Chauffeur Norimune
darthcourt10
Well worn.
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Lord K
A.N./ urgh, was meaning to have this done by like Friday. Oh well, IRL gonna IRL.
Hunched over the morning paper and nursing her coffee in the hopes of the caffeine eventually making her feel vaguely more cognizant of the world around her, Norimune gazes in a zombie-like fugue at the sunrise headlines, while listening to something offensively loud and metal-sounding over the radio.
'No sentient being should ever be up this early,' she silently grumbles to herself while basking in the scent of dark roast, cream, and far too much sugar. 'It's cruel, unusual and inhuman.'
Then she cringes, when as if to exemplify her statement of cruel and usual inhumanity, Kagotsuruhe enters the kitchen and announces her arrival with an exceptionally chipper "Good morning!"
Even for Kagotsuruhe's normally subtlety off and stepford-esque behavior, the Blade of Hoplessness has been particularly bright and lively in the mornings of late. The reason for this is no doubt, because of how much of a morning person, Norimune isn't. Having generally been assigned (re; thrown under the bus in the Unrepentant Blade's own opinion) most of the blame for losing Kyoshu and then letting the 'Reunion' with Juuchi at the park get out of hand, for the foreseeable future the nodachi had been roped into playing chauffeur for Kagotsuruhe. Making up for the loss of her sister's Prius until the actress could finish sorting out her insurance claim and acquiring a new vehicle.
Spoiler
"And how are you this morning, sister?" asks the shapeshifting nightmare, that has for today chosen a more modern facade of maidenly innocence, with a brightly enthusiastic smile.
Spoiler
"Rocking on," is the Unrepentant Blade's flatly phlegmatic and semi-awake response, while halfheartedly giving a sign of the horns in return. While the Blade of Hoplessness wasn't the kind to hold a grudge, and the ability to feel vindictive was normally beyond her, Norimune is pretty sure that the sheer amount of smug and schadenfreude Akutoku had been giving off at the nodachi's fate lately, was too irresistible a treat for the cursed katana to passively enjoy on occasion.
Cheerfully descending upon the kettle, Kagotsuruhe then begins making herself a pleasant cup of green tea, while Norimune continues to sip her caffeinated sugar bomb and gaze at the headlines. "So, anything interesting in the news this morning?" queries the smaller blade with polite curiosity.
Norimune gives a neutral grunt. "Meh, it's all the same general doom, gloom, bullshit-filled stupid. The front page is still all stuff about Mahoutokoro and Kyoto. Though there is an article about some diplomatic chitchat between the Diet and the MACUSA Ambassador. Some rumors about some Diet Representative's daughter being a yokai or something. A bunch of junk about how certain potion ingredients are going up in price again because lol-no-deep-sea-access. Then most of the rest of the domestic and local crap is politics, since we're leading up to the election next year. Meanwhile, in the international section we have...."
The nodachi takes a moment to shuffle the pages. "Let's see.... bunch of doomsayers going on about a potential financial crisis if Bosnia and Serbia default on more of their loans to the ICW and Goblin Banks, which could end up dragging down the rest of the balkans magical governments with them..... The French are indulging in their age-old national part time of rioting basically everywhere they can congregate without the nomajs noticing. Looks like it's about more war taxes.... The ICW is jumping up and down about some civil war between magicals in the Republic of the Congo that's spilling over into Cameroon and the Central African Republic, but who the fuck has the time and manpower spare to worry about that on top of all their own Abyssal shit in this day and age...."
Norimune turns a few more pages. "And here we go, last of the major headlines. There's an article on this collective sad sack of shit in the US, where the Magical Congress is taking the board of some company to court over the fact that, since the war basically made them the sole source in North America of some fancy magic-sensitive plant you can't magically transport or downsize to move in bulk, they've gradually raised the price of the plant by five hundred percent. And also some crap about this singer or actress or whatever in New York turning out to secretly have a non-human in the family tree. It's tabloid-y shit, so I didn't bother reading it, but I figured it might interest you." Kagotsuruhe nods and smiles her stepford-smile while the Unrepentant Blade flips another page.
"Oh, and in England, somebody apparently decided to look at the dumpsterfires going on here, and then told their buddies in the Ministry to hold their beer. Can you believe these idiots didn't just think letting dementors hang around their national school was a good idea this year, but that the fuckwit Auror in charge of shepherding the things around then thought 'hey, let's let them check the train full of school children was going to be totes fine'?" Norimune gives a contemptuous snort.
