2022-10-22: Aurora Consurgens

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<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.

    It's hard to miss the School of Mineralogy in Guild Galad. The building is huge -- for Guild Galad, that is, a place famously a bit constrained due to the limited overall space afforded its residents -- a tall and imposing, if slightly age-battered, building that stands within the Furnace Voids. Notably from the outside, the mixed stone and mortar building largely lacks windows.

Normally, classes would be well into session within, but the thing is, the school has been experiencing a bit of a problem in recent days. There has been some unusual activity, you see. First there had been the incident with the oddly-garbed person who had attempted to get into the library but who had been rebuffed when they couldn't identify themselves. A handful of students claim they had an awfully red face, and that something really had seemed off about their hands.

Shortly after this, it had begun, what some have already begun to call... the hauntening.

Some of the students have reported seeing a glowing cat flying around parts of the school earlier today -- and it should be clear that they mean this literally. The odd part is, even in the same room, only some of them could see the cat. Is it a hallucination?

But something has been rifling through books in the library, and they're not being very subtle about it as they go. The alert has gone out -- does anyone know a priest?

Others, perhaps familiar with a particular Seraph's predilections, may know better.

---

The library is where any would-be interventioneers will be directed post-haste.

The library. What a library!

The School's library is easily the largest single area in the building. In spite of this -- or perhaps because of its needs -- it feels almost overwhelmingly busy, with tall shelves vanishing upwards towards the very high ceiling. But of course -- space is a premium in Guild Galad, and the School of Mineralogy is no different. Spiral bronze staircases and walkways provide access to the books, with but a few alcoves for desks. They are not good places to work if one is acrophobic.

Below, the ground floor is dedicated to reading tables and study spaces, and is where the library staff are found when not working in the stacks above. Somewhere below the library, it is rumored, are the archives.

Normally there would be students above and below, browsing the shelves or reading. Today, they stand to one side at the bottom of one of the staircases, gazing upwards as books higher up seemingly fly from the shelves on their own and flip open to various pages.

Or at least, that's how it looks to those without a particular spiritual sensitivity, aka, the ability to see Seraphim.

For those who possess that gift, they can quite easily see what's really going on. It's him, that bastard, Seraph Harmaus being quite ungentle with the library's books. But what is he looking for?
<Big Scene> ARM HORROR Ida Everstead-Rey immediately flies into library-staff rage, reaches for Harmaus' scruff
<Big Scene> ARM HORROR Ida Everstead-Rey says, "YOU'RE PAYING FOR DAMAGES, YOU SHITTY CAT"
<Big Scene> Margaret van Venetia Vuong says, "You may want to hold for me for like 5 minutes"
<Big Scene> ARM HORROR Ida Everstead-Rey says, "(noted)" 

<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed.

When Venetia Vuong got wind of THE HAUNTENING, she was displeased. Things like this happen from time to time, especially here, in the deep realms, where you are close to things that are well and truly buried. Down here, where one day the lights could go out. All of them.

When she was told of a ghostly CAT, however, she frowned enormously.

Venetia remembers that fucking cat.

The problem, of course, is that the School of Mineralogy has its hidden great treasure -- OK, it has the great treasure of meta-thallic trans-thaumic Crest Graph research, anyway -- and also has a Gear on campus, albiet not the latest nor the greatest. These are the obvious things someone might like to steal, but to Lock Them Down will only draw attention to them. While there were some additional security steps taken - and sealed doors installed down the steps that lead into the carved-out space where most of the advanced Crest research happens --

Well, Seraphs are kind of hard to catch, especially when only Venetia, Jimmy Chan, and a half-dozen advanced Crest Sorcerers on faculty can clearly *distinguish* Seraphs, who do not often come down to Void 41.

Therefore, under SPECIAL BUDGETARY OPERATION "TDC", Venetia has been authorized to be the one hiring the Drifters. "So this is how it feels!"

BUT THEN

The librarian on duty - an older man who has a very bad leg due to a mining accident, but also has an elegant red silk mask and a truly heroic beard to go with his spectacles - rises up as the chaos begins. He takes about twenty seconds to shuffle over to the speaking tube to speak the code word.

"Library, in the stacks. Firefrorfiddle. I repeat, please: Firefrorfiddle."

AND THUS

In the little tea nook next to the speaking tube room, Venetia leaps to her feet. "Library! This way!"

And she starts running.

... At least she didn't pull out her gun.

yet 

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

Talia doesn't really frequent Guild Galad much, but she does keep an ear to the ground for interesting ruins. Especially right now; the experiences of her brother are weighing nearly constantly on her mind. It has began to dawn on her that it is not something she can handle on her own, and she doesn't quite know what to do about that. So, as ever Talia, does her usual coping strategy.

Distract herself.

Reports of a strange glowing cat are a good distraction. A worrying one, too, because she has bad experiences with a cat. A very specific cat.

So she comes, wearing her usual adventuring garb: armored gauntlets and boots, with a sleeveless coat over a vest and a white shirt. Mirage, her short sword, is stowed at her side. She walks into the library a little after Venetia. Her eyes are on the masked woman for a moment, as she enters -- and neatly sidesteps a falling library book.

And then, finally, looks up.

She scowls up at Seraph Harmaus. "It's you!"

<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.

Azoth's ability to decide things is always compromised. Today, it's enough the overrides catch wind of the idea the School of Mineralogy (rocks?! :>) involves research that could, feasibly, by some stretch of the imagination intersect with things a very old and ancient war machine used to do, indistinguishable from magic. Not likely. But not impossible.

Also!! An opportunity to be HIRED! Maybe he can use the money to buy rocks at the School of Mineralogy! Wh... what do you mean the school won't sell rocks...? Don't destroy his dreams!

But what should they find here, causing hauntenings? Moon ghosts. A specific one, in particular. The cat one.

But Harmaus is not truly a cat, not any more than Azoth is human. He has no personal quarrel with the cat-like Seraph, though Azoth also understands that he's been up to quite a few no good and very bad things. More could be in progress... though Azoth would hate to interrupt a perfectly good effort in data collection.

Still, Azoth gives a cheerful wave. "Hello! Could you please be more careful with those? It'll be a problem to reference their data if they get damaged!"

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Ida's alma mater is at least a hundred meters skyward, in a different, older Void. That said, ever since the discovery of Vakero Bulman's legacy, she's kept an ear to the ground for rumors out of the College. While some would dismiss rumors of a 'ghost cat' as a silly haunting-season prank, Ida knows better.

    Like Venetia, she remembers that heartless bastard cat. If it's him, he's here looking for something. If nothing else, Ida can spite him by denying it to him.

    Ida sits opposite Venetia in the tea nook, finishing off a cup of sweetened oolong tea. She wears a green blouse embroidered with leaves and vines, a golden vest, cream-colored slacks, and her trusty (and low-profile) leather boots.

    Venetia rises. Ida follows, matching the other woman's pace without a second thought. Devil's Due rests in a concealed holster at the small of her back, and she deeply hopes she's not going to have to use it.

    Ida blurs forward, and her hand whips out, snatching a falling book before it can hit gorund. "You," Ida says, her voice dripping venom. She looks up at Harmaus, barely-controlled rage in her eyes. She can't forgive what he did to Boudicca.

<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.

Cats and Bats can live in harmony but sometimes the balance betweixt these two spooky but adorable critters is disrupted. Cats aren't supposed to fly, you know! (Ruby is not a cat). A glowing flying cat is very troubling to the Marivel.

"Venetia...!" Marivel says, appearing in a puff of smoke. "I heard you were hiring drifters and needed the assistance of a beautiful and oh you're already running."

She turns into her bat form and lands on Venetia's shoulder for maximum laziness. She licks a paw as if she has no interest in the day's events though this is an ACT because CAT has been driving her positively batty for a while but is sort of hoping to avoid getting blasted by intense waves of light again.

She observes fallen books and the like. "Mm."

A pause. And then: "In pursuit of more truths. I wonder what he could be looking for here." She could imagine something being interesting for someone but Harmaus seemed to have a particular focus in his prior investigations. She wonders.

"Well he seems to know what he wants. I'm curious what he's looking for myself." 

