Eija looked at herself in the mirror as Kali typed at a keyboard over to the side and Urd sat to the side reading what appeared to be a manga.
The marks on her faced were shaped like blue drops of liquid sliding down from the corners of her eyes and her forehead. That blue coloring might have made most people that looked at the drops think they were supposed to be water, but Eija knew better.
She was always marked by blood.
Even before the first time she killed someone, a knife wielding maniac in a cult's den, she'd still been marked by the blood in her eyes.
Curiously, she opened her mouth.
Still no fangs.
"You'd only have fangs if you started with them," Kali noted.
"How did you know I was thinking that?" Eija asked.
"Because," Kali said. "My recent childhood started a little less than forty years ago. I also got the Dracula comments."
The dark skinned woman smiled at the pale new goddess as she said that. The irony of someone with her coloration getting accused of being a vampire not lost on Eija.
"Shouldn't I be practicing now?" Eija asked.
"In a moment," Urd said. "Kali's getting us some training space. and facilities."
"And I should be just about...done," she said. "You have a meditation room, start with the Searching."
"Searching?" Eija asked.
"Of course," Urd said, as if she were affronted by the idea that she would forget something so basic.
****
Naiki blinked at the paired, sickle shaped marks on her forehead and the shark-tooth shapes, split down the middle by a line of unmarked skin, at the corner of each eye, pointing outward.
Her sharp teeth were the same as always, save the outer four canines seemed more prominent somehow. She tried one of her "cute, fangy smiles" and it still seemed to carry off the same sort of effect.
The only real change she noted as that, indeed, the smoky air was a lot more pleasant than it had been. Though in this place it was still a bit thick, like too many perfumes in one room.
The best part was that the smoke didn't interfere with her sense of smell at all anymore. Her other senses seemed a bit more enhanced as well.
The green-haired demoness could actually feel Mara's pacing through the floor, and, if the other demoness got within a meter or so, she could feel the woman through the change in the air.
She could even feel the tingle of electricity working through Mara's body.
These were things she used to have to be in the water to feel. She didn't have near the sensitivity she was used to in water, but it did make her wonder what her new sensitivity under the waves would be like.
Suddenly, Mara stopped and looked toward the desk where one of the demons was working.
"Are you finished then?" Mara asked.
"You're set," the demon said.
"Okay then, kid," Mara said. "Practice is getting started soon. Starting with Conflict."
"Conflict?" Naiki asked. "Do you mean sparring?"
"Not really," Mara said with a smile.
****
Eija looked uncertainly at the potion in front of her.
"We've been using this this recipe for centuries to help us explore ourselves," Urd said. "It will take you into your own soul, for want of a better description. It will help you search for your truest nature...we call it your Domain."
"So when I drink this, I will see something?" Eija asked. "What did you see?"
Urd looked thoughtful for a moment.
"The Searching is very personal," Urd said quietly. "And not something easily...recalled. It sort of becomes a vague dream over time. It's clearer to some than to others, but...."
"I think I understand," Eija said, reaching down to take the drink.
****
"The smoke out there is thick with certain minerals," Mara said. "Sit out there and it will help you enter the Conflict."
"So I'm going to fight something in the smoke. It that the conflict?" Naiki asked. "You haven't explained that."
"It's what it sounds like," Mara said. "A battle."
"So what am I fighting?" Naiki asked.
"That's something different for each demon," Mara said. "But out of that fight will come your Realm."
"So I get my own land or something?" Naiki asked.
"The type of power that you are most suited to," Mara explained. "Do you understand?"
"I go out there, get high and have a hallucination?" Naiki asked.
"Sort of," Mara said with a twitch.
****
A moment ago, Eija had been sitting and meditating in the training ground Kali had arranged for them, but now suddenly, she was sitting on the rocks over Athens.
Looking about, the sky was white and the sea was red.
As she herself stood up, her skin was as black as her hair, an image she found familiar from her encounters in Kaname's Whispered mindscape.
"What should we do?" a voice asked.
Eija turned around to find another girl standing in front of her, one that looked a lot like the way she looked in the real world.
"Excuse me?" Eija asked curiously.
"What should we do?" the girl asked pointing downward.
Eija looked down and saw the red sea splashing on the beach below and receding. Then it came in again struck higher on the rocks. Each incoming wave came higher and higher.
"The tide's coming in," Eija said. "That's all."
As she said that, a heavy wave, more than a simple tsunami, crashed down on the rocky Grecian beach and receded only slightly before another hit and washed further up, carrying away bathers with it.
