Chronicles of Gaia (RP)

Ramuh listened to Aislin's words, slowly nodding before gazing in a certain direction. "You should know, this place was created from Mizuki's deepest fears and regrets. Most of those stem from her former pact with you, Kuja", he spoke. "If you find her, do be careful, she may be more hostile than either of you are used to from her." "Noted", Kuja responded. It was odd to him that the Eidolon would even give him advice; as far as he knew most of them hated him. The silver-haired mage then focused his attention on Aislin. "Yes, I do believe it's best if we start moving." Places that are significant to Mizuki...places created from her fears and regrets... "There are a few places that come to mind, Cleyra is the most notable one however." He was going to find her, he had to. "Let's go", the mage then started walking, uncertain of where the path would lead him, but his mind was focused on finding Mizuki. In the distance it seemed like he could see someone walking, though the person seemed...distorted, as if they were about to disappear. "This place is certainly strange." Seth had healed the wound on his shoulder shortly after Rowan and Iliya had left. The illusionist was angry, but also intrigued. Something had seemed different about the Ghost, and he was going to find out what it was. But first he had to get rid of the human Phoenix he was facing. Rockna kept a close watch on the illusionist; the field was set ablaze by now, the Phoenix exerting more of her power now that the others had left. The wound on her side had been seared closed, she'd get rid of the poison later. The explosion in the distance caught her by surprise. "It's begun", Seth mused, not bothering to hide his amusement. "What remains of the seals on her memories will collapse on their own, everything Mel and Rikazu worked so hard for...it was all in vain. The Avanquilist's only destiny is to die, you know this as well as I do, Phoenix. Why even bother?" "Mizuki won't die", Rockna snapped at him. "Your plan will fail...in fact, perhaps now her relationship with her old man will finally be restored. I'll be looking forward to that."

Rowan just let out a groan and a sigh at Mikhail's reply. "Of course, I don't know why I was hoping for anything else." The angel said, sounding extremely exasperated by their lack of ability to influence their predicament. He shook his head, reminding himself not to get hung up on it. He couldn't afford to risk lashing out at his friends again. He wasn't sure how Mikhail knew what the future would hold, but he was feeling reminded as to why he had always made his old party avoid prophecy and fortune tellers. "If that's what's best, then... well it is what it is. I don't know how long Rockna can delay that guy, but for now I guess it'll be best to just get some rest. There should be an empty tent somewhere around here, or Iliya could sleep with one of the girls-" Rowan was interrupted as the magic exploded out of Mizuki, causing him to jump in surprise. "oh boy..." he half groaned again. "Just... find a place and get Iliya some rest. I need to see what's going on..." Rowan turned and walked swiftly over to where Rikazu was presiding over the unconscious pair along with Mizuki. Seeing Aislin and Kuja there unmoving sent a flash of panic through his mind, thinking they'd been caught in the explosion. A second look revealed them to be physically unharmed, which calmed the angel. But why were they unconscious like this? He recalled Rockna saying something to Kuja about reforming a pact with Mizuki or something, maybe this was part of it? "How's Mizuki doing? Will she be alright?" He inquired to Rikazu.

---

Like Kudret, Laura jumped as the sound of the explosion blasted itself through the campsite. She actually giggled at Kudret's response, but made herself stop when she realized it had slipped out. For some reason, it made her feel uncomfortable. "The only thing I picked up myself was this tablet." Laura said, trying to steer the conversation back toward their findings. "I don't know what its made of, it's as solid as anything, but when you look at it you feel like you're looking through some kind of hole into a much larger dark space." She held up the tablet, it's strange visual quality perhaps not as easy to spot in the dark of the night, but the feeling that something was off about it was still present.

Kudret looked over at Laura's laughing and couldn't help the momentary grin and drawl, "Go ahead and laugh." He certainly felt like joining in, if only to release some of the tension here. The beastman gave a sharp shake of his head to distract himself form his thoughts, and did his best to listen to Laura's contribution to the conversation. He tilted his head slightly, staring at the tablet. He could still see fairly well thanks to the fire, but the tablet seemed almost as if it was sucking all the light from the world into it... Kudret's instincts took hold from the sudden feeling of vertigo and he fell backwards off the rock. He blinked a couple of times in bemusement before squeaking out a "Sorry!" and scrambling back up, carefully avoiding looking at it directly again. "Sorry," he repeated, "It felt like I was about to fall into it, or something similar to that." Aislin nodded to Ramuh, silently thanking him without words before walking after Kuja, keeping herself intent on following Kuja no matter what. The two walked in silence for a time, seeing the landscape, if it could be called that, change and morph around them. She spotted what looked to be sand whipping about, though it could also be glitches waiting for them. "Broken would be more appropriate," she commented, "It puts me in mind of the technology back at my world." Almost casually, she reached out an arm and momentarily halted Kuja from going further, allowing a stray slab that glitched in stripes of black float past them before dropping her arm once more. "Whenever it started breaking, that sort of thing was pretty common, would mess up pretty much everything we owned." Starting forward again, she added, "Sorry about the suddenness there; I'm not too sure what would happen if we got hit by that, and I'd rather not find out if it's all the same to you."

