward. And the carriage can't exactly back up. All it can do is sit there, wedged between two buildings Samantha knows damn well the Juggernaut can tear down any time it pleases, and without a line of sight back to keep track of it.

[Morty]

[On the Trail of the Lair]

"Oh, yeah. I might have dropped that name a bit too casually." Thariza rubs her snout, a little embarrassed.

[Rebonack]

[Ruined Observatory]

Khannie's floundering a bit here. She knows this dumb thing's fear effect is just magical nonsense. She's had to throw down with WAY scarier things than this before but she's still stuck shaking in her hooves.

So what's going on.

What's this thing's deal?

It's attacking emotions. And... eating at memories? It's-

Oh!

Oh that's gotta be it!

It's like the fox trick where you attach emotions to memories. All of a sudden the fox is that person you trust implicitly. She knows how that sorta magic works. Khannie focuses her own magic inward and calms her own feelings like the shadow foxes had taught her. Suddenly the overwhelming terror-thing is just some weird monster.

Skye, meanwhile, lunges spear first!

Normally this would be a solid way to transfix the swirling star at the heart of the horror, but it doesn't seem too keen on allowing that to happen.

Mostly thanks to gravity suddenly inverting and intensifying, yanking Skye off course and into...

Umm...

The ceiling?

Floor?

Either way, not spear-first into the monster.

Speaking of the monster, it suddenly gets WAY more pointy than it was a few moments ago, each point ending in a burning spike of cold stellar radiance.


[Silent Sepulcher]

Tahara finds stillness without.

The room is just a room. Nothing more and nothing less.

A fourth line of light leads to the reflecting pool-
-which is no longer a reflecting pool.

A spiral of stairs, hewed from the night sky, rise from the well and vanish into the starry firmament above.

[Ironsmith]

[Silent Sepulcher]

...Huh.

That's got to be the second-freakiest closet Tahara's ever seen.

But, with the line of light seeming to confirm that she had, in fact, passed whatever test was supposed to be in here, it seems she's bound for whatever's up those stairs.

If this place saw fit to give her the rest of the Icon, it's surely up there.

...She's still not sure she's ready. But now doesn't seem like the time for second guesses.

Slowly, carefully, Tahara begins her ascent, keeping her eyes on the firmament as she approaches, in case something else changes.

[Rebonack]

[Silent Sepulcher]

Time to ascend, right?

What could go wrong.

Tahara climbs the stairs and soon finds herself climbing through a starry expanse. She can still feel the stairs under her feet, but there's nothing else to see here. At least, until, there suddenly is.

It's just...

There.

Shining like a star.

Something churning, whirling, turning, like a great blazing gear at the heart of the cosmos around which all other things turn. The very essence of motion, of time, of space, of entropy, distilled down into a work of indescribable beauty. What does the fabric of reality even look like? How would one grasp such a thing?

But grasp it she must, if Tahara is sure.

Above all else, the Icon is a Sword and a Fire.

It cuts away the dead and burns away the impure until all that remains is a shining Path winding its way toward the apex of the Tower-
-or until all that remains is nothing.

Does Tahara possess anything that can withstand the touch of the Searing Light of Truth?

There's only one way to find out.

[Ironsmith]

[Silent Sepulcher]

Well.

This is it, then.

One way or another, her journey ends here. In either salvation or oblivion.

Honestly, this seems like a much better ending to her than what would have happened if she hadn't come. She would have found a dark alley somewhere, curled up, and simply expired. Somehow, that didn't seem quite right.

It's the end, after all.

Stopping short of the Icon, Tahara lets herself have a little laugh. If this goes badly for her, it'll be the last great Tragedy of her life. Done in by her own hubris. Sure, she'll be dead in a few hours anyway, but she's willing to bet that fading out of existence quietly would be less painful than being purified into nothing.

...Since that would be a Tragedy, she could go downstairs and see how this ends. Borrow the reflecting pool again and take one last glimpse at the future.

But... no. Just this once, maybe it's best she doesn't know.

"...All right, guys. This is where I get out." Tahara smiles, gathering herself up. "This part... this part I have to do on my own." She wraps her arms around herself and gives a little shiver, despite her proximity to the star. "...If I don't see you again... thank you. From the bottom of my heart."

...It feels like she should say more, but... now, of all times, it seems as though words fail her.

"Good luck, my little friends. And here's hoping we meet again, real soon."

-

[Silent Sepulcher] (Downstairs)

Silently, a large, undirected swarm of roaches starts down the stairs, slightly buried under loose refuse and detritus. From here, they'll spread all over the Sepulcher, looking for any quiet place to settle within its walls.

Tahara herself, of course, is nowhere to be seen.

-

[Silent Sepulcher]

The trash witch's shadow reaches out and touches the Icon.

