MGP Chapter 1: [Untitled]

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As Nao fell asleep, the last thing he saw of his room, was the ceiling overhead, and the window that he had cut into it, so that he could view the stars from his bed. That night, a large and bright full moon had risen, taking over the sky and bathing the forest in a rare ethereal glow. That night, everything seemed more lively than usual, as if anticipating something. Nao took no notice, as he slipped from the world of reality into the world of dreams.

A vision now crossed his field of vision. There was a hooded black figure, standing over him. Looking to his left and right, Nao saw that his arms were pinned down by arrows, piercing his hands outstretched to his side. Fear overtook Nao as the figure moved ever closer to him, bending down until they were almost touching. Even then though, Nao could not identify the mysterious person, until the person started to remove his hood, revealing himself as--

Nao awoke violently to a loud pounding on the door.  

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Even in his half-asleep state, Nao could easily tell that it was Mei at the door. Her bubbly personality radiated out from her, infusing itself with the very air, seemingly casting a warm glow upon anything in its detectable range. Getting up, he moved towards the door, as the pounding continued. "In a minute, you know?" he said tiredly.

He opened the door to have Mei latch immediately onto his legs. He could tell that she was excited about something.

"Mei here!" she exclaimed. "Mei have something to show Nao!"

"Alright, just let go of my legs and we'll talk, you know?"

Mei did so, and proceeded to show off to Nao the item that hung around her neck.  

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Nao glanced down at the object that Mei held in her hand. It was a pendant, with a water droplet affixed to it. And the longer Nao stared at it, the more he couldn't believe it.

"Where did you get this?" he asked Mei, barely able to contain his own excitement.

I'm not going to monologue.  

[Sky Yam]

I know, I know, I've been bad about this. Once AP testing is over I shall post religiously. xd

Mei shrugged. "Mei found on bookshelf."

Nao nodded. "May I?" he asked, and Mei placed the pendant in his hand. "It's beautiful," he murmured. Does this mean...? He took a closer look - the silvery metal was absolutely flawless, untarnished and gleaming in the light. And he could sense it. Somewhere within the pendant, there lay a huge power. Mei wouldn't be able to sense it - very few of even the most powerful magicians would, for it was not a power that could be detected by skill alone. Mika had passed on the knowledge to find it onto Nao, and he had told no one.

He let none of this show on his face, of course. Nao spent a few more minutes looking at the pendant, then handed it back to Mei.

"Keep it safe with you, you know?" he said with a smile. "That's not something you want to lose, you know?"

Mei gave him a puzzled look. "Is important?"

He considered her question. "You could say that, you know?" he replied. "That's just an unusual necklace, you know? I'd keep it in my sight if I were you, you know?"

Mei nodded slowly. "Okay," she said, and replaced the pendant around her neck.  

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At first, it appeared that nothing would happen. The strange properties that Nao had devoted a fair amount of his time to researching didn't make themselves obvious at first glance. He was starting to believe that it was merely a coincidence that Mei's pendant looked exactly like the pendants the Eterna wore. However, something caught his attention. The spigot in his kitchen had started to drip, something that he had taken magical safeguards against. Moving over to investigate, the dripping had increased to a small but steady flow of water. Looking back towards Mei, he saw that she had taken little notice, as she had found herself a piece of paper and a pencil, proceeding to draw -of all things- an ocean scene.  

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Turning back now towards the spigot, the water flow had now increased to a raging torrent. When Nao tried to stem the flow, he was alarmed by how quickly the water pressure built up, and was forced to release his grip on the magic after only a few seconds, even though he was, by modern standards, an extremely powerful and skilled magician. Turning back now towards Mei, who looked up at the sound of the rushing water, he noticed that the huge power emanating from the pendant was now more distinct, and had a smooth and flowing quality attached to it that Nao attributed to the water. He turned back as he heard a splash, water now drenching the floor as an ever-growing volume of water flowed out of the spigot.

"Nao? Something wrong?" asked Mei.  

