Re: Behold Atlantis

[Fira]

Varina went bright red at Esteban's suggestion to go find a bed or something, immediately releasing Miles and scootching away from him awkwardly. "I-i'll pass..." she muttered, looking away.

Miles, however, was completely unfazed by the suggestion, barely noticing Varina's reaction. She was probably just grossed out by the idea. He was her best friend after all. He scowled at Esteban, not in the mood to be ordered around. "Last I checked, people say 'please' and 'thank you' when someone has something they want. Decent people, anyways. And I happen to only listen to decent people. Don't be a fucking asshole to me or Varina and maybe I'll consider." He stood, giving the researcher a hard look. "And if you try to pull your stupid 'stoic action hero' shit and try to take it from me, I'll call down the nearest shark to bite you. I'm sick of it."

[Captain]

Esteban twitched at Miles's words. "Excuse me? That is my property you have in your pocket. You attempt to keep that from me and there is nothing in heaven or hell that can save your scrawny little ass. Because I promise you, a shark will do nothing for you if you make an enemy of me. I know more than ghosts, little man. I know demons. And beyond that, I know how to, and HAVE summoned them. And I don't mean a minor shithole that can bind you down and be spent. Oh, no. Pray for hell itself have mercy on you if you meet one of The Aracane, for it will rend you to pieces, body and soul." He was sneering now. "You think you, touching the outskirts of my realm and being granted powers gives you the right to threaten me for demanding my own property back?" He stepped closer. "I can tear you apart, DAMN your money. Fuck you AND your 'decent people'. Give me my goddamn property and don't expect to see me again if you don't care for my behavior."

[Yuufa]

At first, Tate was surprised by the name the other woman gave him. Miamr? How did she got this out of his name? Or was it a nickname of some sorts? If it is, then- Wait. Could this possibly mean that she already saw him as a friend when she did so? This would be really rad! His eyes lit up immediately, though he looked a little bit confused when she didn't took his hand and merely stared at it. Oh, did they not greet each other with a handshake under water?
"Oh, if you wonder what I'm doing, I just want to greet you with a simple handshake! Or how does one greet each other under the sea? Could you show me?", Tate asked curiously, but before his questions could be answered, they were interrupted by the man with the ripped off shirt. While he inquired informations about some stuff, Tate saw the tattoo on his chest and thought it looked really awesome. Which brought him back to the matter of his own tattoos. He still hasn't searched in one particular area, but given that there were womans around them, he couldn't really look right now. Maybe later on, when he was behind a rock or something?

When the woman left them in order to do whatever she had to, the blonde-haired man turned to him and inquired to know when he had been here. Tate didn't waste any time to answer him in his usual easy-going, yet deep voice:"It's just been a few moments ago since I got up here! Wait, didn't you hear me beforehand? Oh, then I should tell you that Lorelei and Dolly are waiting until we get back, 'cause they don't wanna climb the mountain!"
After that, he listened to Varina's summary and nodded here and there. Thanks to her, he could grasp the situation a little bit better, but at the same time, was still lost. So they needed to find some sort of articfact which has something to do with Atlantis and then magic happens? Or something among this sorts, but it was somewhat accurate in his rainbow-filled brain.

As Tate wanted to go to Miles' side and also encourage him, Esteban intervened and the androgynous looking optimist was taken aback by the quarrel that started to unfold. He honestly didn't understand why Esteban had been so snappy at the beginning and he surely didn't liked it when both sides were starting to sound abrasive. Before Miles could retort something, Tate jumped between the two man and hold out both arms, shouting:"No, no, no, no, this isn't good, you two!"
His blue eyes were darting between Miles and Esteban as he continued on:"You can't just bicker like this! Do you really want to ruin your days with shouting and feeling upset? No, you don't! How could you want that anyway? Seriously, it's waaaaay better to be happy instead of being angry, right?"
He pointed at his own yellow shirt with the big smiley and the phrase Don't worry, be happy! on it. He beamed a smile to the both of them and babbled on:"Soooo, calm down, you two and be friends! It's really easy to be friends! Anyone wants a lollipop, by the way? But, oh wait-" He frowned slightly as he pulled up one of the sweets he had in his pockets and looked intensively at it. "... Do you think it's still gonna taste sweet? I mean, we are under water, so it could taste salty! But then again, this could really be tasty... I should give it a try! How about you?", the black-haired man asked everyone as he stretched his hand out with the sweets in it. Whenever everyone was speechless or simply taken aback, it was silent before he chirped up again:"Oh yeah, you also wanted to know who I am, right? Anyway, the name's Tate, nice to meet ya! And about the tattoos... I already looked at my body, but didn't found it anywhere! Well, safe for one spot, but I couldn't look there, because y'know, ladies were around and Lorelei and Dolly really didn't liked that I was already half-naked. Uh, yeah, anyway, I dunno where my tattoos are or if I even have one, but I sure hope I have them! I also want stylish tattoos like yours! Oh and you really shouldn't threaten to summon demons or something like that, dude, they can be really scary! At least if you believe what books and movies tell you! Or anyone who knows about them!"

