middaeg | [OPEN] rainy and sticky days

Who: Wataru & YOU!
When: All of Mareuer
Where: In and out of town
What: Catch-all for the month! Quests, events, and others. Open prompts under the cut. HMU if you want a close thread!
Warnings: NSFW in one of the threads, a corpse in one of the prompts, Kivat being Kivat, and that's it.

i; research request — i fucking love reading

[ A simple enough request that gives me an excuse to look around the library. Though he's strictly ordered to just look up books about chimeras and similar, he can't help himself and skims through a few unrelated shelves, curious about what he could find about this world. His free time has been cut off a lot since he started working, so now is a chance like another to catch up.

He's in the process of piling a few books when he sees another person seemingly into the research. He smiles softly. ]

Are you also looking up chimeras, by chance?

ii; hungry grass — rest in pizzas

[ Wataru brought more than just a sandwich, in case the situation called for him staying in the grass further than necessary. He ended up dawning down more than half his share while investigating, without even realizing it. Kivat might even praise him for getting more fat into his exceedingly slim body, but that's besides the point.

When the corpse comes into view, he feels a sudden wave of nausea hitting him. He'd seen a lot of humans getting turned into nothing but only their clothes when the Fangire sucked all their life essence out. He also witnessed the Fangire themselves shatter into pieces of glass when they died. But an actual human corpse, just laying there and rotting? That's something he's still not quite used to seeing in plain view.

He notices he's still got a piece of pizza in his mouth, and he shoves it back into his bag. He's no longer hungry. ]

I guess that answers it. [ He tells the companion who came to investigate with him, although it sounds even ridiculous to him that a dead body would cause hunger-inducing grass to grow around it. So he adds, as an afterthought, ] ... Probably.

iii; kivat option — stuck in the moment

[ Kivat Bat the 3rd loved wandering around with no purpose, interacting with people and playing pranks sometimes. As Wataru's familiar, he's the complete opposite of him: chatty, loud, and brutally honest. He got around making a few friends among the monsters thanks to his attitude, but with those came also enemies he pissed off either on purpose or by accident.

So one day he gets his comeuppance. A cat turnskin managed to capture him, wrap him up in tape, and trap him under a half dozen sacks of fertilizer. Bad luck wills that the weather is especially bad today, and a rainstorm pours in the area with no one noticing that the sacks are soaking up in the street.

Muffled by the tape, his voice can still be felt faintly in a pitiful "EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE" sound that might as well be ominous if he wasn't pissed off while wildly wriggling and trying to break out. That turnskin is a dead monster.

Wonder if anyone manages to find him before Wataru does? ]

iv; wildcard

[ The prompts are mostly for quest shenanigans but there are still other things Wataru will do throughout the month! He will...
- Help experiment for the sake of vampires in the Desmodus Mori quest;
- Be out of the city and assist the infected when he's not at his job;
- Frequent the Coven, especially the Abjuration and Evocation classes;
- Work at DiplomaTea as a server/musician;
- Walk his petalwolf Dahlia around, play with the orhphans and refugee children, etc.
- Probably be around for full moon shenanigans if you want something hotter.
- Event shenanigans, possibly, when they come around.

Let me know if you want a specific closed thread! PP me at gaiamemories or send me a PM. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Leslie also loves reading and would like to read...basically the entire library. But if she’s told to only look up the books she asked about, she will only look up those books. She looks regretfully at the other shelves, but makes her way to a section where she thinks she’ll find information on the requested research.

She wasn’t expecting someone to talk to her while she was in the library, so she looks surprised as she looks up at him. ]

Yes? ...Oh, I’m sorry, did you need this one?

[ She holds up a book in both hands that is too thick and heavy for her to lift with one hand. It seems to be about Monster physiology of some kind. ]

[ If his hands weren't full of books, he would have waved a hand in apology for startling her. ]

Oh, no. I'm sorry for approaching you all of a sudden. [ In retrospect, he should have been a bit more delicate. ] I just wanted to know, because I thought it would be easier if we helped each other with the research?

[ He makes sure to leave that a question, just so she won't think he's imposing on her. ]

[ Her surprise continues for a moment, but then there is some measure of relief that it would be cooperation instead of competing over the books, with a bit of uncertainty mixed in. ]

I don’t know if I’d be much help. I’ve never worked together with someone else on anything like this, and I’m a witch who has only been here a month, besides. [ The uncertainty gives way to a more determined look. ] But if you still want to work together, I will do my best!

