[fieldbox="Koshi, lightcyan, dashed, 10"]Koshi listened to her intently, kneeling in the snow. Her words didn't come as a surprise, seeing how that guy - Hisao, had treated her. How sad, he thought. Such a lovely person should not be criticized, or hurt. The boy wanted to reach up and clear the tears from her eyes with careful fingers, but not used to giving affection, he was scared of doing so.
Was this what it was like the bear the Starsight? Koshi's lips drew into a thin line as he lowered his gaze to the ground between them, grim-faced. "Well, you kinda are talking to a ghost right now..." He muttered, and looked up when he heard the doors to the school open again. Anxiety bubbled in his stomach... May was hurt, and crying, and Koshi certainly didn't want to let her be seen like that, nor did he want her to have to go to school like that either. He clutched her shoulders a bit harder to get her attention.
"School's overrated. Wanna go somewhere else?" Oh, what a bad influence... But Koshi didn't quite understand the importance of the system, after all, he was a spirit. [/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="May Tachibana, green, dashed, 10"] The brunette felt anxiety crawl up her spine and begin to latch itself to her conscious at his silence. Perhaps, she should have kept her reality a secret from him, then maybe things would be easier for the both of them. But...he answered her. May slowly opened her eyes, starring at the male before the sound of the school doors opening caught his attention. A light gasp escaped from her lips when he abruptly gripped her shoulders. "...Yeah." May bit her lip and sat up, her right hand instinctively clutching her stomach at the pain that had flared up. It wasn't as painful as she had anticipated it to be, but it was still there. "Hnng...I'm fine." She said, though it was mostly meant to reassure herself. She's been through worse and this was nothing. You have to be strong.
"Let me get my things." May murmured as she finally stood up on both her feet then picked up her sketchbook that had been discarded off to the side. She slowly made her way over towards the bench where her backpack still remained, a bit of snow covering it. SHe shoved her sketchbook inside, zipped it up, and slid the strap over her shoulder before turning on her foot to look at Koshi, though her attention moved over to a male. He was someone unknown to her and she had never seen him before. "Come on, Koshi." May murmured as she turned away from the human male who was leaning against the door frame, observing her.
[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="Koshi, lightcyan, dashed, 10"]Koshi's eyes widened in worry as the girl emitted a sound of pain, and he immediately reached up as if to touch her again, then lowered his hand. Humans were so fragile... It worried him terribly, and images of the dying old man surfaced once again in his mind. Koshi stepped away from her to give her space to gather her things, and took a moment to wonder where he should take her.
This girl, the first human to say his name after he became a spirit, was special. He wanted to steal her away, take her somewhere pleasant, where the troubles of her life wouldn't bother her... Where she could be free, and happy. But was there really such a place? Even now, as an immortal being with the power to explore every nook and cranny on Earth, Koshi was remarkably unhappy. Even with all the demons and faeries around him, god-like beings, he was ignored and disliked... To think, he had died to escape the terrible feelings, and was forced to come back for more of them... It was so frustrating... Koshi wanted her to not be like him.
May began to walk away, and he quickly caught up to her, trying his best to wear a smile. "You don't seem bothered by the cold..." He observed, curiosity in his tone.[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="May Tachibana, green, dashed, 10"] The brunette attempted to fix her braided hair though gave up and decided to just cover it up with the hoodie of the sweater she had underneath her jacket. "I um, I really like this season. It's beautiful." May stated as she gave him a side glanced before looking forward at the open school gates. This would be the second time in her life that she actually ditched school, though this would be the first where she frankly didn't care if she got in trouble or not.
"Where would you like to go?" May questioned as she came to a stop at the entrance. Many times before she had thought of asking her parents to transfer her to a different school, but she didn't want them to go through the hassle. They already had enough to worry about with their jobs and her baby brother. Thank the heavens that this would be her last year here. After this she would finally be blue to go to a college of her choice and make something out of herself. Of course, it wouldn't be that easy but a girl can dream.
