Icarian Dreams

Lynette grit her teeth as the ice shattered across the newly-risen wall, more than glad that she managed to get off the platform before it hit. She didn't have much time to focus on that, however, as her blow went wide, causing her to overextend instead of regaining balance. She panted in surprise as the thorny vine wrapped around her leg, pulling it from underneath her. Thanks to her armor, the spikes didn't doo as much as to merely scratch the metal plates, but the sudden tug at her ankle completely put her off, sending her falling backwards into the moist and muddy ground. Only by the very last second did she manage to fit in her own strike, with the edge of her shield swinging at the side of his head. She fell onto her hands, spun around by the momentum of the blow, but quickly turned around, fearful not to keep her back exposed to an enemy. With a quick cut she severed the whip still holding her leg in half, and crawled a few steps back, focusing some energy to channel a ray of ice and frost at the man, gaining a few precious seconds to help herself raise from the ground with her other hand. Re-adjusting her stance, she took just a split second to take better notice of her opponent - the chill seemed to have gotten to him, but he was still standing firmly - in fact, he had already put up way more of a fight than she initially expected he would. She couldn't let him get a breather. His strength so far had come from careful preparation of the environment, but she doubted he'd have as much of a chance in direct combat. Instead of charging him head-first, however, first she lowered the ray of frost she was still aiming at him, freezing down the wet ground and covering it with a layer of ice, slowly expanding in all directions with every passing second. Let's see you run on that. She smirked. Only then did she advance, careful not to run head-first into any stray pillars of stone he might have summoned.

Lynette sensed the ground under her feet shake, threatening to collapse, and she grasped the hilt of her sword. The ice storm began to slow down, no longer draining from her energy, but she still had some time before it completely died down. Once again, she raised her shield-arm, preparing to send another barrage of missiles towards her enemy, before her eyes widened at the massive pillar of rock soaring through the air at her. Her concentration on the ice structure broke as she desperately attempted to slow the projectile down, materializing layers upon layer of thin ice out of the moisture in the surrounding air - without much of a success. She gasped loudly, barely holding her feet on the ice by the enchantment of her boots, as the massive glacier shook violently from the impact, waves upon waves of water exploding all around from the shattering, rapidly-melting structure. She barely managed to hold the ice that was directly under her feet secure, creating a small platform on which she plummeted downwards into the cold waters. She felt her insides jump to her throat as the ice disk crushed into the furious waves underneath, bringing her down to her hands and knees as she barely held onto the edge of the floe. Only after a moment did she get a better grasp on the situation, quickly focusing her energy to freeze the water beneath into the shape of a slope on which she could slide down more safely. Having regained her balance on the rapidly moving platform, she straightened up, trying to find her opponent - only to see him shiver with a whip in his hand right next to his own structure. She commanded the ice beneath to expand in that direction, the platform under her feet gaining momentum with every following second. Just as she was about to hit him, she curved the slide just a little bit upwards, and let her boots release their grasp, the ice disk shooting from the sudden lack of friction from under her feet, with stupendous force heading straight for Lin's chest. Lyn herself tumbled forward, the velocity of her fall surpassing even her own expectations and knocking her well off-balance. By the skin of her teeth, she managed to soften her fall with a roll, even despite it feeling every bone in her body shake, as it was met with the cold hard ground. Finishing the manouver, she swung her blade upwards from the side, in a rather ungraceful attempt trying to force the momentum of her stumble into a blow against the other changeling.

