[color=8dc73f]Meora is caught by surprise when the box she’s holding suddenly starts talking, and bursts open. Before she can even take one of her many guns off of her holster, though, she witnesses the toy bear grow to the size of an actual bear, and then pull out a gun, which then proceeds to transform as well, from a toy into a lethal weapon. A smirk makes it’s way across her face.
“...I’ll admit it. That was pretty awesome just now.” Meora chuckles. She opens her mouth to give an explanation, but Joe beats her to the punch. Then suddenly there’s a Dwarf walking towards them from out of some bushes (and Meora finds herself wondering what he was doing there in the first place...ugh. Kiroketsu really IS a bad influence), who Joe and this big teddy bear, apparently named Zed, seem to know. On top of that, the Dwarf’s name appears to be Snarfulblast. Not the weirdest name Meora’s known...but up there, somewhere.
Meora waits for Michael to show up, hoping for just the smallest bit of sense to be made somewhere, but instead a crow flies out from the portal and lands on her shoulder, which again, nearly makes the wary neko reach for her guns. However, Meora notices how much more powerful she feels with the crow on her shoulder, and then hears Michael’s disembodied voice, explaining the situation. She nods slowly once everything has been said.
“Hai….okay then....just, as long as this thing won’t peck my face or poop on my shoulder. Guh, I remember one of the other assassins at the Japanese base I trained in had a parrot. Kami-sama, was it annoying...so, then I ate it. The guy never found out either, but everyone knew it was me. I was thanked for at least a week.” Meora cackles a bit. She starts following Snarfulblast, along with the others, and then turns to listen to Zed.
“Ah, well...if we assume this Sochi guy to be one of the Master’s underlings, he’ll be in the rich part of town. The Demon Highlands have only a few significant features. The slums make up most of it. Then there’s the rich neighborhood surrounding the castle, and the Demon Square is the center of the place, leading to any part you would wanna go. Oh, yeah, and then there are some smutty clubs sprinkled around, some clinics that provide drug dealers with what they need, underground societies of every kind of horrible criminal imaginable, and back alleys. Lots and lots of back alleys. You don’t go into those. Well, at least, you don’t go into those with the intention of walking back out just fine and dandy.” Meora explains. “So, my suggestion is to head for the square, as Sephie and I always do when we have to venture through that place. Might be able to ask around for Sochi. Who knows? Maybe he could have a connection to some of the people I know who live in the Demon Highlands. Not in a friendly sense, though. The only people I know here are just Seph’s enemies.”[/color]

[color=bc8dbf]The group of friends in the lobby stand by as Michael sends a feathery replacement to head off on the mission with Meora and the others. The noise upstairs from Sephie’s rampage has grown worse in the meantime.
Felixter’s ears perk up upon being called by name. He nods in agreement. “Right, Michael. To be honest, I’d have probably accompanied you either way, at this rate…”
Felixter starts to follow Michael to the room where his sister is, but at that moment, the pair are almost run into by screaming purple blur. It comes to a halt in front of them, and Felixter sighs a bit at the sight of the fleeing spirit guardian.
“O-oh! H-h-heyyyyy there, guys! What’s up?” Kiroketsu calms himself down a bit and tries his best to play it cool. Unsurprisingly, Felixter isn’t buying it in the least.
“Oh, well, it appears that we were just going on our way to do your job, Kiro.” Felixter responds.
“Gyah! I-I didn’t expect such coldness from YOU!” Kiroketsu almost flinches at the remark. He clears his throat, “Look, I have been doing my job! I mean, besides you, I’m one of the most experienced when it comes to handling Sephie in this state. Everything is under control, thanks to me-”
Kiroketsu is cut off with his own startled squeak when more demon gibberish is shouted from the upper floor, followed by the sounds of what is surely a wall getting smashed…
“....Right. Well, we’ll be off then. Perhaps you should stay here.” Felixter starts to move past Kiroketsu, but the stubborn spirit just follows him.
“No! I won’t let you show me up in front of my beloved Sephie! No way am I letting you leave me behind!” Kiroketsu huffs.
“...See, the only reason you’re acting tough now is because you’re not alone. Now there are other people who are on their way to confront my sister. Others you can fall back on in case you should fail. Sorry, Kiroketsu, but you aren’t Marko. You’ve got no bravery.” Felixter shakes his head with a chuckle.
“D-don’t compare me to that other spirit guardian! That...that poser!” Kiroketsu cries, seeming quite offended. “Why do you guys prefer him to me so much, anyway?! Besides, he’s not even here!”
“Well, we were unsure about leaving Silversa and Marko alone, so they might be coming here as well. Though, now that the witches are her instead, I’m not so sure.” Felixter shrugs. “And we prefer him to you because he’s a gentleman, and is actually devoted to his job. It’s as simple as that.”
From the lobby, the rest of the people there listen in on the conversation between Kiroketsu and Felixter.
“...Tch. I expected no less. Such a foul spirit, that Kiroketsu…” Lucille growls under her breath.
“Do you think they’ll be okay…?” Ammi murmurs with concern.
“Oh yeah. Michael and Felixter are there. With them there, it’ll be fine.” Kayori laughs.
“What about purple-kitty-man- Er, uhm, Kiro?” Mirui asks.
