It was a simple mission they told me... The words triggered in my head for a while as I walked to he counter.
"Ah, hello Nina. Your mission today is to explore the forest areas c-1 through c-3 and give back information regarding the state of the natives and the current darker influence." The teller Rebecca reminded me. I replied bluntly, "Anything else?"
"There is one more thing, an unknown person has been located in your first area, be on guard as we have no reliable information on who or what it might be"
"Understood...." As I boarded the campship towards my destination, those words kept repeating in my mind. 'No reliable information on who or what it might be'...... I've heard rumors of a darker man known only has 'Persona' but... we have information on him and they wouldn’t send someone like me alone to fight him... surely? But the time for doubts is over, as the campship portal opened up and showed the forest under me.
'Only one way to find out what is it I guess....' I thought as I jumped down the portal, appearing in the forest moments later. Ordinarily it would take a moment to recuperate being transported in such a matter, but I grew quite use to it. It was raining hard as I took a scope around the luscious forest. Nothing appears to be out of the ordinary here, looks like it’s been abandoned here for
months. I heard a loud blast in the distance. I jumped in initial shock but smirked afterward
"It couldn't stay quiet for too long... excellent!" The noise came from the west, possibly quite a few sectors away. As it was raining quite heavily, it would aid my approach to get closer to the source of the noise, but it wasn’t long until I stumbled upon what caused it. I hid behind a rock and peered over and I couldn’t quite believe what I saw a young girl? Curious of this situation, I decided to stay back to see how she acted, while she didn’t look like an arks member, that explosion I heard earlier was too powerful to approach her unguarded. The girl patted a dead fangulf's body lightly, was she expecting it to have a pulse?
"Something’s creepin out these animals here." She spoke out loud. Getting a better look at her, I noticed she had a rather frail body and long flowing purple hair that looks like it almost touched the ground. It looks next to the beast and notices something on the ground.
"What a shame. Who would drop this?" She was holding a large blue umbrella; I guess one of the creatures down there had stolen it from an older hunter... "It's so pretty! What do you think Hybert?"
Hybert? I didn't see anyone around her. Who could she have meant?
"Yeah! I thought so too Hybert! I’m so glad you're my friend. Oh? Are you hungry? Here ya go!" The girl sticks a loose gunslash out of her bag and the mag above her devoured it. I concluded Hybert was her mag. She must be all alone down here to be talking to her mag. I wondered if she was the unknown person Meji and Rebecca mentioned about. I tried to get a bit closer to get more information but a lone twig went under my foot... CRUNNNCH Shit. I stopped moving as the girl jumps and turns her head around.
"Huh? What was that?" She looks around before looking back at her mag. "Yeah, you're probably right, it was nothing."
I don’t know how I got away with it, but she didn’t seem to notice me. now with her back turned, focused more on talking with her mag instead of what could have caused that noise, she doesn’t seem that threatening. just very. timid..... I decided to approach her, and introduce myself. Being this open was... different for me but the best thing to work in this situation, I decided. I stepped out from behind the rock and called out to her.....
"Hello there!"
"Guah! wwwwwho are you?" Clearly startled by my 'sudden' appearance, the girl I was facing was shaking in fear. I tried the best to put a reassuring voice across to her.
"Hey, hey, calm down there. I was on a mission down here and was told to meet up with a second person already down here, I assume they are talking about you?" She looked horribly confused.
"h-h-h-h....huh?" Perhaps if I just told her my name we could get things moving along more smoothly.
"Ah, my apologies, my name is Nina...."
"Oh!" She pats her hands together, "Nina! I remember now."
Clearly she must have been told about me, or at least heard about me. It was odd that I’ve not been told about her when she’s going to be joining up with me. She creeps up close to me sniffing my body. I keep calm, but I easily wanted to push her away.
"They told us something, but we forget." We? I shrugged it off for the time being
"Oh, well that doesn't matter too much right now. We ought to get moving."
"It’s no sense to go alone right? Why don't we go together? Hybert likes to meet new people, isn't that right?"
"I guess... Sure." She nods and then bows towards me, I returned the favor.
She turned and bowed towards me, I of course returned the gesture...
"Oh I'm sorry. My name is Teinkuru, but you can call me.... Tingle, ok?"
"Tingle..." I thought about the name briefly, "Nice to meet you...Tingle" She smiled dumbly. She has quite the air of absentmindedness to her...