Lyn stopped mid-dash, realizing that her charge would be futile against the newly-created shield that rose out of the ground around her opponent. Hundreds of small icicles flew past her as she ceased her concentration, knowing better than to expand energy on trying to stop their momentum. With the sound of a breaking glass, they shattered harmlessly at the earthy barrier. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed some movement in the grass around her. She cursed under her breath, and slashed to the side, cutting in half a vine that just shot in her direction. A gasp came out of her lungs as another one began wrapping around her shield-arm, pulling her off-balance. She grit her teeth and pulled the plant closer to herself, grasping onto the vine. Solid ice began to gather around her hand as the stem started to freeze, until, with a contraction of her fingers, she shattered the frozen vine, freeing herself. She narrowed her eyes, looking at the road ahead of her, almost mindlessly slashing at a couple emerging vines that tried to replace the ones she just destroyed. With a quick motion, she lowered herself onto one of her knees, pushing her hand into the ground. Spikes of ice began emerging alongside her form and in towards her opponent, effectively walling off any more vegetation that he might have summoned along the way. With a twist of her hand, she let the walls before her expand, reaching to their opposite counterparts, creating a set of makeshift stairs. She rushed up them, along the way cutting or pushing off any plant matter that blocked her way. Her boots adjusted as she strode through the slidy terrain, with every following step digging deep into the icy surface - a small enchantment, but combined with her magic, it proved plenty useful. She stopped on top of the staircase and thrust her blade into the ice, freeing out her other hand. For a split second, she focused her gaze inside the barrier, trying to read what Lin was attempting to do, before she raised her hands, moving them in circular motions and summoning a gust of chill wind right inside said circle. The moisture within the area began to gather, forming tiny shards of ice and snow that whirled, creating a small, but rapidly increasing in size and speed snowstorm, effectively forming a deadly trap, with Linden right in the center of it. She felt the ice under her feet begin to crack as she released the tempest with one of her hands, focusing some of her remaining energy to raise a pillar within the blinding snow, just where her opponent left himself an escape point. The ice walls she had behind her began to melt at an increasing pace, but she didn't care much about them - she had enough time before the decay reached her position.

"Hmph." Lyn groaned, turning her head to the side as she raised her shield to block the cloud of spores flying straight at her. She clenched her teeth, pushing against the surprising force of the particles. Attacking me with seeds, now? She smirked, and forced her way through the plant matter, quickly finding out Linden in the middle of the arena. Small snowflakes started to gather around her wrist, as she focused her mind to channel the energy she felt inside. With a decisive motion, she pushed her sword-arm forward, causing a layer of snow to gather in the gaps between the terrain, creating a more traversable surface. She rushed through the now-clear ground towards the center, and, with a motion resembling an upwards slash, sent a wave of frost flying towards the man, hoping to kill off whatever it was he was planting at the moment. With her other hand, she let go of the shield, letting it hang on her arm as dozens of small balls of ice began to gather, first around her palm and wrist, and quickly alongside her body, sharpening into dozens of small icicles that flew alongside her as she ran. She smiled deviously, and grasped back the shield, trusting her concentration to keep the projectiles flying forward alongside her.

"Then cease your moaning and stand your ground. If you wished to avoid confrontation you should have watched your words when speaking of my liege," she called out, taking a step backwards as she drew her blade towards herself, pointing it slightly towards the ground, and raised her shield to assume a combat-ready stance. The smirk on her face disappeared to give ground for a determined frown, and she waited for him to ready himself for the fight. There was this sense of cold, calculated fury coming from within her. His reasoning was sound, but she didn't really care about that anymore. These few moments when he spoke, she used to get an understanding of her surroundings and prepare. This wretch would regret his words. She looked him straight in the eye, raising one eyebrow. "Ready, summerling?"

"That... sounds like a lot of unnecessary effort..." Lamp confessed. The more answers she was getting, even weirder humans were starting to seem. "You have to go through all of this every time you mate? All these... date things and all? That must be, really, uhm... frustrating," she admitted. To wait for such a long time when she needed to breed... it would be unbearable, really. What if she ran out of eggs by the time it was all done? She found herself lost in thought for a moment, not really noticing the embarassment her questioning might have brought to Hiro. Only when he followed up on that information, did she take notice of his state. "Umm, well, if you ever want to breed, just say so," she affirmed, hearing his confession. "You know, we could even do this... 'date' thing you speak of if you really want to," she tried to appeal, feeling even slightly bad for the boy. He had to go through all this bother just to mate... She would personally very much rather just get straight into it, but if he cared so much about these customs, she could oblige. She tilted her head slightly to the side, examining the glasses as the boy described them. It was a curious piece of apparel, and it apparently helped him see better? She had trouble imagining how exactly, if anything, having two pieces of glass right before your eyes would only diminish your sight, or so she believed. She mirrored his motion, scratching the back of her own head.

