The moon had just come up in the sky and mist was already forming over the field in the woods where Akatsuki had trained since he was a kid with his father. He had taken to continuing doing so here and he had even invited a friend to join him for the training process, but she generally didn't end up training and it interrupted his planned routine, but it wasn't so bad. He'd been friends with Feye for a little bit and while her dad seemed to not want them hanging out, his own father laughed for about an hour when he found out to the quote of "Well like father like son."
In the interim, he continued his training like he had planned. Lightning Spirit Requip... it was something his father had helped him develop so he made sure to keep up with it since no other mage the world over was able to use it. He started by channeling the lightning spirits that came from another world, an elemental plane. A blue glow surrounded him for but an instant while a spark of electricity crawled along his body before forming a wild and whirring blue ball in his hand. He focused on the rage he often kept hidden behind his cloud of calm, the eye of his own internal storm and drew from the only real jealousy that he had to this date. His elder brother had mastered a secondary form of magic, already without their father's aide he had become a prominent member of a special police force for the country. In addition he had left without joining a guild and had tailored his magic to make him perfect at whatever secret missions he had been assigned, but he would never share exactly what it was that he was doing. His younger brother was starting a similar path and that was also a source for him. He didn't deny these emotions, they were human, but he used them to help him focus his own magic. "Rage Lightning." He said coolly as the whirring blue ball turned red, expanding outward and exploding in several large radial columns of electricity.
After about an hour he decided to take a break, sweat was starting to bead down his body and the black shock absorbent clothing that he was wearing was certainly starting to get soaked. With a wave he dismissed it, the lightning spirits that comprised its cloth went back to their own plane to recharge, but he stood with only a deep red shirt on as knelt to the ground. By this point he was waiting for Feye to get there. He had done enough training for the time being.
Feye Lazarus panted as she skidded to a stop, leaning on her hands.She'd hurried as fast as she could, but despite that she'd been almost an hour late. "I'm so sorry!" she panted as she stood back up, pushing her pigtails back behind her before wiping the beads of sweat off of her forehead. She was wearing a simple t-shirt and shorts; it was warm outside and Feye didn't usually wear anything especially fancy, especially not when she wasn't planning to do anything too intense.
"Mom made me do some last minute training stuff before I could leave..." Training with Kotone was scary. She didn't really hold back much, not even with the softer of her daughters. She believed in raising strong fighters, if only so they could protect themselves. She was pretty sure she had several bruises from the training; her baShe had a small smile on her face once she recovered though. "What'd I miss?"
Post by Tatsuma Kiryu on Sept 5, 2015 23:13:34 GMT
He rolled his eyes half in lack of surprise and half in jealousy. "You know if you trained with me you'd be able to surprise your mom and stand up to her. I mean I was trained by my dad and he tells me they're pretty evenly matched." He offered knowing that the concept of training more in order to train less might come across as somewhat counterproductive, but it made sense if one thought about it. "You only missed a new spell set I was working on. There's something my father invented that's a casting technique I want to learn, but i'm at a dead end. Speaking of father's what does yours think about you coming out here in the woods alone with a strange Kiryu boy." Added the last part as both a joke and an inquiry into something that he was curious about. The way his father talked about it the whole "feud" had been almost completely one sided. It was good enough just being friends with Feye but concern that enough adversity between their parents might be enough to finally forbid her from seeing him.
Besides that he didn't understand why their parents were all about their training. The country was boring at this point, there had been nothing going on, no conflict, no major dark guild activities, nothing dangerous to speak of so why push it like they were in the middle of war.
Truthfully, Feye *could* stand up to her mother in a training match when pushed. She wasn't anywhere near as powerful, but she was far more skilled than even Akatsuki probably knew. Her skills only really came out when she was really pushed, and that was why she tended to have bruises. It intimidated her, but when her mother had been hard on her, she'd risen to the challenge pretty well, all things considered. The crying had been more of a negative side effect. Not that it was that uncommon.
