Steel Sky (Adelle/Mind Flayer)

[Guan Yu]

Despite the presence of many doors, Taio appeared to have some sort of knowledge or intuition as to what they, or she, were looking for in this hidden getaway. The building was a big square at heart, with another outdoor garden in the middle while the outside edges were lined with rooms on both sides of the corridor. Taio's path would take them across to the opposite side of the house, where a set of bigger doors were visible. The sound of water and some sort of string instrument being played were audible from beyond.

 

[Mind Flayer]

Adelle kept following Taio, though she was beginning to get an eerie feeling for some reason, that she couldn't explain, but she kept going anyway in hopes of seeing just what this place had to offer. The fact that Taio seemed to have an instinctive knowledge on where to go also didn't help matters any really, and gave Adelle a strange vibe within that caused her to feel even more creeped out. Still though, she followed, though her right hand was inching towards her pistol on her right hip, especially when she heard the sounds of the instrument being played.

 

[Guan Yu]

"Easy prediction that they'd be here..." Taio would speak up before she threw one of the doors open and went right in to rather... interesting sight. The backyard area was fenced off by a bamboo wall, and had a natural hot spring reformed into a medium-sized pool while a quarter of it was a dedicated washing area with basins to throw water onto oneself instead of any other methods. The pool was surrounded by further gardening, huge planters with neatly tended trees and other plants growing in them to make the bath even more aesthetic. And there was some of that elusive red flower to be found too among the varied plant life. But there were some other possibly more pressing issues to deal with.

The spring pool was not empty by any means, a group of five likely Japanese men of varied ages were taking their bath, up to their shoulders in the water. What little Adelle could make up revealed that they all appeared to have even more extensive tattoos than Taio had, inked on in a way that allowed a t-shirt to cover them. On one side, an elegant, motherly woman of the same likely Japanese origin as then men, clad in a rich purple kimono, was sitting on the edge of the pool, a large string instrument on her lap as she plucked away to make soothing, atmospheric music to the group. But as the door was suddenly brought open, the music cut off as the entire six person group turned to the people who had just barged in. And while they were not shooting into action, the collective look of what the fuck was obvious as their attention turned to them, and their gazes were not soft. These people seemed to have the same aura of danger around them as Taio did, even the music lady, despite her apparent motherly appearance, seemed far from an average person.

 

[Mind Flayer]

Adelle followed Taio and was a bit... thrown off by the looks of the men in the bath. "Um... Taio... what uh... do you know them?" Adelle whispered to Taio as she entered with her. "Oh the flowers..." Adelle muttered as she spotted the flowers and prepared to head over and pick some, before she thought better of it.

"Um h-hello there," Adelle greeted the group politely and gave them a polite bow, especially after feeling the aura from everyone, feeling rather worried all things considered.

 

[Guan Yu]

The men in the bath at least seemed to appreciate the show of respect, but Taio was not quite as proper, calling something out in Japanese that seemed to draw the collective ire from a few of the men, though one of them started to talk back and soon got the rest to quiet down. This particular one would then get up and step out from the pool, covering up with a towel the lady had waiting for him as soon as he did. He was a fairly handsome man with somewhat long features, fit of body and slightly taller than average, parted dark brown hair of middling length and a thin goatee. By quick estimation he was likely mid 30s of age. "Taio, I respect the titanic balls you show but can I know why you are here, in the boss' leisure house while all of us are taking a bath? How did you even find this place and bring not just yourself but these other ladies too?" the man would ask, apparently familiar with Taio in a deeper fashion than most. "Aniki, I came here to tell you that I'm out." she would come back at him, which brought back the look of surprise from earlier.

 

[Mind Flayer]

Adelle started to understand a little bit after hearing Taio call the man her "Aniki". It also dawned on her that this was clearly a Yakuza sanctuary of some sort, but as for why it was here, and how, she didn't know. She wondered if they were a part of the Yakuza group from the city, and guessed not, but then again she might be wrong. Adelle didn't want to interrupt the two, but she did want to ask if she could take a few of the beautiful flowers, though she didn't want to risk interrupting them just yet.

If they seemed to be finished though, or if Taio's "Aniki" was just too surprised to respond, Adelle would take a step forward and bow politely again to the group. "Um... I'm sorry for causing any disturbances. But my friend Rose here, and myself, have come a very long way, from the city, to retrieve some of these flowers over here for our job, and so the wizard that hired us to retrieve them can perform a spell for us in return. W-Would it be alright if we took some of them, please? They are really the only reason we ran into Taio here, a ways down the mountain, where we were beset upon by goblins. We took care of the goblins thankfully, in no small part thanks to Taio's help. I daresay if she hadn't been there, Rose and I wouldn't have been able to handle quite that many goblins," Adelle would say politely to the group when Taio and her "Aniki" were finished talking, unsure who the leader of said group actually was.

