Chapter 88 - Don't Mind The Chaos, We've Got Drama To Deal With (Patreon)

Doublepost coming in to get us caught back up today, but in the meantime, enjoy! Raika growing as a person(?)!

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Raika is sincerely, truly, and genuinely bored.

It’s all fine and good to say that one should be patient, and a lot harder to actually be patient. She’s gotten better at it, a fact she holds in pretty high esteem, but there’s a notable difference between waiting while doing something, and waiting while doing nothing, and she has been doing nothing.

Well. Besides Maen, but that’s a given.

After the strange encounter with the trio in the alley (which she has kept quiet about, telling no one), nothing much has happened. Almost a week gone by, and her new mantra has started to get old, fast. Normally, at this point, she’d throw herself into cultivation, but again, she can’t. She’s not able to enter the trance-state that Qi organs seem capable of bringing about. The effort feels like trying to balance without an inner ear; you’re better off just figuring out a whole new way of doing things. Any attempt at her form of “cultivation” is done while awake, and while in tremendous pain, even as her ability to withstand that pain allows her to repeat the experience and improve.

But there’s more to it than that. She can feel something in herself, an uneasiness, like there’s something missing. Ever since that last bite of Zhoulong, tearing out his throat, the hunger pangs she’d been feeling faded, but no matter what or how much she eats, she never feels… satisfied, even when she feels full, or feels the benefits of specific parts of her diet. More than that, there’s an urge to move, to walk around and hit something. Dink helps, but ironically in the wrong way; their transformation led to a skill that allows them to vibrate at a counter-frequency to just about anything she’s bothered to test with (not all that much, considering how weak and relatively young the enchanted spirit is), which means that it can calm her raging Qi and some of the tension, but not deliver the same kinds of useful vibrations as before. That’s to be expected, sure, considering how dense and enhanced her body is now, but it’s still… frustrating. And as it turns out, there is such a thing as punching a block of stone too many times.

That line is crossed once the block of stone turns into rubble. Which is usually around three hits in.

So it is that, despite her best advice to herself to keep separate from them whenever possible, she’s decided to visit the others.

That’s what she’s started calling them. Not exactly kind, especially considering the fact that she likes most of Zhoulong’s old crew, but it’s been… important. Shapefixit has been especially open around her, seemingly fascinated and afraid of Raika in equal measure, like a dog that’s both curious and afraid to let itself be pet. Jun Vral has kept his distance, polite at best, but she’s also rebuffed his efforts to speak with her, minimal at best. She’s pretty sure he’s ensuring that they have no untoward contact, that any potential investigation into them has less to work with, and it’s a good enough idea that she’s pretty happy about using it as an excuse.

But she needs to speak with him. Alone.

The wing of the palace of Cragend, like the one in Paleblossom, always seems to be just a bit bigger than they need it to be, and most of the same dozen soldiers that were with them originally have remained as a guard around them. “Runemaster Boriah” set up some of his wards, once they landed and were secured and before he was called away, but in the interests of ensuring a lack of ongoing drama, the two groups have been kept separate. No official rules against interaction, nothing so obtuse, but… the soldiers tend to stay close to them whenever a member of either “subject group” moves towards the areas they’ve been kept apart in.

So Raika does something uncharacteristic. Something, in fact, rather drastically alien.

She asks for help.

After waiting about half an hour, she knocks, three times, on Taran’s door.

“One moment!” rasps a voice from inside. There’s the sound of shuffling, something like the sound of a bed creaking. She hears a second voice, the same voice whose scent she followed, and the reason she waited so long before knocking, though she has tried to keep her hearing as vague and unfocused as she can.

It’s not an exact science, though, and she hears Taran rasp out a curse before Kaena opens the door, leaning on the frame, dressed immaculately, barefoot in a fur-laden bathrobe.

“Why Raika!” They smile, artfully tossing their hair back. “What a surprise, seeing you around here. Whatever could you wish from our dear, dear Taran, at this rather busy time of the afternoon?”

A sandal flies through the air at Kaena’s head, only to be artfully dodged as if they’d known it was coming all along.

“Hi, Kaena,” Raika says, smiling. “I’m afraid I’m actually here to speak with you, though I wouldn’t be opposed to some help from Taran, either. If you’re not both too busy back there, that is.”

“No, no!” rasps out a voice that, for how weak and dry it sounds, is more than capable of highlighting some embarrassment. “We were just wrapping up.”