"Yeah Vic's got the right of it, if it weren't for the fact I owe them the ability to falsify a Human Mind, I'd have ditched them a long time ago, unfortunately here I am now stuck babysitting most of you to keep you getting an early six feet deep nap." Subtlety was not Ama's strong suit in this situation, much less with all the Chaos going on in the vicinity, she said nothing in response to Vic leaving, though aimed at the rest was "Eh, they just regen the damage if it kills them, they can go, you four though, well... not so much." "I have no doubt in your abilities to repair articles of clothing, but I will respectfully pass, call it sentimentality or whatnot, but I prefer to mend my own clothing, besides, if the company back home caught wind that I'd let others do anything for me, I'd never hear the end of it, it's expected and mandatory that 'you get yourself in it? You get yourself out of it.' same thing applies to repairs." the suit was then tossed over a tree branch hanging just overhead, "I advise you to stay put for now, once Rikazu gets that mess fixed, you should be safe to return to the general campsite vicinity." -- Seyr awoke from her meditation and Mana cleansing, not through the Explosions but the timer she'd placed on herself, she did return her Mana to her body immediately however, instead retrieving the Statuette from one of the Jester's facilities and looking at it for a moment, "It's not immediate that I call upon you, but it would be nice to have the option available in the back pocket... hrm." lazily flicking it upwards, her mana devoured the trinket almost immediately, ripping apart the corruption that had been placed upon it, "Eh, give it a few moments to finish making it clear for use later." another explosion rocked her senses, and her head ever so slightly turned in the direction of the sound, "... Rikazu has zero mana control, he won't last containing that, and Ethers only go so far before the effects degrade..." the Kitsune sighed softly before continuing to talk entirely to herself, "I suppose I should lend a hand at some point, whether it be becoming the Mana source or taking over the Magic completely, I'll see how it plays out first methinks."

Marco, Razar and Felicia all silently agreed that Ama was extremely blunt person, but with the quick explanation of how dangerous the camp was at the moment shared a look of concerned but agreed to avoid going back for now “Guess we’ll stay here and soak in the Hot Springs for now then I guess.” Razar said with a grin that screamed inappropriate thoughts. Felicia saw this and elbowed him in the gut causing him to collapse “Pervert.” she responded as Razar gave a wheezed “But I didn’t do anything!” Marco just shook his head “You do know you have a terrible poker face right?” While the others had this light hearted exchange though, Ricardo continued to stayed crouched on the ground silently. He was no longer terrified by the explosion, instead his terror was replaced by regret as Ama’s explanation finally clicked as she mentioned Rikazu struggling “I wasn’t there...” he whispered to himself “Something happened and I wasn’t there to help like I promised them...” Ricardo clenched his fist in frustration as he slowly stood back up and after a brief moment of contemplation, darted off in the direction of the explosion without saying a word, much to the other three’s surprise “Wait! Ricardo!” Felicia called out to him, but he didn’t stop ”Even if I can’t do much, I’ll never be able to forgive myself if I don’t do anything now.”

