Although it was nearly impossible to hear over the sounds of the nearby city, there seemed to be quite a ruckus coming from within one of the caves that isn't all that far away from the city itself. Inside said cave, there was a girl that was quite clearly a teenager who was struggling to carry a large jar safely. She held it on her back, grunting with every step and finding herself annoyed every single time the clay container clinked or thumped on her back. This girl's name was Chara, and she was the vassal of Elpis(Hope). As frustrated as she was, she knew that when she got the container up and out of the cave everything would become much easier. Or, rather, that's what she thought. Her foot caught on some kind of stone and she hit the ground, the jar falling from her back and hitting the ground.

Chara was prepared for the destruction of the jar, but it seemed to only crack when it hit the ground. Chara began to shake and her eyes rolled up into her sockets some, as another voice made its way past her lips. "Please, my child, do not drop the jar. The more cracks it holds, the more my essence seeps out."

Her eyes returned to their normal position and she rested a hand on the shoulder of her hip with a face that quite clearly wasn't having it.

"Well, you know, it'd be appreciated if you'd loan some of that strength to me so that I don't drop it."

But no response came and Chara decided that this would be a job much better suited for whoever it was that Elpis had called to the cave, as her fragile city-girl body couldn't very well handle a jar that was so unbelievably dense despite how empty it supposedly was. She got her way out of the cave, leaving the jar on the ground where it was, and stood at the entrance with her eyes darting back and forth across the view that she had of the land. "Whoever it is that's coming, they'd better hurry. I'm not gonna starve myself."

There was a teenage girl wondering through the streets of the city, drenched from head to toe in sea water and had a piece of seaweed in her hair that hadn't yet been noticed by the girl. This was Pearl Carter, daughter of Poseidon, Greek god of the sea, that's where she had just came from, she had been living in the sea for two weeks after some government representatives had found her and chased her to try and put her in a home. That was when she had gotten the calling, Pearl had had a feeling that she needed to leave the sea and go somewhere in or near the city which she had finally gotten to, it had taken four days for her to arrive at the city's port. When she had got there all of the fishermen and sailors had stared at her but she didn't mind, she was used to it but she quickly half-walked, half-jogged away.

She could tell that she was getting close now as she went through the city and came to the edge of it, she could see a group of caves not too far away. So that is where Pearl went, as she got closer she saw a girl, huffing and puffing with her load, she seemed to be carrying a sort of jar. She knew that that was the place and decided to see if the girl needed help even though it was against her nature but she felt that the jar was important although she couldn't tell why. She ran up to the girl and asked in her strong English accent," Would you like some help by any chance?" She knew that she would be able to help, being on the streets for so long had strengthened her even though she was slippery with the water. She figured that a hour in the sun would cure that.

Cia had gotten the call much like others had, Cia however decided to take her sweet time getting there. She had bought herself some whiskey before heading towards the cave. She didn't really care when she got there so long as she had fun on the way there. Cia had already become known throughout the city for her rather impressive liver that could take quite alot of alchohol. Thanks to her being a daughter of Dionsys she had an abnormally strong liver, unlike her mother who could not keep up with Dionsys no matter what. Though hidden much farther in Cia's heart was a darkness that had been known to change her personality into that of a psycho killer.

Cia finally found her way to the cave to see a rather wet looking girl and another trying to carry a jug, something that Cia could easily do with one arm tied behind her back. "Hey what you got in the jar there lady? Is it wine? I bet it's tasty Wine! Aged for quite a few years too!" Cia asked with a rather dumb looking smile on her face. Yes Cia was oblivious but she had fun being oblivious. As Cia got closer she leaned over the jug starting to try and smell it to see if there was any wine in it.

Aiden Williamson, a Demititan and scion of Prometheus, lay on the roof of his car, his arms flexes with his hands folded behind his head and his legs, which dipped a bit at the knees as they lay over his windshield, were crossed at the ankles and his eyes were closed beneath his sunglasses as he enjoyed the warm sun that beat down upon his face and kissed his skin. He let out soft breaths of peaceful near-sleep and his bearded features curled up into a grin, today was going to be a good day.

