Receiving the order from the named party leader to spend the night indulging in merriment was as good of a reason as Kaite needed to assume the meeting was over. Since the soldier salary had yet to be provided, she was left to assume that it would be on her own dime. While it seemed a few stayed for questions, Kaite took her leave with a flourish of their tattered cloak to throw it back around herself.
She spent a good few hours at the field where she freed her horse and wondering if she could get it to come back since walking would be arduous, and the idea of sharing a horse made her feel weird. A few kids had shown up during the meeting and appeared to be playing with wooden swords, acting out a battle against a few dummies. It was all imagination and childplay, but Kaite found it funny how they tried throwing their weapons and doing other silly moves like spinning into a melee with the inanimate figures.
Their innocence was certainly admirable, given the state of the world right outside the gates, and the thoughts drew her back to the ring which she removed from her pack. She turned it around between clawed gauntlet digits. "A wishing ring...how quaint" she muttered before sighing and clearing her throat with a small cough. "Eru? I wish I knew what to do with the day I have in this-" Kaite began, likely about to go down the road of insulting the city before a small voice shouted "Look out!" a second before she was sent reeling from one of the swords cracking against her helmet.
"Gawd! Look what you did!" One of the children shouted at the other as they ran over to Kaite who was knocked down from her sitting position as a result of being clocked. "You saw it! The wind caught it!" Another pleaded in their defense as the sword seemingly arced through the air to seek out the knight who reached over to grab the wooden sword. "Grrrah! I d'n care which of ye threw it! At least pretend t'know what you're doing, y'little brats!" Kaite barked in her inelegant dialect, standing up and running a finger over the dent in the metal before it simply popped back into place. Noting that the armor had fixed itself into place from the strike which none of the kids could have thrown hard enough to inflict, she sighed and walked over to the kids who'd begun to take steps back as she approached, offering hasty apologies and claims of not knowing how it happened.
"Look..." Kaite began, her temper easing as she remained unharmed as per the armor's design, "...swords are fun, but ye have to be careful with them. You could hurt someone that you do not want to" her tone threateningly implying that she was still sore over the endeavor, though she handed the wooden sword back to the child who obviously lost it.
They nervously edged forward to take the instrument back and one of the kids in back looked down at their own glorified stick and back to Kaite before asking, "Y-you are a knight, right?" The question seemed a bit silly as Kaite was clad in armor, obscured by a cloak that may have made her seem a bit of the hoods-and-helmets rougish type, but it was a question none the less. "Yeh, and you're what, ten?" Kaite spat, the wit being rude and childish enough for one of the kids in back to stifle a chuckle. She felt like a bit of a jerk for being that way to kids, but they didn't seem to have the mature sensitivities of the rest, her kind of people.
"W-well!" the kid came back to say, "Maybe...you could show us? -How to fight?"
The question took Kaite aback, and if only the kids could see the bewilderment on her face as she looked down at the ring in her hand. With a scoff and a laugh, she put the ring away and started walking back to the setup, patting the kid who spoke on the shoulder. "Yeh, why not. If it'll keep y'all from makin' fools of yourselves" she chirped, the kids excitedly chasing after her.
The next few hours involved various stretching exercises, stance explanation and slow-paced duels for her students to get a feel for the technique before drilling performance on the dummies...just like Kaite's training with her mother back home. However, the tactics were a bit shady since it involved a psychology lesson as well as the sharing of a common rule shared by Ispar's guard: 'pain and the threat of pain is often just as effective as a lethal strike, and often easier'. With this, the kids were irresponsibly taught about kneecapping and knuckle-cracking...with a few of the unruly types earning bruised knuckles from the supposed slow-paced duels getting out of hand. Kaite was certain to give them an earful about taking it seriously. Though they were kids, she still managed to keep their attention well enough to explain wolf-pack tactics, since they were in a group and it quickly devolved into a sort of game of soccer where the kids had to work together to get one of the dummy's heads past Kaite. Needless to say, they hadn't anticipated her reflexes and only won when she convincingly pretended to twist an ankle during a juke.
The sun began to set and the kids were exhausted. Kaite was intent on leaving to find lodging for the night, but her quick reply was responded to with a shout from one of the kids. "Same time tomorrow!?" the words came, stopping the knight in her tracks. "I have a mission from the council. I'm...not sure I'll be back" she said, back turned to the children as she pulled up her hood. There was a tense moment of silence, Kaite waiting for a few seconds before moving to take a step only to be stopped once more by a call of "Wait!"
She turned around, assuming an impatient stance with a hand on her hip.
"Could you...show us something?" They asked, a question that earned no response save for a breeze catching the cloak that billowed like feathers. "You never touched your sword...c-can you..." another kid asked, looking over to the dummies who were a bit worse for wear at this point. Kaite took a moment for dramatic effect before reaching back to draw the full long sword to a chorus of easily impressed gasps. "Just stand back" she ordered with an annoyed huff, shrugging off her pack. While she didn't know what could impress the kids at first, a thought of a trick she developed while rolling with a few bandits shortly after arriving to the mainland came to mind.
"Holy shit, Jericho!" The man laughed, wiping a bit of splatter from his face and clapping along with the rest while I rose from my kneeling stance. "Waaaait for it!" I barked before quickly standing, spinning the sword.
The kids watched with wide eyes as the two halves of the dummy's head sailed through the air. Kaite stood with her sword held aloft and back to the mess, the setting sun glinting amber rays from the polished blade. Sweeping the implement of destruction to the side, she cast off any lingering stuffing and gave the sword a twirl between her fingers before returning it to the sheath on her back in one swift motion.
The children's imagination raced as their eyes went from the dummy's splayed open chest to the halves of its head and then back to the body as it creaked and messily fell in two. "There ya go...one dead bandit" she lied, the actual story being far less noble. Regardless the kids ate it up and cheered as hard as they could, rushing to collect the remains and try to imitate what they'd just seen...a reenactment of her dealings with her first bountyhunter.
Kaite had already begun walking away as the chants "Kaite! Kaite! Kaite!" roared behind her. She lifted her sword arm to the side, clutching her midnight-black gauntlet to a fist, giving it a shake before opening to offer a small wave. Behind the visor, a stern expression softened with a slight smirk as even the voices had quieted. Pulling the ring out once more to look down at it, Kaite flipped it like a coin before returning it to the pack with a satisfied sigh. While she didn't trust things like magic or charms, a warmth in her chest after hanging out with the kids made her feel good inside; turning something ugly into something amazing easily replaced the memory in her mind of the poor slaughtered boy.
