[h2]Shi, the Quiet Killer[/h2]

As Shi walked, she felt as if there were eyes on her. It was a feeling she couldn't stand... why was someone else watching her? It was bad enough already... so many people, it made it hard to breath. She felt so closed up inside. The tiny girl's heart hammered in her chest, as growing nervousness swelled ever higher. She couldn't handle this. What's more, she couldn't risk being followed to her destination. The white-haired girl had to avoid being witnessed, avoid being seen acting as her true purpose no matter what it took. Naturally, this extended beyond simply avoiding the eyes of others. Far, far beyond it. But she had to lose whoever was following her. As much as she didn't want to be in a crowd, with so many people around her, so close... losing someone like this wouldn't be hard, would it?

Shi glanced over her shoulder to try and get a quick look at who was following her, taking her eyes off her path for only a second. She felt herself hit someone, some person, and with a yelp fell backwards onto her bottom, the book tumbling from her hands as she tried to brace herself to avoid knocking her head on the concrete.

Realizing what she had done, the white-haired girl sat completely still for a moment, before slowly looking up towards the person she'd knocked into. Shi's red eyes were wide, her lower lip trembling as her body lightly quaked.

[hr]

[h2]Ando Asami, Closer to the Origin?[/h2]

Asami's hands remained firmly in her pockets as she walked along. She came to a pause after a few moments, her eyes travelling over the nearby storefronts. There was a ramen shop, apparently quite a decent one. [i]Takaki's[/i], ran by a young woman who was apparently quite popular in some circles. There was certainly plenty of time for ramen, that was for sure. It was strange, in spite of this still being a city, it had that nature that only a small town could hold. That way a shop could be known by nearly anyone who lived there. It wasn't something Asami was used to, she had to confess. She lived near Tokyo, and naturally that wasn't anything like a small town. But here, in Rokuro, it was like some sort of hybrid.

It was an odd place to wage such a battle, but it was the only place that permitted such a thing, wasn't it? The only place the White Night could exist in this world. It was a combination of so many factors. As Asami understood, one of them was Japan's isolation from the influence of Mage Circles so long ago, when the ritual was first conducted. That was, at least, part of the explanation for the location as she knew it.

Regardless, this wasn't getting her any closer to filling her stomach. Asami approached the humble storefront, pushing the glass doors open. Immediately she was struck with the delicious smell of ramen... all varieties.

It spoke deeply to her empty stomach.

"Ah, hello there!" said a cheerful, if somewhat rushed, voice from behind the counter. [url=http://safebooru.org//samples/1451/sample_e6ae478944819538614a7671f152ea35bf97585c.jpg?1519875]It was the shop's owner[/url], a young woman with short brown hair. Asami returned her smile.

"Hello," she began, brushing her long red hair back, "I'll be a minute, I have to decide on what I'm ordering."

"Ah, right, good! Er, sorry, things are a little hectic!" the girl replied, hurrying off to attend to one of the other customers.

Right.

A meal to fill her stomach before the night. Before the fighting began.