[ Wataru nods in acknowledgement. There had been many new arrivals last month, and of course he couldn't keep up with them all. Her doubts are something that mirror Wataru's from when he first arrived to Aefenglom. He recognizes them, and is also quick to try waving them off, kind of like how some people helped him find his worth as a Witch in an unknown world. ]

That's alright. A little help is better than no help at all, and I'm sure you'll do fine anyway. [ He didn't miss that determined look of hers. ] Let's find a table to put all these books on.

[ Before they proceed, though: ] I'm Wataru. I've been here for a few months, and I'm a witch as well.

[ Leslie sets her book down on the floor as she stands up, because for her, introductions are accompanied by a low curtsy. ]

My name is Leslie, and -- I guess you know that information for me. Please treat me well.

[ She straightens back up fully before she crouches back down to pick up the book. ] Lead the way, Mr. Wataru.

[ It's a bit awkward, but he supposes she's either old fashioned or from a time where, if it were like his home world, would be a couple centuries back. On the western side. He nods in return, something of a bow, trying not to knock the books off his arms. ]

Nice to meet you, Leslie... ah, over there.

[ He nods again, in the direction of a free table. He can hear the murmurs and mumbles coming from other researches nearby, but he's not bothered. A sigh comes out of him when he can finally dump the books, as gently as possible. His arms hurt a bit. ]

Alright... [ He sits down across from her. ] Should we begin with the book you've found?

[ The modern day of her world would definitely seem closest to that kind of time period, but she was also taught her manners strangely even for her own world.

She follows along and pushes her book up onto the table with a similar sigh. She's only carrying one book, but she's also about the size of the average nine or ten-year-old. She similarly has to jump slightly to get into the chair, which isn't designed with her size in mind, but it's less extreme than most of the chairs in the Salvatore mansion, so she feels quite comfortable like that. ]

All right. [ She opens the cover to the title page: An Encyclopaedia of Monster Physiologies. ] I think it's about the bodies of -- um, the various kinds of people who live here. I haven't seen the world...physio-logy, but it's similar to the word physical, and the infirmary had something about a physician, and logy sounds like logic, so it's probably taking a logical approach to bodies. Or...something like that?

[ Picking one book off the top of his pile, Wataru reads the title briefly and hums in wonder as he opens it. ]

... I think that's it. I'm not very knowledgeable of those matters. [ A sheltered individual he used to be, and surely didn't have the time to resume going to school when he had to fight for his life. ] If it explains the anatomies of monsters, I think that's a good point we could start with.

[ He flips a few pages of his book. ]

This one is about the history of monsters in Aefenglom. I guess it's not as helpful, but maybe there could be a few comparisons to be made between chimeras and dragons?

[ Same hat, even if "sheltered" isn't quite the right word for her childhood. Leslie shakes her head. ]

I don't think it's unhelpful. It's -- if ana...anatomies [she doesn't know the word but she can guess from context] are showing us things about what things are happening inside one person, then a history would be showing us what things are happening on the outside of a lot of them.

[ She glances away. ]

And, um. I don't really know anything about anatomies, but I've learned a little history. Even if it's only history from my own planet.

[ A smart child. Wataru smiles at her effort. He shouldn't do any less work here just because he knows less than someone more cultured than him. ]

If you put it that way, it makes sense. [ He hums in thought. ] How about we trade our books? I'll look through the anatomy one while you search through the history.

[ Wataru pushes the book a bit forward, as a further offer. ]

[ Leslie nods firmly. She will accomplish this task set before her or die trying. ]

That sounds like it would be more efficient. Have you read about anat-tomy before?

[ Even if he hasn't, she knows she hasn't for sure and he did make the offer, so she pushes her own book forward as well, slightly to one side of the one he's pushing forward, and reaches for his book. ]

[ The exchange has been made. Wataru withdraws the book and opens it, giving it a few skims through the pages. Understanding all of this might be harder on him than it might be for Leslie to search her own thing. But it doesn't mean he's going to give it up entirely. ]

Hm... [ He finally answers her question. ] I honestly have not, but I can still give it a shot? I'm not completely hopeless in this...

[ He tried to give his sentence some humour, but it falls flat immeditely. Jokes are not his thing. ]

[OPEN] rainy and sticky days

i. research request

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