“...Felixter and Michael are there. With them there, it’ll be fine.” Kayori answers.[/color]
[color=8493ca]Nelodine, all the while, is still wandering some of the upper floor halls. In the distance, she can hear Sephie’s mad roars, but tries not to pay it any mind with the hopes that she’s securely trapped within that magically-locked room. She looks back down at the marble-sized, saddening milky-white orb that Nymne gave to her before fleeing from a window.
“...8...she said there were 8 of us...but, there’s only 6, right? Then...did he create more?” Nelodine murmurs to herself.
Before she can get much more into her thoughts, she hears a light tap on one of the windows near her.
“Nelodine! Nelodine, out here!”
“Hm?” Nelodine recognizes the voice as a little cat demon named Kieru, Sephie’s niece. She walks over to the window, but can’t see any sign of the little girl. She opens it and looks around outside, craning her neck this way and that to try and spot Kieru.
“Kieru? Is that you? For goodness sake...I-I thought we told you to stay home! The witches are already here, s-so it’s not safe!” Nelodine calls out of the window.
“But, Nelodine, you let Cloudy and her brothers come! And they’re younger than me!” Kieru’s disembodied voice whines at Nelodine, and all the while, something starts crawling through the window. A tiny little creature with fangs and claws, glowing with magic energy…
“That was for a specific reason...C-Cloudy and her brothers were in the heavens beforehand, and from there, they were able to see what was going on earlier, so they knew how to help the others. We had to take them here. Ohh...Kieru, please, I don’t know if Sephie would be happy for you to be here if she were of sound mind right now…” Nelodine continues with her explanation to the girl she assumes is there with her. The little creature she still fails to notice is on the windowsill, creeping closer.
“Oh? Sephie’s not of sound mind? Heh...then this’ll be even easier…[i]sister[/i].”
Nelodine is taken aback when the voice suddenly becomes that of her youngest sister, Noruani. Before she can ask, the creature on the windowsill lunges at her, and latches onto her throat. Nelodine stifles a horrified, pained gasp when it slices right into her throat, and crawls in. On the way, the creature severs her vocal chords, so she cannot scream. Nelodine feels as if she’s about to fall unconscious, and maybe die...but then, her vocal chords and throat heal themselves up. She feels strange, and has a weird sparking feeling inside of her body, but for the most part...relatively okay. Though, she had no recollection of what had just happened, or why she came close to collapsing just now.
Outside, the smallest of the witch sisters walked back towards the dark forests, giggling to herself as she recalled the instructions given by Nimika earlier, concerning Nelodine.
[i][color=ec008c]”What we’ll do, dear sisters, is relatively simple. It’s something we could only do so well by combining our powers.” Nimika began with a smirk.
“Ahhh, of course! I mean, there’s 6 of us for a reason….we’re powerful on our own, but together, we’re absolutely deadly…” Natasha’s own evil grin had stayed strong. “I already love this, and I haven’t even heard the idea yet, sister!”
“Well, I shall explain, then.” Nimika nodded. “As Noruani told us, Nelodine is sensitive and very fragile in her regular, conscious state of mind. But...what if we were to subconsciously alter this a bit? Maybe...control her, a little?”
“Control her…?” Numirra yawned.
“Now I’m extremely interested.” Noruani got a glint to her own eye. “Of course...being me, I think I know where this is going…”
“Yes, Noru. We’re going to combine our powers and create...something similar to a chip or a device. Except, it’ll be organic; a creature. When it latches onto her, she won’t remember that it’s there. Not even when it’s activated.” Nimika snickered. “See, Noruani was right. There’s a gentle balance between Nelodine thinking she’s useless, but could still come back to us...or thinking that she’s useless, and getting rid of herself completely. So, we have to gently ease her our way by controlling her through this...let’s call it a ‘Magic Bug’. Now, the easiest thing would be to just have her immediately turn on her ‘friends’ with this power over her...but that’d be too suspicious. No, we have to take it little by little. Noruani will be in control of the Magic Bug, and thus, will also be able to know what’s going on with our dear, lost sister at any point in time. Noruani will be our observer, and depending on what she sees, she, as well as the rest of us, will command what Nelodine should do at certain points. It’ll be like flipping a switch. We’ll make her act...’differently’ towards her friends. This way, we can cause a natural turn in her behavior and thoughts, as well as those around her.”
“That’s brilliant!” Natasha broke into a joyous cackle.
“Right then. Don’t you worry about a thing. Make the bug, and I’ll find a way to get it to Nelodine.” Noruani agreed with glee.[/color][/i]
“Ehehehehe~! All according to plan...now the real fun can begin…” Noruani continues to giggle creepily in the dark of the forest, near the witch’s hideout...[/color]

“Oooh! Me next, ME NEXT!” Clancy cries, shapeshifts into a tire with a face, and then rolls down the hill after Karl.
“Wait for MEEEEEEEE!” Amber shouts, shapeshifting into a huge spiked rolling pin as she rolls down the hill with them.
Upon reaching the bottom, the two shadows flip into the air, transform back into their default forms, and land on their feet, hand in hand.
“Ta-daaaa~!” Amber sings.
“Right! So, what do ya wanna do first?! We could go to the shadow petting zoo-” Clancy starts.
“-Where ALL the animals have 5 rows of sharp fangs! Even the baby deer!” Amber interjects.
“-Or we could go straight to the carnival, which is pretty much the main part of this whole world!” Clancy continues. “And after we’re done in Shadowland, we can move over to it’s extension, Caria! That’s where Queen Shadowelle lives!”