Before anyone could speak up, he turned to Miles and grinned at him, adressing him in a cheerful manner:"So, uh, Miles's your name, isn't it? Anyway, I can understand if you are upset, but he also does have a point, you know? But then again, I don't really understand the situation, buuuuut screaming at each other won't solve anything, riiiight? So, how about you give me that thingie that belongs to him? Pretty please, Miles?"
He folded his hands and bowed his hand lightly, before raising it and winking at him with a big grin.

[Regina]

Babydoll scoffed and rolled her eyes at Tate's behavior and let out a sigh of relief when he was finally gone.

"Ugh, it took him long enough. Honestly, I don't see anything appealing in over-exerting ourselves by wasting our energy by climbing up to meet the others when they will eventually have to come back down and explain themselves. It's such a bother..."

Meanwhile, though Kindra smiled knowingly at Varina and Miles' exchange, she slowly started frowning when Miles and Esteban started arguing. Normally, she wouldn't involve herself in such fights, but she was really interested in the history of this place and now was NOT the time for tension and stupid arguments. However, before she could do anything, Tate began talking and was definitely not helping out the situation. She decided to take matters into her own hands.

Strolling leisurely to Tate, she gently but firmly placed her hands on his shoulders and guided him away from the two arguing males.

"Kid, I appreciate that you don't want to see any fighting happen, really I do, but I don't think this is gonna help with them." With Tate safely out of the line of fire, she turned to them both, lifting up her sunglasses in order to look them dead in the eye, alternating between staring at Miles and then Esteban.

"Look, the last thing we need right now is fighting. I understand that this is a really weird and awkward and strange and frighting and generally uncomfortable situation, but we really do not need any more fighting and we certainly don't need violence or killing. Miles, I would like it if you gave Esteban back his property and not sic a shark on him, but Esteban you need to calm down right away and so help me if you even try to summon any demons I will take your ass down so fast you wouldn't even have time to start the ritual. Now." She placed the glasses back over her eyes and lapsed into her easy-going tone. "Do we have an agreement?"

[Captain]

Esteban rolled his eyes at Tate, but let him talk. The tall girl, too, as she stepped in quickly afterwards. He grimaced and raised an eyebrow at her, rocking back on one heel and crossing his arms. After a beat, he said "I could take you."

Off in the distance, there was a flash and a thundering sound mixed with a Makara roar and cry. Then... silence.

[Yuufa]

"Agreed", Lorelei said as she watched how Tate grew smaller and smaller from her point of view, until she grew tired of holding her head up and looked around. Out of habit, she pulled her wallet chain out of her jacket pocket and wanted to check what time it is, only to realize that it stopped working. Of course it would, given it was in water now and everything but waterproof. A groan escaped her throat as she put it back, cursing her fate silently. She could only hope that somehow, it could still be repaired when they returned to the surface. Lorelei didn't cared how, but she would return home, no matter what some higher power planned for her.
Suddenly, a flash occured and some sort of cry echoed through the area, before it died down. It was enough to startle the blonde-haired woman as she looked towards the direction from where both things came from. She frowned slightly and asked more to herself than to the other girl:"What was that?"
Lorelei wasn't even sure if she wanted to know and looked around, trying to find some sort of shelter where they could hide if anything dangerous would come their way. God, this was truly a shitty situation.

Tate turned to Kindra as she placed a hand on his shoulder. He was genuinely surprised when she told him that this wouldn't help much and pushed him gently out of (potential) harm's way. And wait, why was he nicknamed kid now? First Miamr, now kid... Well, he was certainly a child in his heart, but he would hardly call himself a kid with 24 years of life experience. Hm, that was weird...
While he thought hard about it, the sudden thundering and roaring snapped him out of his own thoughts, making his head turn to the direction where he had heard the noises.
"Uh, either King Triton has a bad day or this is some animal we don't know? Maybe?", he offered an explanation for what happened and scratched his cheeks.