[Rebonack]

[Silent Sepulcher]

Formless, bodiless, substanceless, Tahara reaches out and touches the Icon.

She feels a moment of searing, indescribable pain as if she had taken the sun itself into her heart, and then nothing.

....

[bc56]

On the Trail of the Lair
"Wait, you knew who I was and you still wanted to eat me?" Mary looks a little upset about that.

But there's another revelation coming.
"What do you mean?" Sekhmet looks concerned. "Eating spirits" sounds bad. To some perspectives, she herself is a spirit.
"Okay, how do I not run out?" Are there spirit grocery stores? Could Mary live off of canned ghosts?
These are important questions.

[Shadowcaller]

On the Trail of the Lair

"I only realized who you were afterwards, those photos your mother showed me were quite old." Puberty will do that to you. Especially succubi puberty apparently.

"As for spirits, it's not that different from eating animals. They're usually found out in the wild but sometimes in settlements too. They're born from the emotions and thoughts of people and animals so they reproduce through them in a way. So you would never run out of them." Which could be easier said than done when you were constantly hungry. "But if you eat too many at once you might have to change hunting ground frequently so its a good idea to try to control that constant need for spirits which you now will have."

The dragon turns to the fort again. "Now, the spirits of this place are tied to a cursed artifact. A bell it the tower of that fort. Each time it senses intruders the spirits will raise to defend their long dead emperor, which is when I consume them. But at each dawn the bell recreates the spirits and the cycle begins anew as soon as it tolls. That way I never have to leave this place to hunt other spirits if I don't want to."

She looks to Thariza. "It's fine. I should have reminded you of that as I know it's not easy keeping track of all my identities." Two would be complicated enough but Ambrosia had three.

[bc56]

On the Trail of the Lair
That doesn't sound like any sort of spirit Sekhmet's ever heard of. But she nods.
"So I'll just find them floating around people? How will I know what they look like?" Mary questions. There are normal ghosts at PREP and at GLoG, she'd better be able to avoid eating them by mistake.

[Murkus]

[Running]

The cervine folk all reel from the sheet of flame, all give a start at the voice that issues forth and the... peculiar child's casual disregard for the heat. Savath exchanges a meaningful look with Mensei. At the feel of the heat and the power of the voice, Savath's armor immediately erupts with renewed and ferocious energy, contorting up off his body to snap at the air with teeth made from steel and leather studs, seemingly reacting to tension or aggression.

Savath decides to take the presence of the girl as part of this terrible sign, whatever it may be. The great ones were not usually so... overt, in making their wishes known. Some of them did not even seem to understand language. Was this truly a god, as the skaela believed? They would see.

"You care for life, is that it?" Savath bellows into the flame, arm raised to shield him from the heat. Curious. It was the first clue that this might be some spirit or power unknown to the Rungaik, rather than the indifferent gods of the dark and the wet. And what's more, if the child could walk through the flame, was it truly so hot? Or merely a glamour of the sort used to entertain fawns? Savath raises his voice again, the sound like a throatful of broken stones, "This girl has stolen a very important object. If it is not returned, many will die. Thousands. I cannot say more without endangering the item still further, spirit! Hear the truth of my words! If she undertakes a new Change, the item will be bound in her form - until she returns to a two legged shape, or she perishes."

The 'skaela' glances down at Asami as she wanders heedless through the wall of superheated air. The pudu-lady beams. "A little avatar, sent to my aid. Hello, there." She seems... off kilter. She sweats visibly and heavily in the light of the flames, regardless of the actual heat they emit, and her face and body are visibly strained with stress and fatigue.

Riacan, meanwhile, notes TASBot's sudden advance as too overt a sign of aggression - or at least disregard for the zone of control around his friends. Or perhaps the giant warrior is simply spoiling for a bit of action. He raises one great fur-booted foot, grunts with effort, and stomps the earth, flexing the massive digits of his weathered hands. His boot remains planted this way--

And a growth of seamless, perfectly smooth metal cord, like an iron wire as thick around as a human finger - erupts suddenly from the earth at TASBot's feet. It tries to catch his ankle, quickly winding upward to bind his leg if successful. It moves like a constrictor snake setting upon a meal, spraying earth and undergrowth before it.

[Earl of Purple]

Sudden Cave

There is a slight breeze, wind channelled in by the edge of the cave. There's also movement; something large and round floating in the air. It's hard to be sure, but it seems to have at least eight tendrils or other slender protrusions at the top, and it's also getting closer to Lia. It's hard to tell if it's being pushed by the breeze, or if it's moving under its own power, but its movement is silent, save a slight squeaking noise as it brushes against the rock wall before bouncing off and turning slightly.

