jikan_rpg | [Nov Catchall] ✵ Change the way you look at things and the things you look at change.

[Vennessa finding her way to a beach was inevitable as soon as she realised that Nippon had accessible beaches. They were in short supply in Mondstadt, which favoured high cliffs over expanses of sand, and she hadn't visited one in many years.

She's used to being alone, though knowing that she can call Venti at a moments notice does make her feel like she is never truly lonely. Still, only one set of footprints trails behind her as she walks along the shore with her shoes dangling in one hand, the wind tugging at her clothes and whipping the scent of salt into her hair.

At a narrower part of the beach where the sand gives way to a few low rock pools she stops and picks up a large shell, turning it over in her hand. She gives it a quick wash in one of the pools, then brushes her hair back and holds the shell against her ear.

The woman feels eyes on her then, and looks around to find a redheaded young man loitering nearby. Unsure if he was watching her or she just happened to feel him glancing over in her direction she observes him for a moment, then mentally scolds herself for her apparent paranoia.]

Hello. [She greets him brightly, the shell she had been 'listening' to now held lightly to her chest.] I'm sorry for staring, it's just that you're the first person I've seen out here for hours.

[ Since arriving in Nippon the beach had become one of his favorite places to clear his head and it should not have been much of a surprise that he would find himself here now, several days of bedrest later. Many of his wounds had been cleaned and dressed, tended to with a careful hand and ample amounts of spellwork that ensured that he could move about comfortably without worry of re-opening any wounds. He still had a bit more to go before he was in fighting form (something that he would argue, incessantly, to anyone that questioned it, because fights while injured were just more challenging and gave an exciting handicap) but he was well enough to walk, and so Childe took advantage of it as much as he could.

The skies were clear, the sun was shining, and the breeze that wafted by brought with it the aroma of salt and the sea. Here and there the beaches were littered with the occasional shell, bubbling sands underfoot denoting the presence of clams or any other type of burrowed, marine animal. Childe didn't bother to check; there was always time to go digging later, he reasoned.

Right now his focus was on making his way up and down the sands, watching the tracks he'd leave behind, scouring the path for any shells that might have been washed up along the shoreline. He had a small collection already - nothing valuable, of course, but pretty enough to do something with, maybe - in his hands, and it was only when he found himself distracted by a bird passing high overhead casting a shadow on the sand that he realized he wasn't alone.

The vivid, bright red hair catches the corners of his eyes and prompts him to turn his head, recognition flaring in his gaze at the color. Diluc, here -

- but it's not Diluc. It very much isn't, even if the shade of hair is almost exactly the same violent red that the Mondstadt man sports. If the shape of the woman's body wasn't enough to tip him off that it was someone completely unrelated, then the friendly, familiar greeting she shoots in his direction is enough to make him realize that oh, this definitely wasn't Diluc.

And she's staring at him. ]

Hello. [ He responds, conversationally, making his way casually down the sands so they both don't have to shout to be heard. ] There's no need to apologize. I'm surprised, there aren't very many people out here, especially during this season.

[ It's not cold, not to anyone from Snezhnaya; but her hair color almost immediately identifies her as a refugee. The fact that she more or less has a shell held up to her ear only solidifies it, and while the sight is charming enough by itself Childe can't help but feel as though there's something... almost familiar about her. He can't quite put his finger on it. Perhaps it really is the red hair so very much like Diluc's. ]

I'm not stealing your stock of seashells, am I? [ He inquires, showing her the assortment he had in his own arms: a predominantly abalone mix, with shells in varying degrees of pearlescent blues and pinks. Nothing exceptionally fancy, but they were certainly pretty enough in their own right. ]

[Any wariness she might have had eases considerably at his friendly greeting in turn, and she picks her way closer to him as he approaches. Vennessa is tall for a woman and well-built, but she hops nimbly across a couple of rock pools between them and pushes her hair away from her face as the sea breeze whips it around.

She looks down at the shell she's carrying - a conch, if she knew what one was to name it - and shakes her head, offering it out to him.]