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She poked her head into the kitchen and gasped. Her surprise and shock only increased the flow of the water, such that the house started to flood rapidly. Nao's possessions could be seen floating around as the water reached Nao's knee level. Even more alarming was the fact that it quickly reached Mei's waist-level. He quickly splashed over to her and wordlessly picked her up, moving quickly towards the door, as the water reached his neck level.

"Hang on, Mei!" he shouted.

Mei might've said something in return, but Nao lost all hearing as the water submerged his head. Wordlessly using a spell, he propelled himself as quickly as he could towards the door, which broke as the water pressure against it increased to an intolerable level. Nao and Mei floated with the current wordlessly, coughing up water. Nao was only slightly aware that someone had come running over in concern.

"Nao! Mei! Are you okay?" came the familiar voice of Mika.  

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"We're fine, you know?" Nao said, still coughing up water. "We just had a little magic accident, you know?"

"Lots of water," Mei stated.

"I can see that," Mika said, looking over at the house, as the water flooded out, along with Nao's possessions, which curiously, weren't soaked or destroyed at all. "Well, be careful next time. We wouldn't want to lose you two."

And together, Mika, Mei, and Nao worked to gather up Nao's scattered possessions.  

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***

Leagues away, in the Northern Protean Sect, something else entirely different was occurring. The small suburban town of Norgale was a civilized place for the most part. Very little happened here without the express permission of the Makise family, who essentially ran the town. They knew everything, from daily schedules of the workers, to the exact inventory of all the stores and taverns. It was rather hard to escape notice, for the Makise's were very particular about deatils.

"MAID!" called out a shrill voice that seemed to echo from the giant Makise mansion that sit atop a hill overlooking the city. It had come from an adolescent girl, who was the envy of many who dared catch her cold, judging gaze. She glanced towards the door every few seconds, as if impatient.

"Yes, Miss Reiko?"

"Goodness me, you took ten minutes to get here! What were you doing? Scrounging the west wing for gold?" the girl, Reiko retorted. She was not someone to be trifled with.

The maid ignored the retort. "What is it you require, Miss Reiko?"

"Do you see this?" Reiko pointed to a seam on her dress, which she thought was hideous, but worth keeping.

"No..." the maid was uncertain. To her, the dress looked quite... dress-like. To be fair, it was rather hideous and rather offensive on the eyes, but she dared not say anything, lest she be fired from the one job that she had been able to keep for more than a week at a time.

Reiko sighed, exasperated, then got up off her chair and shoved the seam in the maid's face. "You see it now?" There was a minuscule tear in the fabric that was barely noticeable until it was shoved into your face in a rude manner.

"Ah, yes, I do see it," the maid said, with a hint of sarcasm.

But Reiko, being the oblivious, egotistical person that she was, did not pick up upon it. "I want you to repair it immediately. Call up the seamstress from town, I don't care what she's doing, just call her immediately. What was your name again?"

It didn't surprise the maid that the daughter of the master didn't know her name. "Mjoll, Miss Reiko."

"Ah yes, sure, please fix the dress for me."

Reiko took off the dress and proceeded to put on another one, one that was more suited to the cold climate of the Northern sect without being too offensive on the eyes.

"Yes, Miss Reiko."  

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When Mjoll left, Reiko sat back down in her chair and went about returning to her studies. She skimmed through the historical, mathematical, and scientific texts. They were the same each year. In fact, there was much that was uniform about Reiko's life. Every day, she would wake up, eat breakfast, and learn about things she knew by heart. Then, she would spend hours sparring with her private sword instructor, beating him as many times as he beat her. And then she would take care of business. Her mother and father were raising her to be their successor, and it was something that Reiko, actually, did not feel like doing. She always felt that she was destined for something more, but what it may be, she never really knew. For now, she was content with living every day like she did the last, being drilled as the successor and inheritor of the Makise regime in this town of Norgale.  

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"Your dress, Miss Reiko," Mjoll called out a few minutes later.

"Ah yes, good job," Reiko said, taking back the dress and closing the door without thanking Mjoll.