"Well... honestly..." Feye rubbed the back of her head with a nervous chuckle. "I haven't said anything to him," she admitted, her brown eyes turning to the boy with a blush on her cheeks. Her mother knew she could take care of herself and wasn't that concerned, both of them knew she had good judgement and would make her own decisions based off of her own rather 'strong' set of morals. "I think I might have done better today..." she admitted, poking her fingers together with a blush. She really played down how good she was, which was probably why no one ever asked her to spar or anything. That and her gentle demeanor made it hard to think she ever could.
Akatsuki shrugged. If she had done better today she might actually be tired, plus by this point it wasn't like he'd have the heart to hit her or anything anyway. "You're going to have to tell him some day. Though if you're training with your mother I'm sure we're at least even, at least until I master this casting technique. You're a horrible rival you know that." He said with a chuckle as he dug through his backpack to get his lunchbox and hand her a rice ball. He wasn't sure if she was a good rival but she was a good friend. His brother might have started their friendship off with a fight, plus Shinichi had already mastered flash cast and his younger brother was already starting on it. "What exactly is last minute training stuff? I'm almost jealous I wanna see what kind of training you do with her." He asked, zipping his bag up and hoping her training wasn't like what his brother called training. He couldn't imagine her getting broken bones just as part of her regular training for any period of time and something protective in him encouraged him to volunteer to take up her mom's training time so she wouldn't be forced to go, but Feye could take care of herself.
Feye couldn't help but chuckle, yet feel bad at the same time. She was a pretty bad rival, at least when it came to anything aggressive. She was a kitten, not a tiger. Sure, both had claws but one was cute and a little pathetic and the other was, well, deadly. "Maybe, but for now it's okay," she shrugged. She didn't lie and wouldn't lie to him, but since he didn't ask at this point, she didn't tell. "I guess... I mean, I'm not really like my mom... she likes to fight," she shrugged. Feye wanted to be a hero too, but she didn't care to be a hero in the soldier sense.
"Er, it's..." Feye shifted nervously when he asked what last minute training stuff was. "I asked her to help me with my dragon roar a bit... since dad was busy..." she shrugged. She could use the dragon roar, but it was a variation, not a true dragon slayer power. It was more for stunning or disabling than harming. It suited Feye's personality. "I was kind of hoping I'd do well enough to show you... you're always working hard and stuff..."
Akatsuki sighed softly. He long ago acknowledged her difference, but if she focused on combat as much as she did mimicking powers that she most likely wouldn't be able to fully achieve, he felt she would have been further ahead than she was. As for himself, he kept finding little tips and tricks to help bolster his skills. Suddenly a realization hit him, but it would have to wait. "There's nothing wrong with not being like either of your parents. At least you know who both of yours are. You might be a horrible rival but you're a great friend. Besides we have a great little sword and shield thing going." He said with a smile, shaking the rice ball at her for her to take. His little brother Kirei was the one who made them. Something about the way he cooked and the way his magic work had made him better at knowing just how to cook things right. "Besides if you show me what you were working on I'll show you what I was working on." He suggested, figuring out a way they could share their experiences. Her dragon roar and his rage lightning were both probably fairly new and it would give him a chance to use flash cast... or at least try to.
Feye smiled a small smile at Akatsuki's insistence that they had a great little 'sword and shiled' thing going. She couldn't really help it - she didn't have the highest self esteem, through no fault of her parents. She was just a natural self-doubter. She questioned everything she was ever told, that she ever saw, and that included herself as much or more than anything else. "Yeah," was all she said in a quiet, gentle voice, accompanied by a small nod. Somehow her voice carried, despite the softness in which she spoke.
"Y-you want me to show you?" She wanted to show people what she was learning, but when it came time to actually do so, she got nervous. Like, really nervous. She gulped, almost shaking in her boots at the thought. She never showed off. There was very little indication that she even knew magic, truth be told. The best indication was when she used a simple light spell to help herself see at night. "I um... I guess I could..."
