NAGASE ERI

"Nagase-san, right?" Miss Hoshino asks.

Instinctively, I straighten up my posture a bit, standing more at attention when addressed by a teacher. It's a habit I picked up somewhere in the middle of always being coached something back home, I think.

"Yes, sensei. That's me." I reply with a small bow.

Fortunately, slipping back into habits help ease me out of feeling overwhelmed by things most of the time. It's probably something to do with the familiarity of a certain action or way of carrying yourself, like an anchor you can rely on to steady up the ship in rough, unfamiliar seas. Or, something along those lines. To be honest with you, I've only ever been on a boat three times in my life total.

In any case, it's a relief to hear that whatever situation I'd stumbled into seems more or less resolved for now. Nobody's hurt, nor is anyone really in trouble...

Although this Matsuoka guy's— excuse me, his Goddess, Cloacina's— getting a bit of an up-close-and-personal talking to from her. She takes control of his body? That's an odd pact if I've ever heard one. Apparently she needs to ease off on it too...

Only, judging from those tomato-colored ears, she doesn't seem like she's got a complete domain over him.

I bite back a smirk, a skill I've spent years cultivating. You're kinda cruel, aren't you sensei? Poor guy's heart must be going crazy.

I'll throw you a bit of a bone, buddy. You and I are probably gonna need to stick together anyway—

Here's why.

"She does do your accent pretty well, though. Somewhere close to Kobe?" I ask conversationally, having pinged the region at an "almost-certainty" level after the first three words left his mouth. A small chance at Osaka, but I really doubted it.

I'm not as alone as I think I am!

MATSUOKA MINORU

Be still, my heart. Do not focus on how incredibly close Miss Hoshino had been to your face and how you could feel her breath on your ears (You're only focusing on it more, Matsuoka) or Cloacina's constant colour commentary. This entire situation really isn't what I had been expecting when I first entered the simulator rooms; certainly, the future I had originally envisaged did not contain two irritated upperclassmen and being lectured by a pretty teacher-ack (=D). I flush again, taking two quick rapid steps backwards before I embarrass myself further. I will not be able to uphold the faith the bigwigs have in their students in this manner!

It's absolutely necessary that I find a way out of these circumstances, and I am immensely thankful for the interruption of the newest person to enter the room. I try my best to control the rapid beating of my heart as I turn to the face the girl who had just addressed me; hopefully the redness of my face has died down but if the heat in my cheeks is any indication it's likely still, to use the American expression, a mere stone's throw away from the DPRK in colour.

You truly have the strangest of metaphors, Matsuoka.

Rogue states aside, I immediately take in the new girl's appearance. Her ponytailed-hair is a warm, chestnut brown, a shade uncommon to those with clearly Japanese features like her. Those golden - maybe amber - eyes are quite evident as well. Maybe she has foreign blood in there? She's definitely of a greater height than most girls I've met, although that could be chalked up to the way she carries herself. Does she do sports, then?

More importantly, that accent of hers is faint, but I would recognise another one of us anywhere.

"Amagasaki, yeah," I reply, failing to keep my lips from quirking up into a small smile. "Guessin' yer from Kobe then, mate?"

NAGASE ERI

I smile in turn. Knew it. And luckily for him, it looks like he's already starting to cool down. Literally. I could almost make a dumb joke about me fulfilling the wishes of my patron god with this, but nobody wants to hear that. Instead, I'll just keep things moving right along.

"You bet! Nishinomiya and proud!" I state, folding my arms as I give him a once-over. Now that I see his face, I can tell that in spite of his height, he's younger than I am. The color-coding of his uniform, which I hadn't really paid much attention to at first, confirmed my suspicions for me. Matsuoka is a first-year.

Looks like I've found myself a kouhai.

...Okay, not really a kouhai in any capacity, I know. I'm as new to the school as he is, since I got transferred at the start of the year. But still, he's someone with common ground, and in this crazy place that's an invaluable trait in someone.