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

Eleanor Klein is also here, pursuing That Damned Cat. She is always happy to help Venetia out, and she is definitely willing to pursue a certain Evil Cat to the ends of the earth. ...Which is kind of what they're doing, here.

Eleanor follows alng, and she hasn't drawn her gun yet, either. She does, however, have a hand up--and an aura that is full of Light, different from the last time she faced off againt Harmaus for sure.

"You could've asked to study, you know."

She's also curious, but she's not gonna say that. 

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    EARLIER
 
     Lanval's been taking Oracle business to Guild Galad again. There's the occasional Malevolence outbreak in the Voids he helps see to alongside his Seers. The Zoara region of Aquvy has been a game of whack-a-mole for some time, one that does not appear able to be won outright but nonetheless kept from getting proportionally worse.
 
     It is also something of a secondary duty to make passes at reversing the ecological damage that is Guild Galad, which Lanval does obligingly as he at some point stumbles face-down into an iridescent puddle.
 
     ...
 
     Someone has been trying to ferment industrial run-off and you know what, he's going to find out where. So, where do you go when you want to learn something, in a world where so very few people can answer you?
 
     LATER
 
     Lanval educates himself unsuccessfully in the vicinity of the library. The vicinity, specifically. Part of the lack of success is because he has found another abandoned drink to distract himself with, conveniently keeping him out of the way until there's... murmurs. Sightings. Serious stuff.
 
     He materializes outside of an overturned bottle as other Drifters he's familiar with arrive, providing quiet and reliable (mostly) back-up behind them. He politely lifts up a leg to step up and around a dropped book, rather than get it wet with his presence.
 
     "Heyy," Lanval calls up a bit more quietly, "why're ya throwin' booksh, they got wordsh in 'em." Funny-looking, simple scribbles of 'words' compared to the tongue virtually all Seraphim know amongst one another, but words! 

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.

    "Ah?" calls out Harmaus, from on high. "It sees me? No mere mortal, this. --Ah! It reminds me! I knows this one! It is... yes, Amaranth's pet!" crows Harmaus from his position on the high walkway. "Seeks it I now? Amaranth attends it not?"

    This is, frankly, extremely rude, even if Harmaus has been unaware of Amaranth's movements of late.

    He returns to the shelf, tugging another volume down onto the floor. 'You', Ida greets him with, and this turns him away from his studies just long enough that he turns to peer at her from his perch. "Yes, I!" he speaks. "Seeks I knowledge -- much and more exists here! Finest yet I finds from Filgaia! But, ah... it is noisy. Distracts me!" He pages through the book despite an obvious lack of thumbs -- magic, one would assume -- and flits again up for the shelf.

    Couldn't he have asked, Eleanor questions him.

    "Asks, I. But turned away! Tragic, tragic. But I am deterred not. Comes I again, again, as much as needed."

    Just what is it that he's seeking, anyway?

    Others -- Azoth, Lanval -- urge him to consider how he's treating the books, some of which are in a rather haphazard pile at his feet. "What cares I for tomes' condition? Information seeks I, but not here. No, not in slightest! Seeking solutions, I served but slivers! Ah, but there is much I seeks, yet... Much yet, to go!"

    A few more pages flit on by. "No, not this site...! Not here at all! Looks I another place!"

    Leaving his pile of books behind, Harmaus flies through the air for another section of shelving in the altogether, not too far from the one he has carelessly denuded of books.

    Isn't that interesting, though -- this is the section of the library, as Venetia and perhaps others might know -- that deals with Ley hotspots. And of course, the School's specialty is Geo. 

<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed.

AZOTH MY BOY YOU ARE IN LUCK: The school bookstore sells a *number* of mineral samples. You can buy standardized kits for several curriculums, and given that many of the raw materials are, you know, literally rocks, there is no shortage. Azoth can also purchased polished and mounted ammolites, as well as ammolite-themed merchandise. (No bet on what the School of Mineralogy school mascot is.)

"No time! Hurry!" Venetia tells Marivel while running.

As others come together, Venetia DOES pull out her gun while getting near to where Harmaus is tormenting the bookshelves. (Several students run for sealed carrels.)

"This is the finest institution of learning upon Filgaia, yes," she says, while pointing her gun at Harmaus. "And you're going to put that book down and reach for the ceiling, because I don't want the likes of you poking around my neighborhood without a DAMN good -- what?!"

Venetia just goes ahead and shoots two rounds after Harmaus. They fly off and embed themselves in the woodwork.

"Tch," she says, seeing where they are. "Damn you--!"

She puts the gun away (THANKFULLY) and fumbles for a Crest Graph, running around to try and flank Harmaus. Astute observers of Crest Sorcery as used by Venetia would recognize her ground-purification spell. She may be hoping to exorcise Harmaus and return him, somehow, to the Cat Dimension. Or mess him up enough for Marivel or someone to pick him up bodily and throw him in the garbage.

"Careful!" Venetia says, heedless of irony. 

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

Talia looks sideways at Azoth. She gives him a wan smile. "He is not going to listen," she says. "This is a very nasty cat, no?"

Then, she looks at Venetia. She is the one who is doing the hiring -- which really makes this her call. Even if part of Talia wants to hurl her sword in his direction and call it a day. More people ask -- including Lanval, whose materialization makes her jump a little -- and she tilts her head, for a moment, as she regards the cat-Seraph.

Then, she scowls.

"I am not Ammy's pet," Talia says, with a frown. "Sometimes I go and do my own thing, no? Like follow up on suspicious rumors." She puts her hands on her hips. Then, she spots him flying -- and Talia is no scholar, no wise woman, to catch that this is about the Ley -- so she frowns, and then starts heading for the ladder closest to Harmaus. "I'll be careful, no?" No magic -- and no hurtling her sword around -- because that would risk the books.

"What could he be after?" she asks, looking at Venetia and Eleanor. They seem smart. And Marivel, who is Marivel.

<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.

AZOTH CAN BUY ROCKS!! He's gonna do a good job in Drifting and get ammolite as his just reward.

Azoth catches a few of the flying books, tucking them under his arms. Deftly, he chases after Harmaus' flitting about, not to try and grab the catty bastard, but to refile the books where they belong. He can't get everything, but his ability to scan texts and process the information quickly allows the android to sort them in a way a human might struggle with under the current circumstances.

It's less work for someone else later, he hopes.

"Yes, but you might need to combine the slivers for your solution later, and you can't do that if they're broken!" Is it right to describe a book as broken?

Talia explains Harmaus won't listen, and Azoth gives a sad beep. "I've... heard some stories."

This is no doubt a terrible creature, but Azoth cannot help but feel sympathy for Harmaus' current ravenous need for knowledge and attempts to seek it. Understanding Harmaus' goals could dramatically change that opinion.

"So, uh, what is it you need a solution for?" he asks conversationally while shots are fired.

It doesn't hurt to ask, right?

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

"Did you ask, or did you demand and make creepy motions?" Eleanor checks with Harmaus. "Because I'm pretty sure you wouldn't know politeness if it bit you on the--" Pause. "Tail."

What is he looking for... Geo? "The books he'd find in this section concern the Ley," ELeanor answers Talia. "And especially this place would focus on Geo... It'd be the best place to look up earth-related magic on Filgaia, really."

Possibly also on Lunar, since the Earth Shrine turned out not to have many books.

But Eleanor has another approach to Harmaus fleeing; sh doesn't fire a gun, or send off a spell. Instead, she stretches out her hand and focuses--and then, the whole corridor he went down brightens, pure harmless Light filling the area so they don't lose him. 

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    Lanval makes a sour looking face at mention of Talia being a 'pet.' There's some places you don't go with that sort of thing!! But he doesn't get offended on Talia's behalf. Talia is perfectly fine at being offended by it.
 
     ARM fire rings out, and Lanval gets a bit more alert as Venetia calls for care after the fact. "All right. 'm gonna flank."
 
     Lanval, with perfect seriousness, draws out something from behind his hip with all the discipline of an experienced marksman, hoisting the heavy drinking gourd over his shoulder while the attached rope tied around one hand before taking the drawn thing in both hands.
 
     A spritzer bottle.
 