[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="Koshi, lightcyan, dashed, 10"]Koshi smiled down at May as they stopped by the entrance, pale eyes blinking as the wind picked up for a moment to push along the heavy clouds overhead.He didn't want it to start snowing now, because he'd hate it if May got too cold.
His stomach felt heavy with feeling all of a sudden - she liked this weather? He wanted to hug her so badly... He almost felt like it was meant to be, their meeting. Not only could she see him, but she also didn't mind the weather the followed him... Koshi was giddy with glee all of a sudden, and it showed in his eyes.
"Well, I have this place I like to go sometimes... It's an important place to me." He suddenly reached over to her and placed a hand on her shoulder - why did touching her make him feel so good? There was something so sweet and reassuring in every moment he spent with her - probably because only she could see him.
"I think walking is a bit tiring, no? What do you say we fly?" Koshi gave her a sweet, reassuring smile.[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="May Tachibana, green, dashed, 10"] Right after she had mentioned her liking of this rather, Koshi's eyes lit up making them even more wonderful. Every time his expression brightened, he appeared to be even more beautiful and young.
"I would love to go there." May smiled at him while she glanced down at his hand that was resting over her shoulder. For a spirit, his hand was warm. It was strange to her that she could see them, yet no one else could. Time and time again, May wondered why she was given the ability to see spirits.
"F-fly?" May's eyes widened as she starred at him in shock. "You can make me fly?"
[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="Koshi, lightcyan, dashed, 10"]Koshi glanced away, to the side, and he chuckled shyly. "W-well, no, n-not exactly. I can fly though." He looked back to her with a gentle smile, and the hand on her shoulder slipped across her back while he leaned down, and put another arm under her knees.
Suddenly, the boy was scooping her up as if she weighed nothing, holding her up bridal-style. Well, that's certainly one way to sweep a girl off her feet...
"You might want to hold on to me," Koshi suggested, lifting his chin to evaluate the skies. A rough wind gradually picked up, rolling through the city like it was trying to take everybody else with Koshi too. Seeing no other sprites in the sky that could potentially be a nuisance, Koshi looked down at May again with his kind smile, grey eyes watching her with wonder deep in their pupils, a gaze that begged her to trust him.[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="May Tachibana, green, dashed, 10"] A light shade of pink dusted her cheeks at his response. "Oh...heh. Right." May lightly chuckled due to her embarrassment. She had a feeling that this would not be the last time she would get embarrassed, but she didn't necessarily mind. He seemed nice.
Koshi wrapped his arm around her shoulder, before scooping her up causing for her eyes to widen slightly. Getting over her initial surprise, she hesitantly wrapped her arms around his neck. "Where is this special place?"
[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="Koshi, lightcyan, dashed, 10"]Koshi's lip twitched in an uncertain smile. "Er, uh... I hope you don't get any serial killer vibes, but it's at the edge of town. There's a forest and an overhang... And from up there, you can see the whole city. It's my favorite place to go." Koshi blushed, feeling a bit of a sinking feeling hit him in the stomach. What if she didn't like that kind of thing? What if she wasn't much of a forest-y kind of person?
"... Or, w-we can go..." Koshi went blank for a moment. Only now did he realize that the girl had wrapped her arms around his neck, and it made him feel like... Like a warm mousse cake, like he was meted on the inside. It was a magical sensation - touch. It made his mind go blank and his heart well up with unsung feelings. "We can go somewhere else if you want, actually..." He couldn't help but look down at her, catch her gaze with his like he was the catcher in the rye, and her eyes were too close to the brink of some great cliff.
