Powder Miner

Perlita had gone a bit still herself when Gabriel returned her hug gently, but of course she'd been plenty embarrassed about the whole thing anyway. It was nice to have him try to calm her down though, with the calm smile routine that she'd seen him do actually a good few times by now. Like on the day when he and Malachi had rescued her from that strange, alien complex. She'd been huddled in the corner, trying to stay out of sight of the horrible abominations in the halls, and then the two of them had burst in, pulled out their own magical beings, and blown the creatures away right then and there. Then Gabriel had stepped forward, extended his hand, and given her much the same smile. She'd sorely needed at the time, seeing as she'd been thrust headfirst into a world she hadn't been equipped to deal with at all... at the time, anyway (now she had a Persona and had been part of the group for months). It was unfortunate that she was just about as stressed now as she was then, but that was to be expected, she supposed. This entire dimension-traveling thing had been overwhelming, but ever since her little team had come to this place it had been more horrible and more eventful than ever. "Ay... not the strangest, no, but I think this is the worst place we've ever been... But... thanks, Gabriel. The others may not be here, but I'm more glad than I can say that I at least have you." Then Gabriel made his little comment about hugging him more often, and with her face dusting a little bit red with a blush, she gave him a quick little thwap on the chest -- nothing with any force hehind it, of course, but something to communicate her sudden embarrassment physically. "Gabriellll! Don't make this weird all of a sudden!"

Having spent a couple of hours mining but without actually gathering all of the materials needed, Satomi found herself at a very unfortunate hitch in her plans: she didn't actually have the stome to start the work on the southern wall, which was a very concerning delay. She didn't want to be working through tomorrow on that wall if it were at all possible, because she needed the time to do her other preparations like building the siege weaponry. It would be a manifest failure of her duty if this town were to be poorly defended from the siege thanks to her own failure to build and gather in a timely manner. This was her duty, her training, what she was specifically meant to do! No time to stand around and mope, though, instead she needed to find a way to use her time productively. Since building the southern wall was off of the table for now, Satomi would have to instead woek on the woodwork for the northern wall (something she would most assuredly have the material to do, having torn down the sad excuse for a wall there present previously). Of course, this was also something she would be unable to do without the stome core of the wall being present, and accordingly Satomi ventured up towards the northern wall-in-progress to see if the stonework was complete.

LOTUS LOTUS was equipped with a translator, given that interpretation of communications was obviously a part of his normal duties, and though he didn't presently have access to the program that could translate from scratch, Vietnamese was an Earth language, and one that was significant enough to be included within his translation date. So the pAI could understand the things that the One Who Dabs was saying -- boasts, promising vengeance for Carolina, and threatening to destroy everything that he stood for. LOTUS didn't care, though, that was the problem. All he stood for (those previous holders to whom he had become attached, and his present holder) was safely outside of the simulation, and inside the simulation (as was actually usual) he had only one priority: achieve the goal. Carolina, and whatever else was outside of victory, was irrelevant. So he had been formulating his response even as the message played, but not a response to the One Who Dabs (why give him more information?). No, he'd been thinking up his response to the scenario. On one hand, there seemed to be no access to the wires possible, as so far as LOTUS could tell they operated off of some horrible eldritch means (and those were often a pain to deal with), which was not good. On the other hand, they did not seem to trigger for non-humanoid objects, which was good even if Potato Man appeared to have been animated only to suffer, something that had given even LOTUS some pause. But even if LOTUS found it extremely unfortunate, even inside a simulation (it hit close to home), he really couldn't afford not to freeze up and endanger his victory, and given the information he had been given, he had a plan for what to do. "No leaving. I doubt it would mean much if you did, anyway, considering what we're dealing with. Here is the plan: since the wires do not trigger for nonhumanoid objects, we are going to create bombs (I will show you how to make ones from scavenged materials), stick them onto the ends of these poles, use the poles to place them at the base of the tower, and remotely detonate them. The tower's base is brick and mortar, which is a weakness we need to take advantage of here -- once it goes, that tower is coming down, and hopefully that will kill the One Who Dabs. However, to account for the possibility that it may not, I need you to place the explosives on the side of the tower base facing the Panthers endzone. This would allow for scoring a safety, or if he does die, an easy touchdown." Perlita Diaz Perlita turned towards Gabriel after he showed up and Grant's attention seemed to swing elsewhere, and opened her mouth to thank him for helping her with that, when suddenly there was a loud noise from an actual military vehicle falling from the sky and smashing into the ground! This actually startled the poor healer enough, to get her to shriek and jump into the air a little, causing her to look around, her heart beating fast, until she caught sight of the vehicle full of the new entries. She took a moment to breathe, her breaths gradually becoming slower and slower until she wasn't hyperventilating, then ripped her attention away from the scene. Perlita then blushed at the severity of her own reaction, and put her hands to her face, but it was only a couple of moments before she did something else entirely. Perlita suddenly made a frustrated noise, and wrapped Gabriel in a hug that was about as crushing as someone with Perlita's general lack of muscle could be. She held him like that for a bit, but she wasn't driven by any sort of romantic urge at all, but rather a visceral need for some sort of comfort, one that she couldn't help but give into even though she was in public, and even despite the many inhibitions and hang-ups she had. Perlita mumbled to Gabriel as she embraced him, a surprisingly large amount of emotion giving her voice a tension that was audible as she spoke: "I-I'm sorry, I just... I just... this world, everything here is so terrible, and it's had me on edge this entire time, a-and then that gambler guy was honestly, honestly just really scary, and that didn't help at all, and I... I don't, it's just too much. It's all just boiling over, I..." Perlita disengaged, looking still more than a little ashamed, and took a breath. "I'm sorry, I just needed a moment."