     With the drinking gourd on its rope resting over his shoulder and on his back, Lanval stalks the shelves holding a spritzer bottle like he's out of some pulpy detective penny dreadful with an uncharacteristically grim countenance.
 
     He sees himself in the mirror and has a laugh at how ridiculous he looks, and continues rounding a shelf. It doesn't last, because it's a serious situation, but you take the little funny things in life as they come before returning to the careful flanking approach. 

<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.

"Harmaus," Marivel says. "Can you at least set the books down properly instead of just chucking them? Other people might want to learn things here too, y'know."

She doesn't seem to be posturing aggressively though she IS in her tiny bat form. She'd rather Harmaus find what he's looking for and bounce than come back later and start mass murdering people. But there's something to be said for library etiquette.

She doesn't open fire just yet.

Talia looks at her and asks her what Harmaus might be after.

"Hmmmm well, I don't like making educated guesses because it makes you look like an educated idiot if you get it wrong, buuuut..."

"I imagine Harmaus is trying to find the origin of the Seraphim, am I right? Or perhaps... An Earth Shrine of some sort? Maybe both?"

She continues to be a tiny bat person.

Her eyes widen when Lanval brings out the spritzer bottle. The situation just got a lot more dangerous! 

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    This, Ida reflects, is absurd. On one hand, Harmaus hasn't put any living souls in danger, but on the other, the Seraph is willing to do horrible things to get what he wants. "Please clear out," Ida says, raising her voice slightly--as if the people yelling at the 'ghost cat' weren't sign enough that something was happening.

    This turns out to be the right call, because Venetia puts two rounds into the furniture. "I'm going up," Ida says, but rather than use the stairwells, she crouches, stretches, and leaps. The wind whips up beneath her, giving her an extra boost as she lands on the mezzanine railing. Ida hops off, and runs after Harmaus, feet clanking on the metal surface. "You might get more help if you weren't an awful person!" Ida shoots back, a little petulently. She looks down, at Azoth, and feels grateful that someone at least is able to approach the cat... semi-objectively.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.

"It defines creepy?" says Harmaus, to Eleanor. "I asks for entry. But turned away! Ah, but walls hold me not..."
In other words, no?

Harmaus is not a nice cat-shaped Seraph at all.

Indeed, his response is to laugh nastily at Talia's reply. "Ah, thinks it? Its life but a flicker -- candle to Seraph's raging flame! Its life short, tiny thing! But I minds it not. Today, learns I much and more! But not if it talks at me yet!" ...In other words, he's considering her (and the others) more of a distraction to... whatever it is that he's doing. He doesn't even seem to notice her as she begins to ascend the metal staircase nearest to the walkway he's occupying.

"Tcha," hisses Harmaus to Azoth and Marivel alike, "Minds I not these 'others'! Useless, useless -- and remembers I what I read! Needs not revisit -- knows I much, remembers more!" So he's claiming a perfect memory, is he? "Needs I not backtrack -- but it distracts me! Sees I its plan! Shh, shh, shh! Silence! Much yet to read of 'the Ley'! Much and more reading of Geo! But not if all and sudry is chatter, chatter, chatter!"

Well, that's a start, perhaps, on whatever it is that he's seeking. Something about the Ley and Geo?

"It thinks me... not," is Harmaus' response to Venetia, when she asks him to set the books down and put his paws to the sky. And indeed, he does anything but stay put, fleeing instead to a shelf nearby. Two bullets wizz on past, narrowly missing Harmaus' flitting form. "Dangerous, dangerous! Ah, but it matters me not!" Unfortunate, for now he avails himself of this new shelf, plucking books down onto the walkway with careless abandon. All books on the Ley, on sites strong in the Ley. He zips downwards even as Venetia gears up for a different approach, flipping through the pages courtesy of a spell.

It must be hard, not having hands.

"No, not Elru. No, no... not Slayheim. Ha! Long gones, I knows," Harmaus mutters, flipping through an almanac with abandon. That he's glowing now thanks to a spell he doesn't seem to notice -- and neither does he appear to notice that he's being advanced upon by Lanval, who approaches with a...

catlike tread. 

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

"Earth-related magic?" Talia asks. Then, she frowns. "And--the origin of Seraphim? This seems like heavy stuff, no?"

Lanval, thankfully, seems well-armed for the situation. And Azoth is trying to talk, even as he is catching books.

Talia climbs up a ladder leading to higher shelves, and then she looks at the cat. Her brow furrows -- she scowls with frustration, to hear that pointed out -- and shakes her head once. "That's--that's not a lie, no?" she says. "But it also seems like it is none of your business, too!"

If she regrets distracting him, she doesn't show it.

She perches at the top of the ladder. Then, she takes a breath, focusing -- and draws upon her years of running across Pendrago's rooftops. That may give her a smidgen of the expertise necessary to catch a cat. It is, at least, enough for her to leap closer to the shelf that Harmaus is on. She lands on the bookshelf, balancing her weight to push it back towards the wall, and has her hands and feet on shelves.

Well, except for one hand, which is snatching out for him.

<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed.

"That's a difficult question to answer,' Venetia mutters to Talia, "because I don't want to assist him, but given what he's saying I imagine he's looking for some kind of key FACT or piece of INFORMATION... it doesn't sound like a particular book, at least, so thank Dinoginos for that..."

Others are with them. Maneuvering. Lanval's going to flank -- Venetia glimpses what she saw. A piece? Is Lanval rolling with a strap as well?

She cannot focus on that. Part of what she said to Talia holds for Eleanor, in so far as she had a question. Her eyes cut towards tiny precious bat!Marivel, narrowing her eyes. "Well then he is surely barking up the wrong tree, on the first part; and for the second, why would he be *here*. We have more than our share of maps--"

Long gone? She was already grown when they were still going concerns! Venetia flicks up her Crest Graph and it begins to glow as she herself draws on the Ley. "Unclean thing, be bound by the purity of the deep earth! I invoke thee, in the name of the greater law - Purify Ground!"

        ~~~ahhhhhhh~~~

It kind of sounds like that. It hasn't come up since she usually did this in combat. A circle of cleansing, focusing Geo-flavored ley begins to well up in a ten foot radius centered beneath Harmaus. This is probably at least moderately annoying, although enigmatically, it would not affect Lanval one little bit. (Is he exempted mentally? Or is it his liquored-up status?) 

<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.

Azoth frowns with Harmaus' continued mocking of Talia and her partnership. He glances toward her, only briefly, unsure if it's even his place to intervene on such subjects. And with his memories distorted and damaged, he wouldn't know where to start.

For now, he tries to maintain some attempt at negotiating with the horrible cat, exploiting both that he hasn't personally witnessed his catrocities, and that emotional output is optional to begin with.

Ley, Geo... Azoth checks the titles as he returns them.

"Yes, but if you just told us, someone could help? Solutions imply problems. Problems are bad." Azoth continues to hop and climb the shelves for the purpose of re-booking. "Problems with the ley sound especially bad."

Harmaus may want to cause problems with the ley, which is even more bad than that. But if Azoth keeps talking, maybe Harmaus will remain as distracted as he claims he is as everyone goes about their various means of knapping a cat.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    The situation has become UNCHARACTERISTICALLY DIRE, and even with the handful of movements and moments that remind the Resonant eye that Seraph Lanval has very interesting ideas on what 'walking' is... it is a thing of care and caution that exceeds even his most clever* attempts to get into the liquor cabinets of the Ruby Empress.
 
* Clever is relative to the success rate, and to state the actual mathematical success rate would be... unkind
 
     Venetia casts Purify Ground. Seraph Lanval, by Althenian elemental theory, is at mercy to the element of Earth. It speaks to both Venetia's mastery of her own sorcerous craft of Crest Sorcery, and Seraph Lanval's own trust in her. In his case, he prevents himself from being locked out by action rolling into it.
 
     As Azoth continues to hold reasonable conversations and questions. Talia does bring up a concept that would be interesting to mull about and consider in less Harmaus-filled times. Still, hardly a breath passes between action roll and then Lanval clumsily hoisting himself up a ladder, swinging wildly with the weight of his drinking gourd. One hand has to grip the ladder, as the other carrying a piece...
 
