Black Coats: Volume 1

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As the game started, Aeira didn't pay much mind to the arrival of Vanitas nor the departure of Arctus. Instead, she merely looked at the partners that were formed and the tasks that were before them. Most of these tasks seemed simple enough, and the girl was already feeling antsy, having wanted to get these games over with since before they started them. Looking towards Vallus she said, "come on, let's get going. We're going to go climb a building." Without waiting for his response, the girl began to look up and try to find where the tallest building was.

 

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Rydia stood around as she waited for something to happen. She was already getting impatient about being away from her home, and now she had to do some kind of trial with someone else to even get out of here? This day wasn't going to be at the top of her "Favorite Days", that was for sure. When she saw the pairings for groups, she noticed that she was to be partnered with that other person who apparently had just shown up.

I don't know what you're so upset about. You always want to help people out, so why not just go and talk to the boy and work together?

Be quiet, no one asked you. And stop shoving your thoughts in where they don't belong. You have a bad habit of butting in when you're not needed. She was thankful that her partner hadn't just started speaking again without her permission, but having it speak inside her head wasn't exactly fun either.

Walking up to the guy, she put her hand on his shoulder to get his attention. Then, as she tried to speak, she felt her body move on its own. "It's a pleasure to be working with you, young one. How about we test an old dragon's knowledge and take that test of wisdom? I'm sure you would like something easy, wouldn't you?"

Rydia pulled her arm back quickly with a look of shock on her face. She was incredibly embarrassed about what had happened, and she didn't even have a say in what trial she wanted to do. She tried to compose herself as much as possible and cleared her throat. "Sorry about that, my partner is a little overzealous about showing off. Do you have any opinions on what you want to do? I don't care too much myself." While that wasn't entirely true, she had heard someone already talking about doing the climbing trial, and that pretty much the only one she was interested in doing.

 

His first look was towards the groups that had been paired up while his next one was at the list of trials that had been present before them as well. They were simple enough at a glance, but it wouldn't be much of a trial if they were as simple as they seemed. "Alright." His lack of a preference for which trial they did first was evident as he merely followed behind Aeira as she wished to climb a building. From what he could see, there were a multitude of tall building all over. "Any ideas on trying to find this building that aren't simply looking up at the sky?"

 

Koa looked at the man as he reintroduced himself once again. He had went by the name of Dastgir. Odd...But he wasn't gonna question it. Koa nodded his head before speaking up. "Nice to meet you. My name is Koa. Koa Salavic." Koa placed a hand on his chest as he introduced himself. As Dastgir lifted up his hood, he was starting to say something before Charlie spoke up. He had announced the teams as well as the several tests they would need to complete. "Interesting.....However......In terms of partners...." Koa sighed a little bit before taking a deep breath. Dastgir had asked his question about the realm of light before Charlie had answered one of them. Koa had then walked over to Finlay. "It looks like we've been paired up. This will be interesting." Koa looked over at the rest of the tests that were still left open. One in particular had caught his eye. The Test of Wisdom. "Hmm...This one doesn't seem too bad. Hey Finlay. Let's try the test of wisdom. What do you think?" Koa looked over to his teammate as he waited for his opinion. ​

 

"That's reassuring..." Datgir commented upon Charlie's response. Koa managed to at least introduce himself before he ended up going off to his own partner. Dastgir pulled his journal back out and scratched down some more notes before he was approached by Rydia. Though the voice was not her own, but rather of another. "A dragon, huh? Is that who's in you?" he asked of Rydia. "That's rather adorable." He said this as he placed his hand on her head. He patted her head a couple of times before returning to his journal. He left remnants of ice in her hair, frozen bits that soon started to melt.

Charlie assigned Strength to him and his partner. "Wonderful. I personally already have a plan on what to do." he said as he closed his journal and tucked it away. He turned towards Rydia once more and smiled. "So tell me, what element can you use? I have dominion over Ice currently. I plan to freeze the statue. Ice can naturally brittle metal down so long as I can get it cold enough....otherwise, we'll be using our weapons to cause damage."

"Oh but I suppose introductions would be needed. I am Dastgir. What is your name?" he asked, looking down at Rydia.