Isobel grinned at Marisa -- not because of her innuendo, which was really not that charged compared to some of the things she had said, but because of Marisa's suggestion to get "sending stones" (what Isobel assumed to be some sort of magical message device) working. Perhaps they were really stretching the limits of how far they were actually willing to go, sexually, as Isobel was starting to suspect (even though she was probably still going to be rather worked up after the conversation, good God), but even as is this was basically Marisa not only doing the equivalent of giving the botanist her number, but suggesting that she'd actually go to the effort to figure out how to do so. The success of her conversation so far sank in, and Isobel blushed, putting her cheek against her hand. This wasn't an overlewded blush like she had had at points in this conversation, but rather a blush from being honestly rather touched that Marisa would put in the work to do that. "Wow... yeah, that'd certainly be nice. It's really nice that you had that idea, even. Um, LOTUS is also trying to figure out interdimensional communication. Maybe if he does, a tip or two will be usable for you, even if he is based off of technology and not magic. I figure, you know, however dimensions work is probably above both of those, you know?" Isobel's expression turned a little bit more pensive, and then softened again, a satisfied smile now on the freckled brunette's face. "You've made my day a lot better, you know. Whatever in particular ends up coming from this, I want you to know that I really appreciate that. It's good to be able to have a conversation like this." She'd been looking for familiar ground, and in a way she supposed she'd found it.

Satomi paused and put two fingers to the bridge of her nose, her hair swaying as she bent her head down slightly, a look of consideration on her face. "Hmm... I was planning to simply mine, but considering that Leo has said some of his less horrific creations will be helping with that, I suppose there isn't that much point in us contributing that manual labor... yes, if a power source were provided I am confident that I would be able to devise a chassis around it, even if I don't have any experience with these jackhammers -- it's merely a matter of providing focused, directional force repeatedly, and if we can get the thing that provides the impetus behind that then I have enough skill with mechanical things, if I may say so myself, to build something around it. ...but Rokugan doesn't have much in the way of power for me to have precedent with, and I suspect that simply spring-powering it would be inefficient and difficult. Do you have any suggestions for power sources?"

Well, at least Satomi had managed to find Kusuke quickly enough. She was losing daylight thanks to that argument, and that was something she didn’t have time for. Still, she supposed it did behoove her to at least tell him the results of the latter end of it. ”I got confirmation that that sword ISN’T a Taint outbreak waiting to happen, and then the dryad also gave me powder in the event that something goes wrong, which is about the safest thing I believe I can expect. I’m still going to keep an eye on them where I can, though.” Finished with that explanation, Satomi bowed briefly to Kusuke. ”I have a favor to ask of you, Kusuke-san. Could you provide me with aid in mining stone? The northern wall used all that we have, which was not even quite enough, and I would not like to rely on concrete for these walls if it is possible, so I’m going to spend the rest of this morning morning stone. Your aid would be deeply helpful and would be much appreciated. ...er, and then I apologize, but you would probably also be useful later when I do woodwork for the northern wall; the golems will be working on the stonework for the southern wall during that time.”