"Mr. Meji told me that I need to get some fresh air so... here I am!" I perked at hearing Meji's name. It all makes sense now. Meji told me about this new recruit Tingle. Apparently she was found aimlessly walking in the shopping area. Though this was my first time actually seeing her. Interesting.
"It’s raining. And the air smells nice you see." She spoke to me aimlessly, like she had a full concurrent thought left unanswered. "I’m really... not too fond of the rain myself...well how about we get going then?" The girl nodded but looked confused again.
"I’m not too sure about which way we should go but... I got this really cool umbrella!" She shows it off to me, with a look as proud as a kid with a shiny toy. She swung it aimlessly around the area. Her swings were capable of creating photon shockwaves. She learned how to perform the Sonic Arrow.
"That is... certainly some umbrella you got there." She nods.
"Hybert agrees!" Her words stop dead in the tracks. She has a slight look of horror in her face. "Maybe you should go on ahead. You look like a busy lady."
"Well, part of my mission was to find you."
"Find me?" She asks
"More precisely, To find you and then find about the increased darkers influence in this area."
"Ah! Does that mean you're an arks member?" I was just as surprised as her reaction to this fact, the arks training uniform isn’t really... subtle in hiding this fact, everyone knows what it looks like. just who was she?
"Yes. I am indeed an arks" I replied rather irritated by her ignorance.
"I always heard such cool things about your Arks! Like there was this one time 12 or so Arkers took down this giant dragon! It ate spiders and screamed very loudly! It was super cool!” She seemed to be almost... too excited at this fact which threw me off balance. The creature she could only be referring to would be known as a Chrome Dragon. A huge dragon that towers over even the tallest of us, using corrupted photon energies to attack. just thinking about it makes me both angry and upset at the same time. She looked back at me with her hot crimson eyes and smiled. "You look like someone who could fight those giant monsters!"
...we'd like to see that, yes yes yes...
I could hear faintly under her breath. I ignored it for now; I would not put talking to herself past her oddities. "It isn't all fun and games you know." I shot back coldly, trying to get to the mission. Sitting talking to this girl in the rain was not exactly on my agenda, "Anyway I believe this should be the right way."
"I'll follow you if you lead the way! I can do this!" The girl waved her hands. Her eyes shrunk a tiny bit as she reviled a large explosion out in the distance. It was a Rafoie spell. It kind of disappointed me it wasn't from a hostile source. She seemed to remain very close to me when leading the way, but she once again was focusing more on Hybert then anything else, not that I minded. I was never one for conversation... The heavy rain was the only sound in the area, interrupted only by quiet murmurs from tingle now and again. We spent a good ten minutes walking before the first real sign of life other than ourselves made it known. Gulfs. They eyed at us
mischievously we were their next pray.
"Be careful." I prompted, grabbing my blade, "These gulfs are known to be tricky." While these were easily dispatched, I noticed tingle not taking a single action. was she just observing me, or maybe testing me in her own way? after the last was killed and I put away my wired lance, I motioned her to carry on walking with me.
"You're pretty strong!" She commented sheepishly.
"Are you injured at all?"
"No.... but my shoes are untied though." I sighed and continued to walk. She finished lacing her shoe back up and followed me. We continued walking for a short while, the sound of the rain easing up somewhat, but it was already too late to be dry, my clothes were soaked through which made it uncomfortable to say the least, tingle however didn’t seem to notice this at all. In the distance I saw more gulfs and agnis... natives that normally are never seen together suddenly are together? the darker influence in this area must be stronger than I thought. These were dispatched without problems either, my wired lance was having no issues and neither was I. As I
turned around however, I noticed tingle crouching on the floor, holding out a hand to a rag rappy... did she want to... pet it? It bit at her hands. She squeaked in initial pain before smacking it with her hand.
"Nyr! That hurt!"
"They were never this aggressive before... You have to keep your guard up at all times. Even to the smallest creatures." I scolded her. She looked at the blood on her hand before licking it. Acquiring a taste of the liquid coming from her body. Before jumping up and waving
her arms to the air. She showered herself in a healing photon aura... resta.
"Babuuuu! All better! The air is nice and clean." We continued to walk through the forest. The rain finally eased away and the sun began to shine. Desperately I was in need for the sun as my clothing was horribly drenched.
"Ah! The rain is gone." She commented bluntly.
"The sunshine and warmth is just wonderful!" I commented. I stretched and tried to wring out some of the excess water from my uniform. The girl walked ahead of me climbing on the rocks above.
