[h1][color=778899]A[/color]maryllis and [color=tomato]O[/color]ros[/h1][sub]Cold and Hot[/sub]

Even shrouded by clouds and besieged by barbarians and beasts alike, Penrose shone with the light of a thousand stars, electricity crackling through them and shedding brilliance against the snow-draped city. Softly, the winds of winter whispered, filling the tense silence with their suggestions and their assumptions, their wordless view of the world below. Few men still dared travel the roads of the humble city; when monstrosities so boldly revealed themselves, what hope could one have of a peaceful life? Only the supernatural paraded these avenues now, and the city continued to fall into disrepair.

Still, still, the boon of geniuses from eras ago filled this dark world with light, and still, the darkness that surrounded the city, formless and endless, could not fully make the world of mankind their own.

For her kindred and herself stood, bastions still in this desolate winterland, and in her hand, she wielded a brand brimming with lunar light. So long as there were those who slew monsters, the light of civilization would not be snuffed. So long as she drew breath, Penrose would still have a protector.

[color=778899]“[i]They[/i] yearn for purity, so that they may defile it.”[/color]

A corrupting light thrummed from her chest, base instincts rising up in her skin even the power of the Infectious Yearn expanded further outwards. Her Sword thrummed in her hands, excitement racing up her lungs in a vicious haze. The Knight of Rose had promised a mountain of monsters as recompense for the deaths she denied that night.

Now, she would fulfill her vows.

One step, and she descended, plummeting deep into the living shadows of the city.

[hr]

Amaryllis would have no problem finding monsters. It hadn’t even been an hour and her sword had found many. It was working just as Brittany said it would. OR HOWEVER THAT PART OF THE COLLAB WENT I WASN’T THERE! WAS THERE EVEN A COLLAB GEE WIZ

In the late hour of the night, Amaryllis would come across another girl. Her style was so loud that Amaryllis could practically hear her outfit before she saw it. It looked like she went into a designer clothing store and put on the finest jacket she could get her hands on. While the coat was striking, it wasn’t really the best for the weather. Her legs were clad in nothing but a pantyhose, and her shorts couldn’t have done that much to ward off the cold. While her jacket looked thick and warm, it was open, revealing a tube sweater with such a low cut that would give most men whiplash and cause woman to blush. Despite her clothing choice, she did not have the demeanor of the sex goddess she was trying to dress up as. She was jogging with a piece of toast in her mouth. She would occasionally use her hand to make sure it didn’t fall out of her mouth. If it was earlier in the day, it wouldn’t be hard to picture a girl like this rushing off to get to the movies or some special outing like that. She didn’t have a flashlight, nor did she have anything else that would help her see at this hour of the day. Her gaze was locked on something straight ahead. Something that wasn’t Amaryllis.

As she ran past, she looked at the rose knight. The piece of buttered toast that bounced in her mouth slowed with the cadence of her feet. She had come to a complete stop behind Amaryllis, looking at her over her shoulder.

A flick of the wrist, and the viscera of the swordswoman’s latest kill slipped off her polished blade as she stopped as well, taking an instance of reprieve. Though the more intelligent monstrosities resisted the urge, culling the horde held meaning too in restoring order within Penrose. Slay the mindless and convince the intelligent to scamper off elsewhere. She glanced back at the skimpily-dressed girl, but spoke nothing.

Penrose was filled with magical girls, after all, and she wasn’t the Ascendancy. So long as the monster girl behind her could repress the disturbed urges brought forth by her mutations,  the Knight had no quarrel. Closing her eyes to listen for areas of activity within the labyrinthine alleyways, Amaryllis strode off once more.

[hr]

Amaryllis would have difficulty finding anything else in the area though. There were always some monsters around at this hour, but things had gotten really quiet. Had something killed them all? Had another monster called them away? The sword did not yet have its pile of corpses, and it would remind Amaryllis every now and again.

Then a young woman’s scream pierced the air.

Energy returned to Amaryllis’s legs as she sprinted towards the sound. Down a dark alley there was another magical girl. One with pink hair and a black outfit. She was trying to scream, but some monstrous appendage had coiled around her mouth. It also had a tentacle around both of her wrists, and a fourth one was dragging her Katana around a corner. She attempted to struggle against her attacker, which retaliated by slamming her against the wall. It shook the building, and she suddenly lost her strength. The blow had to be painful, or at least put her in a state of vertigo.