 

The black coated man nodded in response to his partner. "Catching it as all well and good, we should be able to do it between our elements, but the first thing we need to do is find the thing. Any ideas on that front?" He asked. He wasn't sure what exactly she was capable of. She was one of the two he was supposed to off, though, so she had to be fairly powerful. He made a mental note not to judge her based on her appearance. "Surely we'll never find it if we run around aimles- Well i'll be damned" He said as a white blur darted under his feet. He turned on his heel and chased after it, so as to not lose track of it and ruin this incredible stroke of luck. ​

 

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Melus did not have a particular preference to whatever route they took. But when Alex mentioned how he wasn't exactly strong, she realized that applied to her as well, so she was grateful he ended up picking sight. When he mentioned catching up, she smirked a bit. She knew she wasn't the slowest person, but fortunately for her she at least could make her own guts of wind to help herself go faster. The brunette summoned out her harp with a bit of air and began playing a small tune to get the wind to rush with her as she ran down wind. She continued running, she let herself drift up slightly in the breeze to carry her to her desired destination, not really paying attention to see if she was messing up anyone else who had to walk against the wind.

When she arrived at the middle of the city, she stopped and plucked a few strings on her harp and looked around at the walls and asked, "So, is it graffiti of a cat... or graffiti of the word 'cat'?
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As Vallus asked his question, Aeira turned to him and with an impassive expression, shrugged at him. "I figured we'd just walk around and look at the skyline until we figured out which was the tallest." As she said this, the girl then pondered on it for a moment before saying, "but I suppose that wouldn't do much good." The girl looked at the man, then looked to the buildings. "It'd probably go faster if we looked from on top of other buildings, though. Then you'd just need to find what's taller than you. But I can't get up one by means other than climbing. And you can't fly." Or at least she didn't think he could. "So, here is my solution." The girl then grabbed Vallus by the arm and taking a deep breath, spun around spinning the boy with her before using all of her might to toss him into the sky. Hopefully that'd get him high enough that he could figure out where to go from there.

 

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Rydia half-listened to what Datgir was saying as the trials were given to each team. Apparently they were supposed to destroy some sort of statue within the time limit. She sighed a little, not really sure if this was a good thing or not. She wasn't exactly high on the list of "top powerhouse" for anything; in fact, it was one of the reasons she decided to learn how to use her guns. As she got lost in her thoughts, she felt her partner put his hand on her head and froze it a little. She might have been shorter than him, but did he really have to treat her like a child? Apparently her personal partner didn't appreciate it, since they came out to try and put Datgir in his place.

"Oh, so I'm adorable, am I? I'l have you know I happen to be much older than you for one, and the only reason you think I'm adorable is because you can't see what I really look like. Saying a dragon like myself is such a thing, how rude." She turned around and pouted a little, folding her arms. "And the name's Seiryu, not 'dragon'. At the very least know that difference."

Seiryu gave back control to Rydia as she put her arms back down. She almost found it funny how Seiryu got so worked up about it, but than again, she did pride himself on his background. Personally Rydia never found her adorable, more like a pain in the neck that couldn't leave her be, but she figured it best to respond to Datgir's earlier question.

"The name's Rydia. I use water as my element." She pulled out one of her guns and shot a water bullet at a nearby tree, damaging it and leaving behind traces of water as well. "If you plan on breaking the metal with cold, the most I can do is soak it for you. I don't have much in terms of sheer strength."

She put her weapon back and gave a slight glare to Datgir. "By the way, I don't recommend getting on Seiryu's bad side. It's not fun for anyone around when she gets angry."

 

Dastgir listened to Rydia and smiled at Seiryu's response. "I would love to see your awesome and true self. Ah, but I'm not as young as you'd think I am, I will say that. I've been around a couple of centuries now at least." he chuckled. Rydia soon regained control after her body was walked away and she turned back to look at Dastgir. She went on to explain her element and showed off a little bit. "That would probably work. The water can seep into the stone and metal and then crack and shatter from the sudden cooling." he commented, tapping his chin.

"In all honesty, does Seiryu get angry easily? Is...is Seiryu feminine or masculine anyway? I..I'd assume the latter, but...you...well..." he got confused and pulled out his journal, wondering what his notes said about that. "Masculine, I guess..." he muttered, not sure what to make of it. He closed the journal an glanced around. He spotted a sign that had an arrow and words that mentioned Hachiko this way. "Come on, the statue is this way. We better get this over with." he said, walking towards the sign.

 

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Rydia was fine with leaving things as they were and heading to the statue that they had to break, but Seiryu apparently had different plans in mind. It was annoying most of the time when she had to deal with Seiryu's constant interruptions normally, but now it was like they were getting buddy-buddy, and Rydia had no interest in that. Too bad for her though, she shared her body, and it wasn't exactly an equal sharing of usage when it came to Seiryu trying to one up people.

