The Day of Thunder

Everyone was expected to be at the village headwoman's house in a little while for some sort of festival feast, and Otaku isn't exactly looking forward to it. This sort of large, busy gathering of strangers in somebody's home isn't her favorite social environment; moreover, while it's natural that the villagers are glad she and the others saved those farmers yesterday, it's also sort of awkward when people want to talk about it over and over. What do they expect her to say in return? "You're welcome?" "All in a day's work?" "Yeah, I'm pretty great, right?"

The peaceful garden draws her wandering steps instead. She has plenty of time, anyway; no sense being really early to a party you're not that enthusiastic about.

Yukara had been using the garden as a refuge as well, the sympathy shown by the peasants becoming strangely grating. Along with vague assurances that 'it would get better soon', which angered her.

So she returned to the garden, standing on the small wooden bridge, leaning on her bisento as a crutch of sorts, letting the evening breeze play with her hair, which she had been unable to tie back. So many things to re-learn, things you didn't even realize you knew.

As Otaku appeared from the village mist, she appraised the woman, and then recognized her. "Miss... Otaku?" Was that the name she had heard?

"I am glad to see you are well."

There was a grunt in the midst of the mists while someone emerged from it. It did not matter if she had other senses that she could rely on to not stub her damned toe. This mist was still irritating. Still, the garden was much more to her tastes right now. A little away from everyone. Nozomi was finding her own council to be desirable, or at least preferable right now to the alternative of all those way too happy villagers.

Seeing a pair there, she gave them a bow and cleared her throat. "Minna-sama. I hope you two are well."

Otaku nods politely to the others, a suggestion of a bow. "Glad to see you are standing, Ryoshun-san," she says in her soft, musical voice. Her gaze moves to the second newcomer. "You must be the monk Nozomi. Well met. I'm Otaku."

"I am. Thanks to the kindness of others, who took care of me after I fell."

Yukara offered a rather stiff and shallow bow from the waist, glancing between the two. "I am Ryoshun Yukara." It was offered to Nozomi as greeting.

"A pleasure," she said to the two of them, rising. "It seems that Otaku-sama has heard my reputation. I forget sometimes that I have one of those. I'm just one of the ones who follows the little teacher around and tries to keep him out of trouble. I'm terrible at it." She looked over at the Ryoshun and nodded once. "Do you need any further attention, Ryoshun-sama? I have a few tricks I know."

Yukara quirked an eyebrow. "My wounds have been tended - I do not think there is more that can be done with bandages, if that is what you intend."

That wasn't to say she felt tip-top, but there was only so much one could do without spiritual tricks.

"I appreciate your offer, in either case."

"Of course, Ryoshun-sama. I would expect that they tend to them without question," she said, nodding once. "I am actually not that skilled with applying those. You wouldn't want me to dress a wound unless you were out of options. I simply know some ways of re-aligning the chi within the body. It can help the natural flow of healing somewhat." She was, in fact, offering mystical healing if the young samurai wanted it.

Nozomi wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 01, 2023 1:16 am

"A pleasure," she said to the two of them, rising. "It seems that Otaku-sama has heard my reputation. I forget sometimes that I have one of those. I'm just one of the ones who follows the little teacher around and tries to keep him out of trouble. I'm terrible at it."

"Yes, that's how I recognized you. He said that day we should ask you or your colleagues our questions, while he's occupied," Otaku says quietly. She cocks her head and stifles a yawn as the two monks discuss matters of chi. It's not that the subject isn't interesting--if mysterious--but something about this garden is, as everyone says, weirdly soporific.

"Oh?"

Yukara sounded quite intrigued. "I would welcome a demonstration. Perhaps you could instruct me, later. My own master focused on manipulating one's own chi - I did not learn to do so in others, save in a single... drastic manner, to temporarily correct the most horrific of spiritual maladies."

Glancing at Otaku, she blushed. "I apologize if I have bored you - I just find the esoteric to be truly fascinating. Have you any experience yourself, Otaku-Sono?"

"Yes, the little teacher does sometimes appreciate having someone a bit more blunt around," she said with a bit a smirk. "I've never been very good at speaking like a monk, so I can sometimes make it easier to understand." She cocked her head towards the other and considered for a moment.

"I can... show you how I do it, but the easiest way would be to demonstrate it on you. Whether or not you can understand the piece of the elements' mysteries involved in it is up to you." She did, however, smile a bit apologetically over at Otaku. "it is a bit flashy, and I'm going to have to punch you."

"Ah, I see. So not unlike my own technique, though hopefully at least marginally less painful."

Yukara winced, but then nodded. "If you must. I trust a student of Rock-Sensei knows what she is doing, after all, he is the reason we are all here."