He'd be her catcher, he wanted to - so that she didn't find a cliff at the end of her road, like he had. Koshi smiled warmly, for a moment, his ice-grey gaze melting into intense tenderness. [/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="May, green, dashed, 10"] The brunette raised a brow when he described the location and it intrigued her. May hardly went out to many places, given that she didn't have friends to hang out with. Of course, there were times where she would go places by herself but the sight of others hanging out with their friends only reminded her that she was alone. No one to confine in, no one to talk to, no one to be friends with. It sucked and sometimes she wondered what was the point of even being here.
"No, no. I'm fine going where you had originally said. I trust you." May's trust only went to a certain extent given that they just met, but she had this feeling that he didn't mean her any harm. Plus, she really wanted to take the chance to make a friend, even if he was just a spirit. Maybe he could be someone she could talk to. That is, if he still wanted to hang out with her afterwards.
[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="Koshi, lightcyan, dashed, 10"]Koshi gave her a smile. "Alright then, hold on tight." The wind gradually picked up speed around them, sending flurries of snow in all directions. After a moment of gathering strength, Koshi leaped upwards, as graceful as a feline, and once more let himself be overcome with energy.
He was a god, in this case, not a human. Midair, great pale-blue locks of hair emerged forth from his head and neck and fanned out around him - translucent and flowing like veils. Immediately, in a burst of white light, the fine, pale expanse of a deer-like skull, with massive, curling horns, appeared over his face. Blue eyes blinked forth from the depths of the blackness of its sockets like flames. Twin wings spread out around his body, disconnected from his back, and yet their pale grey feathers were a part of him. He glanced down at May as he gradually rose into the air, the blue flames trained on her face like torches. This wasn't even his final form. [glow=black]"To cross greater distances, I have to let more energy into my body... This is what happens. I'm sorry you have to see it."[/glow] Koshi's voice was a smooth, watery wave of deep echoes from the blackness of the mask. He took off in flight, holding May tightly against his chest as they rose over the city. Wind and snow dazzled his vision for a moment before it cleared again, and he could see the edge of the green forest just a bit further away.
In a few powerful stokes of his wings, they were at the edge of he forest on an overhang where the whole city could be seen beneath them. Koshi hovered over the ground, stilling their decent by beating his wings faster, before finally landing on the snow-covered earth once more. [glow=black]"Thank you for flying with Air Koshi~`"[/glow] He carefully lowered May's legs first, so she could hop off his arms. Through the strange mask on his face, the eagerness of his smile was hidden from view. [/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="May Tachibana, green, dashed, 10"] The wind picked up around them, sending for snow to go flying which made May burry her face slightly into his chest. Of course, the brunette immediately looked back up at Koshi when the white glow shined above her. The skull of a deer with horns appeared, concealing Koshi's face. What she found most intriguing was his eyes, they looked so...Words couldn't describe how magical they looked. Wings fanned out behind him as they were airborne.
She never knew that spirits could transform like this. Now that she thought back on it, she had never even bothered to get to know any of the spirits she had encountered which was mostly due to her fear of them. It still hadn't fully sunk in the ability she had, but now, flying up in the air in the arms of a spirit, it was beginning to fully sink in.
At his apology, she tilted in her head in confusion. "Don't apologize. I'm honored to have seen this." May stated as she gave the male a warm smile. He truly was good hearted and she would, for once, actually try to hold onto him. Maybe he could become her friend the. She would finally have someone to talk to, someone to trust.
It wasn't long before they made it to the overhang he had mentioned and he lowered her down feet first. A small chuckle left her lips and she jumped down from his arms. Her feet landed on the snow and slightly got burried, but it was no big deal. Fortunately she had decided to wear her boots for today.
[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="Koshi, lightcyan, dashed, 10"]He chuckled at her words. "Honor? This... This thing is a curse. You should feel afraid." He muttered as she jumped out of his arms, and all of a sudden... Something happened.
There was a strange twitch of his hand, and a bright light - a flash, gone as quickly as it came. It had spread out between his fingers, along the webbing of his palm and up his hand. In the same moment as it vanished, claws sprouted out of his bones in place of his nail beds, and Koshi lifted his arm up to stare at the spectacle with minor alarm. The corruption was getting harder to control. How long would it be before he ended up like Kaito, or like Shinatsuhiko?