     "Shtep away from the booksh~!" Lanval shoves the business end of the spritzer nozzle in a direction that's very wobbly but is nominally 'Harmaus' chin.'
 
     "Or I'll drench ya~" 

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

"Yes, very heavy," Eleanor says. and she doesn't answer to much else for now. Why here? that's a good quetion. But Harmaus seems willing enough to explain a little bit of it, anyway.

"I think you should listen to Azoth," Eleanor says to Harmaus.

But she narrows her eyes, all the same. The things he has to say to Talia... "Human lives may be short, but that doesn't make them less valuable, Harmaus. Yet another example of the flawed thniking that ensures you'll never find any truth worth hearing." Pause. Maybe she went a little too hard. She looks at Marivel a moment. "Ah, hah.... I have strong feelings on this..." 

<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.

MArivel says, "Eh, I'd say an eternal life is pretty much 90 percent waiting. Most of the time nothing interesting's happening. Usually brief periods of excitement followed by long periods of boredom. In the grand scheme of things, I figure you accomplsih almost as much with a short life than one that's merely what a few hundred years?"

"Babycat." Marivel adds. "Adorable youngling."

She is a little annoyed by Harmaus being a gosh darned rudey at Talia so if there's going to be an AGE WAR, MArivel will put her foot down on it.

Not that she doesn't occassionally start them herself. NEvertheless.

"Look if you want me to just check the books out for you so you can read them later," Marivel says. "I can but if you're not gonna show some common courtesy... I won't tell you about the secret library."

There's a secret library?!

Marivel might be bullshitting or overtly lyign. Then again, there probably is a secret library. There always is one even if Marivel doesn't know where it is. 

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Almost all of the Seraphim Ida's interacted with have been amiable towards humans, or at least tolerant of them. It makes sense; if you're an invisible nature spirit, you have to work hard to build relationships with mortals. It's self-selecting. There are definitely more Seraphim out there who would agree with Harmaus.

    This does not, of course, ease Ida's opinions on the subject, especially as Harmaus keeps talking.

    Ida stays where she is on the mezzanine for a moment, watching as Harmaus leaps from shelf to shelf. When he looks like he's going to stay put for a bit, she climbs up after him, this time using the stairs as they were meant to be used. When she reaches the right sub-floor, she stops for a moment--

    Waits for Venetia to cast her spell--

    And then approaches, with all due caution, as Lanval threatens Harmaus with the dread fate of getting wet. The air currents down here are faint, but they muffle Ida's steps as she creeps towards Harmaus. Her right hand reaches out for the back of his neck.

    Ida would never, ever do this to a normal cat, but Harmaus is not a normal cat. As a cat-shaped villainous sorcerer, he is getting the scruff.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.

"Ah," breathes Harmaus to Talia -- and Eleanor -- cruelly, "It believes whatever lies it tells self, yes? But it matters me not. Thinks what it likes of my thinking. Seeks I not of the Silver Star but Blue!"

    Marivel, though, isn't having any of this. "--Silence! Seven centuries, I! No child! No child!!"
Is this a sticking point of some sort for him...?

Considering how recently Slayheim was ended, particularly from the perspective of an ageless Seraph, one might be given to wonder if he'd even meant it as a sort of taunt -- to underscore how certain he was that the place wasn't what he was seeking.

"Ah? Intends it helps?" Harmaus speaks to Azoth, baring his teeth. "Ha! I born not yesterday. I knows its tricks! It distracts, it lies! Even now, I drifts further, further from resolution!" He turns to another of the books scattered on the floor, the pages fluttering as he seeks out whatever it is he is after.

    "Silence!" hisses the Seraph. "It not-- secret library?"

    It's a potent distraction, right when Venetia needs it. Her spell wicks upwards around him, a hallowed ground through which all might not easily tread.

This infuriates Harmaus.

"Graaaa---!!" Harmaus rises into the air with a howl. Some of the lighter tomes fly into the air around him as he ascends, his form glowing all the brighter in his wrath than it might normally do for Eleanor's spell. He is, fleetingly, a small nova erupting in the library.
This may also mean that instead of feline Seraph, Talia and Ida will find their hands full of a book. Or two!

"Minds it its manners!" he shrieks as Lanval gives his ultimatum. "It dares not!" Searing beams of light scorch through the air in the next breath for Lanval, as if Harmaus could thereby end the threat of the... water bottle. Rolling about, solar fire flaring off his form in his fury, even the enchantment Venetia has worked might just... fragment. Wide-eyed in rage, Harmaus might seem about ready to scour the lot of them with his light.

Then, it seems that he sees it. His prize, it would seem. Surging through the chaos about him, Harmaus dives for the shelf and plucks free a particular text.

Just like that, book grasped precariously in all four paws, the feline Seraph surges down from the walkway and erupts like a comet for the door to the library. He's out into the hallways! He's down the hallway!

But glowing brightly and leaving quite a trail of shimmering particles in his wake, it isn't as if he can't be tracked and followed. And the halls are quite wide: a chase will hardly be impeded by the architecture.
The old dean was a rather large man, after all.

There! Look, right over there! He jukes right then soars like a hawk left into one of the laboratory rooms.

This is one of the laboratories for the School -- there are many like it, but the group in pursuit of the terrible Seraph has entered this one. As befits the sorts of experiments conducted by the students, this space is pure functionality with part of it open to the air of the Void beyond. A suit of strong fans ensures that whatever experiments happen in here don't suffocate the students -- which, normally, would be situated at the lab benches arrayed facing the instructor's area at the front.

There is, mercifully, a shower and eyewash station.

Harmaus here has planted his chosen book -- a mercifully (for him) slender text -- onto one of the benches and rifling through the pages.

What was that book title-- perhaps some of them saw it during his initial flight down from the walkway?
That's right, it was 'Titans and Legends: Towards a Theory of Ley Tracking through Folk Studies'.

    "Titans of Ley... yes, yes, it seems I closer, closer!" 

<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed.

Azoth and Marivel both take something that Venetia considers to be a liberty. "Don't speak for our help OR our secret libraries THANK YOU," she says, querulously, nt actually upset, or at least focused on the core problem. A grin of triumph slashes across her face as Ida moves in--

"See!" Venetia complains when Harmaus perks up at the mention of a secret library. And then Harmaus quivers and his light begins to rise and the library seems to get MUCH brighter quickly -- for even though your eyes adapted, true believers, most of Void 41 is quite dimly lit indeed, it's just hard to tell how dark it is in the deep parts of Guild Galad --

Venetia pulls out another Crest Graph, prepared perhaps to counterstrike Harmaus.

Harmaus chooses to run.

Venetia blinks twice, audibly.

"He has a book!" Venetia says. "After him!" And she breaks into a dash...

... huff, huff, it's a bit of a jog after all...

"Oh, lords save us, is he going to SUMMON something," she grouses as they end up moving towards the laboratory spaces...

One of the doors is swinging closed - for safety!

Venetia kicks it open!!

"You've made three vital mistakes here, Harmaus!" Venetia says as she huffs her way inwards, wiping sweat from her forehead. It seems that she is not going to elaborate; instead another Crest is raised and a shower of turquoise flinders, intermixed with agates - yes, CATS EYE agates as it turns out - flies at him, like some sort of horrible rock-tumbler firehose.

Except not smooth! They're sharp!!

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

"You've got some nerve!" Talia snaps at Harmaus, her voice briefly more heated than usual. Normally, she can keep that in check better; she prides herself for being able to roll with insults. But, lately...

No, don't let herself get distracted.

She tenses, her fingers clutching at a book -- and not a cat. Her eyes narrow, and she turns around to look at Harmaus. Harmaus, who is now surging down the hallway with a particular book in his possession. "You're interested in the Blue Star...?"

That, Talia decides, can't be good.

She drops down, landing in a three-point stance. Mercifully, there are motes of light to guide them. Talia lets her book down carefully, and she starts off into a run. "I see it! We'll get it back, these need to be checked out, no?"

A beat, as she skids in after Venetia.

"Wait. Summon something?"

<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.

Venetia scolds him for offering help, and Azoth helplessly gestures at her in a futile attempt to communicate he is allowed to speak lies in favor of getting a job done.

