World Tree MUSH

    After the big battle, a lot of damage had accrued, and investigators had moved into the scene to try to figure out what had happened and why. So, two days later the police line had shrunk to just around the building, where wreckage and rubble still got cleanup. It was just shy of dinnertime, still plenty of daylight left but the sun nearing the horizon, so most of the workers were finishing up and either looking for a place to eat, or hanging around talking.

    It was, in other words, a good time to take a look at what had happened and the damage. Weiss was doing that anyway. She'd been paid to take care of the problem, had helped do that, now to see how people handled the aftermath! And maybe the real culprit would return to the scene of the crime. She's in a slightly more durable dress with a hat, because it might rain, and discovered something amazing:

    Street vendors.

    Falafel, here we come!

Emily has started experimenting with her appearance. Right now, she's given her skin a silvery sheen, and she now has three pairs of glowing purple eyes in a vertical row, and her hair is strangely black -- so black it looks like a hole in space, or like some sort of graphical glitch. Otherwise, she looks exactly like she did two days ago, in a red and gray Victorian dress made out of expensive-looking silks. In deference to the weather, she's carrying an umbrella tucked under one arm which is also that unnatural level of blackness.

All of this draws a few stares from time to time. Emily maintains her pleasantly amused and faintly smug smile.

She approaches Weiss. "Hello again," she says, perfectly casually; her voice is unchanged. "I don't think we were properly introduced, I'm Emily Nyx. Found anything since the other day?" She raises her eyebrows (which she only has over the uppermost pair of eyes). "Besides the food, I mean."

Exploring the area is a short fellow, about 5'5" with a debonair mustache and what looks like standard barkeepers attire. He also has an umbrella, but he looks rather fragile and skinny...almost unhealthily so. 

 But, blue eyes look through plesant glasses to see Emily and Weiss. 

 "H-H-hello there." he notices the damage. "Oh no! what happened?" and here he was coming to see if he could get some good food for his bar. 

 But hey, it's good to come across people on the road.

    Ryuunosuke had no idea what happened. News doesn't travel between worlds very well, so all he'd heard is 'something big happened'. So he's here to nose around. Nosy snek is nosy! His outfit is mostly rain-proof anyway, him wearing a leather jacket over his outfit. With the addition of an umbrella it should be fine. He has one with him, though it's closed; he's using it sort of like a cane, setting the end on the ground with the hooked end under his hand.

    He wanders near the site of the scene, looking much more nonchalant than he is. Also the fact that he's not hiding any of his stranger features -- his eyes are blood-red and bisected by an upside-down triangular slit for a pupil, his nose is markedly flat for a human, and there are strange lines seemingly carved into his face from the corners of his mouth to just under his ears. Those crimson eyes do have a shrewd look to them, belying the relaxed countenance of the rest of his body.

    "Oh... hello... oh right, you." Weiss greets Emily in a kind of offhand manner, but the new looks are interesting enough. She stares at Emily before shaking herself out of it. "Weiss. Weiss Schnee. No, I haven't found much of anything. It was all so totally random... but that one guy sure seemed to have the thing out for him."

    The other two are interesting additions. Escanor asks the question, so gets an answer! "Some large wooden thing attacked the place and the meeting going on," she explains. "It was pretty messy... know anything about it?" She is holding a pita with falafel in it while she talks, looking over toward Ryuunosuke too. He looks pretty suspicious!

Emily, her smile never wavering, turns all six eyes on the young man who's a full thirteen inches shorter than she is at the moment. "Politics turned a little heated," she says dryly. The smugness quotient increases slightly at Weiss's stare, but only briefly. "Or maybe that's always how it happens in this world, I don't know."

She turns to look at the damage, noting Ryuunosuke but not seeming overly-concerned with his presence. Nor the dark aura. "I noticed that the apparent target was in favor of unification," she says. "There's a debate going on regarding whether to unify with heroes from other worlds, and suddenly there's an attack which is defeated entirely by heroes from other worlds?" A second pair of arms materialize under the first in a burst of silvery glitter, and she shrugs with all four. "Seems kind of clumsy to me, if the construct's creator was anti-unification."

... There's a faint note of suspicion in her voice.

Escanor looks to Weiss and nods faintly. "oh...I see. H-how horrible." though he recalls fighting a wooden monster in his daytime form, where he won without difficulty. But, how cruel of them to attack a poor shop. 

 Then he feels the presence of Ryuunosuke. 

