Celadine Hills (Farmland)

Odd, Jun did not recall Lady Naoki being this tall. Eventually she came up for air and direct her attention to the floundering young girl at Naoki's side.

...

Wow.

For some reason Jun pictured Lady Naoki's main squeeze as a more dignified, aristocratic figure, as opposed to the bumbling horse-lover before her. One of Raynor's eyebrows practically disappeared into his long hair at the phrase "Nice to shit you". Jun's wide eyes followed Kate as she trailed after the horse that she was apparently only now coming to terms with, despite the fact that it was their horse. Raynor smirked and nudged Jun's shoulder. Jun shook her head. "Uh, Miss Green? Are you... hungry?" She called out, stating the word "hungry" with such trepidation to suggest that even saying the word might cause Kate to lose what was left of her mind.

"Jun, we should tell the others to prepare a feast." Raynor then called out to the horse girl. "How would you feel about dinner in an hour?" Jun turned to Lady Naoki. "The Sun Marshalls don't have to stay in the carriage if they don't want to. I think we have enough guest chambers for everyone. They're also welcome for dinner." The father and daughter would beckon Lady Naoki, Kate, and the Sun Marshalls to follow them towards the base of the stone tower. As they turned they would exchange looks, as if to say to each other how many more weirdos are we going to have to contend with today?

Speaking of which, "Oh, one more thing" Jun would say. "We also have another guest. He's, well, we don't really know anything about him but he seems to be a refugee from Goraia." They gestured over to the strange man drinking tea next to one of the fields.

With a scintillating jingle, Kate replies to Naoki: I’m behind some tent type thing! Near where they took the horses? I don’t think they really mind me, but do come quick. Kate took some deep breaths to release the pressure. Gosh. That did not go well at all. Naoki would find her standing with her arms crossed. She hadn’t been crying but her face might as well been on fire. “Sorry, that did not go as planned… She just, made me a bit nervous, you know? When you meet somebody famous for the first time it’s… Whew. I guess I just need to get used to it, right?” She laughed sheepishly. Some of the horses wagged their ears sympathetically.

Kate grabbed Naoki by the arm and gave her elbow a reassuring pat. And then two more. “I'm gonna let you lead the conversation and enjoy the atmosphere for now, hun. And for heavens' sake stop me if I start going off like that again. Maybe I can still make a decent second impression. Hm? Is something cooking?” Kate gestured her bracelet-hand towards the place where Jun was preparing for a feast for her guests. She'd begin tugging Naoki along towards them. She had been learning about different food ingredients lately and Land-Tillers cuisine would definitely be interesting to learn from, given their connection to the earth.

Rounding the corner, Naoki is visibly relieved to find Kate seemingly highly embarrassed, but otherwise none the worse for wear. She considers elaborating on how she doesn’t mind at all, and seriously doubts that Jun or Elder Havalor will hold that first encounter against her, but decides instead to simply nod in what she intends to be interpreted as an understanding way.

Naoki continues to nod quietly as Kate continues. She would need to get used to meeting and dealing with ‘famous’ people- and quickly, too. After pondering the matter for a moment, Naoki offers the following advice, “A big part of it is confidence in yourself. Don’t allow others to dwarf your own sense of self-worth. Keep your shoulders back, head high, make eye contact, and remember that I’ll be right here for you.”

With that, she takes both of Kate’s hands in her own and squeezes slightly while making eye contact, intending to express the support she offers through the gesture, and ease some of Kate's embarrassment at the same time.

As Kate takes her by the elbow and begins leading the way back to camp, a small sort of self-satisfied smile curves its way across Naoki’s face.

I’m getting better at this ‘relationship’ thing, she thinks.

Regardless, the pair would soon find themselves back at The Celandine village, in the vicinity of whatever manner of feast preparations are presumably underway. Naoki, rather than leading the way, stands slightly behind Kate, suggesting that she lead the way. While it would probably be polite to assist with the feast-making in some manner, cooking… isn’t exactly Naoki’s forte, and her foremost priority is to offer support to Kate. A second instance of Kate ‘shitting’ the elder of the village probably wouldn’t be so great for international relations, and to best prevent such things, Naoki figures she ought to keep close.

That’s how she justifies it internally, at least.

Indeed Enigma was lost as he stood there awkwardly watching the locals go about their business. He couldn't help but brood during that time as he had nothing to do at the moment. 