No, you're not. I remember hearing once that you could hear the wind if you put a shell to your ear. I haven't been able to try it before.

[Her nose wrinkles slightly when she smiles, and she looks out to the sea with a happy-sounding sigh. It really is good to be able to just exist, for a little while, without having to worry too much about anything. The things she could worry about aren't things that she can change, so she has been trying not to let them weigh too heavily on her mind.

Amber eyes flick down briefly, catching sight of the Hydro Vision secured at Childe's hip. She looks up at him then with a faintly knowing expression.]

Another one from Teyvat? I seem to be finding you everywhere.

[ His expression changes minutely at her words, easily missed if one wasn't looking. Something like reminiscence, nostalgia, a longing flits across his features, reflected in the limpid blue of his eyes and reasserting itself in the distant smile that curves his lips. What she offers him isn't anything remotely shaped like a starconch, but the sentiment is very much there. Perhaps it differed between worlds.

But Childe isn't so impolite as to not take an invitation when he sees it - even if he has nothing really to offer in exchange - and he reaches out a hand to take the conch for himself. It's weighted and fits nicely in his hand, held carefully in long fingers as though it were something precious.

It's as he's lifting it up to his ear, however, that he freezes, because what she says next has his gaze flicking from her face down over the rest of her body. Being from Tevyat herself it should be pretty obvious to her what it is he's looking for. ]

... I'm afraid I haven't had the pleasure. [ Her features mark her as someone from Natlan, perhaps, a descendant of the Muratans? He'd thought the same of Diluc when he'd first seen him, nevermind how... less brightly his flame burned. ]

Tartaglia. Though I imagine if you've met others they might have referred to me as Childe. It doesn't matter to me which one suits you. Given our circumstances, who knows when we'll make it home again.

[ A pause - he has to act. The hair is too similar not to. ]

Are you related to the Ragnvindrs, by any chance?

[He'd be the first aside from Venti to be able to properly identify where she comes from=, and she sees him glancing up and down her frame no doubt searching for a Vision too. Vennessa doesn't have one, though she's been getting more eager about learning the magic of this world now she has the chance to be able to do such things.]

Tartaglia? That's an interesting name.

[As is the other name she gives - she'd think it was some kind of mockery if it wasn't given by him as something to call him by. What must he have done to earn a nickname like 'Childe'?

As for 'Tartaglia', that's a mouthful.]

But, ah... no, not that I know of. [In the future, perhaps... who knew if their bloodlines might mix. She knows the name, she thinks - they're a wealthy family in Mondstadt - but certainly nothing to do with her.] I'm not from Mondstadt, I'm Muratan. [As he had rightly identified. She holds her hand out in greeting, though curls her fingers back slightly and chuckles as she realises that he has his hands full with seashells.]

Vennessa.

[ And that's certainly a name that gets a reaction out of him. There's a familiarity, a blink and a onceover of the woman in front of him, Visionless and without not much else to mark her as someone from Tevyat. If not for her confirming it he might have expected her to be someone from a completely different world, but he supposes that sooner or later those without any kind of Visions might turn up here anyway.

He wonders if his family will make it here. But that's a thought best saved for another time.

The name is fitting, he thinks - because he has no idea if anyone presumed dead (or ascended, in this case) can even be brought here, so the only other likely explanation is that her family had the same idea his did and named him after a hero - and he gently shifts the seashells in his hold over to one arm so he can reach out and take her hand in his. ]

You certainly look it. Your parents had the right idea, giving you that name.

[ Not that he's seen Vennessa herself in person, but there's been paintings and stories. Hers was one of the ones he remembered hearing about quite often, as it was among his sisters' favorites. ]

Are you settling in all right? It can be a bit of an adjustment, but it's peaceful enough if you're into that sort of thing.

Mm, it's been strange. There was no one here that I knew.

[There was Venti, but she has almost made the mistake of entirely outing him before and even though he hadn't said anything about it, she had decided after that to leave his telling people that he was the Anemo Archon entirely to him. Some things were certainly not her place to be telling.