Akatsuki shrugged and set his bag down on the ground. She was pretty obviously nervous about showing him her spell. He thought about offering to go first, but that would just pile on the pressure more than anything else. "Relax, you're just showing me the same thing you've been showing your mother. You can picture me as her if it will help, though I don't know if I can quite pull of the hair style." He said with a shrug at the end as he pulled his silver white hair in opposite directions to try different feminine hair styles. "Besides it's good for a shield to practice its shielding. I'd love to see." He added. It was true, but most of it was being said in order to get Feye to smile and feel more comfortable. He was starting to get a bit nervous about showing her his spell. It was fraught with anger and negative emotions and she was almost guaranteed to feel it when he used it. He had faith she wouldn't react too badly, but the possibility she might feel unsafe because of it was almost as bad, if not worse. He needed to shake the insecurity and stay calm, confidence was integral for both spirit magic and flash casting techniques. Even though it remained internalized, even though he was hiding it fairly well, he was sure he had missed something and let slip that he was nervous.
Soooo. Going for the jokes and flattery angle, eh? Well duh, of course that would work. Feye was as complicated as anyone, but surprisingly simple to please. It made her seem kinda easygoing at times, when she was around people she trusted anyway. She chuckled at the hair thing and imagined Akatsuki in her mother's clothing. "I don't know that you could pull off the skirt..." she admitted, looking him up and down distractedly as her imagination worked. Normally she'd have probably realized she was staring and just died.
"Maybe if you shaved your legs and let Eri and me get ahold of you for an afternoon..." she mused, a small blush on her face. She quickly shut her eyes and shook her head to get out the mental image of Akatsuki in a dress. "No, No Suki in a dress. That's just scary."
"Oh, right!" she straightened up, remembering that she was supposed to be pretending she was at all impressive. She straightened her pigtails and brushed the wrinkles out of her shirt, stalling a bit before finally taking a more braced stance. "I call this the Roar of light. It's kinda like a dragon roar, but not really since I'm not a dragon slayer." She kind of dreamed of that changing one day, considering she knew where her dad's dragon lived. "Here goes!" inhaling, she focused her energy before firing out a very roar-like beam. The difference was that while it was almost blindingly bright (and would have been if she'd have used it directly on Akatsuki) it didn't actually seem to do much harm to anything around her, making the non-damaging nature of the spell rather obvious to someone who had done as much training as her friend.
Post by Tatsuma Kiryu on Sept 10, 2015 0:10:41 GMT
Akatsuki blinked for a moment wondering what had just happened. He knew he had opened the door but she had run through it chest first and opened the refrigerator. It was funny in its own right, plus she seemed to have calmed down. When she finally did use her dragon roar he was pretty impressed. It kept up with her M/O of not wanting to cause harm to people. He wanted to bring up seeing more of her spells, but he had promised if she showed him hers he would show her his. "I like it, it's flashy and has a ton of uses I can think of. Mine only really has the one use, it's the casting technique that I'm more proud of." He said as he thought about how to go about doing this. He had only just invented the spell and applying flash cast to it was kind of risky. He started by gathering lightning spirits to create his overcoat, in a brilliant flash of light and the scent of ozone it materialized on his body. "Okay, this one is going to look a bit intimidating maybe, but um... don't worry?" He said, ending the last bit with a downward inflection to make it seem like a question.
He started by gathering lightning spirits, remembering the rage from earlier, but in the back of his mind he pictured a swirling vortex from which all his spells derived and pulled lightning spirits into being. The entire process took but an instant and in a flash his spell was active. The forest in front of them was destroyed in no time as a small field of red lightning pillars erupted into existence. When the light from then died down there was a large burn area with a clearing of blackened and destroyed trees. It was what he was worried about in the first place with using the spell but it was impossible to hold back when using the technique. "The destructive spell portion isn't really that different, but flash cast is my dad's technique for gathering and using mana and components quickly... It is very difficult to control or change anything else about the spell when you use it." He explained, still unsure of how she was going to react.