When the fourth tentacle returned, it had a fluted spear sticking out of it. Not unlike the appendage a mosquito uses to feed. Just as the girl started to recover, she took notice of the spear hovering over her chest. Her breathing became more erratic. She struggled, but her arms were already right where the monster wanted her. She closed her eyes as the tentacle pulled back before thrusting into her rib cage.

A flash of silver, and the tentacle split into four, streaming out on all sides of the pink-haired girl. Before she could be tainted by the spray of monstrous blood, silver coated the wounds and raced down further to encase the entire tentacle in a mold of metal. The Knight of Rose, heralded by rusted petals, had arrived. One step in, and she sliced through the appendage wrapped around the maiden’s right arm, clasping it in her left and leading the girl into a spin. The second appendage twisted as well, severed as she drew her Sword back in a reverse draw cut. The final, most intrusive one seemed to simply fall off her face, chains of ivy forming a lattice over it that restrained even the flow of fluids through the flesh.

Surrounded on all sides by the restrained monstrosity, the two ladies twirled in the moonlight, and stopped in a dip that brought the pink-haired girl almost perpendicular to the ground. Staring deep into her eyes, the swordswoman spoke. [color=778899]“I am Amaryllis Evenings, Knight of Rose. Shall I offer you the liberty of becoming your own avenger? Or do you desire I take that mantle and slay this creature in your stead?”[/color]

The girl blinked a few times. Then at last she grinned. Her sword levitated into the air and thrust at whatever was hiding behind the corner. The squirming tentacles went limp, only to dissipate into smoke as time progressed. It was almost anti-climatic, but not everyone could be as flashy as the knight of rose. 

Her arms slid around Amaryllis’s back, and the pink haired maiden sniffed the air. The breach between their faces closing with each passing second. [color=Tomato]“I’m Oros, and I like flowers myself.”[/color] Her eyes darted down to the glow coming from Amaryllis’s chest. [color=Tomato]“Is that a unicorn horn in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?”[/color]

[color=778899]“Can one not be beholden to both?”[/color] Amaryllis responded. Gently but firmly, she pulled Oros up once more. [color=778899]“It warms my heart, having disarmed this foul beast before it could claim the life of a sister, and if more of these aberrations come, this facsimile of a purebeast’s horn, stained as it is in the blackest of magics, will ensnare them to my attention, rather than scramble for you.”[/color]

[color=Tomato]“So I gotta keep you close? Okay, I can do that.”[/color] Oros hugged Amaryllis tighter. She stood motionless and didn’t say anything for a time. [color=Tomato]“Thanks, Amy. I feel [i]really[/i] safe like this. Can you feel my heartbeat? I’m still a little nervous.”[/color] She rested her head on Amaryllis’s shoulder. [color=Tomato]“Mmmm, so you just run around stabbing monsters and saving maidens? That’s pretty heroic.”[/color]

[color=778899]“Nay, merely my obligations.”[/color] Amaryllis twitched slightly as Oros embraced her, but forced her shoulders to relax after a steadying breath. [color=778899]“The night carries on, and my Sword thirsts for more, but if you wish, maiden, I shall safeguard you on your journey back to your abode.”[/color] Placing her offhand on her shoulder, she gently pushed the pink-haired girl back, creating some distance between the two again.

[color=778899]“If you lack any such abode, however, I’ve heard of a hotel run by a Lesser Force in the area.”[/color]

[color=tomato]"Abode, you’re so frickin’ funny with your vocabulary. I’d pinch your cheek if I wasn’t bear hugging you! Haha!"[/color] She picked her head back up. [color=tomato]"You know now that I’m holding you like this, I’ve kind of become aware of a tragic fact."[/color] She locked her eyes with Amaryllis. [color=tomato]"Amy, you’re kinda large, aren’t you? You’re thicker than a DQ milkshake, more beef than a Big Mac. You know what I’m saying? It’s not my favorite body shape, but I can’t lie: You. Are. A. Snack."[/color] She stared at Amaryllis for a moment. Were those pink hearts in her eyes? Yet the rest of her face had contorted into a snarl. [color=tomato]"What the shit are you even doing Amy?! You’re walking around in a winter wonderland late at night, wearing the equivalent monster perfume, rescuing girls and what not."[/color] As she spoke, her skin turned darker and darker shades of red. [color=tomato]"And you’re so oblivious to my sexual innuendos it just makes me wana-"[/color] She threw back her head to scream, only to then throw her head forward into Amaryllis’s ‘pocket.’

That is to say the source of the dark glow.

Her body was faster than her mind.

