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[Strider03]

"No issue. Clothes are a lead, probably. What you're wearing right now, I assume?" If the article wasn't too generic, maybe they could locate the store from which it was purchased too. That would come later though. For now, Shef was planning to use the leads on the phone. First, he copied the stored numbers to his own phone. Hopefully it wouldn't be necessary, but if the other phone got lost, they'd have a backup.

"Here."Shef tossed Noriko's phone over to Yuki. "First things first, take this, give Kouta a call. He wouldn't recognize my voice." Not that recognizing Shef's voice was likely to reassure anyone. "Tell him Noriko is no longer at this number, is on her way back sooner than expected, etc."

As an afterthought, Shef added, "Also tell him to try not to get in the way of his sister's date."

[Twinwolf]

Yuki managed to catch it after a bit of fumbling. "Ok, can do!" Yuki said cheerfully, before turning on the phone, spending a few moments figuring out where the call thing is, and then actually making that call. Assuming Kouta picked up, she started talking at her usual rapid pace. "Hey! This is Noriko's friend Yuki speaking! She's on her way back to your guys' room right now, but she left her phone with us so don't call here for a bit. Oh, and my other friend said to tell you to try not to get in the way of her date."

[Strider03]

"Good. Now, let's head over to the selfie place, and see if they'll let us in." Shef led the way out, with the intent of catching a train to the nightclub. Maybe they wouldn't have the enchanted air security or something. Maybe.

As they exited the guild hall, Shef commented, "I should mention, we're probably gonna be ambushed again at some point. There's a woman in a red dress who was my adversary for the training, and a group including someone with a bag on their head. They've been tailing you since. . .well I don't know since when. But at least an hour I think."

Check the call history with Yuki, were any of the local numbers called? And if they were, check the timestamps on the calls to determine whether they were made before or after the text to the guild.

[Powder Miner]

"You did the twins switching clothes thing...? You two are like the most horrible cartoon in existence."

Faith's mouth twisted into a grimace as the restrained details of that damn moon of madness tried to strike her in her mind, assaulting her eyes and her sense of direction, forcing her to turn her head slightly so she wasn't at least staring it dead-on. At least her Shield of Apathy was there protecting her from the moon's full effects, but it wasn't going to last unless reinforced. ...unless reinforced... If the Shield of Apathy even being simply around that moon put it under her control, Faith supposed that the madness effects actually fell under the purview of her emotional magic. And Faith already knew that she could fill other magic with her own and control it, so if she could push out the madness magic...

Faith began to move backwards (because she suspected Luna wouldn't just let her do her plan unaccosted), but as she did she set her face into one of effort, conjuring the magic of another Shield of Apathy -- but instead of letting this one physically manifest into either a shield or a net in the first place, Faith channeled it directly through the net holding the moon under her control, and she tried to push the apathy magic into the moon and force the madness out, first putting all of the magic of the new Shield of Apathy into this, and then using whatever remnants of the currently-net-form Shield of Apathy there were for the same purpose. If she was successful, Faith would be able to turn the moon from Luna's Moon of Madness into her Moon of Apathy -- and perhaps even if she couldn't manage that she could take the Moon out of the running altogether.

While backpedaling to avoid follow-up attacks, Faith casts a new Shield of Apathy directly into the old one, and actively tries to replace the madness magic in the moon with the apathy magic from both. Alteration to 5.
World Line: 1-->5 1 6 1 6 5 5 4 5 3

[Chevaleresse]

Noriko follows Patricija through the process; she's fairly certain she understands how to do it just fine, but she deems not screwing up a basic task to be of higher value than that lost by the embarrassment of having to be guided through said basic task, directly or indirectly. As it cooks and the silence stretches on to a somewhat uncomfortable length, Noriko finally breaks it, seemingly in an effort to make it more awkward.
"So, um. . . how exactly did we run into each other last night?"

[Empiricist]

Shef and Yuki
None of the numbers have been called. Noriko apparently just saved them into her phonebook without giving them a name. You make a mental note to lecture her on proper contact management later. No sign of baghead when you exit the guild. Red stays in the guild building as far as you can tell.

Train station is again, fairly close to the guild.

((We can skip forwards or have you guys do something depending on Sakurako's action and your responses.))

Sakurako
Baghead and co have changed positions though their modus operandi remains the same, observing Shef and Yuki nearby buildings, taking great care to stay out of their line of sight. Red remains in the guild building. However you notice that a young boy is tailing the duo as well, taking advantage of his size to hide in the crowds and making sure to always stay a few paces back.

