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Although it was Kiku's fault that Sai'gare had left before she could get any straight answer, Tsukei'chi was glad to have someone at this point of time. It was soothing, almost. Then again, now that the yelling had subsided and the tension just about depleted, a dancing cactus could be pricking Tsukei'chi's a** and she would still find that soothing.

The girl whimpered and shook her head avoiding the 'grape' at all costs. It wasn't that Tsukei'chi failed to trust Kiku, but it was .. well... already her stomach and mind were at odds. She could feel the bile rising and was afraid to open her mouth. Besides, the smell of that thing was far from pleasant and it was making things worse.

And then it happened. Vomit came spewing past those plump tiers. It started as a trickle, warm and frothy like fast boiling milk pouring onto the sides of the overheated pot as Tsukei'chi struggled to hold it back. Hell, she even attempted to swallow the rest but it only made things worse, and with a loud splatter the girl's stomach was emptied. It surely was a colorful rainbow (apperantly she had some salad with rainbow chard and three different types of cabbage of varying color) that spewed a good distance and arched as she turned her head.

"I'm showwy..." uuuurrgk and heave.

Whatver little pride had remained intact for the miserable, upheaving Tsukei'cih was shattered the moment Kiku's fingertips pressed her nostrils shut. She had been reduced to a baby!

Oh, but how wonderful it felt, to have that heave silenced in mid contraction. It felt heavenly to be able to breathe, even if it came in wild, short gasps between held-bad sobs. Instinct said to move, to fight, but Tsukei'chi knew Kiku. The fiery little woman would beat her sensless into forced rest if she had to -- and considering Tsukei'chi's own abilities in the 'then and now', Kiku's prospects looked rather good.

What was worse, the bitterness of bile or the putridness of the concoction that made her tongue grow numb in disgust? Tsukei'chi tried spitting it out for if her tongue had a mouth, it took would vomit , that 'grape' was just THAT vile. The need to breathe was greater and that detoxing agent placed too far back for Tsukei'chi to push out. It either had to be swallowed, as to save her tongue further torture, or be spit out in order to breathe.

As the pill went down her throat, Tsukei'chi heaved, the urge to vomit greater than before. Pain swelled at the pit of her stomach and her throat ached with desire. In the end, nothing came up and slowly the wretching subsided. Oh, but the girl was still far from lucid -- she just wasn't regurtitating anymore.

If anything, the headache she was to wake up with the following morning came without warning. Tsukei'chi groaned, rising her hands to hold her cranium as to keep it from splitting in two. Instead, she felt mush, still warm, slick and oh so putrid. She had vomited all over her hands and now it was in her hair. This, of course, made Tsukei'chi whimper, which made her moan.

"What are you trying to do, kill me?"

As Elexial approached the Shrine of Heaven, he could feel the many layers of the Tapestry of Life stripping away every aspect of himself that was not in balance with the tranquility and peace of Takamagahara. Like peeling away the layers of an onion, Elexial was more than spiritually changed - he was physically altered as well. His aura rapidly began to change as the white smoke that oozed from his black robes took on a soft mako glow remeniscient of lifestream. His eyes ceased to burn as they returned to normal, his irises consolidating into a crimson hue of scarlet, his pupils now ordinary and formed.

For all accounts he looked once again human, save his wafting aura of lifestream that continued to bleed from him like steam rising from a hot coal. It still enveloped his black robes and swirled around him as he approached the gates of the shrine. With every footstep, the living earth upon which he tread seemed rejuvinated and brought back to health. Sounds seemed crisper, images more vibrant, smells and tastes more acute, and impressions more solidified. The natural world welcomed Elexial as if it knew he was not its enemy, and Elexial wondered why that was so.

"What is this that I have become?"

His still and fallow eyes floated across the scenery before him and the grand architecture of the palace, and his heart was not filled with contempt. For the first time in his life, he felt true awe and appreciation. Life embraced him, like a lover reunited after so much time and so much struggle. But Elexial could not shake his feeling of confusion at why these feelings were such as they were. He still did not fully grasp the importance and the tremendous value of his achievement.

"Transcendence..."

The idea echoed in his mind, and there was nothing else. When Elexial looked upon the castle and palace, he did not see the world of forms and sensations. Those things were as shadows cast by the truth that transcends the world...

The transcendent realm of the truth was where Elexial now walked. The physical body and the physical realm were but reflections of the realm of the mind, the conscious realm. Without light, neither can be understood. Elexial now stood in illumination and looked up at the sun. He saw with cold, clear-eyes and an enlightened mind the splendor of the empyrean light of Heaven that transcends the mind and the body, giving deffinition to one that it might reflect upon the other. Elexial had become one with this sacred place. He had become one with the Sword of Kami.