As Oros swung her head in, Amaryllis caught her by the chin, holding her face back with the heel of her palm. Not enough force to strike, only to arrest the magical girl’s movements.

[color=778899]“[i]I[/i] seek neither.”[/color]

The dark glow died, the debased horn losing its alluring hue. She maintained the tautness of her arm for a moment longer, her muscles almost looking as if carved out of marble, but still, the knight answered not to her blade’s call for bloodspilling. [color=778899]“My apologies,”[/color] Amaryllis spoke. [color=778899]“The broker had certainly elaborated upon this artifact’s influences over even those only partially steeped in impurity, but I had not recognized you as one of them, Oros. Have you reined your impulses in?”[/color]

[color=tomato]"Yea I’m cool."[/color] Oros said, as if absolutely nothing had happened. Her chin was still resting on Amaryllis’s palm, and whatever was going on with her eyes seemed to have worn off. [color=tomato]"Can’t believe I have to wait two whole seasons to get that swole. Better than the five seasons I’ll need to catch up to Penny. Am I even going to be alive that long? Shit that’s depressing."[/color] Oros hands slid further up Amaryllis’s back. [color=tomato]"Though FYI, I could have undone your bra strap. But I’m going to date Mary so I don’t want to screw that up."[/color] Her arms slid off of Amaryllis and hung at her sides. 

[color=tomato]"Anyway, this is kind of a shitty way to end things."[/color] She tapped her foot. [color=tomato]"You want to hunt monsters right?"[/color]

The Knight of Rose remained unmoved by Oros’s chatter, if only because she didn’t wear a bra to begin with. Still, seasons? Certainly, it was an interesting way to denote the passage of time, even though Amaryllis didn’t believe herself that she had been active for eight months yet. The talk of monsters drew her thoughts away from such topics though, and she nodded. [color=778899]“I’ve promised my Patron to deliver a mountain of monsters upon their banquet hall, yes, though it certainly wasn’t my intention to have you caught up in it either.”[/color]

[color=tomato]"Of course you didn’t! But that’s because you thought I was a damsel that needed rescuing."[/color] The maiden set her hands on her hips and laughed.  [color=tomato]"Anyway, I know where the bigger ones like to hide. Usually with their shit-eating minions. Important question though, ice skating or hockey?"[/color]

Amaryllis raised a brow at the question. Wasn’t one just an extension of the other? Still, while she could admire the tenacity and physicality of hockey players, it was certainly an uncouth competition, when giving in to adrenaline and rage was ingrained in the spectacle of the sport. [color=778899]“Ice skating,”[/color] she replied. [color=778899]“However, my feet are much less accustomed to handling blades than my hands are.”[/color]

[color=tomato]"Imagine not being as good at doing something with your feet that you can do with your hands."[/color] She shook her head. [color=tomato]"An ice skater magical girl would be cool, pun intended. Too bad Penrose already has too many magical girls."[/color] Oros pulled out a pair of ice skates. [color=tomato]"So if you’re not boring, you’ll put these on."[/color]

[hr]

Oros had guided Amaryllis to the harbor. A very specific part of the harbor where there did not appear to be any boats. Oros had her ice skates on and was tracing figure eights and loops into the ice. At one point she wrote her name in cursive. 

[color=tomato]"Flip on your thing and hop down here. I promise they’ll come screaming outa here. It’ll be like you’re wearing lewd cosplay to an anime convention, only the monsters probably smell better."[/color]

Amaryllis gazed pensively at her companion. [color=778899]“And what of the influence the artifact has on yourself?”[/color]

[color=tomato]"I’m just gunna hang back."[/color] Oros was skating backwards. [color=tomato]"Wouldn’t wanna become part of your sword’s meal. Or ‘banquet’ if you wanna be pretentious."[/color] she reached behind her back and grabbed her heel, which she had raised behind herself. [color=tomato]"If I scare you though, you can always turn it off once they show up. I could also pay you for it."[/color] She held up a gold coin. [color=tomato]"This is worth eight silver right?"[/color] She squinted her eyes. [color=tomato]"Unless the grand magistrates shifted the continuum to increase the value of silver and bronze coins. You’ve gone too far this time!"[/color]

[color=778899]“No, that’s quite alright. Though I know not who these Grand Magistrates are, it’s recompense enough for you to introduce new hunting grounds to me.”[/color] She sat down at the edge of the harbor, her heels hanging off in mid-air. Watching Oros skate for a moment, Amaryllis visualized the same blades that the pink-haired monster girl skated on, before weaving her Metal magic into her shoes. Polished blades extended out from the soles in a crystalline fashion, and she carefully hopped down onto the ice below. Amaryllis pushed off, glided for a couple feet, and then pushed off with her other feet, slowly getting into the rhythm of it now.