 He takes a breath, and seems to actually be shivering as he looks to Ryuunosuke, and he gives a bit of a shy and scared wave. "h-h-h-hi t-t-t-there...." though he glances to Emily. 

 SO MANY EYES!?

    Ryuunosuke looks in Weiss's direction as he notices her looking at him. He offers a polite smile and a bow of his head to her. Outwardly it looks perfectly normal and polite, really. But there's just something about his expression that makes it seem like the politeness is not genuine.

    He will wander over towards where the others are, seeming in no hurry. He offers a greeting of, "Hello there" to Escanor. Hopefully getting near won't scare Escanor too much. When he gets within earshot of the group proper, he notes, with an amused note in his voice, "Someone made quite a mess of the place, hm...?" He smirks.

    Huff, "Yeah it's kind of strange. Maybe they expected it to not have as hard a time? It was a lot faster than the golems I'd fought before with Raven," Weiss says to Emily. She isn't sure what Ryuunosuke is up to - could be harmless! - but he seems to make Escanor nervous, so she steps up next to the twitchy and short man just for support.

    "It looks like, but I'm not sure why yet," she admits again. "Emily here is right... seems like it'd be better to make sure the job is done."

Emily ignores Escanor's nervousness, and nods to the Ryuunosuke as he approaches. "Hello again, Ryuunosuke," she says. "Emily here." She has the same voice she had at the dead city in Ivalice, too.

She turns to face the building again, and considers Weiss's words for a moment. "It was needlessly complicated, absurdly ostentatious, and it failed utterly because we were there," she says finally. "... And maybe you're right, Ms. Schnee, maybe they didn't properly anticipate that a debate concerning combat-ready outworlders would have combat-ready outworlders watching."

And then grins, and spreads her arms in an expansive gesture. (You can make much more expansive gestures when you have four arms.) "But what if our interference was anticipated?" she says. "What if, indeed, it was the whole point?"

Escanor is still a little scared, but he doesn't seem to be about to die of fear when Ryuunosuke approaches. But instead, he just listens to the surrounding conversation. "H-hello..." he replies to Ryuunosuke, clearly scared of the man, though his eyes eventually turn to find Emily and Weiss once again. 

 seems he's content to listen.

    Ryuunosuke doesn't seem to take it as offense that Weiss more or less puts herself between him and Escanor. He doesn't outwardly react to it at all. Though to Weiss's words, he suggests, "Perhaps it was merely a distraction. Have there been any disruptions else where in this world?"

    Emily gets a greeting as well, "Ah, yes. Forgive me, I did not recognize you while you were wearing that skin." 'Wearing that skin'? Did he HAVE to put it like THAT?! But he does nod to her statement. "That is also true. It could be an attempt to show the world that outsiders are dangerous. Or that we are valuable. Or both. Perhaps it was just a way to show the world that We Are Here." The capital letters are as audible as if he had written them.

    If it helps, Ryuunosuke doesn't seem to be being overly imposing at Escanor, at least on purpose. Dark aura or not, he seems content to stay where he is and not harass him unnecessarily.

    Now that the strange man is speaking, Weiss is relaxing some... even with the weird talking. She looks back to Emily, then to Ryuunosuke, and decides Escanor is the most normal of the group now.

    "Maybe... or maybe it was an accident and wasn't supposed to attack at all. Or maybe there was supposed to be more of them," she points out. "We really don't know... anything I guess, other than it had some pretty strange movements."

Emily brightens at Ryuunosuke's turn of phrase. Yes. Yes he did have to phrase it like that. "All good points," she says, nodding between him and Weiss. "... There's no politics in the halcyon remnant, the world where I'm from," she says. "We Eudaemons simply haven't formed groups large enough to warrant it. So, I'm not particularly experienced in such matters. I was going to zero in on the possibility that it was meant to directly sway the debate." She nods to Weiss again. "But yes. We simply don't have enough information to say anything for certain."

She turns back to the building. "I'd watch the news, if I were so inclined to follow the story to its conclusion," she adds. "I'm paranoid enough to wonder whether it was the work of someone on the anti-unification side at all." A gentle shrug. "And on the other hand, for all we know there isn't any grand conspiracy, it's just some malcontent with some mechanical skills and sufficient access to the food carts who just had it in for that guy in particular."

    *tup* comes the light landing of Justine hopping off the street car trolley. Shouldering her bag, she wanders toward the wreckage and the group, dressed in her typical 1910's era clothing. Some might notice that this style was what one side of the debate was wearing as well.