After a moment, the blue-tipped, jagged things vanished into thin air and left his hand in its normal state. Just to make sure it was over, Koshi flipped his hand so the palm faced away, and then back again, towards him, studying the pale hand. It was over, there was nothing left of the previous outburst, no strange mark, nor jagged nail. Kaito's change had started with such small things - sharper teeth, pointed ears... Until he sprouted an impressive set of tawny antlers wreathed in red poppies.
Koshi turned back to May, and the mask suddenly grew taunt like an overripe fruit, and burst into small, translucent pieces. When they fell upon the snow - the left the fresh white blanket unmarked, and simply vanished into thin air. The ordeal hadn't effected Koshi's posture - his wings were folding inwards and growing fainter in outline, and whose tufts of white hair were once again going short and black. After a moment, the boy was stand there as himself, and it felt good - he'd hate to be a monster, no fate could be more terrible.
"This is the corruption that happens to every spirit over time. The more power they use, the worse it gets." Koshi explained, as he found a place to sit amidst the snow. For May, he called forth a wind to push the mounds of snow away from the ground so she could sit... But, seeing as the ground was still wet... The boy unzipped his jacket, and lowered the cloth of the ground so that May could sit on something warm and comfortable. Under it, he was wearing a sleeveless black shirt, but looked completely comfortable in the winter chill.
After smoothing the jacket out, Koshi patted the furry lining with a warm smile, in a gesture that begged her to sit with him.[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="May Tachibana, green, dashed, 10"] May hadn't realized that he viewed this in a negative light, she had just believed that it was apart of him. "But I'm not afraid," May answered truthfully. The form he had taken hadn't scared, it was more interesting and unique than scary.
Suddenly a flash of light ran along his hand, which caused her to close her eyes for a second before looking at him-well his hand. In place of his nail, claws had sprouted and for a moment she want sure what was going on. Why was his hand like that? Though the next thing she knew, it disappeared. After that occurance, he began to morph back into his normal state.
"There's no way to stop that?" May didn't know how that whole corruption thing worked, but from what he was saying she understood that the more they used their power, the worse it got. Surely there had to be a way to stop that.
Noting that he moved a patch of snow so she could take a seat, May had been about to politely decline given that it was wet but he began to take off his jacket. "Ah, no. Don't do that, it'll get your jacket wet and won't you get cold?" May didn't want to deprive him of his things just to provide her comfort. Thoigh his inviting expression made her want to sit next to him. "Are you sure this is okay?" She asked while gesturing to his jacket.
[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="Koshi, lightcyan, dashed, 10"]Koshi chuckled, and when he looked upon May, his eyes changed to make a strange, unreadable expression - akin to bittersweet sorrow. "May, I'm dead. I don't get cold."
He patted the jacket again, wanting her to sit with him. This was the first time Koshi had taken anyone here - for obvious reasons (well, nobody could see him). It was a sacred place to him - the secret of the pines, unknown to all but the Spiritmakers and himself. The trees were part of a strange memory - their inky caricature spanning around the two beings like broken eggshells, and just in front of them was the entire span of the city, visible from their little perch atop the hill, amidst tall grasses. In the summer, the green stems grew yellow and looked like wheat fields, and Koshi smiled when he thought of the last red flower he had found here, among the grass when he was still a human.