"Kh." Satomi let out an undeniable scoff of displeasure as the situation seemed to resolve itself without any action being taken on her part to get rid of the damnable taint-sword, but she then reached out and took the sack of powder from the Dryad, placing it into her obi. "I will be checking up on whatever situations may be arising with that thing, even if it means I have to deal with Jun far more than I would like, and if it calls for action I will take action. But for now... I have spent enough time screaming at you. I can only hope you do not go further down this terrible path, and that you do not fuck us all over with it. Take care to avoid that -- the Taint is NOT a toy. REMEMBER THAT. Now I must go take care of my plans to go mining -- we need stone for the southern wall." Satomi headed out, then, the frown still fixed on her face -- she did have mining to do, and it would do her well to do it with Kusuke there to provide her with his usual aid.

One of the comments that the Dryad made caught Satomi's attention, and the still very grim-faced samurai spoke up then. The anger had mostly died from her voice, but there was still of course not even a mere trace of levity in her voice as she spoke. "You say that it acts as a reservoir of dark energy... so what I want to know is this: is the corruptive power of the Taint not present, or is it merely something that is contained and which could be potentially released by an unfortunate reaction with some other world's magics or energies? We have had at least one terrible incident occur because of something much like that," and even if they never one day rescued her, Satomi would always remember Somatotrope, "and I will not allow one involving Taint to occur."

Satomi was silent a moment, her arms crossed as she put what the two had said through her mind and weighed the dangers as she went through the process of coming to a conclusion. Eventually, she spoke again (without, of course, showing the slightest hint of levity at the fish samurai’s joke), without the bellowing fury of only a few seconds earlier, but with that tight simmer of anger still in her voice, even if it had settled slightly. ”Toshiro, the problem is not the spontaneity of the energy. It is the existential threat that the source of the energy provides, and whatever level of control you may for now have is not enough on its own to change anything. Leo... okay, we will talk to the Dryad, and we will hear what she has to say about this sword. But know this: if I am not convinced that this blade does not pose an active threat, one whose very presence provides the risk of taint for us or which is dangerous enough to endanger this realm, I will do my utmost to see it destroyed, no matter the cost to me, material or physical. If I am not convinced that the blade is free of corruption —not merely contained in some way that some other realm’s magics may undo— then I will do my utmost to ensure it does not leave this world. Do you understand?”

The words that Leo had allowed to leave his lips filtered through Satomi's ears, and her eyes widened as she processed what he had just said. She ventured forth a few words: "You mean to tell me..." Her voice began to escalate at this point, the hard edge turning into more overt anger phrase by phrase. "...that you took one type of pure all-corrupting evil, one of the things that has plagued this entire world and which they had to fight to cripple, took the other type of the pure all-corrupting evil that a war was fought to dislodge lest it TAKE OVER THE WORLD, and then YOU PUT THEM TOGETHER?! Her voice was volcanic now -- she was practically screaming at the top of her lungs at Leo and Toshiro. Her voice was relatively high pitched, but with the ragged edge that comes with screaming outragedly at the top of your lungs. "AND THEN YOU TOOK THE ALLOY THAT RESULTED FROM PUTTING TOGETHER THE TWO KINDS OF PURE EVIL, AND YOU REFINED IT EVEN AS IT SHOT BLASTS OF PAINFUL MAGIC AT YOU, AND WHICH WAS IN THE PROCESS OF TRYING DIFFERENT TACTICS JUST SO IT COULD UNLOAD ITS PURE MALICE ON YOU, IN OTHER WORDS A POWER WHICH MAY WELL BE INTELLIGENT AND WHICH DID HIT ONE OF US," even if it was Jun, "AND YOU MADE IT INTO A WEAPON SO THAT YOU CAN CARRY IT TO MANY DIFFERENT WORLDS?!" She goggled at them for a moment, and then followed that up with a: "WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?!" She stared at them for a couple more moments, her chest rising and falling as she caught her breath back, and then she spoke again. This wasn't the hard-edged voice from earlier, nor was it anymore the screaming at the top of her lungs. It was a slightly hoarse, barely restrained simmer of anger, where the emotion was fully undisguised and she was just barely managing to keep her volume down. "Had you done that in Rokugan, you would be dead. If you'd been caught doing that with the Taint, they would have killed you on the spot, and they'd have been justified in it. Maybe you don't come from a realm like mine, but I can tell you with the horrible certainty of generations of Clan experience, and thousands upon thousands of deaths that you do not create a foothold for such evil powers, those that explicitly will try to grow from them, because they will TAKE those footholds. They will TAKE them, and they will spread if you EVER give them the chance, and that will result in loss and death and devastation!" Satomi had to stop to take a breath, and swallow, but she continued on. "Not only have you created an artifact of great power from two of these powers, but you clearly intend to actually use it in combat, which I must presume means blasting those energies everywhere. And not only THAT, but you are going to be taking this to worlds which have never seen the Taints of this world, and which have no way to fight it, and you are going to risk giving these evils the ability to SPREAD ACROSS THE MULTIVERSE IN THIS WAY?" Finally, she stopped talking, staring at the two of them, still breathing heavily, with fury and disbelief still written upon her face and in her eyes.