"Ah, so you're only a few centuries old, huh? You're nothing more than a newborn child in my eyes." Rydia kept walking as she tried to keep Seiryu down, to no avail. "Also, just so we're clear on the subject, depending on who my host is I can be male or female. Since I'm a spirit born of myths and legends, I change depending on whoever I inhabit. For Rydia, I'm a female, but I was a male back with my last host. So don't go putting down notes in that book of yours without getting the facts first."

Rydia grumbled a little under her breath, wishing Seiryu would just be quiet. She had been told the same thing about the spirit when they first met, but to Rydia, it seemed exactly the same as day one. Hearing Seiryu try to one-up Dastgir was like listening to a petty child.

 

"One upping me will get you nowhere, dragon." Dastgir noted, jotting in his journal. "Myths and legends only exist as long as there are people who believe in them. And so, you are only as old as the one who first thought of your myth." Dastgir, looked at Rydia. "Can I have my partner back? We have more important matters to deal with right now and you're clearly not helping."

They finally made their way to the statue and were standing face to face with....a....dog? Dastgir tilted his head. "Why a dog?" he wondered, putting a hand on the statue and watching the stone get an icy sheet. The ice only went as far as the immediate area around his hand before Dastgir pulled back. He looked to Rydia and wondered. He was pretty rude back there, after all, he just didn't like the feeling he got while he thought of how he spoke to Seiryu. "I probably made Seiryu mad, huh?" he asked. "But, this mission is very important. So I'm sorry for being rude. Please forgive me, dragon." Dastgir turned back around and placed both his hands on the statue, trying to freeze the entire statue.

 

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As they continued walking, Dastgir apparently wanted the final word since he seemed to read Rydia's mind and told Seiryu that she wasn't going to one-up him. Watching as he put a note down in his book, it made Rydia slightly curious as to what he was writing about. Since it wasn't her business though, she left it be. Reaching the statue, the first thing Rydia heard from Dastgir was that it was a dog. She wasn't sure why it was that big of a deal to him, but it certainly seemed to catch him off guard. Then he ended up freezing the statue, but he only managed to freeze the area around where he placed his hand. After doing so, he tried to apologize, thinking he upset Seiryu about what he had said, then began to completely freeze the statue.

Pulling out her guns, she began to shoot rapid fire bullets at the statue, covering in a layer of water. "You don't have to worry about Seiryu, she doesn't get upset about much. Just prideful to a fault and always needs to have the last word."

Continuing her assault, she began to think about what Dastgir said about myths and stuff and figured a clarification was in order. "Oh, and something you should know, where I come from all the spirits are born from myths of all worlds and all times. In Seiryu's case, she's born from legends about dragons, and while not all of them pertain to her, just think back to how long the thought of 'dragons' has existed and you can start to comprehend how old many of the spirits in my world are. It's annoying how she talks about being old and superior about stuff, but to an extent it is kind of warranted."

Finishing her own thoughts, Seiryu decided to join in once again. "On come on, I don't brag. I simply state facts about myself. There's nothing wrong with a spirit as old as me giving out advice and correcting those who need it."

Huffing a little, Rydia began to fire shots faster at the statue "Though that doesn't stop her from being irritating in the end."

 

Dastgir thought about what Rydia said and started to really think. On his world, myths and legends were not common at all. The only legend they had was one that explained how their world came to be. That was truly the only one that he knew of.

"On my world...from what I can remember...we have but one legend." he started. "Bear with me, it's a little lengthy, but I'll try to condense it."

Dastgir let go of the statue and touched the crystal around his neck. It glowed brightly as his halberd's shaft extended outwards. Dastgir eventually gripped the shaft and yanked it out the rest of the way, revealing the long blade. All in all, the halberd was even taller than he was and he was quite tall. Though it was just a little taller, not 7 feet that's for sure. He spun the weapon and held it in both of his hands, smirking at Rydia.

"My world came into being from one crystal. For hundreds of years, it was left to grow by itself before it eventually got so big, it could not be worn any longer by the owner. She lived to be around 1000 years old before she eventually died in the waters that fall off the crystal. By that time, the crystal was dubbed the "Mother Crystal" and was the source of our magic and life. From her, small shards would fall off and be turned into the stones that would be given to newborns. Other stuff happens from there, but basically, the Mother Crystal is the source of my life and I am sworn to protect her and her countless souls house within her." Dastgir finished and began to stab at the statue, chipping away at the ice and water clumps.

"We die in her waters and are then absorbed back into her to be reborn. A circle of life that has gone on for thousands of years. I've seen many grow and die. One day, I will die for my betrothed as she protects the Mother Crystal and will be reborn to be with her once again." he said this and stepped back to take a breath. "I love her very much..." he muttered sadly.

Dastgir blinked and turned to Rydia. "Apologies, I rambled...."