"Rawr! I am a Koltova!" She growls to nobody in particular. I wasn't exactly sure what a "koltova" was, nor did I really care I guess.
"Oh, where did she go?"
"I’m just down here looking around." She jumped down from the top of the rocks and bound over to me, which was quite a feat considering it must have been a 35 foot drop...
"Hihi!" I looked at her with a serious face, pointing towards the north. "Let’s go." I could hear a roar I was not too familiar with hearing in this area. A mass of dark photons massed into the towering monster Wolhgada!
"This is urgent, powerful darker readings detected, defeat it asap!" I could hear my communicator go off. I gritted my teeth and grabbed my wired lance
"Hahaha! This may pose a problem, Tingle! Stay close!” A wolgahda appeared, right in front of us, but it didn’t seem to faze tingle at all. If I wasn’t mistaken, she didn’t seem threatened by it at all it was more like it was her friend. However, thinking about this right now won’t solve anything, more pressing matters awaited.
"Wolgy! He always comes to visit me! Play with me Wolgy!" She kept trying to get into its field of vision. My wired lances didn’t even seem to be scratching it, this was a far more powerful one then I’ve ever faced, so much so it was breaking through my guards like it was tissue paper. Tingle seemed to be helping me attack it now at least, throwing zondes out now and again but it still seemed to make no difference. There was only one option for me and it could backfire quite easily.
"Baooo! So cute!" She commented clinging onto its leg. I didn’t know what she was referring to, was it my seemingly useless attempts to damage the beast, or something else completely, however this momentary lapse of focus was about to hit me, in more ways than one. That
hit was my limit... as I flew backwards from the force of that punch, my mind became clear, I was angry... my rage became the only emotion left. This had to end here, or I would be ended here instead. I couldn’t let that happen, he would be very disappointed with me.
Just go to the forest they said, it was an easy mission, they said. My face grew a bit red in anger as I pulled out my Ruined Charm from my transbag. I swung 3 sharp violent blows at the beast.
"THIS... ENDS.... NOW!" it screams in pain as my sword cleaved into it. A huge cut kept into its body from its left shoulder. Tingle had since jumped off of its leg and admired the liquid coming out of the dark creature. It disappeared into a red ball of photons and vanishes.
...coward... I continued to breathe heavily as my communicator went off again.
"Strong darker readings still detected. Finish it off!" A rockbear infected by the darkness jumped at us. A rockbear was far easier to overcome in combat but I was still injured greatly from the previous fight. Tingles eyes glowed a darker red. She looked disgusted at the rockbears appearance.
"Disgusting..." she commented. I was distracted. That last hit broke my guard wide open, for a second my already damaged body was wide open to another attack and, unfortunately for me, the rockbear was more than willing to take advantage of this...
"No.... not here..." Another punch perfectly hit me, this time I wasn’t so lucky, I flew backwards and as I hit the rocks behind me, I heard a bone break. My mag triggered a healing aura around me, which temporary stopped the intense feeling of pain allowing me to fight on. The rockbear's stamina was lower than the wolgahdas, allowing for a quicker kill at least.
"The darker readings have come negative. Lifting martial law."
I panted heavily, holding my chest in pain. "I apologize. I did not expect this to happen at all like this." The girl shook her head absentmindingly.
"Wolgy was always kind of a brute. Rose told me not to hang out with them at all." She tossed into the air a Star Atomizer. An aura of healing photons fills my body numbing away the pain I currently experienced.
"Baboooo! all better! You're really strong!" She was very excited about clinging back to my side. I sighed and continued to walk onward. As we were walking deeper into the forest, I couldn’t help but continue to wonder what she was talking about, with that wolgahda and this
rose person just where did she live, why is she here now? My rib was still giving me a great deal of pain, but the only way to fix it was to have this mission done quickly. The rain came back... just as began to dry up. The creatures around us all showed signs of darker infections all over them.
"What foolish creatures." She murmured. "Are all of them going to become darkers?" I could hear her murmur to herself some more. "Let they all become darkness; it’s an easier...yes yes. Dark... Kught..." She stopped in her tracks holding her head in frustration
"The fog... it smells like death out here this fog." The more I speak with this girl, the more questions I get and the less answers I receive, although I’m not being direct at all, she really is an... interesting character.
"I don’t understand it all, but, my job is pretty simple really. Preserve the natural wildlife, using hostile actions where necessarily. Darker infestation, natives being corrupted or turned on each other... or a new threat completely...