Well traveled as she is, the Unrepentant Blade considers herself as having something of a healthy respect and wariness for pathoknietic beings and magics. Especially since unlike some of her sisters, she lacks for any innate resistances or sheer overwhelming offense powers, and against something such as a dementor, has only her knowledge of sorcery, skill at spellcraft, and luck manipulation to fallback on. Something that was long ago driven home for her, considering who two of her sisters were.
Kyoshu (once upon a time, and still occasionally when she remembered) was deadly in a 1v1 and a right pain in the ass to fight, but at least for Norimune, she'd never been that much of a boogeyman and personal tormentor. Maybe it was because the Unrepentant Blade often passed between owners and wielders like a spare I.O.U. anyway, so she rarely got that attached to anyone she didn't expect to eventually either sell her on, loan her after serious injury, or have die on her at the end. And while Kyoshu may have once rivaled Juuchi in personal skill, the most evil of the Demon Blades had always lacked for any kind of larger strategic acumen, rarely changed her overall tactics, and had never displayed any long term ability to plot beyond her immediate desires. All areas that, while Norimune was admittedly not much better at either, she had at least grown in via osmosis, after trotting the ever changing battlefields of the world across the centuries.
(It also probably helped that her mildly inglorious backstory and reputation likely didn't make her rank very high on Kyoshu's list of 'sister's I need to mentally abuse, torture, take everything from, and lord my superiority over', which while she was thankfully for, occasionally rankled at her pride a little. And then there was the fact that she was outside the country more often than in it, for most of the last three hundred years...)
No, in Norimune's opinion, Kagotsuruhe had always been the more terrifying opponent to face back in the day. Kyoshu was a personal-scale weapon of untouchable domination that made any slip-up fatal, with an untapped potential to sow chaos, mistrust and confusion among the forces, commanders and courts of foes, that the old Sword of Faded memories had never cared to utilize in any useful fashion beyond her pointless sadism and immediate personal entertainment.
But Kagotsuruhe was sheer, overwhelming force. Not even a tidal wave, but a blunt, crushing avalanche of cold. She had the ability to not only reach across an entire area at a range no one else in the sisterhood could match, but she could visit her effect upon multitudes at once. Inexorably burying all under the weight of her freezing will, until they either succumbed or were broken. And unlike Kyoshu's perversely self-centered trails of whimsical torture, the Blade of Hopelessness had the cold, emotionless intellect and the skills learned at the hands of generations of competent masters, to utilize herself to optimal and devastating effect on the rare occasions she took to the field or was drawn into conflict.
There was a reason it was said that of the greatest of the magical Muramasas, Umitsubame was the one Kyoshu hated, Chisuheri was the one that Kyoshu despised, Juuchi Yosamu was the one Kyoshu envied, but Kagotsuruhe was the only one Kyoshu ever feared.
Which, thus brought Norimune's train of thought back to the subject at hand. Sure, Kagotsuruhe was in some ways worse than a dementor, thanks to her intelligence and the nightmarish mishmash of other dark and vile things that were horrifically combined to formulate her blade, fittings, and powers, but that in her mind, only reinforced how nasty dementors could be. At least Kagotsuruhe didn't eat people's souls.
"You got to wonder abut these people," says the nodachi with a shake of her head. "Are they seriously lacking that much brain power? They're lucky none of the kids got hurt. " Actually reading the article beyond just a glance at it's headline aand initial blurb this time, Norimune then makes a mild noise of surprise. "Huh... it actually sounds like the dementors are the ones that came off worse from the incident?"
"Really?" asks the Blade of Hopelessness with mild curiosity as she sips at her tea.
"Yeah," sitting up and frowning, the Unrepentant Blade now starts paying proper attention to the words she's previously been skimming over. "Oh wow, that's.... that's something it seems they actually killed some of them."
Pausing mid-motion, Kagotsuruhe is abruptly oddly still. "They killed dementors?", questions the katana in a now flat tone.
Too engrossed in the article to notice the change in her sister, Norimune continues. "Yeah, there's pics of the aftermath too. Looks like it's ripped from somebody's cell, considering most of them don't seem to be magical photos. Go figure that that Potter kid nailed a bunch with some sort of uber-purification ofuda, but what interests me more is that it sounds like somebody nailed a bunch with something in the style or vein of Heka. I haven't seen that kind of magic since the Battle of Alexandria, and most of it's grandmasters considered it's more powerful spells and curses lost arts after that fight." The nodachi frowns and scratches her chin thoughtfully. "Although, it probably didn't help that most of those few grandmasters who knew the spells which still functioned without the intercession of the gods, died over the course of the Egypt and Syria Campaign. Fucking ICW looking the other way and encouraging the frogs..."