"That's Lady Syrabane to you, summerling." she corrected, a storm beginning to brew inside of her. "And well, had you paid attention during attendance, perhaps you'd be wiser than to take my warnings so lightly," she continued, drowling every word. She could have standed the rotten insults he directed at her, but such an insolent insinuation as the one he directed at none other, but the Queen herself, was one step he took too far - even if he wasn't far from the truth. She barely even listened to his further explainations, subconsciously noting them somewhere in the back of her mind. Her voice was filled with the coldness she felt from the blizzard inside of her, as she continued her answer. "I'll have you know that, as you adeptly pointed out, there are some rules that even you need to subject yourself to." "And since you're so eager to learn about my interest in fencing, I shall be more than willing to oblige," she finished with a snark. With a single smooth motion, she unsheathed her sword, thin strings of ice raising up its blade as she pointed it straight towards his gullet. Her questions could wait. "Linden Direnni," she spelled out his name, making it clear that she did, in fact know its full extent, "your lack of respect towards the Winter Queen and her servants is as much a dishonor to the reputation of this fine establishment, as it is a slight to my pride. I ask that you stand against me in a lawful duel, as the Codex demands," she commanded, the corner of her mouth raising in an ever so slight smirk.

Perhaps it was for the best that the subject was changed - and it wasn't long until Lamp brightened back up, seemingly leaving it behind. As long as it wasn't her who was being the one eaten, it didn't really matter all that much. and Hiro had been so nice to her so far that she couldn't really hold anything against him. She looked back up at him, still keen on listening to everything he had to say. "Oh, yes!" she smiled even wider at the encouragement of her questioning, more than happy to oblige. "Umm... Do humans lay eggs? How do you attract mates? ...how often do you even mate?" she inquired, eager to gain more knowledge on subjects that most related to her goals. After all, if this world was, as he said, ruled by humans, it was most likely her potential mates would be from amongst them. Things would be much easier if she had knowledge on how they operate, since - to her horror - so far they have proven to be much more complex of a species than Lamp initially thought. "Oh, and what is this thing on your nose?" she added after half a second, gesturing with her head towards his glasses as she repeated an unanswered question from earlier. The shiny construct had occupied her attention for a while now, and she was more than curious as to what it actually did.

Lynette stood ground, warily watching the changeling's movements as he turned slowly towards her. It was the first time she truly had the chance to take a better look at him - her previous attempts having been thwarted by his slippery ways. His appearance was of no surprise to her - she knew well of the Summer servants' deceptive beauty - and Linden's own roguish charm fell well into this category. Still, even having set her expectations, she could barely stand that cocky smile of his. "You truly expect me to believe that the queen of trickery would send her servant to learn arithmetics? You'll have to forgive my scepticism," she snarled coldly, feeling herself rise in anger at such blatant attempt to deceive her. Her face twitched at the insult that followed, thrown towards her. If he was trying to provoke her, he would have to try better than that, she thought. Still, she couldn't help but feel her fingers tighten around the hilt of her weapon. It was clear that he was hiding something, trying to cover it under the veil of slights and mockery. Was he spying on her? Trying to gather information on her whereabouts for the Summer Court? She felt cold droplets of water gather at her fingers, the energies within her responding to her emotion. Something foul was afoot, Lyn knew it. It was no mere chance that their arrivals coincided with each other. Her eyes went to the snake wrapped around his shoulders. That damn snake. She couldn't help but feel that it was mocking her at least as much as its owner was. She grit her teeth. "You may want to silence this vermin of yours while both of you still have your heads," she warned. "And before I consider letting you go, you will answer some questions for me. Starting with your name."

Lamp listened to the long list of foods that Hiro spoke about, barely understanding every other word of what he said. She tried remembering the names of some of the dishes he named, but soon gave up, as the amount of information overwhelmed her. So for a moment she just enjoyed the sound of his voice without much care about the content - at least until the moment he proposed to introduce her to said foods. Her antenae twitched slightly and she raised her head, looking with curiosity at the boy as he briefly explained human gastronomy. "Wait, you mean you don't hunt for your food?" she asked out loud, her eyes widening in surprise at the revelation. She fell silent for a moment, processing this new information. Of course, even in her world, she's heard of groups of monsters that practiced animal husbandry - although she didn't know much about them, there were civilizations in her world that could compete with the technological advancements of humans - but she's never given it much thought. Now however, faced with someone who apparently knew much more about the concept, she found it a bit perplexing. "That's... Umm... I don't know, it feels, like, wrong, you know?" she decided after some thought. "Like, what if someone decided to do that to you? It... uh... I think I'll stick to plants, okey?" she changed the subject, not really wanting to visualise such scenario herself. She smiled without much conviction when he looked at her, not wanting to discourage her new friend. "N-no, it's just... a lot," she somewhat affirmed, and pointed her gaze slightly towards the ground, unsure what more to say.

