#queued reply.

“You fought that... lesser me alongside the great Siegfried, in your first ‘proper’ adventure.” Possibly an odd way to start a conversation, besides sliding into their personal space with a look that is more of an inspection of quality than perhaps standard for one as carefree as the twilight dragon. A doomed jewel- or perhaps one that invokes a miracle? The same thing, really. They’re truly the same thing.

Dooming someone, giving them a miracle... living and dying... they couldn’t be more similar. Or at least, looking upon the atrocities the Grand Order must witness, a dragon would assume.

“Was defeating him a gift? Or would it have been better for him to be an impossible hurdle?”

“I guess it’d be pathetic, to someone like you.” The words still sound sharp and biting, but there’s an exhaustion to it that he can’t shake away. Ruler can’t shake the emotion out, even beaten and with a bruise from the very man he talks to growing tender on his cheek. “Doing such a thing. I’d assume you’d understand, but you have something of your own, even with a lord you speak for.”

The singularity is being resolved nicely. Ruler’s efforts failed. Despite everything, despite remaking himself, reshaping himself... it wasn’t enough.

It was never enough. It was never going to be enough.

But where else does he have to go? Who else did he deign to talk to besides Chaldea’s Master (and he hates the idea of it, of calling anyone else his lord, but they spared him and didn’t let him die) and the very demon he planned on using to change the world, when it all was crashing down around him?

Okada Izou probably is livid, but where else is there to go, in this misbegotten shape, with these lost ambitions that were so openly deemed pathetic by everyone else in the world, despite their own loves and people they’d flip the board for.

Ranmaru Mori has nobody else to speak to. Especially not the one he did this all for, the one he cannot even face nor name.

“At least you can kill. I fucking tried my best, and you’re still alive.” It isn’t even that he’s upset at him. It’s just... 

(He would have been lost to becoming a monster if he wasn’t cut away from it, wouldn’t he have? (Would that have been so bad, if he could be by [XXXXXXXX]’s side again? (...))) 

...frustration. An idle aching in his teeth. If Okada Izou chops his head off, he doesn’t need to deal with this fallout. 

“Hhhffph. You said before that you’re just a manslayer, didn’t you? But that’s at least something you are before you’re their manslayer, isn’t it?”

“You’ve grown far too arrogant about me, you know.” Says the suddenly appearing and disappearing thief, who has put one boot upon the table Cú Chulainn was sitting and eating at like today would be a normal, every day sort of day. The Assassin almost seems more confident, despite everything that he normally gives off.

Wait, no, that’s not really an ‘Assassin’, is it? The class has melted away to something more like the true self...

Is this the power of a Pretender’s class advantage?! A blue rose is extended forward, the petals brushing against Cú’s lips-

No, that’s paper, isn’t it? An undying rose.

“You forget that I’m a proud and heart-stealing thief- the Phantom Thief whom all others look to emulate. One may make my tears fall, but having power over my body means nothing to my spirit.”

...

......

.........

Ah, how they knew. How they truly, truly, knew.

It’s d e l i c i o u s.

...

Well, yer a really cool senpai! W- we’re talkin’ about bein’ a senpai, ri- right...? Please?

...

Uh, not to be rude, but I think your charm for at least Lord Kamadeva is... kinda like those ugly little pug dogs?

Sometimes yer cool, but it’s kinda more, like, when yer not really tryin’...?

                         she was in the midst of stabbing her latest  ‘ love ’  to death,  getting a  little  to into the act to notice someone else near her.  she watched the life fade from their eyes,  body jittering excitedly and hands almost  SHAKING  as she cupped their face in her hands,  put a kiss against their forehead and then wasted little time once they were dead in moving down and putting her mouth against their wound.  a couple of seconds after beginning her little drink,  she  finally  caught movement out of the corner of her eye and straightened out,  seemingly unaware of the blood around her mouth and on her chin ...  and not exactly  caring  that,  the last time she saw salem,  they came very close to a deadly fight.

                         today,  in particular,  toga is rather  tired.  her posture is missing her usual bounciness and energy;  her mood isn’t all that sour,  but she doesn’t have the energy to be dialed up to eleven like usual.  the task she’d been given earlier in the day hadn’t been an easy one,  and the person she’d been asked to stalk had gotten out of her sights  --  she hadn’t been able to pick up on them again,  and returned to her usual stomping grounds.

                          she spots gemiya while she’s wandering around,  waiting for the time shigaraki usually gets back to their hideout,  and waves with a small smile.  she approaches without much hesitation,  hands behind her back.