[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/wfYSh8s.jpg[/img][/center] [img]https://i.imgur.com/I0DIzZb.png[/img]
As it turned out, Jukati was the first to ask of the skull-faced being of his truth and identity. Indeed, it seemed like a question that might have been placed first, but it wasn’t quite so with the group gathered. By means of proximity, all the Abyss’ former prisoners stood in one area, moving about and doing as they were told. The speak of an alliance was fresh in the air and so the skull-faced being saw no reason not to answer the oni’s inquiry. [color=ed1c24]“My name is irrelevant. It is lost in shadow and time, but if there is anything to address me as…it is Ignis. Lord Ignis.” [/color]

He stood where he stood and stared where he did, placing an unreadable face on Willowa. [color=ed1c24]“You will waste breath trying to coax that girl into talking; for she is the very will that once held us under these depths, the caverns that breathed and the waters that swallowed. She is the sole, true jailer of this Abyss and the reason you have all been locked down here for some time. You may address her as Pandora, for now that she is in our grasp; she will become a valuable ally.”[/color]

The man who wore his skull spoke in rhythms, almost eloquently. He gave no pause in his mannerisms, nor did he take time to explain his meanings. But he had a point. By whatever reason, if this girl, this Pandora, was as he said, then it was priority to keep her at their side. Indeed, Ignis had since moved beside the girl who trailed him, lifting his dark coat and parting it to rest around her shoulders. [color=ed1c24]“Thus, it’s good to see we’re in agreement of unity, Emperor Velo, Azrael…and Chryseis, is it. I believe you will make admirable allies under the right hand.”[/color]

Ignis turned his face to observe the oni, though his sight moved past her and towards the rat and the cat. [color=ed1c24]“Even you, trifling. Yes, I have observed you as well. And that is why I am ordering our newest ally to keep a very careful eye on you,”[/color] he said, referring to the cat crouching in the shadows. Ignis’ eyes would linger on Rafiq for a moment longer before greater factors were more needing of his attention. [color=ed1c24]“If we are to be as one, we will need several components. A base of operations, as a starting point.”[/color]

The skull-faced being raised his staff and pointed it at the wolf who attacked Raula. [color=ed1c24]“Information. Information must be extracted from this pup. Where his leader hides, we will take. Where they have fortressed themselves, we will make our own. To escape to the surface, we must ensure we do so with no one among the Abyss to impair us.”[/color] Apart from the dripping noises of the Lagoon’s steady atmosphere, there were also the groans of deformed wolves still resonate in the area. Indeed, Willowa made no exaggeration to the questionable usefulness of the surviving wolves but if Ignis was concerned, he did not show it. 

[color=ed1c24]“As long as they breathe and bleed, they have some use for us. There are ways of which beyond alchemical properties. After all, once we’ve made this prison our own, they may be the first to atone for our mercy as loyal lap dogs.”[/color] He said this almost vaguely, some unseen, unkempt darkness shrouded in intent towards the hapless wolves. But that was neither here nor there. Ignis raised his staff and smacked the end to the ground, as if dropping the gavel in some human courthouse. Such was its intensity against the stone that small ripples formed atop the Lagoon’s surface.

[color=ed1c24]“We conquer what we must; only then will our revenge and escape be achieved. As soon as the wolves tell us where they remain, we will conquer them too. This is the first step in making this prison into our sanctuary.”[/color]
[img]https://i.imgur.com/I0DIzZb.png[/img]