aerodynamic | INBOX for purgastory

Oh. The river?

[She looks out to it.]

I feel no particular pull myself, but...In my travels, above or below the surface, I will come upon a chamber, empty of all threats. Instead it will bear a fountain, and drinking from it restores my vitality. Heals my wounds. It fortifies me enough to continue my task.

Waters may work many miracles. If you have hesitations, I could enter with you, or hold onto you from the shore?

[ the fact that she doesn't feel a pull actually makes this more suspicious, and the look on his face says so. then again, he knows melinoe's done some serious dungeon-crawling so he could buy that to be something she's experienced. ]

Really? [ hesitantly. ] How do we know it'll work the same? I can't ask you for that.

We don't. We may only try, and learn.

[She looks to him, smiling.]

You don't have to ask, because I am offering. And I will not leave you in pain if there's a chance to relieve it.

Shall we? Take my hand, Yosuke. I'll see to it we are safe.

[ once again, he finds himself appreciating her more than he anticipated. melinoe is someone who resembles strength to him, someone who appears a little untouchable but continues to show kindness and thoughtfulness in situations like these.

she says it's an offer, and there's a promise that she'll keep him safe, and he does want to believe her. he isn't against getting himself healed. he's far too aware of the fact he'd be a detriment if he was still hurt, and that alone is something to push him into doing it. and yet... there's a shaky little exhale even while he offers a thin, uneasy smile. ]

Okay. Um... can I have five minutes?

[ because while he may want to do this, he really is still trying to decompress from everything that just happened and also waking up in the morgue for some reason. ]

[oh, dear lad.

She may not understand exactly why or what he stalls for, but there's an earnestness to his hesitations that tugs at her heart nonetheless. He's not quite like anyone she's ever met. Maybe Icarus was a little like this, when he was still alive? Bright hope and fragile dreams, the sparking drive to do something. Make it right.

Mortals are fascinating creatures. They share traits with the gods, but the shortness of their lives casts an urgency about it all. A fright, even. Something desperate that she yearns to ease.

Melinoë smiles kindly, and nods.]

Only five! [joking.] Though if you start to look any paler, I might have to hurry you.

What's on your mind?

[ this isn't a wrong read on him. yosuke hanamura is a teenage who is still figuring out who he wants to be but can recognize the potential of a brighter tomorrow and has a few dreams of his own. to lose sight of those... to not remember who he really was, everything they'd fought for, the things that mattered...

... that was a little scarier than he's willing to admit right now. there's a lopsided grin with the joke she makes because he can tell she's joking, but then he has to think of what he wants to elaborate on.

"what's on your mind?" she says, and he has to think of where to even start. ]

I think... I'm trying to decide how much of this was "real" and how much of it "wasn't." [ the quotes around those words are near audible, because everything really did happen to them but he isn't sure how much to hold onto just yet. ]

Hm.

[She settles in, getting more comfortable as they make to take airs by the river for the moment. All the better to ponder in.]

Your false life...but there were flickers of the truth within it, weren't there? You called out to certain people as you woke, seeming surprised to find them here. And Reirin mentioned mourning some of our number. Was that the way of it? Shadows of the souls here, recast into your new life alongside you?

Yes. The four of us were together pretty much the whole time, but there were other people in the expedition party who were people from this place, too. Or other people we found elsewhere up at the top of the summit. Everything fit together way too neatly.

[ which is. confusing. because he knows that wasn't entirely real. ]

Too neatly to be believed, I wager.

What happened? What is it you were made to do, the four of you?

None of us questioned it at all. [ alarming, really. ]

... it was our year to join the expedition to head up the mountain and try to kill the god who came down every year for the Erasure. Expedition parties are small, but all four of us wanted to go to try and make it as far as we could.

[was this an akayona cyoa]

So it was a test of your mettle?

But...it didn't pan out in your favour, I take it.

[ help. ]

I wouldn't say it was a test when we volunteered to go because we were tired of waiting around. Nobody makes it back from those expeditions alive, but we were gonna go anyway. Things started going wrong pretty early on in the ascent, but we were getting further than the expeditions before us.

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