Feye wasn't quite sure what she thought of the spell. Destruction wasn't her thing, nor were the feelings evoked by the magic. She'd involuntarily raised her arms defensively, though in less of a fighter posture and in more of a scared girl in a fetal position posture. Feye wasn't that hard to read when it came to social cues. "I um... it seems powerful..." she told him truthfully. She didn't want to insult it - he'd worked hard on it. It was just that power wasn't exactly how wone impressed a teenager like Feye. She'd seen everything with the mother that she had and the people that brought into her life.
After a moment she straightened up properly, giving him a grin as she wiped a tear that had barely escaped her eyes. She was definitely a bit of a crybaby for a girl her age, but she'd managed to mostly hold back the tears from the feeling the spell had caused. "I'm glad to see you're doing well with it," Another truth, despite not liking the spell itself much. "Um... why does it need to feel so angry though?"
Post by Tatsuma Kiryu on Sept 10, 2015 1:45:56 GMT
And there it was. He had even thought that the spell wouldn't have been something she was really going to want to see. Thankfully he had a backup plan involved. "I use rage and negative emotions and translate them to power in order give them a purpose. That's not the only thing though." He explained, preparing to show her something else. "This next thing though I think you'll like a bit better." He shared. With hands outstretched to either side of him he gathered lightning spirits, a beautiful light blue glow filled the field as they came together to and sparked gently and peacefully. With outstretched palmed, approximately half of them gathered around Akatsuki, the other half gathered around Feye and began to coalesce into a beautiful electric blue dress. In Akatsuki's hands the spirits formed a long, flowing, slightly lighter blue, supernaturally soft scarf. It was something he'd spoken to the lightning spirit king about procuring from his vault.
Once the dress was formed he handed her the scarf and placed it around her shoulders. "And that's the other spell I have. I know it looks pretty, but it also protects you from lightning to an extent and disrupts wind magic. The scarf is just a pretty scarf, it might be magicked to look pretty, probably not, but it's yours." He said, smiling as he placed the scarf on her. He wasn't sure if it was going to make up for the earlier display, but he wasn't really trying to make up for it, he was trying to give his friend a gift.
"Huh?" Feye looked around, spellbound by the bright lights as they circled her. It was most certainly different from the previous magic. It bore no ill intentions and none of his previous desire for violence. It almost felt like an entirely different person was casting the magic. The next thing she knew, her previous t-shirt and shorts were replaced by the strange and magical blue dress. It almost seemed to glow, itself. She pulled at the hem of the dress, marveling at how she was suddenly wearing something different. Where had her other stuff gone, anyway?
"Uhm that was different..." she sounded kind of stunned. She crouched down and got into her bag she'd brought with her, pulling out a small mirror. She realized the pigtails looked stupid in such a pretty dress, and quickly let her hair down, a large blush on her face the entire time. "It's really pretty..." What else was there to say? She didn't have any magic like this, and she suddenly felt like her magic was so... basic and unimpressive. Still, she appreciated the thought quite a lot.
Post by Tatsuma Kiryu on Sept 10, 2015 23:35:30 GMT
Akatsuki was reminded when he gave her the dress, the purpose for his learning spirit magic instead of going off to learn dragon slayer magic. His father had insisted that he knew several dragons who would willingly train him, but he had turned it down and insisted on learning spirit magic like his older brother. Things like this made him happy for his decision. "It's something I saw and thought you might like." He said as his hand crackled, summoning her old clothes that had been removed and absorbed by the lightning spirits and handed them back to her. "For some reason though I can't get the lightning spirits to stop stealing the clothes from other people instead of putting them on over what is already being worn, but um.... I..." He suddenly realized he had talked himself into a corner with that whole stolen clothes thing. "So anyway missing clothes are in the past, let's not dwell on the past. Now, we can't just stay out here in a random forest with you dressed like that. Why don't we go get something to eat and figure out where to go from there? I think the forest would appreciate it at least. Plus between your light and my lightning I'm pretty sure someone things there's monsters from outer space landing here." He joked on the last two parts, gesturing at the now open clearing in the woods that still seemed to be somehow brightly lit.