Reiko tried on the dress again and looked in the mirror. There was something different about the dress, and she could feel it. There was a slight pressure on her leg as she looked at herself in the mirror, something that hadn't been there before. She quickly took off the dress and flung it away from her, afraid that it was some creature that had crawled in there. Reiko had had bad experiences with animals before and this seemed to be no exception, but when no critter crawled out of its pockets, she deemed it safe to approach and reached into the pocket in question. Her hands touched and felt the shock of cool metal. Recoiling slightly, she moved again to pull the object out. It was a serpentine figurine affixed to a pendant. For a moment, she looked at it with wonder, but, "common sense" overcame her. She was not a fan of serpents, even inanimate objects that resembled them. She flung the figurine away, and it disappeared into her closet, among her vast jewelry collection.  

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For a while, she was content with dealing with whatever mundane things she would have to do to pass the day, but as the clock ticked, her mind thought back to the pendant she tossed in the closet. Finally, the feeling just became unbearable, and she went and dug through the vast amounts of jewelry she had until she found the serpentine pendant again.

It's rather curious, she thought. Curiouser and curiouser.

It certainly was, much so that she put aside her hatred for snakes to examine the figurine in greater detail. Wherever it came from, it must've been worth a fortune, for it was shaped with immaculate detail. Reiko could almost consider it a thing of beauty... almost.

Placing it in her pocket, she walked over to the window. For the first time in ages, it didn't appear to be frigid outside. So she decided to go for a walk. It had been a while since she had been outside for an extended period of time, and for the first time in a long time, she was content. She closed her eyes and felt the sun shining on her cheek, and she wandered off for a little while, before opening her eyes to find herself in the grove of willows on her property. The place was secluded for the most part, and Reiko, as far as she knew, was the only person who came to the grove on a regular basis. Her parents complained of "allergies" whenever they had to step off of the unpaved path, and the servants were off attending to them and their needs, so Reiko had some privacy.

She took out the serpentine pendant again, and was surprised to find that it held even more mystery under the shade of the grove. Cautiously, she slipped it around her neck. For a few seconds, nothing happened, but as she tried to get up, she found that she couldn't.  

[AvatarAeang]

Oh yes, posting.

It would've seemed that Reiko had gotten over her extreme dislike of snakes and other slithering creatures for the moment, but that all came back as she looked down. Her legs had fused together, and seemed to be elongating. She watched with horror as her arms started to shrivel up and merge with her body. She fell down with a thud, unable to move as she felt her entire bone structure shifting and changing. It certainly did not feel like a relaxing massage. Frozen with fear, she could glimpse dark, emerald green scales starting to form on her skin, and she opened her mouth to scream, only to find that she couldn't. There was a sharp pain in her head as bones started to rearrange there. Her nose and mouth seemed to stretch and grow longer. She closed her eyes and wondered if the pain would ever end.

And then suddenly, it stopped. Reiko opened her eyes. She was by the waterside, so she looked down to see a pair of bright amber eyes with dark slitlike pupils staring up at her. It wasn't the perfect child that was born years ago, but a serpent, a big, ugly serpent.  

[Manjuu Eats You]

BWAHAHAHAHAHA

She shrieked.

Except it wasn't exactly a shriek--it was more like a sonic boom, the way the almighty roar escaped from the serpent's, or rather Reiko's, mouth. It was ear-splitting to Reiko herself, and it didn't take long for Mjoll to come running outside. Reiko's eyes widened with fear at Mjoll's paralyzed expression. Her father and his guards were accomplished fighters--what if Mjoll accidentally got her killed by calling them out? What if she got injured, even? Worst of all, what if everyone saw her in this giant, overweight, ugly state? What would everyone think of her then--

Before Reiko could do anything else, though, she felt herself shrinking. Her eyes flickered from side to side as she turned back into a regular human, dropping to the ground on her unsteady legs. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Mjoll stare at her with shocked eyes, and as soon as the maid approached her Reiko raised a hand.

"Don't tell anyone."

Her tone, though shaky, was authoritative. No one...No one was allowed to know of this event. Reiko barely acknowledged Mjoll's nod and her father's concerned questions, quickly waving them off and slowly returning to the mansion.