When she takes his hand her own is warm, roughened by weapon use, and her handshake is firm and confident. She had noticed the way he looked at her of course, expecting the inevitable follow-up question, but what he says instead sparks a small flicker of amusement in her chest.]

But what makes you say that? [Vennessa takes her hand back, smiles again.] About my name, I mean.

[... She can tease, sometimes.]

Do you know other Muratans?

[ That statement answers one of his lingering questions, and for a moment he wonders if she'd just been a mainstay in her country the entire time without doing much travelling. It makes sense; people don't wander to the beach here unless they hadn't actually seen them before since nothing was quite so unremarkable as miles of white sand dotted with seashells.

Childe didn't mind, though. That just meant that he usually had the beach to himself, save for times like now when he encountered someone who could also appreciate the aesthetic of the shoreline. ]

Not very well, I'm afraid. [ Which is as much as he's going to say on that subject. The grip he has on her hand tightens a little in acknowledgement before loosening again, and he'll drop his hand to his side as he balances his armful of shells while he mulls over what to say next. ]

I'm from Snezhnaya, myself. Though I'm sure you might have been able to tell just from looking at me. [ The hair, probably. ]

Did you only come out here just for the chance to try hearing the ocean through a shell... while next to the ocean?

[Vennessa makes a face at him when he questions her.]

It's different. [She insists immediately.] I can see the ocean in Mondstadt, but they don't have many beaches. [And the ones that she has seen are small and not easily accessible unless you want to climb down a cliff. While Vennessa could probably manage it, she's never taken the risk just for a few minutes of sinking her toes into the sand.]

And besides, I only wanted to know if it was true.

[Though she might find another one later to take home with her in replacement for the one she handed over to Childe.]

I've never met someone from Snezhnaya before. [She says then, looking him up and down as if trying to gauge what about him would have marked him out as being from there.] That's the Cryo Archon's country, isn't it?

[ he recalls to mind the general geography of the land surrounding Mondstadt; could those even be called beaches, really? he'd always been under the assumption it was some kind of massive, man-made lake, but when one came from Morepesok he supposed there were few things that could compare.

a sea-breeze whips up, blowing his hair into his face with the lingering scent of salt and fish. he shifts what he's got in his arms to tuck a strand behind his ear, following the path of the wind over to the horizon and peering out at the vast sea beyond.

dimly, he thinks he can see the buoys marking the border of safety and he recalls, with a sudden chill, the scent of death and rot from the ships moored out past the boundary. ]

Mm. [ he affirms once he's been pulled back into the conversation. the expression on his face betrays none of his somber thoughts, Childe instead adopting a pleasant smile when she speaks of his Queen. ]

It is. There are few who leave the borders of Her Majesty's country, and those who do never turn their backs on their homeland. I assume the same is true for you; that no matter where you go, you always think fondly of where you come from.

[She doesn't have quite the same expression on her own face when he turns her thoughts towards Natlan. There's a brief hesitation, then she gives a small shake of her head.]

I have very few fond memories of Natlan. [Vennessa tells him, loosely clasping her hands behind her back.] I haven't been back there for ten years, not since my tribe were chased into Mondstadt and captured by the nobles there.

[But she gives a little shrug, taking a few steps away to pick up a particularly shiny-looking pebble half-buried in the sand. Her thumb smooths the grains away from the surface of it, revealing the mottled colours worn almost glassy by erosion.] Murata cares little for her people. Or, at least, she never seemed to care for mine.

[No help. Not even a whisper of acknowledgement for ten years. Would Venti have done the same, had some of his own people been held captive as slaves in another country? No, he would have found a way to free them. She's sure of it.

She forces a smile when she turns back to Childe.]

But I think an archon of love would care far more for her own than one who loves only war. Snezhnaya must be a pleasant place.

[ the first indication that something is off about her is her mention of being chased into Mondstadt and captured by the nobles. rare as it was to see the people of Natlan outside of Natlan, it was especially strange that they should be captured by the nobles. what would they do with them? was there some secret underground Mondstadt thing he wasn't aware of? no... none of that made any sense.

she speaks of war, but from his understanding there was no war to be had; not yet, even with the creeping forces of the Fatui invading every land in their quest to fulfill Her Majesty's wishes.

there hadn't been a war for quite some time and it's this more than anything that has him looking over her with renewed interest.