Satomi watched as Leo casually added bone to the sword, bone which molded itself around the handle, and then she watched as he further added magic into the whole mix of it, observing how the blade Leo was handling seemed to darken the very area around it, and her expression managed to harden even further. Satomi’s voice dropped to something close to a snarl. ”That magic... blasts of pain and force, if what happened during its creation is any indication. The way that blade steals the light, the way that bone glows, that is not the result of simple metallurgy. Where has that power come from? What is in that blade? Would it happen to be the taint?”

The "I've always been the type to try something at least once" line, and the way it was emphasized, was another one of those lines where Marisa's attempts to arouse Isobel worked well enough to render Isobel at a loss for words for a moment. She opened her mouth, closed it, and then shot Marisa a very frank look, a blush but also a dryly knowing look to go with it, or at least as close to one as she could manage while blushing and shifting her legs a bit. You know you're doing things to me, as she was trying to communicate nonverbally. Still, Isobel continued on. "Eheh... yes, it'll be nice. We are coming up with very appealing things in this conversation, aren't we?" Not Isobel's best, but maybe it would escalate things a bit more anyway -- the sexuality of their flirting clearly wasn't going to go away, so the lesbian botanist figured that maybe she ought to simply see where it goes now that she'd also got some less lewd conversation with the demon summoner and was finding her rather likable (honest, but as she was finding, irresistably clever).

Before all that had gone down had gone down, Satomi had been pressing Kusuke for details on what exactly a jackhammer was. "Okay, so I now understand the purpose of a jackhammer, it is essentially a rapid-fire device for applied force to a small area, if I am understanding you correctly, which does sound effective for breaking hard, cleavable substances, but what about its mechanism? How does a jackhammer wor..." Amazingly enough, something managed to distract the orange-haired engineer from her technology-inspired fervor, and she trailed off... it looked like they were doing smithing work right now! What began as somewhat excited intrigue, though, very quickly devolved into something else. The catalyst was the blasts of black energy that emanated from the metal Leo and Toshiro were working. First, she watched the small blasts of energy, and the smile started to die from her face. Then, she watched the ingot seem to reformulate its tactics (something she deeply hoped she was just imagining) before hammering into the barrier that had been set up. By then, the smile was very wholly dead. Then she watched Jun walk in, very promptly be slammed by a strike of the black magic, and collapse into a loudly gurgling pile. The look in her eyes, then had become fierce, a sharp edge now making up the core to her gaze as she pondered the situation while Kusuke took care of Jun. Satomi did not like Jun, but this was a sign of something potentially very, very bad. When the golem-maker and the fishman samurai finished their craft, Satomi looked at them and began to speak. Her expression was dead serious, mouth a tight line, and also wholly unnervingly intense, nearly unblinking as she stared the two craftsmen down. There was something dangerous in those eyes of hers, right now, analysis of threat and a capacity to do something, and the Crab Clan samurai's voice was appropriately low, hard-edged, and intense as she spoke. "Leo. Toshiro. Just what did you just create that sword with? Just what have you involved yourselves with?"