Which Harmaus immediately accused him of. Azoth's hand goes over his chest where a normal person would have a heart. He looks the perfet picture of offended. Heartbroken!

The assault begins. A much greater mess of books is made, and Azoth, who already could not keep up, isn't making much of a dent in the preemptive clean up. With a sad string of beeps, he gives up his task, because it seems Harmaus has... a prize?

Azoth bursts forward with a streak of energy, giving his momentum a head start as he dashes after the wayward Harmaus. His irises refocus and whirr, adjusting for speed, trying to see what it is the cat's gotten a hold of as he spins and turns and kicks off walls to keep himself oriented in all the right directions during the mad dash.

"Titans and Legends... Ley tracking...?"

He digs his heels against the ground to stop himself as they enter the laboratory. He glances to Venetia and Talia. Summoning...? Harmaus doesn't like distractions...

Azoth's voice synthesizer emits horrible, awful screech on a frequency a human shouldn't be able hear, but a cat should. Harmaus is Not a Cat, but worth a try, right? 

<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.

"Oh, well, I guess." Marivel says to Venetia, also not particularly upset.

She covers her face with a paw when Harmaus is assaulted by spell effects. This is probably to protect her bat eyes from giant flares of light. Marivel remains a funny animal companion to Venetia for now. 

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    Searing beams of light shine through, and Lanval flails comically as they superheat the water bottle, and the ladder he's on. Both Lanval and ladder collapse in a heap where the ultimatum is defied and overturned, leaving him lying flat upon the hallowed ground.
 
     "Mmmmmph." He grumbles, as Harmaus quickly disengages from the lot of them. He takes care not to leave a puddle where he collapses, there's a mess of discarded books here. He's going to end up trailing behind much the rest in the scramble to rise up and follow after him towards the laboratories.
 
     He staggers along towards the back of the lot, which puts him a whole dialogue cycle behind most of what everyone else is saying, but he does pick up something about Ley tracking and 'summoning something' so it's more he's a half-step behind.
 
     More distressingly...
 
     "Heyyyy," Lanval calls as he rounds the corner into the laboratory, eyeing Azoth, "are ya okay? That'sh a reeeeeeal... loud... thing ya got goin'..."
 
     Lanval and Harmaus are technically the same species, despite vastly different self-images. 

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

Titans...

"Oh, no you don't," Eleanor says, and--that's a horrible screech. it's a good thing Eleanor can't hear it in the moment! But he does have a book, and--

"Oh, to hell with it," Eleanor says, and sighs, putting down her pointing hand and closing her eyes.

In a shimmer of magic, Eleanor changes her form, abrubtly becoming a beautiful owl that rockets straight after Harmaus, talons-first.

"You're nt the only one who can get through small spaces!" comes her ordinary voice, though there is a brief addenum of, "Hoot!"

She has a feeling she knows what he's after, now, and--"Now slow down!" 

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Seraphic physiology is more suggestion than actual anatomy. Harmaus might not have the same scruff-reflex actual cats do, and Ida knows that. But if she can at least grab him, she could endure being mauled, or burnt, or blinded long enough for the others to bind Harmaus, or stuff him in a bag, or do something to evict him proper.

    A flash of light goes off right in Ida's face. For a few moments, the world goes completely white. She surges forward, her hand a blur as it closes around something--

    The spine of a book entitled 'Ancient Roots - A Treatise on the Ley of Geo of Sylvaland'. Ida blinks twice as the spots fade. "Damned cat," she hisses, and her head cranes to follow that trail of motes. She gently sets the book down--she makes a note to help the library aides clean up after this fiasco--and takes off again, leaping down to ground level with another surge of rushing winds. Geo. The Ley. Ida keeps that in mind as she runs after Harmaus--she can see the book's spine, and her eyes narrow. "You could've just looked at the catalogue!" she shouts, after the fleeing feline. "We have catalogues, you little--" Titans of the Ley. That's not good.

    Then Eleanor surges in from behind her, her form shifting--and Ida stops dead in her tracks, staring at what her friend has become.

    Only for a second, though.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.

"On Blue Star lies answers for Silver!" replies Harmaus to Talia. There was a reason he'd descended from Lunar to Filgaia in the first place, though he has yet to have found the results he's been looking for. It all comes down to Malevolence with him, over and over again -- his maddened search for 'truth'.

"Great giant... Odziozo... But where? Where?" mutters Harmaus aloud, flipping through pages.

"What is this? The Great Wo--"
This is when Harmaus gets a face full of rocks. Small tears of bright corpus leak from him, vanishing almost as soon as they appear. "It dares--!!" he snarls, fur standing on end as he arches his back in response to this assault upon his person. Arcing beams of light rise from his very person, a flurry of missiles all directed for Venetia. That one hurt, it would seem.

But he won't get more than a few in. A terrible screech rips through the laboratory audible Seraphic ears alone and Harmaus, fluffing up fully, scrabbles backwards and falls off the lab bench. Is this a case of Seraphim being more sensitive to such things, or a case of the body impacting the mind?
Regardless, it's not the most elegant moment of his career.

"How dares!" comes the small howl from the floor. Azoth might have two seconds to get out of the way of the obliterating beam of light that follows. It will leave a hole in the space over the door at the very least.

    He rockets up into the air, light beginning to orbit him in rapid rotations. Look out, this cat's about to blow--

    Well, or would have, if he hadn't suddenly been attacked by an owl. Now this is an indignity, and one that might fleetingly lead to him and Eleanor tussling it out on the floor for a long, perhaps strange, moment.

"Enough!" Harmaus snarls, abandoning this fight. "I finds answers elsewhere!"

He flees this place at speed, partially clipping right on through the door (there's a hole above it, remember) in his haste to get away from the lot of them. The book, at least, has been left entirely behind, such is his urgency. Soaring down a few doors, he ducks into a different, smaller lab.

    Ah, the rock identification lab. A nice place -- it would seem that one of the TAs had set this up for a course later as there are samples out on the benches. Granite, gneiss, feldspar... the basics, for a beginner's lab. To judge by the chaotic way that Harmaus (still floating) dips hither and yon across the laboratory, though, this is not where he'd intended to go -- or even what he was hoping to find. 

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

A lot happens that confuses Talia.

Azoth opens his mouth and no sounds come out, but Lanval seems to respond. Eleanor, surprisingly, turns into an owl. Talia stares at all of this for a moment, before she looks at Ida. "The word 'titan' tends to be concerning, no?"

Is that what her brother would become, if he lost control? The thought intrudes, distracting her; her expression hardens for a moment.

Then she shakes it off. Focus, she tells herself.

"And you're sure you'll find them here?" Talia asks, with a frown -- and then she grimaces as he bolts from Eleanor, through the door, and down the hallway. Talia mutters a swear, before she hurries along, blitzing down the hallway.

She darts onto the laboratory, looking around for a moment, and then towards Harmaus. "Stop!"

<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed.

"Klein!" Venetia barks as she sees a miracle. "Why are you an owl!?"

"Broadly speaking, yes," Venetia tells Talia: "obviously some delicate or older books you have to consult here, but at least some of the basic or routine books can be taken out on a lending basis. There's a library with the secondary school we have exchange privileges with." This presumably is something else in Void 41.

"I don't mean, the Spiran summoning, I mean the, you know, the calling up devils sort of thing," she clarifies. Frowning. Because, DOES she mean that? WOULD Harmaus summon up a demon?

"He wouldn't know what a catalogue is," Venetia complains to Ida, before frowning to herself. IS he seeking secrets of the Seraphim somehow? Venetia knows that the Seraphim were, as far as SHE knew anyway, not present on Filgaia until rather recently. Perhaps she understands wrongly. Or perhaps there is something that's sitting there in plain sight --

He says it.

Odziozo.

Venetia is hornswoggled enough to slap her forehead in irritation. "BY DINOGINOS," she says. "Is THAT what he's after? Yes! Find answers elsewhere! Gods below, that's a ROCK STRUCTURE, you IDIOT!"

BUT HE IS OFF! Venetia wheels about, hard enough to end up having to brace herself from the door. "Get back here and take your medicine, you four-legged miscreant! Beat him! Beat him til he cries off!" She's the world's greatest magician (so claimed), not the world's greatest role-model for children. 