 

[Guan Yu]

The aniki would eventually come back to his senses from the surprise, but his face would only turn amused by the proposition of Taio's departure. "Well... No. You do know what that means, leaving us like that?" he would put it rather bluntly. But Taio did not seem too fazed by this, and looked even more intent to have her way. "I don't care about that, aniki. If anyone tries, I'll make sure it's the last thing they do. Even if it's you, aniki."

While a normal reaction to this kind of reply might have been anger in their circles, the aniki once more got the look of surprise that was followed by a sinister laugh. "Oh, now you are talking too sweet, Taio-chan. You think you can take me?" he would speak up as he turned to the woman at the pool, gesturing her to get something. While turned, one could see his back tattoo, a bamboo forest that had a fierce green viper snake coming out of it. The woman would hand out a dagger, a finely lacquered deal with the very same viper on the otherwise black scabbard. "We'll see if you got what it takes, girlie. Testing you out again sounds so exciting... I'm already getting hard!" he would announce his intention to start a fight, the mirror polish tanto coming out, and it looked like his erection was ready too as a tent formed on his towel. Taio would not be left behind, her concealed dagger too coming out as she tossed the sword to Adelle for keeping.

 

[Mind Flayer]

Adelle watched the exchange between the two and gulped at their words, wondering just what she might have gotten herself into in all honesty. "Um... w-what's going on? I'm totally lost..." Adelle asked the woman, and to be fair, the other men as well, that were in the pool softly, maneuvering around towards the woman primarily after the aniki had drawn his dagger, though when Taio tossed her sword over to her, Adelle did catch it and hold onto it. "I do hope Taio won't get hurt. I rather like her," Adelle said softly as she watched the two preparing to.... Fight?

Her eyes also spotted the aniki's erection, and she gulped at the sight of it too. She'd seen plenty of course before. But seeing yet another still caused a faint blush to spread across her cheeks, even if it was still covered for the most part.

 

[Guan Yu]

Seemingly fully in grasp of the situation at hand, the man would blurt out a response to Adelle even when he was primarily focused on Taio. "It's a knife fight, can't guarantee anything ma'am." As he was preparing, the woman had stood up and gotten past the two, coming out to guide Adelle and Rose to the side where they would not be in harm's way as much. The whole thing seemed to be of interest to the rest of the yakuza too, despite their looks of disapproval about it all, and they moved up a little closer in their bath to see the throwdown happen.

The two would square up, their stance and movement identical as they circled for a bit, suggesting that they had more of a connection than just a boss and underling, with each taking the other in to see what would be the best course of action. Of course Taio would draw attention to the raging boner going on and call her aniki out on it, something about him never being able to keep his pants on. "Can't expect a man to stay calm with this much excitement, you should know this by now..." he would reply as he threw himself in to break the stalemate, coming in with a stab to the face that was not holding back in any way. Taio was quick to move her upper body aside and push his arm away, coming at him from the other side with her own blade in a similar stabbing motion, but he was ahead of her, already moving as she had to sway away with his arm in the lead. A few steps would see him spin and attempt to slash, but of course the girl was ready. Not quite ready enough though, as while not completely avoiding the blow, it did not look like Taio was cut in any other way besides a clean cut on her upper arm sleeve that ripped it open somewhat. "Whoa, almost." the man would comment as they were already on another exchange, similar result playing out again as Taio was countering but the man worked past her countering and soon she had another gash in her robe.

 

[Mind Flayer]

Adelle followed the woman and sat down next to her, watching the whole thing curiously, and she gasped when the slash went out at Taio, a look of fright on her face, worried that Taio had just been cut very deeply. Then it happened again, this time hitting her robe. "Taio... calm down... focus. Don't let your emotions rule your actions," Adelle called to Taio after the second slash that struck her robes connected.

After blurting out what she had, Adelle blushed and looked away, unsure if she ought to have spoken, but she didn't want to see Taio, whom she considered a new friend, to lose. She knew how she'd felt when she lost a fight, and as prideful as Taio had seemed to be, Adelle knew that it'd really piss her off and make her feel down, at least she suspected it would anyway. "M-Miss... should I... w-well, Rose and myself I mean... should we undress and get in the bath too? To be honest we could do with a bath after the long trek up the mountain, and after that sweaty fight with those goblins before," Adelle asked the woman softly, genuinely wanting to get cleaned up.