    "My, this is a busy place for something so run down," says the teenager, adjusting her hat with gloved fingers. Her eyes dart to Ryuunosuke, the only one she recognizes, since Escanor is in a very different look right now.

    Ryuunosuke gives a quiet 'hmmm'. "I suppose we have no way of knowing, do we? We would need more information." A pause. "And I was not there, so I have little information of my own to work on. What do you mean by 'strange movements'?" he inquires.

    "Politics can be both incredibly messy and ridiculously opaque," he notes. "And things only get worse when you add in other worlds with other ways of thinking. There is no way to know what was intended until the person responsible is found and asked. Perhaps, as you suggested, it was completely unintended and all this was just a random occurrence. That is, I feel, unlikely. But it is possible."

    Justine arrives from the trolly then, and Ryuunosuke looks in her direction as she speaks. "Ah, greetings," he offers, with a bow. "It is nice to see you again. I hope you are well." As for it being busy? "Apparently there was an attack here, where a debate on how to handle off-worlders was being held, if I understand correctly." He looks to Weiss and Emily to confirm.

    Weiss nods, because the summary is pretty good there. "Ugh, politics. Don't remind me..." She bites her lip and looks away, her voice taking on a very bitter turn... not just from her obviously aristocrat origins either. But when someone else is coming by, she tries to nod to them. Weiss isn't very friendly in the best of times, but this is someone who seems from the same world.

    "It was mostly just... punching and kicking, but then it flipped up and started blasting shockwaves around. It was pretty weird. And it was mostly made of wood and cloth, but they were really tough to cut through, way more than cloth should be."

Emily smiles and nods to Ryuunosuke. "Just so!" she says. She raises her eyebrows at Justine's remark, but Ryuunosuke seems to know her, so she isn't perturbed.

She nods to Weiss's explanation. "There was some sort of magical effect that reinforced it," she says. "Though I can't really say more than that, since it wasn't the kind of magic that's used in my world."

She languidly puts two hands behind her head, and shrugs expansively with the other two. "Really, I just happened to be in the area, I suppose," she says. "I was watching the political debate because it amused me; and I participated in the defense against the construct because that amused me, and because everyone else seemed so enthusiastic about it. And figuring out the cause feels like an interesting puzzle to me, which I might drop altogether if I find some other way to amuse myself in the next world I visit."

Escanor also recognizes Justine. 

 He looks SCARED! because...well, it was night time. and he was rather...weak at night. and cowardly. and shy. and....everything his daytime personality was not. Bipolar, much? 

 Instead, he seems still content to listen, even though his knees are shaking so much it looks like he's attempting to do the crazy legs dance.

    "That would be my world," Justine says readily enough. "The Adventurer's League manages what would be vigilante activities, and regulates them. Also murdered my parents, but that was the previous administration." Flippantly adding that comment. "It's likely they'll be expanding into these worlds soon, but those talks will take some time I think."

    She pauses and taps her lip. "I'm not the best at negotiations, I'm afraid. Still, surprising to see so many offworld taking an interest... do I know you?" Suddenly saying that to Escanor, because she's noticed his look. Her empathy isn't telepathy though... she doesn't actually recognize him!

    Ryuunosuke notes the looking away and the bitter tone in Weiss's voice. And immediately files this away for later reviewing. But he doesn't bring attention to it here and now. There's nothing to be gained from it. Instead he turns to the mention of incredibly tough wood and cloth. "Hm... magical enchantment?" Ryuunosuke inquires. That's really the first thing he thinks of, oddly, despite being from a heavy-tech world.

    "A pity I was not there," Ryuunosuke notes. "I could have attempted to drain energy from whatever was powering the magical enchantments. I do not know if it would have worked, but as they say, 'nothing ventured, nothing gained', yes?" And a chuckle at the mention of it being amusing. "It is, at that," he agrees. "Who knows? Perhaps in the end you may agree with the reasoning of whoever caused it?"

    Ryuunosuke notices Escanor's rather obvious discomfiture, and tilts his head. "Are you all right?" he inquires. "There is nothing to fear. I doubt whoever did this is still here." It doesn't cross his mind that Escanor might actually be afraid of /them/. Weirdly. Because making people fear him is kind of something Ryuunosuke did in times past.

