[Common Region] Kikka

[Bloodedge]

https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4872/31969560188_9ea21787bf_c.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/QH3mrA)

Kikka is one of the castle towns of the Clover Kingdom, due to its close proximity with the Noble region. The town is close enough that the citizens have a vivid view of the Kingdom's palace from it. Kikka is a well-developed town with paved roads and many large stone-based houses. The amount of houses established in Kikka suggests that it has a considerably large population. One of Kikka's prominent features is its strong trading center. Various merchants, from foods to weapons, come to Kikka for business, which makes Kikka's market one of the liveliest markets within the Kingdom. Many people, including the Magic Knights, come to Kikka for their errands.

Notable Venues

Magic Knights Colosseum: This large stone stadium is where the Magic Knights hold their exams.
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1942/30462966137_c1a7f4ac79_c.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/NpUEw6)

Black Market: The market is one of the hidden locations within the town. Generally, people are aware of its existence, but the nobles tend to avoid entering the place. The market houses merchants who sell goods, which are not allowed to be sold at a regular market. Additionally, the black market also features a casino where people could gamble in various games.
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4834/44023904290_bd9e3ae0d5_c.jpg (https://flic.kr/p/2a5f1YA)

[Apollymi]

A girl with green hair and fiercely predatory eyes stood in line among dozens of others trying to become Magic Knights. She seemed apathetic to her surroundings her face with an immovable expression as she pushed locks out of her face so that they settled in a still rather mangy way around her ears. She heard every person called before her and knew the routine and though she stood in line absently she still heard more calls from the front. "Have your Grimoire ready to be inspected!" the chant called. She wondered what kind of test this would be, she'd never heard anything about it before. And though she'd traveled quite a long way to get here, she hardly seemed bothered by any of the things going on around her. A her vacant expression almost belayed boredom if not for the tension in her body hiding right beneath the surface. As if she didn't trust the calm of this moment and something could simply go wrong without warning. Her tattered golden shirt billowed in the breeze as she tucked her right thumb into her belt loop pulling further at her already disheveled appearance. "Oi, look at her, there isn't anyway she didn't come from the Forsaken Lands!" an average looking young man with blue eyes and brown hair teased. His words, though a hushed whisper seemed to draw the girl's gaze as she look gave a look that implied his future doom, but spoke no words only allowing a malicious smile to grace her once apathetic visage.

[Bloodedge]

"Of course she did!" spoke the voice of another young male with white-silver hair in short spikes. This lad's red eyes looked in a condescending manner at the green-haired girl in her tattered clothes. He held this expression in spite of the death stare this girl offered the male he spoke to, as if he didn't care whatsoever. "You see what she's wearing? Only someone from the Forsaken Lands couldn't even afford a decent pair of clothes to put on their backs!" he added.

At that moment, another male interjected. This particular lad wore no shirt whatsoever, only cladding himself in a pair of dark pants and boots, as well as an open white jacket that revealed his uncommonly-muscular build beneath. This individual with spiky black hair stepped up and patted the back of the condescending lad, doing so in a manner which seemed to cause the latter great discomfort from the impact. "Oi! Aren't you a foreigner? I'm pretty sure that doesn't give you a lot of room to talk, dude!"

[Apollymi]

The green haired girl had a book tucked in behind her, in her only worthwhile possession a single leather studded book cover. Of course the glowing coming from it was massive as if she was rather suddenly planning to move. "Two bitch made spoiled brats..." the small words came from her as nearly a whisper but she licked her lips as she turned on her heels. It didn't matter to her if she couldn't become a Magic Knight this year, she could kill these two here and now and feel satisfied with the trip. But before she could go any further she was rather surprised to find someone coming to her aid, at least verbally. Such a thing was quite unusual considering and she was more than prepared to handle herself. "Oi, green hair you're next..." said the person at the front of the line. Seeing this the girl's rather angry eyes averted and she went on about her day. Her gaze shifted from her original target and was accompanied by a gentle nod at the muscular lad before she turned to go about her business. It was meant to portray gratitude, if she got the chance she might say it directly, but for now, she was standing at the front of the line with a strangers hand upon her Grimoire and after a moment or two a grin passed that person's face. "Number 362, Next!" he said and she moved on and that boy seemed to become immediately relieved. Like a weight had been lifted from him, and the interruption of the other lad was enough. "Well, whatever right? His family is established, even if he's a foreigner. Butt out..." he said finding it in himself to recover from the deep sense of fear he had within himself.

The whole of this interaction was being observed by a blue haired lass who was a bit astonished. Most wouldn't bother sticking up for anyone else, even less someone who was considered subhuman almost due to where they came from. Her little dress blew in the wind as she also stepped up, shaking her head at the entire situation but gaining more than a bit of respect for the shirtless lad despite his state of undress. She handed over her book for examination. 'I can't believe people are actually like this...' she thought, she was from a small town in the more common area. And though the extremely royal and rich were snobbish, she didn't expect it to be so readily ingrained into their children. She wondered how they'd feel about that later. "Number 364," the person at the front of her line said as she also moved on.

[Bloodedge]

"Ugh! And who the hell do you think you are, huh!?" the white-haired male asked while recovering from the hit he'd taken. Hearing this and the words of the other individual, the shirtless lad raised a brow. "Eh? Family's established?" he asked. This query prompted the white-haired one to stand erect with all the arrogance of a prince, even whilst not deserving or owning the title. "Hmph! Obviously you don't have a clue who I am! Itamu Senju! My brother is none other than Tobirama Senju of the Azure Deer!"

The boy named Itamu seemed very confident in himself during his introduction, but what he received in response was a blank stare, which turned to light confusion over time. It was almost as if the male he spoke to had no idea what weight this name was meant to hold. In fact... "Yeah? Hmm... No clue! Itadakimasu or whatever your name is, that doesn't mean shit to me! If you wanna fight me, fight me, but you should both probably leave people alone unless you plan on doing something!"

During this dispute, yet another spiky-haired male entered the fray. This teen had ash-blonde hair and a coat lined in black fur. Piercing red eyes looked straight ahead as he casually stepped between the bickering lads, bumping into both of them en route to registration. "Outta my way. Save the dumb shit for the exam," he said in passing. Upon reaching the desk, he followed behind the blue-haired girl by presenting an orange grimoire.

[Apollymi]

A giggle escaped a young woman in a mint green shirt as well as several others. The ongoing spat between these boys was now a moment to watch but as another pushed through the crowd it seemed most didn't care much about it. "You're funny~" mentioned this girl, who seemed to care very little that she'd been cut in line. The orange book set forward by the boy who'd breezed past her and the rest of the group was looked over by the person at the front who sat a hand against it and after a few moments and a bit of magic handed it back. "He's right. All of you should calm down... you are number 365," said the desk person to the boy as the orange book was shifted back. "Next!" was the shout which would prompt the girl with the glasses to push them up onto her nose. "Hey, keep the line moving or you guys are going to get skipped," she said to the group. "Hold your horses commoner, you probably won't even make it either..." said the antagonizing boy from earlier, apparently content to choose a less scary looking target for his vocal torment. Still he went ahead and stepped up placing his brown grimoire in the hands of the desk person who performed the same test. "Hai, number 366, keep it moving. Next," the person ahead would be waiting for the next of this group to step forward. The conversation and antagonism between these individuals didn't seem to bother these people at all.

[Bloodedge]

"Oh, well that's pretty rude," the black-haired boy commented, though he was content to leave the previous topic behind. That is, until the original instigator had another comment for the girl who'd so recently spoken and preceded him in line. "Oi... it's like you didn't hear a single thing I just said!" he growled as his right fist rose slowly, showing a suddenly vascular arm peering from under his jacket sleeve. Still, he was next in line, so he chose to present his grimoire while talking himself out of the fight he frankly wanted to have here and now.

Sadly, the boy now presenting his grimoire was standing in the wrong place to do so. He was a full three paces to the left of registration, holding his grimoire out to no one at all. Another male figure was meant to be behind him, and stepped up in his place. This individual was very strange bar the hooded cloak he wore. Even with this article of clothing cladding him, one could note the mass of silver hair beneath his hood, seeming to gleam with the added colors of a rainbow as the light struck his protruding locks. Standing before the receptionist, he held out his left hand, above which floated a golden grimoire with a four-leaf clover upon it. "Onegai," he said to the receptionist upon revealing his grimoire. He seemed relatively silent, yet he also seemed to be in a bit of a rush.

[Apollymi]

The girl who was now out of line in front of the muscular lad shook her head from left to right. "It's rude, but... maybe he was in a rush," she said watching and waiting for the next person to get through the lines, as a lad stood to the left of the actual line another slipped forward. "You're standing at the wrong spot, slip in behind him..." mentioned the girl with the glasses to the lad. The person at the desk was now looking at a very special Grimoire. "Sugoi! I've never seen one of these!" said the person, spawning a couple of other people behind him to look with glittering eyes. "This is a 4 Leaf Clover! That's super rare, you..." it seemed a moment of nerdy appreciation was spawning as this book was looked over.

The girl pushed her glasses up on her nose, wondering about the commotion. "What? A four!?" she seemed stunned by the news. Such books were rare beyond all reason. She wondered what kind of lad held such a book, still she moved forward and hoped to catch a glimpse herself at some point in the future. She would have assumed such a thing would have only spawned in a noble or royal family. That being said, a real noble or royal wouldn't have made their children come to this area. The test was considered a formality for them, they'd just be placed in a group at some point. A few seconds of stunned amazement afterward and the white haired lad's grimoire would be handed back to him. "Hai, Number 367, go ahead and wait with the others!" said the man behind the desk. "Next!" was the call. Tired of waiting, the girl carried on content to wait on the other side for her new friend.

[Bloodedge]

"... I'm what now?" the raven-haired boy asked, though he looked over for his own confirmation. True indeed, he was standing in entirely the wrong place, and the mystery lad from behind him was now having his grimoire registered instead. "Oi, I..." Whatever he intended to say was lost to the universe during a moment of shock and awe. Before him was a four-leaf grimoire, which he was made to believe he shouldn't expect to see in his lifetime. And yet, there it was, possessed by a boy who - unlike many present thus far - didn't seem to intentionally draw any attention to himself.

"Hontoni arigatou," the cloaked male spoke when his grimoire was returned. With that out of the way, he took his leave of the line with a sigh of relief that seemed somewhat unwarranted given the circumstances. Finally seeing his chance to be registered, the lad with the open jacket stepped back into place with his grimoire extended.

[Apollymi]

It seemed that like everyone else, the muscular boy was lost in thought about the boy with the 4 leaf clover book. Of course, this shock seemed to subside as the boy who tried not to draw attention to himself look relieved and slipped on past. The boy who'd stepped up most recently after also had his book looked over, but after seeing something so rare, even his got only the most minor of treatment by comparison. "Hm... everything seems to be in order here. Number 368, next!" and just like that this boy's book was returned to him and he was given leave to continue on.

The line would continue moving as others gathered in the area behind this one, gathering in the starting place looking around the open expanse of the arena. Many people were grouped up, in huddles of friend groups or recent acquaintances talking about this thing or that thing. A dull murmur with bits of conversation being picked up all around. On the outskirts of this, was the green haired girl practically in rags who stood still with aggression in her eyes, though she'd apparently calmed down just a bit since her last appearance. "I wonder what kind of test we'll have to take?" questioned one person in the crowd. "I don't know why I came back, I failed out last year!" said another anxiety ridden individual. "There was a commotion a few minutes ago about a rumored 4 leaf clover book..." a homely looking girl mentioned. "Stuff like that never happens..." said another. It seemed it hadn't taken long for the rumor mill to start. Still this green haired girl stood with one thumb hooked into her belt loop her eyes tracing over everyone. "Noisy..." she mumbled as she backed herself against a pillar taking to leaning for her own comfort.

[Bloodedge]

"Yosh! Good to go!" he said upon his registration. Over time, others remaining in line were cleared to participate in the entrance exam. Many groups were present in the stadium, all in wait with their own varying levels of patience. Eventually, some would take note of a different group of people stepping out in front of a line of chairs in the stands above. Among these people were: a younger male with spiky blond hair, another with short and spiky white-silver hair and red face markings, a younger male with bright orange spiked hair, and a final male figure with long and vibrant red hair, and a mask covering the right half of his face. The first of these men to arrive was also the first to speak with these prospects. "Hoh! It looks like we have a lot this year! Who wants to be a Magic Knight!?" he called out, mostly to grab the attention of those who hadn't yet noticed this group's presence. As this man looked out into the crowd, the glow of a grimoire showed from beneath his waistline. Suddenly thereafter, tree roots would sprout next to every participant of the entrance exam, cutting themselves off to take the shape of brooms. The rest, he left to another...

[Apollymi]

Soon enough all of the people trying to become Magic Knights had gathered within the arena. Beyond this, there was a total of nine people at the top of the chamber. One would be a young woman with a giant witch's hat in white silvery color and a piercing silvery gaze. She said nothing but her eyes moved over the crowd. One woman with a deep tan and purple hair found herself rather gently flopping into the chair she was meant to take. "Yare yare, this group seems so lively..." she muttered as she looked out over the crowd. Yet another woman also took a seat, but her eyes weren't visible, in fact the only visible part of her face was a the lower half which garnered something of a smile. One woman with flame red hair and living vines within that seemed to sit down with a rather regal disposition. "Oh such hopeful little saplings... the garden needs tending though..." she apathetically. The last woman said nothing, but her blonde hair seemed to poke out from the edges of her hood. Just as well she was pushing up her glasses as if she intended to keep watching. "Sugoi, all nine Captains are here..." was the murmur among the crowd who looked up in awe feeling the need to impress.

And watch the group did at large, the first test was simply waiting to see if any could properly ride brooms. They'd have some interesting things to see. The girl with the glasses and her hair pulled back in a neat bun seemed to present no problems riding. While the girl in the ragged clothing was an entirely different matter. She did indeed ride her broom, but she strangely did it on all fours practically laying across it but finding the speed to zoom around the area. Several others also succeeded at varying levels of speed and actual capability. After this part was over and everyone had taken note of everything necessary, another of these nine Captains would stand. It would be a young woman with a hood and round glasses the last who'd taken her seat. "Since everyone has now demonstrated some magical ability there is one final thing that needs to happen. You guys are going to have some quick battles so we can see what your talents for actual fighting is like..." she started which made a slight interruption come to place as the woman with the the red hair spoke. "There are only 399 participants... it's an odd number, what will we do?" she asked aloud. Murmurs broke out among people wondering what kind of special condition such a circumstance would create. A sadistic grin came to the face of the green haired girl after hearing this and she raised her hand and spoke up. "I'll take two of them." she said of the fights without much more to be said, this caused a look of shock among several of the female Captains. Who looked to the others to see if such a thing should be allowed.

[Bloodedge]

The odd number of participants this year produced a strange outcome. In previous events of days long past, a group of the three greatest - or worst - prospects would be brought together in one battle to show their worth or eliminate the worst of them entirely. Given a certain event where an eliminated individual returned the next year to excel, though, this became viewed as a less effective method due to it keeping potential strengths for the Magic Knights at bay. As an organization, they did desire anyone who could be a boon from each entrance exam. Luckily, one brave soul came forth with a suggestion to face two opponents. While this may not have been the most sane thing to do, it did catch a couple of Captains' eyes.

Before any actual word would come from the Captains, a torrent of water swept through a small portion of the crowd toward the green-haired girl's rear, aiming to sweep her away. It came from the grimoire of Itama Senju, who intended to humiliate this lowly peasant who thought herself to be at such a level when making her suggestion. "Lowlifes like you should really learn their place in this world."

[Apollymi]

The best of three option seemed to be up at arms, but surprisingly enough there were immediate takers for this young girl's open-ended idea. Of course, the green haired girl knew this would be the case considering the kind of talk she'd heard from individuals, but as a torrent of water came up behind her, she turned into it, seeming to care little if she was affected by the wetness, as her own Grimoire glowed with power. "And whiny attention seeking bitches should beg for their lives!" those slanted pupils of hers seemed to become almost invisible as she created a number of short combat blades around her. Several were aimed forward at the lad, meanwhile moving at high speeds, she grabbed a pair from the air and rushed forward with them. And just like that the crowds moved around them and none were left but this white haired lad was standing before her. She kicked several knives towards him while still moving in a crazed but deliberate way, intending to use her built up moment to aim a spinning slash at the boy's torso from left to right with enough strength to leave a shallow but obvious mark.

"Oi, Tobirama isn't that your kid brother?" asked the purple haired leader of Blue Rose with almost instigating cattiness to her voice.

[Bloodedge]

"Tch! You'll learn how to speak to your superiors," Itama stated. The simple fact that this lowly peasant managed to even recover from his attack was absolutely disgusting to him. What's more, she was retaliating. Itama dashed forward whilst drawing a katana from his left hip. As he built up forward momentum, he used his water magic to coat the katana's blade. His blade was swung at each of the ones produced to parry them as he and the green-haired girl approached one another. He readied himself for a parry of her incoming direct attack, but the momentum she gained from spinning was more than even his magically-enhanced sword could defend against with the strength he had behind it. His blade clashed with hers, but in the end, the commoner was able to push past his guard and gash his left bicep and the same side of his chest. He grimaced, more from disgust than from pain. In his moment of fury, he spun clockwise until he was able to slash out horizontally, sending the crescent of slicing water in the peasant's direction at chest level.

Meanwhile, the white-haired Captain of the Azure Deer, Tobirama, was addressed by one of his peers with a query. His crimson stare shifted from the ongoing battle to the tanned woman, and he replied with some hesitation. "That is... my sword, yes."

[Apollymi]

"I don't see any superiors here," she said in response to the boy's taunt. He had some problem with her being a commoner, but he was a foreigner he had no right to judge her life. Beyond that, all she really wanted in the world was to fight a good fight, and he hardly seemed capable of offering it. He drew a blade and managed not to immediately succumb to her attack, but still he wasn't up to the level of combat she expected. He soon spilled blood and she sniffed the air as he made faces of disgust. Following the spin of her own attack this boy's body seemed to be fueled by fury alone as he lashed out with a horizontal spinning slash, which led immediately to a crescent of water being fired at chest level for this green haired lass. She knew she wouldn't be able to run around or disturb this innately, so she did the only thing she could do, she allowed her weapons to drop from her hands, as she aimed to fall backward under the crest of water, using her hands to brace herself on the ground. Once it was gone over her head she twisted her body, spinning like a top on her hands, and using the momentum for a counter, aiming to kick one of her falling daggers into the boy's horizontally extended sword arm. She aimed to pierce it with force enough to send the blade through it forcing him to drop his weapon as well as leaving him open and in pain. The force was created from the young girl using her mana to enhance her physical capabilities, not that she realized this herself. It wasn't important after all, all that mattered was that she fight until she couldn't anymore.

Meanwhile, the hesitant reply of Tobirama brought nothing but a laugh from the tanned woman. "Ah, right. Just your sword~ That makes perfect sense..." she replied sarcastically. It would be obvious to all that she'd known the answer to her question, but it seemed Tobirama wasn't content to play the game of explaining the sorry state his brother was presently showing. Perhaps, his was the reason he was in the exam in the first place. The green haired girl was promising but... at least to the woman with the deep tan, something seemed to be a bit off about her personality, advanced fighting skills or not. 'Hm, I wonder if she knows she's doing that...'