Faith

Spoiler: Rolls (click to show/hide)

Faith: 5, Hyper[3]

Luna: 6

So the moon just swings at you, rays of madness filtering through a thickening web and coming out as mostly apathy, you recall thinking of trying to wrestle further control of it from there but to be honest you don't really feel up to it, you kinda just feel meh right now, even as the moon practically brushes past you, your dodge succeeding by the smallest of margins. Shit! It's the apathy isn't it? You've corrupted the moon, you've corrupted it alright it's fucking affecting you too! In fact, it's getting worse now - the rays are intensifying, the illumination previously focused right at you like a searchlight blooming out like the world's worst discoball, though really the worst part about all this is just how deadpan Luna is handling all this. At least Satoshi looked like she was having fun when she was teasing you, Luna meanwhile just stares at you unblinkingly with those cold dead eyes.

"Yes." She replies. "But only our underwear."

Wait, what?

You hear this horrific garbled roar behind you, the howling heat of a raging star exploding out from behind you. They, they can cast both?

You're trapped now, sandwiched between the sun and moon, and with all that apathy you can't even gather up the will to move, to save yourself. The sun burns brighter and brighter prominences coiling across its surface readying to strike you from behind with a flare. You observe it all with detached disapassionate acceptance. The sun flares brightly one last time, and fizzles. The moon fizzles too.

"I think I'll have some tea."

Sol just sort of wanders off into the crowd tying his ponytail back up as he does so, leaving you standing there dazed and hollow for a few moments. Eventually, you come back to your senses.

...Did, did you just win?

Spoiler: Notes (click to show/hide)

The apathy managed to hit you both a lot harder than expected since it also made Sol stop restraining the Light of Madness causing it to just pump out more apathy. Burning Occultation deploying behind you and readying to open fire would've been the action executing next turn but combat ended right then when you kinda did another mutual "kill" except this time this time both sides just stopped fighting out of sheer indifference.

Noriko
With a plume of steam your dish cools to a less scalding hot. You detach the bottom and toss it in the bin.
"Oh, um... we met in a bar, you two came in looking really happy, Yuki said something about having 'super special secret training' I think?" You're pretty sure she's glossing over some details there.

[ragnarok97071]

Sakurako didn't quite know what the best option here was, deciding to settle for watching the watchers, looking for a moment where she could catch them unawares and tale action.

[Chevaleresse]

"Well, we're here to train, but I don't think it's particularly secret or special. Unless she meant whatever the hell it was we signed up for last night. . ." She sighed, continuing to pick at her food. "But we were just, at a bar together? There was some news report or something, but I don't remember anything."

[Empiricist]

Shef and Yuki
Aight so you two board the train and you're a ways away into your trip when Noriko's phone starts ringing. It's from one of the local numbers in her contacts list.

Sakurako
Baghead and co don't seem to follow immediately, they seem to just start discussing something in the bookstore they're holed up in, something that gets Baghead rather animated. Eventually, they resume tailing Shef, and Yuki, moving from building to building before finally perching themselves ontop of a train carriage. Through all this Red still hasn't left the guild as far a you can tell anyways, maybe it was an illusion like the one Shef was using and they discarded it now? The boy meanwhile follows the duo straight onto the train.

Noriko
"Well..."
She fidgets, smiling a bit too nervously
"We did go on a date..."

[Strider03]

Shef had been considering asking Yuki a question as they'd boarded the train. He'd wavered back and forth for a bit before coming to the conclusion that the information gained was worth the risk of asking. At this point, he was confident he could put it in a manner that would make it seem like mostly innocuous conversation to any eavesdroppers.

The ring of the phone put that plan on hold. "You answer, since you might have been there when Noriko got the number. Keep them talking if you can." Shef murmured.

[Twinwolf]

Yuki, for her part, seemed completely oblivious to any potential questions, but she did as Shef asked and picked up the phone. "Hello?" Then she paused - a lot of people spoke English around there - "<Hello?>"

[Empiricist]

Shef and Yuki
It's an energetic lady on the other end of the line "Oh hi Yuki! How've you been? ...wait why are you answering you Noriko's phone?"

[Twinwolf]

"Hi! I'm good, how're you!" Yuki said cheerfully, despite not having the slightest clue who this person was. "I'm picking up because I have Noriko's phone and she's not here right now. What's up?"

When Shef inevitably asks if she knows the person, Yuki would shrug.

[Empiricist]

Shef and Yuki
"A likely story! But how do I know that you are definitely Yuki and not a total psycho who's kidnapped my adorable models and trying to steal their identities?"

[Twinwolf]

"Why would I pretend to be myself when I can just be myself? And if I was some total psycho why wouldn't I pretend to be Noriko instead of Yuki, since this is her phone? Well I guess maybe if I were a psycho I'd be too crazy to think of that, or maybe too stupid, whichever really, but then I wouldn't really be talking about it. How do I know you're not some random psycho calling Noriko's number to lure us to our doom?"