Her lines weren’t so crisp as Oros’s, but she maintained her balance. It would be harder to stop on a dime though, and she’d have to be careful about how much strength she put into her legs too, lest the ice crack underneath the force of legs strong enough to send a sedan ten meters into the air.

A challenge then.

An aurora of malevolent energies exuded from the Knight of Rose once more, magenta ethers seeping out from the defiled horn in waves as she fed her artifact. In her hand, her Silverlight flourished, slicing crisp lines in the frosty air.

Seconds ticked on.

[i]Crack.[/i]

Amaryllis glided to the side, dropping low on the ice as a dark blur shot out. More shapes followed, riddling the skating rink with holes. Fast. Almost fast enough that her eyes couldn’t track them. The darkened silhouettes crashed into the ice once more, before worming themselves up onto their flippers. In the moonlight, their form, their nature was revealed in all its slippery, spiny beauty.

The porcupoises have arrived.

Oros continued to skate around, even as the creatures burrowed up all around her. [color=tomato]"I forgot how ugly they were, little shit-prickers! But see? They just took a bath. They can’t smell bad after a bath!"[/color]

The monsters seemed to ignore Oros and instead crawled closer to Amaryllis. They placed their front flippers over their heads before bending over. Then with a hop, they seemed to [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2xhfjIEcik]spin in place[/url] before jetting towards Amaryllis at high speed.

And the Knight of Rose skated to meet them. The ice beneath their feet were becoming more unsteady now, the holes punched into it cracking under the weight of the porcupoises, but remained steady, positioning herself sideways as the creatures leapt at her. Their spines flared out of their body, layering upon each other to turn each porcupoise into living spears. With no weapons beyond what their body had, however, they had no way of fighting in any other way. She dug her skates deep into the ice, cut off the magic that supplied the Infectious Yearn, and cut them down.

There were no bodies of flesh and bone that could withstand the bite of her Sword.

[color=778899]“Oros, I’ll leave the ones that retreat to you!”[/color]

[color=tomato]"Hmmm?"[/color] The shrine maiden turned her head. [color=tomato]"I mean, yea! Sure, why not?"[/color] There weren’t many monsters left once Amaryllis was done attacking, but a few had turned to flee.

There were here to ice skate as well as fight, or at least Oros was. She leaned folward so that she could raise her hind leg behind herself. Then with all her might, she swung her leg forward while leaping into the air. Before completing her first rotation, her sword flew out of her sheathe and cut one of the creatures in two. A second creature was decapitated, and a third one was minced by an array of carefully positioned swings. She landed after performing a perfect quadruple axel, and her sword arm was covered in quills. The last porcupoise was prepared to dive back into the sea when the needles came flying out of Oros’s arm. The porcupoise was juggled in the air by a salvo of flying needles. The last needle hit the creature between the eyes before it was allowed to sink.

[color=tomato]"He now has enough holes for all his friends. Am I right, ladies?"[/color] 

But that was just the first wave. Off in the distance, A creature slightly larger than a porcupoise revealed itself. It had a black and white body, and its quills were even longer than before. The Hystricia had surfaced to see what became of its minions. 

[color=tomato]"Oh man oh god! Oh man, oh god!"[/color] Oros skated up to Amaryllis. [color=tomato]"We should do a duet!"[/color]

[color=778899]“Ah.”[/color]

While Oros was excited, Amaryllis was very much not. This wasn’t a foe that was necessarily leagues above the porcupoises she had made sashimi out of moments ago, but rather, this was the foe that was just enough to become the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Or in this case, the mammal that broke the ice.

As the ice broke into bits, the dozens of holes connecting to each other with fractures, Amaryllis recalled a very different situation, during a much warmer day. Grabbing Oros, she hurled the monster girl skywards with the force of a baseball pitcher who could pitch sedans.

And then she hit the water.

[color=tomato]"Huh."[/color] Oros said as her body soared through the air. [color=tomato]"I just realized how absurd Keijo is."[/color] She continued to have her discussion with no one in particular. [color=tomato]"Everyone wears a bathing suit, but the goal is to avoid touching the water. Everyone is dressing up like they’re going to lose."[/color] She placed a hand on her chest. [color=tomato]"Meanwhile, I’m not wearing a bathing suit, and I’m all about getting wet."[/color] She winked before plunging head first into the depths.