    Ryuunosuke listens to Justine's explanation of the Adventurer's League... and then blinks at the mention of them having killed her parents. "Certainly a black mark on their record," he remarks. "But yes. Perhaps the new administration will not display the same tendencies." As for the time that the talks would take? "Indeed. It is a sticky area. How would off-world people be tracked? Should they be? How would this world tell the good off-worlders from the bad? How could they know who to watch out for and who to leave be?"

    Her own bitterness is set aside when Weiss hears Justine's comment! "They what?" That's startling that she'd even be here! "And you don't... have even a little bit of a grudge?"

    She looks at Escanor, and then launches into an explanation for Emily and Escanor's benefit. "It sounds a little bit like the Hunters and Huntresses back home... but those were mostly to fight the Grimm and defend humans. And faunus," she adds that quickly, like she needed to assert that she didn't leave them out. "But we don't have magic. Maybe they were planning to use magic to do what you are saying um... I didn't catch your name."

Emily looks between Escanor and Justine. Okay, his nervousness mostly seems to be about Justine in particular, so no need to drop her own ostentatiousness just yet. She just shrugs at Ryuunosuke's comment. "I'm no hero," she says, as if she finds the idea of being one somewhat distasteful. "It's less about agreement or not, I'm simply not as interested as I might be."

She blinks all six eyes at Weiss's outburst. "Some people just don't hold grudges," she says. "Particularly if they were too young to remember, and the matter has been settled since then." Now there's a possibility they hadn't thought of earlier in the discussion: someone who's against the League itself. She isn't going to voice this while Justine's right there, of course; there could be any number of people who were orphaned or widowed by the previous administration, and she has no reason to antagonize the girl in front of her in particular. Just the general kind of low-level antagonism she's giving everyone around her by shapeshifting into weird and unsettling forms.

She pauses as Weiss brings up the not magic. "... You summoned a warrior made out of light," she says. "Many would consider that to be magical." She glances down at herself. "... Not that I should be the one saying that. I found evidence in the halcyon remnant that before the world ended, they had competitions to see who could make the most magical-seeming effects using purely non-magical means."

Escanor knows exactly who Justine is, but he dares not speak. Instead, he plays it off as if he can feel the auras of those around him. "O-o-oh! I am quite alright." looking to Justine, he rapidly shakes his head. "o-oh! n-n-n-no, not a-at all! Ii-i-i- am just here t-to get food...b-but came across this." he gestures to the damage around him as he slightly hunches over. 

 This was terrifying! 

 This is perhaps the only mmoent where night-time Escanor is begging for the day to soon arrive.

    "Sounds like a lot of fun," Justine says, adjusting her bag. "I'm sorry I missed it. I don't really like to fight, myself, though. It gets me all worked up, and that isn't really healthy for anyone." She smiles, trying to be lighthearted about it.

    Weiss does ask a penetrating question though, and Ryuunosuke isn't exactly right. Nor is Emily. "All the ones responsible directly are dead, but I'm not very happy with the League. What am I supposed to do though, go to every world and destroy it? That would be a lot of work. If they leave me alone, I won't bother them. Mostly." She did send the last one but... "Quiet the mess, but I doubt just one construct had much chance anyway... warrior of light, you say?"

    Escanor's stammering is kind of annoying her, but Justine is more puzzled than upset by it at least. "They do have some very nice ethnic food over there..."

    As Weiss stalls on his name, Ryuunosuke notes, "Ah. Forgive me, my manners are lacking today." He bows in greeting, the gesture a formal one. "I am called 'Ryuunosuke'. It is a pleasure to meet you."

    Emily's mention of not being a hero gets a chuckle. "A wise decision," he replies. "The pay is horrible, the benefits are non-existent, and if one expected anyone else to face death on a daily basis for no remuneration one would probably find oneself being laughed out of one's own office."

    A nod to Escanor. "It is a rather... noticeable bit of damage, is it not?" he agrees. "I came here while exploring and happened upon it, myself."

    He does nod at Justine's overall view of the situation. "If everyone raged at their worlds when they lost a loved one, it woudl be a very messy Tree," he comments. And then, with what sound like actual honesty, he offers, "For what it is worth, I am sorry for your loss."

    Justine's getting a funny look, but Emily is the one who spoke about something important to her. "That isn't... exactly magic. Real magic is a myth, that was my family Semblance. I guess it looks a lot like it to people who don't know how my world works or something..." She touches her sword hilt.

    Weiss then sighs. "I guess we aren't going to find out why that thing attacked though. It'll be a mystery for now. I just hope there aren't any more coming..."