"Nice to know some old neighbors are along for the ride too, huh?"

Now, I'm starting to feel a little more like myself. I thank you for that, Matsuoka-kun. You've helped me out in a way I'm sure you could never know.

I'll have to pay you back.

MATSUOKA MINORU

Nishinomiya, huh? It isn't exactly within Kobe proper, but the difference is so utterly miniscule that she's essentially from the city anyway. A gentle warmth fills my chest at meeting someone from the same general area (right next door, in fact) from me. The Kanto plains are a far cry from home in many ways, so it can be positively bizarre dealing with the culture of the easterners.

"Yeah, all these Tokyoites start lookin' at me funny whenevah I open my mouth, yaknow?" I reply, taking note of her uniform and the colouring upon her lapel. She appears to be another upperclassman then. (Upperclasswoman, Matsuoka) I seem to be meeting a lot of upperclassmen today. "Though yer accent sounds pretty standahdised."

Those from Nishinomiya speak in a manner more similar to the Tokyo dialect than we do; Amagasaki is pretty Kansai through and through.

"Anyway, nice ta meetcha senpai," I continue, bowing to her in greetings. "The name's Matsuoka Minoru. With the kanji for 'pine', 'hill' and 'to bear fruit'."

Jen accepted the tap on the head gracefully, because her normal reaction to someone's attempt to touch her hair had ended with her being accidentally tossed into a wall the last time she'd objected. Maybe she should have asked Ruriko to wait whilst she got a teacher, but how was she to know that someone that started off seeming irritated hadn't snapped under the pressure and decided on fights to the death?

That god, though, spouting off about their own power... sure, maybe she could have told actual trajectory of the weapons at that point. But it was obvious that they had no practice at this sort of thing if they thought there was any danger. If they weren't practised with these sorts of fights, then...

A now angry-again blonde stomped up to Minoru and kept waiting for an opening to speak that wouldn't get drowned out by the babble about hometowns. When none was forthcoming, she simply pointed a finger at the boy and started anyway. "Hey, god, I don't care if you think you're better than me: listen up!

"Stop being cocky! Nobody wants you to step in and mess things up. You don't even know how things work, idiot. Your stupid power would've been useless if I'd turned the cutting off and there's no way you would have been able to stop that in time. Watch some videos of the last tournament and see what we're supposed to be doing!

"You must be going senile if you think anyone would want to follow some shitty god like you... and I think Tsu would be mad if she heard you saying things like that about the students."

Rant finished, and feeling a bit better about it, the blonde girl crossed her arms and waited for permission to leave. It wasn't like she was going to be getting any training done in this room, so she may as well get changed and go home.

---

"The hard part would be convincing someone that maybe we should take advantage of all the training tech to make it less dangerous. We'd have to win to be listened to, but that means having to put up with the thing we need to change in the first place... politics is such a bore."

The redhead closed her eyes again, slightly irritated that the sun had sunken lower over the course of the conversation in such a way that it was now shining right at her face. Pity that she didn't have arms at the moment to shade them with. Well, she could just lie down the other way round if it got too annoying...

There seemed to be a bit of conversation, things relaxing... though Ruriko certainly didn't feel relaxed. What was all that supposed to mean?! What, that an outside observer could predict her moves better then she could? Even when it was a goddess, Ruriko still felt insulted. Her glare returned to laying on the boy, but before she could speak up, the other girl spoke up before her, landing quite a rant at the goddess inhabiting the boy's body.

Akira was quick to step between them all, interposing herself into the verbal conflict.

"That's enough!" she began, "There was a lot done wrong here, but fighting about it will get us no-where. I think everyone needs to leave the room and cool off immediately."

She glanced back at Matsuoka for a moment. That goddess in there... she was so sure of herself about some things. It was hard to say that a goddess wouldn't know anything, but a lot of things about the scenario felt wrong to the teacher.

