kaisou | Open log

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WHO: Ritsuka + anyone
WHERE: just some random street corner
WHEN: 1st of July
WHAT: Ritsuka found herself whisked away to another world? Must be Tuesday...
WARNINGS: Probably none, this time

There's a new face in town! Or at least, there's a redheaded young woman who, while not appearing particularly bewildered or confused, most definitely is spending some time looking over the surrounding buildings and cityscape. As one does when trying to figure out where one is or how to get where one needs to go. In any case, it's definitely true no one here's seen her in town before!

Should you approach, though, she'll promptly swap from that evaluating stare to a friendly grin.

"Oh, hi there! Are you from around here?"

If you're especially observant, though, you might notice a set of red marks on the back of her right hand. But that's probably not important, right? Right.

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"... Chaldea?" Directly the name didn't mean much to him. But it meant a lot to a few people he knew. Nagiko mentioned it. And Cu did as well. Cu's original Master was from there. This was her? This young lady?

"So... then you are..." Said half to himself before lightly shaking his head. She is a Master, indeed. And the fact that she was made his stomach turn, but in favor of keeping to his word he pushed the unease further away.

"... Excuse me. I'll, ah, start from the beginning in that case." Said leading her to a park bench a few steps away so they can at least sit down and break this to her. A pause to take a breath, steadying himself. "This may be difficult to believe, but this realm is far from the one you know. Chaldea, to my knowledge, does not exist here. This is another world entirely."

The way he trails off doesn't go unnoticed, but Ritsuka doesn't say anything. There could be any number of reasons for a reaction like that, after all. And she, for one, would rather like it if it turned out that it was something that didn't matter, or at least wouldn't force them to fight each other. Maybe whatever the issue was, it could actually be resolved without getting to that point, for once. Ritsuka would certainly like that.

That said, well, she doesn't look even remotely surprised by that explanation.

"Oh, yeah, not everything's the same in every world..."

Apparently this is not, in fact, news to her!

Something he will immediately call out with a tilt of his head.

"You sound as though this is standard fare for you." Which was worrying to say the least. He fidgeted slightly, drumming his fingers over the seals on his left hand, clearly wanting to acknowledge them but waiting for the right time. He shook his head.

"... Regardless, this city is called Kaisou and occasionally people from other worlds are dragged here due to weakness in rifts between worlds. There is more to the situation, but this is where you stand now."

It was considerably more complicated, but he did not want to risk overwhelming her even though she took being from another world like one would a train delay if that.

"I hail from another world myself. My name is Takame Kesi. The situation is not ideal, but it is no less a pleasure to meet you." He gave a small bow of his head. For as much as he wanted to ask about her seals, introductions were the polite thing to give before asking possibly invasive questions.

"I guess you could say that..."

It's less that she doesn't want to explain and more that she doesn't know how to explain. She only just barely grasps much of the stuff she's been involved in, herself. Trying to explain it to people who have no familiarity with any of it is always tricky and it's hard to know where to even begin.

"Oh, I'm Ritsuka! Fujimaru Ritsuka. It's nice to meet you too!"

"Ristuka." Repeated with a nod to commit the name to memory. There was quite a bit about her world, this world of Heroic Spirits and Mages no matter what timeline it came from, Takame didn't really understand. Even he only had the light gist but he knew the man who explained what he knew was a teacher. This young lady obviously was not, so he would not push so hard.

That said, if she would just sort of accept this situation he thought to breach the subject now with intros out of the way.

"My apologies for my forwardness but if I may ask... You must be Chaldea's Master, correct? There are two other Servants here that have spoken of you."

To be fair, there's a whole heck of a lot Ritsuka doesn't truly understand about it, either. She just knows enough of the gist to get by, really. Maybe a certain Lord could pull it off, once he gets enough information to fit all the pieces together, but Ritsuka herself definitely isn't the best to explain more than the broad strokes and throw around some technical jargon.

"That's right," Ritsuka nods, not looking particularly bothered by the question. If anything, now she's just plain curious. "Do you know them?"

A certain Lord happens to be Takame's dearest friend in this place, which was the whole reason he knew a damn thing. As well as part of the reasoning for the seals on his left hand.

He nodded, once again forcing the monster that was his discomfort at Ritsuka being a teenager and a Master behind reinforced emotional walls he's known for three decades.

"Indeed. Nagiko is a co-worker and friend of mine. There is also, ah..." Right, this was where the awkward came in. Behind him his tail twitched uncomfortably and he felt guilt begin to well up.

"Caster... Cu Chulainn. He is here as well." He lifted his hand to show the Seals more clearly. "He is currently contracted to me. I do not hail from your world, but I have the aether -- mana -- to provide a Caster with minimal risk, you see."

Well, now Ritsuka has a name or two of Servants to look out for, but more importantly--

"Oh! So you're a friend of his!"

If anything, she sounds delighted to hear about this.

"Is he still complaining about being a Caster instead of a Lancer?"

No, Cu, you are never gonna live that down.

"Ah." It was the delight that threw Takame off. Just the tiny noise showed his surprise, but his tail stood out on end showing that he was damn near gobsmacked by this.

It relaxed and returned to a natural sway after not too long, at least.

"I... am, yes. He, ah, still would have preferred to keep his lance, indeed. I can't blame him, I suppose, I couldn't imagine using anything but a sword myself..." He trailed off a little due to veering into an irrelevant topic.

"You... aren't upset?"

Now it's Ritsuka's turn to be a little surprised.

"Why should I? If he was here without me then it's better for him if he found someone he could make a contract with, right?"