[hr]

Meanwhile, the porcupoises and hystricia were able to make use of their underwater mobility. Mobility that the magical girls present didn’t possess. The hystricia surged forward as its smaller counterparts spun underwater. Even below the waves, they were capable of spin dashing. 

No, that wasn’t wholly correct. Below the waves, their spin dashes became even more potent, their quills extending outwards to form propellers that shot them up at increased speeds! Miniature tornados, the remaining pack of porcupoises and their hystricia leader zoomed towards the two humans who had plummeted into an alien battlefield.

In the shock of freezing water, Amaryllis bit into her lower lip just to keep herself conscious. Dark waters surged all around, her pale flesh turning white in the frigid temperatures. Had her muscles turned sluggish, or was it just the resistance of water, pulling at her whenever she tried to move? Too dark to see where her enemies were, only that above, chunks of ice still bobbed up and down in the choppy waters. Holding onto her breath, forcing her blood to pump faster through her veins and counteract the cold, the Knight of Rose began to kick her feet, swimming upwards.

A phantom pain hammered into her back, and Amaryllis turned around just in time to block a porcupoise with her Sword, the monster catching onto the blade with a tangle of quills. Underwater combat was their domain, and they could hold their breath longer than any normal magical girl too. With a powerful flex of their tailfin, they swam further away from the harbor, pushing Amaryllis horizontally to prevent any ascent.

Ten seconds. She had ten seconds of oxygen left, before things became even worse.

And Oros was nowhere in sight. Nowhere to be heard even, despite never shutting up. Then again, Amaryllis had thrown Oros into the air. If she landed in the water, she had probably been separated. Though a bull shark had shown up from the direction of the harbor. It swam right for the monsters without a care in the world.  

As dangerous as the monsters appeared, even porcupines didn’t have quills everywhere. Their bellies and faces were exposed to their predators, who often attacked these areas when they could. The bull shark was no different. It charged straight for a porcupoise’s exposed stomach and bit into it. Rather than letting go, it used the creature as a battering ram and strike another. It seemed Amaryllis had a friend in the sea today.

She didn’t know where the shark had come from or why it had chosen to help her, but the split second it bought Amaryllis was enough for the Knight of Rose to regain her composure. If she couldn’t reach the surface, then she would simply have to bring the surface to her!

Sliding her Sword back to her side, Amaryllis let the final bubbles of air left in her lungs hiss out between clenched teeth. She watched the direction they floated and stabilized her footing with two bulbs of silvered buds. The water was cold. Her temperature was dropping. Her hair floated in and out of her eyes, obscuring her vision. And from above now, the hystricia descended, fully armored in quills.

The Knight of Rose unleashed her strike.

The hystricia went flying, and she took her second breath of air as the waters parted.

The shark sped off in the direction of the hystricia, which had likely been killed or weakened by the attack. The remaining porcupoise had lost interest in Amaryllis and swam away to join up with their leader. The water was already dark at this hour of the night, but now it was also clouded with blood. The knight of rose was still able to find the surface of the waves.

Once she surfaced, she could see several monster corpses. Amaryllis was far away from the harbor, so none of these had been killed by her. Not one of them had been killed by a blade. Some of them had their stomachs bitten open, while others had been decapitated. A few unlucky ones had simply been speared on each other. Their blood looked like spilled oil or gasoline on the surface of the water. Splotches of various colors leaking out of the strange monsters. It wasn’t clear which direction led back to the harbor, but Amaryllis wouldn’t have to wait more than a few seconds for someone to discover her. 

[color=tomato]"Amy!"[/color]

Oros was paddling an inflatable raft over to her position. She had a life vest on, and was drenched. She wiped something off of her mouth as she approached. 

[color=tomato]"That was frickin’ badass!"[/color] She tossed a life saver at the freezing magical girl. [color=tomato]"You tossed me to safety, and then you took on all of those critters underwater."[/color] She laughed. [color=tomato]"Anyway, get your ass in this boat."[/color]

The life saver had a rope attached to it, which Oros used to pull Amaryllis closer to the raft. Once she was safely inside, Oros held out a towel for her. Though Oros’s eyebrows flicked upwards at a sudden realization. [color=tomato]"You were never wearing a bra to begin with?"[/color]

Amaryllis sighed with some small relief as she climbed aboard the lifeboat. She hugged herself close as she shivered, teeth chattering against the cold. Environmental Sealing was beginning to sound like an amazing perk at this moment.