"..."

Ruriko glared for a few more moments, before turning towards the door.

"I guess I'll train somewhere with less idiots," she said, before huffing and marching for the doorway.

NAGASE ERI

"Matsuoka Minoru, got it. Good to meet you to, Matsuoka-kun! I'm Nagase Eri, using 'Long', 'Rapids', 'English', and 'Pear tree'. I guess being closer to the city did kind of tame it a bit."

For all our talk about regionalisms, life has just been getting more and more interconnected at every level. It's an interesting phenomenon that, with the advent of the digital age, seemed to be taking off especially hard in our generation. Though, that might not have anything to do with the accent yet, as far as I'm aware those die fairly hard.

It must just be a Nishinomiyan thing.

The foreigner who's fight his goddess had stepped in on apparently was waiting patiently for a small break in our conversation, and now addresses Cloacina-sama directly. My bad about that, I just got a little excited to hear a slice of home here. I didn't mean to completely take over. Please, go ahead and continue resolving this.

Matsuoka-kun turns about-face, and is met with a deluge of vitriol directed squarely at his patron Goddess.

Oh.

"Uh oh..." I murmur lowly.

So much for an easy resolution. I really admire your guts, but did you have to follow it up with a direct insult to her and an indirect one to Matsuoka-kun? Airing your grievances is one thing, and I get what you're saying about needing to train close to live combat—

But if you're looking for that, I don't think picking a fight like this is the way to go.

Is that just a western thing, maybe? Venting about people directly to their faces?

Luke always did say they wear their hearts much more on their sleeves over there...

Akira-sensei is quick to break everything up before it escalates further, thankfully enough. She's pretty sensible. I think it would be best if everyone here cooled off a little too, ma'am. But wait, do I have to leave too?

I'm contracted to Kuraokami-sama. I can cool myself off pretty quick if you'd like.

My ice puns are not going to be a thing, I promise.

The caped one marches off my way in a huff, scoffing that she'd train somewhere with fewer idiots on her way out the door. It crosses my mind to approach her and offer to train together, but I got a strong feeling I'd have just been lumped in with "the idiots" and blown off squarely.

I do have to get some rounds in somehow, though.

"Sensei, is this room going to just be out of commission with the gash, or is it still alright to use?"

I mean, I did just get here, so I should be good, right?

MATSUOKA MINORU

Even though I'm personally not the target of that vitriolic tirade, having the white girl jab a finger hostilely in my direction and start ranting still feels hurtful. It's Cloacina that she's started a feud with, but writing me off as acceptable collateral damage makes me want to shrink in on myself, and it doesn't particularly endear me to this girl either. I don't want to be treated like an innocent civilian caught in the blast radius of one of an American drone strike. The purpose for my visit to the training room was to, as the name suggests, train myself in preparation for the big shindig that is the tournament; I didn't expect to be dragged into such a commotion, nor did I expect Cloacina's actions to irritate two upperclassmen to the extent where any future working relationship with them has, to use the American expression, been dragged kicking and screaming around the back of the house and shot dead.

I try and open my mouth up to stammer out a response, but my throat suddenly seizes. Cloacina, what are you plann-

"Yer what they call tsun tsun!" she declares brightly, my face nearly splitting open with the force of her smile. I can't actually see or feel it, but I am very sure that my hijacked eyes are a twinkling blue right now. 'Tsun tsun'? Your pronunciation was horrid, and I don't even know what the context of that is. 'To turn away in disgust'? She does look disgusted at me, but I don't think white people understand horribly garbled Japanese, Cloacina.

This is truly akin to the concept prevalent in late night Japanese animation!

What.

In an incredibly frustrating yet perfectly predictable course of events, I don't get any reply from her, because my left arm is already in motion, moving upwards to tap a pondering index finger against my cheek. Please don't ruin my reputation any further, Cloacina. My day has already gone to heaven in a handbasket.