 

[Guan Yu]

The woman did not say anything, just gestured Adelle to be quiet and observe the event going on with all her attention.

The exchanges between the two combatants would not develop one way or another, no matter the angle Taio went for. The boss seemed her superior no matter how one looked at it, and while he never seemed to fully connect his cuts, each one always tore up a new hole on the girl's clothes, which was suspiciously looking like he was just playing around and purposefully going for Taio's clothing instead of her body with the blade he so skillfully wielded. The man, while a high ranking officer in this group, was clearly a man of countless fights under his belt.

After a bit, Taio was looking rather cut up, her robe in tatters from the aniki's handiwork. Yet, even with the now wide open robe, there were no signs of actual blood anywhere.

 

[Mind Flayer]

Adelle merely nodded and kept quiet at this point, still worried about Taio to be honest. But she was technically not even a guest here, so it probably wasn't a good idea to say too much more than she had, at least not until the fight was over with. She could only hope that Taio could land at least one blow, for her own measure of pride, if nothing else. She also silently prayed for Taio to win, even if she knew she probably wouldn't.

 

[Guan Yu]

With no input from any outsiders, the two could fight properly further on. Some further swinging of bodies and blades would see Taio's robe practically nonexistent as they started to peel off, and soon it looked like the boss was going for her bra string to get that away too. But this particular exchange was a particularly reckless one on his part, the effort ultimately succeeding but Taio had not gone through the entire fight without learning. Seeing an opening, she threw a wild stab at her boss, forcing him to stop the incoming shot with his off hand to avoid getting a blade to the eye. "Aaaaaaa fuck!" he would shout as he retreated, having had his palm impaled with the knife in Taio's hand.

Quickly tearing off a bit from his towel, the man wrapped his cut palm inside it and threw the rest away, now with no towel at all and yet still fully ready to go as the two squared up again. "Gonna take more than that, Taio-chan!" he would call out as he pointed his knife to signal that this was far from over.

 

[Mind Flayer]

Adelle kept watching, and she'd already seen Taio's body, so it was rather distracting for her, as she enjoyed the short miko woman's body quite a bit, and seeing her in nothing but her bra and panties, and soon enough her bra was falling off too. However, Taio managed to get a blow in and impaled his hand with her knife. Adelle's eyes shot open wide and clamped a hand over her mouth to keep from gasping aloud. She was at this point sitting next to the woman with Rose, her boots having been taken off so she could soak her weary feet in the pool, unless the woman stopped her from doing so.

"J-Jeez... those two are really going at it. D-Do they hate each other, you think?" Adelle whispered very softly to Rose, nodding at the pair fighting.

 

[Guan Yu]

Before Adelle could get to dipping her footsies in the pool, where the four other bosses still were, not that far away either, she was stopped from doing that by the collective death glare of three of them. Maybe it was the best course of action to not do that. "Somehow... it doesn't look like that... They are both so... happy even in this situation of life and death." Rose would comment, the looks of joy on the two combatant's faces as they clashed likely confirming what she thought.

Taio and her boss would proceed to engage further, the impaled hand actually looking like it did enough to take some wind out from the aniki's sails. He was starting to miss now, and the girl would get a trio of shallow cuts on him, two on the upper knife arm and one on the opposite shoulder, adding to the scars he already had in various places. And yet somehow, it looked like he had been playing her during even those exchanges, as he had been shifting position around her, and with her hakama not completely gone, she had managed to tangle her feet somewhat in the hanging mess that it was. Suddenly realizing that she would fall over if she kept spinning, she stopped. The boss would keep moving, soon having a rear position as he leaped upon her, both on the ground soon.

Now on his opponent's back, the boss quickly pinned Taio's knife arm down, most of his weight pushing her down as he brought his knife against her neck with his own armed hand. "Gotcha.." he would come out in a somewhat joyous voice. The two would lay there for a while, the boss visibly struggling against his bloodthirst as his blade cut a shallow mark on Taio's neck, drawing a small droplet of blood, the girl herself looking like she was fully ready to leave this world right now. "I... so want to just... kill the shit out of you... Would give me the best fucking nut ever..." he would say, his raging boner looking like it would unleash any second now. "But... what would this life be if... I did that now."