[Fira]

Miles stared at Kindra for a long while, his eyes narrowed. Did she seriously not notice how rude the man had been to him after he had what amounted to a fucking breakdown? "...Fine." After a solid couple of minutes, he huffed out a response and pulled the REL/A out of his shirt pocket, setting it down in front of him. He turned away, not willing to apologize. He may have been the first to back down, but he only did so because Kindra was correct in one regard: fighting would get them nowhere. However...that didn't mean he had to do anything else.

At the cry of the makara, Varina snapped to attention, wide-eyed. "...No..." she whispered, feeling as though a lead weight had dropped into her stomach. The girl scrambled to her feet, turning towards where she heard the cry and straining to hear anything else. But there was nothing but silence. She sank to the ground. "No...why...?" she murmured hoarsely.

[Captain]

Esteban jumped at the roar, but quickly recovered, especially when Miles actually did as bidded. Flipping the GPS up using his feet didn't work quite as well as when normal gravity applied, but it did the job just fine, if slower. Stepping away from the others without uttering a word to the rich brat, he held the piece of the Tus within a foot of the GPS and clicked back a few menus before selecting a new option. He waited and moment, grunted, and held both higher. REL/A blinked and beeped for a moment before it pinged, at which time, Esteban lowered the hand holding the golden fragment, but continued to hold REL/A high.

It beeped. And again. And again. In fact, it beeped every two seconds or so for a while, Esteban continuing to stand and watch it.

[Yuufa]

Varina's reaction got his attention immediately and he looked worried when the other girl sank to the ground. He only knew these people for only a few minutes, but this didn't mean that he couldn't be worried over them. Tate hurried to Varina and crouched besides her, tilting his head slightly as he asked:"What's wrong, Varina? Is everything okay? Do you know what that was?"

The black-haired man also turned his head towards Esteban when there was a continuous beeping to be heard and blinked. What was he doing? Well, it couldn't hurt to ask, so he shot the question right out:"What are you doing over there? Did you find something?"

[Captain]

Esteban didn't look at Tate, his gaze stuck to the output screen. "I'm seeing if REL/A picks up anything with the same chemical makeup as the Tus fragment. Since, I don't know," he shrugged, "Having a KEY might be helpful to getting out of here?" He shot a glare at Miles. "Even if SOME would rather stay at the bottom of the ocean."

It wasn't a moment later the lady returned, fluorescent green stuck to her skin and clothes. "I have returned. Apologies for the delay - there was a pest in the area." She frowned. "And that's putting it lightly. Now, what was I sa..." Looking at Esteban with a single lowered eyebrow, she cocked her head. "What ARE you doing?"

[Fira]

Varina looked up at the woman's approach, having completely ignored everything else in favor of her grief. However, as soon as she saw the substance coating the woman, she put a hand to her mouth and gagged, turning away with teary eyes. She shoved Tate away, completely unwilling to talk right now. She didn't know why it had happened. Frankly, she didn't even care. Having an explanation wouldn't have alleviated the pain of losing such an important discovery.

Miles, too, ignored the goings-on, though he wasn't fueled by grief like his friend was. He paced at the edge of the plateau, avoiding everyone and simply focusing on his footsteps. He needed to calm down, had to. Before he did anything rash. There was only one thing he hated more than being useless, and that was any sort of anger. At the very least he would avoid being an asshole. However, seeing the woman and Varina's reaction to her made him pause, his brow furrowed. He couldn't resist his curiosity. "Okay...Mind explaining why exactly you're covered in...blood?" He blinked, realizing why Varina was so upset now. He hurriedly changed his question, sounding a bit irritated despite his best efforts. "Actually, no. Why'd you kill the makara? What point did that serve, exactly?"

[Captain]

The woman blinked. "Makara?" She shook her head. "No, you are mistaken. I killed a Sluk." She tilted her head. "Unless that is your word for Sluk?" She shook her head then, her hair becoming a hypnotizing floating mess. "Could not be. You would know them as parasites if it was." She looked at Varina in worry. "Is she all right? Did one of her tribe die?"

