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 Posted: Tue Jun 20, 2023 8:46 pm
Quote: Shock Mark (15) : Thunderstorms are common this time of year, but what’s not common is the number of people reported being struck by lightning. Strangely, people are surviving with only minor, if any, injuries at all. Being struck can feel like a static shock, or can feel like a sudden flash of heat, and targets are left with a strange lightning mark across their body. Though the marks will fade, for their duration–up to a full week after being struck, you might notice that you are more prone to static shocking yourself or others, and you may notice electronics charging or overcharging and malfunctioning. The marks can take longer to fade at player discretion, or players may choose for them to leave pale scars, but otherwise there are no lasting effects.
But Kāifēng had heard whisperings around town while wandering out for Star Festival thing, about all of the storms recently and how many people around town had gotten struck by lightning. In and of itself, a single person probably didn’t rate very highly on the weirdness scale. Even surviving that kind of experience, as far as Kāifēng knew, happened often enough for there to be an official name for the specific type of scar that lightning left behind on people’s skin: Lichtenberg figures.
But so many people all getting struck by lightning in such close proximity to each other? And all in Destiny City? Well, that had to be some kind of magical shenanigans, didn’t it?
And was it not the duty of a magical knight to investigate shenanigans? What if somebody got hurt or something? (The idea that Kāifēng himself might end up being that somebody occurred to him and was swiftly dismissed. Better him than somebody who couldn’t handle it.)
So, here Kāifēng found himself: out and about in one of the fine Destiny City parks, in one of the more residential areas. More townhouses and the like than taller apartment buildings, and this specific park occupied a stretch of space where most of the houses were fairly low to the ground. The storm itself was starting to pick up, and Kāifēng had perched atop some very tall playground equipment, sitting on the railing that presumably kept small children from taking nose-dives off the platform while playing on the slide.
In deference to Qi-jie’s concerns about hir husband and cousin potentially catching cold whilst doing magical knight business, he’d brought along the bright orange fox umbrella that Ming-er had found while they’d hidden from another rainstorm.
Distantly, he felt another powered aura, but Kāifēng didn’t pay enough attention to discern more than that it had the warm, bright feeling that other Order knights and senshi had. Whatever they were up to was probably fine. Their own business unless they decided to make it Kāifēng’s. Or unless he got bored. That was always a major possibility with him.
For his own part, for the moment, Kāifēng kept his eyes on the sky and sang to himself, a sprightly, upbeat little tune, “Oh, I’m goin’ to Hell~ In a handbasket~ Of my flesh they’ll make a feeeeast~ I’m gonna be there in that numbeeeer—that’s six-six-six, the Number of the Beast~!”
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Posted: Thu Jun 22, 2023 11:14 pm
Why was someone singing.
Michel knew that every sane person was inside already; there might have been a break in the weather, but this wasn’t the ideal time or place to be out doing anything. Occasionally, the wind blew so fiercely that it shook loose a few raindrops, but for the most part it was just a cool breeze. He’d pulled his jacket close to fend off the coolness of the night, but he still stomped a bit as he walked. Maybe it was because he was just used to it, or maybe there was a small part of him enjoying splashing the puddles as he walked through them.
Lightning flashed often enough that he probably could have seen clearly even without the lamps everywhere.
He felt the Saturn Page before he saw them, and when he did he considered just walking away.
Might have, even, if their paths didn’t seem like they were going to directly converge. He wasn’t sure if he had the luxury of just walking past this Page and pretending he hadn’t seen him, and even if he did–what was the point? He wasn’t out here to make friends but he wasn’t jumping to piss people off tonight, either.
He’d sized Kāifēng up even before he was within speaking distance, and when he approached, he spoke with only enough volume to make sure the thunder couldn’t drown him out.
“Are you trying to draw attention to yourself, or just confident that the Negaverse isn’t going to be interested in you?”
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Posted: Sat Jun 24, 2023 3:09 pm
While perched up on the slide, mostly watching the sky and enjoying his song, Kāifēng felt the powered aura getting closer to him. Whoever belonged to it, however, belonged in turn to the White Moon, or Order, or whatever the proper name for their shared faction was, so Kāifēng didn’t worry about it. Maybe they’d be up for working together on sussing out what might have been up with the weird lightning strikes going on, or even if they didn’t feel like doing that, maybe they’d be friendly like Pendour and Encke. Their aura felt powerful like Pendour’s and Encke’s, so Kāifēng preferred to hope.