[Bloodedge]

Itama scoffed once again. She didn't see any superiors here, did she? Well, this peasant was obviously lacking in the sight department, so he would have to make sure he did something about that first and foremost. Much to his chagrin though, the girl ducked under his own magic attack before utilizing an amount of ingenuity he never expected to see. She made use of another spin, albeit this time for very different reasons. Her foot connected with another of her magic blades as it descended toward the ground, and as Itama continued to move forward, that very blade was launched by kick in his direction, finding its home - however temporary - in his bicep. Itama looked toward his arm and saw nothing but a hole where he knew there had been impact. Then, and only then, did it register what had occurred. There was no blade in his flesh. All he could see when looking at his wound was pouring blood, as well as a small window to the other side.

In a matter of moments, the otherwise silent arena would hear - as a unit - the cries of agony belonging to Itama Senju. In the stands, the Captain who'd been pinned as his elder brother looked very displeased. Whatever the case may have been with the older male, the battle was over, and more could commence. Itama was taken away to have his wound tended to while other matches took place. Many bouts later, the ash-blonde who'd barged through a certain group to clear his registration stood in the open space that had become the exam battleground since the day's first altercation-gone-showcase. He stood with his hands in his pockets, and a grin on his face. Unlike others who'd paired up for their matches, he was offering an open challenge to any who'd yet to be evaluated.

[Apollymi]

The white haired lad's screams filled the arena by the time the green haired lass had righted herself. It was obvious to her there would be no retaliation for her most recent assault. In fact, the grin which spread across her face bordered upon sinister as the knives she'd summoned disappeared as she closed her Grimoire and put it away. A few of the Captains were amazed by this outcome, but if they had anything else to say they kept it to themselves. Even the instigating Captain of the Blue Rose didn't have anything to say, as the boy's screams rattled the arena. Of course, he would eventually be carried off, apparently everyone within the space acknowledging that the green haired lass had won her altercation without needing to say so aloud. Strangely, none wanted to challenge her immediately after this particular bout, though she could rather clearly hear the murmurs of the crowd. Given how it seemed to be playing out, she slink off to the side, to watch the fights of those who'd partnered up for them. She'd find herself capable of slinking out of her battle hardened status without too much of a problem. Until...

Several fights later a boy with blonde hair stood in the middle of the arena where countless battles had now taken place. He didn't have a partner and apparently was simply waiting for one. The green haired girl would push off from her pillar of choice and stand before them once more. "Oi, you taking any challengers? The other guy I wanted to kick the shit out of got stomped out already..." she said her voice loud enough to be heard but giving ample time for the boy to deny her. She figured some would, at least find her frightening after her most recent display. It had to be the reason no one had immediately challenged her after her first fight. Of course, she was waiting for something else entirely in these challenges, and she wondered if she might find it here.

[Bloodedge]

The male teen could have counted the seconds after his arrival to this open space where he received no immediate answers to his obvious open challenge. A beacon of hope shone down on him in due time, and in the form of the green-haired girl he'd seen fighting at the beginning of this event. When she spoke to him, he looked her way and found her to be a little more familiar than just that upon closer inspection. "Hmm. Now that I get a good look at you, I've seen you somewhere else before..." His mind wandered to find his original thought, and as it did, he inspected the girl before him. If nothing else, the state of her clothing gave away her identity well enough. "Oh! You're that girl they were saying came from the Forsaken Lands! Right... that must've been the guy you were talkin' about," he said, remembering a certain male participant who'd recently met a swift end in a match against someone not all too special in their own right. "Fuck it, right? You kicked that other guy's ass enough for both of 'em. Leonis Vermillion." With his introduction offered, Leonis answered the girl's question with a simple gesture. His left hand left his pocket and rose, soon moving in a motion meant to beckon the green-haired lass toward him.

[Apollymi]

A short conversation was being had between this pair of teens, and in the meantime, a few of the Captains seemed to be straightening up their postures a bit. At the very least, the now bored looking Captain of Blue Rose perked up in her chair, wondering if this secondary match would be a slaughter as well. But she supposed she'd be waiting like everyone else. In the meantime, the green haired girl was listening to the words spoken by the blonde and a slight smile shifted on her face as he mentioned knowing the reason she wanted to beat up on one of the others and choose this moment to properly acknowledge her as a person, going so far as to introduce himself and beckon her forward. "Leonis Vermillion? Hm...one of those royals huh? But I have a good feeling about you," she said as she stepped forward, her Grimoire once more emerged from her bag and she cast the spell that produced several blades of which she immediately grabbed a pair from the air and began to spin around in her hands, while the others hung in limbo. Unlike many others, this young woman chose to judge people based on their own actions and the vibes they gave her when they met. She trusted her own instincts, and knew deep down this lad wasn't judging her for being born in a different part of the country or poor. As such she'd treat him with all the respect he showed her. "Those guys, they talked a lot of shit, so I figured they should back it up. But that went all to shit...kufufufu~" the girl said, a malicious laugh escaping her at the end. "But you... smell like a real fight!~" she seemed excited by the prospect her body tensed as she prepared to charge.

And charge she did, aiming to close the gap between them in a matter of seconds using the blades in her hands to aim a rotating slash across this young man's torso from his right shoulder to his left hip. "Hikage..." she gave her name in the singular second her face was stopped before this young man's. She was excited for this fight suddenly and she hoped he wouldn't disappoint.

[Bloodedge]

"Yeah, sorta. I don't know what you mean by good feeling though. That's a weird thing to say to a guy you just met, isn't it?" he asked. Whether his question would be answered or not, Leonis removed his right hand from his pocket as well, but left it hanging at his side. He inhaled deeply while awaiting the girl's response. When he received her words, he also experienced a somewhat psychotic laugh with a front row seat. While this was strange, he did find the statement preceding it to be laughable. The follow-up was quite the strange thing to hear, though. "I... smell... like a real fight?" he asked with much confusion on his countenance.

With little prompting, the green-haired girl was suddenly upon him, in rather close proximity to his face. In that very moment, she offered her name to an abruptly wide-eyed Leonis. 'Fast!' was all he thought. He had but a single reaction, involving the extension of his right arm to its respective side. A strange explosion spawned from magic occurred where his palm was, and that very explosion rocketed Leonis several meters to his left, just before Hikage lashed out. The blast had a stream-like effect, allowing Leonis to turn and us it to arc himself around to the girl's rear, all while holding his left hand out toward her backside. "I like the name. And you're quick," he said just before a blinding flash of light erupted from his left hand, heralding another explosion with enough range to strike Hikage's back with jarring concussive force.

[Apollymi]

Apparently Leonis found something strange about her mentioning that she had a good feeling about him in their first meeting. "Is it?" she wondered about the weirdness of the statement she'd given this lad upon their meeting, but clarified the best way she knew how. "But, I always know how to feel about people," she said as if she imagined everyone was like this for the same reason she was, which was just an innate feeling she got around people, especially in battle situations. Speaking of, it seemed that she'd managed to surprise this lad with her speedy closing of the gap between them, an explosion took hold of him and launched him away from her in the last second before her attack would have taken place. Her spin was completed regardless of this. "Sugoi! I was right!" she said without explaining what she meant about smelling a real fight on him.

To be honest, it would be a few moments before she could even reply because the boy had rocketed himself behind her, her entire body tensed and her spin continued and her arms crossed before her, seemingly allowing her to absorb the shock of the hit to her crossed forearms. That being said the shining brightness of the blast blinded her momentarily causing her to close her eyes as she skidded away from him several meters. "Shit! That burns," she said her eyes opening for just a second as blinding spots made her give up on sight. She sniffed the air and her ears twitched, as she tried to figure out where this lad was while her eyes recovered from the blinding shock. "So are you..." a wide grin crossed this lasses face, even without the immediately use of her sight she seemed to be excited. The remaining hovering blades around her converged on her fore in a circle with the blades point out from her fore. Until she could open her eyes and recover from the blinding light, she'd be on the defensive. "This is gonna be so much fun!~"

[Bloodedge]

Once the offensive explosion connected with Hikage, Leonis put an end to the first explosion and let himself come to a stop. Hikage managed to turn and face his attack with her own defenses prepped, but she still succumbed to the initial blinding effect and did not escape the impact itself. Leonis took a moment of pause while the girl took her defensive stance. "It's pretty weird to say you always know how to feel about people. I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but... it's still weird." It was more than apparent that Hikage intended to defend herself until her sight returned properly, and Leonis was almost content to let this happen. Still, he removed his grimoire from its holster on his waist, and opened it as it hovered in front of him.

"A fun fight, huh? Are all commoners like this?" he asked while readying the first spell his grimoire offered him. The book glowed with an orange hue as Leonis aimed his right hand toward Hikage. "Honō Mahō: Soru Rīnea!" By the power of Leonis' grimoire, his right palm produced a small ring of orange mana. From that very ring came an explosion so concentrated in its structure that it shot forward as a beam capable of pummeling its way through solid concrete at its thin point. It did, however, widen as it traveled through the air, returning more toward pure concussive and burning force as it aimed to encompass Hikage's entire body, bar her head which remained in the clear by virtue of the angle chosen for the attack.

[Apollymi]

Leonis apparently found the girl strange for her ability to know how to feel about new people. To her surprise though it was commented that he didn't think this was a negative only that he found it to be weird. "Sou ka, I figured everybody was like that..." she said, not giving it too much thought beyond that. Still this wouldn't stop her from continuing to follow her feelings, as it was obvious that at this point, the young man before her seemed to exactly what she thought he'd be a fight worth having.

She tried to open her eyes again, but her vision still wasn't clear, so she chose something else. 'Don't let him one up you...' she thought as she concentrated. She heard the sound of his grimoire open and new she should be preparing a defense, but she'd never properly been a defensive person, what would she do to help herself? Beyond this it seemed the boy maintained some curiosity about her attitude and she answered it the best she could. "I can't speak for everybody... but kicking ass is fun!" she said that maniacal smile spreading across her visage. Whatever this boy was planning she could only try to defend against the explosion and prepare to muscle through. 'Attack!' her mind gave the order as the blades hanging around her person spun in a circle before her, it couldn't negate the blast but by its spin it could divert enough of it for her to dash around. Each of her footsteps vibrating through her, as she felt the heat and force of the blast encompassing her space. She arced her run towards the upper heat of the blast. Her aim of course to swing her short blades with superior speed into the boy's right side, one blade aiming to stop the potential movement of his arm towards her, while the other lashed out across his midsection pulling the blade towards herself. She as she did this her eyes would finally open, their intense slits full of glee as she checked her progress with her vision. "Did I get ya'?"

[Bloodedge]

"I don't think anybody's like that. Well... except you, I guess," he replied. As strange as this individual was proving herself to be, Leonis didn't really care. If he had to admit one similarity to the girl in front of him, one would always come to mind right away. Leonis was a member of House Vermillion, one of three Royal Families in the Clover Kingdom. As one who stood above even most other nobles in the kingdom, he most certainly did not have to take this entrance exam. He was here for no other reason than the fact that he wanted to be.

Even blinded, it seemed this one had more fight in her than the average person. She managed to move around Leonis' blast in similar fashion to how he previously maneuvered around her opening attack, albeit without the propulsion. The end of her forward movement resulted in a pair of blades being used for two separate purposes. An attempted movement of his arm was stopped by the presence of one blade, while another slipped underneath it and gashed Leonis' abdomen. It didn't seem to be anything major in the end, but it was only afterwards that he saw the green-haired girl's eyes open. "Huh. Blindness doesn't mean a lot to you, I guess. That's weird too."

[Apollymi]

"Hm..." the girl seemed to be at a loss, she was beginning to wonder about the nature of other people. She'd always assumed that everyone had an internal compass they used to figure people out. If this wasn't the case, she didn't know how or why they bothered. But perhaps it was this which made people assume they could take her in fights or thought themselves on pedestals she couldn't reach. Regardless, she did not care if people lacking this trait brought her to combat, she only cared when they didn't live up to the expectations of their words. This young man before her, was taking the exam and putting up a more than reasonable fight.

Her attack by the time she opened her eyes was indeed successful, and much to her surprise this lad didn't take this as an immediate out. As such she only got more excited. "Kufufufufufu~ I didn't know if that would work out," she said seemingly satisfied at that point she used her strength to push away from the lad putting several meters of space between them, a surprising move considering how quickly she'd ended the other lad she'd fought. "Why is that weird? If you can't do what you normally do, you do something else, right?" she said seeming to find the adaptation simple, even without understanding fully how or why she'd managed it. The girl's glowing Grimoire produced several more floating blades and she began bouncing on her toes as she waited, all of them pointed at Leonis. A moment of indecision came from this girl though, 'I'm not ready to try and end this fight... I want more!' she demanded from the world at large. She always thought of ways of ending people, even more so of ways of causing them damage they couldn't fight through. Right at the moment though, she wanted to fight Leonis for longer than a couple of minutes, but nothing she had would make that possible. It forced her to pause, to stop and think about how best to go about achieving her new goal.

[Bloodedge]

Apparently, Hikage had no idea whether her blind strategy would work or not, but she thought it reasonable to just do something different when the norm was removed from one's repertoire. Leonis couldn't possibly argue this. If there were no other viable options, refusing to try a different approach could result in death as a Magic Knight. "Sure, but that doesn't make what you do any less weird. Besides that, you agreed to take two fights. The Captains are gonna think you're a warmonger."

Leonis had gone without countering after Hikage's previous attack, but when she completed her assault and placed herself at a distance, she seemed somewhat lost. Whatever the case was, the otherwise aggressive girl was no longer attacking him. 'Whatever that is, it's too much hesitation,' he thought. Of the many things he'd been taught over the years, one of the most crucial teachings was the deadliness of hesitation in battle. With his grimoire still open, he quickly raised his right hand again, pointing it toward Hikage to recreate the very same laser-like explosion he had used mere moments ago. Though she wasn't already blinded during the use of this one, the majority of Leonis' spells contained this very same blinding flash at the moment of their activation, and this beam was no different.

[Apollymi]

Leonis was of the opinion that the girl was still odd, though he seemed to have some agreement with the idea that different things should be done to accomplish new goals. He went on to state that the Captains might think her a warmonger for agreeing to take multiple fights and surprisingly enough, Hikage thought nothing of this. "But... I'm here to try and get paid to kick people's asses, Magic Knights face the biggest threats and I want to, 'cause I enjoy it..." the girl stated plainly. She seemed to understand enough of herself to know she was in this mainly for the fight. "Besides, I wanted to kick two people's asses, and it helps them out. They shouldn't care why I chose to do it," she said. Strangely this girl seemed to be the type to want to be used as a weapon directly, and simply pointed in the direction she needed to kill things in. Her present hesitation, wasn't even about attacking or not, but more about attacking in a way that wouldn't finish everything off too quickly.

But she wouldn't get to make this decision now. Leonis though her hesitation needed a bit of punishment and went on to begin a spell once more. The girl's eye lids snapped to a close at the start when he lifted his hand up. Her body moved left as the light behind the lids of her eyes let her know that the boy had launched the attack and though she had moved, she was still caught in the widening blast the boy had launched. Her body singed a bit and the concussive blast sent her careening backward several dozen meters. But in the moments she was flying away she came to a decision. 'It doesn't matter what I do. I'll fight and fight and fight... I'll throw myself at them if I have to and I'll reach them every time!' she thought as her body flipped and righted itself. Her hand made contact with the ground and strangely enough as she looked up into her open Grimoire with all but the knives she held blown away and shattered by the blast she'd find a new spell written in her book. "Eh? I guess I'll do this then," she said as she forced magic downward from across the arena. This would spawn a small black animal with spikes on its back and a surprisingly cute little body. "Kawaii." She managed stunned by this but maintaining an apathetic outlook before she rolled this small animal up her left leg spinning on her right one she'd turn and kick it as it wrapped itself up she launched it forward with a powerful kick aiming it for the center of Leonis' body. The animal picked up speed and its body hardened beyond normal belief it would hit with concussive force and aim to spike the center of the young man's body with a spinning force. Something about this magic would make one note an intrinsic difference in the way Hikage approached her previous fight to the way she approached this one, it gently hinted that though she enjoyed fighting, she also knew that some times, a fight to ultimate defeat wasn't necessary, especially if she wished to fight again.

[Bloodedge]

Even while hesitating, Hikage was not unawares. It was good that she remained alert enough to react to Leonis' next spell, and she was at least clever enough to not be blinded a second time in one fight. "Nobody's gonna judge you for why you want to be a Magic Knight. The Captains still might not take you if they think you're crazy, though... except that one squad." Leonis was able to observe the evasion of his attack by Hikage, but more importantly than that, he saw the development of her newest spell with a front row seat of the action. Hikage was such a strange individual to be generally apathetic, a bit of a psychopath, and yet still be able to find something cute upon unleashing her Creation Magic.

"Congrats on the new spell. You didn't look like the type to have creation magic, but if that's what we're into now..." Leonis' own grimoire flipped to a new page, but his next spell of choice was not a grimoire spell. In that face of an incoming hedgehog created by Hikage, he created an explosion from each hand to rapidly propel himself into the sky above. Leonis spun counterclockwise until he slowed to a stop mid-air. His grimoire showed a creation spell of its own, but as he prepared himself to cast it, he instead descended to ground level in front of Hikage. "Sorry; it's not worth it. Let's fight again later, when we're both Magic Knights, yeah?"

[Apollymi]

Hikage seemed to have elicited a bit more surprise out of Leonis than she would have normally thought possible. "As long as one takes me, it doesn't really matter..." the girl said, having not thought too much about what might happen if she wasn't chosen she simply assumed as long as at least one Captain saw her merits she'd be fine. Judging by the words the young man before her said, it was likely that she had the eye of at least one Captain in a semi-positive way. Her new spell also garnered a bit of positive attention, as the lad congratulated her on it. "Arigatou," she managed not quite sure what to make of this. As he moved out of the way of the incoming spell, he shot up in the air, leaving the still spinning hedgehog to make contact with a pillar on the outskirts of the arena, barreling into it until it stopped moving and fell to the ground and dizzily stumbled before it disappeared.

Apparently to Leonis this match was over, he looked like he was about to cast a spell, the feeling Hikage got was one which made her eyes widen just a tad, but... it seemed that it wasn't to be. Normally such a thing would have infuriated the girl, but the boy before her, made her an offer that they could fight again after both becoming Magic Knights. She thought about this for a second before a hint of her first non-malicious smile appeared on her face. "Even if I don't make it this time, I'll come back until I get that fight..." she murmured as she extended her now empty right fist. Perhaps she'd really enjoy the idea of fighting this lad later, but if nothing else, he'd shown her that not all people she'd come across would be bad. She put her Grimoire away and gave the boy one more stare, such was used to confirm her earlier feelings, and she was quite certain she was right about this lad.

[Bloodedge]

"Heh! That's the spirit!" Leonis said in response to Hikage showing her resolve. He may have pointed out the very real chance of most Captains not being keen on recruiting someone like this girl, but he did believe it would be possible for her to make it as a Magic Knight in this year's entrance exam. Even if that weren't the case, though, Leonis was sure he and Hikage would see the proper conclusion of their fight, one way or another. "Keep getting stronger. I'll do the same, and we'll push each other to the limits later. Ciao, Hikage," he said while walking past the green-haired girl, offering his farewell in the form of a passing shoulder pat.