The correct word is 'hell', Matsuoka.

"It is goin' ta be difficult change my job," she notes aloud to herself before I can get another thought in edgewise. I think she's completely brushed off the white girl's existence already. Or maybe she hasn't. I lack the capability to read her feelings and memories. "I already deal with human faeces rather oft? Do I need'ta start smitin' people more fer worshippers? Jehovah always had lots of folks visitin' his place next door and he was an excellent smiter."

Suddenly, the upperclassman is directly in my field of vision. Cloacina is staring at her.

I feel very cold.

"It is very becoming of yer barbarian heritage," she says rather sweetly, in a tone of voice that my mouth rarely brings to bear, "that you have yet to apologise to young Matsuoka for your outburst. If you seek quarrel with my course of action, feel free, foederati, but no matter whether or not I may have made a mistake, such behaviour rarely garners sympathy."

Orimono

A sense of urgency trails behind at the fringes of my thought processes—I'm not completely confident that my scheduled combat training hadn't started yet—as I make your way through the tiled hallways to the complete other side of campus. This urgency expressed as more than a slight frantic skip in my gait. This was in no small part the result of the fact that the sun had moved only a bit up from the horizon from when I had first closed my eyes this morning to opening them again.

Or maybe it had been a full day? I didn't really have much time to check the time (or date) between throwing on the uniform and opening my eyes enough to wake up; in that order, mostly.

"There's no sense in rushing," came a youthful voice off to my left side, though I don't feel confident enough with my current motor control skills to spare any visual attention away from the strained relationship of the floor and my feet to see which one of them- It? Which side maybe? was speaking. Some days I know exactly who it was, this wasn't one of them. "A few more minutes now isn't going to make a difference."

The voice is slightly more feminine, that and I catch a glimpse of ribbon-bound raven hair as I round the corner. It was blessing that no one else was present in the hall to see my legs forgetting how to work just long enough to half slide, half stumble into my new direction of motion.

"And there is a much faster way to get around." This time from the right side. I know exactly what she's referring to, and it makes my (empty) stomach churn from the thought.

"Oh god, no," I realize the futility of addressing a god with the phrase only after it leaves my mouth. Brain to mouth filter being another causality of possibly under/oversleeping.

Moving five feet was hard enough that way, pulling oneself instantly across the academy was a less than inviting prospect. Being shoved halfway through a wall would be very less than ideal for my state of mind.

Thankfully, it doesn't have to end that way; the door to the training room was just ahead. I slow down to a more sedate pace as you approach, flattening out the wrinkles in my uniform and running a hand through my hair as I go to at least make the fact that I'd been nearly running not immediately obvious. Unfortunately, I were so focused on that, it's not until I pass through the door and run straight into a student (Ruri-something or another?) leaving the room that I realize the facility is currently occupied.

"Oh hey."

Naturally, Omecihuatl chooses that moment to bail on me.

"You uh, wouldn't happen to know what time it is?"

@Crimmy@HereComesTheSnow@VitaVitaAR@Raineh Daze

Makoto sighed and rubbed the back of his head. She was right. They had to win and thus they had to do the things they don't want to do. "Maybe I should make that my goal to win instead of just thinking of the pride of the school." He said before following it up with a light chuckle.

Noticing that his senior closed her eyes, he curiously asked, "Are you feeling sleepy? I can go if you want." He honestly said. Makoto did disturb her earlier so if she wanted him to leave, he would happily oblige. There were tons of students out there anyway. The thought of training crossed his mind but he quickly threw that out. Maybe tomorrow.

The goddess's retaliation was directed entirely at thin air; the blonde had taken the teacher's immediate suggestion and left the room. Had she stayed to listen, the most pertinent point after working out that it was a Roman goddess that had gone and messed things up would have been that she wasn't a barbarian. It might have been years since she'd been in English history lessons but it wasn't like she had completely forgotten that Roman Britain was a thing--or that towards the end, everyone was a citizen. Unless the goddess was going to call even the people of Rome barbarians...