<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.

The loud thing Azoth's got going on abruptly cuts off when Lanval comments on it. Azoth gives him a nervous, apologetic smile. "Oh, sorry. Sorry." If he wants to elaborate, he can't: the offended Harmaus launches a beam of light at him and Azoth gives a far more normal and less upsetting beep-string of distress as he jerks up on one leg, arms raised, barely out of the way in time.

But maybe if Azoth had eaten that beam with his face, Harmaus would not have escaped! A miscalculation on his part!

"You can't just ask people why they're owls!"

Azoth scoops up the abandoned book, flipping through it quickly while running after Harmaus because he's nothing if not adept with multitasking. "I'm not familiar with 'titan' as a specific label... And Odziozo...?" The Great Woods, was Harmaus about to say?

In the next lab, Azoth looks up from his reading material and his eyes literally sparkle.

"I like this place."

There is still a problem: Harmaus. Azoth winces at Venetia. "Is, ah, that the plan now? Just... beat him?"

Azoth has doubts that will improve the situation.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    Lanval isn't the one aimed at for the noise but he does sway back to avoid getting struck by an annihilating light.
 
     "Ain't that kinda the point? Goin' shomwhere el--" Harmaus goes somewhere else, indeed, nearly bowling Lanval over a second time. He gives a look with two half-open eyes as Harmaus passes above again.
 
     He's had enough of this, so he makes a wet failed whistling sound, and somewhere... somehow...
 
ELSEWHERE, AT THE ENTRANCE
 
     A flat-bodied hollow rubber... horse... thing rockets by, because the school is having a very strange day.
 
     WHERE THEY ARE
 
     Lanval takes off with a hop and a skip, leaping for the en-route flat bodied... horse... thing...
 
     Which he misses, as it speeds down the hallway towards some other wing of the school to creep everyone out. This act of humility done, Lanval stumbles along towards the laboratory full of rocks.
 
     "Hey, Venetia," Lanval asides, "I don't know much 'bout... rock. Are they all good? All bad? Any that'd be bad fer Harmaus ta touch, or... ish it all of 'em. That'd be bad." 

<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed.

 
"If he has a decent reason to REQUEST our aid, he can write a letter!" Venetia answers Azoth. "Or ask a friend, if he has one! Right now I want him out of my school and off of my woodracks!"

"Unless he can concoct something from raw ores," she grumbles at what Lanval says. Before looking at him, as if to say: CAN HE? 

<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.

Marivel obviously isn't going to complain about demon summoning so long as you summon a cool demon like Marivel, obviously. Honestly Harmaus's questions are pretty close to Marivel's. He might be, you know, who he is but if he's going to reveal information Marivel also wants to know...

Well he's already absconding. Ultimately, still a bat--

"Why not an owl?" Marivel says.

She glances to Venetia. "Odziozo?" She asks. "Do you know anything about that, Venetia?"

She reaches into a tiny bat pouch and draws out a Marivel sized piece of fruit that she sinks her fangs into.

munch munch. 

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

Important note about Owl Form: it isn't Crest Sorcery, and neither is the thorough drubbing Eleanor attempts to dole out to an Evil Cat Man during the midst of their dustcloud battle. But Venetia has a fair question: Why is she an owl?

"It seemed like a good idea at the time!" Eleanor calls back, which probably only raises more questions. Azoth says you can't just ask people why they're owls and Eleanor appreciates him a little more.

"Anyway I'll explain later, but--"

Rocks!

"You won't find those answers in here! Shoo!" Flap flap flap. She's chasing. 

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    'You can't just ask people why they're owls!'

    "I know," Ida says, "but how?!" She's no Crest Sorceress, but that seems distinctly outside the purview.

    Odziozo. That's a name Ida recognizes, but she can't place it--not when her brain is on full alert. Venetia's rock barrage gives Ida the opening she needs to get closer, but Harmaus is already in full Angry Cat Mode, back arch, fur fluffed, casting some sort of primordial Light Arte--

    "Venetia!" Ida shouts, and she ducks, reflexively, as missiles rip through the air. She rolls beneath a lab table as a second beam races at Azoth. Eleanor intercepts Harmaus, and Ida--who knows well the value of teamwork--goes for the fallen book. If Harmaus doesn't intervene, she grabs it, and tucks it safely beneath one arm. As the others continue the chase, Ida stows it in a cabinet full of glass lenses; they can come back for it later, but it could be damaged if she keeps it.

    "A rock structure?!" Ida shouts, as she rejoins the chase. That's how she knows it! "GIVE UP AND GO AWAY, YOU FILTHY LITTLE CREATURE."

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    'You can't just ask people why they're owls!'

    "I know," Ida says, "but how?!" She's no Crest Sorceress, but that seems distinctly outside the purview.

    Odziozo. That's a name Ida recognizes, but she can't place it--not when her brain is on full alert. Venetia's rock barrage gives Ida the opening she needs to get closer, but Harmaus is already in full Angry Cat Mode, back arch, fur fluffed, casting some sort of primordial Light Arte--

    "Venetia!" Ida shouts, and she ducks, reflexively, as missiles rip through the air. She rolls beneath a lab table as a second beam races at Azoth. Eleanor intercepts Harmaus, and Ida--who knows well the value of teamwork--goes for the door, to try and cut off Harmaus' exit. As he leaps away from the scuffle, Ida jumps up, grabbing for the feline Seraph with both hands. She misses him by inches; he's through the hole above the door, and gone.

    But Ida doesn't let that deter her. She throws the door open and takes off after Harmaus once more. "A rock structure?!" Ida shouts. That's how she knows it! "GIVE UP AND GO AWAY, YOU FILTHY LITTLE CREATURE."

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.

    A great rubber horse... thing goes rolling down the hall just as several people surge in pursuit of what, to the professor who stumbles blearly out of a staff room, looks like a softly pulsing light. He stares after the lot of them for a moment.

    "Goddamn fairies," he says, retreating back into the staff room with a slam of the door.

    Harmaus does not stop as requested by Talia, save for but a moment to hover before a display case of textbooks as if to determine if any of these books might have the last fragment of information he seeks. At least, he doesn't seem to be very interested in the rocks? Maybe that's a good thing, depending on how Seraphic powers play out.

    Harmaus ducks, having a bit of a mid-air sortie with the equally aerial Eleanor.

    Landing for a moment atop the bookcase, he turns to fix his gaze upon Venetia, eyes wide. His response to Venetia's flabbergasted statement that Odziozo is nothing but a rock structure is a simple one:

    "Rock structure? Rock structure!? How little knows it! Odziozo is not rock structure! Odziozo is Geo, itself!"

    "Odziozo is Primarch! I finds it, I has--"

    This may be when Eleanor catches up to him. He's forced to take flight, in any case, flying haphazardly about the small laboratory room.

    The book, as Azoth will find, details a number of folk legends about the Ley, particular in regards to identified -- or suspected -- Ley-rich sites. There are a few of note on various continents, mentioning, among other things, the legends about a volcanic site in Aquvy, a strange desert structure somewhere in the Aveh desert, and an ancient mine near Meria. Some of the tales seem like they could have a glimmer of truth in there somewhere, while others seem more than a bit farfetched.

    Odziozo, according to the page Harmaus had been looking at, was a legendary legless giant who created the world only to fall into a deep slumber. Venetia might know more than a few things about Odziozo for Marivel, and now Azoth does, too.

    It might take him a few moments to veer on out of here through the door, narrowly avoiding the party in hot pursuit in this very room. He flies for the staircase leading downwards, erupting out onto a floor where classes are very much in session. The students may mostly be unable to see him, but surely, they must feel something. Surely they must see the glow of Eleanor's enchantment.
    Surely they must notice the wave of destruction rolling their way. Light is beaming from Harmaus' body, scouring the walls. They scatter, diving into classrooms and slamming the doors. He, erratically, ducks into first one classroom then weaves into another, passing right through the doors, through the walls. There is screaming, but he is only present in these spaces briefly; he hasn't the opportunity to cause harm beyond sowing chaos.
    A few throw basic crest artes at him. They don't seem to have any great effect.