Or so he thought until he felt something from within him stir and move, a strange feeling that he was all too familiar with, this was a portent of something that was coming, something......bad. GRRMMMBRRBMRFMRMRNMNR went his stomach again. Aiden sighed, he took himself off the top of his car and searched the inside for any sustenance, alas, none. So he checked his wallet, and after finding enough green in there to procure himself some food he drove to the nearest Burger joint and ordered himself two large burgers and a plate of fries.

"Well Crap" he thought to himself as he, having taken his time to smell the food, had turned it around in his hands and suddenly felt his stomach drop, his vision begin to cloud, and then suddenly, nothing. When he awoke he looked around himself and, having seen where he needed to go and needed to do, backed out, growled, went back through the drive-through getting another burger/fry combo and headed for the cave in the middle of nowhere.

Aiden arrived at the cave soon afterward and parked his car on an empty road nearby, he grabbed his walking stick, the extra food, and took off. For where? Only his instinct was leading, but apparently it seemed to be enough as he reached the cave in time to see a three women, one holding an ancient looking Jar and the others sort of loitering about. Seeing Chara and recognizing her from his vision, Aiden tossed her the greasy fast-food bag and then swiftly put himself between Cia and the Jar and said

"Listen, My guess is that we weren't called mystically out here to see a girl with a jug of wine, plus with that crack in it, there's no way it could be filled with wine and not spilling out" Aiden attempted to reason with the woman.

"If there's some kind of divine booze in there, I'm calling dibs."

The voice came from the mouth of the cave. Slightly rough and lower than the average female's, its owner raised an eyebrow at whoever turned to look. At least her voice fit her, with one small, white-pink scar through her lip and another creeping its way up her neck, not to mention the shabby (to put it lightly) appearance of her black leather jacket, boots, and dark jeans. The steel knuckles of her gloves clinked as she adjusted the strap of her equally shabby duffel bag, folding her arms once it was settled.

Leah had been on the move for weeks now—she'd had to drastically change her course to answer the vision that had lanced through her head in the middle of jacking a car. At nineteen years old, she'd long since learned to listen to the strange daydreams she occasionally received. She'd ignored them before, and it hadn't turned out well. Here, in the middle of the woods, she could survive just fine, even if she were more suited to city life, and she'd thought she'd lay low for a while in the cave she'd seen. But no—she arrived to already find a group, arguing over a jar. She looked over each of them in turn with a critical eye, sizing them up, but said nothing more.

"You guys are ridiculous, we were obviously sent here for a reason and all you can think of is booze," Pearl sighed and continued," Look, do any of you know why we are here, it has something to do with that jar and that's all I know." This fighting and ignorance was annoying her, all she wanted to do was do whatever she was supposed to and then go back to her underwater home. She was finally dry and starting to get hot, she had gotten used to the cold of the seawater so this was horrible for her but she knew that if she left she would more than likely regret not finding out what the jar was and what was inside. "What's your name?" she asked the girl carrying the large jar. @Cinderella Man

Too much was happening far too fast for Chara to completely process it as it came to her, and she stood there with a greasy bag in her hands as the people that flocked towards the area began to fight over what was in the jar. She lightly set the bag on the top of a rock before taking a deep breath. "BE QUIET." She stated, loudly and firmly before moving over to the jar and moving it upright. "Very sorry for my rudeness, but I should really let her explain."

Chara's eyes rolled backwards as a bright glow settled over her eye-whites. When her mouth opened, the voice that came out wasn't the harsh, somewhat shrill tone that she had used seconds ago. It was a much more calm, mature voice that could probably ease the troubles of the greatest of beasts. "Hello. Thank you for coming as soon as possible." She curtsied politely, smiling towards those around her. "You were, indeed, called here for a purpose by me, the spirit of Hope. I will attempt to explain, to the best of my ability, why it is that you were called in the first place."

"You see, Death has become restless as of late. He's been taking people far too early, and presumably feeding them to the evils of the world. I am quite sure you all have noticed. Sickness seems to be more common, people seem to be dying too young?" She sighed, a quite distressed look crossing her face. "So I have called you here to help me in convincing Death to stop what he's doing and go back to doing his job properly." As Hope explained, she examined the jar whilst crouched on the ground and tutted lightly as she traced one of the cracks with her finger. "This jar. Shaped generations of life with one decision. Only right that one decision undo that which changed." Hope spoke in a hushed tone, almost as if she was speaking to her self as she stared at the jar.