Nonetheless, Jen remained blissfully unaware of her mistaken nationality as she stepped past a student heading the other way and headed for the changing rooms. Back into uniform, go home and get changed again, then make dinner, probably. It wasn't like anyone was going to stop her if she stayed away from delinquents.

---

"I'm not sleepy, it's just the sun," Kaede explained, deciding that it really was too much of a bother to stay like this and sitting up only to lie down once more, with the sun behind rather than in her face. There probably wasn't too long she could stay before having to go home and help with her siblings, especially putting the smaller ones to bed. They seemed to find her enormous strength with those arms a challenge...

"Do you have any brothers or sisters, Makoto-kun?"

"Oi oi, when I said everyone leave and cool down, that meant you too, goddess," said a sighing Akira, placing her hand on the boy's shoulder ... and forcing him down to her level again, leaving him a casualty in her attempts to admonish a deity once more. Really, this was just getting way too out of hand. Next time she had any of the students in her PE class, she'd have to work them extra hard so they could get these frustrations out. That only made sense, didn't it?

Her hand still forcing the boy down, she glanced over towards the girl who had entered later.

"The room should still be working fine," she explained, "I'll even be hanging around to make sure nothing else happens here. Even if they're not typically damaged like that, they're made to handle this kind of thing. The floor's not going to stop the simulations from working."

---

Ruriko's irritable march out of the training room continued, even as she heard the commotion behind her. That didn't matter, aside from making her a fair bit more annoyed about everything involved in the situation. The mock battle she'd started had been completely ruined. She'd have to train elsewhere. Someone with less stupid people. There were other training rooms, or she could even simply head home... yes, going home could also pose an excellent option. The Adachi family mansion held a rather large outdoor area that could allow for training.

Ruriko would simply pick the option that lead to the least annoyance.

But then another girl ran right into her. The tiny black-haired girl stumbled back for a moment with a yelp of surprise, before catching herself. Her annoyance swelled, after nearly being knocked over, and she looked up at the other girl in frustration. Really? She must not have been watching where she was going at all.

"It's probably around five," Ruriko said, irritation evident in her tone, "But your inattentiveness makes me wonder exactly how much training would help you."

"...I... I was..."

Today was quickly becoming one of Ushio's more embarrassing experiences, the young maid found. Why did Hiromi have to question her so much...? Then again, why couldn't she just answer honestly? It wasn't like changing in the bathroom was all that shameful, right? Probably? Yet it seemed to be an action far beyond Ushio's capabilities. The far easier thing to do was clearly to just move on and forget!

Darting a few paces forward, Ushio slapped on a nervous grin as she faced the drill-haired girl and said, "N-nevermind! We should hu-hurry, the, uh... the food might get cold! Y-yeah, that!"

Sakamori took a deep breath. God, she hoped that this wouldn’t be a mistake.

“A simple spar. No Ritual Technology, no other weapons either. I will make sure to supervise. I won’t let anything happen to either combatants.”

“Now we could go down and find a classmate willing to have a spar with you or-”

Here came the leap of faith.

“If you don’t have any objections, I could be your opponent. I have the necessary training and qualifications to ensure that your spar doesn’t result in anything … unfortunate.”

She held her breath, fingers absentmindedly brushing over the flask in her back pocket. Dammit, why was she so nervous about this? He was just a student. She looked at him, glanced at the hands that had almost bludgeoned someone to death. She could still see the after-image of the blood splatters on his palms. She banished the image from her mind and returned her focus to retaining her calm demeanour. She wasn’t going to let this student endure his pain any longer just because she couldn’t keep her pokerface.

“Of course it doesn’t have to happen today,” she added a bit hastily, “but I would recommend that you address the problem sooner than later.”