“The poor dear’s all tuckered out, it seems. Oooh, are you at last hear to ask for some hands-on treatment?” Kaena asks. “I don’t mind a second appointment, not when we’re all friends, and you’ve been so very stressed lately. A good massage would do you well.”

“As tempting as the offer may be, I actually have another idea in mind. I came to ask a favor. I need a distraction.”

Immediately, Kaena throws open the bathrobe, letting it fall to the floor and unveiling the simple kimono and shorts they’re wearing beneath. “Say no more, darling! Well, I’d actually prefer it if you talked a lot more, I’m not one to put myself on display for just anything, but goodness me, look at you, all trusting and asking for help and hatching up a plot! Considering how your last plot turned out, I am eminently interested!”

Taran puts up a hand, stepping at last into view of the doorframe, wrapped in his belts and acupuncture needles, and doing his best to calm the ongoing excitement that has Kaena nearly bouncing in place. “Yeah, backing up a bit. What do you need a distraction for, Raika? The last time you went rogue, you… did some stuff we can’t talk about, and the time before that didn’t work out great.”

She nods. “Which… is why I’m trying to do things more like the second time than the first. Asking for help. You know the soldiers here watch us extra closely whenever we get too close to Zhoulong’s old group. I have… I have some questions I want to ask that I don’t really need them hearing.”

“Oh? And how do you intend on dealing with any spells or ritual listenings, hmm?” Kaena asks.

“Let me worry about that. I just need some time alone with Jun Vral, and I can handle the rest.”

“Oh so forward! Do tell, does Maen know of this little tryst? I’d hate for any burgeoning sexual tastes of yours to hurt the darling, she’s far too sweet for that particular brand of infidelity, Raika dear.”

“Wha- no, no. He’s… fine? He’s fine. She’s cultivating. I mean I- no, that’s not what this is about. Just… talking.”

“And you’re sure it won’t turn to a fight?” Taran asks.

“No,” she says, “but I don’t think it will. The questions I have aren’t the insulting kind, and it’s… it’s something to do with a change I’ve experienced. I’m hoping that he might know something about dealing with it, considering his condition.”

Interestingly, she notes that none of what she said is a lie. She could have lied, Kaena would see through the important bits without trouble, and it would be smart, considering how the walls have ears in this place. Literally, in the case of many of the runic arrays around them. It’s one thing to ask for a quick distraction for a conversation, good to have it on record, even, but there’s some things it’s not good to even allude to.

But she doesn’t. She says the truth, even if there is a lie by omission in it, and she’s… not sure why.

“Well, alright,” Kaena says. “I was on board from the word ‘distraction’, but I suppose hearing it won’t lead to yet another catastrophe is a good thing, at least. Taran, what do you think? Fake a huge fight, middle of the dining room? See how many we can drag in, make it look good? I figure a few pistol shots should do the trick.”

Taran frowns, but she notices a twitch in his fingers, a slight shifting in his scent she’s come to associate with him conferring with some of his other selves. Eventually, he nods.

“Ok. Yes, alright, I can assist. I trust you, kid. Let it not be said I was so lacking in that virtue I didn’t participate in some shenanigans here and there. I’m not sure how long we can buy you.”

“Nonsense, I’ll make it sexy, call some attention. We can start making out halfway through.”

Taran blinks. “Uh, are you… are you sure? You’ve been a help with the pain, lately, but I don’t want to-”

“Taran, just because I prefer my own company for some things doesn’t mean I can’t have fun as a group activity when I so choose. Now come on, grab that jacket and some of those hideous holsters of yours. I’ve been bored out of my mind, and it’s been months since I put on a good show. Chop chop, understudy, we’ve places to be!”

Taran laughs, dry as a mummy and twice as warm, before giving Raika a nod. “Try not to cause too much trouble. I’m- we’re trusting you on this. I don’t think it’ll be good for any of us, you included, if you do anything too dramatic here.”

She nods, then thinks better of it, smiles, and gives a little half-bow. “Why yes, cultivator Taran. I shall endeavor to keep things entirely civil, perfectly pleasant, and utterly benign.”

“You do that, beastie,” Kaena says with a smile. “We’ll take the opportunity to put on a show.”

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As far as prep time for a performance goes, Kaena had Taran ready to go in record time.

