[ As Getian mulls over the answer, as he delicately serves himself a "handful" of berries, Kiritsubo is making work of the pear, sharp teeth cutting easily through the juicy flesh of the fruit and able to neatly tear it out in chunks that can be gnawed back and swallowed. A bit messy, no helping that, but... It was the Vale. There were plenty of places to wash her paws off afterwards if she so desired.
While she eats, though, she is listening. What Getian describes... it is something she knows of, something she has heard accounts of and observed... but when it came to her own experiences... ]
It would be a disservice to you for me to claim near the amount of difficulties you encounter.
[ For a moment, she stops eating, and her abyssal black gaze wanders over the branches and down below, where in the distance guests of the Golden Peacock wander the set paths through the false forest garden. ]
I observed humans from places hidden... from ferns and tree and burrow and around wood piles... long before I ever tried walking amongst them.
[ How old had she been, then, when the simpler mind of a beast had grown into that of a spirit she was meant to be? Twenty? Sixty? No, perhaps over a hundred... ? ]
I learned how to mimic their voices, first... their sounds, their words... and then their forms... and I am, shall we say, particularly gifted, even for a tanuki.
[ Shapeshifting had come easily to her once she began it, and once she mastered it... She put kitsune to shame. ]
I suppose in my youth there was an occasional mistake... a tail gone rogue, a face not quite right, a stumble with some custom I was not yet aware of... But I have walked among them now for so long that I barely recall it now... and back then, we spirits were treated with a good deal more fear and reverence than we are now. I could get by.
[ The half-bestial sound produced by a racoon dog with modified vocal chords were, apparently... capable of some degree of sounding wistful. ]
These days... the spirit world has been kept staid for so long, as if our glory days are behind us and those ruling cling to power and structure no longer fitting with circumstance... The humans, with their little flame lives... they have been more interesting to me, of late.
[ Wiping her muzzle, she eases into a sit, staring off at the distant figures... and then back to Getian. ]
They can be overwhelming, perhaps... But I sometimes feel as if I have seen so much that I require their chaos and noise just to notice.
[ She didn't usually admit to such things. But she was no liar. ]
( even if the small, white-furred tanuki tearing into the flesh of the pear with her teeth and claws is a little messier than getian picking at his bunch of berries one at a time, he doesn’t bat an eye. the Miemeng bird doesn’t personally invest in a strict sense of propriety as many humans might. he is, after all, still an arcane creature—neither of them grew up within human civilization, only adapting themselves to live within it later in their lives. and, from what she describes to him, she has been doing this much longer than he has… which isn’t very hard to do, considering he’d only left his mountain within the last year or two.
the path that she describes is a fascinating one. his own people have always existed adjacent to humanity, occasionally influenced by the tremors that went through their world (such as when his people traveled from the borderlands to settle on their mountain in the Central Plains, fleeing from war and destruction), though for the most part they had remained a world apart. by the same token, however, it seems that their hearts were destined to yearn to join that world which would inevitably see them perish. getian yanping, first of his kin to be born on the Central Plains, had also been the last to leave. in that, he had been a straggler among his kind; contrary to this, it seems like kiritsubo was more of a trailblazer among her own. did all tanuki possess such abilities, or was she unique and exemplary in her skill? he has heard of fox spirits and the like taking the form of human beings, but the story she tells him does not fit to any of these stories or myths he can recall from his own era. )
Changing one’s form is an arcane skill that many arcanists learn, to varying skill… Your own ability surpasses any that I have seen, because it could even trick my own arcane skill, which usually allows me to discern illusions or transfigurations.
( “the spirit world”… it’s so interesting to think of these two things as separate. humans and arcanists have always lived together, even among arcane creatures such as himself. that the Miemeng birds had decided to live apart from humanity had been a privilege of their own powers and abilities. most other arcanists do not have that choice. they must live in a world that is predominantly ruled by humans; often, depending on the place and the era, they had faced great discrimination and hardship.
he is quiet for a long moment, processing, before he nods. )
I wonder if the other Miemeng birds who went before me felt similarly to you. Our temple, our mountain… they were safe, but they were also static. What I felt as peaceful might have been unbearably stagnant to others…
( he trails off, a faint melancholy entering his tone. he hesitates. he can sense such earnestness from kiritsubo that it encourages him to do the same, even though he is wary, given that the truth he could share might not be the most flattering. )
…For a very long time, a part of me resented them. ( he lowers his wings, gaze sweeping out over the landscape of the Vale around them. ) As wonderful as their inventions are, as beautiful as their art, as entrancing as their music… these humans were still the same creatures who found ways to extort my people for their compassion, leaving their memory behind to be consumed by the sands of time or, worse, condemning them as yao, even as they gave up their immortal lives in the simple desire to become a part of their world or even a brief time. I… could not understand why they did not see as I did. Surely they, too, could read the tragedy in the bones we brought back…?