    "No," calls out the Seraph, in response to Ida's shouts. "I has it, nearly-- Finds 'Great Works' and I has it...!" Harmaus will not be deterred. He has yet to find what he seeks. Somewhere in this school is the last piece he needs.

    The book in Azoth's hand mentions that there is a rock structure named 'Odziozo' for the giant... in that long-abandoned mine near Meria. Deep within the mine is a particularly geologically phenomenal area called 'The Great Works'. 

<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed.

Even Marivel doesn't know. This surprises Venetia, who glances at her, if with *suspicion*, but Talia and Lanval have very good reasons not to. "That's what they call an enormous underground rock feature," Venetia says, as pursuit continues. "It resembles a sleeping man, which is obviously suggestive. The initial assumption was that it was carved by ancients, but analysis in the last few decades (including my uncle Anterior) suggests it was actually a natural formation."

She pauses.

Venetia frowns to herself. "I suppose it is something of a nexus."

And then:

"Oh come off it! Not every natural feature is some epicenter of sorcerous might! You're fixating, because your brain is the size of a dumpling, even though you're composed entirely out of some kind of spiritual energy!" WOW VENETIA NOT SHOWING YOUR BEST SELF RIGHT NOW.

Of course, the book Azoth has will probably validate his *suspicion*. Or at least what Harmaus's working hypothesis is. Venetia, panting, chases after Harmaus, who is currently lit up like an Orokin disco ball and is therefore very difficult to find. "All of you! Evacuate if you can't see the intruder!" Venetia shouts.

'We don't have to listen to you!' answers one particularly snotty-sounding sophomore.

Venetia clenches her teeth. "WHAT DID YOU SAY?"

'You're just a baccalaureate, Vuong! My advisor told me you can't draft us!' Her arms fold.

"Hoang you traitorous cow, I'm going to throw you -- ugh! Ugh," Venetia says, pressing a palm to her forehead. The student with the crossed arms, glancing at the assemblage of drifting weirdoes, ducks back into her classroom and closes the door.

Venetia rubs her temples. "... This...!! This has been terrifying, and it's been getting to me, I'll admit... I... Oh, for the love of roast duck I can't just go on about my emotions right now. Come on, if he's heading this way he'll hit a dead end --"

Is he really going to hit a dead end, Venetia? He is a flying cat and also some kind of ghost 

<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.

Marivel is a suspicious person. She has worked hard to make sure nobody really knows what she knows and to what extent she knows it.

Marivel says, fondly, "You're wonderful, Vene." And she shifts to leaning against the nape of her neck, beedy bat eyes staring ahead. 

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    "Huh." Lanval learns something, and he didn't even pay tuition for the honor to do so. Lanval isn't just a free booze mooch! He has diversified his portfolio and stock options thusly.
 
     Lanval is a silly person. He has worked hard to make sure everyone is aware he is out of his depth in almost anything that isn't his direct spheres of knowledge. He is a silly person with an important station he executes faithfully to the fullest extent of his ability. It is ability that is not lacking. But other things are.
 
     'Odziozo is red-text-Primarch-red-text-exclamation-mark.'
 
     Lanval's eyes flash open in shock, without the show of color and power that tends to follow when they are. "Well 'm hopin' yer right 'caushe... that ain't good."
 
     He's understating it, and somewhere in all this it's time to chase again. (Meanwhile, strange hollow air-filled... horse-thing just cruises down the hallway in the opposite direction, unattended and giving life to a new academy legend of weirdness.)
 
     When Venetia hits the seeming dead end argument with another mortal student talking about matters of permissions and authorities and whatever it is they do when they don't leave out treats on the ground for him to eat later, Lanval puts on a (real, genuine) smile.
 
     "Don't worry 'bout it, they ain't gonna shtop me, unlessh... they got the Resonance too." Only one way to find out, as he disincorporates into a bright ball of blue-ish light and tries to squeeze on past whatever sort of irritable student-made blockades have been made in pursuit of either catching up to a naughty Light Seraph or what have you. 

<Pose Tracker> Talia has posed.

"Primarch? That's--" Talia heard about Primarchs. They were dangerous, from all she heard. Her eyes are wide, for a moment.

She takes off after Harmaus. As she runs into the hallway, though, she spots the light blasting from the Seraph's body. She hisses -- and then she leaps, jumping over the shockwave, and lands with a scramble. She goes blitzing after him, and her eyes narrow.

"If he hits a dead end, maybe we can corner him, before he can... do whatever he has in mind!"

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

Primarch. That's a problem. Eleanor does not say this at the moment, though--at the moment she simply tussles with Harmaus a little longer. And then, he flees. "Get back here!"

She is going to shapeshift back with so many scratches.

Eeanor's enchantment at least helps, but the students--

"I'M AN OWL, and I'M TELLING YOU TO DO AS VENETIA SAYS!" Eleanor exclaims loudly. "HOOT!"

She chases, and chases, and chases. No Crest spells for her at the moment. Dead ends or not, she finally comes to a stop, and--

"One way or anotehr let's get him AWAY from these people!" In an instant Eleanor is an elf again, and shimmering light radiates from her hand. The next classroom door he might think to enter to go between is suddely BARRED by a shimmering barrier!!

...but tha doesn't stop him going the other direction probably. 

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    'Odziozo is Primarch!'

    Ida's heart leaps in her chest. Her stride falters for a step or two. Her eyes go wide as she processes all the horrible things Harmaus might want with a Primarch. Malevolence is one of his primary pet interests; Althena is another. Seraphic history in general. Out of all of those, Malevolence seems the most likely candidate.

    Could a Primarch become a Hellion? A hellish vision flashes before Ida's eyes--the Hellionized form of Raftina, floating above a dead world. In the sky, Lunar cracked open like an egg, hideous EYES staring down at her from the black mass within.

    Ida staggers. She gasps. And then Venetia Vuong's pettiness drags her back into reality, and she is back in a school in Guild Galad, her home, and everything is safe.

    "GET TO SAFETY!" she shouts, as she notices a few staring students. She takes off again, but she's lost valuable time.

    "You DAMNED IDIOT!" Ida shouts, at Harmaus' fleeing tail. "Do you WANT to die?! Do you WANT to become a Dragon?!"

<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.

"A Primarch..." Azoth muses as he flips through the book, like that's not a big deal. He pauses, looking up, as if realizing it IS a big deal. "Ooooh. We don't want him to have one of those."

Azoth, speed reading in the way an artificial intelligence can abuse, devours the text as well as he can while on guard for being fired at again. He absorbs the knowledge, most of which might need to be relayed later. Except:

"No legs!" Azoth leans closer to the book. "Like a snake? It must be hard to create a world with no legs... Or... well, no, there would have been no ground to worry about walking on yet!" Azoth squints. "...Yeah, I'd sleep too after all that."

Azoth in fact would not. He can't sleep. Lies, again!

The Great Works. That's what Harmaus wants. Azoth snaps the book shut. If Harmaus did not manage to find the part about Meria, all the better he doesn't have it. But possibly he knows and needs specifics. Either way, Venetia is right, after a fashion. Time to spook Harmaus off.

He tucks the book under his arm and chases a cat. Bark bark? Well, perhaps they're all more herding the cat...

Azoth lifts his free hand and snaps his fingers, summoning an explosive blade of energy that intends to detonate and cut off Harmaus' intended pathways, at least away from innocent people where he can. But Harmaus is such a tricksy kitty. 

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Harmaus has posed.

"It thinks wrongly!" Harmaus replies to Venetia. "It opens eyes, it washes out ears! It looks and it sees!"

    He's defiant about this, whatever it is that he's pieced together from his storm through the library (along with anything else he might have uncovered before). "No-- not dragon! Something more. The truth! A new world!" he retorts as Ida sees the follow of the path he is flinging himself down. He wants what he's always wanted.
The same thing that Magilou had out and out named for him. It doesn't exist in this world -- in either world. Not in a way he would recognize. No, for Harmaus, there is no path but the one he walks.

The chase down the hall has the group following on the heels (paws?) of the Seraph Harmaus as he banks a hard right into one of the many classrooms on this floor, prevented from going into the one across the way by the barrier that Eleanor flings up or further down the hallway courtesy of Azoth's bladed arts.