Greater Sattleborough

Samantha yelps again as the carriage comes to a stop, falling off her seat where she'd been staring out the rear and tumbling to the floor, eyes wide as she scarcely breathes; Jubilee's scythe also tumbled, and the point of it is... uncomfortably close to her face, and worse, the haft's behind her head. After a gulp, the child gets up and touches the side of her head; a swathe of hair has been cut, and there's a shallow graze along her scalp where the edge touched skin.

"I don't see it. Can you hear it? I... don't know where it's gone." But it's getting further away, which is at least reassuring. For now, anyway. And Samantha knows from the vision that it preferentially went for buildings over fleeing civilians. Perhaps the carriage triggered the Juggernaut as 'moving building'.

[Ironsmith]

[Greater Sattleborough]

"No, I don't."

Jubilee sits up, carefully retrieving her scythe from where it lay, looking over Samantha for any sign of serious injury.

"You did well. I have a few notes, of course, but it's good to see you taking charge in a crisis. You're coming along nicely on that front." She calmly pats the seat next to her, offering Samantha a place to recover while they figure out their next move.

[[brackets lover]]

[Running]

Asami narrows her eyes suspiciously at the 'skaela', clicking her tongue. "Uh... No. I just came here because I was curious. I don't come rushing to the aid of everyone I meet."

She scratches the back of her head, looking between the group gathered. "I especially won't get in a fight on your behalf. I won't force anyone's hands here, but I urge you all to relax."

[Rebonack]

[Running]

Now, Solahart has met a few things over her life that laugh at the threat of flames.

She's one of them, after all.

But typically human children aren't one of those things. At least in her experience. But then again, she hasn't had a great deal of experience in this 'Nexus' yet and who knows what wonders might dwell here?

If she's learned anything over her life it's that one should never assume they know and act without knowledge.

That's a good way to get killed.

Now then. They have one side of the story. Time for the other. Hopefully.

"I have heard you," the fire crackles. "But I have not heard the accused. What is your side of this story, little one? Why do you flee so doggedly?"

[Rebonack]

[Ingress]

In a snowy field, some distance from a rock outcrop that looks suspiciously like a skull, a small menagerie of cats are milling around.

Well, not cats anyway.

Felines of various sizes and sorts.

And not living felines, either. Bones of bronze, covered in snowy white feathers and wrapped in green vines with scarlet flowers. Some even have little curling horns. All echoes of the one who worried them back to life. Or something like life, at least. Husks in the service of Zebakhel, ready to sacrifice themselves to her cause.

The cause was doing some questing.

But then she popped out of existence.

BUT NOW SHE'S BACK!

She just sort of zoops! into being, growing out of nothing, a nearly abstract array of feathers and bronze and blossoms and hooves and horns and eyes. But she quickly folds in on herself, like some kind of preternatural origami, until a young lady in a stylized lion tamer's outfit is standing there. Top hat on her head. Crimson passion blossom in her hair.

"Okay guys I'm back! Change of plans, probably," she says to her heap of cats which all begins headbutting her legs.

[Ironsmith]

[Ingress]

"Hey? Zehb? A little help?"

The request comes from a pair of stocking-clad legs sticking out of the ground nearby, which are... not kicking, exactly, but going through a looping motion somewhat resembling an attempt to walk on an invisible plane just above their feet. On the snow itself, a skirt of glossy black fabric is twitching around erratically, in a flurry of seemingly random activity further complicated by its many layers colliding with and repelling off of one another.

"I think I did it wrong." The legs' owner moans.

[Morty]

[Ruined Observatory]

That's not great. If this monster can change someone's course without any apparent effort... well, let's try how often it can do it. Hiep grabs a nearby chunk of rubble, easily as big as she is, and flings it at the creature with a heave and a burst of yellow starlight.

[Rebonack]

[Ingress]

Oh.

Haha!

Yeah that's not quite right.

"You don't want to get stuck in the ground, usually," Catherine points out. Usually it isn't a problem. Usually stuff just gets out of the way. But Formerly Tahara is having some issues for sure.

"Okay we're going to try a Drift and then pop back in. It'll just be a hop skip and a jump outways and everything should be a okay!" Cat says, quite certain that this is true.

She'll take Amadel by the foot and try to Drift them both a few steps sideways in time. That should get her extracted from the ground!

[Ironsmith]

[Ingress]

"No..." The upside-down empyrean groans incredulously through the dirt. Getting stuck in the floor is a bad thing? Why, she never would have figured that out!

Textual sarcasm aside, Amadel waits patiently for Catherine to grab her foot, then for the two of them to Drift back out and in. A few seconds later, she's standing right-side-up next to where she was, dusting off her skirt.

She looks a bit different from her most recent form as a mortal, but she'd probably be recognizable to anyone looking intently enough at her face; the youthful, rosy cheeks are a new addition, but the overall shape certainly isn't. She's dressed in a black, long-skirted tunic and shawl, both of which are covered in a smooth sheen resembling that of stretched plastic. A cowl rests against the back of her neck, currently not in use, mostly obscured by a rull head of raven hair, which she gives a tentative sniff.