Satomi turned and gave Leo a quick little half-bow of thanks, and then turned to Kusuke, because what he had said had fully captured the technology-loving girl's attention... in fact, in what was practically an instant, she had suddenly whipped out her notebook and walked several steps until she was now only a few feet from him. "A jackhammer? No, I have not heard of it. Ooh, but if you have knowledge of some other new technology I can learn, please tell me all you know about it. There are so many things to learn about here in this world. Concrete, this "solenoid" that I still need to work with when I actually have the time, and now this "jackhammer" thing?" Satomi was openly grinning. "Well, this is the best part about being out here in all of these strange worlds!"

Isobel put a finger to her chin and began to consider something. "Can you conjure basic ingredients like sugar and flour and have them work out?" She grinned. "Cause, you know, if you can... I'm actually a pretty good cook, and I can bake too. You know, not here because, well... you know." Isobel gestured at the castle around them. "But, heh, maybe sometime after we get out of this place, we could go and make something that way. It'd be nice to get something a bit more mundane where I know what I'm doing to do." Isobel caught herself short of actually asking Marisa on a date, or rather referring to that idea as one -- it was essentially their first meeting outside of literal battle, so Isobel realized that was way too forward, even for the way she got sometimes. Still, she really did like the idea of baking something. "It'd be pretty sweet~" Isobel then tried to keep a straight face after a joke that bad, but found herself not entirely succeeding.

Satomi wasn't too sure what Jun meant by "gravitational field", and she wasn't exactly going to be going to see Arminius if she could help it (much like Jun, who had unfortunately approached her...) and she didn't fancy the idea of creating a mining oni. So she could happily reject Jun's advice on this one, something of which Jun's only indication would be a small smug curling upwards of her lips. "Well, now that you have been informed, I have other things I need to do," that they would let her escape Jun was only a nice bonus, "and I must go now to do them." Satomi stood up, leaving the towel she had been using earlier on a spot on the bench, straightened her gear up, and then she began to take a walk around the village in hopes of both ditching Jun and finding the two people she was currently interested in acquiring aid from. She ended up finding them, too, seeing them a distance away from the shop of the blacksmith, and she approached the two of them, walking not quite right up to them, as they were working on something, but close enough to be seen clearly. "Kusuke-san, Leo, when you are done with that, I would greatly appreciate it if you could help me mine for stone for the southern wall."

LOTUS "Well, this seems unconventional," were LOTUS' very first words as he took in the situation presented to him by the simulation. Not the simple sports match he had been expecting, but rather a matter of life and death, the conclusion of a conflict that had taken its toll and now simply rested on one climax performed by tired troops in desperate need of a plan. ...all in all, it was a situation that was far better suited for his experience and skillset. Yes, he could work with this indeed. But first up would come his overall analysis of the situation, his analysis of the goal, and the overall direction of his strategy. "As I am understand, the goal is to retrieve the ball from the One who Dabs and place it within the end zone that will give the Denver Broncos the score to win the game. As I understand, the situation is that the construction of the fortifications of the Carolina Panthers has allowed for a stalemate despite the destruction of the Panthers forces, a stalemate and war which appear to have essentially completely devastated the entire area. They appear to have put their entire fortifications as one tower, with the base a weakpoint. Therefore, my plan will consist of four parts. The first part will be to ascertain information and to take apart the perimeter that prevents access to the tower's base. The second step is to prepare the demolition of the tower such that the One who Dabs does not survive, and that the ball lands as close to within the stadium and not within the end zones as possible. If the ball is within the Broncos endzone and is held by the One Who Dabs' corpse, this is a losing condition and must also be avoided. The third step is to perform the demolition of the tower. The fourth step is to secure the ball after the demolition and place it into the Panthers endzone." LOTUS turned his attention back to the players now -- it was time to carry out the first step. "If the rules prevent my players from leaving the field, I will simply have them communicate with outside parties, perhaps some of the 9 people in the stadium to carry out this first task, if not I will send some of them to do it. I will need them to scavenge the area for tools -- wire cutters, shields, the like. I also need them to gather information on the One who Dabs' capabilities; does he have any way to survive a long fall? Does he have any way to fly? Once I have these, the players will begin experimentation upon the wirefield, by poking scavenged poles into the field to confirm the nature of the defenses as invisible wires. Then with a dummy, to trigger any other defenses. The remainder of part one of the plan is contingent on these answers." Perlita Diaz "Um... there are quite a few nonmagical members of the team, and they do seem to be doing pretty well for themselves, uh, on the whole." This guy made Perlita very nervous... she didn't know if he would do something sudden, or try to trick her, or anything unfortunate like that... he just seemed dangerous to her. Something about his demeanor. Maybe someone else could deal with him on his level, conspire with him or warn him, but Perlita didn't know how to do any of that. She wasn't intimidating or charming or cunning like that... to be frank, it kind of scared the hell out of her. So Perlita looked again at Gabriel, a glint of fear and nervousness visible in her eyes, and tried her best to gesture for him to come over without being noticed... she really needed someone to back her up here.