Several more fights would ensue. The more these battles took place, the more one particular participant thought he was all but out of luck. The cloaked figure with the four-leaf clover grimoire had gone without a challenger since the beginning of this exam segment, and now here he was, still just wondering if he would find an opponent before it was discovered that he'd come here against the wishes of those who looked after him.

[Apollymi]

Whether Hikage thought it possible or not, she would definitely be joining the Magic Knights. The last words that Hikage would speak would be warm ones as she was stunned by this young man's kindness, "Hai, see ya' Leonis." Unbeknownst to most, she didn't have a problem with the idea that she might not immediately be everyone's cup of tea, but if none wanted her she was sure they'd eventually change their minds. The golden eyes of a certain Captain were shining though. 'Sugoi! She could be so good... I definitely want her,' thought the leader of the Blue Rose. In fact, she was looking exactly for a girl this rough to make the shining gem of her own group. She'd appreciate a girl like her, who knew how to get her hands dirty. Irrespective there were more fights to watch and watch she would. Another rather interesting one was about to happen.

A girl with glasses soon approached the cloaked young man. It seemed she'd drawn short lots as another girl with blue hair had mentioned to her wanting to fight the lad she'd spoken to outside. A bit of a pushover she'd let the girl have her way in this and hadn't interrupted. "Ano... would you mind if we fought each other?" she asked seeming to not know what else to say. She was a slim girl wearing a mint green overcoat with wire framed glasses over purple eyes. Sleek black hair was pulled back in a tight bun and she seemed very by the book, even so she didn't mind the idea of facing someone pretty quickly. She didn't have much by way off offensive magic, but if she could catch someone off-guard, she might be able to manage something.

[Bloodedge]

After dozens of battles had taken place for the exam, the cloaked young man finally encountered someone willing to face off against him. Until this very moment, either others had been fearful of the alleged four-leave clover he possessed on his grimoire, or they had found some other reason to desire a fight against someone else entirely. Perhaps it had nothing to do with him, and everything to do with their individual preferences. Whatever the case, here before him now stood the glasses-wearing girl who had been a couple of places ahead of him in registration. "Ah... of course! I've been hoping for a challenger this whole time. I... figured I would end up being last."

[Apollymi]

A small smile came to this young girl's face as she also nodded. "Iie, I know how you feel. I was a bit scared after a couple of those... I had to work up my nerve. Kirsa Chambers, yoroshiku onegaishimasu!" she said offering the lad a bow she couldn't help her nature led her to be polite and formal. Given the circumstances that they would be battling she saw no reason that they couldn't be cordial. Even the green haired animal girl had managed it, in her second fight at least. Though the girl had a plan to use her magic as quickly as possible in this demonstration she couldn't help but be a bit wary of it over all.

All the while after this cloaked young man approached one of the female Captains, the one sitting far to the left had straightened up her posture just a bit. She had on a large white witches hat with several gemstones in it and her face seemed passively frozen in a state of melancholy. Unlike many of the other Captains, who'd managed to show approval, speak, or even tease each other, the entirety of this proceeding she'd only managed to widen her eyes once and that was at the brutal take down of a boy who thought he was strong. Otherwise she hadn't shown anything even resembling care, but that there was something about the mysterious boy in the cloak which caught her attention and she wasn't sure why that was yet.

[Bloodedge]

A few steps led out into an open space that would become the stage for this next battle. The cloaked lad had been shown kindness the likes of which he hadn't seen this entire day at this venue. This young woman even offered her name to him prior to their fight. "... Asher. Yoroshiku onegaishimasu, Kirsa-chan." Since his battle was upon him, the cloaked male named Asher unveiled his golden grimoire. Though he opened it, he did not cast any of its spells just yet. Still, the grimoire glowed brightly, returning the visual that was Asher's rainbow-like hair accents beneath his hood.

[Apollymi]

It seemed this young man was nice enough to introduce himself as well. "Asher-kun, I'm glad we could help each other out here..." she said as she finally managed to step out into the arena with the lad. She felt the need to give him a bit of warning, because her own skill set was presently limited, but it had a few choice uses that she thought she could get by with. "Gomen, I don't think this will last very long," the girl said rubbing the back of her head just a little. "That isn't arrogance or anything, I just... have a limited skill set," she mentioned, only to have her book floating before her. It had a three leaf clover on the front and glowed a shade close to a magical mint green. She looked at the boy's shining hair and smiled. "Sugoi! I never thought I'd get to see it up close," she mentioned in a moment of admiration. "Verre Epée," the girl said holding her hands in the air, this cast a spell which created several glass swords which rose up from the ground aiming to impale and surround this young man in a single go. This was the only real spell she had to attack with, but she maintained a supreme bit of mana control, which allowed a rather dense use of this magic compared to many others. It was about all she could do, and it wasn't about impatience but she thought it a bad idea to dawdle too much with a user of magic she imagined was truly advanced.

[Bloodedge]

"Iie. I know what you mean; I don't have a lot of options, either..." Asher concurred. It seemed both parties were of the opinion this would be a short-lived battle, albeit likely for different reasons entirely. Asher was more than ready for what was to come, but he was slightly taken aback when Kirsa mentioned getting to see something up close. "My grimoire?" he wondered aloud. He obviously expected this to be the case, since the grimoire he wore was something many obsessed over after discovering it.

The first spell was cast by Kirsa. Her glass magic erupted from the earth itself with speed and precision leagues above what was possible for many of Kirsa's peers as seen today. In fact, most would - and did - consider this one an automatic acceptance to more than one Magic Knight Squad based on this single spell alone. Asher was not felled by this, though. In fact, by the time spectators witnessed the eruption of glass blades from the ground, Asher had already changed location. He hadn't teleported or anything of the sort, but he had somehow moved at the speed of light itself to stand atop this collection of blades while holding out his own grimoire. If one were to discern whether he'd moved or vanished, perhaps the answer could be drawn upon seeing that his hood was now down, revealing his full visage to the crowd at large. "Hikari Mahou: Danzai no Kouken!" The first spell Asher's grimoire offered him produced over a dozen shards of light in the area around him. Each blade/spear-like shard had four smaller lines crossing it along its length. Quickly, the shards traveled through the air en route to Kirsa. One could note that none of these were aimed at any location that could be considered vital. No, instead it seemed Asher intended only to restrain Kirsa by pinning her every extremity to the ground below and behind her.

[Apollymi]

As they moved on in the conversation, Kirsa found the lad to be strangely taken aback by her stunned admiration of his Grimoire. "Hai, you'll have to get used to it pretty soon. Something like that is rare, it will draw attention to you," the girl mentioned seeming to think it odd he wouldn't know this already. But their conversation would likely be as short-lived as her attack. It seemed the lad was not to be caught by any of the magic she'd put forth. The glass swords converged the way she thought they would, but none of them would actually make contact with the lad. She hadn't seen him move, but he had done it, and she could now see his face. 'So fast!' she thought but there was no time to defend. The words he spoke caused several blades of light to converge upon her, and beyond this she was soon pinned to the ground where she'd previously been standing her extremities pinned. 'Crap!' there was nothing she could do or say to stop this from happening so it simply was. 'Oh well, I knew it would be over fast, I just didn't expect to get completely out-classed...' the girl thought. "Asher-kun, I surrender... you're really impressive."

Surprisingly enough there was an extreme level of shock when this happened. Other potential magic knights found this to be an extraordinary case, even after witnessing the first brutal beating of the day and a couple of the other matches to boot. There was the matter of a certain woman who'd be stoic in her visage who was now at the edge of her seat. Whether she'd seen him move or not wasn't important, she could now see the lad's face and her eyes went wide. "Asher," she murmured. Many of the Captains would likely want this lad based on what he could grow to be, but this young woman, recognized him, and wanted him for different reasons entirely. Mainly, she'd been looking for him for some reason or anything and this would be the first time she'd set eyes on him in a very long time. Even so, she recognized his eyes, and the rainbow coloration of the ends of his hair. Even as a fully grown man, she saw in his deep purple eyes the infant she'd known him as. Her normally stern expression broke out into a smile of pure elated joy, for reasons completely unknown to her peers.

[Bloodedge]

"Hai. I figured as much, but it didn't seem like that's what you were talking about for a second," he said. Regardless of what was meant, or what Asher initially thought was meant by the young woman's statement, his first offensive spell found its target and restrained Kirsa in a way that left her offering forfeit. Asher had already taken up one of the light shards to wield as a melee weapon if needed, but there was no point in the end. As such, he allowed his spell to fade while hopping down and offering Kirsa a hand up. "Arigatou."

Even with all the spectacles previously seen, there were still battles to be witnessed. The final battle of great merit would take place late in the event indeed. One of its participants was the muscular young man with spiky black hair, who many became acquainted with - for better or for worse - during registration. "Yare yare! There's too much hype to live up to now! Should've gone earlier..."

[Apollymi]

Kirsa managed to look a tad abashed at the confusion surrounding what she may or may not have meant by her earlier comment. In truth her admiration could have been easily applied to the lad's rather stunning hair. Beyond this though there was the mark of his kindness which came with an extension of the lad's hand to her after he released her, accepting her surrender. Her own magic faded as her grimoire closed, she sat up in this moment and took the hand outstretched to her offering the lad a smile. "Iie, no need to thank me," she said seeming to mean this more than most. Their battle concluded she went off to the sidelines to watch what was left of these battles to take place.

And watch they did, all the way until a certain very muscular lad, came onto the scene. It seemed he'd ended up going last, even though someone had stated they wanted to fight him earlier. Of course, his words would be heard by the opponent who chose him, a blue haired girl dressed in frilly skirts white in color and a dark blue vest like top. Her eyes were wide and also a deep shade of blue and her tone would be that of mild amusement. "Iie, Gray you save the best for last..." she mentioned as she held out her hand not bothering to bring out her Grimoire just yet. She held out her hand with in front of her and pointed it at Gray. "Let's test the waters a bit, hm?" she asked the lad before a collection of water in the form of a large bullet gathered before her hand flying off aimed at this young man's fore, to splash him with water and send him reeling from the potential concussive blast.

[Bloodedge]

Gray's opponent had an opinion that differed from Gray's. It was her belief that he'd saved the best for last, which was yet to be seen. He could at least hold out hope that there was some truth in this, but not too much. Her offer to test the proverbial waters was joined by the grand unveiling of her magic affinity, which was - interestingly enough - water. "Was that on purpose?" he asked hastily to address the obvious pun. In the face of her opening attack, Gray held out both of his arms and used his own magic to release a blast of ice into the water bullet. This effort alone caused the water to freeze, and a second blast from Gray shattered itself and the frozen bullet. When next seen behind the diamond dust, Gray would be without even the jacket he previously wore, and he would also be wielding his grimoire with his left hand. "Kouri Mahou: Tengeki Hyouga!" he announced while swinging his right arm toward his opponent. The ground between himself and the blue-haired girl produced a mass of ice then and there, angling itself up into an icicle with its tip aimed at the girl's torso. While pointed, the tip of this icicle seemed more capable of causing blunt damage than piercing.

[Apollymi]

The young woman with the blue hair had the grace to look a bit abashed a red tint coming to her face as her pun was addressed. "In this case is it better or worse if it was on purpose?" she asked. Strangely enough, she was somewhat known for making a bunch of puns, but this was almost always an accidental occurrence. That being said, she didn't know if the lad would find this more or less appealing and as such aimed to find out, rather than answering directly if she'd done it on purpose. Still the young man had a rather hasty answer for her water ball, which came in the form of a freezing bit of air and then the shattering of it, turning it into diamond dust by the time the lad was done with it. "Sugoi!" she chimed, but the reasoning for this could be many things, not the least of which was the now exposed body of the muscular lad. "Do you always strip when you start using magic?" she asked, wondering if she should feel special or think strangely of the lad for his clothing abandonment. Beyond this his magic proper was unveiled with the use of his Grimoire after which he created an iceberg between them. She was not fast by any means, and as such found herself bluntly assaulted about the stomach. Even so, while bent over this particular iceberg she used her own glowing blue book. "Mizu Mahō: Akua Jaberin..." created in her hand a long javelin which she immediately let fly in the young man's direction aiming it at his left shoulder.

[Bloodedge]

"Uhh... I dunno. I'm no pun expert," Gray said as his icicle struck its target. To the question of whether he always stripped when using magic, Gray had no immediate answer. In fact, one could say he had no prior knowledge of this alleged stripping before it was mentioned. Just before he could even formulate a response for what was asked of him, or even recover from his most recent use of magic, his opponent staged an offensive which traveled back down the length of his icicle to pierce his left shoulder. "Ack! Kuso!" he exclaimed. Frankly, he hadn't expected a quick retaliation at all, and had actually been hoping to avoid one. Fluidity in offense was certainly not one of his strong suits, and that extended to his ability to shift between offense and defense as well. Taking a step back from where he was struck, Gray reached up with his right hand to grab the water javelin and freeze it, both removing any future threat it presented, and sealing his wound. "Kouri Sousei Mahou: Kourudo Ekusukaribaa!" Since his enemy in this battle had this obvious edge against him, Gray decided to make use of the physical abilities he'd given himself because of how his magic manifested. His grimoire glowed brightly as two long swords of ice formed in his hands, both presenting the sharpness and durability of a steel weapon while also boasting the ability to trail large amounts of ice in their wake. A freezing mist was around Gray during the activation of this spell, and as it began to clear, one could note that he had been reduced to wearing a pair of heart-patterned boxers.

[Apollymi]

The response to her bit about whether or not pun making was good, there was nothing but another one to fall out of the girl's face. Again, not necessarily on purpose, but this was simply how she spoke. "Well, I'll go with the flow then... and see how it turns out," she said in all seriousness. There wasn't any response to her question about his stripping, but she did indeed make contact with her most recent attack, giving her a chance to recover and remove herself from the iceberg she was upon. "Sugoi! It's going to be difficult with you freezing everything I do to you..." she commented absently. Of course, soon after he'd taken care of himself, she found him using yet another spell, this one led to the creation of a couple of swords, which was rather interesting, aside from the very obvious secondary effect. Her face turned a bright shade of red and she tried not to look directly at the lad now in nothing but his boxers. "Um, seriously... why are you in your underwear?" she asked doing her hardest not to allow her gaze to wander.

[Bloodedge]

A deep exhale followed the creation of two ice swords, and Gray still didn't seem conscious of the fact that he'd discarded even more clothing. A second reference would not be missed. He couldn't even think for a moment that this pun was unintended. "Well it's gonna be difficult if you keep bouncing back from my attacks. Let's go then," he said. No further time was wasted before Gray dashed forward, traversing the icicle of his own creation en route to the blue-haired girl. A counterclockwise spin occurred once he was in range, first resulting in a horizontal slash using his injured left arm, then a stronger slash aimed from his enemy's left shoulder to right hip using his undamaged arm. Still, he didn't seem to care at all about his state of undress.

[Apollymi]

It seemed that she still wouldn't be given an answer about his state of nudity not that it seemed to matter much to him. In fact, the more pressing issue of her day was his rather sudden approach with two ice swords in hand which he held while traversing his original iceberg enroute to her. His spin came with swiftness and without the hesitation that bouncing between different forms of magic had initially shown in him. 'Of course,' she thought as she was left to deal with the coming slash from his once injured arm. This made contact, but the one that came next she moved with managing to take several steps back to clear it with a bit of a frown on her face. "Yare yare, you're a bit of a hard counter for me... those swords are freezing," she stated. Soon after though something strange would occur as she turned the pages of her book to a different place. Upon reaching it she cast a spell, "Mizu Sōsei Mahō : Kairyū no Su," Upon doing this the girl released a massive bit of water around herself, aiming to create a giant dome of water with spiraling whirlpools shifting around it. Feeling relatively safe within it, she went on to turn the page of her book preparing something else entirely for Gray potentially. She'd gone on the defensive, but this was mostly due to being unable to combat the young man on the basis of his advantage to the kind of fighting she normally did.

[Bloodedge]

"That's good for me. The whole point is to put on a show, right?" asked Gray, who would have no complaints about a chance advantage in a battle meant to showcase his magical abilities and decision-making. After taking one of two strikes, his opponent went on the defensive with a barrier of whirlpools from her grimoire. Gray was no expert on barriers and the like, but he could easily tell this was not something he would be able to easily overcome with his frozen swords. Even so, he had to press onward. His left arm had already been weakened, so he chose to press the sword that hand held against the barrier, reducing the sword to a tool aiming to freeze an opening into the barrier over time.

[Apollymi]

It seemed that Gray had to say that this bad match up was the point, putting on a show would make it good for him. She couldn't agree more. "I suppose, that is very true, still... I guess I am doing more than my part, showing how I deal with something like this," she said with a small smile forming on her face while turning the pages of her Grimoire. "Though to be honest, at this point I think we'd make a better team than pair of enemies~" she chimed as she watched her barrier weaken from the outside. It was going to take about thirty or so seconds, but it was all the time she needed to unleash her next attack from its safety. "Mizu Mahō: Sājingu Weibusu," she said as she placed her palms against the ground. This would lead to a giant surge of water which built up before her and aimed to completely overcome this lad should he break into her space. Even if he didn't the water would have a much easier time surging outward than he would have breaking in. She seemed to have quite a bit of magic power to spare in using such wide attacks choosing to overcome her physical disadvantages against the lad with sheer force.

[Bloodedge]

Gray couldn't argue that he could see more teamwork coming out of this match-up than aggressiveness, but now was not the time to be bothered by that. The fact of the matter was, they were now fighting to earn a place among the Magic Knights, where life would only begin for many who sought the title. If they both made it to be Magic Knights, perhaps this notion would see the light of day, but not now. For now, Gray had to deal with an attack being mounted while he continued his attempt to break through the barrier. Just when he was beginning to think some progress could be made to break the barrier, he was struck by a surge of water from the other side of the barrier itself. He was washed away without much of a chance to even fight back, but the ice sword in his right hand being stabbed into the ground allowed him to at least prevent being blasted too far from his opponent. At the end of it all, he pulled himself against the current from about 13 meters away. "Woah... chill out! This is a little bit much..."

[Apollymi]

"Chill out? Now who is making puns?" she laughed from within her barrier as the young man stuggled his way back from several meters away. She had to give him an extreme amount of credit, people with weaker bodies would have been completely blasted away by that. She couldn't help but be in awe of him whether he also made bad puns or not. Be that as it may there was still the problem of having to deal with the lad potentially breaking through her barrier and it was sort of disadvantageous to be a sitting duck in these kinds of situations. She seemed to be exceedingly safe in this moment, still there wasn't much else she could do without having to deal with the problems of a direct confrontation. 'I still can't deal with him directly, if I take down this barrier I am kinda screwed...' she thought to herself. At this point she had no choice but to wait and see what he would do and try to counter from within the safety of her barrier appropriately.

[Bloodedge]

"That wasn't even on purpose!" spoke the male who was presently pushing against the torrent, continuously clawing at the ground with his sword to keep as much leverage as possible. Tooth and nail, he fought. Many stabs of his sword into the ground later, he was finally close enough to be within striking range of his opponent's barrier. Once there, he readied the sword in his right hand by raising it until its tip pointed at the girl inside her barrier. "I..." he said menacingly before his hand opened, and the sword in it washed away. "... I've got nothin'. I quit!"