Following quickly behind him Lamp listened carefully to the human's words. Every couple of steps, her wings would flutter slightly, and she would rise for a moment into the air, just to land down a few seconds later, but aside from that, she made no other sound, visibly interested by what Hiro had to say. While she didn't quite understand what "omnivorous" meant, thankfully Hiro followed up with a quick explaination, to which Lamp smiled happily, glad that he didn't leave her in the dark. His answer she found most interesting. From his words, it concluded that humans ate all sorts of stuff. The fact that this included meat was slightly off-putting to her - Hiro certainly didn't look like a predator - but then she remembered the look (and most certainly the fangs) of Mr. von Braun, which led her to believe that perhaps there were different kinds of humans, some of which were more adapted to hunting for food - just like bees had soldiers and workers. She was quite satisfied with that parallel, and as a result almost missed the fact that Hiro had asked her question - if not for the inquisitive gaze he directed towards her. "Hmm...?" she muttered. "Oh- me? Umm, mostly fruit. Sometimes other plants. Depends on what's around," she explained quickly. She thought for a second. "What do you eat?" she emphasized. "As in, you, Hiro," she followed up.

It was not long after Linden entered the arena that Lynette herself emerged from the building complex, following nearly the exact pathing taken by the green-haired changeling. She was obviously in full arms, as befitted a Winter Knight in the foreign soil, but the fine, ornate craftsmanship of both her armor and weapons indicated that her intentions were not, in fact, hostile, and that her equipment was more of a mere display of status rather than actual preparation for combat. That didn't, of course, mean that her armor would not be able to withstand even the stronger blows, or that she hadn't spent extra time ensuring that her blade was sharper than a razor ever could be. She knew from her days in the Winter Court that danger could come from anywhere, at any time, and that experience alone was enough to keep her on her toes no matter the surroundings - and the recent events have only affirmed her convictions. It was only the, what, the second day, that she attended the teachings in this fine establishment, as the Winter Queen herself requested, and already she had found out about a potential threat coming from none other but the Summer Court itself. It was obviously this young man of vibrant green hair and most piercing of gazes she's seen all throughout her classes. He's been clearly avoiding her ever since she first saw him, but even despite that, Lyn couldn't help but take notice of the soft symbols of the Summer Queen embroidened into his clothing. However, any of her attempts to approach this wanna-be spy have ended with failure - the man was at least as slippery as his serpent companion. She looked around her surroundings, a frown appearing on her pale face as the rays of sunlight illuminated her visage. She quickly raised her shield, blocking as much of the searing beams as she could. The days here have been way too hot for her liking - and the suit of metal plates that adorned most of her body certainly wasn't aiding the situation, but she never even entertained the notion that she could get it off. Her eyes rested on a small archway leading into what seemed to be a small stadium or arena, structured in a way that gave just enough shade for a person to hide within. She breathed out in relief. With that and her magic, perhaps she wasn't going to boil alive just yet. Her advance stopped mid-way, as a sound of a quiet conversation reached her ears. The voices... no, a singular voice, was coming right from inside of the structure, gently explaining something to an unknown recipient. Lynette was almost about to dismiss it - after all, countless students hung around the complex even after the classes have finished - but a certain sound attracted her attention - one that couldn't be anything else but the quiet hissing of a snake. Her hand instantly traveled to the hilt of her sword, and she once again checked her surroundings, making sure the area was clear. Slowly, hoping not to make too much of a sound, she approached the entrance, trying to locate the source of the sound. And there he was, alone in the arena, petting and speaking to his vermin friend. Lyn frowned. He would not get a chance to evade her this time. She cleared her throat. "You're far from your realm, summer child," her voice resonated behind the man. "What are you scheming out here on your lonesome? Waiting for someone?" she accused, her voice bearing the tone of a forming icicle.