Esteban, only somewhat paying attention to the conversation, lit up when REL/A stopped beeping. "All right!" As the lady jumped in surprise to look at him, he lowered the machine. "We've got twelve parts listed, but a couple pieces in the same location, and a few locations in similar locales. That's roughly... five parts." He looked up. "Anybody up for questing, or I am doing this solo?" He shrugged. "I could."

The lady stood up. "What do you need?" Esteban held up a hand.

"Hold your horses." He pointed at the others. "I need to know if they're up for this, first."

The woman crinkled her eyebrows. "Horses?" But she relaxed and looked at the others curiously.

[Fira]

Varina stiffened when the murderer mentioned her name. She looked up at her, her face contorted into a mask of pain. "They weren't evil! They didn't need to be killed! I could have...I could have studied them! Or something!" She sniffed, rubbing at her eyes. "That medicinal saliva of theirs...could have really helped someone at the surface. And you killed them. Without a second thought." She went silent again, turning away.

Miles frowned at her outburst, concerned, but Esteban's words were a bit more urgent, so he responded to them first, his tone as stiff and polite as when they first met. "...I'd like to go along on this quest. I may have lost respect for you, but I am not going to let that get in the way of the final goal here. I'm sure Var will also be going. She...probably needs the distraction." he concluded, looking at her with worried eyes.

[Captain]

The woman regarded Varina sharply. "You know nothing, do you?" She caught herself and immediately bowed. "Uh... sorry, Adache. What I simple meant to say is that you are mistaken. They are not..." She frowned. "Wait. Healing saliva?" Her eyes flickered to Miles. "She is yours, is she not?" Without waiting for an answer, she barreled on. "If she was the one affected by the creature's saliva, you MUST heal her!" She took a deep breath in. "I've helped a little by killing the creatures presumably involved, since I haven't heard any others, but there's a likelihood that there's a nest somewhere nearby, or that one shouldn't be." She ran a finger through braids. "It matters not."

[Fira]

Miles held up a hand. "Wait, hang on. First off, what was that about her being mine? We're friends, but there's no possible way she has any sort of...property-like feelings towards me, or...whatever you were getting at." Varina had gone completely silent at his words. Even her sniffling had ceased. But he barreled on, not noticing. "Secondly, affected by saliva? Healing? I have no idea what you're talking about. What exactly happened to Varina?" He crossed his arms and gave his friend a nervous glance, his worry only increasing at the news.

Varina rubbed at her forehead, sighing. She took a deep breath and got her emotions under control, at least long enough to explain. "All I know is that I had a sprained ankle, the makara licked me, and then...I was better. I could run again." Her voice was still pretty hoarse, but it was understandable, at least. She shook her head. "I didn't have any open wounds, so even if it is some sort of parasite, it would be pretty difficult to make me a host."

[Captain]

The woman shook her head again. "No, it is not a parasitical feast on your body or blood - it feasts on your Cakra."

Esteban snapped to attention. "Ahhhh." He turned to Varina. "Okay, that might not be a thing you understand, so let me explain it quick." He hooked REL/A onto his belt and settled. "Okay, so there's another realm that runs parallel to ours. I call it the Spirit Realm, some call it The Veil... there's a couple names. It's where ghosts commonly collect in, right? Well, every human - or, person still alive, rather - they have a Spirit Body of sorts." He waved a hand. "A lot of people call it auras and 'energy emission', but that ain't right. It's literally another version of the PERSON - usually doesn't look like them, but that's not the point - and it resides in the other realm."

"Thing is, that thing - the Cakra? It helps a person move on. It can be drained for a number of reasons, most commonly by a newly dead spirit clinging onto something they 'needed to do'? That feeds off the Cakra. They're literally spending their ticket to eternity in order to stay on earth, until there's nothing left of the ticket and they're stuck here."

He waved at the lady. "What she's saying..." a thought struck and he pointed at her, "Remind me to ask your name, all right?" Turning back to Varina, he continued. "What she's saying is that the Maka- er... Sluk? Sluk. What she's saying is that the Sluk is feeding off that Cakra while you're still living. Not only does that have massive implications on your afterlife, it can affect how well you connect with others. People pick up on each others' Cakras, whether they see them or not. Ever had a person you just... inexplicably couldn't be around? Chances are your Cakras were incompatible, or that they didn't have one. Living people without a Cakra become... basically leeches in their own right. Although, instead of feeding off others' Cakras, they feed on emotions and memories and... stuff you don't want stolen."