[Apollymi]

Juvia found herself standing within her barrier and watching in amazement as Gray made his way back to her barrier. Once he was there he stood with swords drawn and she smiled at him wondering what his newfound stance would bring. Surprisingly enough though, his words were ones of surrender. Her eyes widened and she giggled at the moment. "I... didn't expect that~" she chimed, as she cancelled the magic which she'd created around herself and approached Gray directly from a few paces away. "That was pretty fun, arigatou gozaimasu," she said staring at the lad for a bit too long and noticing he was still in his underwear, her entire face soon went red and she turned. "Maybe next time keep your clothes on," she said turning her gaze away and covering her face with both of her hands to help with the redness. And with that she was finished at least for now. To her knowledge this would be the final test and she didn't think any other matches needed to take place. Once the center of the arena was clear a voice would come out and from the upper area but it wasn't any of the Captains.

"Arigatou Gozaimasu, all of you. At this point, your numbers will be called and you will step forward, and any Captain who wants you in their squad will raise their hands," the speaker stated. "If more than one Captain raises their hands, you may choose where you would rather go, based on whatever criteria you deem fit, but..." there was a stern silence inserted. "If none raises their hand for you, you didn't make the cut for the Magic Knights. Of course, you are free to try again if you don't make it, but you won't be accepted this year," the voice called out, murmurs would ensue as this was stated but the same voice that had been speaking began calling numbers starting at one. Whether Captains raised or lowered their hands for people they'd began separating themselves. Several who didn't make the cut found themselves running from the area without any real consequences for them. But soon a number would be called which belonged to one white haired male who'd had the first battle seen today. "Number 361!"

[Bloodedge]

The white-haired boy given the number 361 stepped forward after a long and gruesome wait for his number. He had seen many participants of the exam be turned away by the Captains, but regardless of this, he stepped up with absolute confidence in his own acceptance. His eyes were closed as his number was spoken. A wide grin spread across his face before he opened his eyes to see how many hands were raised by the Captains, only to find...

Nothing. There were nine Captains seated above, one of them being his own brother, and not a single hand was raised by one who would accept him into their squadron. "Bakana..." he mumbled. There was no way he, just shy of being a noble by association to a powerful Captain, could be turned down so openly by so many. This was obviously the fault of that girl. With a sigh and a grimace, Itama Senju turned tail and walked away.

[Apollymi]

The numbers approaching the ones known by some of the more standout candidates were approaching. The call of 361 caused the boy known as Itama to step forward, and surprisingly enough to him, he went without chosen by any, including his own brother. Hikage felt nothing about this though deep inside she could honestly say the boy had gotten what he deserved for acting out in the way he had previously. Soon enough he sauntered off and Hikage herself had her number called. "Number 362!" this caused the green haired young woman to step forward and wait to see if any wanted her given her 'war-mongering,' She watched for movements and knew the leader of Blue Rose was now raising her hand. But she wanted to see if any others wanted her before she spoke.

[Bloodedge]

The numbers being called out seemed to be becoming interesting all in one group. First there was the brother of Tobirama, whom a few of the Captains figured would end up a member of the Azure Deer by virtue of relation. Next up though, was a much more interesting prospect who'd even managed to defeat Itama and his inflated ego. Number 362 was an interesting prospect, to say the least. A few other Captains understood exactly why the leader of Blue Rose wanted this individual for her squad, but the other Captain to raise their hand was one who had no clue whatsoever. The black-clad male with spiky orange hair raised his hand as well, representing the squad known as the Black Bulls. This Captain was known for possessing no magic whatsoever, but from what he saw of the girl named Hikage, her personality 'flaw' would make her fit right into the type of rag-tag group he put together.

[Apollymi]

Hikage looked up at the Captains above and found that two of them wanted her to join them. One of them a female with purple hair and golden eyes, at the other at the end of the line, an orange haired male. She didn't expect to get a choice and as such found herself taking a moment to actually consider things before she said anything aloud. When her gaze found the leader of Blue Rose and saw the excitement in her eyes and practically vibrating off her person, she got an annoyed feeling. But when she averted her gaze and looked towards the leader of the Black Bulls she didn't feel anything at all. That was a curious occurrence, a wide grin spread across the girl's face. "I'll join the Black Bulls," she said while making eye contact with the orange haired male. "Thanks for pickin' me..." she said to the leader of the Blue Rose who snapped her fingers as if she'd lost a bet. even she didn't assume the leader of the Black Bulls would think to take a girl with such an obvious personality flaw.

Hikage moved to the side and this allowed the next numbers to be called. One for the boy who'd been with Itama when he'd been talking trash to her, didn't get picked either. Irrespective of this, the numbers kept going after he also had his ego crushed. "Number 364!" this made the girl who'd so recently been fighting. Her hair blue as she stepped up to see if and where she'd be accepted. She didn't know what qualifications she had nor what to think about the group at large.

[Bloodedge]

Two options were given to the green-haired girl, and the one she ultimately chose was the Black Bulls. Heero Yuy, the Captain of said squad, looked toward the tanned woman who rivaled him for this recruit with a grin on his face. "Tough luck this time," he said. Moving right along, another number was called without receiving a single offer by the nine squads. After that, though, was one of the two most recent participants. She was on the list of interesting prospects, and her stepping forward resulted in the immediate rise of at least two hands. One hand to rise was that of Tobirama Senju, who'd rejected his own brother only a few calls ago. Another was the male with crimson hair and a mask on the right half of his face, who headed the Crimson Lions.

[Apollymi]

Another hand was the leader of the Blue Rose, for Juvia leaving her with three total offers. Of course she found herself looking at the group and then thinking about it a bit she looked to the man with the mask on and the Crimson hair. She found herself looking at the group at large and a small frown came over her face. She hadn't expected to get more than one offer, but she had in mind places she'd wanted to go. "I'll join the Azure Deer, arigatou gozaimasu," she said. Making this choice based on the fact that Tobirama hadn't simply given his brother a spot and actually apparently valued hard work among his group. She could respect him and as such she could join him. After making this decision it would make the leader of Blue Rose 0-2 on choices she had contested. But another number would soon be up. A call would ring out soon after Juvia made her decision. "Number 365!" This was the number belonging to the boy known as Leonis Vermillion. One female hand would enter the air, and it belonged to a woman whose face was hidden behind a deep hat. She had a somewhat sinister grin on her face as light blue locks escaped her hood.

[Bloodedge]

It was time for number 365. One of the more interesting battles of the day had taken place with this particular male and one other person who'd already been taken into a squad. This boy was given a sight he hadn't expected to see, that being the raised hand of a more sinister-looking Captain of the Magic Knights. Beyond this hand, though, was the return of the Crimson Lions' offer, as well as the Black Bulls. Leonis was slightly perturbed by the choice he was being given, but his choice was ultimately one of power lust he already understood. "Heh! I'll take the Bulls!"

[Apollymi]

It seemed that Leonis would be joining the Black Bulls as well, and with that taken care of the hands of the Captain of the Purple Orca lowered once more. She always felt slightly rejected at these things, and she was beginning to think she might scare people from time to time. Regardless of her insecurities, the next number would be called as well. "Number 366!"

This shout would lead to the emergence of Kirsa, the girl with the glass magic who wore glasses. In addition her exceedingly high levels of control, she'd also sparred against the boy with the Four Leaf Clover book. As such she was held in reasonably high esteem. As she made her way forward, the Leader of the Blue Rose raised her hand again, this was added to by the leader of Green Mantis the red head whose body seemed to have living vines draped over it.

[Bloodedge]

A brand new occurrence would follow the calling of the next participant's number. The girl who combated a holder of the four-leaf clover grimoire was next on the list, and she would receive more than just a couple of offers from the Magic Knights. The leaders of Blue Rose and Green Mantis had their hands raised, and the same could be said of the Azure Deer and Crimson Lion leaders. As if four out of nine squads was not enough, she would also be offered the raised hand of Siegfried Vangeance, leader of the Golden Dawn - one of the most illustrious and elite squads throughout the history of the Magic Knights. One could note that Siegfried's was not a hand which rose often, if at all. Some even speculated that squads such as Golden Dawn only accepted nobles and royalty.

[Apollymi]

"Sugoi," the girl managed. She didn't think she would get more than one or two offers if she got any at all. From what she knew about the Magic Knights, the Blue Rose was run by a woman who enjoyed the company of other women so she was likely to get an invite there so long as she didn't show any sign of cowardice. The leader of the Green Mantis was said to be a nature lover but also a lover of great beauty so it was likely the look of her magic which earned her that attention. The other two though were elite among squads for different reasons. The Crimson Lions tended to favor strong people and the Azure Deer was much the same. The Golden Dawn was said to specifically be for nobles and royalty, an illustrious group which was a difficult one to get into. She didn't expect to catch the attention of their leader at all, regardless of how he chose his members. As such she could hardly turn down the opportunity. "Arigatou Gozaimasu, I'll join the Golden Dawn," she said taking a bow and knowing she'd probably find herself in good company or at the very least among people who could help her get better properly. With her decision made she stepped to the side and the next number would be called. "Number 367!"

[Bloodedge]

"Hmph," Siegfried murmured. He wore a smile that was prideful and satisfied. It was obvious to him that others saw the potential in this new Magic Knight as well, but it would be Golden Dawn who saw this growth. The next number called was a prize to be won beginning at registration. 367 was the number assigned to the boy who wielded the four-leaf clover on his grimoire. Siegfried's hand rose a second time this day, and only the second time in the last two entrance exams. As he expected, though, his was not the only hand to rise when the boy named Asher stepped forward. The Captains of Azure Deer, Black Bull, and Crimson Lion also raised their hands, all having every intention of claiming the boy with the rare four-leaf clover, as well as the less rare - but seldom seen still - light affinity.

[Apollymi]

At the forward approach of the boy who was holder of both light magic and a book with a four leaf clover, the hands of several other Captains raised as well. The leader of the Green Mantis, Purple Orcas, Blue Rose, and Coral Peacock all rose in the air as well. Strangely, so did the hand of the leader of the Silver Eagles, upon seeing how many other hands as raised as well she became discontent, she'd known this would happen as well. There was a stirring from those left below who looked on in astonishment as this young man basically got to pick which group he would go to, on merit alone. But this would not be all there was to talk about, "All of you should put your hands down, especially you, Cross." these words came from the normally stoic and silent leader of the Silver Eagles. This woman in her white and blue robes soon stood with staff at her side her hand extended to the lad below with a warm smile on her face. "Don't mind them Asher, you belong with us," she said a uniquely open offer to a lad. The Silver Eagles seemed to be even more exclusive than the Golden Dawn as her hand hadn't risen at all over the course of this day. Regardless of this, she had more than a single reason for wanting this lad, and it had nothing to do with his powers and everything to do with the realization of a single goal she'd had since she was quite young.

[Bloodedge]

It came as no surprise to many of the Captains that none of them stood alone in this choice. The surprise of this moment came when the leader of the Silver Eagles spoke after everyone's hands rose. One other Captain in particular was addressed by the woman, and it was none other than the Crimson Lions' Captain. "Especially me, eh? Well that's just downright..." As he spoke, Cross wondered what could have possibly driven this woman to speak in such a way over her choice. Looking down at the young man in question, though, he realized something that had been stirring for many years now. "... Rude. You're owed your choice, I suppose. Silver Eagles will struggle against the rest of us, so let's all give Sibylla a handicap this time," he said to the other Captains while his own hand lowered. Cross himself understood what was going on here, and the other three males were given all the understanding they needed when he backed down. Their hands began lowering as well, with the Golden Dawn's Captain speaking again. "Yare yare. Sibylla's wrath is something I'd rather avoid. Who'd have thought it would also get to you, Cross?"

Meanwhile, Asher looked on in awe. Coming into this exam, he had no clue he would actually make it into the Magic Knights, much less have every Captain on the roster accept him into their respective squads. There was even more to experience beyond this, as one Captain out of the nine spoke to deter the others from their efforts, then spoke to Asher directly to tell him he belonged with her squad. Frankly, Asher didn't know how to feel about this. Something about this woman's countenance was warming. He felt as if he wanted to reach out and take her hand then and there, and what's more... he was now watching other Captains lower their hands one by one.

[Apollymi]

All of the female Captains looked at each other and along with Cross it would be the Captain of the Purple Orcas who next lowered her hand. Being the sort of person she was, she had some fairly close ties with every person that could be counted as a witch, she knew of the personal goals of one Sibylla Silva and acknowledged fully what the white haired woman thought herself to find. "Iie, it isn't so much her wrath Sieg, it's something else entirely..." she mentioned. This caused a scoff from the leader of Blue Rose but she also put her hand down, as it was obvious there was something more afoot here than a simple squad choice. The same could be said for both the leader of the Coral Peacocks and the Green Mantis the latter of whom stared between the pair and figured out the missing link by the whispers of the vines near her ears. "Sou ka," she murmured while letting go of this.

Sibylla for her part, had been searching ceaselessly for this lad for his entire life, she could hardly believe he was standing before her. She absolutely wouldn't be losing him to one of the other Squad Leaders this day. The boy seemed to be thinking it over, he'd had quite the few accomplishments this day some known and some unknown. All nine Captains wanting a single person was almost unheard of bar a few exceptional cases, but having one speak out directly was also just as unheard of. In Sibylla's case this was likely doubly true considering that she also didn't speak very much at all to begin with. He'd gained acknowledgement beyond the standard, and now the Captains had all but backed down, even so, Sibylla wouldn't force this lad, to come with her if he didn't want to. Still she thought to make her stand on this abundantly clear and did so with a few words, leaving her hand outstretched. "All of us acknowledge you fully and every Captain wants you for their squad, but..." she said calmly. "I'll leave with you, or with no one."

[Bloodedge]

Several moments passed, eventually resulting in every Captain other than Sibylla lowering their hands. Still, she stood strong and spoke to the confused boy. Did she desire him as a member this badly, that she would shun the advances of the others? Could he truly be that much more use to a single squad than any others? Either way, she claimed that she would either leave with him as a member of her squad, or with nobody from the exam. Asher was shocked to hear this, and still didn't understand why, but... she still left him with a choice, even with such high stakes for herself. And, still... he felt he should be taking her side for some reason. "H-... Hai. I'll join the Silver Eagles..."

[Apollymi]

The longer this seemed to go on the higher the stakes were. This particular group of individuals in the late 360 people in the exams total of 399 candidates seemed to all be something extraordinary. Strangely enough, Sibylla Silva seemed to want this lad more than any other individual and her stance was that she'd leave this exam with him or with no one at all. It was such strong conviction that many of the others were taken aback by its directness. Several of the Captains who didn't know exactly why she'd do something like this, were also stunned, but Sibylla waited for the moment of truth. Her heart thundered within her chest, but the look of warm welcome didn't leave her face and then suddenly relief. The lad said he'd join the Silver Eagles, which sent Sibylla into a state of pure elation. "Hai!" this was one of the happiest moments of this Captain's life and none would really know why that was the case immediately. With the boy having made a decision, she hopped down from where she'd been perched to join him. "I know this probably doesn't make sense to you right now, but it will soon." she said to the boy. She had other business to attend to within the Noble Capital and she'd be taking this lad along. "Come along, Asher..." the young woman mentioned, aiming to leave with this boy in tow. She was quite serious about this moment and fully intended to leave with or without this boy at the moment his decision was made. This spectacle now over another number would be called. "Number 368!" This call would be for the boy bearing the Ice Magic from the last battle of the day.

[Bloodedge]

The surprises were seemingly unending today. After he accepted the invitation to the Silver Eagles, Asher was met directly by the Captain herself. She claimed the things which confused him at present would make sense eventually. She was his boss now, so he had to at least put forth enough faith to trust her in this. As such, he followed along when she prodded him to, apparently getting a head start on his new lifestyle before the exam was concluded.

Up next was Gray, a boy who stepped forward with absolute dismay all over his countenance. His head hung low, and a dark cloud pouring rain and cackling thunder and lightning loomed over him as he trudged along. 'Had my spot taken. Had to follow ridiculous strong guys in the fight. Lost the fight. Now I have to follow this...' he thought. At this point, all he could hope for was acceptance, which he looked up for desperately. 'Somebody. Anybody. I'm even one short now, just raise a hand!' Luckily for him, a hand began to rise. Tobirama Senju of the Azure Deer lifted his hand, and before there was even the chance for another, before Tobirama's hand even finished rising, Gray was yelling. "I accept!" he said.

[Apollymi]

Up next the lad known as Gray was about to be chosen and it seemed that he felt some intense form of anxiety surrounding his being accepted. So much so that he jumped the gun and accepted the first hand he saw raise which belonged to the leader of the Azure Deer. This excited utterance made a laugh come from the leader of the Blue Rose who had glanced from the corner of her eye and seen the soon to be lifted hands of the leaders of Purple Orcas and Coral Peacock as well. "Hahahahahaha!~ Well shit I guess I'd be gun shy too after seeing something like that~" she said knowing that at least three would have picked him regardless of what he thought about himself. Hell, she was thinking about giving him a try just for the ability to diversify the girls of her group but alas that wasn't very important. Numbers would continue to be called until the very end and everyone who made squads would find themselves grouped up together, aside from the one person who'd joined the Silver Eagles as they'd already departed.

[Bloodedge]

Several days after the Magic Knights Entrance Exam, the ashen-haired Senior Magic Knight of the Silver Eagles passed through a wall at the end of an alleyway in Kikka. The result of this was an arrival to a place known of by most, but acknowledged by few: the black market. The street that housed the black market was as busy as always, but many thought it strange to see someone wearing the garments of an Elite Magic Knight in this, of all places. All eyes were on this man, namely Hawks Vaude, the moment he set foot in the black market alley. This prompted him to speak with intentions of his words reaching the woman he figured would be close behind. "Hm. Probably should've changed first, huh..."

[Apollymi]

There was indeed a purple haired young woman in close proximity to this man. And she had basically been dragged along to this place as well. That being said she huffed gently thinking of the best way to respond to Hawks. "I figured you understood what would it would mean to just come straight here, Vaude-senpai. Obviously, we could have gone about this in a more covertly, but..." she looked around and all eyes were indeed on him and a few glances came her way as well because she too was dressed as an elite but in a slightly less obvious way. "If they know we're here they might to something obvious and make a mistake. Or... they could go into hiding and we'll be able to find them by finding out who is missing," she suggested two methods in which they could progress their goals without having to change anything about them right at the moment. Kajun Faycott was considered to be more than a bit clever and as such had earned her title as an Elite, but she wasn't without power as well, which would likely become obvious overtime. "At the very least, someone should be fairly forth coming with information should we ask the right questions, Vaude-senpai," she said after having a glance around and making eye contact with a single merchant who was trying exceedingly hard not to draw attention to himself. His wares apparently consisted of several dozen jewels which seemed to be of varying degrees of expensiveness. He drew Kajun's attention simply by trying not to look at them when everyone else was gawking, and she took the initiative to nudge Hawks in the man's direction as they walked.

[Bloodedge]

"Uhh... No. Didn't think about it at all. Once we got the tip on where to look for these guys, I only thought about coming straight here," Hawks said to his partner for this job. Any cover they could have used had been blown by the time Hawks set foot in this area, so that didn't really matter anymore, but Kajun did have a point. The pair of them could easily fish out the oddball in the room, as it were, and find something from that. The only fault in this plan he could think of was...