"Ohh, that would be great!" Lamp lit up at the proposition, her wings widening in excitement for a moment, almost as if she were to jump into the air again, but remaining afoot for the time being. "Lead on then!" she accepted, squinting her bug-eyes slightly as she grinned at the boy. He seemed like someone who knew a lot of things, so Lamp was excited to have a chance of prodding that knowledge a bit. She's been in this world for barely more than a week, and have already found it easy to get lost in. It was so much different from her home realm, and the beings that inhabited it were so interesting as well! They seemed like some sort of "base" a base version of many monsters she knew, It was frankly, quite fascinating, and so she was glad that she found one that could explain it to her personally. "Sooo..." now that she had one in front of her and his assertion that he would answer her questions, she was having trouble finding one - or rather - picking one from the dozens that were scattered across her mind. Her eyes went to the door still standing behind Hiro. "What do you even... eat?" she started, for once not trying to ask about everything at once. Her gaze returned to the two silver irides the boy hid behind his glasses and she stepped slightly to his side, expecting to move out. [ OOC: Sounds good to me! ]

[ OOC: I edited the "completely upside down" to "completely misaligned" in my last post - on a second thought it would make sense for their mistake not to be so severe, and it will keep the scene easier to manage. ] Silence befell the room, as Anpu's mind went to the small library of knowledge she had about summoning rituals. She's read quite a lot on the subject, but as far as her memory extended, none of the testimonies she's read ever described an... imprefect ritual. Not a succesful one, at least. As far as she knew, if the conjured being was strong enough, even the slightest gaps in the structure of the circle could prove fatal to the entire ritual. And if you were to summon a weaker creature... well, the circle wouldn't be as elaborate as it was if it was a "weaker creature" they were trying to conjure. "Well, the correct course of action would be to re-do the circle from scratch, but..." she paused, looking at the lines intertwining in the circle before her. Redrawing this thing would take ages... Maybe it would not be that much of an issue? The error wasn't too jarring after all. "I mean..." she picked up. "The circle should work as it currently is. It will just be... weaker. Depending on what you want to summon, it may hold, it just... what exactly are you trying to summon here?"

"That's great! I'm sure we'll have an amazing time getting to know each other!" Lamp expressed her enthusiasm, in eagerness fluttering slightly upwards into the air. She landed before the boy began to speak again, finding herself having to look ever so slightly upwards at him to maintain eye contact. "A phone?" she asked after Hiro had finished speaking, taking a moment to remember what exactly "a phone" was. She did try to learn a bit about the human world beforehand, but some concepts still eluded her mind every now and then. Seeing Hiro bring his own to his hand, however, refreshed her memory. "Yup, I have it! What is this 'exchanging numbers' you said? I... umm.. don't exactly know what it does yet," she admited with some reluctance. Someone did, in fact, advise her to buy one of these just before she got to the academy. She wasn't exactly sure what it did just yet, but hey, at least it looked nice. And she managed to make it light up when she wanted, which Lamp found pretty satisfying to do. She lowered her head slightly, catching a short glimpse of the timetable she almost forgot she was still holding in one of her hands. "Oh, uhh... do you know where herbalism and history classes are?" she changed the topic and looked the boy hopefully in the eyes, reminded that she still had something to do around here.

Something in Hiro's body language and behavior told Lamp that, despite what he was saying, his relationship to that "nice monster" (or monsters, Lamp realized) was something more than the human let himself admit. But if it wasn't a mate then what? Lamp frowned heavily, trying to focus her thoughts in spite of Hiro's agitated denying. Why did the humans need to be so complicated? This place was so different from her home... Hiro's voice snapped her out of her thoughts. She shook her head slightly, almost as if to cast away the lingering thoughts and focused herself back on his eyes, before following them to her own body. "M-hm!" she nodded. "Although Mr. von Braun said I was anth-ro-po-mo-ro-umm..." she scratched the back of her neck, looking slightly off to the side, trying to recall what exactly it was Mr. von Braun said. Lamp could have sworn that the words he used always had like an extra syllable or two thrown in there just to make things more difficult. "-morphic. I think," she concluded after a while. "It means that I'm not fully an insect! I only have traits of one!" she announced, proudly puffing her chest forward. She followed him with her gaze as he begun walking a circle around her. To a human, her form might have been indeed quite curious. She had a thin coat of white, soft fluff covering most of her (numerous) limbs, and a small patch gathered around her neck, creating a puffy collar right above her chest. Two insect wings extended from her shoulders, resting down on her body in a cape-like structure whenver she wasn't afloat. She herself was quite shapely, perhaps even a bit too much for her otherwise rather lithe frame. She crossed her lower arms under her bust, waiting for Hiro to finish his examination. When he did, two black, shiny eyes smiled back right at him with almost a certain question in them, as if she wanted to ask him what he thought about what he saw. "It's alright. You're one of my first humans too! " The moth-girl assured, finding herself blushing slightly in response. "And you seem nice enough. Maybe we could- hang out sometimes!" she announced happily, with slight awkwardness finishing the sentence. For some reason she felt that the human may not be so eager to mate just yet. Perhaps it wasn't his breeding season. Lamp could only guess.