"What should we do?"
Eija didn't bother to answer as she leaped down toward the beach and moved to rescue the people carried off, but as the non-descript people touched the flow of the red waves, they dissolved and melted into the flow of red liquid.
Flinching away, Eija danced back and grabbed a person before they could touch the red waves. The other her copied her actions, saving other men and women. Several others, however, were caught and dissolved into the rising current.
Grabbing as many people as she could, Eija continued to deposit the faceless masses that she rescued higher up the cliffs. Only to see that the cliffs themselves were being dissolved by the torrent.
"What should we do?" the other her asked.
"Why do you ask me?" Eija asked. "You can do as much as I can."
"Okaasan is not here," the other her said.
Eija flinched away.
"Deimosu and Naiki are not here," the other said.
She looked down helplessly at the scarlet waves eating their way toward the phantom Athens.
"Sousuke is not here," she said. "Kaname is not here."
And then the natural-seeming Eija looked toward Eija's black-skinned, red-eyed true spirit.
"You are the only one I can ask," she said. "What should we do?"
"Do...do you always ask others what to do first?" Eija asked.
The other her nodded.
"Do I always ask what to do?" Eija wondered.
As she thought the tide kept rising below.
"How do I stop an ocean of..."
Eija stopped mid sentence, head dipping downward and biting her lip as her eyes stared forward hollowly.
She leaped down again toward the advancing sea, stopping just before it.
As it crashed in toward, her, she tensed nervously, but held her ground as the wave came in and stopped just short of her.
The waves started to move around and past her on both sides and experimentally she raised one hand to her side. On that side of her, the red wave washed straight upward as if it had struck a wall. Seeing that, she raised her other hand upward and the sea on that side slammed into its own invisible force.
Taking in a breath, Eija calmly and coolly stepped forward, bringing her hands forward and pushing back the waves as she did so.
From that clapping motion she moved into the beginnings of a routine, noticing that with each step forward, the torrent shifted back. She spun calmly and then thrust forward with a slight hop and the tide retreated further back.
There was less fear and desperation with each step she took, and less and less hostility as well.
"Blood," she said quietly. "It's always blood with me."
As she walked forward now, she seemed almost unaware of the blood as it she pushed it forward.
Protecting the blood of her family and friends.
Shedding her own blood to help others.
Spilling the blood of enemies when she was forced to.
There were other ways to look at things, but Eija had to admit that for her, everything came down to blood.
And right now, the world was drowning in it.
So, right now, someone was needed to send the tide back.
"I have to make decisions and act," she whispered.
****
Naiki stared around, wondering just where she was. A moment ago, she'd been sitting in the middle of a lot of smoke, but now...she was standing on the edge of an island air base?
The ground around her was shades of blue with a sky of lavender and purple clouds. She herself was all in shades of green with bright blue eyes. It was like she was in that weird place where she'd started merging with Tessa.
"Heads up!" a voice shouted.
Naiki looked toward the sound in time to leap over the small helicopter hurled in her direction.
In leaping over it, watching it pass below her, she almost failed to see another figure leaping upward to join her in mid flight. By the time she did see the figure, it was too late to do more than block and roll with axe kick delivered at the end of a forward flip.
She didn't just idly block of course, but latched onto to her opponent's foot, launching the other in a graceless tumble even as Naiki herself hit the ground and rolled into a standing position.
Instantly her eyes locked sight of the figure rising out of the tumble.
Shaking it's head clear and staring at the wreckage of the helicopter.
Smirking at the easy victory, Naiki let fly with a pair of Kijin Raishu Dan vacuum blades. They rushed across the sceen with a ripping sound, twisting at times to cut deep grooves in the ground.
Finally, as they came upon their target, they crossed together and Naiki's attacker flipped up over the attacks with a snickering flourish before landing and bouncing again over Naiki's head.
Naiki started to follow the figure's movement, when she heard a shriek behind her.
Twisting about, Naiki was just in time to see her vacuum blades slash through her sister, leaving little more than a bloody pile of pieces behind.
"Damn you!" her opponent shouted bitterly, drawing Naiki's ire as it seemed her enemy was angered by the death of HER sister.
"Come on then!" Naiki roared out, turning to face the enemy and leaping forward, sharp teeth grinding against each other.
The vague figure of the opponent leapt to meet her again, but this time the growling figure got a face full of Naiki's knee. This time, Naiki was the one who was grabbed in the last moment, and the two were sent scattering across the jagged terrain at the edge of the base.
