#hingan rp

REi SEKiRO | THE GHOST OF HiNGASHi

　　　　　　　　　　　　自由になりたい。

Pronunciation: Koh-toe-me Nih-coo-yah Nicknames: Koto, Tomi, ‘Sukeban’, Migite no Akuma, Kotomi Goldblum(this is def ooc tho) Height: 5 fulms 5 ilms Age: 30-ish Languages: Common, Hingan, Rudamentary Auri

PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS.

Hair colour: Jet black, streaked with dark grey when not dyed. Eye colour: Brown (’Doe brown’) Skin tone: Tanned, more so than the typical Hingan native. Body type: Broad shouldered, strong arms, back and legs without being overly muscular.  Accent: Lower-class Hingan. Dominant hand: Right, but ambidextrous. Posture: Tall, but prone to slouching, often with folded arms. Scars: Swordsman callouses on her hands, thin knife cuts along the backs of her hands from years of bladework. A thick, jagged scar along her left brow, ending just past her eyesocket. When visible, a huge, brutal network of scars along the entirety of her back, from right shoulder to left hip. Various small combat scars across her body. Tattoos: A fanged men-yaori on the back of her right hand, vividly red in hue. Full sleeves of yakuza ink, ending just past her shoulders. A massive blue Othardian scalekin across her back.  Most noticeable features: Her tattoos, particularly the very obvious gang-based iconography. Her dark brown eyes, and tanned skin. Her overall muscular build, particularly the obvious show she puts on of display her abs and Adonis belt.

CHILDHOOD.

Place of birth: A small fishing village along Koshu’s southern coast, close to Bukyo. Hometown: Kugane Birth weight / height: Healthy, but small. Manner of birth: Natural. First words: Unknown. Siblings: No blood relatives that she knows of.  Parents: Asahiko Nikuya, Eada Merchant (Unaware of mother’s name or origin) Parental Involvement: Kotomi’s father raised her as a single parent back on Koshu, but succumbed to illness when she was four years old. From there, she spent the majority of her life as an orphan on Bukyo’s streets and then a gang member in Kugane. Her mother was entirely absent for her childhood and teenage years, and Kotomi has spent no time whatsoever searching for her. When asked, she makes reference to a “Madame Fuyumi” acting as her adopted mother.

ADULT LIFE

Occupation: Mercenary, ronin Shinobi, alchemist. Current Residence: The Mists(Free Company), Kobai Goten Apartment (Shirogane) Close Friends: Very few since arriving on Eorzea. Relationship status: Single. Financial status: Decently well off. Chocobo license: None, though has considered getting one once capable. Vices: Drugs, gil, alcohol, sex, acquisition of weapons and armour, gambling, envy & occasional jealousy, apathy, violence.

The night was quiet. It was a welcome change to the bustle that had occupied the seamstress’ shop during the day. Now, I found myself sat up in the tall trees near the geisha house and inhaling the cool air. Two bodyguards strolled around the perimeter as casually as one men could be outside of a female exclusive building. The lanterns had gone low in the rooms of the geisha and maiko, and though everything seemed peaceful, I could feel a prickle of discomfort going up the back of my neck. Head tilting, I peered downwards and raised a brow as I heard faint footsteps dropping into the dirt to the east of me, at a low part of the fence wrapping around the inner garden of the geisha house. 

 Craning my neck, I watched the figure in black landing on their feet and ushering silently to another - similarly clad - following behind... and another, and another.  One more, then, for good measure. Five total, all of them tall with their faces covered. A frown creased my brow and I lifted my head to see both of the bodyguards with their backs turned, muttering to each other. 

 What kind of incompetence...? No. It’s not your business, Xiu. The oyabun probably sent them anyway. Don’t interfere. 

 A flash of steel, bright beneath the full moon, caught my eye as I was turning my head away. A butterfly knife? I inhaled quietly and watched the first figure that had hopped the fence slowly creeping up upon the beefier of the two bodyguards. Just as he was about to get the knife driven into his back, his brother noticed and whipped around, grabbing the arm of the assailant and shoving him back. Immediately, both of the men were swarmed by the attackers.

 Five against two. That isn’t fair, oyabun.

 Like a shadow, I dropped to the ground and landed low on my feet. My steps didn’t make even the hint of a sound as I made my way across the sand garden that had been so carefully arranged by the maiko named Hana earlier in the day. In contrast, the scuffle was getting loud, blow after blow being delivered to the two bodyguards that had been sent to protect the women within the house. One of them had dropped to the ground, groaning and bleeding from the temple and gripping at his side, where I saw crimson blossoming. As one of the figures clad in black spun around to aim a kick at the standing bodyguard’s head, I reached out and grabbed their leg, causing them to topple a little before getting flipped over my shoulder and onto their back.

 “Attacking a man with his back turned is a coward’s move,” I said, raising my eyes to look at the fight that had suddenly frozen. “You should know better than that, gentlemen.”