Lamp listened to the human boy with attention, hungrily grasping every piece of information he gave her. She frowned a bit hearing his refusal to share the story, but smiled back to reassure that she wouldn't hold it against him. "Oh, well, I don't mind. I think it only adds to you being interesting!" she decided and giggled a bit alongside him, not quite aware what exactly was so funny. She scanned him with curiosity, once more inquisitively tilting her head to the side as he spoke about his experiences. Why did he suddenly start acting so weird? Did she say something? Then the realization hit her once again, and she exclaimed loudly and proudly. "Ooooh! You already have a mate!" Her form excitedly circled in the air in front of him, clearly glad that she found yet another thing to be thrilled about. "You'll have to introduce me sometimes! What's their name? Is human pairing always so quick?" she continued, not letting the boy get a moment of respite. The topic was clearly quite important to her mind, so she didn't spare questions - not that she had a habit of doing so anyways.

What is says on the tin. If I had a penny for every time I closed a page by accident and had to rewrite my entire post from scratch, I'd have around a dozen pennies. And that's way too many pennies! What I'm suggesting is to add a prompt to confirm whenever a tab is closed while there is still text in the "new post" box (or any text-box if possible), to avoid instances of mistakenly ereasing all of one's written content. I'm sure it would save people many frustrations.

Lamp grasped her head in her upper hands and leaned forward a bit, listening to Hiro's response and even nodding a few times as if to confirm his words. At his mention of humans and their relation to Earth, her already quite large eyes widened even further in disbelief. "Woah... You own... an entire planet? That's, like... a lot, right?" she asked, for once not quite sure what words to use. In fact, the revelation seemed to have shocked her to the point where she almost forgot about her previous questions. Her gaze followed his back to the door and back towards himself again. "Dining hall? Oh." she responded to his explaination, the one erect antennae slowly slumping to its original position. For a moment it looked as if the girl was truly and seriously concerned, her stare pointing at the door behind Hiro's back, but after a couple moments, she straightened her head back up and looked into the boy's irides. "Well at least I know where the food is." She once shone her teeth at him in a happy smile. For some reason her initial excitement was beginning to fade, it seemed she remained quite joyful regardless of it. "What brings me to this academy?" she shadowed his question. "Well, I need to 1) Find a mate, 2) Find a nest and 3) Umm... I haven't thought that far." she admitted. "But I've heard the academy can help with that! And what brings you to this academy?" she countered, in an almost accusatory fashion pointing her finger at him.

A light blush ran over Anpu's face. Obviously, she expected the sisters to behave flirtously, they were lust demons after all (and Anpu had her share of lust demons even today, having met the headmistress earlier this day), but even despite that, the constant flood of compliments made her unsure how to react. So she reacted how she usually did - by focusing on the task at hand. She breathed out with relief though, as it seemed the siblings did not have any malicious intent - not towards her at least. She lowered herself closer to the circle, still not quite wanting to disturb it - the first rule of magic circles was to always treat them as if they were active - no matter how dormant they seemed. She took a soft sniff of the substance it was made of. The usual materials would be chalk or blood, but certain rituals required some specific ingredients to lock the summoned creature inside - for example, many demons could be stopped by mixing some salt into the barrier. She had trouble discerning what exactly went into the creation of this circle, but the scent was rich enough that she concluded it must have been from a recipe - otherwise the girls would not waste that much time to craft the solution. Satisfied with this part of her examination, she put another knee under herself and sat in front of the circle, once again taking a look at its entirety. Her eyes sought out the sun through the window, before turning towards Jessica. "Well, for starters the entire thing is almost completely misaligned," she started, her voice gaining confidence as she spoke of the topics she had good knowledge of. "The sun needs to be pointing directly to the north, and the moon towards the south. Yours is slightly skewed, see?" Without looking, she gestured towards the sun slowly heading towards the horizon outside. "Do you have a compass around here?" she requested, her compulsion to correct this ritual overshadowing her doubt as to why is she even helping in a ritual in the first place.