When the other came close enough to speak, Kāifēng turned to look down his way, and found himself torn between two immediate responses. First, his heart wanted to run around in excited, happy circles, the way that Táotáo did when Liánlí came home from anything, even if he’d only just run down to a bodega for a drink. Because!!! Those colors!!! On the other Knight’s outfit!!! All of those purples were so very like the purples in Kāifēng’s own outfit and—oh!!! Oh!!! There, right there! The Saturn symbol stood out clearly on the other Knight’s shoulder, golden on him but otherwise the same as all of the Saturn symbols on Kāifēng’s skirt and cuffs. All of which meant that this new friend was also a Saturn Knight, and Kāifēng! Wanted! Very! Badly!! To meet! More! Saturn Knights!!
(Which wasn’t to denigrate Ming-er/Selenga, nor any of the senshi or other Knights whom Kāifēng had met, not at all. They were lovely, every single one of them, and getting to know how Ming-er had grown up and gotten to be less of an a*****e, more of the husband that Kāifēng’s favorite cousin deserved? Kāifēng really did enjoy having that chance, even if he usually expressed it by affectionately bullying Ming-er. But something about meeting other Saturn Knights felt so Special and Important to him.… He simply had to make friends with this one, the first fellow Saturn Knight he was getting to meet.)
On the other hand, though, Kāifēng tilted his head bemusedly at that question. “Neither, gege!” He smiled as he called back to the other Knight before deciding that they could speak to each other more easily if he just……came down from on top of the very tall slide. Humming the same tune he had been singing until spoken to, Kāifēng hopped down from the top platform to a middle platform on the stairs that kids were supposed to use to get up to the slide. From there, he trotted the rest of the way down and over to the other Knight. Still smiling, and holding the fox umbrella so that it covered both of them, he held out a hand.
“I’m Kaifeng,” he said pleasantly, “and I wasn’t thinking about what you suggested? I just don’t like it when things get too quiet.”
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Posted: Sat Jul 01, 2023 12:41 pm
Michel squinted at Kaifeng immediately because they were only a handful of words into this conversation and he was already saying things that Michel didn’t get.
“What did you call me?” he asked, not too curt, but not willing to admit that he might have misheard what he’d said. All of these new Knights were so weird, he didn’t know how to talk to them.
But then, he hadn’t come out to make friends, so he wasn’t really worried either way.
He didn’t mind the umbrella over his head so he didn’t step away, and he had manners enough that he accepted Kāifēng’s hand and shook. “My name’s Michel. If you don’t like the quiet, you should find someone to talk with you while you’re out, not make noise just for the sake of it.”
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Posted: Sat Jul 22, 2023 10:53 pm
“‘Gege,’” Kaifeng repeated brightly, because the question was fair enough. Sure, Mandarin was the language with the most speakers in the world, but……well, most of them were in China or Hong Kong. Only made sense that not everyone in Destiny City would understand. “Literally means ‘older brother.’ Contextually, it has a lot of other potential meanings, but the one I intended was a show of respect for a more experienced Knight—and as a stand-in for addressing you until I learned your name.”
Everything else that Michel had to say, though, had Kaifeng listening attentively, nodding along as the more experienced Knight imparted his wisdom. Idly, Kaifeng thought about Selenga, recently awakened, and resolved to talk to him; Qi-jie had definitely gotten some peace of mind out of the idea that Selenga and Kaifeng could go around on patrols with each other. Keep each other out of too much trouble. Try to keep Kaifeng specifically from getting himself stabbed again, since one time was apparently too many times or something, even though it honestly seemed like a potential occupational hazard of the magical knight business that one probably needed to accept. But, well, Kaifeng filed those opinions away to debate with Qi-jie and Selenga later.
“Thanks for the advice, Michel,” he said genuinely, continuing to smile. “You must hear that all the time, though, huh?”
It just made sense, didn’t it? Here Michel was, stopping in the rain to give advice to some Page he didn’t know. Obviously (to Kaifeng, in his own mind and without any input from actual reality), he was a very experienced Knight of Saturn who made a point of looking out for other Knights because he cared very much about keeping people safe. Truly an inspiration.Kyuseisha no Hikari HI, TRYING TO GET BACK TO OLDER-ISH TAGS, and thinking kaifeng can get struck by lightning on his next tag?
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Posted: Tue Aug 01, 2023 10:43 pm
Ugh, no. Why was he still smiling. That wasn’t advice, Michel was nagging. He grunted a response and shrugged as he looked towards the sky. It wasn’t going to be a good night, the weather was already so fussy. He should have stayed home.
“I guess.” He didn’t sound particularly invested in the thought but it didn’t really matter. He was a s**t older brother, but Adria was too nice to say as much, and Michel wasn’t going to go announce that to anyone, anyway. If it was supposed to be a sign of respect, he supposed it was better than being called sir.
“You’re new to all of this, then?” He must have been, he seemed too energetic to have been doing this for long. “There are a lot of good people around these parts, I’m sure you’ll find some to patrol with. You should be careful, at least until you figure out how to use your magic. Have you been making trips to your Wonder?”
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