"Almost everybody is up to something in the black market." Though he may have been over-exaggerating a little, Hawks' statement was true for most inhabitants of this street. However, he couldn't use this clause to dispute Kajun's assertion, as there was no telling what the chances were of their specific target being the oddball they found. At least one person with strange behavior was quickly noticed by Kajun, and brought to Hawks' attention as a result. Hawks honed in on this before making his move, approaching the sketchy merchant... though in the end, he stopped instead in front of a consumer at that very merchant's stall. Once in contact with this other person, he offered his query. "Oi... the biggest crime syndicate around here. What do you know about 'em?" he asked, both loudly and clearly enough for numerous others nearby to hear him.

[Apollymi]

It took all of Kajun's restraint not to palm her face. Their Captain often sent her out on missions with random individuals, but this man in particular was never really one to think about much of anything before doing it. In fact, her exit from the Silver Eagles base of operations spoke massively to this point. "It is possible to act, without every aspect of the situation being a matter of urgency, Vaude-senpai..." she said not knowing if this man simply didn't know how to slow down, or if it was simply his way of dealing with everything in life. Regardless of their differences in opinion and action, there was the very real matter at hand which was the fact that they were in the Black Market and currently looking for a very specific group of people.

Soon enough she'd spotted someone who might be good to use for information, and the jeweler seemed to be suddenly distraught but remained silent. He was a stout man, with black hair and a large crooked nose. Otherwise he'd seem mostly unremarkable, but he was now sweating profusely as he watched is young customer get accosted by an Elite Magic Knight. "I don't know nothing, about anything..." the customer said. "I'm trying to conduct business here..." he said with a weary eye going towards his customer of choice. This was a young man didn't really know how to react, this would only be added to by Kajun though in a much more subtle way. "All of these were stolen from nobles' houses. I'm sure you wouldn't want to be caught with them in your possession, and blamed for their theft personally, sir." Kajun's words made the man's eyes go wide and he immediately scurried off. Whatever this jeweler was involved in he wanted nothing to do with it. "My customer!" the man seemed aghast, but Kajun had a bit more to say. "You'll end up jailed or worse if you don't simply answer his questions," she finished which made the man sigh. "Fine, just... lower your voices... I guess. Would it be too much to ask to make it look like I'm not cooperating at least?" he asked of Vaude, wondering if the young man would understand why he couldn't just speak calmly with two obvious elites of the Magic Knights.

[Bloodedge]

"I know you don't." This was Hawks' statement to the escaping customer, prior to his attention returning to the merchant himself. He understood how impossible the chances were of someone in a theft ring coming to the black market to obtain their items. Surely the thieves themselves would aim to sell off their goods before being caught with them, and what better place was there to do it? Well enough, Kajun pinned the jewelry of this merchant as items belonging to nobles in the Clover Kingdom. "That's a lot of jail time, mate. Probably not as bad as it'd be if we handled you our own way, though..." As the vendor pleaded for cooperation to make this exchange look less obvious to the public of the black market, Hawks stepped forward and leaned against the table between him and the stout male. His right hand was slammed against the table, while his left hand remained on his hip. A rather wicked grin was upon his face as he replied to this male, taking on a persona befitting the venue, if only to play this interrogation more aggressively. "And give you enough time for the sweat to wear off while you think up a whole web of lies? Nah! We're in the black market, though... where nobody could say anything if we beat the ever-loving shit out of you for withholding information. So, how do we parlay? I say right here, right now, you tell me and this nice lady everything you know... and we don't flatten that giant sniffer of yours. Sound fair?"

[Apollymi]

The customer had all but scurried off and there was now a strange confrontation taking place. Kajun stayed rather quiet during the start of this exchange, as she'd figured out her role in this particular endeavor was to be the 'calmer personality'. While she waited to interject a bit her fingers dragged along the jewels as she looked at them. As Hawks leaned into the table, a jump came from the merchant, his nervous tick seemed to develop as he began to rub a single finger against the tip of his nose. "What you'd do?" he questioned not liking how the questioning was already going. Hawks final act would be an intense bit of threatening. Whether or not this man would actually carry through on this threat or not wasn't really important, the accompanying hand slam seemed to shake the greasy little man to his core. He looked to Kajun for help maybe confirmation and she looked up from the jewels and shrugged. "I'm not in control of him or anything... best to just tell us everything you know," she said raising her eyes with a most vacant expression.

"Alright alright. Look don't be too hasty..." he said still sweating bullets. "I didn't actually take any of these things, I don't know where this stuff comes from. There are some guys, and they go places and look for things. And they go through them, and then they sell me the left overs at a discount, and I sell them to the good people," he explained this situation. "I literally don't know anything... I'm literally the bottom tier of this whole thing. I just move jewels and it isn't really my job to know where they come from and that's the truth," he finished his explanation hoping this wouldn't go any further. Granted he hadn't said anything about the people who sold to him or anything like that, and it was necessary information.

[Bloodedge]

Hawks' grin widened as Kajun fell right in line with this little role-play he'd initiated. He could see its effects taking place through the expression of the merchant, and it wasn't long at all before he was hearing it as well. Everything this man said could have easily been a lie, but Hawks didn't believe this to be the case. "You know what I don't like about lies?" he asked rhetorically. The rhetoric would be shown when he immediately rolled into his next statement, which answered the question itself. "Lies take too long. There's so much detail thrown into an explanation, and bad liars can't even keep up. I like you, though. You're no liar. Know how I can tell?"

Whether the merchant knew or not, Hawks' most recent question was also rhetorical. A slight pause followed as if he was awaiting a response, but even if one were to begin, Hawks quickly slammed his other hand against the table as well. "Because everything important is missing! Don't screw with us; who are you getting it from, and where are you supposed to meet them once you unload what you have now?"

[Apollymi]

The jeweler seemed to be in the clear, until of course, Hawks began to speak rhetorically about lies. A deep swallow came from merchant, he didn't know what he expected from Magic Knights, but these two seemed to be a bit more brains that he was prepared to deal with. But still he thought to contribute a bit to the conversation, trying to formulate an answer to his secondary question. "How..." before he could even get the question out, Hawks' fist slammed onto the table again. A jump ensued as did a soon to be covered smile from Kajun who simply shook her head from left to right. It seemed that the jig was up so to speak, as Hawks did a good enough mental job of following along to know that he hadn't gotten any real details. "I... but... it's..." he stammered repeatedly apparently scared. Now would be the time that Kajun participated once more, adding a bit of sweet to the obvious threats given by Hawks. "Look we don't want to hold you up? And you don't want to be in danger, it's easier for everyone if you just... answer the angry man's questions," she said while flickering her gaze over him. A sigh would ensue as the man began to spill his proverbial guts about his business partner.

"Alright, look. When I am done here. I meet someone on the east end of Kikka. We don't meet in the Black Market because it's too crowded. Anyways, there is a guy who has greasy slick back hair, muscular with a bad attitude and a leather jacket. He will show up after dark every day. He'll be able to tell you more than I will. I swear... I am just trying to make a little money," he confessed. As far as Kajun was concerned this man was definitely a little fish, but the breadcrumbs would eventually add up. Still there was a great deal left to do, and Kajun could take it that this man had nothing else to offer, but they still needed to confiscate his stock to have it returned to the people it actually belonged to.

[Bloodedge]

At long last, the pair of Magic Knights had all the information they needed from this man. At this point, all they needed to do was follow through. "Well, you're not gonna get any more money out of..." Hawks was in the middle of inspecting the jewels, and a pause was brought to his speech as he discovered a certain box labeled with an insignia depicting an eyeball and various hieroglyph-like accents surrounding it. Hawks collected this first and foremost, completing his clause only as he did so. "... this. Two seconds left until you should really not be anywhere I can see you. Go. Now," he demanded. A sigh would follow, during the time he expected this man to be scurrying off. Only when he was gone did Hawks intend to begin speaking again. "Alright. Good work there, Kajun. Think it's worth it to just follow him to make sure he's not leading us astray? He doesn't have this lot anymore, so he might be dumb enough to already be going for the next supply drop."

[Apollymi]

It seemed the merchant wouldn't even be allowed to keep the merchandise he'd already paid for. "But... I..." the timing of two seconds left the man scrambling out of the Black Market at record speeds. He couldn't help but be immediately scared. In his own mind, the worst case scenario would involve him needing to resupply before his suppliers got busted and that would only take but so long. Meanwhile as he ran away, Kajun's grimoire opened briefly. A small rose seed would find itself planted in the man's skin at the nape of his neck and hairline, imperceptible to the naked eye. Moving right along she looked over the box with the eye and hieroglyphs while listening to Hawks speak. 'I've never seen this symbol before, I wonder what it means...' she thought only to look up at Hawks. His methods were quite strange, but she couldn't deny the results he'd attained. "Arigatou Gozaimasu, Vaude-senpai. You did well to get so much information out of him..." she muttered as she finally picked up the articles bagging them to be taken back to the Magic Knights Headquarters to eventually be returned to where they belonged. "It isn't necessary to follow directly. I put a seed on him to track him, it will allow us to go to any place he goes until the seed grows into a rose and falls off. We have time to return these goods to Headquarters... and plan our next move," she said calmly. "And time to make sure he gets good and worried about what might happen to him," she mentioned with a gentle nod of her head. "Have you ever seen this symbol before now?" she asked pointing out the strange eye with the hieroglyphs it seemed a bit abnormal compared to most of what they'd come across so far, and it made her wonder if it was some sort of clue.

[Bloodedge]

Hawks had become furious. He couldn't allow it to show for the sake of progressing the mission without unnecessary baggage, but the rage was there underneath. "Yeah. You rolled with that nicely. Good teamwork," he said, noting that she had done something with her grimoire as the merchant ran off. Apparently, she had affixed him with some sort of tracer seed, so they didn't quite need to follow him per se. Before they went about returning the stolen items, Kajun questioned the box he held, or rather the symbol upon it. "It's nothing special. Well... it won't do anything for us, anyway." Hawks took a moment to turn toward her, opening his coat to reveal the black shirt he wore beneath, which bore a tamer form of the same engravings. "This box... They took it from my family's house."

[Apollymi]

Hawks change in emotional status was barely noticeable to Kajun. It could have even simply been related to his normal excitement and she would have never known the difference. He did however comment that they had good teamwork which led her to nod her head in agreement. Though she didn't understand why her Captain had initially sent her out with this particular individual, things always seemed to turn out right when Sibylla made the decisions, as such she did as the woman asked without question. 'I have to give credit where it is due. He is good, and Danchou makes great team choices, even if it isn't obvious at first...' she thought. Only to have attention brought to the strange object they'd seen and that Hawks seemed to be looking at a great deal more than anything else. Soon enough it was revealed why he was so interested in it, as it bore similar markings to ones on his very clothes. The clothes of nobles and royalty always seemed to link back to their families and Kajun knew this, as such she was only mildly surprised when Vaude mentioned the box came from his house. Still the girl managed to feel for the man she was with, not knowing how he felt about the situation. "Sou ka... Vaude-senpai, would you like to go there and make sure everything is okay?" she asked first and foremost, in a moment of worry for any potential losses he may have suffered. Though there was more than one reason to go to this man's family home and check it out, there was also a sudden and rather important question looming on the horizon. "What was in that box?" she questioned making the assumption that said box was now empty.

[Bloodedge]

"... No," Hawks said, even as he looked at the box with eyes full of remorse. "The mission comes first. If we take these guys out as soon as possible, then we keep them from doing anything to anyone else," he continued. The box itself was soon stored in his coat pocket, and with that, he was ready to move out again. An open grimoire from Hawks resulted in a large pair of black-feathered wings sprouting from his back. These wings were folded around the piles of jewelry to carry the items using their feathers. When asked about the contents of the box, he sighed. "It's not important. Let's go."

[Apollymi]

There was remorse in Hawks face even as he stated that he didn't want to visit his family home. He went on to claim that for the sake of the mission he was willing to forego this, even though it would have made just as much sense in Kajun's mind for him to want to go and check up on it. Her eyes widened at the assertion, because this was the level of self-sacrificing that she'd become used to being part of the Silver Eagles. It gave Kajun a better overall view of the man she was with, and it made her respect him more as her senior. "Hai, that is true. Let's go finish this mission up then... so you can check on your family," she said with an encouraging nod. If he didn't think what had been in the box mattered, perhaps it didn't. Still, it might come up again at some other point in time. Regardless she'd lead the way to the Magic Knight Headquarters in town to drop off all the stolen merchandise.

A few moments after all of this had been cleared up, she'd be waiting in front of the building with an open grimoire casting a different spell altogether. "Briar Magic: Rose Petal Tracking..." she murmured. This immediately created a three dimensional make up of the town out of briars and then got to watch as she searched for the pollen signatures across the town. These were easy enough to see, and highlighted in yellow with higher density where their tracked criminal spent more time. "Sou ka, he really is going straight to the east end of the town. After having spent a bit of time in a bar, perhaps gathering his courage or trying to shake off his earlier encounter with us... would you like to follow this... Vaude-senpai?" she asked thinking about it more and giving a bit more reasoning. "We could interrupt a potential purchase and find the guys he buys from directly. Catching them all at this moment would be an easy way to get rid of that whole aspect of the group at once," she mentioned.

[Bloodedge]

"Hai. That sounds like the best plan." Having agreed to the plan of action, Hawks carried the stolen goods to the headquarters as needed, bar the box belonging to his family home. Upon returning to the outside world after leaving everything else behind, he met with Kajun again to determine their next course of action. He looked at the map she produced, noting each stop made by the man she was tracking. His location choices were to be expected of a shady individual, but what mattered most was the end of the route. "If we wait until he stops, I could get us there before they finish their exchange. We could cut them off without risking getting caught. Aside from that suggestion, I've got nothing different in mind from what you said."

[Apollymi]

A nod came from Kajun, she aimed to be reassuring but she didn't often have much to say in moments like these. They found themselves delivering the stolen merchandise then going over a little something resembling a plan. Her analysis of the situation was added to by Hawks who seemed to think it might be pertinent to wait for the stop of their target, as such she continued to watch the movement of his golden dust on the map. And only when he reached the far eastern part of the city did he stop. "There, he's stopped for real...." she said with general acceptance of this man's plan as she dispersed the magic only after making sure that Hawks got a good enough look at it to know where they were going.

When they arrived, the sketchy merchant who'd been slowly mulling around, stopped in front of something which looked like an abandoned shack. It had no lights and was exceedingly dark beyond that, but it didn't really matter. He fully intended to get his next round of merchandise and get out before anything bad could happen. As such he knocked on the door still looking around from side to side. "Open up, I need the rest of what you got!" the sleazy man claimed without restraint.

[Bloodedge]

Hawks waited until Kajun confirmed the ceased movements of their target. Once this confirmation was given, he chose to make haste by once again grabbing Kajun by the midsection and taking flight. As one who flew around so often, he had a good enough lay of the land from his typical birds-eye view to know exactly where he needed to be from only a moment spent looking at the map.

Meanwhile, the merchant these two Magic Knights dealt with earlier was at the designated location for his next supply. The sun had set, but the time was a bit earlier than what would be expected. As such, the male figure who stepped out of the dark shack did so while wearing a quizzical expression. This man was fairly tall and slender with blue pineapple-shaped hair and a long ponytail. His left eye was blue, and his right eye remained closed as it always was. "Nufufu~. You're early today. Don't tell me you sold all that so soon; I'll have to charge extra for your next supply if you did."

[Apollymi]

For his part in this, the shady merchant had reached his destination quite a bit earlier than he normally did. Even so, the man he usually met in this spot was indeed here, and as the greasy man looked up at him and his one closed eye he sighed. "Look man cut me some slack. You can't charge me extra for doing what you ask. I buy and move things from you, no questions asked..." he said having thought the better of explaining what likely happened with the last set of supplies he had. "Anyways, I'll take whatever else you have right now, if it is nothing just go ahead and say so..." he mentioned still looking around himself as if nervous. That being said, this wasn't exactly the most legal of activity so a bit of tension was normal for the situation. All the while, Kajun was being carried towards this destination by Hawks in the hopes of busting multiple levels of this ever expanding crime ring.

[Bloodedge]

"I can charge whatever I like. You're the one flipping my hard-earned work for profit; you should have more than enough to cover inflation by now," the blue-haired man replied. In actuality, he was keen on the knowledge Magic Knights had of this business. He stood against the door frame while discussing business with the portly man, crossing his arms while blocking any path to the shack's interior. "If you want everything I have now, it's going to cost you a hundred thousand yul. Everyone's been hitting major places, so we're stocked to the brim. Hell, even I did some solid work earlier today." With that said, this man held out his left hand, as if expecting immediate payment. "Upfront, chop chop."

Hawks' flight made it possible for Kajun and himself to reach the skies above this shack in no time at all. In fact, just as the blue-haired man held out his hand, Hawks was landing on a nearby rooftop in the best cover of darkness he could find. Looking down into the alley, he could see all but maximum confirmation of the deal they were to be interrupting. "Figures. This isn't the place he tried sending us to at all. There's a parallel street that probably would've given him enough time to finish this deal and get out, if we'd actually gone that way on foot."

[Apollymi]

"Inflation cuts into my profits, and I am the one taking the most risks. I should get a discount you fucking crook," this portly man seemed to be upset about the price increase, but he didn't really have time to argue. As far as he was concerned the sooner he paid and got his his new product the sooner he could disappear no questions asked. "A fucking hundred thousand yul... I can't believe you people," he griped. Even so, he brought a large pouch of coin out of his pocket which would be the amount that had been asked for and placed it within this man's outstretched hand. "Fine fine... take it and give me what I need," he said apparently his rush was real and he looked around himself again, not seeing Hawks and his female charge land on a nearby rooftop but still getting a tingling feeling along the back of his head that he was being watched.

Meanwhile, Kajun got low and heard the words stated by Hawks. She nodded her appreciation of their apparently wrongly given location versus the one which they were actually at right now. "I mean, he is an actual criminal. I guess we couldn't expect him to do anything but try and get his last score," she mentioned, which was why she'd put a tracer on him in the first place. Confirmation was necessary when dealing with the words of the untrustworthy. As their mark placed coinage within the hands of the man there she looked with wide eyes. "It looks like it's about time..." she mentioned, knowing that it was very likely that they'd have to storm this place to work on the next part.

[Bloodedge]

"Yes, calling me a crook will definitely get me to budge on the price, you ignoramus." Regardless of the stout one's view of the situation, he produced a pouch of coin whose weight and texture seemed right enough to the dealer. Still, he never liked this consumer's attitude, and now was an even more exceptional case than the norm. His right hand cracked the door behind him and reached inside, but he was not reaching for anything positive. Out came a full trident to be pointed at the nervous customer of this criminal organization, stopping only centimeters away from the nape of his neck at the end of its thrust. The movement to reveal this trident happened so swiftly, so succinctly, that the gleam from its metal tips in the moonlight left a trail behind the weapon. And then, there it was, just waiting for a moment to draw the life blood of this man if necessary. "You're being awfully demanding for a grunt, you know? I'm thinking maybe it's time to up your taxes for this next supply. Out with it. I want everything you've got now."

Hawks was in wait next to Kajun, keeping his eyes trained on the trade below. "Yeah, but I wish I could get a criminal to tell the whole truth at least once when I've got them terrified. It's on my bucket list, and that thing isn't getting any shorter," he said, offering this bit of passing conversation while the deal progressed. He intended to wait until the deal below was finalized to begin their raid, but they were Magic Knights, and as such were meant to protect even lowlifes from harm where possible... and there was now a man at the bottom of a criminal pyramid, whose life looked to be in danger. "Let's go!" Once more, Hawks aimed to grab Kajun and fly toward ground level. From a meter or two above the ground, he would release her to allow her to approach the situation her own way, while Hawks himself flew directly over the heads of the two criminals, intending to grab their attention before the situation between them escalated.