And she doesn't see any reason to demand him back if Cu is happy with the arrangement. The Servants are allies and friends, not her personal, well, servants.

The way Takame visibly relaxed at that. It had nothing to do with her world, just entirely on his reluctance to do anything out of turn. All the time he's spent in this realm and he still had reservations about making his own decisions.

At the time he did not, he chose to contract with Cu with the conviction a Master and Warrior of Light should show. He just never expected the original Master to show up. But if she was fine with it, so was he.

"I see. ... He is a good person and friend that I am honored to have by my side. Both he and Nagiko will be thrilled to see you, I'm sure." His tone softened as well. Both of them spoke highly of Chaldea's Master and she seemed to be an upstanding young lady. Which, you know, made things worse in a way.

"... One other Master is present in this city, but he is a good man. Neither he nor myself will do you any harm, this I swear. The Holy Grail does not exist here."

"Oh, I wasn't planning on getting involved in any Holy Grail Wars."

Look, she's been to singularities where those were taken place and still managed to weasel her way out of participating. This was never a concern for her on that level.

"But it's nice to know no one's going to cause trouble anyway."

"Ah." And the confusion returned. Granted, Takame was contracted to a Servant and there was no war here but what reason could she have to possess several Servants without a war? Something must be taking place.

"Is there not a Holy Grail War within this Chaldea? I'm afraid I only know it by name, but as to what takes place there and its purpose I know nothing. I would appreciate it if you would tell me what you can."

"Oh, no."

At least Ritsuka can explain this!

"Chaldea doesn't use Servants for Holy Grail Wars, but to help fix singularities--sort of like points in the timeline where something went wrong, and if it's not taken care of it would wreck the rest of history."

She's also currently under the assumption that this is just another singularity, but that's a whole other conversation to be had.

Well, that... sort of explained why she was so blase about being in another world. Having known someone who breached the rift between time and space in his realm and having seen the edges of reality, he knew such things were... possible, but...

"A 'singularity'? Hmm." It's both sad and a relief that he understood something like this being necessary. "It's an organization that is able to re-write history? Or rather, set it on its correct course. And to that end, it utilizes Servants with you as the Master. Is that what you're saying?"

There's a long pause and continuous agitated tail twitches.

"... Are you the only Master they have?"

"Right. You can't actually change history, exactly, but if something like a large singularity is disrupting it, then it can make everything else collapse."

See, Ritsuka knows some things, at least!

"And yeah. There were supposed to be a lot more, but Chaldea was sabotaged and someone planted a bomb in the command room when everyone was about to go on the first mission."

Well, there's a second Master now, but explaining that is... complicated, to say the least. And doesn't change the fact that Ritsuka's the one with contracts with literally hundreds of Servants.

Takame visibly tensed. Force of habit caused a hand to cling to his left flank hiding a massive scar covered by his clothes. A bomb. Sabotaged. Command room, all of these things were so familiar to him it made him sick to his stomach.

How many people must have been killed in that incident that caused there to be only one Master left? Seven hells, what has this girl seen?

"... And so they threw everything onto you? Because you were the only one left?" He's only assuming this, but that's how things tended to go.

"I wasn't in the room when it happened."

Which is a bit of a story unto itself, but that's another matter.

"But Mash--someone I met when I first got to Chaldea--still was, so I went there to try to help her. We were going to be trapped, but then the rayshift system activated and sent us to the first singularity instead. After that, the only way to fix things was to keep going, so..."

In a way, nobody had truly forced her into it, other than circumstances. She could have chosen to give up hope and quit then and there. But Ritsuka's desire to live had been too strong to allow that, so she'd fought, even if it meant taking on such a massive burden by herself.

"So you continued your journey and it has taken you as far as this realm." Takame knew how it was. Sometimes you take something simple up and revelations upon revelations build up to the point you know nothing else but to forge ahead.

That you need to forge ahead no matter how heavy the weight became.

"I understand. At least to some degree."

"It's not just that I was the only Master, but if I wanted to live, I had to keep fighting."

At least, that's how it started out. Sure, there was the grand goal of saving all of humanity, but that's just an abstraction. What really drove a sixteen year old to make her way through all that was simply the will to live, herself.

Maybe things are a little different now, but... Well, it's complicated.

"I see. From the outset there was but one option for you, then. Anyone would want to keep their life. To the bitter end we fight and live and learn." In one fleeting moment thou must live, die and know. She is young, of course she would want to live her life. She had the spirit.

Takame didn't know the extent of her circumstances, but even someone as emotionally inept as him could sense strength of spirit. She had that in spades.

"Ah, I've asked you so many questions but answered few in return. Please, if there is anything else about this realm you wish to ask I'll be glad to answer." Said pulling something from his pocket. It's a smartphone.

"Did you receive one of these when you arrived?"

"A smartphone? I'm not--"

Actually, hang on, let her check her pockets quick. Funny thing is, when you're so used to getting whisked away to other worlds with little to no warning, you don't stop to check and see if anything else is weird.

And look, sure enough, a similar phone is produced!

"Huh, when'd that get there?"

There it was. Same place Takame found his all those months ago, in a random pocket. Right, this was where he could make himself useful.

"When you entered this city, that phone will appear on your person somewhere. I don't know for sure how, but regardless it is how the rest of is in this realm communicate. At least those of us with awareness of magic.

The Libra app is used for that purpose, run by Zodiac. I'd advise placing your faith more in the users than in Zodiac itself, though twice per month they make themselves known with announcements." Through their conversations, Takame had maintained a mostly neutral tone. But when speaking about Zodiac there's a subtle but noticeable sourness that accompanied it.

[You are not safe, Cu Chulainn.]

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