Getting to her feet, Naiki found herself facing the oppoenent as she came in with a flurry of attacks stolen straight from Naiki's yamasenken. Blocking and dodging furiously, Naiki felt her rage boiling as she finally side stepped, letting the enemy pass right by her as she kneeled to the ground and let her anger pass through her left hand into rock under her feet.
The ground shook violently all around as Naiki turned slowly to watch her enemy's disintegrating stance as the ground shook itself apart underneath.
Blue eyes raging with anger, Naiki ripped her right hand backwards, bringing a torrent of water flying from below to envelope her enemy and drag them down into the deep, her playground.
Naiki was about to follow when she noticed something left in the wake of the wave. A body crushed and battered by stone and wave, but still recognizeable as her brother.
Seething with rage, her hesitation gone, she leaped out into the ocean and slammed down into it, letting her senses spill outward. The senseation of a living nervous system and the vibration of a swift, natural swimmer were easy to track down as she propelled herself forward.
Her enemy, as natural a swimmer as herself it seemed, turned about and came to meet Naiki, flashing past in a strike that spilled blood into the water. Naiki started to follow, but changed her mind briefly as she felt the rushing current of the water about her shift dangerously.
Dashing away from the forming whirlpool, Naiki swam around the edges of it, seeking her enemy even as she noted debris funneling down the whirlpool to the seabed.
The remains of a boat and her mother's surprised and drowned body.
Naiki was screaming as she pushed herself along, finding the enemy, staring into the whirlpool probably to gloat. The young demoness slammed into her enemy, putting all the strength of the water behind her in a huge wave that thrust both her and her enemy up onto the island again.
Immediately, Naiki was up and recovering herself rolling to a standing position next a small helicopter as she immediately noted her opponent standing further out, glancing around in confusion.
Grabbing the helicopter, Naiki lifted it up and, glaring at her opponent, shifted to hurl it.
"Heads up!" she shouted angrily.
Her enemy turned about just in time to see the huge projectile and leap over it, watching as the thing flew past, and giving Naiki an almost perfect opening.
Leaping forward, she waited until she was near the enemy before throwing herself forward into a flip that ended with a downward axe kick that her opponent barely had time to block and roll, adding a suicide grab and twist at the last moment.
Losing control of her own momentum, the demoness came down hard to the ground before rolling to a standing position.
There, before her, crushed under the weight of the helicopter she'd thrown, was Tessa Testarossa.
Her stare was frozen on that body when she heard the characteristic ripping sound of Kijin Raishu Dan vacuum blades growing closer.
Her immediate idea was to leap over the incoming projectiles, but she paused, glancing behind her to see Eija incongruously running to her aide.
"Kijin Raishu Dan!" she growled hurling her own blades forward into the two coming her way.
Charging forward, her enemy slipped backwards, away from her.
"I hate being toyed with!" Naiki shouted angrily as she caught up with her enemy and lashed out with an array of Yamasenken strikes.
When her opponent tried to side-step, she didn't stumble forward but stayed her ground and swiveled smoothly to place herself between the enemy and the ocean.
She was tempted to make another full scale earthquake again, but she didn't know where enemys or friends lay. Instead she channelled her anger into a much more specific target as she thrust her foot downward in a stomp that cracked the earth outward to her enemy.
The localized crack sealed tight once the opponent's foot slipped inside, crushing the limp and trapping it.
Naiki grimaced bitterly as she looked about her to see Deimosu landing at the top of the cliff and her mother beaching a boat further down. Elsewhere, Eija was helping Tessa walk away from the wrecked helicopter.
That satisfying her fears, Naiki turned to face her enemy. The one that made her rage less of a weapon and more of a disaster.
Laughing up at her, was her own face as it appeared in life.
Stepping forward, Naiki didn't hesitate to slash a dark Kijin Raishu Dan through the neck of her double, watching her head hop off and roll to a stop against a shed, shocked expression on her face.
"I can't be acting without thinking about anymore," she said, breathing heavily.
****
Eija snapped awake, much of the memory of her vision already fading back away from her.
A small flood of relief came through the link she had with Kaname, making her come to a guess that, for however long that vision lasted, the Whispered had been blocked from her at least temporarily.
"Well," Urd asked.
"Blood," Eija said. "My Domain is Blood."
****
Naiki thought about the pace of the fading vision and some few images.
"I'm the Demon of Torrent, I think," Naiki said, ignoring the annoyed worry coming out of Tessa's end of the link.