He took a deep breath. "I'd wager the way the M- er... Sluk begins to feed on a victim is through a swap of body fluids. If it can get whatever it's got in it into YOU, probably carried on the spit and through your blood, then it can feed from any of you - including what's not physical." He shrugged. "Makes sense to camouflage its feeding habits by virtuous deeds. What better way to stay undetected until it's too late?"

The woman stepped in. "It is additionally imperative to find the nest and kill it." She looked at Varina. "When one feeds, the clan benefits. Even after the original feeder dies."

Esteban nodded to her, turning back to Varina himself. "It might be that they're all dead. For now, we don't know, and REL/A here," he tapped her a few times, "Doesn't do so well tracking living objects. But it does do well tracking inanimate objects."

Back into planning mode, he pointed at himself, the woman and Miles. "That's one, two, and three people willing to go searching. I'd rather none go solo, since we don't know what's out there, so if we're the only ones, it'd be best for all three to go together, however slow that could be." He snapped his fingers and pointed at the woman again. "You. Name."

She sniffed. "I am called Ilaih, Adache Akreva."

He nodded sharply. "Ilaih. Thank you." He smirked. "For a second there, I thought I was gonna have to call you Sacagawea." At her confused face, his smirk dropped into a grimace. "Nevermind."

[Fira]

Miles blanched at the explanation. To have something that important stolen away like that...It was absolutely unthinkable. And once again, it was all his fault. He shouldn't have let her stay behind with the Sluk. He clenched his hands, his mouth set in a hard line. "Wait, Ilaih, you mentioned earlier that she can be healed. How do I heal this? There has to be a way." He stared the stranger down, beginning to get desperate. "I can't go on a quest to find this...key, or whatever it is, until I know Varina can be safe!"

Unlike Miles, Varina had little reaction to the news beyond a slight frown and a glance at her ankle. She still wasn't quite sure if she fully believed Esteban's explanation, but she shook it off as her old prejudices. This wasn't the phony garbage her mother believed in. She needed to keep that in mind. However, she couldn't help but smile a little at Miles's determination, her cheeks gaining a slight color. She quickly closed her eyes and turned away, pushing her feelings aside for the moment to try and think of any sort of solution she could.

[Captain]

Ilaih set her lips in a tight line. "Destroy the source of the feeding, and you will be safe."

Esteban shrugged. "Again, I say we don't know if that's all of them or not. Here." He unhooked REL/A and flipped through a couple of menus. Holding it up, he took a picture of Varina. "There. I have a snapshot of your Cakra." He looked at it a second, frowning. "It doesn't look too much weaker than usual. Maybe it's just coloration. I... don't actually know yet. Let's go about finding these Tus pieces, and I'll keep an eye on this," he held up the gps, "And alert you of any changes. All right?"

[Regina]

Kindra had been initially confused and concerned for Varina's feelings when her beloved fishy friend was killed, but frowned at the news that the Sharkpuppy was actually harmful. A kind of sisterly urge to protect the younger girl came over her, and she vowed to make sure any kind of creatures would stay away from her. She snapped out of her thoughts to finally voice the fact that going searching with the rest of the group didn't sound like a bad idea to her.

"Oh, for the record, I wouldn't mind going along with all of you to search." She tilted her head at Miles' outburst, understanding why he would be freaked out in this type of situation. "Don't worry, kid." She called out to him. "Varina will be fine. We won't let any more of those things near her or anyone else."

[Yuufa]

For a while, Tate was quiet and absorbed every word he heard and thought about it. Granted, it was a lot to take in, but it seemed important enough to remember. Hopefully, the black-haired man wouldn't forget it the second he was distracted by something else - which could happen all too easily. As long as he didn't let himself get licked by whatever the others encountered, he should be good, right?
Now that they knew the name of the strange woman, he decided to speak up:"Count me in, guys! No way I'm letting this chance of a quest slip away! Aaaaanyway, with this, almost everyone goes to that search, so we just gotta ask the other two now! Hang on a minute, I'm going inform them!"
He had picked himself up long ago after Varina had shoved him aside and walked up to the edge of the mountain. Tate inhaled deeply before he shouted downwards:"HEY LORELEI, DOLLY, YOU GUYS HEAR ME?"