Grant's innocent smile put another degree of worry onto Perlita's face, but she pressed onwards to answer his question anyway. "'Uh... yes, but we all have different ways that we can do it, and different things we do. I use a kind of... manifestation thing called a Persona," and she had no intention of showing hers to this guy until she couldn't get away with not doing it, because her Persona's form was embarrassing enough without this kind of guy commenting on it, "which lets me cast spells that heal people, or a couple of light spells for attack. Um, I have a friend who can do other things like fire and radiation spells with the same method," and here Perlita caught Gabriel's eye and gestured him over to give her a little bit of backup with this guy, "but there are also people with, like, magic of a giant sphere of blood, or fiery sword magics, and things like that... also people without magic, but they're good at other things."

Isobel’s first instinct was to be a little bit coyly humorous at first, and so she responded with: ”I can’t say I’ve had any negative experiences with professional adventurers, so I don’t have a problem with that at all!” She grinned at Marisa, but then of course she did understand that it had been a rather vulnerable question, so Isobel then let that grin settle into a much more reassuring smile, leaning forward and looking at Marisa as she spoke more seriously. ”But, no, don’t worry, I’m not especially bothered by the demon summoning. I won’t lie, the demons themselves are pretty scary, but there’s only one thing close to demon summoning where I come from, and you’re nothing like them, plus you’ve not done anything but be helpful, so I’m not scared of you at all, if that makes sense. More than in the sense of being nervous talking to a pretty woman, anyway, heh heh.” Isobel was actually Catholic, but to be frank she hadn’t really believed in demons and the like back in her universe, so she didn’t have much reason for reaction.

Perlita watched as he took his weapon out from his jacket, and then when he suddenly fired it into the air with an exceptionally loud and startling noise, Perlita reflexively shrieked and jumped about three feet straight backwards. She tried to regain her composure, of course, but that was pretty difficult to recover from, so her voice was still infused with some shock. ”Um, wow. So. Yeah, that’s definitely something. You, uh, you probably shouldn’t be shooting a gun in here, but yeah, I think that does kind of answer my question... um, however much answering my question actually means. I can’t really do a whole lot more to introduce this place, unless you have any specific questions or anything.”

So that was it -- Jun had come slinking on back because she needed something. Of course. Now, unfortunately, Satomi really couldn't justify completely ignoring the request without it being an abrogation of her Duty: Jun was an ally, and she was also helping prepare for the invasions of the Trespassers, and thusly working on her armor was in fact something she had to do to advance the cause. But one thing Satomi could do was make Jun's life a bit more difficult than she otherwise would have. So Satomi fixed Jun with another brutally cold look, and spoke. "Hmmph... I am busy with a great deal of other things right now, Jun. I have the walls to build, I have the siege weaponry to build, I have whichever other upgrades and fixes I may decide to perform... so I will work on your armor, but only after I am done with everything else."