"...Huh. Nice of my avatar to use shampoo." She notes. That's a habit she's going to have to get back into.

...Right. She can look herself over more thoroughly later. For now, she turns her attention back to Catherine. "All right, I think I'm okay."

That'd probably be more convincing if it wasn't followed by her briefly flickering ankle-deep into the snow and then back on top of it again, but one can't have everything.

[Shadowcaller]

On the Trail of the Lair
That doesn't sound like any sort of spirit Sekhmet's ever heard of. But she nods.
"So I'll just find them floating around people? How will I know what they look like?" Mary questions. There are normal ghosts at PREP and at GLoG, she'd better be able to avoid eating them by mistake.

On the Trail of the Lair

"Not always, they're complex beings. Some are connected to locations that people visit. While they might be physically distant their thoughts still return to such places for one reason or another. But more to the point, you can feel them..."

The dragon pauses.

"You're worried about eating someone, aren't you? Well, I'm afraid that's something you simply have to try to control from now on. I use spirits as guards and servants so I know that it's possible. With little practice you could even control them like I do." Oh right, that was the other aspect of dragonhood that she hadn't mentioned yet.
"But yes, if you have any spirit friends you might be tempted to eat them now and you will always be able to feel when they're near." Ambrosia clears her throat. "And another important thing, and this is a bit more complicated." Hopefully Mary wouldn't find this awkward to talk about in front of her mother.

"You know how consuming food strips it of all energy? Whatever we can't use to fuel ourselves becoming waste that we get rid off the usual way? Well, I get rid of the spirit matter I consume through emanations which is similar to how humans can get rid of heat through sweating.
However, these emanations are more akin to radiation in that they can 'poison' the area around me. It's only really harmful if it happens in the same location often enough and then just to spirits. Though animals and people probably shouldn't eat anything from the area as enough of it is harmful to them as well."

It can be useful as weapons against spirits though.

[Gold]

[Running]

TASBot looks back at Riacan upon hearing movement and notices him raising one foot, evidently preparing to stomp. A stomp, the robot reasons, usually triggers a ground-based attack, so he's already watching the floor and staying light enough on his feet to whip his foot out of the way of the snaking tendril of metal by the time it rises from the earth.

"Cool technique, but it's pretty telegraphed," TASBot casually comments as though they were engaging in a bout of friendly sparring rather than an actual fight. Internally, meanwhile, he gives silent thanks to the firewall - whether an invention of the skaela's or its own entity - for protecting her and letting him give his full attention to the fight.

TASBot moves to put a little distance between the two combatants as he says "If slow attacks are all you have..." He doesn't finish his sentence though; instead, he chooses that moment to put on a burst of speed and charge towards Riacan, closing the distance between them in under half a second before launching a fist at the warrior's chin in a jumping uppercut attack.

[Rebonack]

[Ingres]

Okay great they're making progress! Cat has her eyes on the horizon (dramatically] and is contemplating their next move!

Which means she misses the flicker.

One of her cats, however, is busy smelling the new empyrean's feet and recoils at the strange motion.

"Okay so we can head back into town. I think there's an obelisk somewhere nearby and that'll be SO MUCH faster than walking," Catherine says, shading her eyes with her hand and peering off over the snow covered hills. "Oh! Or you could finish this quest with me first! It didn't sound like it was going to be very hard and the cursed village can wait for a while probably."

[Ironsmith]

[Ingress]

"...You know what? I like the sound of that." Amadel says, rolling her shoulders. "I mean not the fact that there is a cursed village, that's not good, but... I think I could use a test drive. Get used to, you know..." She gestures toward herself. "All of this."

Also, yes, helping people. That's part of what she set out to do in the first place, right?

[Rebonack]

[Ingress]

"The obelisk is over that way I think we can probably get over to it in about an- wait, you want to do the quest?" Cat says, a little surprised here. "Oh sweet! Alright! Let's do it!"

Okay Cat is getting pumped now!

This is going to be cool! And fun. Both of those things.

"Alright first I should probably get you up to speed on the quest, right? So there's this cursed village. The curse is pretty bad! So this village curse? Anyone born in the village can't travel more than two miles away or they turn into a CAT. Like. FOREVER. And most people don't want to be a cat which, I mean, cats are cool and all but it get it! No good! So there's something in that cave over there-"

She points at the foreboding skull cave.

"-which makes the curse all... cursey. And so I was going to go in there and smash it! I guess there are some weird cat demon things, too? I already smacked a few on the way here lurking around on the way to the cave. Real rotten felines! They didn't even leave anything behind for me to make some new friends with!"

Which is the worst. Especially since they tore up Pawful! And Catherine really LIKED Pawful!