"Sorry." Otaku rubs a hand over her lips, looking slightly nonplussed. "It must be true what they say, this park is... sleepy. Strange village."

She sighs lightly and flicks her fingers open in a gesture of invitation. "Do as you will. But... striking Ryoshun-san when she's recovering from surgery?" She had been surprised when she'd heard the village bonesetter had taken such a drastic measure. Surely now the last thing a person with fresh stitches over an amputation site needed was to get hit again.

"It will re-establish the healing flow within the body. There are limits." She didn't mention the fact that there was a missing limb. Deep down, she had a feeling that wasn't necessary. She started to size up the young woman, frowning. The focus was careful, as she started to pin-point what she could of the chi points on the woman. One hand raised almost like a fist, but with a pair of fingers extended. When she jabbed, there was a pinching sensation, but after the second and third strike, a washing sensation of water flowed outwards. Like a cleansing flow, it would begin releasing the body's own ability to heal faster.

"It's a bit strange to imagine that pressure points can be used this way, but ... it's come in handy in the past." Rambunctious daughters...

(Chi Protection: 1 VP spent, 3 Healing/Round for 3 rounds, 9 Wounds healed total.)

Yukara flinched at the contact, the lancing pain catching her off guard despite her preparation, but the relief of the re-alignment of chi was immediately felt.

"Thank you, ah... Nozomi-sam. I will definitely need to learn how to do that. My own studies have been neglected these last few years."

Looking to Otaku, she added, "Had I such a skill, perhaps I might not have... well. There is no point in contemplating what could have been. I failed to avoid the final strike, and the arm was dead before it was taken from me."

Glancing between the women, she smiled faintly, "Yet I am alive. A monster I tracked for years is dead - though I could not save the poor fool's soul, I did at least end her reign of terror. I was ready to give my life for the task - one limb is small price to pay. I will do my utmost not to become a burden, but if I do, I will depart without complaint."

"No, you won't. No one is leaving leave this village. The fog turns you around in the woods." Otaku frowns. "Not even the spirits of air and water are getting out, the shugenja say."

Her focus sharpens, though her voice remains quiet. "You knew that monster?"

Nozomi frowned at the statement from Otaku. Nothing was leaving? She could almost guess that they'd collectively walked into a trap, but it wasn't that simple, and she knew it. There was something far deeper going on, because if it was a trap, it would have been a simple matter to snap it shut. For now, however, she watched the two of them. So, this injury was very recent.

"I would hear of this incident." Just in case, anyway.

Otaku wrote: ↑

Wed Nov 01, 2023 3:23 am

"No, you won't. No one is leaving leave this village. The fog turns you around in the woods." Otaku frowns. "Not even the spirits of air and water are getting out, the shugenja say."

Her focus sharpens, though her voice remains quiet. "You knew that monster?"

"She was once human. A bandit. Her band razed my village and set it to the torch when I was a child."

Yukara said it in the same tone one might discuss the weather.

"Nearly a decade later, she killed my sensei. I started to hunt her band after then - that was when she began to... turn. Into whatever that was."

Her eyes were full of a strange melancholy. "I thought I might dispel her corruption, if only for a moment, before returning her to the wheel. She was too strong, however, and I could do little more than fight for my life. Her soul is lost to that nightmare now, beyond any saving by mortal hands."

"That was human?" If true, this would be a much more radical transformation than any others Otaku had witnessed in the last five years. Riding for Shinjo, she'd seen people sickened and twisted in more than a few ways by the corruption stalking their dreams, but not... not that changed. "When did this happen? All at one time, or slowly? Did you track it here, or did it come later?"

"I was tracking it before I encountered Rock-sen.... Shinsei. He directed me here, and said that I would find answers in this village."

Yukara wasn't going to argue, as she had found her monster here.

"She did not change in a single instance, no. The villagers I spoke with while hunting her began to describe their attackers being led by an unusually large woman with clawed hands, but I was there when the balance tipped."

It was not a pleasant memory, but Yukara kept her expression bland and her voice level. "I arrived at a village already in the process of destruction - I was close then, and had been hurrying to intervene, but was still too late to stop it. The villagers had fought back, the band having been so badly reduced by that time, and only she was left. She had gutted a half dozen with her hands, and when I arrived, she looked at me and... screamed. It was the moment she lost her last grasp, I think - it became a howl and her body shifted, fire burst from her eyes, and she attacked me then."

Her left hand traced her collarbone. "Got a bite in, but was not used to her new strength. She had no balance, and I was able to pitch her off a steep incline. I thought it killed her, so I went to the village to look for survivors." Her face began to darken for the first time and her voice faltered. "There were... they could not... ... ... I could only give them one mercy. When it was done, I went to bury her, but she was gone. After that day, I have hunted her as a beast, not a woman."