His eyes shed tears again, as the sun poured warmth and energy into the vial of his spirit and cast light into his tranquil mind, which had become like a deep void disturbed only when he allowed thoughts to exist within it. Without thoughts, there could be no shadows cast. Without shadows, there was no physical reality. To even see this place, this world of forms, Elexial allowed thoughts to form in his mind. These thoughts would cast the shadows that defined this world of forms that he gazed upon as he gazed upon the Shrine of Heaven.

And the darkness was beautiful.

The wind stirred, as he closed his eyes and swallowed his bliss, letting the droplets slip down his cheeks silently. The wind caressed him, and Elexial felt his heart break to cry out the wonders he could feel. He ached to express this feeling of salvation, this feeling of selfless loving. The sun warmed him. The wind touched him and cooled him. The smells of the earth and wood filled him with relaxation and romantic beauty. The sounds of time and space rang like bells of stars, and the majesty of existence unfolded before him like the welcoming arms of his soul-mate.

Opening his eyes slowly, he let his bamboo walking-stick steady him as he continued to walk. He was the very picture of an anti-hero, robed in black kendo robes, wearing a black head-band displaying the kanji of the August Star, bearing a katana with a sheath that glistened like finely cut obsidian. His eyes a crimson red. His hair raven black. All danced in timeless oblivion. Everything was harmonius in shadow, and tranquil. His sword was at peace.

Elexial's soul knew peace, then.

He was oblivious, very much so, to the onversation being had just a few yards away. Oh, but they were out of sight and out of mind. Then again, one had to directly talk to Yamisa after smacking him upside the head to be in his mind. ..He really wasn't the brightest of the elder students after all. Yet, how much of that was an act just to keep him from being a priest? One couldn't be too sure. He was already 25, after all. He had to of learned something!

Oh, but in the end there he sat staring at the water of the Tenin and Tennyo's lake, his brow arched as he stared at his own reflection. It was so cold, that water, the longer he stared at it the more he felt as if he had begun to freeze. Yet, that wasn't particularly surprising considering the fact he was laying across a large stone, and Winter was swiftly approaching. All he had on him was a simple robe, and nothing more. Granted, that robe was designed for the winter.. It was useless if the person who wore it didn't wear it RIGHT.

Yamisa NEVER did. Instead, it exposed his chest and leg as he laid there. Even so, he could have sworn there was a layer of frost upon it! ..Maybe he was just getting tired, however. After all, he was lazy - and with a winter laze came swift sleep. ..Sleep. It sounded good didn't it? Slowly those eyelids, which held upon them long butterfly-leg-like lashes fluttered and began to droop.

Slowly..

Slowly...!

They closed, and Yamisa's head bowed in slumber. His form began to shift, downright slide even. Unfortunately for Yamisa it was in the direction of the cold water which, he found, hated him even though he chose to follow after Susanoo. It didn't take long for the sound of his splash to fill the air, as well as his cries of surprise. It wasn't a happy surprise, either!

Oh, but in the end he resigned himself to floating about within the freezing water, staring up at the silver sky, his brows arched. Oh, the poor thing looked rough, if not perhaps even a little drunk! ..Or maybe he just looked like a drunkard, because as the winter months approached that stumble had become much more thick and dark as his hair tried desperately to keep him warm.

"Susanoo, why do you hate me so?" a pout caressed those lips swiftly as he stared at the clouds which were supposed to support Takamagahara.

Eyes of fire burned into Elexial as those words flowed from those lips. This was an interesting young man, he who had the appearance of one born of Ama no Kagaseo's residue yet who behaved like a soul who had achieved transendence. His initial impression of the younger male had changed drastically at the words which he spoke. That was not to say that Muroze had dropped his guard. No, he was still cautious of the male who had been a follower of the Mikaboshi.

In the end, however, his question had gone unanswered.

"I withdraw my previous observation." stated the elder male, that deep voice purring with intrigue. His own form bowed as his hands lowered themselves to his sides, silken strands of twilight spilling forth from his head to act as a curtain for his face, only for a moment, before he rose.

"You hail from the darkness of the Brilliant Male and his August Star, yet you are above those who fill the halls of that which was once the center point for the cycle of life. Would it be accurate to say that you are no longer a mere shadow, but what I would call a 'base'?" It was at the end of his statement, however, his brows came together. No, his words poured in a manner which he did not like. They lacked a certain flow, and they lacked the simplicity to make them easily understandable.