[Apollymi]

"I don't even know what that fucking means..." the sleazy man said. He called people what they were and this man should have accepted this by now considering how often they did business. Still a few insults passing between them wasn't something he was at all concerned about. As all criminals spoke the language of coin and this man had just received his. He should have been fine with what he had but... it seemed that this would not be the case immediately. In fact this sleazy man was now staring down the business end of a trident, so quickly that he'd seen the shimmer of it and almost nothing else. "Hey I paid you..." he said seeming to find it strange that this was how this was turning out. Of course, the true nature of this pineapple topped man was now showing itself, as he extorted even more money out of this particular low tier salesman. "You've gotta be kidding me..." he began rummaging through his pockets still looking around. Obviously, he didn't have much of a choice but to pay this man, but this little exchange wouldn't be seeing its proper end. As there was now a flying man over top of their heads whose shadow was large enough to distract the man before anything else. "Shit."

The conversation leading up to saving this individual would have a small chuckle escaping Kajun. "Well, bucket lists exist for a reason. I am sure you'll find a softy criminal who is scared enough to tell you the whole truth one day," she'd managed before they were soon off. She was dropped a couple meters above the ground and chose to act as back up. She'd disappear into the background and approach from the shadows without a hint that she was there to begin with.

[Bloodedge]

"And I... am not the least bit surprised," he said in regards to this man not understanding his word choice. Whatever the case, he would see all of this man's money added to his own funds... if not for the sudden interference of a flying individual who seemed to have followed his little accomplice. "This is why you pay extra, you bloody amateur," he commented while retracting his trident, aiming to thrust it forward again and pierce the merchant's throat. Sadly, this maneuver would not see fruition. Hawks took his flight on a return route while pulling two long, sword-length feathers from his wings. The feather he held in his left hand intercepted the dealer's trident, acting as a proper sword would during the clash. "Yo! I'm here for the party. You guys look like you're having fun already," Hawks spoke. With that, he slashed at the blue-haired man with his right-held feather blade, prompting the man to leap away to save himself by producing space. All the while, there was a wicked grin upon his face. "Nufufu~. Is this really something the Magic Knights are worried about right now? You have many other problems to address."

[Apollymi]

It was more than apparent that this pineapple topped man had a lesser opinion of his business associate. Even so, the sleazy man was nothing if not stubborn about this whole situation, but before he could be completely robbed, they were joined by the winged Magic Knight. "I didn't do it, I didn't lead him here..." he tried to plead. This was quite true of course, but it seemed his end was coming regardless, as the trident was about to close in on this throat his eyes closed and he sighed into his supposed death. But a clash was heard instead, and the man had pudgy fingers feeling up his neck and having no injuries before he opened his eyes and realized this Magic Knight had actually saved him. "Thank goodness... I'm out of here!!" obviously this man had no reason to continue this transaction and it was time to cut his losses with what he had left of his cash before it became ugly.

For all he cared this racket wasn't worth the risk any more regardless. The turned and ran away, only to find himself tripping. His feet got caught on vines which grew around him and then bloomed with several roses which filled his lungs with a pollen which immediately made him drowsy. He wanted to push through but the vines were covered in stickers which he couldn't get past without injuring himself. As he blinked a haze out of his vision he saw the purple haired woman come back into view for the first time since he'd separated from them. "Sleep." she mentioned as she moved forward once more. Kajun had an open grimoire glowing green as she prepared to try and support Hawks in any way he needed. In this case, she aimed to create several prickle covered vines to encroach upon the trident wielding criminal's feet after his initial dodge, her aim to capture him within vines as well or at the very least hinder his initial movements.

[Bloodedge]

"Bye!" Hawks said to the merchant he'd interrogated earlier, doing so in a very jovial nature for one now in the middle of combat. His clash with the dealer was short-lived, but as the man put space between Hawks and himself, he stepped right into a vine trap. A brush against his boot alerted him to something not previously on the ground nearby, and upon looking down, he realized further movement had quickly become something quite difficult. "Hoh? What might this be?" he asked in rhetoric.

Hawks stopped moving about, but did not land just yet to avoid limiting Kajun's options on the ground. As he saw it, their combination could easily remain perfect if he remained airborne, so long as Kajun had approaches like this in her repertoire. "Gomen, gomen! I forgot to mention, I brought a plus one! I hope that doesn't make the party run short on snacks or anything." The Magic Knights' target in this endeavor smiled wider, producing a strange grimoire with a spade on its front cover. This grimoire, when opened, allowed the man to cast a spell which sprouted eyeball-covered tentacles from the ground, forcing the vines away from his feet while also forcing Hawks to a greater distance. Hawks fought against this by slashing away at the tentacles as they grew and encroached upon him, but they seemed to be growing continuously toward bot Hawks and Kajun, as if intending to ensnare both parties.

[Apollymi]

Kajun had timed her attack perfectly and it almost seemed like it would work, until of course it was properly noticed by the man it was aimed against. He seemed at least a little curious about it, but Kajun had no intention of explaining her abilities to an enemy. Thinking of him as such, when his grimoire opened she immediately went on the defensive. "I suppose it would be asking too much for a simple victory," she commented absently like she wasn't about the idea of prolonged combat. Even so, the coming tentacles with the large eye weren't at all something she wanted to deal with directly. Her glowing grimoire produced a new spell stemming from the already created vines. "Ibara Sōsei Mahō : Kugari no Odoro-ju..." this would use the still visible vines to grow up in an attempt to capture the bulbous like structure in an attempt to rip it to shreds between the thorn covered vines as they grew up into a single tree like structure. These vines though seemed to be alive, and would continue trying to pursue the tentacles even if they escape, and beyond that seemed to also be continuing to move discretely along the ground. Whether it worked completely or not, she mostly aimed for it to give them a bit more thinking time to figure out how best to take down their new opponent, the man of much higher quality than their earlier intimidated merchant. 'Sou ka, from the Spade Kingdom... I wonder what he's doing here?' she thought having noticed the design of his grimoire.

[Bloodedge]

As Hawks continued his efforts to cut down the tentacles, Kajun cast her own spell to swarm them via similar methods, even using the same vines she already had in use. While the man's tentacles were occupied, Hawks found the opening he needed to close the distance again. Over time, he was more clearly seeing the benefits of Kajun and himself combining their efforts, and now was such a moment where that combination could truly shine. Instead of closing the distance between himself and the dealer, and keeping it that way, he did so and left a flurry of feathers behind as he took a place in front of Kajun. "Gomen! Blindness for a second," he said as his wings spread out to shroud Kajun's view of their enemy. The black feathers falling around their enemy created a shroud of absolute darkness. "Genyakō!" he called out. The dealer's vision became nonexistent during this spell, and once that was done, Hawks moved out of Kajun's field of vision. "All you, Kajun!" Hawks said while the dealer was busy dealing with his temporary blindness.

[Apollymi]

Kajun found that the fighting combination between herself and Hawks was about what she expected. Their captain seemed to have a pretty good handle on the potential outcomes of two of the individuals she placed together. In fact, she'd say she could always count on this kind of outcome given their Captain's taste in match-ups. Soon Hawks was claiming some sort of apology before covering her field of vision with his wings. "That's fine, I don't really need to see or anything," she said seemingly sarcastically but the truth of the matter was, the vines she created seemed to move of their own accord. Soon enough they were moving alone, and Hawks was making a large field of darkness around their newest target, in doing this he cleared Kajun to finish up their combination. The vines she'd previously created converged upon the man within the darkness, and if they succeeded they would entrap him in the same way they'd trapped his associate. He'd be tangled up in vines and left suspended a meter or so off the ground supported on all sides by spine covered vines. "Did we get him?" she asked.

[Bloodedge]

"Anything besides me when I steal the show, yeah. I know how it is," said Hawks amidst the blinding darkness of his own feathers. Once he was out of Kajun's way, the purple-haired woman took the initiative in binding the dealer in her vines. Hawks seemed elated by this development. Even as he continued to avoid contact with the ground, he flew around to Kajun's rear and threw himself around her shoulders in his moment of excitement. "Yosh! That's what I call team play! You're my partner from now on; case closed!"

[Apollymi]

Kajun found herself looking at Hawks with a raised brow. "Oh?" she said seeming to find the humor in this situation. She supposed there were worse things to see in moments like these than Hawks, but it was a strange thing to consider in the moment. Beyond this it seemed her capture of their fugitive had gone on without a hitch and as such she was satisfied by her work. "Hm, something like that is wha..." she was soon accosted by Hawks who practically and literally threw himself around her shoulders in appreciation of her work as well and her eyes widened at his statements. "Hai hai, I guess I'd be fine with that. Arigatou gozaimasu~" she said having a chuckle about this particular statement. Success was awesome in this moment so she looked at Hawks over her shoulder and she couldn't help but smile at him. "So, what do we do about him?" she asked since Hawks was in general in charge of the questioning.

[Bloodedge]

"Good. It wasn't an option anyway. We can kiss on it later; there's work to do now," Hawks said prior to releasing Kajun of his grasp, and moving toward the shack. He slowed his pace when passing the dealer, commenting on what they should do with him in passing. "Keep him tied up. I'm guessing he's in charge here, since he was willing to kill a client on the spot like that. There should be a lot more, though," he commented. Only a moment or so later, he was blasting his way through the door to witness the shack's interior, which was filled with other criminals in this organization - those between appraising newly-acquired goods and sorting through them for releasing to the black market. "Ooh, nice after-party!" Upon setting foot in the building and drawing the attention of the criminals, Hawks used his keen eye to pinpoint every person in the room. What happened next was the spreading of his wings, and the release of steeled feathers to maim and/or pin down many of these targets as they scurried about the room.

[Apollymi]

Kajun was surprised by the sentence that left Hawks' mouth. Her eyes widened and a blush crept up to her face with an immediacy that should have left her woosy. "Vaude-senpai!" she said with firmness as she covered her own face with her hands. She wondered how he got away with saying such things all the time, or if he even did any of the time. It was a rather confusing situation after all. Luckily there was more to be done here, and her apparent job was making sure their captured criminal didn't go anywhere. "Hai hai." she commented her understanding. As such she attempted to remove the blue haired man's grimoire from his person with an extended vine, which she aimed to wrap around it and stop it from opening, while Hawks took care of the people within the shady looking dwelling.

[Bloodedge]

"That's my name!" Soon enough, Hawks' efforts halted the movements of everyone within the shack. As he was frequently sent on missions such as this, he came prepared. After producing a long strip of strange cloth, he saw to it that every member of this organization was restrained with it, before dragging the pile of them outside. He seemed easily capable of carrying a few dozen men with the strength of his wings, but using his wings to hold the bound criminals left him without the ability to fly. In the end, he figured this was worth it to prevent wasting multiple trips to and fro. "There were more guys in there than I thought. Looks like we're walking back. Wanna lead?"

[Apollymi]

"Tch..." the woman known as Kajun had only good things to say about this man, still it was quite odd the change in his behavior now, versus when she'd seen him in other interactions. She thought to question this, but decided he was likely just a man of action. Beyond this she soon found him outside again, with all of the men from inside bound by some strange manner she'd not previously seen. So in addition to being a man of action, he was prepared for all aspects of his work, this was something she could respect. As such when she was asked if she'd like to lead, she had a simple reply. "Hai, it seems like that would be best," her own captured criminals were dragged along in their cages by vines as they made their way through the streets and back towards the Magic Knights Headquarters. Overall this mission could be counted as complete, and the streets safer both from home robberies and from stolen merchandise. "Nice job, senpai," she complimented as they walked. She didn't really have much to say, but she thought the praise was necessary given how smoothly everything had gone. Her choice in route would lead them back to the same place they'd dropped off the stolen merchandise earlier, this time with dozens of prisoners in tow.

[Bloodedge]

And just like that, they were off on the last segment of their job for the day. Hawks would be the first to admit that Kajun made this task far easier than it would have been if he'd taken it on alone, as he normally preferred to. Perhaps he'd have to change his outlook on how he approached missions. Either way, he was given the perfect opportunity to vocalize his train of thought after being complimented on his own work by the purple-haired woman, so he seized the moment then and there. "Yeah, you too! I don't really like working in teams, but... you're alright, ya' know? I'm gonna have to make an exception after this."

[Apollymi]

A few days after the events which led to a major set of arrests in in the town of Kikka, a green haired girl with no defining facial characteristics stood waiting near the main square. She was waiting for a white haired lad who was supposed to be meeting her here as her partner for the duration of her next mission. She had previously been a bit miffed that Leonis wasn't to accompany her on this mission, but lived with the idea that it might be fun regardless, since if she was completely sketched out or attacked, she was allowed to start and finish a fight. As this was the sort of thing the girl was looking for anyways, her normally passive face remained but in her eyes, her slit pupils tightened with anticipation. She wore nothing that would have defined her as a Magic Knight, content to wear her ripped jeans with their snake motif, an equally ripped t-shirt and even with a belt on the zipper on her pants was quite low. She tossed around her green locks while she waited passing the time looking like the average loitering teen and garnering similar kinds of stares because of it.

[Bloodedge]

Hikage was to be in wait for some time, but eventually, her partner for this mission would arrive outside the black market. The silver-haired young man named Asher appeared wearing black pants with a hooded jacket that, aside from a deep crimson lining and a long scarf-like attachment of that same color, matched said pants. The shirt underneath his jacket was of a thin white variety, and the shoes he wore for this endeavor were a shade of red to match the accents of his jacket. He was shockingly more well-dressed overall than he had been during the entrance exam to become a Magic Knight, but he felt this didn't matter so long as he didn't look like the royal he recently discovered himself to be. It didn't take long at all for him to recognize the green-haired girl he was meant to meet, and when he did, he stepped out ahead of her to meet that slit gaze of hers with his own deep purple eyes. "Ohayou gozaimasu!" he said with a smile. "Hikage, right? I'm Asher; yoroshiku!"

[Apollymi]

"Yo." Hikage said, her voice was apathetic at best, but she still looked simply as if she was meeting friend. Still, the girl's strange habits would come to light almost immediately as this lad approached meeting her gaze gave her a bit of pause. Most people wouldn't have done this, many said staring at her was like looking an animal in the face, because there didn't seem to be anything going on in her head while she looked at things. In the same way that animals considered prey, she considered people, but this lad gave her hope that he'd be alright. Even so the girl still sniffed the air while staring a hole straight through him. It was as if she intended to look until she felt something. Strangely, from this lad, she felt as if she'd stepped out into the world at high noon after being deep underground. It was as if he shined with feeling, but it wasn't at all negative. His feeling wasn't the warmth and vibration of one like Leonis, or the simple lacking of Heero Yuy, nor was it the bristling animal sensation she got from Artem, this lad seemed to be extraordinary and by her own approximation this feeling was enough. A few seconds after she simply nodded. "You're bright, but not as warm as Leo. You... don't give me tingles but you don't feel like anything bad I guess..." she mumbled this sentence loud enough for him to hear in the manner that was her general assessment of people. If it hadn't been for the fact that she was actually a person, one might have expected an even more ridiculously animal-like greeting. "I understand now..." she mumbled, remembering that this particular lad had been chosen by every single Captain and had chosen to go to the Silver Eagles with the woman who looked a bit like him if she was remembering the situation correctly. Whatever the case, she was excited by the prospect of this mission, so she pointed towards what looked like a sheer wall face and spoke a few more words. "It's there, we can go now... if you want," she said. In her time spent with Leonis she'd been trying to work on first meetings and not attacking people, but she still wasn't entirely sure what she should be saying in conversation with people not Leonis.

[Bloodedge]

Following his introduction, Asher continued smiling in the face of his to-be companion. The result of their meeting was something very unorthodox. Before introducing herself, Hikage sniffed the air between them and drew some strange conclusion about the energy he presented. Asher seemed confused by this, but it didn't seem like she had anything negative to say, so he couldn't question any more than the basics of what had just happened. "I'm... bright, not warm, and not tingly? Haha! That's strange, and I don't know what it means, but I kinda like it! Let's do our best, ne?" With that said, Asher backed away from the girl. The entrance to the black market was pointed out, though it was nothing more than a wall. At this point, it was a given that there was some magic afoot to hide the true alley behind said wall, so he took measured steps forward until he was phasing through it and entering the black market itself. Upon entry, he was surprised to see exactly how full of people this place was, considering how many were apparently against its existence overall. "Ano... there are a lot of people here. Any ideas for an approach?"

[Apollymi]

"Hm, I guess that was weird too..." the girl mumbled once more, still this lad didn't react negatively to what she'd said, so she knew that they'd be alright. He even went so far as to suggest they both try their best, she could do nothing but nod to this sentiment. "Hai." she managed, before she followed Asher towards the wall she'd pointed to. He did the same thing she would have done and took measured steps until he stepped through and when he did, she was right beside him to his right. There were a lot of people in this place, more than she tended to like even moving about, making purchases, even random vendors shouting at passersby to try and get their attention. A shrug would come from Hikage when she was asked how they should approach this, "I was just going to walk around until someone gave me bad vibes. I met another merchant and he was sketchy so I have a pretty good idea of what kind of feeling is off enough..." she said, the girl had very simple motivations, but she wasn't completely opposed to working with someone if she needed to. "But, if you have a better idea, we could do that too..."

[Bloodedge]

"Too? Are a lot of things weird around you?" Asher wondered aloud. Regardless, he didn't much mind his first impression of this girl. She even came forth with an actual idea as to how she intended to approach the black market they were now standing in. Before Asher could respond to her idea, some random individual walked by in a rush, bumping into him and momentarily throwing off his balance from the left side. This took his attention for a moment, but he was soon enough returning said attention to Hikage. "Sou ka... you look into people to such an extent, huh? I think that's a reasonable plan. I wonder what sort of people we're looking for this time, though. The theft ring is said to have been taken out at its head, so... what other sort of illegal activity could we be looking at?" he wondered aloud as he began to move forward.

[Apollymi]

"People always say I am weird. I didn't really care what they think, but Leo says it too, but not like it's bad. So... I'm keeping track of it now," the girl said about her own weirdness. The fact that she shared this information with an almost perfect stranger was likely weird as well, but that was simply how she was. The person rushing past Asher bumped into the lad, and caused him to stumble a bit, seeing this Hikage conjured a single steel blade and threw it at this person's feet intending to cause them to trip before walking by and picking it up while glaring at them without saying a word. She then continued walking, with Asher choosing to answer his questions. "Hai, I do that," she said as for the other illegal activities they should be looking for she shrugged. "In my experience bad people are either, stealing things, stealing people, making evil shit, or killing people... so those are probably the kinds of things to watch out for," she said thinking about it objectively though without sugar coating it at all. "Theft is already covered so evil items, killing people or stealing people are probably the other things on the list," she said with a nod and a completely apathetic look on her face. She seemed to be completely detached but she'd simply lived a rather complicated life.

[Bloodedge]

The man who bumped into Asher was accosted by the efforts of the green-haired lass, though he found this entirely unnecessary. Still, she seemed adept enough when it came to intimidation for the purpose of vengeance. "... Arigatou," he said, deciding after a small amount of hesitation that it was a gesture he at least appreciated at face value. "Whoever Leo is, he's right. You're really weird, but I like you. Weird is just another word for different," he said in the most chipper of tones. As they progressed down the alley, Hikage listed the types of bad people she had encountered in her life, and removed thieves from the list to leave the remainder for what they should seek. "Hmm. We are in the black market, though. That list is probably most of the people here, to some extent. I'll trust your judgement on anyone you think is stranger than the others, though."