Norimune shakes her head. "Anyway, these pics are kinda neat. If I didn't know any better, I'd say this one almost looks like Umi's handiwork, if it wasn't for the fact that she wouldn't fit in that carriage corridor. And I don't know if this was Potter or the Heka user, but somebody legit burnt some of the creepy cloaked assholes to ashes and bone. Seriously, check this out, it's an honest to god pile of- hey!"
The paper being taken from the nodachi's hand makes her look at her sister in surprised annoyance. The retort that starts on her tongue however, then dies before it can pass from her lips.
No longer is Kagotsuruhe smiling and bubbling with an unnerving not-quite-right-ness.
Instead, there is a cold, emotionless focus behind her blank expression, as she looks intently upon the image of humanoid yet inhuman bones printed upon the paper.
Then the Blade of Hoplessness looks to her sister. Kagotsuruhe isn't one to normally show emotion when she is serious. In fact, she is technically incapable of it, even if she chooses to 'display' expressions for other's benefit and to try and fit in to the social situation at hand. But there are some things she can occasionally feel, that very rarely, she may imperceptibly display.
Spoiler
So when Kagotsuruhe gives Norimune the smallest twitches of the lip, and a slight gleam comes to her normally blank and soullessly empty eyes, the nodachi has to restrain a cringe at the memory that arises. Because for all that the Blade of Hopelessness is without emotions, she almost rivals Chisuheri for self-control over one's own desires and nature.
Subtle though the expression is, that it comes through at all, speaks of what it really is. What in their 'youth', it would have looked like.
Spoiler
Raw, craving hunger and crazed untamed want.
Hollow emptiness, only able to fill itself and feel anything at all, when supping upon minds of others while their intoxicating torment peaks.
Shaking her head, the vision passes, and Norimune does her best to fixate on the current Kagotsuruhe, sitting across from her in the here and now of the present. The modern Kagotsuruhe, who thankfully has intelligence and reason ingrained by generations of competent wielders and masters, to reign in her rare moments of base desire.
"Do you still have your nomaj passport?" asks the Sword of Hopelessness, momentarily throwing the Unrepentant Blade off with the unexpected question.
"Um- what?" Norimune blinks, before shaking her head. "I... yeah, I think it should be current?"
Kagotsuruhe nods, expression blank as if her sister had just affirmed that the weather was indeed fine today. "Perfect. May I borrow it then?"
The nodachi is thankful she isn't drinking, otherwise she may have done a spittake. "What!? Why?!?"
"I would like to go to England," declares her sister in answer, as if such a journey were a day trip to the next town over. "And I believe travel by magical means would be too long and convoluted to organize, considering their prejudices towards anyone other than baseline humans."
"Which just raises more questions as to why you even want to go?!" declares the baffled Norimune. "The only thing that sucks more than the weather and public transport is the magical community, and the only likely change since I was last there is that the aristocracy's' family trees would have gotten more Hapsburgian."
Lifting a hand, Kagotsuruhe raises a pair of fingers and counts them off. "Firstly, you last went there in the 1800s. Secondly, that is why I want to go."
Following where where her sister points her second finger, the nodachi frowns. "You want to go to England because of a possible Muramasa and a picture of what looks like a large pile of ash?"
"But what is in the ash?" asks Kagotsuruhe.
"I dunno?" offers Norimune with a shrug. "The hopes and dreams of a small child, now free of a dementor's gullet?"
"Bones," answers the Blade of Hopelessness, dutifully ignoring her sister's obtuseness.
"So?"
"Dementor bones," elaborates Kagotsuruhe with something that might almost be exasperation. "Bones like the one carved out to make my hilt."
Norimune raises a curious eyebrow. "Your hilt's still good though, isn't it? Sure, Chi's in a league of her own thanks to her regen, but you've got all the same preservation charms and tempering magics as Umi, Juuchi and Kyo. You're even hardier than me."
"But I'm more exotically made than everyone else. And as Kyoshu proved, we may be among some of the hardiest of magical blades barring those made by the outright divine, but we are not indestructible," points out Kagotsuruhe levelly. "Half of my materials are now either impossible to attain or inhumane to acquire in this era, and the rest are ludicrously rare. When was the last time you heard about a dementor being killed in a manner that left enough of it behind that it's bones were intact? We still don't know how or where Muramasa sourced the bone he used for my hilt, or even what part of a dementor my hilt is from."