While the others were doing whatever they did on that top, Lorelei was bored out of her mind. For a while, she had called up various laws and the likes up in her head to memorize them better, but eventually, she gave up on that distraction. Conversing with Babydoll wouldn't distract the both of them for too long and in all honesty, the young woman didn't knew what to talk about anyway. What the heck were they doing up there? Making a picnic or what?
Before she could ask herself any more question, she was once again slightly startled when Tate's voice echoed down to them. The blonde woman growned and whispered to the other blonde:"Should we ignore him?"
"HEY? GUYS? I HOPE YOU HEAR ME, BECAUSE THAT'S KIND OF IMPORTANT!", they heard from above and Lorelei let out a sigh. If it was something important, than they couldn't really ignore it... oh dear.
"WHAT IS IT?", she yelled back rather annoyed. If this wasn't anything crucial, she would goddamn slap that idiot for wasting her time and making her shout.

"WE'RE GOING TO EXPLORE IMPORTANT STUFF WITH OUR NEW FRIEND HERE! YOU WANNA COME ALONG?"

"Explore important stuff... Yes, this tells us quite a lot, genius", Lorelei mumbled to herself, though she resumed to answer the blockhead:"WHERE? AND WHY DON'T YOU COME DOWN FIRST?"

"UH... SOMEWHERE? WAIT, LET ME ASK!", Tate yelled down as he turned back to the others, though his eyes were drawn to Esteban,"Where are we going?"

Meanwhile, Lorelei simply facepalmed.

[Captain]

Esteban was staring at the screen with a single eyebrow dropped in a fixed focus. "We're..." he murmured, incredibly distractedly, "... going to go wherever we go, in groups... to find the pieces of the... key..." the last letter was heavily drawn out.

As if snapping out of a trance, he turned to Tate and blinked. "Yes, we're going... around the city, definitely. As to where, specifically, I have locations, but nothing more concrete than that. Are we going or...?" He looked at Tate expectantly, as if he could answer for the other two.

[Yuufa]

"Gotcha! One moment please!", Tate said as he hold up a finger and then turned around to yell again:"OKAY, I KNOW IT NOW! IT'S AROUND THE CITY! WE ONLY HAVE A FEW LOCATIONS, BUT WE NEED TO FIND THESE PIECES TO MAKE THE RING- WAIT, I MEAN KEY! SOME KIND OF KEY WE NEED!"

Lorelei frowned slightly as she heard what Tate had to say. A key? Locations? Oh and also that new friend of theirs... Well, if this helped them to get out of here soon, then they kind of needed to tag along, right?
"WELL, NOT LIKE IT'S GOING TO DO US MUCH TO JUST STAND AROUND HERE! WELL, AT LEAST FOR ME", she shouted back and then turned her attention to Babydoll. "I mean, I don't know what you want to do, but I think it's better to do something instead of... well, standing around and look at our nails."

"ALRIGHTY!", Tate answered back and then turned with a big grin of his face to Esteban and gave him a thumb-up. "I think that means we're all going!"

[Captain]

Esteban snapped his fingers at Iliah. "Light, please?" She raised an eyebrow and he gave her a droll look. "Are we finding the pieces to put the relic back together and find out what's at the bottom of all this or not?"

She rolled her eyes. It seemed a rather universal gesture. "Those fragments have been long lost to the centuries and dust. I doubt if we could find them, even with magic."

"My magic's stronger than yours." Esteban lifted REL/A up in a sarcastic flourishing gesture, "Meet my magic. Now... light, please?" He shook his head in silent acknowledgement that she hadn't heard a word of when he'd actually described the whole business of scanning the base.

Iliah, instead of responding angrily, took a step closer with her brow knit in interest. With a flick of her wrists and a whispered intonation, she raised her cupped hands and let a starburst of white light cascade over the city, illuminating everything beautifully. The water was dirty, but bright.

"Now show me what your magic can do, sage."

Esteban looked down at REL/A and pointed to Miles and Varina. "Temple. I'm assuming such from the way the foundation is laid and the layout of the seats. You're looking towards the front, probably around the altar. It's over that way, the building with the spire going up, you see it?" He pointed, and without waiting for an answer, continued, pointing at Tate.

"You. Tell the girls they're checking the... park? Farm?" He looked up and squinted at the city in front of him.