Lamp's lips parted slightly in a joyful smile, shining two sets of tiny teeth at the newly met boy. He was looking over her, but his gaze wasn't of the kind that a predator gives before eating his pray, making her easily trust his reassurances not to do her harm. She also realized that he was much nicer than Mr. von Braun. And much more apologetic. "What year are you on, Hiro? I just got here. Well, technically yesterday. Do you like it here? Are there many humans around?" Yet another barrage of questions escaped Lamp's mouth, who apparently tried to convey - and receive - as much information as possible in as little time as possible. Her wings buzzed once more as she flung back into the air, once again giving Hiro an eyeful of her bouncing bust. She blinked a few times, fluttering the surprisingly long eyelashes. The boy - Hiro - was nice, and even a bit handsome. Maybe she could even have eggs with him sometime, she considered for a moment, before she reminded herself of the reason why she even had this encounter. "Oh, what are you guar- What's behind these doors?" she asked, placing both sets of her arms on her hips and bobbing her head gently to the side, in an almost birdlike fashion. Through the motion, one of her antennae straightened to an upright position, giving her a rather quizzical look as she hovered in front of Hiro.

Out of all things Anpu had anticipated might have hid behind the door, the calm, professional politeness with which the girl addressed her was likely the last. "Oh- Umm... Hey. Good to see you?" she quickly responded, a note of surprise and question making it into her voice. She accepted the offered hand, shaking it delicately. What was going on here? She smiled hesitantly at the girl closest to her. A soft blue mist went over the Anubis' usually green eyes as she blinked, attempting to see past the physical form of the demon whose hand she just shook. "Good to see you, Claire." she reassured, having recognized the soft spiritual aura glowing around the girl, and raised her gaze to examine the two remaining sisters. It was not an ability Anpu liked to use often - watching the spirit realm was seriously straining on the eyes - but it was one of the few, if not the only, reliable way she had to discern the sisters. "and you, Jessica and Giana," she continued, addressing the siblings from her left to the right. With another blink, she returned to her normal sight. "About that-" she picked up, slowly following Claire, and blinking a few times to adjust to the lighting. "What exactly is it you nee- Oh." She stopped, finally noticing the large circle drawn out on the floor. Transmutation? She instinctively took a step back, more than willing not to end up near - or within - the diagram when it fires. No, conjuration, she concluded after a second, recognizing the symbols she saw once in "Zahar's Guide to Summons". Still largely unfinished. And definitely incorrectly aligned. "Umm... what is this thing doing here?" she asked as politely as she could have, eyeing the girls as she stepped a few feet closer, taking a knee before the circle to examine what exactly it had been made of.

With only milimeters separating her from the undeniable treasure that hid behind the door, Lamp rested her hand on the handle, which, to her surprise twisted from her mere touch. Clearly it must have been enchante-"Y-Eeeeeep!" Lamp found herself squeak, in a high-pitched tone expressing her surprise and fright as a strange creature rammed head-first into her torso. She rocketed backwards, her wings fluttering in an incredible rate. This weird, spider-looking thing must have been some sort of a guardian, protecting the treasure from the hungry eyes of someone like her! Lamp's heart jumped to her throat. Was it going to eat her? She tried her best to recall what her parents taught her to do when facing such large, threatening predators. She stabilized herself in the air, raising her gaze to meet what foe she was about to face. To her surprise, it didn't really look like the spider she imagined it was. It had way too few legs. And it's mandibles didn't really look all that threatening. She blinked a few times. The longer she looked at it, the more it seemed to resemble a smaller version of Mr. von Braun rather than a carnivorous predator. Which, given her recent history with the teacher may not have been much of an upgrade, but it still calmed her down somewhat. She slowly landed onto her feet. It in fact appeared quite apologetic. A silent moment passed before a light bulb went off in her head. "Ooooh!" she exclaimed in sudden understanding. "You're a human! I'm-so-sorry, did I hurt you? What is it on your nose?" in elation she dashed in air back towards the boy, with half of her hands motioning towards his glasses. "What's your name? My name is Lamp! Nice to meet you!" she enthusiastically extended her entire right-side-of arms towards the boy, eager to shake his, before she remembered something, and lowered them for a moment. "...you're not going to eat me, are you?" she added in a slightly slower and a bit more suspicious tone.