"So you want to.... what? Take off to England as soon as possible, and then buy them before anybody else can or something, all out of fear of a "vague what if'?" asks Norimune.
"Yes." replies Kagotsuruhe flatly.
The Unrepentant Blade facepalms. "You do realize that I still technically have an international criminal record, right?"
"Only on the magical side," counters the katana. "To the nomaj world, I would simply be another traveler, who's only factor of note is that she has a number of trips to Okinawa on her passport. Once I'm in Britain, I enter the magical world as myself. There's technically nothing illegal about entering Britian through nomaj means, and the average lay-person with no knowledge of tsukumogami would be more liable to pass me off as a foreign tourist than a non-human to discriminate against. Considering that I also transform my appearance for the majority of my theater roles, I doubt anybody would identify me as a foreign actress either."
"There's still one problem with your plan genius!" declares Norimune. "Do you seriously think you can pass yourself off as me?!"
For a moment, Kagotsuruhe's body shimmers, a rippling with black haze coursing over something ivory-pale and non-descript beyond knowing underneath.
Then it reconstitutes, settling and recoloring in a new shape and form, now with tones of dirty gold and woolen magenta.
Spoiler
"Hey, I'd like to think I can!" declares the shapeshifter in an accurate enough approximation of Noriume's brash impertinence, that the real Unrepentant Blade jumps in surprise.
This is the other area where Kagotsuruhe has always excelled, and which Norimune has always been a little jealous of. Adapting to a new use and purpose in the modern world. While Kagotsuruhe sucks at being herself and expressing her own emotions, she has a natural talent for becoming others and aping theirs'. An adaptation of her sense for what people fear most and will garner the strongest reaction from them, turned towards looking for what they will believe and how to reinforce that feeling.
"Hey, that's-" for a moment, Norimune stammers, trying to find some flaw or objection in the plan. "I do not sound like that!"
"Like what?" asks Not!Norimune with a cocky raise of her eyebrows. "I'd like to think after knowing you for so damn long, that I got most of your tones and inflections down pat."
"Y-You make me sound like a one of those whiny, annoyingly hi-pitched tsundere girls!" declares Norimune in an unknowingly whiny, hi-pitched tone as she flushes with embarrassment.
The fake Unrepentant Blade shrugs. "Everyone sounds different to what they think like. Look it up, it's a proven fact!"
The nodachi grinds her teeth. "So you're saying I sound like a whiny, annoyingly hi-pitched tsundere?"
"I'm not trying to." Not!Norimune then pauses for a moment, before then giving the real Norimune a classic Norimune smirk, that even Norimune thinks is punch-able. "But I will say that I got most of your tones and inflections down pat."
For a moment, the Unrepentant Blade stares across the table, trying to figure out if Kagotsuruhe is having her on for some reason, of if she's just pretending to be as annoying and irritating as everyone seems to exaggerate her as.
'fuck it,' she thinks to herself.
Then with a battle cry, Norimune throws herself across the table at her doppleganger, who simply smirks in response. "Would you believe garnering that response, a sufficiently successful reproduction of yourself and your mannerisms?" she asks in the flat tone of Kagotsuruhe, briefly 'breaking character' as they wrestle on the floor.
"I-Idiot! Screw you! I don't sound like that! Go die!"
Unnoticed by the two as they grapple, footsteps announce the arrival of a new person in the kitchen. Drawn out of her office/studio, by the sounds of scuffling and raised voices in the kitchen, Akutoku then appears, sporting a curious frown.
"Hey!? What going on in-" The Sword of corruption pauses and then blinks owlishly at the sight that confronts her.
"-copy-cat faker asshole messing up my-"
"-I'd love to insult you in return, but I'm afraid I wouldn't do as good as nature already has-"
"-raaaghhhh!!!"
Brain briefly failing her, Akutoku stares as the twin Norimunes tussle on the ground in front of her.
Spoiler
Then the red-wrapped Muramasa grins, as an idea comes to mind.
Giggling to herself, the Sword of Corruption fishes around in one of her pockets, before finding a little notebook into which she hastily begins jotting down her thoughts.
Yes.... Yes! This can be part of her next big comiket compilation release!
Tongue poking out as she concentrates, Akutoku then begins mumbling to herself gleefully "Twins! No- Clones! Yeah, that's right! Yuri self-"
Before she can get any further, a noise makes her look up. An angry growling, that is her only warning before she receives dual kicks to the head in tandem, that send her flying.
"NOT ON YOUR LIFE PERVERT!" scream both Norimunes in unison.