They didn't really know who he was yet, what he had done. He had tried to tell Jun, but how would she have reacted if she knew? He had to hide his identity if he wanted to stay. He did want to stay here, he wanted somewhere to stay at least. 

Fool, you think you can stay here? They will find out, and they will cast you out.

That voice, Enigma knew it all too well. As much as Echoes' reconfiguration of Enigma's condition had helped, it also set apart both of Enigma's identities, once again making them distinct as they once were. 

No, maybe they will forgive me, if I can just explain to them what happened...

What happened was you burned down most of Stonevale, killing hundreds in the process... unforgivable, embrace who you are now. They will find out sooner or later, might as well take what you can now. Or you can let me do it for you.

Enigma, now under quite some inner turmoil would be approached by Raynor. He would be somewhat startled as the man put his arm on his shoulder, and his eyes would grow even wider once he asked his name. 

Oh no, it is happening... they will find out who I am. 

In a panic, Enigma would run away into a nearby field, away from Raynor and the others.

Naoki treads along quietly, behind and slightly to Kate’s left. A small pang of intense anguish grips Naoki for a moment as she realizes that she’s mimicking Artemis- what with her hands behind her back and the slight, neutral sort of smile. She would need to address that with Kate sometime very soon.

But now is neither the time nor place. For now, Naoki offers only her presence, and that little smile- should anyone care to look her way. Idly, as not to seem as if she’s hanging on every word of the conversation, Naoki casts her eyes about, observing the village. It is, after all, her first visit to the Celandine Village. And though she supposes, it is sort of simply just a little village, it’s also a rather important little village in the grand scheme of things, and it would be a fine idea to gain an understanding of its people. However, one ear and the majority of Naoki’s focus remains rigidly fixed on Kate and Jun, and she stands ready to interject or offer support as needed.

As she was led to the tower's basement kitchen, Kate began to see Jun in quite a new light. She's the most powerful, and the most important of all these people, yet she's helping them make... soup. After all the time she had spent in the Midnight Sun, where she only had to lift a finger and a fully roast pig would be brought before her, such humility was truly moving. Well. It's not like she had any dragons to slay at the moment, but still. Nice gesture.

"Oh, of course I'll help. It's the least I can do for popping in like this." Kate felt a sting of remorse in her stomach. Now they had to make extra large serving because of her whimsy.  "Do you have any spare aprons? Or a scarf for my hair?" She looked around for the items she mentioned. The cookery was slightly bigger than the one at the bar, and certainly bigger than the sorry excuse for a stove she had at home. She sensed some familiar scents in the air, as well as some that were altogether new. Also, there was a noticeable lack of demonic presence in the air, which might explain the absence of the smell of sulphur. Yet, she did not see any spare cooking garments. She figured they were kept in a closet or something alike.

"Would you like to help, dear? You could put those well trained arm muscles to good use in chopping some leek, yeah?" She nudged Naoki and gave her a syrupy smile, but the ill-defined edge in her voice made it clear that they were both in this together. 

Following Kate into the tower, Naoki expresses mild curiosity, looking around every which way to properly observe their surroundings. It’s interesting to see what all they have going on in here, what with the glyphs and such. Passing further down into the cookery, Naoki is both pleasantly surprised and mildly repulsed by what she finds. The room itself- the cookery, isn’t the most terrible thing, and she finds its inherent warmness to be quite nice.

However, the scent of fish is everywhere. Fresh fish, at that; the worst sort. Contrary to what one might assume, Naoki is in the “Definitely not a fan” category when it comes to seafood. She finds the scent of it- especially in such quantity and a more or less unventilated room, to be quite frankly, rather nauseating.

Unhinging her jaw slightly and parting her lips, Naoki employs a technique she learned long ago, and hasn’t needed to in years. By breathing primarily through the mouth, pungent scents aren’t quite as terrible, presumably because of the decreased airflow through the nose. This helps, but is only capable of so much when the air itself is seems to be suffused with scaly fish innards. As such, Naoki is less than fully aware of what all is going on, and only snaps back when Kate nudges her.

“Some leak?”

More or less blindsided by the request, Naoki takes a moment to reevaluate, reinterpret, and reassess the situation to figure out just what the heck all is going on. Only a moment, though.

