HikariAngel
04-09-08, 04:19 PM
Calloused feet made barely a whisper as the body they carried walked with a casual pace toward one doorway. Above the doorway hung a simple sign that read “Warrior”. Underneath the plaque was a removable piece of wood that read “Monica”. The brown-clad monk did not hesitate in the slightest when he opened the door and stepped through the swirling, inky black vortex.
“Mistress Monica? A man has requested the pleasure of a personal performance.”
Clad in a denim jacket layered over a leather tank top, the only other being in the arena turned her head slightly so one of the large cat-like ears set atop her head could swivel around and catch the rest of the man’s words. Ears were such convenient things.
“A ‘Homun Culus’, actually. Is there anything special you would like for this match?”
Her shoulders dropped slightly as she turned to face her personal monk. He was the one who had fixed her broken ribs from the first fight. Someone else had taken care of the poor man who had been her opponent at the time. Her shoulders drooped, but she still had a small smile hidden in the corner of her mouth.
“No… just leave it be for now.”
“As you wish.”
She turned back, her tail hardly swishing as a gentle breeze picked up out of nowhere. Was every fight destined to turn into a bloody massacre? She sighed and closed her eyes, preparing for the worst that could happen.
~*~
To say it was the conjuration of a deranged mind, you would need to make two assumptions: the first of which is the idea that Monica’s mind was deranged and the second being that she actually put a significant amount of thought in her choice of fighting arena. Neither would be accurate in her case. She just didn’t think the same way “normal” people thought she should… many times she didn’t think at all before doing something.
This was one of those times, and very clearly so.
The field was rather simple for a change if you discounted the catgirl’s unique eccentricities. Standing on the floor, grass spread from a swirling black vortex—the entrance to the arena—in colors that it had no business being. Green worked its way into the kaleidoscopic palette here and there, but for the most part, pinks, yellows, and other random flavors of neon blades cast an omnipresent light on an otherwise dim space.
Yes, the grass is glowing, but it’s not trying to kill you.
What filled that requirement was the multitude of floating landmasses. Half of them looked as though they were uprooted straight from the psychedelic groundcover, the other half were strangely inverted. Each one was moving straight up or down, drifting lazily as though it had nothing better to do. Despite the multicolored grass, the dirt was quite normal and brown. Perhaps she hadn’t thought that deep about the strangeness of the arena.
Looking up, another unique sight would quickly come into view and solve the riddle of where the overhead glow was coming from. Nearly identical to the ground below, the ceiling three-stories up was coated again with the same grass to provide a second source of light. The strangest thing, however, was the fact that a girl with silver hair was standing on the ceiling as though it was no big deal. She walked quickly over to one of the floating clods and jumped atop it, crossing her legs and sitting down as it began its descent to the floor.
She drifted slowly down, past a tree in the very center between the top and bottom halves that seemed to be growing in every direction at once, up and down as well as out to the sides. She sat there until her head was about ten feet from the ground, at which point she stood up and walked to the edge of the clod and stepped off it, still upside-down. She might as well have had magnets on her feet for how she pivoted on her stationary foot and stepped back onto the “bottom” of the clot. She was now right-side-up and oriented directly at the new challenger.
Looking around, the catgirl’s silver hair glistened from the luminous grass. Her large ears twitched back and forth as she smiled innocently. Her perky, peppy attitude was back; the small bout of depression from earlier was hidden under her “typical” façade. A small hop and half-flip later, she was standing on the normal ground, the top of her head coming up a half-dozen inches short of her foe’s forehead.
“Mister Homun… Culus…?”
It really was a strange name now that she thought about it. He had a strange air about him that made her want to stay back, too. Eyes colored with rose petals glanced across his body, never lingering in one spot too long but not flitting around too quickly to assess the potential for threat he had.
“I’m Monica. It’s nice to meet you.”
“Mistress Monica? A man has requested the pleasure of a personal performance.”
Clad in a denim jacket layered over a leather tank top, the only other being in the arena turned her head slightly so one of the large cat-like ears set atop her head could swivel around and catch the rest of the man’s words. Ears were such convenient things.
“A ‘Homun Culus’, actually. Is there anything special you would like for this match?”
Her shoulders dropped slightly as she turned to face her personal monk. He was the one who had fixed her broken ribs from the first fight. Someone else had taken care of the poor man who had been her opponent at the time. Her shoulders drooped, but she still had a small smile hidden in the corner of her mouth.
“No… just leave it be for now.”
“As you wish.”
She turned back, her tail hardly swishing as a gentle breeze picked up out of nowhere. Was every fight destined to turn into a bloody massacre? She sighed and closed her eyes, preparing for the worst that could happen.
~*~
To say it was the conjuration of a deranged mind, you would need to make two assumptions: the first of which is the idea that Monica’s mind was deranged and the second being that she actually put a significant amount of thought in her choice of fighting arena. Neither would be accurate in her case. She just didn’t think the same way “normal” people thought she should… many times she didn’t think at all before doing something.
This was one of those times, and very clearly so.
The field was rather simple for a change if you discounted the catgirl’s unique eccentricities. Standing on the floor, grass spread from a swirling black vortex—the entrance to the arena—in colors that it had no business being. Green worked its way into the kaleidoscopic palette here and there, but for the most part, pinks, yellows, and other random flavors of neon blades cast an omnipresent light on an otherwise dim space.
Yes, the grass is glowing, but it’s not trying to kill you.
What filled that requirement was the multitude of floating landmasses. Half of them looked as though they were uprooted straight from the psychedelic groundcover, the other half were strangely inverted. Each one was moving straight up or down, drifting lazily as though it had nothing better to do. Despite the multicolored grass, the dirt was quite normal and brown. Perhaps she hadn’t thought that deep about the strangeness of the arena.
Looking up, another unique sight would quickly come into view and solve the riddle of where the overhead glow was coming from. Nearly identical to the ground below, the ceiling three-stories up was coated again with the same grass to provide a second source of light. The strangest thing, however, was the fact that a girl with silver hair was standing on the ceiling as though it was no big deal. She walked quickly over to one of the floating clods and jumped atop it, crossing her legs and sitting down as it began its descent to the floor.
She drifted slowly down, past a tree in the very center between the top and bottom halves that seemed to be growing in every direction at once, up and down as well as out to the sides. She sat there until her head was about ten feet from the ground, at which point she stood up and walked to the edge of the clod and stepped off it, still upside-down. She might as well have had magnets on her feet for how she pivoted on her stationary foot and stepped back onto the “bottom” of the clot. She was now right-side-up and oriented directly at the new challenger.
Looking around, the catgirl’s silver hair glistened from the luminous grass. Her large ears twitched back and forth as she smiled innocently. Her perky, peppy attitude was back; the small bout of depression from earlier was hidden under her “typical” façade. A small hop and half-flip later, she was standing on the normal ground, the top of her head coming up a half-dozen inches short of her foe’s forehead.
“Mister Homun… Culus…?”
It really was a strange name now that she thought about it. He had a strange air about him that made her want to stay back, too. Eyes colored with rose petals glanced across his body, never lingering in one spot too long but not flitting around too quickly to assess the potential for threat he had.
“I’m Monica. It’s nice to meet you.”