[Apollymi]

Hikage succeeded in intimidating that particularly pushy individual and much to her surprise, Asher thanked her for the effort. As she took up pace beside him she looked at him strangely and her left brow rose, only for the girl to shake her head from left to right. "Iie, it was a reflex," she said and it was true. Shows of weakness were very bad where she was from and as such she was content to show none regardless of where she was. Beyond this it was stated by Asher that he liked the girl, and that her weirdness was another term for different and he apparently had no problem with her. She felt strangely about this but nodded. "Arigatou..." she managed as she tossed the knife around in her hand as a vendor queued in on them saying a sentence which would have been normal to most. "That knife is a bit ordinary. Take a look at my stock... maybe you'll find something you like better?" he offered. This man seemed strangely friendly considering he was obviously watching a girl toss around a knife rather casually. Hikage's head turned to the side and she looked to Asher. "He spoke to me... that is also weird. Probably a good place to start," the girl murmured, as she began walking towards this particular individual glaring all the way.

[Bloodedge]

"Iia," Asher replied. As far as he was concerned, anyone willing to openly be themselves without also being some horrid individual was deserving of respect, and Hikage seemed to be such a person. Moments into their travels, one of the many merchants along the path addressed Hikage by taking note of her knife. He claimed he could offer her something superior to what she wielded, and she seemed to think the mere notion of him speaking to her was a bit off. Asher couldn't form a direct link between these things, but he did already state his intention to trust the girl's judgement, so he followed suit.

[Apollymi]

It seemed that true to his word, Asher was willing to trust Hikage's judgement while they rooted out the next bit of sketchy behavior. This particular vender was a rather plain looking man with scruffy blonde hair and blue eyes. He didn't seem to be anything out of the ordinary, of average height and musculature. Of course, none of this matter to Hikage because as soon as she was within this man's space her eyes shifted and her entire countenance changed. 'That doesn't feel right...' she thought. Normally if an individual had bad intentions or would be annoying to her, it'd be obvious almost immediately. This particular male seemed hollow to her. Not like her Captain's emptiness as there was magic there, but it didn't seem as deep as she was used to feeling people. It was almost as if he wasn't actually a person. "Come on, how about this dagger? It comes complete with a paralytic magic on the blade. It will completely immobilize an opponent for up to three minutes. Or... the magic can be upgraded for a small fee?" he pitched. This strange man even held out the blade for balance testing to Hikage. Her gaze never shifted from this man, in fact, everything about her face oozed intimidation but nothing about this man seemed to acknowledge this. Even as Hikage caught the knife she'd been tossing around and stabbed it into the stand for the seconds that she picked up this apparent 'better blade'. "Ano, I don't know if I need to paralyze anything..." she murmured, as if starting a conversation with Asher. The blonde man before her seemed to think this some kind of different situation. "Come on, tell the lady she can never be too safe..." he offered to Asher, his voice hollow, his eyes almost empty.

[Bloodedge]

When they reached the merchant, Hikage began an exchange with the blonde male. This consisted of a marked attempt to sell her an enchanted dagger meant to paralyze its victims. As they conversed, even Asher managed to pick up something of a strange aura coming from - or rather, hardly present in - this man. As for the sketchiness of the male, he honed in on something very specific spoken in the attempt to persuade Hikage into the purchase. When Hikage spoke as if reaching out to him, Asher took an additional step forward to take a place at her side, only to be immediately accosted by the merchant, as if the man wished Asher to help sell the item to his companion. He decided to play the role of a potential consumer, if only to prod the man for more information. "I never had use for anything like that in Hage Village, and things got pretty rough out there from time to time. But... isn't everything here a resale? How would you be able to enhance the magic if we wanted to pay you extra for it?"

[Apollymi]

The merchant seemed to take Hikage's hesitation as interest and began to try and pull Asher into helping him with the sale. This of course, made the blonde man talk more which gave Hikage's eyes more time to study the man and gave her a chance to get a better feel for him, and figure out exactly what was wrong about him. The blonde male for his part, managed to wave off the assertion that everything here was resale, but given the information that the lad was from the Forsaken Region he could assume the same of the lass and thus catered the sales pitch for them. "Yes things get tough out there in the middle of nowhere but that is why a lady should be able to protect herself with a little extra oomph. Besides, my merchandise isn't resale, it's all made by a reputable person who happens to think magic items in the hands of everyone is a good thing. Even if you need something a little stronger than say a simple paralyzing spell," he mentioned casually. He wasn't outright talking about anything illegal, and the fact that he refused to mention what stronger than paralysis meant was indicative of knowledge that his words could be taken at face value. All the while there was nothing but supreme aggression coming from Hikage and this man still didn't flinch. "Sou ka... can you put your hand right there fingers spread wide?" she asked of the blonde man who surprisingly enough placed his right hand on top of the counter area with his fingers spread wide. 'No one exists with this little fear... let's find out how much of a not person this is...' she thought to herself, she'd subsequently begin moving this paralyzing knife back and forth between this man's fingers at increasing speeds, stabbing between them with an amount of accuracy which would likely seem to strange to most. All while watching the blonde man smile blandly. "You think this is strange too right? This lack of fear is strange... it's hollow," she mentioned, this entire scenario only made sense if the being trying to sell this dagger wasn't a living being in the same way as everyone else. As such she continued to move this knife between the blonde man's fingers waiting for a fear response and receiving none. "That's a good way to test that dagger, it has good balance right?" the man asked, as if he had no fear of loosing a finger or two when breaking Hikage's concentration. Not that he did... no the girl's fingers continued moving as she thought of what to say next, this time aimed specifically at Asher. "Look around for something suspicious..." she mentioned as she paused mid one of her knife pull ups and aimed to stab it into this creations hand. There was no pain response from it, it continued to only smile in the face of this pair of teens. And it would be left to Asher to notice, a purple haired woman with sunglasses pushing them up onto her face in the window of a small casino across from them and then moving away from the window having been watching the entire time this was going on.

[Bloodedge]

In the merchant's assertion that none of his wares were resales, Asher couldn't help noticing one very important thing. This man, this rather shady merchant, hadn't answered his question at all. Asher looked toward him with slightly-widened eyes as his own thoughts progressed. 'Even so... how would he upgrade them if someone else made them? Whoever he works for must be nearby, but why wouldn't they be selling these tools themselves if it's not resale?' he wondered. Beyond all these things was the apparent emptiness of this man, magically and emotionally. Hikage went about putting this to the test while Asher looked around the alley to seek his own questions' answers.

'Argh! Too many people!' he thought. There were far too many shady and underhanded people looking out for their own benefit here; he couldn't pick a single one from the crowd. One person in particular though, took Asher's attention simply because of a gleam across her glasses which occurred as she righted them on her face. Asher's quick eyes pinpointed this woman who'd been looking directly at them through a window across the street, and as he watched her walk away, he quickly looked back to the fearless, painless merchant. 'This magic...' It was the same sensation, albeit significantly smaller in the husk standing before them. If that wasn't enough, Hikage had already confirmed this man to be some sort of magical construct, or something else of the sort.

"Woman, long purple hair, circle-frame gold glasses with red lenses, and gold eyes. She's about 5'7, headed west from the other side of that window," he recited, taking a moment to nod toward the aforementioned window. "If her pace doesn't change, we can cut her off at an opening in the casino's crowd, in that same room... but we have to move at my pace in about four seconds."

[Apollymi]

Hikage didn't bother anymore with the puppet after stabbing it's hand into the counter top. Instead she pulled her own knife up and turned around to find Asher speaking of a woman he'd picked out of the crowd. Surprisingly, while she acted in a way most would have considered brutish and animal-like, he'd done what she asked and looked for a person who was more suspicious than all others. Besides that, he showed the ability to find similar kinds of mana, finding the one who was mostly likely to be connected to the stall they were now at. His words about her gave Hikage all the information she'd need to identify her and as such her height, what she was wearing, what she looked like and even where she was at this exact moment. He mentioned the ability to cut her off, and Hikage's eyes went wide, there was a mention of moving at his speed to make it though. If Hikage recalled correctly this lad used light type magic and as such this would likely be a bit disorienting. Even so, she was content to allow this to happen. "Hai, do it then..." she said, placing a great deal of faith in the lad's abilities, but he'd already shown he deserved such. Hikage took the initiative to extend her unoccupied hand to the boy, assuming she wouldn't be left behind in this to await this transport.

Meanwhile, the purple haired woman turned her back and began moving through the crowd in the casino. 'Damn it. Even good customers usually take longer to figure out something like that. And those two, are way stronger than most of the people who want stuff from me,' she said, when she pushed the glasses up onto her face she'd seen the amount of mana contained within the bodies of both these individuals and knew she'd require help to get rid of them if they gave chase. She had an entire arsenal of people at her disposal within one of the back rooms of this casino she needed only to reach them, as the crowd opened up a bit, she was about to take a left hand turn down a long corridor away from the commotion which would allow her to drum up her own supporters perhaps.

[Bloodedge]

"... Hai." Somewhat to Asher's surprise, the green-haired girl quickly accepted his terms for cutting their target off. Meeting her extended hand with his own, he counted down to the final moment when he used his light magic to move through the traffic and into the casino. In little to no time at all, they were at the opposite end of the opening to the crowd, and Asher was staring down the purple-haired woman opposite to them. He intended to confront this woman, but something else was bothering him. If he were in this situation and thought someone was onto him, the path he would have taken would have been a very different one. Where she seemed to be going wouldn't have led to safety from pursuers at all, leading the young man to believe something else was afoot. As such, he further closed the distance between Hikage and himself, brushing against her side so he could whisper as quietly as possible. "She was going toward this hall, but it doesn't lead to anything major. I think she either has more of those puppets, or more people with her nearby."

[Apollymi]

They did indeed make it to this spot in record time, and Hikage got to experience the speed of Asher's movements first hand. When they stopped she had wide eyes but seemed to recover easily enough. The lad even brushed her slightly to bring attention to what he thought was the major problem of the cut off of this woman. He was apparently of the assumption that either this was a place which lead to more of her comrades or more of the doll like creatures like the ones outside. To be perfectly honest, Hikage was excited either way, in fact there was a glow in her eyes which was almost childishly delighted. "Sou ka, it's a trap. That's fine either way. You can take her, I'll take everyone else," she mumbled this. It was apparently part of Hikage's plan to walk straight into this trap, if only because it would definitely start a fight. Of course, there was the matter that they had a good bit of information to run on, when considering that the woman was definitely selling the sort of items which were implied to be upgraded to induce death in people.

The purple haired woman's eyes widened in this moment where she turned the corner and the lad and the green haired girl who'd discovered her puppet were standing directly in front of her. "How!?" she stressed this, before she recovered a small smile coming to her face, as she turned on the charm while this set of teens whispered to each other. "I mean, only my best customers can see thorough that ruse. That is pretty impressive for the pair of you... perhaps you'd enjoy talking together in the back, and getting at look at the better merchandise," she said, practically sweating bullets. She looked at both of the teens, but flinched just a tad when looking towards Hikage, she decided in this moment that Asher was the better bet. "Can you keep her calm enough to talk business?" she asked of him, as if she expected Hikage to attack without provocation based solely on the amount of animosity in her stare. "That is the more normal reaction to me..." she mumbled to Asher, bringing back her earlier statement that the puppet speaking to her wasn't normal.

[Bloodedge]

"Good plan. It'd probably be best if both of us didn't confront her at once anyway, and you seem like you'd have a better time fighting a bunch of people," Asher replied to agree with Hikage's idea. Beyond this, she was certain to have an easier time picking out - and picking off - the purple-haired woman's associates than he would. Shortly after their brief exchange, they were being spoken to by the woman they'd followed here. Indeed, she urged them toward the trap they had assumed was in place, claiming they could talk business and look over her better wares. Before going into any further detail, though, she spoke to Asher about keeping Hikage calm, at which point it became apparent what Hikage meant when pointing out the puppet's reaction earlier. "... Sou ka. That's a shame," he said. A nod to Hikage would follow, prior to Asher stepping forward with the intention of handling this end of their task himself.

In a few steps, he was standing directly in front of the purple-haired woman. "She'll busy herself," he said as his hands slipped into his pockets, causing the jingling of many coins as if to imply he was the money-holder of this pair. In actuality, what he held in his pocket was his life's savings that he intended to use for the purpose of starting his new life as a Magic Knight, but that was neither here nor there. For now, he would continue his effort to pick this woman's brain for information, lest he make a bad move and blow their cover. No matter; this wasn't the first time Asher pretended to fit in with a bad crowd, in spite of his looks. As such, he got into character right away. His visage was no different than that which he'd used to gamble his way out of debts he'd been strong-armed into, or intimidate those who thought they could swindle him out of that which he didn't actually have. "I don't care to see what you've got in the back. I could be your new best customer, period... but your best stuff isn't in the back, is it? I think it's either on you right now, or nowhere near here. So... what's your real best merch? Tell me what it is you don't want to sell. And don't worry; we weren't coming to take you out or anything. We really are here on business," he claimed, and in no way was he telling a lie. Of course, the 'business' they were here on was very different from what he implied, but that was another matter for another time.

[Apollymi]

A simple nod came from Hikage. It was very true she was more used to taking on groups of people in combat, and beyond all of that she enjoyed fighting enough that it wouldn't matter to her if she had to face dozens of people at once so long as they put up a decent enough fight all together. As they paused though it seemed that Asher had picked up on what she'd meant initially when pointing out that the merchant speaking to her directly at all was strange. Hikage was quite used to people being afraid of her, or at the least wary of her presence. This was especially true of the sorts of people she came across in public. "Iie, it's normal..." she said to the idea that it was somehow a shame. She'd actually be a bit more confused if someone broke this, which meant technically she was more confused by Asher than this woman.

Moving right along, Asher's hint at holding the money sparked a bit of greed in this woman. Beyond the idea that she didn't wish to fight, was the matter that this casino only contained more puppets and that would be a bad match up for an actual fight against these people, if it even needed to take place. The lad even showed a bit of savvy by noting that her actual merchandise was logically either far away or on her person. She smiled then, because her safe house was indeed far away, but it contained all of her good merchandise and some trust worthy proper fighters. If these people happened to not be in the mood for a fight she could just make a bit of money and a new customer. "Hm, I didn't expect you to be clever. Don't take it to heart, I'm a woman running a business. I can't just have my face out there, people would try and take advantage of me or abuse me," she mentioned, this was a truthful reason for the amount of deception she went about as a matter of good faith she turned heading back out the front of this place. "Come. My actual wares are at a spot at the far end of the Black Market, but I can give you this as a sample," she said showing him a vial containing a strange purple liquid. "It's good for a boost at the very least..." she said giving the lad a wink. Hikage looked over the lad's shoulder at the offered vial and felt like something about it was off... she definitely wouldn't advise using it, but it definitely counted as made evil shit, in her personal opinion. And with that the woman began her exit of the casino, either her new customers would follow or they wouldn't, it didn't really matter to her at this point. And she'd lead the way to her true safe house.

[Bloodedge]

"The Forsaken Region isn't a happy place," was Asher's simple response to the woman he spoke with. She had become no less suspicious in this short time. Rather, she was becoming more of a suspect the longer they shared words, even if he could understand the realism of her alleged plight being a female vendor in the black market. "Sou ka. You're not strong enough to protect yourself against the types of customers you get. That's why you have so many puppets. Are they also tools, or is that your magic?" he asked. As he began to follow this woman, he took and inspected the purple fluid-filled vial he was given. She may have claimed this to be an act of good faith for a potential customer, but she had already tried to set them up once today. Either way, he slid it into his pocket and continued trailing closely behind the woman. "Arigatou. I'm Asher, by the way. My companion here is Hikage. Yoroshiku onegaishimasu."

[Apollymi]

It was soon mentioned by Asher that the Forsaken Region was no happy place and the woman just gave a flippant shrug. "So I hear, never been there myself though, sorry..." she managed to actually sound a bit taken up by the plight of those who lived in the Forsaken Region. She couldn't imagine growing up in such a place but she didn't have to. Beyond this it seemed that the lad, was content to ask questions about her business, he seemed soft enough to have believed her story so she had no reason to tell too many lies. "Yeah, male customers are a bit of a problem and female ones are less likely to care as long as the merchant isn't creepy. The Dolls are a creation of mine, they aren't my magic, but they are run by magic. But your friend seemed to have already figured that out..." she mused without thinking about it much. Asher went on to introduce himself and Hikage, while the girl considered that she would have been bored fighting a bunch of dolls because she knew there wasn't any magic in that back casino room. "I'm Eve. Nice to meet you..." she said, stopping after a few more moments of travel in front of place that looked neither run down nor particularly flashy.

"This is the place, now, I can take you in and show you some stuff. You just have to let me know the kind of stuff you're looking for," she said to the pair. Hikage was still tossing around her knife, the entire time they'd been walking with this woman, she felt that the level of sketchiness she possessed was exactly the sort of thing that she disliked about the man who'd come to the Black Bulls Headquarters. She pushed open the door and about a dozen pairs of eyes looked up, Hikage took note of these and that intimidating light returned to the green haired girl. But she figured they should get as much information as possible out of this before she went crazy.

[Bloodedge]

For all the purple-haired woman had to say about her customers of different genders, Asher couldn't figure out how one wouldn't consider her doll stand-in creepy. He did get more information out of this exchange though, like the fact that her magic remained unknown since the dolls were actual magic tools instead of spells cast by her. Soon enough, they were upon her place of 'business' as it were, and Eve was questioning what they had actually come looking for. Immediately afterwards, she opened the door to reveal what Asher could only assume was the rest of her group. Assuming Hikage would have anything involving them handled if it came to that, Asher continued his discussion with Eve. "We're not looking for anything specific. That puppet of yours was interesting, though. If I'm not mistaken, that little upgrade he was talking about would be good for... let's say getting someone out of our hair for a very long time, yeah?"

[Apollymi]

A few moments after they entered this place, Asher was still engaged in conversation with Eve. Eve managed to simply nod at the boy's explanation that he'd not been looking for anything in particular but was interested in the darker aspects of her upgrades. "Oh you caught that did you? Yeah, it could definitely make someone not a problem for a long time..." she said with a smirk coming to her face. "But if you wanted something like that, I'd need a show of good faith, yeah? I couldn't just show you or tell you properly about something like that," she said in a way which probably would have made a lot of sense. "So, just to make sure you're on the up and up, so to speak, drink that potion I gave you. Then I'll know you really want to be here and we can do business properly..." she left this open. Hikage heard this and her brow rose, she didn't like the look of that potion at all, and felt like it was likely poisoned as an idea way to get rid of someone in the middle of bringing them here. Or maybe just to paralyze them, she wondered what the lad would do but she didn't seem to break at all, instead she simply kept flipping that one knife around multiple times as she waited to see if she should start a fight or not.