 “What are you doing here--?” snapped a familiar voice, and I raised a brow, looking to the source. Beady eyes, pitch black. Hikaru, one of the other orphan boys my father had ‘adopted.’ He was holding the bodyguard by the collar, and the latter was already bruising in the face, a fat lip bleeding. 

 “I was walking by when I saw five people dressed in black scaling the wall to an okiya that I know is under threat,” I replied with a frown. “I should call the  Sekiseigumi... Your Hingan isn’t what it should be, if you’re from around here,” I added, glancing down to the man I’d flipped. Didn’t recognize him. Not by his eyes alone, at least. 

 “Just shut her up so we can keep going!” he ordered the others around him. “We have to get this done tonight.”

 I sighed, watching them all converge upon me. 

 “Bad move.”

I took a step back and lifted my hands, tiredly gesturing for them to come forward. At least one of them knew who I was. The others seemed oblivious, and judging from what little I could see of their faces, they weren’t Hingan or Doman. Their eyes were pale, and so was their skin. They were Garleans that my father had been training, people I had never encountered. They certainly had a pack mentality. All of them came for me at once, knives glinting. One even pulled a gun, and I went for him first. 

 Dodging beneath the arm of one trying to drive knife towards my chest, I spun him around by the back of his shirt and shoved him into one of his friends. With him half bent, I vaulted off of his back and slammed my heel into the jaw of the one aiming the pistol. I heard a bullet whistle past my ear and rolled to the side once I hit the sand, kicking his feet out from behind him. As another dove for me, I grabbed their friend and used him like a shield, feeling the warmth of his blood spread over my lap as the knife met with his stomach rather than mine. 

 “You bitch--!” he gasped, and I kicked him away from me, seizing the gun out of his gloved hand. I shut one eye and fired a bullet into the kneecap of the one who’d drawn first blood, and on his own comrade, at that. 

 I admit, it wasn’t my quietest operation, and I didn’t like it. The lights were being lit inside of the geisha house, and I swerved to the side as I was rushed at by one of the broader of the five mystery assailants to buy me more time to dismantle the pistol. The bullets fell to the ground, and I tossed aside the weapon itself. Fighting in a kimono was restrictive, at best, and I exhaled in frustration as a blow met with my mouth. Reaching up, I untied my obi and side-stepped one of the attackers, wrapping the obi around his neck and tilting him backwards until he was purple and gasping, and I grimaced at the sound of his cracking back. Just before his air was cut off completely, I pushed him to the side, letting my obi flutter away with him. 

 Two down, three to go, and I didn’t hardly have any time before the house mother came out like a screeching banshee. One of them I just punched square in the jaw, blood leaking out from the tight fabric of the mask he wore over his face. My legs propelled me upwards around him until they were wrapped around his neck, and using my lower half, I flipped him onto his back to hear him land with a ‘crunch’ upon the sand. My kimono had ripped in the scuffle, to my relief, making it far easier to move. Grabbing a fallen knife, I cut the long underwear beneath them up the middle to give my legs more room to move. 

 The last two standing converged on me together, and I ran towards one, driving my shoulder into their gut and hearing them gasp for air as I winded them. They toppled backwards and I spun around, delivering a kick to the only one I had recognized - Hikaru - to the throat. Everyone was on the ground but me, by that point, and I looked around to assess the damage as I heard the hurried and panicked footsteps approaching the main door to the garden from the geisha house. Clicking my tongue, I turned the knife over in my hands, careful not to get any on my clothes, before pressing it into Hikaru’s palm. 

 Like a shadow once more, I was in the darkest part of the garden as the doors were flung open and the cries of the geisha pierced the air. Silently, I scaled the low part of the wall, grimacing at the bruising that was already starting to develop on my ribs from a kick one had managed to land. I was getting rusty. Regardless, I shook it off and inhaled deeply before starting to weep heavily and run down the street.

 “Sekiseigumi!” I wailed. “Please, help! Help! There’s been an attack at the okiya! Ijin attack! Please, help--!”

 “What’s happened?” A trio of Kugane’s finest rounded the corner, clearly shocked at my disheveled hair and torn kimono. “Miss! Miss, what’s happened? There’s been an attack at the geisha house?” 

 “Y-Yes!” I stammered, thick tears running down my cheeks. “I h-heard shouting and I-I scaled the wall -- or tried to, and my kimono got all r-ripped - and when I saw into the garden there were a bunch of people all lying in a pile! It looked like the b-bodyguards there got in a fight with some intruders... Please help them!”

 “Are you alright?” one of them asked me while the two others took off to go be big damn heroes. I looked up at the Hyur and sniffled. “You’re not injured?”

 “No,” I said, rapidly shaking my head. “No, I’m fine! Please go help them before all of those terrible people wake up...!” 

 “Right!” he said quickly. “Miss, please go wait somewhere safe until we can come and question you about what you saw!”