Retracting his knife, the boss turned it around into an icepick grip before stabbing it down, just barely missing Taio's head as he wedged it into the wood floor. Smiling like the maniac he probably was, he managed to coax out the exact same reaction from Taio, and for a few long seconds they just stared at each other with those manic grins plastered across their faces. Now having a free hand, the boss would slide his fingers across one of his fresh wounds, collecting some of his still flowing blood on them before slipping them into Taio's mouth, who was completely willing to go along with it. "If nothing else... you can always remember me by this blood you shed." the boss would speak up again as the girl, rather sensually, licked off the blood from his fingers. By then she had let her own weapon go, and the boss would unhand her, the two going into a brief but extra-passionate kiss of blood, before they would disengage and look at each other again.

"But enough of that. We'll talk in a bit." he would equally unceremoniously end the engagement, picking himself and his blade off from Taio before walking out of the bath area, naked, still bleeding and savagely erect. Taio, for her part, didn't seem ready to get up yet, looking like she had just gotten the time of her life. She was a mess in shredded clothes and some of her former boss' blood on her after that, but yet there was some savage beauty in her prone form. And she was still smiling like no tomorrow. "Boss... you are something else..."

 

[Mind Flayer]

"Mmm, you're right. They do look rather... happy..." Adelle whispered back to Rose before pulling her feet back, though she did keep her boots off, not wanting to earn the ire of the Yakuza people here, even if she could probably have just shot the rest of the men and just put her feet in the water anyway.

Watching the two continue to go at their fight, Adelle had to wonder... were they getting off on this? Or was this merely their idea of fun perhaps? Either way, when Taio was forced to the ground, Adelle had a slightly jealous look on her face, but she said nothing, and after a few moments, with Taio still laying there, Adelle started to get up to go help Taio up, but she wasn't sure if anyone would get angry with her, though it'd be clear that she was still worried about Taio. When Taio licked the blood though, Adelle had to wonder if the girl was a vampire of some sort too.

 

[Guan Yu]

Taio would get up on her own before Adelle would get too close, only managing to give her a slight lift up. "Hmm, I guess that's my departure from the gokudo. Somehow I thought it would have taken more than this." she would ponder aloud, gathering up her weapon and the remains of her clothes before addressing one of the remaining four men, a grey, older gentleman of advanced age in Japanese for a bit before giving him a proper, deep bow. And the old man seemed to understand her, giving her a nod of acknowledgement in return. The rest of them looked on with differing reactions, but the old man was likely the head of them so they would not make anything of the situation.

The woman, by then, had come to Adelle and placed a hand on her shoulder. "This way, if you would..." she finally spoke, sounding as caring as she looked while gently urging the ladies to leave the bath with her.

 

[Mind Flayer]

Adelle sighed and looked relieved when Taio started to get up on her own, helping her the rest of the way and handing Taio's sword back to her. When Taio bowed to the older gentleman, Adelle followed suit and did so as well, not really sure if she ought to, but figuring it'd be proper anyway and polite regardless. "O-Oh... alright. L-Lead on then," Adelle told the woman and followed her out with Taio and Rose, curious where they were being taken.

 

[Guan Yu]

The woman would not take them around too far, just a few doors away from the bath. "Here we are. If you would..." she'd urge them to go in. Inside was a somewhat basic but nonetheless serviceable dressing room with some big baskets instead of lockers or similar. "Please be at home. Once the masters finish, I'll escort you to the bath. Don't be concerned for your belongings, they will be safe as can be here." she would tell them as they got in, going around in the room to show them where the towels were and that they could view the inner garden from the opposite side doors if they wanted to before going back to the other door. "I'll be back shortly..." she'd tell them as she exited to attend to the menfolk, leaving the girls to undress for the bath and maybe talk for a bit if there was something.

 

[Mind Flayer]

Adelle smiled and nodded to the woman. "Oh thank you so much, truly I appreciate it," Adelle said to the woman and bowed politely to her before she sighed and looked over to the others.

Adelle took the time to help Rose undress and get herself a large towel to wrap around her, helping her tie it so Rose wouldn't have to try and hold it with her large clawed hands. Once she had helped Rose get her clothing off and the towel around her, Adelle would undress herself and get two towels for herself, and an extra one for Rose. She'd wrap one of hers around her body after she undressed, and carried an extra towel for herself and Rose to rest their heads on once they got to the bath. She made sure that her backpack was all zipped up and her weapons placed within it, as she didn't want to lose them. Her clothing she folded neatly and set into the basket she set her backpack up against, and undid her ponytail she had been wearing her hair in, before waiting for the woman to return.

"Okay Taio... now's as good a time as any. What the hell was all that about out there? And did you know this place was already here? And... did you come from the city?" Adelle said as she leaned against the wall near the door while they waited.