[Bloodedge]

True indeed, Eve did apparently have methods of wiping out an annoyance. Asher now had little doubt that this was the target they sought, but... if only there could be something more solid, like proof that she wasn't actually lying on her merchandise just to make a sale. If this ended up being a farce, Asher and Hikage could accidentally screw up the entire mission. There was a beacon, though. The next words Eve spoke were a request for a show of faith before they properly conducted business. As skeptical as this was, Asher never broke his character. "Is that all? Well, I've had to do worse to get what I want. I just recently abandoned my adopted family for my ambitions," he said while pulling the vial of liquid out of his pocket. Without hesitation, he popped it open and tilted it to his mouth, pouring all of its contents in with no second thoughts. One could see his Adam's apple moving as he swallowed multiple times. When this was over, he began tossing the empty vial up and catching it, the same way Hikage treated her knife. The young man stared at Eve and smiled thereafter. "Good enough?"

[Apollymi]

Eve watched this lad as he removed the bottle she'd given him from his pocket. Surely he wasn't dumb enough to simply consume something because he was told to, even so, if he did, she'd have him right where she'd like him to. She then heard out a rather convincing tale about how the lad had abandoned his adoptive family just to get his goals in life. She could almost respect that, but still she watched. She watched as the lad consumed the contents of the vial and then much like his friend tossed it into the air. "Sou ka, well never get between a man and his dreams..." she said concisely. "And since you did what I asked, yes, I have everything necessary to upgrade that paralyzing dagger to one which will kill as soon as someone is touched with it. Doesn't matter how big or small the cut is, like you have to be careful drawing it... and it's not just a pitch," she said knowing one might consider her to be faking. She then had a huge grin spreading across her face as she spoke. "Not that it matters much, you won't be buying anything like that... in fact, you'll either buy the antidote for that potion which will also wipe your memory... or you'll die right here and my friends here will kill the girl just to get rid of you both. Nothing personal but I can't have people, actually knowing what my merch does, it'd be bad for business..." she said, rather callously. Hikage for her part in this looked around the room, having noticed that most of the men had stopped working and where now surrounded by open and glowing grimoires. "That's a threat right? I can fight them now?" she asked of Asher. Hikage didn't know if the lad had actually drank the poison or not, but she had faith in him nonetheless.

[Bloodedge]

There it was. In one shining moment, Eve admitted to everything that would see her convicted for her crimes and have her segment of the syndicate shut down for good. She also went on to say the potion he drank was poisonous. Asher continued smiling in the woman's face even as this was said. He would have laughed, but certain circumstances dictated that he didn't. When Hikage asked for confirmation as to whether she could fight them, he spared a glance in her direction. There was a threat on the girl's life to allegedly be executed if the poison's antidote wasn't purchased. Asher took a moment to compare Hikage's magic and obvious bloodlust to that of everyone else in this building, and when he was done, his attention returned to Eve. "Go ahead," he said both to Hikage's request to fight these people, and Eve's threat to have Hikage killed. "By the way, we're Magic Knights. You're all going to jail, unless my friend here goes too far and kills all your guys."

[Apollymi]

It seemed the woman known as Eve had tipped her hand a bit too soon. Strangely this lad didn't even seem afraid of what was happening, nor did he immediately try and buy his way out of his impending doom. No, instead he simply mentioned that he and the girl he was with were both Magic Knights and that everyone in this building was going to jail. Hikage's grimoire began glowing as multiple other knives were produced and she got a wide grin on her face. "I... don't kill people," she said, which was true. Even the lad who'd been rude to her in the Entrance Exam wouldn't have lost his life from the injuries he'd received. As such, Hikage found herself staring down a man who aimed to maim her with a fire spell. She rather easily moved down of the firebolt and launched a knife into the man's shoulder only to immediately charge forward and spin into the man lashing out at him and the man beside him before another spell could even be launched. "I have this by the way," she said with battle mania in those golden eyes of hers.

Meanwhile Eve was left standing there looking amazed. "But that doesn't make sense, why aren't you writhing on the floor in agony? You should be poisoned by now... you drank the vile," Eve said, her own grimoire now visible a deep purple color with a diamond in the center of the front cover. "I was hoping to avoid this sort of thing. I can't get shut down..." she mumbled. "One chance leave and forget you saw us..." she mentioned as several balls of purple energy began floating around her and she let them hover in the air.

[Bloodedge]

Hikage said she had the extras covered, even though Asher could already tell this was the case. Not only did he believe she could easily deal with Eve's associates, but she seemed like she would enjoy even the opportunity to do so. Asher nodded to the girl, but continued with his own end of business nonetheless. When it was claimed that he should already be writhing in pain, he remembered something important. "Oh, right! Sumimasen, I've never been able to get rid of it so soon," he said. The final time the vial he'd been tossing hit his hand, he brought it to his mouth again while using his left hand to pull on his cheek. After this was done, his lips pursed and out came the full vial's worth of poison, right back into its original container. Asher plugged the vial again, and held it out with his right hand thereafter, while holding his open grimoire in his left hand. "We can't just leave. Besides, I don't want to be arrogant or anything, but... I don't think you can beat me. Can't we just arrest you now?"

[Apollymi]

Hikage continued her work throwing and kicking knives into individuals, if one bothered to look she'd halved the number of individuals she was fighting even as they launched countless numbers of base elemental spells at her. She couldn't help this as most seemed to be incapable of stopping now that she'd started. Even so the wounds on these men were shallow and only enough to stop them from moving and not nearly enough to cause them any lasting damage.

Eve on the other hand had a different plan entirely. She watched as the lad managed to spit out all of the poison which he'd taken earlier without any real issue. "Oh... that is kind of gross," she said as if she hadn't just tried to poison someone. To be honest she was a bit upset she'd been out-played like that. Those glowing little balls soon lashed out as she addressed what this lad had to say. "Sure, whatever you say. But no one wants to be arrested and I won't apologize for whatever happens to you..." she said these balls aimed to converge on Asher where he stood, if these made contact they'd dull his senses and cause him pain as they were filled with cursed magic. "Hai Juso Mahō : Kiki Kai Kai," she stated of the spell she'd just used.

[Bloodedge]

Asher agreed that his method of avoiding a potential poisoning was somewhat gross, but it was a survival tactic which had served him well more times than he'd like to admit. Eve seemed totally disinterested in giving up to make things easier. In fact, after Asher's suggestion, she used her curse spell to attack him almost instantly. Asher's already open grimoire glowed bright gold as this happened. "That's the difference between us. Sumimasen," he said, apologizing for any damage he would need to inflict just to restrain this woman. "Hikari Mahō: Retten no Senkō!" Asher's high perception showed itself once more as the cursed orbs came his way. Quick-moving eyes pinpointed each of them, and with his own spell, he summoned orbs of light that intercepted each part of Eve's attack without moving to meet them. These orbs of light were only the starting point of this spell, though. Once Eve's attack was stopped, Asher's orbs each unleashed beams of light which traveled outward at blinding speed, then turned in toward Eve to target numerous non-vital points along her entire body.

[Apollymi]

In a single moment, it became obvious that Eve had no intention of stopping. Of course, she was more than a little shocked by this lad's magic type. "Light magic?" she questioned only to have her curse magic stopped before her very eyes. That wasn't something she fully expected to happen. Beyond all this the lad was content to apologize before aiming to maim the woman with several broken shards of light. Her eyes widen as she couldn't have been properly prepared to deal with something like that. "Shimatta!" she muttered. She was hit dozens of times over a short stretch of time. She fell over at this point and couldn't move any further.

Meanwhile, Hikage finished off the last of the extra guys and laughed maniacally. "Kufufufufu~ That was pretty fun..." she said tossing her knife into the ground her grimoire closing and returning it to her side. "Are you okay over there?" she asked of Asher, not as if she was concerned but instead just to confirm the current situation they were under.

[Bloodedge]

The fall of Eve was expected by Asher, though it was an easier thing to accomplish than even he anticipated. The orbs which spawned the beams to end her onslaught vanished as their target fell to the floor, and Asher took the time to step forward until he stood over her, grimoire still open but moved aside enough that he could maintain eye contact. "If you can make all these tools, you could have made your money being a Magic Knight. It's a shame, really." With these words shared, Asher cast one more spell which aimed to bind Eve using a crucifix-shaped light construct. He then bent over to pick up her grimoire while looking toward Hikage, finding her end of things to be wrapping up as well. "Hai; no problems here. Looks like you're done too."

[Apollymi]

Hikage stood and began picking up fallen grimoires from her opponents who could move but wouldn't do so for fear of what she'd do. As Asher chastised the ring leader for the bad use of her time she said nothing. She was already captured she wasn't going to admit to anything they didn't already know, or maybe she couldn't. Hikage looked to Asher in this moment and nodded rather simply, "Hai, I will make the call to Command. Maybe they'll come pick up all these people," she said picking a magic device from her pocket. She used magic on it and it lit up. "Command this is Hikage of the Black Bulls. We completed our mission but we have more downed people than we can carry, can you send someone to move them?" she asked waiting on words or confirmation. She'd seen Leonis do this before but didn't know if she'd manage anything besides scaring people.

[Bloodedge]

"Hai. Arigatou gozaimasu," said Asher in appreciation of Hikage making the call. In the meantime, he had a look at Eve's grimoire, taking special note of the diamond upon it in place of a clover. 'Sou ka. She's not even from this country,' he thought. As Hikage made use of her communication tool, it produced the image of a blue-haired man with a tribal-looking tattoo over his eye and cheek. This man was scheduled to work at Command in the capital for days in a row, but he seemed entirely unfazed by it when responding to the green-haired girl. "Hikage of the Black Bulls, I'm having your location pinned as we speak. You're in Kikka? We should have other Magic Knights at your position soon; can you keep the situation under control until then?" Following this query of the blue-haired man, Asher encroached upon Hikage from her left side. In doing so, he playfully nudged the girl and grinned to the projection. "It's been under control, right? We've got everything covered until the pick-up."

[Apollymi]

A simple nod came from Hikage in response to the thanks she was given. Of course, beyond this point, she was speaking to a blue haired man over the communication. He went ahead and pinned their location in addition to asking if they could keep this under control until the other Magic Knights arrived. She was soon nudged by Asher who made a joke in the moment and it made a small smile come to her face. "Hai. He's right... it's under control. We'll wait for the others..." she said before ending the transmission. Of course, this was the first time she'd done such a thing still it didn't go badly at all. She looked to Asher and gave him a firm nod. "I like you... you aren't half bad," she said giving the lad her nod of approval before confusion came to her countanence. "I mean that in the regular way not the tingly way..." she said clarifying. "I only like Leo in the tingly way," she affirmed. And with that they would wait for their reinforcements to arrive without any care in the world.

[Bloodedge]

And so, the exchange of information was made. All they had to do now was wait until help arrived to carry the criminals away. In the meantime, Asher holstered his own grimoire while keeping a firm hold on Eve's, content to relax so long as none of these culprits tried anything more. Hikage made a claim of appreciation to the young male, much as he had done to her earlier in their time together. However, she went on to specify that she didn't like him in whatever 'the tingly way' was. From that moment forth, even including the mention of someone named Leo, Asher was absolutely confused. "The... tingly way?" he asked. It took several seconds and a great deal of thought for him to come to any sort of conclusion for what this might have meant. When he did realize what it could have been, he figured it had something to do with the very strange upbringing she must have had on her end of the Forsaken Region. "I think you mean love. That's the only way I can think of liking someone that might be... tingly."

[Apollymi]

Hikage was about to learn something today. And that was an apt description for the tingly feeling she got around Leonis. It seemed that her description wasn't one that Asher was familiar with. In fact Hikage managed to think about it and frowned deeply, "Love? Sou ka... that's a different word. But if it's tingly I assume it works..." she said with a nod. Actually that whole thing was rather interesting to think about but it didn't really matter. Soon enough another Magic Knight was converging on the area, a girl in purple and black robes with platinum blonde hair showed up. She looked a bit distressed but chose to address Hikage directly. "I'm... Irisviel von Einzbern, Junior Magic Knight of the Purple Orca. I'll take care of transporting these criminals to the nearby prison," she said with a quick nod of her head. She took in Asher as a sight and her knees buckled just a bit.

"I'm Hikage. Hey were you at Command the other day?" she asked of the girl and she nodded this as she opened her grimoire. "Hai, I was, it was an order from my Captain to get me used to talking to... them," she said with her eyes shifting over Asher as if to hint at what she meant. And though talking through command was okay, she still couldn't talk to a man face to face yet. This made Hikage's eyes narrow as she tried to understand what the girl meant, but she was very sure that she was scared of something even as she cast the most advanced looking creation magic Hikage had seen so far. "Kemuri Sōsei Mahō : Honsōsuru Monogusa Kuruma," this created something which looked like a black smoke made stage cart. Her knees knocked together as she reverted her attention and the cloud of smoke moved to take up all criminals and stack their grimoires in the front with her as the criminals themselves were held up by the smoke and pulled into it as well. Beyond this the last car managed to hold all the confiscated items as well.

[Bloodedge]

"Hai. That's my assumption, anyway. It's a pretty strong word," Asher said about the situation Hikage claimed to be in. Strange as it was that she chose to preface the difference between her claim of liking him and the way she apparently 'liked' this other person, he moved along seamlessly. Soon enough, someone sent for collection arrived. This was an unfamiliar young woman who seemed to not be in the best of states at all. More specifically, every time she looked toward Asher, he was left more confused by the fact that this was the trigger to her odd, seemingly nervous behavior. She even openly admitted this to be the case when speaking with Hikage. Asher couldn't understand what she meant by 'them' initially, but his query which followed was one he felt happened to be open enough. "Ano... did I do something wrong? I haven't even met many people."

[Apollymi]

"Hm, but it's a pretty strong feeling," she mentioned, knowing her own actions were driven by the way she felt at any given moment. Anything which could be described as a normal feeling she understood, even when she didn't experience them herself. But she knew she didn't fully understand all emotions and she didn't really understand love so it made sense that she wouldn't have applied that word to her own feelings. But it seemed that Hikage wasn't the only one who was confused or at least at the control of her own emotions. The girl who'd showed up to do the collection of the bodies and properties of this particular bust, also had a problem. Hikage remembered her shaking her way through a conversation with Leonis and spent a few moments trying to rationalize whatever similarities there were between them. And she saw none that would cause the same kind of reaction. Of course, such a distinction would be hard for Hikage to make because she didn't care about that sort of thing. Being asked a direct question made Irisviel nervous even as her knees shook though she tried to explain. "Iie, it isn't your fault and I don't know you. I'm a witch from the Witches' Forest... so until I came out here I'd never spoken to men before, they make me really nervous," she mentioned all of this while still looking at Hikage to get all of the words out. "Sou ka, you're scared of men. That's gonna make sex really weird unless you like girls," Hikage said rather bluntly which caused a giant blush to appear on Irisviel's face as she tried to stutter through a response. "Nani!! Who..who...who'd want to do something like that anyways!?" she questioned which made Hikage look at the woman with the blankness in her face she was known for. "It's pretty fun, besides... you shouldn't be scared of men. Just kick their asses, then they'll be like everyone else..." Hikage offered which was likely strange advice coming from the girl, but she wasn't completely unfeeling towards the girl's plight. And it was how Hikage made friends, even as Irisviel's magic worked to collect the last of the individuals she had to she couldn't help but consider the green haired lass' word.

[Bloodedge]

Irisviel did end up replying to his question, even though she retained a visual link with Hikage throughout. When she got around to explaining, this made sense. If he didn't count his sister, Asher only had contact with a single witch who did not have this issue at all, though in that case, it was one who had a strong desire to meet others across the world. Asher opened his mouth to speak and hopefully offer some reassurance, but Hikage beat him to the punch with a very... very direct statement. His eyes widened, and his mouth opened even more despite no words coming out immediately. "E-eto..." was all he managed to say for some time, though his face reddened as he tried to even think of something better. Over time, he began thinking about the many potential negatives to this sort of fear. Given what he knew, there was one certain piece of advice he could and should share with the witch. "Einzbern-san, if I may make a suggestion... You might want to avoid going to a dungeon if one appears..."

[Apollymi]

The strange and direct advice from Hikage was well-meaning and Irisviel understood it. The other women of the Witches' Forest had said similiar things to her when it was discovered that she was fearful of being around men at all. Of course, her own Captain had been this way as well so she was well on her way to discovering her ability to have regular conversations with other people. "Hai, arigatou gouzaimasu, Hikage-san," she said, having met a few blunt women in her life already. To Asher though his advice was some which she actually hadn't heard before, she managed to look surprised by it and more so, she felt strangely that the lad would even continue speaking to her directly after she explained how she felt. A lot of the men she'd met so far were content just to talk to her only when needed. Still his words seemed to come from a place a genuine concern for her safety even though he didn't really know her. "Ano," her knees were still shaking as she turned to the lad and bowed her head quickly. "Arigatou, Asher-san." she managed to spit out after some hesitation. "I'll keep all that in mind. I'm going to take all these people off your hands. You two can return to your respective divisions, and report to your Captains, you might be called to the Royal Capital later for reports. Ja ne..." she said and the smoke train with all of the bodies, grimoires and merchandise took off at strange speed with no steering wheel but didn't seem to hit anything. Hikage managed to nod her head to the lass accepting the thanks and the order that she could leave now, still Asher had been nice to her so she wouldn't completely abandon the lad until she had to.

[Bloodedge]

Even though his words did nothing to help Irisviel's apparent situation, the message was taken nonetheless. This was all Asher intended, believing one such as her would be even worse off if she had to deal with the same goblins Junon, Dior and himself encountered in his first excursion. "Hai. Arigatou. And... sumimasen," he said with a bow to the departing witch, offering his genuine apology for making her speak with him, even if indirectly. Once she was gone, Asher stood akimbo and took a deep inhale. For what it was worth, this was a rather well-executed mission. He was now two steps closer to his ultimate goal. "I think we made a good team. Working together was fun; arigatou gozaimasu!" said the male, who went on to extend his right hand.

[Apollymi]

"Sou ka..." Hikage said finding it strange that the lad apologized to the girl for making her speak to him, but even so she noted the small smile on the girl's face as her resolve solidified a bit more. She could even feel it in Irisviel's magic. 'Hm, he's really bright, even to people who create their own darkness,' she thought absently. Strangely enough after this girl vacated the premises, Asher chose to speak once again to Hikage. He said that they made a good team and that he enjoyed fighting along side her during this mission. This was a hearty compliment for Hikage as it was the sort of thing she'd only ever received from her peers among the Black Bulls before this moment. If one took with this the fact that Asher also shared other similarities of upbringing with her and it was as if she'd found something close to a kindred spirit, minus her obvious battle maniac tendencies. His hand extended to her in a form of friendship which made her extend her own to him to shake his hand. "Hai! It was pretty fun. Next time though... you should fight me too~" she said with a huge grin on her face. She was quite serious about this, but she always was, she enjoyed the challenge of a new fight always, but she'd been sated for the day so she was fine to leave. "Catch ya' later, Asher."

[Bloodedge]

Asher's hand was taken, and he smiled. He felt he'd made a new proper comrade this day, and it seemed this feeling was mutual. Hikage, however, did have a very different mindset to his own. Her parting words involved the notion that he should fight her the next time. Asher was keen on a bit of friendly competition here and there, and training with other Magic Knights did seem like a good idea, but no... this was something very different. "Wai-" he started, but he cut himself short when the moment of surprise wore off. With everything said and done, he stepped out of the building, making his way back toward the Silver Eagles' base with a smile upon his visage, and his eyes on the skies. 'I guess in this case, I should take that as a compliment. Next time, then.'