 And off went the final big damn hero. I waited until he had rounded the corner to stop crying and sighed to myself, reaching into my ripped kimono to take out a pack of cigarettes and a book of matches. With one lit up between my lips, I ran my hand gingerly over the swelling bruise on my left side and took the darkest alleys back to the seamstress’ home where I was staying. 

The night was still and quiet, and so was I. My eyes were fixed on the ceiling above me, fixed on listening to the rhythm of my heartbeat. I was acutely aware of my own pulse. It was a disconcerting feeling, almost, to be so aware of your own body and every single way it moved, to feel your lungs fill with air over and over again. What was worse? Being too connected, or too far away? 

Moderation would be once, every once in a while. 

Like a bolt of lighting had zapped me, I had been awoken from my sleep and sat straight up in bed, panting, eyes wide. Etsuji wasn’t there. Where was he? It was a passing thought; he was probably just in the bathroom or the kitchen, maybe taking a walk. He was as sleepless as I was, sometimes. Nervously, my hand found the beads of jade around my wrist before I slowly lowered myself back down into my bedroll in an effort to calm myself. 

Slowly, my mind drifted back to the before. It seemed like that’s where I lived so often, before – before Eorzea, before Doma. Back to Kugane. Back to Hingashi. Back to home, back to when my friends were all still alive and well. I would have given anything to back to before. But there is no going back. There is only going forward. So we soldier on. 

Gradually my eyes came to close, and I found myself thinking of her - of Hana. It had been so long since I had last seen her, but she was always a vivid memory. And yet… Yet. 

When I tried to focus on the way she looked when she smiled, I struggled. When I tried to recall her laugh, I heard something… generic. Not my Hana. Not my dearest friend, but a sound that could have belonged to any girl walking down the street with a gaggle of others. My eyes didn’t need to be open to know that my knuckles had gone white around my comforter. 

A crooked canine with an end that seemed too sharp. You teased her about it and called her a little wolf. Her eyes were like honey, almost like Etsuji’s, but a little lighter. I remember them catching the sunlight and looking like jewels, but the sides would always crinkle up when she laughed. She would cover her mouth every time and bend her head unless it was just us. And the sound… It was loud and unashamed, even if her body language had her trained to seem embarrassed over it. Loud. Happy. Sweet.

I exhaled sharply, my eyes snapping open to look up again. It was a starry night, and I turned my head to look out of the bedroom window. The stars themselves were shimmering, and I felt a lump in my throat as I focused on one in particular. The same stars had shined over us in Kugane. Hana had loved looking at them. Was her favorite one still up there, one that she proclaimed always came on the first of the month and had a green shine to it? Or did it burn out when she did? 

My sister. My summertime freesia. I am so sorry. Don’t forgive me. Don’t give me that much. I will never forget you. I will never let it happen. It would be better for me to die than to forget you. 

Tears overflowed and ran down my cheeks and I gasped out a sob, curling into myself on the futon. Whee was Etsuji? It didn’t matter. I didn’t deserve him near. I deserved to be alone, if the memories of people I loved better than anyone were fading from me. I would write it down, all of it, all of them. I would never forget anything about my friends again. 

“We are alike, because we both use people to get what we want. For you, it’s a false sense of family because, what? You’re lonely and old? And for me...I just want to stay alive long enough to realize my goals.”

Toz’o laughed, tossing more bread. "Lonely and old? Hardly. I haven't even lived half my life span yet!" He smirked. "Or maybe I have, who knows. Maybe you'll kill me in my sleep tonight...”

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Another repost of art now that Toz’o is a miqo’te again. This was the birthday commission I got @koko-works last year. Back when Toz’o and Rei hated each other. Or, rather... Rei was thinking of ways to kill Toz’o while Toz’o was considering his life choices holding on to Rei for a week haha.

“One must wonder what sort of secrets lie outside the view of the lanterns...” 

The Keeper didn’t remember much. There were the shape-shifting guards into whom he ran into. They seemed very unhappy by his presence in their city and immediately attacked him. Perhaps he deserved it. He was an outsider in this strange underground demon city. But at the same time, it didn’t seem like he was their target. They kept talking about him as though someone else was with him and that was who they were afraid of. Maybe it was about Toz’o? Rei had seen the thing around the man. But Toz’o wasn’t with him when he was arrested. These monsters seemed to be afraid of him and treated Toz’o as if he were one of their own. 

In any case, that was all he remembered. There was little indication how much time had passed since he ended up in this cell. He had fallen asleep and woken up a number of times. But ever since they came to the cave, and ventured further and further inside, the Keeper’s condition got worse and worse. And then his eye… He lifted a hand to where the cloth usually hung over the empty socket. It was still uncovered, but it didn’t appear there was anything else…coming out of it. And the pain had subsided quite a bit. 

“Toz’o…” he muttered quietly, unsure if the man was with him or if he even caught up to him or found him before he was arrested. But there was no answer. Rei was alone.