A.N./ urgh, was meaning to have this done by like Friday. Oh well, IRL gonna IRL.
Hunched over the morning paper and nursing her coffee in the hopes of the caffeine eventually making her feel vaguely more cognizant of the world around her, Norimune gazes in a zombie-like fugue at the sunrise headlines, while listening to something offensively loud and metal-sounding over the radio.
'No sentient being should ever be up this early,' she silently grumbles to herself while basking in the scent of dark roast, cream, and far too much sugar. 'It's cruel, unusual and inhuman.'
Then she cringes, when as if to exemplify her statement of cruel and usual inhumanity, Kagotsuruhe enters the kitchen and announces her arrival with an exceptionally chipper "Good morning!"
Even for Kagotsuruhe's normally subtlety off and stepford-esque behavior, the Blade of Hoplessness has been particularly bright and lively in the mornings of late. The reason for this is no doubt, because of how much of a morning person, Norimune isn't. Having generally been assigned (re; thrown under the bus in the Unrepentant Blade's own opinion) most of the blame for losing Kyoshu and then letting the 'Reunion' with Juuchi at the park get out of hand, for the foreseeable future the nodachi had been roped into playing chauffeur for Kagotsuruhe. Making up for the loss of her sister's Prius until the actress could finish sorting out her insurance claim and acquiring a new vehicle.
Spoiler
"And how are you this morning, sister?" asks the shapeshifting nightmare, that has for today chosen a more modern facade of maidenly innocence, with a brightly enthusiastic smile.
Spoiler
"Rocking on," is the Unrepentant Blade's flatly phlegmatic and semi-awake response, while halfheartedly giving a sign of the horns in return. While the Blade of Hoplessness wasn't the kind to hold a grudge, and the ability to feel vindictive was normally beyond her, Norimune is pretty sure that the sheer amount of smug and schadenfreude Akutoku had been giving off at the nodachi's fate lately, was too irresistible a treat for the cursed katana to passively enjoy on occasion.
Cheerfully descending upon the kettle, Kagotsuruhe then begins making herself a pleasant cup of green tea, while Norimune continues to sip her caffeinated sugar bomb and gaze at the headlines. "So, anything interesting in the news this morning?" queries the smaller blade with polite curiosity.
Norimune gives a neutral grunt. "Meh, it's all the same general doom, gloom, bullshit-filled stupid. The front page is still all stuff about Mahoutokoro and Kyoto. Though there is an article about some diplomatic chitchat between the Diet and the MACUSA Ambassador. Some rumors about some Diet Representative's daughter being a yokai or something. A bunch of junk about how certain potion ingredients are going up in price again because lol-no-deep-sea-access. Then most of the rest of the domestic and local crap is politics, since we're leading up to the election next year. Meanwhile, in the international section we have...."
The nodachi takes a moment to shuffle the pages. "Let's see.... bunch of doomsayers going on about a potential financial crisis if Bosnia and Serbia default on more of their loans to the ICW and Goblin Banks, which could end up dragging down the rest of the balkans magical governments with them..... The French are indulging in their age-old national part time of rioting basically everywhere they can congregate without the nomajs noticing. Looks like it's about more war taxes.... The ICW is jumping up and down about some civil war between magicals in the Republic of the Congo that's spilling over into Cameroon and the Central African Republic, but who the fuck has the time and manpower spare to worry about that on top of all their own Abyssal shit in this day and age...."
Norimune turns a few more pages. "And here we go, last of the major headlines. There's an article on this collective sad sack of shit in the US, where the Magical Congress is taking the board of some company to court over the fact that, since the war basically made them the sole source in North America of some fancy magic-sensitive plant you can't magically transport or downsize to move in bulk, they've gradually raised the price of the plant by five hundred percent. And also some crap about this singer or actress or whatever in New York turning out to secretly have a non-human in the family tree. It's tabloid-y shit, so I didn't bother reading it, but I figured it might interest you." Kagotsuruhe nods and smiles her stepford-smile while the Unrepentant Blade flips another page.
"Oh, and in England, somebody apparently decided to look at the dumpsterfires going on here, and then told their buddies in the Ministry to hold their beer. Can you believe these idiots didn't just think letting dementors hang around their national school was a good idea this year, but that the fuckwit Auror in charge of shepherding the things around then thought 'hey, let's let them check the train full of school children was going to be totes fine'?" Norimune gives a contemptuous snort.