"I see... yes. Perhaps this will clean the air. It’s disgustingly dirty down here. Brings us such sorrow." Her answers grew more and more offbeat and wear as she continued to speak, "We would wish a refresh. Start it all over again..."
Trying to break that topic I spoke up about the photons that we used to defeat the darker menace, but she seemed too content with muttering weird things to herself. So I just shrugged it off.
"Sorry. I have a headache again. I've been very distracted."
"It's okay." I replied, "Just let me know if it happens again. It'd be no good if you got that way during combat now would it?" In fact, this rest did me a lot of good, but I wasn’t going to admit that up-front.
"I'll do my best!" We continued walking north, although it appeared to be a dead-end, we backtracked and went west this time, where, it appears, something else was waiting for our arrival. What... was that?
“Unknown readings detected, Nina please be on guard and dispatch the target asap!" My communicator shouted out, freaking out about what lied ahead of us. "Stand back! I yelled at Tingle, "I'll handle this!"
Out of the purple mist, a man formed, wearing almost entirely black gear, with purple hair. He said nothing, his weapon was a purple version of a coat edge... could it be a corrupted version I wondered. He went for tingle straight away, I had to act and do something... I have no idea how strong he is, but even in my weakened state I could beat him. I hoped, anyway.
"YOU! get away from her!" I flung a few sonic arrows, as well as shouting to get its attention, after they hit, he turned and faced me. This is what I was hoping for, I didn’t know how well she would do in direct melee combat as, well, forces are not known for their resilience to blades and I figured I stood the best chance at taking him down. As our swords continued parrying and exchanging glancing blows, we both went in for a chest blow, our swords locked, this was it, the winner would take the fight, the loser would lose their life. I was using all my rage and energy to try and overpower him but... I was losing, until crystalized light photons started raining down on his face, it made him flinch just slightly, which gave me the opportunity to finish the strike. He flew backwards with the impact of the blow. He disappeared back into the purple cloud he came from just a few moments ago.
"W.. who was that? Someone... you know?"
"I.... I don’t know.”
"Readings confirmed, darker codename [Persona] repelled. Good work!"
"Ah! someone like that... chased me away earlier....They... they called me a witch just because I talk to Hybert! 'Freak! Witch! Murderer!' is what they screamed so... I ran away. Then I meet you!" She blurted to me, rather unphased by the Persona attack just now. First she claimed it was because of Meji she was out here, now it was because someone chased her away? Just... who is she? I knew precisely what just attacked us, but I wasn’t going to tell her, something tells me it would just make the entire situation more confusing... first the wolgadha, then persona. Just what the hell is actually going on down here and why did they just send me and an air headed force who with her severe headaches that can’t really be relied on in combat too much to this area? This is a job for an entire party of experienced arks dammit! It stopped raining again, so I took this opportunity to sit-down... although my companion seems to be suffering more than me.
"I apologize for interrupting you, but it’s not safe down here, we should proceed and get out of here quickly" I patted Tingle's shoulder as she sat rubbing her temple with her hands. She had lost her positive attitude for just a moment
"I don’t know if I DO want to go back up there. Nobody has really been.... this friendly with us..."
"We should at least, finish up here before deciding what to do then." I wanted to get this mission finished with already. Having to stay down here with this girl any longer would finally get on my last nerves. She nodded before inhaling. Holding back her tears. Before casting another blast of rafoie.
"Kazoom! The filthy creatures’ burn!"
I admit, I was staying back more in combat then I’m used to, I’ve already hit my limit as far as combat goes, while tingle seems.. to be enjoying herself in her own ways I suppose... however, this mission was just about to get harder. A funji has appeared in the local area. This darker trap seeks out arks and traps them in a far-away sector. Uh oh... Of course, it would be after me. The trap grabbed ahold of me and I vanished into is darkness web multiple sectors away from Tingle. I was lucky that I could at least see the girl in the distance to shout at her.
"W- where did you go???" I heard her scream.
I lost my weapons as it took me; this kind of funji was the worst. Knowing I had to wait for a while, without any backup or weapons in this state was a worst-case situation, but I had to survive.
"Tingle! Don’t panic, just go back the way we came and you'll get to m..." A pair of Dagan legs took a slice at my leg *slice* "Gah! ...soon enough. Come, quickly!"
As I was fighting off both the Dagan that appeared inside in some sort of cage match, while trying but failing to break the funji, my previous injuries where beginning to surface at the worst possible time as well. Tingle had not arrived yet.