( he shakes his head, finally looking back to kiritsubo. ) I didn’t understand until I was among them myself. Impetuous, impatient, avaricious, self-absorbed… yes, I have met many humans that can be described this way. But they are also brave, self-sacrificing, and so, so kind.
In the end, it felt fitting that I ended up too bound to their world to return to mine. It was like… being given a chance, to move on and grow from my own past foolishness.
Well, I am an exceptionally gifted individual. Or so it was once said.
[ Kiritsubo provides that context as she polishes off the pear with a last bite, pink tongue lapping over black gums and white maw to clean herself from the juice. The clarification that what she did was not illusion or magical transformation but more based in spiritual biology, perhaps the reason she was able to fool his own skills... There was no need for such specifics here. A woman had to retain some certain mysteries.
And help herself to a little more fruit. A damp paw reaches back into the pile to sort through and find something, rolling out a bundle of berries, colorful juice be damned. And she listens, because though their worlds are different in some ways, though the non-human races were somewhat different... The situation was much the same. How strange was that, that even across actually different worlds there would be so many coincidental threads. So many anchors. ]
They are easy to look down upon. To even hate.
[ Or to resent. Many spirits Kiritsubo knew had tales with humans tainted with such emotion. Miwa had been a child imprisoned in a tiny shrine hut to be "sealed" away for his powers, Murakumo had been hunted, the Kaze siblings abused by callous owners, Konnosuke betrayed by a human lover... There were plenty of reasons from spirits, just as there were plenty from the more short-lived mortals. Though Kiritsubo herself had always possessed the sight that made judging one side over the other a near impossibility, she could understand the motivations in others. ]
But you are right. Though they are fearful and greedy and hateful, they are also fierce and giving and loving. Because they live so little time, they compact all the emotions and desires of a spirit's life into a scant few decades... and so sometimes, it seems as if they are capable of feeling and doing somehow "more"...
[ And was that not fascinating, in it's way? She agrees with him, looking back up at him with her dark, dark eyes, cool and unblinking like a beast in a way that anyone would dismiss if they did not know she was there, that she could speak. ]
It is the dynamism that is capable of shaking us from our respective slumbers.
[ Breaking the skin of the berry with her claw, she lifts it to her muzzle to lick. ]
Now that you are awake... The question simply becomes "what will you do"?
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While she eats, though, she is listening. What Getian describes... it is something she knows of, something she has heard accounts of and observed... but when it came to her own experiences... ]
It would be a disservice to you for me to claim near the amount of difficulties you encounter.
[ For a moment, she stops eating, and her abyssal black gaze wanders over the branches and down below, where in the distance guests of the Golden Peacock wander the set paths through the false forest garden. ]
I observed humans from places hidden... from ferns and tree and burrow and around wood piles... long before I ever tried walking amongst them.
[ How old had she been, then, when the simpler mind of a beast had grown into that of a spirit she was meant to be? Twenty? Sixty? No, perhaps over a hundred... ? ]
I learned how to mimic their voices, first... their sounds, their words... and then their forms... and I am, shall we say, particularly gifted, even for a tanuki.
[ Shapeshifting had come easily to her once she began it, and once she mastered it... She put kitsune to shame. ]
I suppose in my youth there was an occasional mistake... a tail gone rogue, a face not quite right, a stumble with some custom I was not yet aware of... But I have walked among them now for so long that I barely recall it now... and back then, we spirits were treated with a good deal more fear and reverence than we are now. I could get by.
[ The half-bestial sound produced by a racoon dog with modified vocal chords were, apparently... capable of some degree of sounding wistful. ]
These days... the spirit world has been kept staid for so long, as if our glory days are behind us and those ruling cling to power and structure no longer fitting with circumstance... The humans, with their little flame lives... they have been more interesting to me, of late.
[ Wiping her muzzle, she eases into a sit, staring off at the distant figures... and then back to Getian. ]
They can be overwhelming, perhaps... But I sometimes feel as if I have seen so much that I require their chaos and noise just to notice.
