Akiko nodded as she made her purchases, also buying an extra Serei slot when she had gotten her card back since it couldn't hurt to have one extra one in her pocket... maybe two. Yeah, two was much better than one. Brought her up to the starting hand size in that one weird card game she remembered her brother playing. Magiyoh? Something like that.
Her new card, however, definitely interested her. Along with the arrow, of course, but the card mainly was what tantalized her. It was a little creepy to see such a mushroom man on her card, but she shrugged and simply wrote it off as she summoned the new card to see what he was like.
"Rise, Bonesword the Hellish Wood."As if on cue, in a dark cloud of a sickly green smoke, a skeletal figure of what could barely be described as someone once human stepped out. Their ribs were covered in the same fungus that weaved in and out of broken bones, some looking much older than others, and almost as if the body was an amalgamation of two different skeletons that were mashed together. Parts didn't seem to match with other ones but, somehow, likely due to the fungus, the body moved fluently as one whole organism, like this body had been very well known by the user.
"We have been summoned." The skeletons voice echoed, two distinctive voices speaking at the same time, in the same pitch, almost like a unity of two souls.
"We taste the light of a new area. Who would summon us to such a location..." The being gazed around the bar with hollow sockets, the lights within gazing along all different forms but finally resting onto Akiko.
"You."They stood straight, eyes dimming, and finally galling into a bow.
"We are your Serei. Our name is Bonesword, second in command to the great general Ira of Hell." He stood once again and waited a moment, seemingly wanting Akiko to act, which she... well, did. Her eyes flashed in the familiar
glint as she got what she needed to from Bonesword, and as she realized more and more things about this husk of a knight, a crooked grin grew across her face.
"You'll fit in well. For now, you are dismissed, Hellish Wood. Trust me, I'll call on you when the time comes." As he was dismissed, Bonesword fell into a pile on the ground, quickly beginning to turn to dust in the wind and completely dissipating back into a card form. Interesting card, and a
fine addition to her collection of cards.
The next order of business she wanted to address was simple - this arrow. The glint from earlier definitely helped key her into how this arrow worked, but only in one vague way - she needed to stab herself with it. Ok, maybe stab was the wrong word, but it needed to pierce through her for her actually work. So, she took the arrow in her hand, and took a deep breath.
"I dunno if this is gonna hurt, but here goes..." Within one fluid motion, Akiko jammed the arrow into her shoulder, the head diving through fairly cleanly and coming out the other end, covered in blood but the wound itself didn't seem to start bleeding, likely from Akiko's other hand holding the Red Relic to keep the blood from going all over the place. She didn't wanna get kicked out of Cait's Bar juuuust yet.
"Yeah, that hurt alright..." she grunted, reaching around to pull the arrow all the way through and allow for the Red Relic to clot the wound properly. It certainly wouldn't be flawless anymore, but a scar was fine if this arrow awoke something in her... which, so far, though nothing had appeared around her, she was fairly certain that she was less alone in this moment, even with the 3 people she had in card form. Regardless, she tucked away the bloody arrow into wherever her inventory was, just in case she needed it later.
If Cait had bothered to look at Akiko's card, she'd clearly notice that something, was coalescing from behind her. It was too blurry to make out at the moment, but it was certainly forming from seemingly nowhere.
"Alright, my bloody shoulder aside, who's the new kid?" Akiko asked in reference to Thomas, who had just entered the room and everyone had ignored this whole time. Judging from his reaction, this was all new to him, too. It took her only a few seconds to realize what went on.
"Another adventurer. Man, how many people from down below is this place going to bring." She flicked her hair out of her eyes before she stood and walked over to where Rose and Kanbaru were, watching the stranger as she walked.
"Can't you read the sign? This is sort of the hub between different floors of this Tower. Cait can probably explain things to you better, if you want to wake her up." Akiko pointed her thumb towards the barmaid as she walked past, pointing Thomas in the right direction while she made her decision about the next floor.
"Crimson Pact seems fine with me, if we're all moving through to the same floor. Might as well clear out one of the earlier floors before we move to a harder one, in any case." She offered her opinion before she spoke again.
"Plus, I'd trust a world like that to have actual people in it to give us an armorer, compared to how the Grotto is described."
Crimson Flame
Skinner35
PlatinumSkink