Childe barely understood the finer details of the time loops and the surges that had brought them here. he had wondered, of course, and meeting Aether who hadn't really recalled his other form only deepened those musings.

if this place could bring the Traveler in from a different time entirely, surely it could bring other people as well. say... thousand year old heroes of Mondstadt.

though the words would surely come out biting, harsh if he gave them the appropriate tone, instead he adopts something curious and wondering when he speaks. ]

Do you know who you are?

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vennessa - 2021-12-09 09:14 (UTC) - Expand

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acutabove - 2021-12-24 03:36 (UTC) - Expand

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vennessa - 2021-12-31 17:22 (UTC) - Expand

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vennessa - 2022-01-30 21:58 (UTC) - Expand

[It's been another day of fruitful exploring in Vennessa's opinion. She had found an abandoned stone shrine far off a trail in the middle of some woodland and sat there for a while after clearing the leaves and moss from it. There had been nothing there to tell her what or who it might have been for, but it had provided her with a fine place to think and to practice the concepts of Kaze magic that she had been taught the day before.

The idea of being able to learn magic is still a strange one to her, having never had a Vision in Teyvat, but as the air gathers around her fingers and moves outwards in a soft burst of wind she can't help but feel a stirring of excitement. Is this what it feels like for them all the time? To have the elements at their command like this?

Later on, as the sky begins to grow darker and the birds begin to come down to roost, Vennessa packs up her things and shoulders her pack, moving off to find somewhere to camp for the night. City life doesn't suit her, although it's very convenient to be able to walk into one without worrying about anyone harassing her while she gets supplies. She certainly doesn't mind that part.

As she looks for somewhere to stop for the night she spies something not too far from where she's walking. A small campfire perhaps, or something glinting between the trees. Vennessa frowns, stops for a moment, then makes her way towards it. What she finds looks to be a small camp and she stops at the edge of it, rubbing the back of her head as she looks around. It's the first time she's seen evidence of someone else living outside like this.]

Is someone there? [She calls out after a moment, sliding her pack off her shoulders and setting it down lightly. There's evidence of belongings left here so whoever set this up surely can't be far...]

[In his time since arriving to Nippon, Kazuha has slept outside many nights, but few times has anyone with sentience approached his camp. On the occasion he’s had to slay an ayakashi or another monster (is there a difference? He’s not sure yet) but very few times he’s had to worry about a human or yokai visiting him.

Evenings are always when he settles down to have dinner and wine, a time to get comfortable and settle in before night fully falls. There’s a pot bubbling away over the fire, giving off the rich aroma of forest vegetables and— is that rabbit?

He’s just returning from washing his face and hands when he hears a voice. Cautiously, he places a hand on the hilt of his katana as he approaches his camp, fire light casting shadows over his face as he steps out of the darker part of the woods. His ruby eyes flick over her, wary but curious.]

Just I. [His eyes fall to her pack. He has one similar, sitting nearby.] I wasn’t expecting company tonight. I should probably add more water to the pot then.

[Ah, there is someone here.

She had expected that, but somehow his appearance still startles her. Perhaps it's the way he arrives with a hand on his weapon that makes her wary. Vennessa herself doesn't carry one, but she had never needed one - she could use her fists as well as any weapon she might have tossed to her in the arena.]

I don't mean to impose.

[And she lifts her pack up easily, as if it weighs almost nothing in spite of the size of it, moving to sling it back over her shoulder.] I can find somewhere else to spend the night.

Nonsense.

[At her readiness to leave, he feels more relaxed, and he just simply steps over to the pot and picks up a nearby cloth to lift the lid. As he opens it a cloud of steam and the smell of stew puffs into the air, and he picks up a cut bamboo water bottle, pulling the cork from the top so he can pour more water into the pot. While he’s there, he throws a few more mushrooms in.

As he leans, the string holding his visions slides over his back, clinking softly. He pays it no heed— they are secure on him, no threat of them falling off or getting lost in the pot.]