He... was here because he was a gambling addict who had made and lost some sort of gamble? Perlita often tried not to be judgmental, after all she was not a fan of getting judged for things herself (like that one time she tried on a miniskirt... or, way less severely, this guy literally a couple of minutes ago), but really this was a bit much. "Ohhhkay... well, my name is Perlita, uh, I'm sixteen, and I guess that even though I'm not a leader or anything, 'cuz I'm just a healer for a smaller group that recently kind of merged together with another one here, the question I should probably ask is what you can do, in battle, you know? Or maybe you could tell that to one of the squad leaders -- a tablet, a kind of engineer guy (oh, he's right there), an angel lady (oh, she's right there), and this... I don't know, I think she's a woman with a goddess of some sort. Either way, if you just came here with some sort of gamble... well, uh, sorry to be asking about violent stuff so quickly, but given the circumstances, can you fight?"[/color=yellow]

Isobel had the lopsided, rueful grin that one often has when talking about a somewhat unpleasant subject but also finding someone who could empathize with it. "Eheh... yeah. So I can breathe easier in here." Isobel's expression turned pensive for a moment (albeit not before Isobel somewhat blatantly took a look at the ways that Marisa's position accentuated some of the nicer bits of her form), and then her grin became a bit more of a sheepish one. She also curled a lock of her hair around one finger nervously -- Isobel was pretty experienced with relationships and usually even flirting, but circumstances had kind of had her rush into it faster than she usually did, so she had to be a bit blunter than she'd perhaps have liked to be. "Um... hehe, I admit that I didn't exactly think up smooth things to say past the point I needed to to make sure you were into women too... but basically from the moment I saw you on the battlefield I really wanted to get a chance to talk to you. You're, well, really pretty," actually, Isobel was thinking of a couple words more intense than pretty, but she didn't want to creep her conversational partner out, "and now I know you're pretty clever, too, so I decided that I wanted to try and get to know you a bit. Sooo, as part of that, I guess I'll tell you a bit about myself. Like I said earlier, my name is Isobel Low, and basically I'm a botanist. I really like plants and fruit and wine and all that, and I got to work with them back on my world. Eheh, almost wish I had some of my stuff with me when I got here, in fact. A bottle of wine or a pot of tea does usually make this part a lot cozier, and I can make both pretty well, I'll have you know. So, how about you? What do you do?"

Satomi slowly closed her notebook upon hearing the voice of her current least favorite person in the group, and slowly turned to give Jun a very, very cold look. Jun was actually not off base with her suggestion, Leo was someone it would probably behoove her to ask for the assistance of, but Satomi wasn't, of course, about to allow Jun the pleasure of getting her suggestion acknowledged, even, not after last night. Really, Satomi was almost just as furious with Jun for the "diplomat"'s humiliation of her the previous night, but now the anger had settled and distilled itself into the kind of anger so often seen in Rokugan, icy, cold anger hidden behind the careful emotional mask of the samurai. Satomi wouldn't say anything specifically regarding her humiliation (which really she'd rather not bring up anyway) to Jun, nor would she say anything explicitly impolite unless Jun pushed her... but when she did speak, her voice was icy. "What do you want, Jun?"

Indeed, in front of the new arrival is a certain Mexican-American persona user, whose face is still locked into an expression of embarrassment and anger (she really couldn't believe this guy would just say something like that the moment he met her, in the middle of being confused, no less! Some people...), her gait appropriately stomping enough and when she spoke, her tone appropriately brusque enough. "Yeah. I wasn't "fooling". It's magic like I mentioned and more. The future, the past, vampires and skeletons, whatever." Perlita sighed, clenched and unclenched her fists a bit and then let out a long exhalation, calming down somewhat (though she still wasn't very happy). "Alright... well, here's what's going on. We, uh, well actually I don't really know what the main group here things because my group just recently merged with theirs but anyway, what we know as far as I know is that there are a bunch of beings of some sort called Trespassers. They can possess people and turn them evil, and they want to destroy everything. We're a team that's been formed up to stop them. There, erm, there was this guy that explained it to us, he was some sort of supernatural being and he looked stabbed by all these weapons, and he really made it a lot more ominous... but basically, we're supposed to go around a bunch of worlds and help fight. We're... apparently not that strong in the scheme of things at all, but right now we're on this world where... there are a bunch of historical figures but they're super magical and powerful and also corrupted now, and it's also in the middle of a gigantic horrible war between two medieval factions. And... yeah. That's the situation."