Another explosion had followed, Rikazu once again shielding anyone nearby from the blast. The male heard Rowan's question, but took some time to answer as dualcasting magic took a lot of concentration. "It's too soon to tell, but the way things currently are, she won't survive the night", he finally responded, trying his best to keep his emotions under control. That probably didn't explain much though, he figured. "Mizuki's bloodline is cursed, the females in her family are born with much more magic than any human body can handle", he fell silent for another moment. "...Normally, the powers of the 'Avanquilist', as we call them, don't awaken until the age of sixteen...though since their powers are directly tied to their emotions, a powerful surge of emotions can cause them to awaken early. That's what happened with Mizuki ten years ago, when Seth came to our village and attacked us. Mizuki's powers awakened and went out of control, and in order to save her my wife placed several powerful seals on her powers and memories." He stroked the blue-haired girl's hair as he spoke. "Seth shattering those seals has left her mind on the verge of breaking and simultaneously awakened her powers once more. It's that raw magical energy that's currently causing these explosions, and it will kill her unless Kuja and Aislin can get her to calm down somehow." "I'd rather not find out either", Kuja responded to Aislin, carefully looking around the area. Glitches aside, the place was starting to take form and look more like Cleyra as they moved onward. He recognized the area, the observatory where Mizuki would often be to watch the sandstorm. Mizuki was nowhere to be seen though. "So she isn't here..." He placed a finger to his chin in a thinking motion. "This place is where she made her pact with me the first time. I suppose you could even say this is where everything she fears and regrets began..." As he spoke, two more glitches seemed to appear in front of them, vaguely resembling Mizuki and...himself? "I'm scared..." Mizuki's voice rung softly through the area, not coming from the glitch in front of them, but seemingly spoken straight into their minds. Kuja looked around in confusion. "Mizuki? Where are you?" "I'm afraid...of being cursed...of being nothing but a tool to others..." the voice continued, and seconds later, the ground shook violently, with a black 'crack' appearing in the sky. "...Something tells me Carbuncle won't be able to keep this place from collapsing for long", Mizuki's words concerned the genome, but it didn't seem like she was able to hear him. If she wasn't in Cleyra, then they'd just have to look elsewhere. "We'd best move on, before Odin decides to show up and destroy what's left of this broken place." Carbuncle had been watching over Mizuki ever since the girl's consciousness had appeared in her 'spirit world'. Seth's magic had put him to sleep to keep him from intervening, knowing he would guard his summoner against the illusionist's magic. Instead the small Eidolon had been casting his magic to keep Mizuki's spirit world from collapsing, knowing full well that if it did while her consciousness was there, she would be unable to wake up ever again. Mizuki had been curled up in a corner of the room they were in, both of her hands placed on her head. She was crying and in pain, and even here her magic was lashing out. "Carby..." her voice sounded strained. "Are we...home? Why am I...here? Why did he leave me here again..?" 'He didn't', Carbuncle responded to her. 'You're dreaming, that's all. When you wake up, everything will be fine.' The Eidolon wasn't sure how else he could help her. Saying the wrong words now would probably spiral her further out of control, and he wanted to keep that from happening at any cost.

Victoria continued at a brisk pace towards Rikazu and the others direction when she noticed Ricardo run right past her towards the same direction “Hm? What’s he up to?” Victoria was confused momentarily but shrugged it off “I’m sure I’ll find out soon enough, but I should probably pick up the pace.” But before she could run off she heard Alex’s voice call out to her “Hey! Vic!” Alex still in full armor, followed by a towel wrapped Nicole and Lumine, caught up to the Demoness, all looking rather concerned “What was that explosion?” Alex asked with Nicole standing with arms crossed, she was more annoyed than concerned than the others “Yeah, what was that? It’s hard to work with explosions going off.” Nicole gave an annoyed huff as Lumine just looked confused at Nicole at that statement “Work?...” Victoria just gave a dismissive wave as a second explosion went off and she coolly ignored it “It’s nothing to worry about, just Kuja practicing his magic. I’m heading over there now to ask him to tone it down though as it is getting rather disruptive. Nothing to concern yourselves with.” Victoria was lying of course, no need to get more people involved than there probably already was, and thankfully the group bought it, as Nicole’s annoyance turned to anger “That Jerk! I’m going to give him a piece of my mind! Later! After a good soak!” Nicole then grabbed Alex and Lumine and dragged both of them off back towards the hot springs as Alex just gave Victoria a quick “Good luck with that then.” Victoria just smiled and waved at them until they were out of sight, then went into a full sprint towards her destination “Well, now that that’s out of the way, I need to hurry.” After a short Sprint, Victoria had arrived where Rikazu and the others were. She admittedly wasn’t sure what she expected to see when she got there, but after seeing Mizuki on the ground with the insane level of Magic blasting out of her and Rikazu barely able to hold things together, she knew things were dire, and she silently wondered if Ama was being intentionally vague on the matter. No matter, Rikazu clearly needed a hand and she was more than willing to lend it. She approached Rikazu silently as she worked out that he was channeling two spells, one was clearly a shield and the other she could make out was a spell meant for entering one’s mind or soul. That spell she couldn’t help with, but the shield on the other hand “Looks like you could use a hand.” And without hesitation Victoria set up a magic shield of her own and that’s when she truly felt the immense magical energy Mizuki was really giving off, but she was able to hold it “You tried blocking this and channel another spell at the same time? You have my respects.” Victoria complimented the mage “Just focus on that other spell, I can handle this part.” Victoria may not have been at full power, but her magic was still strong enough to at least hold back all this out of control magical energy.