Well traveled as she is, the Unrepentant Blade considers herself as having something of a healthy respect and wariness for pathoknietic beings and magics. Especially since unlike some of her sisters, she lacks for any innate resistances or sheer overwhelming offense powers, and against something such as a dementor, has only her knowledge of sorcery, skill at spellcraft, and luck manipulation to fallback on. Something that was long ago driven home for her, considering who two of her sisters were.
Kyoshu (once upon a time, and still occasionally when she remembered) was deadly in a 1v1 and a right pain in the ass to fight, but at least for Norimune, she'd never been that much of a boogeyman and personal tormentor. Maybe it was because the Unrepentant Blade often passed between owners and wielders like a spare I.O.U. anyway, so she rarely got that attached to anyone she didn't expect to eventually either sell her on, loan her after serious injury, or have die on her at the end. And while Kyoshu may have once rivaled Juuchi in personal skill, the most evil of the Demon Blades had always lacked for any kind of larger strategic acumen, rarely changed her overall tactics, and had never displayed any long term ability to plot beyond her immediate desires. All areas that, while Norimune was admittedly not much better at either, she had at least grown in via osmosis, after trotting the ever changing battlefields of the world across the centuries.
(It also probably helped that her mildly inglorious backstory and reputation likely didn't make her rank very high on Kyoshu's list of 'sister's I need to mentally abuse, torture, take everything from, and lord my superiority over', which while she was thankfully for, occasionally rankled at her pride a little. And then there was the fact that she was outside the country more often than in it, for most of the last three hundred years...)
No, in Norimune's opinion, Kagotsuruhe had always been the more terrifying opponent to face back in the day. Kyoshu was a personal-scale weapon of untouchable domination that made any slip-up fatal, with an untapped potential to sow chaos, mistrust and confusion among the forces, commanders and courts of foes, that the old Sword of Faded memories had never cared to utilize in any useful fashion beyond her pointless sadism and immediate personal entertainment.
But Kagotsuruhe was sheer, overwhelming force. Not even a tidal wave, but a blunt, crushing avalanche of cold. She had the ability to not only reach across an entire area at a range no one else in the sisterhood could match, but she could visit her effect upon multitudes at once. Inexorably burying all under the weight of her freezing will, until they either succumbed or were broken. And unlike Kyoshu's perversely self-centered trails of whimsical torture, the Blade of Hopelessness had the cold, emotionless intellect and the skills learned at the hands of generations of competent masters, to utilize herself to optimal and devastating effect on the rare occasions she took to the field or was drawn into conflict.
There was a reason it was said that of the greatest of the magical Muramasas, Umitsubame was the one Kyoshu hated, Chisuheri was the one that Kyoshu despised, Juuchi Yosamu was the one Kyoshu envied, but Kagotsuruhe was the only one Kyoshu ever feared.
Which, thus brought Norimune's train of thought back to the subject at hand. Sure, Kagotsuruhe was in some ways worse than a dementor, thanks to her intelligence and the nightmarish mishmash of other dark and vile things that were horrifically combined to formulate her blade, fittings, and powers, but that in her mind, only reinforced how nasty dementors could be. At least Kagotsuruhe didn't eat people's souls.
"You got to wonder abut these people," says the nodachi with a shake of her head. "Are they seriously lacking that much brain power? They're lucky none of the kids got hurt. " Actually reading the article beyond just a glance at it's headline aand initial blurb this time, Norimune then makes a mild noise of surprise. "Huh... it actually sounds like the dementors are the ones that came off worse from the incident?"
"Really?" asks the Blade of Hopelessness with mild curiosity as she sips at her tea.
"Yeah," sitting up and frowning, the Unrepentant Blade now starts paying proper attention to the words she's previously been skimming over. "Oh wow, that's.... that's something it seems they actually killed some of them."
Pausing mid-motion, Kagotsuruhe is abruptly oddly still. "They killed dementors?", questions the katana in a now flat tone.
Too engrossed in the article to notice the change in her sister, Norimune continues. "Yeah, there's pics of the aftermath too. Looks like it's ripped from somebody's cell, considering most of them don't seem to be magical photos. Go figure that that Potter kid nailed a bunch with some sort of uber-purification ofuda, but what interests me more is that it sounds like somebody nailed a bunch with something in the style or vein of Heka. I haven't seen that kind of magic since the Battle of Alexandria, and most of it's grandmasters considered it's more powerful spells and curses lost arts after that fight." The nodachi frowns and scratches her chin thoughtfully. "Although, it probably didn't help that most of those few grandmasters who knew the spells which still functioned without the intercession of the gods, died over the course of the Egypt and Syria Campaign. Fucking ICW looking the other way and encouraging the frogs..."