"I didn't want to mention this, because I didn't want you to think I'm talking to you just for this reason... But, there's an old myth among us spirits that a human with the Starsight can make the corruption go away with a touch of their skin. Strange, isn't it? I... I'm not asking for anything, because I want you to stay here without thinking that I'm using you. You don't have to... Just sit with me." He stammered and blushed, turning away from the pretty girl to look out past the overhang and at the tall buildings. Like two separate worlds, these place were. One grey and industrial, just beyond the tangent line of the greenery, where the nature sprites flourish blooms and keep gardens... On a grave.[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="May Tachibana, green, dashed, 10"] May's eyes widen when she realized ow that must have offended him or made him feel bad. "Oh! I'm sorry! I didn't mean-," the brunette decided to just close her mouth and take a seat on his jacket. May knew that he wasn't alive, yet he just seemed more human at the moment that she forgot. She brought he legs up to her chest and she hugged them before glancing off to see such a wonderful sight before her. The city was practically covered in snow and she could spot a couple of buildings that she knew.
At his words, her brows furrowed. So she had the Starsight? Which meant that she had the power to stop what had occurred earlier with the flash of light and claws, with just a single touch? This was the first time ever hearing what she was and what she had. "So I just have to touch you? I have the Starsight?" May frankly had so many questions about this but she didn't want to bother him with them.
[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="Koshi, lightcyan, dashed, 10"]Koshi glanced at her with a weird expression before he realized that 'Startsight' was a spirit term, and humans didn't use it. "Oh, uh... It all starts with the Spiritmakers.... The Spiritmakers live all the way up in the stars. They're the strange, mysterious beings that revive the dead to make them into spirits...When they give a human the ability to see us, we call the ability the Starsight. There hasn't been someone like you in... At least a century, according to the older spirits." The boy explained, and as May sat down next to him, he shuffled a bit closer to her. He couldn't explain why, but her presence calmed him... Stilled the restlessness in his heart. His grey gaze met an grey building in the distance, faded against the backdrop of the already-grey sky - it all blended together... While some might call the city dull, Koshi found it calming. He liked the sounds of traffic at night, and the sight of the lights. They made him feel comforted, less lonely somehow.
He turned to May with a smile. "I don't know exactly how the whole thing works, but that's fine. After a couple more 'turns' I'll be too far gone anyway." His gaze shifted away from the girl again. His hands balled into fists on his lap, and his crossed legs tensed... Then all at once Koshi relaxed again, reminding himself to try to wear a smile for the girl beside him. [/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="May Tachibana, green, dashed, 10"] May listened to his explanation, but that only left her with many more questions. The most important being: why did the Spirirmakers choose her to receive the Starsight-not that she was complaining since she was able to meet Koshi with it. As far as she knew, she wasn't that much of an important person so why?
Tilting her head to look at the male as he gave her a smile, May thought for a moment. "I...I want to help you. I'm sure I was given the Starsight for a reason." May said as she gave the male a smile of her own. "If I can do good with it, then I might as well make good use of it."
[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="Koshi, lightcyan, dashed, 10"]Koshi smiled at her, a happy look in his icy eyes.
Instead of replying to her with words, he reached over and ran a hand along the arm wrapped around her legs. His larger finger caught her wrist and wrapped around the small width of it, while he watched her with an apprehensive, hopeful gaze. "I... I don't know how this works exactly..." He pulled her hand to him, and with his other hand, reached over to press their palms together.
After a moment, nothing happened. His fingers intertwined with her's to maximize the contact between them, yet still nothing. It was clear in his eyes - his spark of hope being trampled. The smile faltered, and fell... And expression of grave worry came over his face - the same face a sinner might make if they found that hell was a real place. It was as if a crushing weight had settled on his shoulders again.[/fieldbox]
[fieldbox="May Tachibana, green, dashed, 10"] The warmth of his hand surprised her, yet she remained still as it ran along her arm before pulling her wrist towards him. Her emerald orbs remained glued to his face, a small hopeful smile lingering on her lips. Their palms met but nothing happened so he intertwined their fingers and she did the same before giving a gentle squeeze. The hope fading from his expression was enough for her heart to ache. "Maybe-maybe we need to do something else for it to work-Or maybe you need to be in that form you were in earlier." May stammered as she tried so desperately to bring that hopeful expression. I was much better than this distraught one.
[/fieldbox]