Without anything in particular to do or any real reason to deny Kate’s suggestion, Naoki nods, accepting the great responsibility.

“Of course, the leeks.”

Shuffling over to the indicated bag of leeks, Naoki decides to devote her attention wholeheartedly to ensuring that these leeks get chopped well, and that she doesn’t regurgitate upon them during the process. That’s a fine enough goal, she thinks.

Quietly, she notes that this is an awful lot of leeks. A whole bag full, maybe thirty pounds worth. Some part of her mind registers that this is probably way too many leeks to reasonably fit in a stew. As such, she begins by selecting a few of the best looking leeks- those with the largest and clearest pale bits. Then, another handful, and another, until she has about ten.

Arms full of leeks, Naoki carefully proceeds over to what would seem like an area designed for washing and cutting things. What with a basin of clean water and knives and whatnot. Depositing her load onto the counter, Naoki begins by washing her hands; rinsing them in the water and drying them halfway with a nearby cloth probably intended for such a purpose.

Next into the basin are the leeks, albeit one at a time. Dunking the vegetable in the water, Naoki uses her thumbs, primarily, to remove the dirt on the exterior and between the leaves.

What a strange sort of plant, she muses, doing her very best not to pay attention to the fellow to her left, who would seem to be gutting some manner of fish. If she recalls correctly, it’s in the same family of plant as onions, and garlic. What with the layers and the growing underground and such.

Wish the first leek washed, she begins to form a second pile, for the clean leeks. Slowly and carefully, leeks move from one pile to the next, until the entire stack of leeks is about as clean as they’re going to be without opening them.

Next, Naoki supposes that she ought to chop them, as suggested. Leaning a bit close to the fellow gutting the fish, Naoki selects a knife more or less at random. (Why is he even handling raw fish in the same vicinity as the vegetables. Is she in the wrong spot? This is probably the fish area. Why hasn’t anyone corrected her?)

Focusing very intently, Naoki begins to take the knife to the leeks, starting by cutting the roots off each one and discarding the roots into what would seem to be a composting bin. Next, she makes an incision into each leek lengthwise, opening them up. With each step, Naoki processes her pile of leeks in tandem, performing each step to every leek before proceeding.

Next, she washes the dirt out of the open leeks. What with being layered and growing in the earth, dirt tends to get all up in there, and she gets that right out. The open, clean leeks are then sliced thinly widthwise, and the little leek-bits are then slid from the cutting surface into a bowl.

This leaves Naoki with only a bowl of perhaps two quarts worth of sliced leek bits in a bowl. Nodding slightly to herself, Naoki realizes that the fish-fellow has since finished his task and departed. Without any particular idea of what to do next, Naoki turns back about and moves to seek out Jun- who she hopes is responsible for the actual assembly of the stew, holding her bowl of leeks in two hands.

The archer and mage's quick explanation coupled with their decision to reveal themselves immediately would go a long way in calming Enigma down for the moment. He would take a couple of deep breaths, uncurling his fingers from the fists they had formed in the momentary tension as he shifted back to fully human and lost his more keen senses once again. There was no visible indication of shifting except for reptilian pupils that replaced the normal human gaze in those few tense moments before the two Land Tillers had revealed themselves. Even then this detail alone would have been quite difficult to spot from a distance.

"Yes.. I'm fine... I will follow you back."

He would then walk into view of the two, seemingly normal once again and follow them back to wherever dinner was being held.

“Alright, alright…” Raising her hands in mock surrender, Naoki accepts the apron from Kate and holds it in one hand to examine it. Such things, what with their floral pink designs and overly feminine frills, are very much outside the realm of what Naoki would dress herself with. Very much the sort of thing Kate would probably wear; there isn’t much of a difference between a cooking apron and a gardening apron anyway, Naoki assumes.

Regardless, Naoki dons the apron at Kate’s insistence, grumbling slightly but smirking the entire time. Looking a bit foolish is well worth it, Naoki decides, to see Jun- but more importantly, Kate, pleased. That, Naoki thinks, is a decision she would make every day of the week.

Now wearing the frilled apron, Naoki resumes her work, taking the knife to any vegetables that may be placed before her. Occasionally, she glances in Kate’s direction to see how she’s faring, and then toward Jun, in an attempt to gauge just how many damn vegetables she’s going to need for this stew.