@Renny

Orimono

"Oh, uh okay." The set of three words was really all I could put together at the moment. She was shorter than me, but it did nothing to lessen the surprise of the impact. Or the impact of her rather barbed observation. Contrary to what she must have thought about me at that moment (great way to introduce yourself), I wasn't totally blind. So I was rather aware now of the almost literal waves of annoyance rolling off of her, so I did my best not to get pulled under. Drowning in irritation is not how I wanna go out.

I step around her carefully. And then another step to get out of her way for good measure, considering the fact that she's got a sword.

"Thanks. I'll keep that in mind. Uh, sorry?"

"The food we haven't ordered yet, Ushio-chan?"

Hiromi raised an eyebrow, tilting her head slightly to one side as she did. They hadn't even picked a place they were going to eat at yet. Expecting that excuse to actually work out was, quite frankly, a little bit hilarious. Ushio was so nervous about these things, oh dear. How ever could such a thing be remedied? The blonde girl shrugged her shoulders slightly.

"If you're having trouble telling me what the problem was, maybe I should just make it easier for you," she began, putting on a pleasant smile as her gaze returned to her friend and maid. A little distance away, the person who was on the bench seemed to keep shifting about and adjusting her position. Maybe the sun was getting to her or something, it wasn't relevant.

"As your master, Ushio-chan," Hiromi continued, "I order you to tell me why you're not in uniform... and then to rectify that situation as soon as humanly possible."

---

"... Hmph."

Ruriko folded her arms. While she had things to do, it was clear that this girl needed some kind of direction. After all, she seemed to have just been blindly marching forward like that...

"It's not as if my performance in the tournament will be at all effected by your own," she continued, not even deigning to look back up at the other girl as she spoke, "But you're still representing this school. Someone being so inattentive will surely be defeated quickly, so you should certainly work on that."

It wasn't often that she went out of her way to do things like this, but now? Not only was she annoyed, but this girl seemed to have just blindly stumbled into her. There was no way she'd simply let that lie, and to Ruriko that action spoke volumes to her about just how competent the girl would be in a fight.

"It would be almost humiliating to have a fellow student eliminated because of a total failure to pay attention, after all, wouldn't it?" she added, finally looking back up a the taller girl with an eyebrow raised, "Hmph. I'd certainly feel that way about something so stupid."

Orimono

"I agree," I mused, taking in what the snappy sword-wielding girl had said. She did... kinda have a point. So maybe there could be some improvements made in some, uh, broad areas of my martial ability. Okay, I'm one to admit it first, but I'm certainly not going to be the last to realize it. Despite the fact that she rather obviously wasn't having the most stellar of days-I couldn't have run into her that hard, right?-it couldn't be all just be her venting off some steam. "It would reflect badly on our academy as a whole; I'd hate to be the sole reason for it-"

I stifled a yawn, or did my best too. Talking so much made me kinda light headed. Or maybe it was the impact. Or lack of sleep. Or someone had yawned nearby, I heard they're contagious. Might wanna start wearing a mask. Are they transmitted through the air, or is through sound? Wait, no, I hadn't heard anyone yawn, that couldn't be it. This isn't a very controlled setting, thou-

You're staring.

My eyes widened momentarily, and it took a moment to realize that it wasn't my voice in my head.

Of course, it was then that an idea sprung into my head, and I smiled, only slightly down, towards the girl.

"You seem awfully competent; perhaps you would be able to help my, uh, inattentiveness?"

She did have a sword, after all.

Makoto watched as his senior positioned herself so that the sun won't bother her anymore. So that's the reason. He then looked at the position of the sun then to his watch. Hm, it was getting late. Well, he doesn't have to worry about much anyway considering that there wasn't really much to do back home.

"Two younger brother and sister. Twins actually." He replied. Playing with them was the best. They were living the normal life though. Apparently, they weren't interested in the whole ritual technology thing so they didn't undergo training like him. Ah well.