"Tingle! I could really... use your help right about now. Focus your techniques on this dome and avoid being hit by anything else!" I shouted again, breathing heavily from the pain. She arrived shortly after, her light-based techs made short-work of the funji and it broke apart relatively quickly. The only thing I could do was collapse on the floor in pain. Phew... its finally over. I panted hard while the girl begins to scream slamming her rod into the muddy ground. Head pains again? This didn’t seem natural... but without her saying anything, who am I to ask about it? besides, my first and foremost focus was getting recovered quickly. I pulled a trimate out of my bag and consumed it, it tasted of nothing and its very slow acting but it certainly does the trick in a pinch. She continued to scream at herself now clutching to her head bizarrely.
"I keep hearing things in my head. That I don't want to do!"
"What? What are you saying?"
"My head... said that I should have let the darkness eat you in that web, but you're a good person! Not like anyone else!"
"OH, well you shouldn't worry too much. This kind of trap couldn't finish me off." I smirked; being cocky was in my nature but during this conversation it looked like Tingle was in a lot of pain. I didn't see anything actually hit her during that fight. Could it perhaps be that her head pain is really this bad? She hunched over spitting something questionable out of her mouth before calming down. She breathed heavily coughing from the pain of the vomit.
"Maybe we should take a quick break; you don't look too well..." Was the only thing I could think of saying.
"Maybe you should go on ahead without me. I've just been holding you up now." She whimpered. She certainly seems very flip flopped about her emotions I walked closer to her, patting her on the back as she continued to cough.
"Doing so would mean I haven't finished my mission. Besides when I tell them what happened here, I am going to need someone to prove it."
"Are you sure they would even believe me? The witch?" I’m not sure who she even talked to first but I guess it was possible she had wandered into one of the more shadier areas of the ship. I heard district BTwenZero was the worst of the worst but before I could comment any further...
"GET OUT OF MY HEAD" She screamed violently. I jumped back as she began to flail her arms around her. Her pain seemed far more serious looking than before. It almost felt like she was fighting something inside of her. Whatever the case I couldn't do anything to help her
but boy I sure get dumped with the most interesting cases. This girl who seems like a bipolar, a forest that has attracted so much darker energy around her. This kind of mission would need 12 arks units here not just myself. And worst of all? It was raining and the pain around me is unbearable. Ugh...
Her egg-shaped mag looked down at her with concern before spitting out another aura of healing. Her struggling stopped instantly.
"Hybert! I... I love you Hybert! You always know how to cheer me up!" I turned away looking back at the darker cave ahead of us.
"Well! If you're feeling better why don't we keep moving." She nods. We got to the location where the funji took me, it was a peaceful rest of the forest, after that. We approached the final area and, shockingly nothing bad happened, tingles head didn’t even play up once.
We got close to the heart of the forest. The rockbear nesting grounds. "Alright tingle, the final targets in here. Let’s go." I grabbed my wirelance and she clutched onto her umbrella as we moved through the brush. And not too surprisingly two rockbears ambushed at us. They were both carrying an infected core. Their breeding would only spread the darkness further in this forest.
I went after the one on the right while tingle went to the one of the left, something about her seemed different this time, much more focused on the combat. I didn’t pay it any mind however. My rockbear was dispatched with ease, and soon after the second fell. Tingle was on top of the body. She was licking her fingers again like she did when she was bit by the rappies. This has been an interesting mission for sure.
"Their blood it tastes good." I could hear her say; I decided it was best not ask. "The air here is beautiful. Why don't I stay here? I can sleep in the bushes over there!" She changed her topic very quickly. I sighed and shook my head.
"It isn't safe here. What if more of those Rockbears came in here? Or even the Banthers?"
"What if a greater force wanted it that way? What if my purpose was to be Banther chow?" A greater force? They said a lot of people believed in higher forces but I was not one of those people.
"Why would anyone want such a creature like myself back up there? To be called a witch and be hated..." I thought about my words carefully to hopefully not say anything to upset her any further
"Because firstly, I would be failing my mission if I knew you weren’t safe and secondly I know people like meji and others in our team who'd welcome you up there with open arms."
"R. Really?"
"Of course, I wouldn’t say it otherwise." I would say so between that one girl who often got drunk on wine and Meji being as interesting as he is. She would fit right in. On hearing this, she started crying, she clung onto my chest again. I reluctantly returned the hug rubbing her hair. It was an awkward moment.
"I've been... selfish, I’m... sorry...”
"It’s... ok... Now then, shall we depart?"
"Yes.”