Iliah leaned forward and glanced at REL/A's visual output of streaming data before shaking her head, blinking, and looking at the city. "Where?"

Esteban pointed. "The... plot of land without any buildings, stone fencing, and, uh..." he looked back at REL/A, "Some kind of organic matter?"

Iliah smiled. "The graves. Let them hope they don't encounter any Yuryinolich"

Esteban blinked blankly, "The, uh.. what?"

"What do you think the fence was for? Keeping things out?" Chuckling, she made for the edge of the plateau they stood on. "Don't worry, raven one. I will tell them." And headed for the base of the mountain.

Esteban watched her leave, eyebrow quirked in a hilarious confused face. After blinking once or twice, he shook his head. "THEN... Tate, you and I will take the library." He pointed at a very large building with stone pillars out front. "And let's hope we find all we're looking for."

He clicked REL/A's display off and hooked it on his belt, turning to face the others. "We'll find the other two groups of pieces when we reconvene. When you find your pieces," he directed to Miles and Varina, "And it is pieces, since there are two. And no, I don't know where the other is, but it's in the temple. It might be buried, or guarded by foreign technology, or... anything, really." Looking at Tate, he added, "And we're finding four."

Looking back on the general group, he cleared his throat. "But we will meet, say... in the town center?" Again, he pointed out over the city, "Around the... ridiculously superfluous fountain, whether it be functional or not? Yes? Good."

"Any questions?"

[Fira]

Miles frowned at the answer Ilaih gave him, but gave a short nod nonetheless. There was nothing he could do...at least for the time being. He gave Varina another worried look, but quickly looked away and shoved the problem aside for now. There were other things to worry about. "...Got it. So, we'll head to the temple, find the pieces, and then meet up by the fountain? Seems simple enough." He gave his friend a small smile, a little forced, and jerked his head towards the temple. "...Well? Shall we go, then?"

Varina seemed to have returned to good spirits, though she was still a little withdrawn. She looked up when Miles spoke to her, offering a small smile in return. "...Sure." She stood, starting to make her way over to the plateau's edge. The girl looked down at the murky blackness below and sighed. "This is gonna be a long walk..." With that, she started down the mountain.

Miles followed her, looking off the edge to see her carefully clambering down. He shivered. It was so...high.

Varina paused, giving him a smirk. "You coming?"

"Y-yeah...I was just...checking out the view. Absolutely breathtaking." Miles coughed and quickly started to descend, trying to cover up his fear. However, he still couldn't ignore the trickle of nerves in his stomach.

[Yuufa]

Tate felt almost sad that they had to split up, but then again, it surely wouldn't take that long, right? They would meet up soon enough, so it would be all just peachy and dandy! He was confident that everyone would find these pieces or whatever they were supposed to find and then they would solve this puzzle! Like in that one puzzle game with that hatman in there...

When he was spoken to, Tate saluted gleefully at Esteban and said:"Gotcha!" He turned around and already wanted to shout down at the two girls, but then their new friend began to swim down. Even though she would tell them, it would be alright to at least, uh, "warn" them about their new friend? No, warning had a rather negative meaning to it... How about indicating about her presence? Yes, that sounded more friendly!

"GUYS? OUR NEW FRIEND WILL BE DOWN IN A MINUTE AND TELL YOU SOME STUFF! I THINK SHE WILL BE WITH YOU FOR THE SEARCHING! WE'LL ALL CATCH UP LATER IN-", he turned around and listened, before he resumed shouting,"THE TOWN CENTER! SOME FOUNTAIN OR SOMETHING! OKAY?"

Meanwhile, Lorelei rolled with her eyes and endured Tate's shouting with a frown on her face. A new friend? Oh, that sure sounded lovely, she totally signed up to be friends with some strangers. "ALRIGHT!", was her sole response, not really in the mood to say more. Why should she, anyway? All Babydoll and her could do is wait for that new person and get told what exactly was going on. Oh, the nerve!

"I think we're all settled then! Though...", Tate tilted his head a little,"What about Kindra? She should also join a group! Where would you like to be?" He turned to the woman with the sunglasses and beamed her a smile:"If you would like to join us, I'd be happy! The more, the merrier, right? Oh, but we should finally go, right? Soooooo, OFF TO OUR QUEST! CHAAAAAARGE!"

His vibrant exclamation would be far more impressive if he wouldn't run in slow-motion. Or swim, for that matter.

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