Aislin nodded, muttering, "Right, the Odin thing. Pretty sure Kudret and I were still in the forest during that." She took a quick look around Cleyra, marveling at the tree (and the varied glicthes) before trotting after Kuja. She was almost certain that she wouldn't even make it halfway without him, but at the same time had the nagging feeling he wouldn't make it halfway without her either. And if she, Kuja, and Mizuki died to all this... Seth would win, everyone would grieve, and she would not let that happen. Aislin narrowed her eyes and sped up, coming up to walk alongside Kuja this time, determined to reach Mizuki. They'd make it. They had to.

Ricardo had reached the scene at roughly the same time Victoria had, and upon witnessing it covered his mouth as he let out a gasp in shock. He just stood there in disbelief as he saw Mizuki laying there, the pained look on her face and Rikazu struggling to keep things together as he himself fought back tears of frustration as he silently cursed himself “Damn it! I should have been there! I promised them I would!” he still held his hands over his mouth as he held back letting out a cry, that’s when he noticed Victoria approach and immediately lend a hand to the struggling Rikazu, this caused Ricardo to lower his hands from his mouth and then slap his face ”Get a hold of yourself Ricardo! Now’s not the time to regret the things you could have done! It’s time to focus on the things you can do now!” Ricardo paused there a moment though as he looked over the situation “But what...?” he said silently as he started to rack his nonexistent brain. None of the songs he knew could help in this current situation. That’s when he suddenly remembered something, a moment back in the Forest when they left the Port Town and Mizuki had lost control. He remembered the song Rikazu started to hum at that moment and that he helped with and he reached for his guitar. He lowered his head, his hat blocking his eyes, as he held his hands over the strings “Please...let this help...even if only a little.” Ricardo then started playing, the song was vivid in his head and each note was the same as last time, but not everything was the same as last time as Ricardo was putting all his soul into it, quite literally in fact. He hadn’t noticed it himself, but Ricardo had become engulfed in the Aura from his soul due to his strong desire help, and as if responding to this desire, the surrounding area had filled with humming of various voices and music matching with what Ricardo was playing, as strange magic also filled the air. The source of this music and magic was unknown but seemed to be coming from the forest itself, as if it to shared Ricardo’s desire to help Rikazu and Mizuki.

Laura watched as Kudret peered into the tablet, seemingly becoming entranced in its mysterious depth. Then suddenly he toppled backward, much to both her own surprise and seemingly his own as well. As he scrambled back up, she couldn't help but smile slightly at the silly sight. A part of her wondered if he'd done it on purpose to be funny. Laura raised her free hand quickly to cover her her mouth and to stop herself from smiling. She also abruptly stood up, not looking at Kudret. "Yes, it does that have tend to have that effect," She said shortly, "I think I'll retire now and get some sleep. I suggest you do the same if you're falling over." And without a backward look the Siren strode off to her tent, shaking her head slightly at her own foolishness. It must be the lack of sleep that was bringing this about, a good rest and she'd be back to normal she assured herself.

---

Rowan nodded silently at Rikazu's explanation. It seemed everything was under control, or at least as 'under control' as one could be in this kind of situation. Kuja and Aislin seemed to be their best shot at saving Mizuki from the magic within her, and Rikazu was covering the stray magical explosion that was leaking out. A moment later Victoria showed up, offering assistance to Rikazu in holding back he explosive magic. Those two would be able to handle it, he assured himself. Rowan turned away, thinking of getting some sleep. He hadn't had any since the previous night, and the long day of travel plus this sudden rescue mission and consequential emotional toll had left the angel quite exhausted. Unlike the others he hadn't had a chance to set up somewhere to sleep either. Of course all he had to do was set up a Hammock in some trees, rather than pitch a tent, but it would still take time. The trees in this area seemed fairly well spaced for it, thankfully. The angel was just stepping past some of the other's bags when something distracted his attention away from the prospect of sleep. Stopping and turning for a second look the angel realized what had grabbed his attention: it was his name, written upon a piece of paper stuffed at the top of a bag. In surprise and curiosity he stepped over for a closer look, and recognized the bag as Aislin's. Why was there a paper labeled for him in Aislin's bag? After quickly checking to make sure the others were per-occupied with the newly arrived Ricardo, he leaned down and slipped the paper out of the bag and into his pocket. He wondered vaguely if taking the labeled paper was a bad idea, but in his sleep deprived state he dwelled on it little. Rather he looked around for a private place to read whatever was written on the paper. If I could still fly I'd find a nice high treetop where I could read in solitude. But Rowan shook his head, reminding himself that he couldn't keep thinking like that anymore. So the angel moved off to the edge of the campsite, finding a sizable tree to sit behind and, with the glow of a small magical spark, read what Aislin had written for him.