Norimune shakes her head. "Anyway, these pics are kinda neat. If I didn't know any better, I'd say this one almost looks like Umi's handiwork, if it wasn't for the fact that she wouldn't fit in that carriage corridor. And I don't know if this was Potter or the Heka user, but somebody legit burnt some of the creepy cloaked assholes to ashes and bone. Seriously, check this out, it's an honest to god pile of- hey!"
The paper being taken from the nodachi's hand makes her look at her sister in surprised annoyance. The retort that starts on her tongue however, then dies before it can pass from her lips.
No longer is Kagotsuruhe smiling and bubbling with an unnerving not-quite-right-ness.
Instead, there is a cold, emotionless focus behind her blank expression, as she looks intently upon the image of humanoid yet inhuman bones printed upon the paper.
Then the Blade of Hoplessness looks to her sister. Kagotsuruhe isn't one to normally show emotion when she is serious. In fact, she is technically incapable of it, even if she chooses to 'display' expressions for other's benefit and to try and fit in to the social situation at hand. But there are some things she can occasionally feel, that very rarely, she may imperceptibly display.
Spoiler
So when Kagotsuruhe gives Norimune the smallest twitches of the lip, and a slight gleam comes to her normally blank and soullessly empty eyes, the nodachi has to restrain a cringe at the memory that arises. Because for all that the Blade of Hopelessness is without emotions, she almost rivals Chisuheri for self-control over one's own desires and nature.
Subtle though the expression is, that it comes through at all, speaks of what it really is. What in their 'youth', it would have looked like.
Spoiler
Raw, craving hunger and crazed untamed want.
Hollow emptiness, only able to fill itself and feel anything at all, when supping upon minds of others while their intoxicating torment peaks.
Shaking her head, the vision passes, and Norimune does her best to fixate on the current Kagotsuruhe, sitting across from her in the here and now of the present. The modern Kagotsuruhe, who thankfully has intelligence and reason ingrained by generations of competent wielders and masters, to reign in her rare moments of base desire.
"Do you still have your nomaj passport?" asks the Sword of Hopelessness, momentarily throwing the Unrepentant Blade off with the unexpected question.
"Um- what?" Norimune blinks, before shaking her head. "I... yeah, I think it should be current?"
Kagotsuruhe nods, expression blank as if her sister had just affirmed that the weather was indeed fine today. "Perfect. May I borrow it then?"
The nodachi is thankful she isn't drinking, otherwise she may have done a spittake. "What!? Why?!?"
"I would like to go to England," declares her sister in answer, as if such a journey were a day trip to the next town over. "And I believe travel by magical means would be too long and convoluted to organize, considering their prejudices towards anyone other than baseline humans."
"Which just raises more questions as to why you even want to go?!" declares the baffled Norimune. "The only thing that sucks more than the weather and public transport is the magical community, and the only likely change since I was last there is that the aristocracy's' family trees would have gotten more Hapsburgian."
Lifting a hand, Kagotsuruhe raises a pair of fingers and counts them off. "Firstly, you last went there in the 1800s. Secondly, that is why I want to go."
Following where where her sister points her second finger, the nodachi frowns. "You want to go to England because of a possible Muramasa and a picture of what looks like a large pile of ash?"
"But what is in the ash?" asks Kagotsuruhe.
"I dunno?" offers Norimune with a shrug. "The hopes and dreams of a small child, now free of a dementor's gullet?"
"Bones," answers the Blade of Hopelessness, dutifully ignoring her sister's obtuseness.
"So?"
"Dementor bones," elaborates Kagotsuruhe with something that might almost be exasperation. "Bones like the one carved out to make my hilt."
Norimune raises a curious eyebrow. "Your hilt's still good though, isn't it? Sure, Chi's in a league of her own thanks to her regen, but you've got all the same preservation charms and tempering magics as Umi, Juuchi and Kyo. You're even hardier than me."
"But I'm more exotically made than everyone else. And as Kyoshu proved, we may be among some of the hardiest of magical blades barring those made by the outright divine, but we are not indestructible," points out Kagotsuruhe levelly. "Half of my materials are now either impossible to attain or inhumane to acquire in this era, and the rest are ludicrously rare. When was the last time you heard about a dementor being killed in a manner that left enough of it behind that it's bones were intact? We still don't know how or where Muramasa sourced the bone he used for my hilt, or even what part of a dementor my hilt is from."