[ She didn't usually admit to such things. But she was no liar. ]
no subject
the path that she describes is a fascinating one. his own people have always existed adjacent to humanity, occasionally influenced by the tremors that went through their world (such as when his people traveled from the borderlands to settle on their mountain in the Central Plains, fleeing from war and destruction), though for the most part they had remained a world apart. by the same token, however, it seems that their hearts were destined to yearn to join that world which would inevitably see them perish. getian yanping, first of his kin to be born on the Central Plains, had also been the last to leave. in that, he had been a straggler among his kind; contrary to this, it seems like kiritsubo was more of a trailblazer among her own. did all tanuki possess such abilities, or was she unique and exemplary in her skill? he has heard of fox spirits and the like taking the form of human beings, but the story she tells him does not fit to any of these stories or myths he can recall from his own era. )
Changing one’s form is an arcane skill that many arcanists learn, to varying skill… Your own ability surpasses any that I have seen, because it could even trick my own arcane skill, which usually allows me to discern illusions or transfigurations.
( “the spirit world”… it’s so interesting to think of these two things as separate. humans and arcanists have always lived together, even among arcane creatures such as himself. that the Miemeng birds had decided to live apart from humanity had been a privilege of their own powers and abilities. most other arcanists do not have that choice. they must live in a world that is predominantly ruled by humans; often, depending on the place and the era, they had faced great discrimination and hardship.
he is quiet for a long moment, processing, before he nods. )
I wonder if the other Miemeng birds who went before me felt similarly to you. Our temple, our mountain… they were safe, but they were also static. What I felt as peaceful might have been unbearably stagnant to others…
( he trails off, a faint melancholy entering his tone. he hesitates. he can sense such earnestness from kiritsubo that it encourages him to do the same, even though he is wary, given that the truth he could share might not be the most flattering. )
…For a very long time, a part of me resented them. ( he lowers his wings, gaze sweeping out over the landscape of the Vale around them. ) As wonderful as their inventions are, as beautiful as their art, as entrancing as their music… these humans were still the same creatures who found ways to extort my people for their compassion, leaving their memory behind to be consumed by the sands of time or, worse, condemning them as yao, even as they gave up their immortal lives in the simple desire to become a part of their world or even a brief time. I… could not understand why they did not see as I did. Surely they, too, could read the tragedy in the bones we brought back…?
( he shakes his head, finally looking back to kiritsubo. ) I didn’t understand until I was among them myself. Impetuous, impatient, avaricious, self-absorbed… yes, I have met many humans that can be described this way. But they are also brave, self-sacrificing, and so, so kind.
In the end, it felt fitting that I ended up too bound to their world to return to mine. It was like… being given a chance, to move on and grow from my own past foolishness.
no subject
[ Kiritsubo provides that context as she polishes off the pear with a last bite, pink tongue lapping over black gums and white maw to clean herself from the juice. The clarification that what she did was not illusion or magical transformation but more based in spiritual biology, perhaps the reason she was able to fool his own skills... There was no need for such specifics here. A woman had to retain some certain mysteries.
And help herself to a little more fruit. A damp paw reaches back into the pile to sort through and find something, rolling out a bundle of berries, colorful juice be damned. And she listens, because though their worlds are different in some ways, though the non-human races were somewhat different... The situation was much the same. How strange was that, that even across actually different worlds there would be so many coincidental threads. So many anchors. ]
They are easy to look down upon. To even hate.
[ Or to resent. Many spirits Kiritsubo knew had tales with humans tainted with such emotion. Miwa had been a child imprisoned in a tiny shrine hut to be "sealed" away for his powers, Murakumo had been hunted, the Kaze siblings abused by callous owners, Konnosuke betrayed by a human lover... There were plenty of reasons from spirits, just as there were plenty from the more short-lived mortals. Though Kiritsubo herself had always possessed the sight that made judging one side over the other a near impossibility, she could understand the motivations in others. ]
But you are right. Though they are fearful and greedy and hateful, they are also fierce and giving and loving. Because they live so little time, they compact all the emotions and desires of a spirit's life into a scant few decades... and so sometimes, it seems as if they are capable of feeling and doing somehow "more"...
[ And was that not fascinating, in it's way? She agrees with him, looking back up at him with her dark, dark eyes, cool and unblinking like a beast in a way that anyone would dismiss if they did not know she was there, that she could speak. ]
It is the dynamism that is capable of shaking us from our respective slumbers.
[ Breaking the skin of the berry with her claw, she lifts it to her muzzle to lick. ]
Now that you are awake... The question simply becomes "what will you do"?