Pearl took in all of the given information that Hope gave, she felt better now that she knew what was going on. The girl, the jar, it all made sense but she didn't see how she came into it, she wouldn't be able to do anything," Thank you for the explanation and I would be happy to be of any assistance but I'm afraid I don't see what I could do. Why has Death only now become restless after all these years? What's the difference between now and before?" She also wondered to how the girl had managed handling the spirit of Hope, it couldn't be easy.

Cia looked at the girl in confusion. "So, I get that it's not wine in the jar. But what you just said went right over my head kid." Cia said scratching the back of her head. Cia wasn't exactly smart and very often people would have to explain things to her in rather simple words for her to understand it. "And I agree with the wet girl though, what do you need us for? You said we had to convince Death, if you mean convince through beating him up I can understand, but otherwise I have no idea." Cia said. She really did think with her fists, and very rarely actually used her head too much, this was most likely due to her constant drinking taking it's toll on her. She was very easy to manipulate, and if one wanted, they could turn her rather large strength onto her friends if given enough effort.

@Cuccoruler

"I believe that Hope basically said that she wants us to persuade Death to stop killing people before they are meant to be killed," Pearl tried to explain to the other girl," I really don't think that force would convince Death and I think that it should only be used as a last resort anyway." She wasn't one for violence in general but she could put up quite a fight if she needed.

Aiden had been listening carefully to the conversation and as he was his thoughts went to those he had seen who had passed before their time; Brook, Angelo, too many to count. After taking a moment to reflect on these newfound facts, threw in his two cents:

"I think you're right" Aiden said gesturing to wet-looking girl "Besides, how does one even go about threatening death 'give us what we want or we'll send you to you?' something tells me not only would that not go over well, we would all find ourselves dead. Though by the same token I imagine that asking death nicely to stop being a jackass will equally go over like a ton of bricks, No, what I imagine we need is some sort of leverage or blackmail...."

Hope smiled and gestured to Aiden when he brought up leverage, nodding quickly. "Yes, yes, exactly. You see, you all have been looking at this from head-on. I need you to help me convince Death to stop, as I said. But that's going to be nearly impossible while he's so powerful and he's got legions of underlings and horrors," She continued. "So what we're going to do is, we're going to shove the horrors back in the jar." From her expression and tone of voice, it was quite clear that Hope assumed it would be a piece of cake.

"And that, my friends, is where I have to call bullshit," Leah said dryly, approaching the group but staying a good distance away. She hadn't really...been part of a group in a while. A long while. "So you're just giving us this 'simple' task," Leah started, eyebrow raised and sketching airquotes with her fingers, "of shoving 'the horrors' back in this jar. Without telling us what exactly these horrors are, and, I'm assuming, you're just going to leave it all up to us." She folded her arms, settling back on her heels and narrowing her eyes. "If you give us some half-assed riddle as an 'explanation,' I"m out."

@Cinderella Man

"She has a point," Pearl said agreeing with Leah," you're telling us that we are meant to do something without telling us what we are actually meant to do. I can't do anything unless I know what I'm going up against, actually, it's more of a matter that I won't help unless I know how this problem is to be solved. There is always the possibility that you want us to figure it out ourselves but then if you do I would at least like some clues." That would of been a mouthful for most people but she was used to the fact that she talks a lot when she's given a puzzle that she's trying to figure out. She was starting to get frustrated which didn't help her already very talkative mood.

Aiden returned the smile, as he wasn't in the habit of not returning the smile of pretty girls, of course he wasn't exactly in the habit of being smiled at by pretty girls either....

Aiden waited as the others spoke, carefully listening to every word that they said in case it came in handy later. They made some valid points, and the one holding the jar seemed very confident that this task would be easy enough for all of them to handle together, but Aiden wasn't so sure, after making sure the wet-looking one had finished he spoke up saying almost directly to Hope "I think we'd all like some more information, specifically what these things you want us to hunt down can do, and how we shove them back into the box, if you expect us to fight this war, then I suspect that having all the knowledge we can get our hands on is one of the best ways to arm ourselves." Aiden slumped down and sat with his back against a tree as he finished speaking, waiting and looking at Hope pointedly.