"So you want to.... what? Take off to England as soon as possible, and then buy them before anybody else can or something, all out of fear of a "vague what if'?" asks Norimune.
"Yes." replies Kagotsuruhe flatly.
The Unrepentant Blade facepalms. "You do realize that I still technically have an international criminal record, right?"
"Only on the magical side," counters the katana. "To the nomaj world, I would simply be another traveler, who's only factor of note is that she has a number of trips to Okinawa on her passport. Once I'm in Britain, I enter the magical world as myself. There's technically nothing illegal about entering Britian through nomaj means, and the average lay-person with no knowledge of tsukumogami would be more liable to pass me off as a foreign tourist than a non-human to discriminate against. Considering that I also transform my appearance for the majority of my theater roles, I doubt anybody would identify me as a foreign actress either."
"There's still one problem with your plan genius!" declares Norimune. "Do you seriously think you can pass yourself off as me?!"
For a moment, Kagotsuruhe's body shimmers, a rippling with black haze coursing over something ivory-pale and non-descript beyond knowing underneath.
Then it reconstitutes, settling and recoloring in a new shape and form, now with tones of dirty gold and woolen magenta.
Spoiler
"Hey, I'd like to think I can!" declares the shapeshifter in an accurate enough approximation of Noriume's brash impertinence, that the real Unrepentant Blade jumps in surprise.
This is the other area where Kagotsuruhe has always excelled, and which Norimune has always been a little jealous of. Adapting to a new use and purpose in the modern world. While Kagotsuruhe sucks at being herself and expressing her own emotions, she has a natural talent for becoming others and aping theirs'. An adaptation of her sense for what people fear most and will garner the strongest reaction from them, turned towards looking for what they will believe and how to reinforce that feeling.
"Hey, that's-" for a moment, Norimune stammers, trying to find some flaw or objection in the plan. "I do not sound like that!"
"Like what?" asks Not!Norimune with a cocky raise of her eyebrows. "I'd like to think after knowing you for so damn long, that I got most of your tones and inflections down pat."
"Y-You make me sound like a one of those whiny, annoyingly hi-pitched tsundere girls!" declares Norimune in an unknowingly whiny, hi-pitched tone as she flushes with embarrassment.
The fake Unrepentant Blade shrugs. "Everyone sounds different to what they think like. Look it up, it's a proven fact!"
The nodachi grinds her teeth. "So you're saying I sound like a whiny, annoyingly hi-pitched tsundere?"
"I'm not trying to." Not!Norimune then pauses for a moment, before then giving the real Norimune a classic Norimune smirk, that even Norimune thinks is punch-able. "But I will say that I got most of your tones and inflections down pat."
For a moment, the Unrepentant Blade stares across the table, trying to figure out if Kagotsuruhe is having her on for some reason, of if she's just pretending to be as annoying and irritating as everyone seems to exaggerate her as.
'fuck it,' she thinks to herself.
Then with a battle cry, Norimune throws herself across the table at her doppleganger, who simply smirks in response. "Would you believe garnering that response, a sufficiently successful reproduction of yourself and your mannerisms?" she asks in the flat tone of Kagotsuruhe, briefly 'breaking character' as they wrestle on the floor.
"I-Idiot! Screw you! I don't sound like that! Go die!"
Unnoticed by the two as they grapple, footsteps announce the arrival of a new person in the kitchen. Drawn out of her office/studio, by the sounds of scuffling and raised voices in the kitchen, Akutoku then appears, sporting a curious frown.
"Hey!? What going on in-" The Sword of corruption pauses and then blinks owlishly at the sight that confronts her.
"-copy-cat faker asshole messing up my-"
"-I'd love to insult you in return, but I'm afraid I wouldn't do as good as nature already has-"
"-raaaghhhh!!!"
Brain briefly failing her, Akutoku stares as the twin Norimunes tussle on the ground in front of her.
Spoiler
Then the red-wrapped Muramasa grins, as an idea comes to mind.
Giggling to herself, the Sword of Corruption fishes around in one of her pockets, before finding a little notebook into which she hastily begins jotting down her thoughts.
Yes.... Yes! This can be part of her next big comiket compilation release!
Tongue poking out as she concentrates, Akutoku then begins mumbling to herself gleefully "Twins! No- Clones! Yeah, that's right! Yuri self-"
Before she can get any further, a noise makes her look up. An angry growling, that is her only warning before she receives dual kicks to the head in tandem, that send her flying.
"NOT ON YOUR LIFE PERVERT!" scream both Norimunes in unison.