Taran arrived at the dining room first, wearing his robes, some holsters, weaving their way through the plates and dishes, always hot and ready to be served.

Kaena came in after, and the mess was… impressive.

Even with her enhanced hearing, Raika doesn’t get much more than the bare basics. Kaena does a masterful performance of half-sobbing, half screaming, half outright shrieking, with the few words that slip out sounding something like “dare you”, “bastard”, “worthless shitheel”, and, near the end of where she was listening, “gorgeous jar of spiced honey”.

Sometime in between a very abrupt kiss that Taran very obviously was not forewarned about and screaming at him, Kaena managed to get one of his guns, peaches and cream inundating the room as she waves it around comically.

Well. Comically for anyone who knows that it isn’t loaded, and-

Ah. That was a gunshot.

Well. Let it never be said Kaena is anything less than an utterly dramatic performer.

In between the sound of footsteps and armor moving towards the sound of the commotion (and then, not long after, the sound of coin trading hands as some of the soldiers perform the timeless military ritual of betting on potential outcomes), Raika finds her moment.

She has to focus. Spend some time, tweaking the occasional vertebrae and joint, preparing.

And then, the instant one group turns a corner into the dining room, but before the next set of guards she hears can make it into the hallway, she launches.

No Qi expenditure involved, no need to inflame and pump energy into herself. She’s dense enough, heavy enough with chaotic Qi movements that she can be sensed, but her skin does a good job of blocking any Qi from leaving or entering, making it more than a little difficult to track her for anyone who doesn’t know, vaguely, where she is, and how to identify the vague eddie and current of Qi in the ambient that she appears as to most senses. Took Kaena and Maen both confirming to let Raika feel confident that her unique relationship with Qi is still stealthy, though not hidden or near invisible like it used to be. Enhanced natural senses, a particularly sensitive sensory technique, anyone with focus and time who’s felt her shadow in the Qi of the world could theoretically find and track her easily enough, but for the purposes of avoiding the eyes of distracted soldiers and moving unseen through an empty palace, it’s enough. Camouflage, not invisibility, but it’s plenty useful.

Especially when she moves so fast she has to deal with air pressure.

Her legs are reformed, digitigrade for maximum bursts of coiled strength, and her shoulders and ribs are shifted, allowing for more flexibility and less air resistance. She lets her mind fall away, embracing the feeling of air against her skin again, closing her eyes to avoid damaging them with the wind.

Before the next group of soldiers has entered the hallway to check out what’s happening, easy enough to attract to entertainment after weeks doing so little, she’s landed on the wall opposite her start and past the corner.

She feels an ache in her spine and knees as she lands, forcing her joints and back to absorb the entirety of the shock rather than let it break through the wall or make too loud a sound. Even still, she senses it when one of the soldiers begins to turn their head-

But she’s moved again, staggering at first as she heals from the absorption, then confidently, and silent as she can be the whole time.

And then she’s in front of Jun Vral’s room.

She knocks, three times, then a fourth.

She smells him as he comes close. His scent is different, just a bit. The smell of glass is… faded. Not pressed against living flesh, but surrounding it, cage rather than dissection table. He smells of serpents, of venomous fangs, of things that coil close, straining at a sharp-edged room of glass.

He opens the door.

“Ah! Raika!” He steps back, straightening his robes (they’re immaculate) and coughing awkwardly. “I, ah, didn’t sense you. Then again, you are rather hard to-”

Snakes are notoriously known for not having ears. It’s the source of more than one fable at their expense or benefit. They do, though, have ears, just designed differently. They sense vibration far more directly, tracking it through the environment.

Raika stares very intently at a corner of the room behind Jun Vral, where she senses another of those strange accumulations of pressure, the slight wisps that indicate the attentive servants of an Imperial palace. As always, under direct scrutiny, it vanishes back into nothing.

She touches Dink, letting the item-spirit amplify only the vibrations of what she says, reshaping it from words into a hum as she whispers.

“I still see Zhoulong,” Raika whispers, below the range of human hearing. “Ever since I ate a piece of him, I can see him.”

Jun Vral says nothing for a long, quiet moment.

“About fucking time, rat,” says the white robed figure suddenly behind him, leaning on his shoulder as casual as can be.

“I’ve been waiting for you to finally tell someone,” Zhoulong says with that same bright, wide smile he was always so good at using. “I can’t wait to see how this turns out!”