My company is open to all, most of all a fellow traveler.

Ah...

[Well, then. She smiles readily and sets her pack down again, moving in closer to the fire. Although she does have enough food in her pack to make herself a meal the smell of the stew cooking makes her stomach rumble quietly and she curls her hand around it.

She wouldn't expect him to feed her - Vennessa is used to going hungry - but if he's offering so kindly...]

Thank you.

[Vennessa smiles, then her eyes fall on the Visions attached to his clothes. The glassy trinkets are things she has seen many times before though she had never been blessed with one herself. Though, she has never seen a person carrying two...]

... Are you from Teyvat?

[One of Kazuha's greatest pleasures is being able to cook for someone else, so sliding into the role of offering a stranger part of his meal comes quite naturally. He stirs the stew, incorporating the water and mushrooms he's just added, and then looks over his shoulder at her.]

I am. I hail from Inazuma.

[He looks over at her, his eyes studying her, though it's more his sense of smell and hearing that's working more to attempt to place her. She smells like campfire. He can't quite determine where she's from.]

Are you familiar with it?

With Inazuma? No... only by name, and a few pieces of knowledge.

[She could find it on a map only by virtue of knowing it was an island nation to the south, but she knew next to nothing about the place save that it was the home of the Electro Archon, and by all accounts a beautiful country.

She sits down, content enough to be seated on the ground and finally rest. Spending at least some of the night with company would be a welcome change - she couldn't call on Venti every time she felt lonely.]

I'm Muratan, from Natlan.

[A quick smile is sent his way.]

Though most recently of Mondstadt. My name is Vennessa.

[The ronin perks up some at the mention of Natlan. He’s never met anyone from there before— Inazuma really couldn’t be much more remote than the rest of Teyvat and outlanders from as far as Murata’s domain were very rare.]

All the way in Mondstadt? That’s quite far from home.

[He sits near her, but not so close he’s in her personal space. In any case, he goes through his own pack a moment later, removing a bottle and two cups. Before placing both down, he looks at her.]

I’m Kaedehara Kazuha. Wine?

Kaedehara Kazuha... [She tries his name out softly, looking off into the distance as she does so and admittedly butchering the pronunciation somewhat on the first try. Realising this, she makes a face and tries again, making a much better job of it the second time.

Vennessa laughs quietly at herself, nodding at the offer of wine.]

Yes, please.

[And she begins to rummage in her pack to look for something.]

Your name sounds like poetry. It's lovely. Do all Inazumans have such names?

[He smiles to himself as she practices his name, taking no offense as he pours her a cup with two hands, then waits while she rummages in her pack.]

Names are very important in Inazuma. They denote lineage from my ancestors and also mean something. [He smiles warmly at her. How nice it is to have company tonight.] Mine means Ten Thousand Leaves.

Edited 2021-11-09 17:13 (UTC)

[It is nice to have company. Vennessa has relaxed by several degrees since she first came across the camp and is finding more comfort than she expected in the simple presence of another person. It has been very lonely, staying in the wild by herself. While she had always been a nomad it had been with her tribe, not alone.]

Ah... how lovely. [She knows so little about Inazuma - and most other places, in fact - though has never had reason yet to feel ashamed of her ignorance. Muratans simply had... other concerns.]

Do you prefer the whole name used, then? I... will certainly try to not insult you with my pronunciation.

[Vennessa seems to be very straight forward and open, which just makes Kazuha like her a great deal already. He's always enjoyed conversing most with frank people, as it meant that there wasn't too much guessing about what the other person was feeling.

He laughs a little, but shakes his head.]

Just Kazuha is fine. Kaedehara is my clan name. My given name should be much easier to pronounce.

[He's learned his lesson with expecting outlanders to know etiquette, so he helps himself to his own cup of sake, taking only a small sip for now.]

Have you been here long?

[Nov Catchall] ✵ Change the way you look at things and the things you look at change.

✵ Vennessa

for Childe (@acutabove)

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for Kazuha (@leafwhistle)

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