"Forgive me. I take that back." he backtracked as a hand rose to gently rub his forehead. "I say a base, but I mean a child of clay, or perhaps you are better described as an empty canvas." he explained a hand pointing up to the sky and form twisting. He pointed to the silver sky above them which begun to threaten to rain. "Like a cloud you can become a storm. Like a mound of clay you can be shaped into anything."

"..Would it be accurate to say you are nothing at all?" He was a priest, but that was not to say that he understood everything immediately. He was not that great of a creature, he was not a god. Yet within him he contained a desire to understand everything which he laid eyes on, and to describe it in such a way that could be described as an art.

"Forgive me, again." he stated as his form swiftly came to distort itself, bend, and bow before Elexial yet again. As a priest, it was shameful. He nearly forgot his manners! Hands came together and hid themselves within his robes before he withdrew from each sleeve bizarre fans which could easily be described as weapons.

No, at first glance they were sickles - as the fans had been folded into a single block of wood. Yet, at the left and right edges a long sickle had been built into the fan, a weapon he took great pride in because it had many purposes. Their deadly nature made itself even more evident as thin chains began to pour from his sleeves as well, connected to a loop at the base of the fan. The fact this male had seen many years of war made itself evident. If one had a good enough memory, they could look back at his early days when he arrived at the shrine at the age of 17.

But, he paused not in his movements - after all he didn't want to frighten the student before him. Nor did he want him to think that he would attack him. Instead, the fan in his left hand was opened with a flick of his wrist, and before Elexial could become conscious of it an elaborate introduction began.

The fan in his left had illustrated a dark cloud when it was fiirst opened, and soon with a delicate flick of his right hand the other fan was opened. Within mere seconds the right fan passed in front of the left, and the left passed behind. Images changed and illustrated upon the right fan were black markings which were meant to illustrate a black, dark wind. "I am a child of the clouds who bring the dark wind of Autumn."

To say that it was over at that was a lie. The left fan had been flipped by a role of his wrist the moment it passed behind the other, and the other side of the fine rice paper illustrated a sea of corpses, death, and blood. "A child who spent the first seventeen years of existence loyal to the Shinigami, and destroying those who tarnished the name."

His form shifted elegantly, arms now facing his right rather than his left. This allowed the fans to cross paths yet again, this time the right fan exposing.. nothingness. A blank side of rice paper. "He who experienced death once, he who has seen the black sands of creation and the realm of their king, and he who was born again by the Queen of Artistic Creation - Benzaiten."

"He who bears a name not worthy of remembering." the fans were closed, and were abruptly with a snap which had such timing that it seemed as though it caused two leafs to fall from the tree near by. His form bent yet again at the waist, his hands remaining obscured by his robe. "Yet, you may call me Muroze if you wish."

Elexial watched with his placid eyes and humble expression. His face was the deepest neutrality, neither hot nor cold. If there was a place between minutes and between each second, a place between places and non-places, a realm where one existed not as a being, but as an expression; if one could become an effect without a cause, Elexial, the Seshin Tsurugi no Idai Arashi, had stepped outside of space and time and entered this place. And to look back at the world from whence he came was, to him, like looking at the image in a mirror.

Elexial turned and looked at Muroze not with his body, but with his mind, and the mirror moved. Elexial no longer saw the reflection. His spirit turned, and his spirit knew Muroze's spirit in that moment. Together all things dwelt within the realm outside of forms and thought. It were as if the two of them were engaged in speaking to one another by entering a state of deep meditation, creating a world in their minds, calling it reality, and then communicating with one another through this mental construction.

Elexial stopped meditating. With his spirit, he extended a hand to touch the soul of Muroze gently on the shoulder. His touch was not strong enough to awaken the man, though, Muroze would awaken if he wished to. If Muroze, deep within his heart, longed to feel the touch of something outside of space and time to prove to him that transcendence was more than a fantasy, to know by directly experiencing it, then he would feel Elexial's touch now.

And in the mirror of reality, Elexial's spirit cast a new shadow as it had moved and caught the light of illumination in a different fashion by moving. In the world of space and time, the wind shifted. Elexial's aura was still alive with a white steam and curling whisps of smoke that were now pushed by the wind in Muroze's direction. They would pass by Muroze's nose and he would smell the scent of the realm of true enlightenment in which he slept. If Muroze had not forgotten that smell, then he would remember it. If he remembered, it would bring Enlightenment to Muroze.

"The canvas is ever not the paint. The cloud is ever not the storm. The Void is ever not the Tao. I am the art, the wind, and the spirit."

Elexial bowed once more.

"My name is Seshin Tsurugi no Idai Arashi," he offered his name as a gesture of respect as Muroze had offered his, "You may call me Elexial if you wish."

Elexial straightened. And as he spoke that name, the rain of snowflakes began to fall.