Lanval may well be the first into the classroom, hot on Harmaus' heels. Eleanor, with her current advantages, might follow not terribly long behind.

At a glance, this particular lecturing space has a rather... Kislevi feel to it. Some of the posters tacked up at the back advertise a few excavation sites of note around that part of the Ignas continent. Perhaps the instructor who uses this room is from there? Even the furniture feels the part: the desks alone look like they'd take at least two adults each to shift, and never mind the podium which is, as the children say, 'an absolute unit'.

On the desk to the side of the podium, however, is a syllabus package, apparently for a seminar in the upcoming year. It's for a place near Meria, an extensive natural cavern called 'the Great Works'.

It's possible to, if one is a quick reader, get a glimpse of part of the top sheet as Harmaus flies about the room erratically for but a moment:

FIELD 106 will prepare you for your career in MINING ENGINEERING, ORE ASSESSMENT, THE STYGIAN RITES, and GEOLOGY as well as broadening your CV with foreign travel and conduct, and the opportunity to observe the results of Deep Time, part of our fourth Learning Strand in the Stygian Rites-based curriculum.

Please keep the contents of this packet intact and together. While your instructor will have several additional prints of this syllabus and map, train tickets, meal vouchers, and site access pass coupons can _NOT_ under any circumstances be replaced without additional expenditure.

Some of your areas of emphasis will have additional material that you should bear in mind. You can include this material in your packet, and your instructors have coordinated to avoid conflicts. However, you are responsible for your own work.

Pack the following:

1x Appropriate Attire (full suit)
2x Working Attire (boilersuit or similar OK) ..

The train tickets are included, and are visible peeking out of the side of the top sheet. But then--!

"Ah, finds it, has I! This key, gives me access to Great Works!"

They will only have a moment. Harmaus seizes upon the syllabus package like a hawk, plucking it up in its entirity with his mouth!

"Nrrw, awrry goesh I!" ...Even a Seraph has trouble speaking with their mouth full, it would seem. Taking flight once more, the shimmering Seraph beelines across the room, as quick as a wink.

Chasing him further will come to little avail, tragically, for he darts into the classroom vent with his prize and -- most likely -- soon escapes out into the expanse of the Void and beyond.

Just what on earth could he be planning, with these connections between the Ley and the element of Geo, this Odziozo, and the Great Works? Certainly, nothing good. But without question, whatever comes next must happen at that site. 'The Great Works' in Meria, is it...? 

<Pose Tracker> Venetia Vuong has posed.

Marivel expresses fondness to Venetia. "DON'T PRAISE ME WHEN I'M ****ING FURIOUS OR I'LL GET AN ANEYURSM!" Venetia bellows to nobody in particular. She then looks towards Lanval, who seems to know his stuff. "It would be bad, but it's not one of your blessed Primarchs!"

Run, run, run. A classroom. "Oh, come off it! Your brain isn't just the size of a dumpling," Venetia huffs back at Harmaus, "It IS a dumpling." ANd then he slides into a classroom and finds --

A box of pre-packaged syllabi intended for the upcoming year.

He's opened one. Venetia skids to a halt as she hears Harmaus crow about having found the key, and then he puts it in his mouth and flits towards the air vents and upwards and outwards and --

And --

"He... he..."

Venetia's eyebrows twitch. "He came here..."
"To get..."
"To get confirmation of where he wanted to go, and -"
"And to -"

Venetia's face is contorting in unusual ways. Her mask is hiding part of it. Not enough. "And to get... TRAIN TICKETS... to..."

Venetia sinks to her knees.

Venetia's hands come up to bury her fingers in her hair as she feels it come up to her throat. Towards the back of her mouth. Her mouth contorts. Her nose seems to flare. Her head tilts back as she

    S
    C
    R
    E
    A
    M
    S

in absolute, profound disbelief and fury. Outrage pure and distilled. A stick of chalk on the chalkboard rack snaps.

Venetia then flops forwards onto her face and swoons.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-SkaPAPzxyo

<Pose Tracker> Azoth has posed.

Cats are difficult beasts to calculate. Even if Harmaus is not a cat, he's adapted to many of the advantages of one! Efficient creatures, and this one more so for its defiance of physical limitations.

Azoth makes disparaging beeps the less he's able to keep up. Finally, they catch up, but not nearly in time. Azoth can read quickly and does so, but then -- Harmaus has his key. His prize. The last piece of the puzzle.

And off he goes with it. Azoth gives chase, futile and fruitless, returning once it's clear there's no mathematical possibility in catching up.

But Azoth will be happy to summarize and relay to everyone the contents of the book -- even if they end up having to check it out first to do this proper like.

The key to the Great Works... Train tickets.

Azoth presses his lips together, and slowly looks to Lanval and leans in, whispering his question under Venetia's screaming. "...He takes the train?"

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Lanval has posed.

    Sometimes, the best way to pursue a Seraph is to have another Seraph, and given the opportunity and reassurance, Lanval swerves along through the (for his kind, deeply unpleasant but not existentially dangerous) underground structures of Guild Galad.
 
     Lanval re-incorporates into the portly bearded fellow his self-image manifests as with a flare and character of water of all forms (pleasant and not), and that native Seraphic Domain he produces that enhances small joys. Small joys like finds it, has he, this key.
 
     Lanval can only spy enough of a glimpse of what's being said from the paper just about when Harmaus settles and decides that this is, in fact, 'this key' that 'gives (him) access to Great Works!'
 
     "Heyyy, that'sh jusht paper, a whole pile of the shtuff--" It's not clear in the moment if Lanval might be playing games or might be sparing Harmaus the potential embarrassment just to save face and dignity even if it's the kind of face that might be about to catch at least four different pairs of hands once they catch up.
 
     Harmaus deems it is time to 'awrry goesh I,' and Lanval takes off after. He doesn't have Harmaus' raw speed and ability to dart about places. The speed of light is, by Lanval's reckoning, 'something very fast that nothing can ever go as fast.' (Little does he know...)
 
     There is surprising grace in the movement as he hops across classroom desks, swinging the ever heavy gourd over his head like he could reach out and whack it right out of him, but just as Harmaus finds his exit and Lanval gives the makeshift mace its swing...
 
     * THUNK *
 
     The vent catches it. He's too late to land that hit. It takes a bit of effort for him to pull it back out. He's not sure how much he just poured down that vent in the process. He loses his footing when Venetia screams her feelings out. He's not going to stop her from doing that. It's okay to let feelings out.
 
     Azoth whispers his question, and Lanval holds up a hand. "Yep. I ride on 'em a bunch too. They're real fasht... fashter 'n a carriage, or a ship."
 
     He does have that horrendous body he likes to use, doesn't he? Would they say 'no' to him if he had tickets? 

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

"Oh, dear."

Eleanor, in ehr elven form once again, walks over to Venetia and kneels down beside her. "It's all right! We can go and find him--"

"Oh, I do hope she didn't land too hard on her face..." 

<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.

    Ida has no answer to that. She could scream at Harmaus until she goes blue in the face, and he still wouldn't get it, would he? She wants to take what she saw in Love's Cradle and somehow dump it into Harmaus' brain, with all its existential terror intact. Would that work? Is there any convincing someone who thinks that he has privileged insight into the truth?

    Ida rounds the corner and tears into the classroom. Her eyes dart about, taking stock of anything sensitive--syllabus packets? Ida reads all of two lines before Harmaus pounces, gloats, and flees.

    Ida does not experience the same dramatic collapse that Venetia does, but her brain does the math. Harmaus is going to do something profoundly unwise with a force of nature, and she's going to have to help clean it up, and there's no way some variant of 'Everstead-Rey Scion Chases Alleged 'Ghost Cat' Through College' isn't ending up in the rags. Her hands curl into fists. It takes deep force of will to keep from slamming one into a desk--

    Keep doing that, yes. You know where that leads.

    "Let's get her somewhere she can rest," Ida says, as she crouches next to Eleanor. Her face is red. She doesn't look well. She is concerning herself with Venetia's well-being to avoid dealing with her own.

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