[color=778899]“It doesn’t come with the outfit,”[/color] she said between chattering teeth. [color=778899]“But more importantly, there was a shark too. Helped me for some reason.”[/color]

She draped the towel over her body, but still, the night breeze and the dampness of her hair and skin sucked heat out of her body.

[color=tomato]"Oh! Yea, that was me."[/color] Oros turned her arm into a shark fin and flapped it around. [color=tomato]"You looked like you had it all well under control, so I just took care of the stragglers."[/color] Her arm turned back. [color=tomato]"I’m a little disappointed in the monsters though. I mean first of all, they were just a mish-mash of existing creatures. Secondly, that spin dash move is really situational. I’d feel weird using it just because they weren’t hedgefins that were using it."[/color] She reclined backwards into the raft, letting her arms prop up her torso. [color=tomato]"Well, you look kind of cold. It’s probably not a good idea to keep fighting like that."[/color] She grinned. [color=tomato]"Do you have a preferred way of getting warm?"[/color]

[color=778899]“Ah, a wearer of a thousand skins,”[/color] Amaryllis nodded. [color=778899]“I thank you for your assistance then, Oros. As for recovering from this dreadful chill that has seeped into my very soul…”[/color]

She paused, remembering the warmth of a hot meal after three days out in the woods. The spiciness of fried chicken, the saltiness of the broth, the textures of minced garlic and spring onions, the melting of slow-cooked meat. She had been eating a lot ever since she became a magical girl, huh?

[color=778899]“...noodle soup would be a comfort unmatched by anything but the embrace of another human being.”[/color]

The maiden raised a single eyebrow. [color=tomato]"Really? Didn’t figure you for the type to say something like that."[/color] Her grin widened. [color=tomato]"I think I know of [i]one[/i] thing that can make you even warmer."[/color] Oros shook off her arms until they were somewhat dry before embracing Amaryllis a second time. But this time something was different. Everything behind Oros started to disappear. The raft, the water, even the stars in the sky were being consumed by a shadow. Soon, darkness blanketed Amaryllis’s entire vision. She felt a brief chill and then…

Sunlight.

Amaryllis and Oros were still in the raft, but they had been transported to what looked like the beach dimension. The cold air of penrose had been replaced by the sweltering heat of Dan’s dimension. It felt like she had just been rolled out of a freezer. Oros no longer felt warm. If anything, she was doing more to prevent Amaryllis from overheating. 

But when Oros lifted her head to meet Amaryllis’s gaze, she could see pink hearts in her eyes again.

[color=tomato]"Turnitoffturnitoffturnitoffturnitoffturnitoff!"[/color]

[color=778899]“Oh.”[/color]

A flicker, and the horn became inert once more. Amaryllis gently pushed Oros off her and stood up to survey the location she had been transported to. She couldn’t feel the tug of Penrose’s barrier, that was for sure. So that would make it...Dan’s beach resort? The Knight of Rose slipped off her boots and let her feet into the warm, salty waters.

[color=778899]“Your Patron is Dan?”[/color]

Oros had simply allowed herself to fall onto her back with her arms crossed above her head. She was breathing deeply, like she had just run a marathon. [color=tomato]"Nah, I just found this place in my travels."[/color] She picked up her sword and looked into the sheen. [color=tomato]"This isn’t my first time in Penrose, I’ve been to that shit hole a few times. A bit more exciting than here I’ll admit."[/color] With a sigh, she lowered her sword back into the sand. [color=tomato]"I didn’t entirely bring you here for the warmth. I have some business to conduct here too."[/color] Oros stood back up. She slid her arms out of her robes, which caused the top half of her outfit to fall around her waist. [color=tomato]"Shouldn’t take me too long."[/color] A frilly bikini top appeared in her outstretched hand, which she started to put on. [color=tomato]"You’re fine if I leave you alone for a bit right? I’ll be back in thirty tops."[/color]

[color=778899]“So long as your work does not add Penrose-esque excitement to this realm, feel free to,”[/color] Amaryllis waved. She took in a breath, enjoying the saltiness of the ocean waves and the gentle grittiness of the sand squeezing between her toes. [color=778899]“A moment of respite is never unwelcome the morn beyond a clash. Though this change in light and dark will doubtlessly befuddle my natural understanding of temporal cycles.”[/color]

[color=tomato]"Heh!"[/color] With a tug, her bikini top was secured. Oros immediately set off towards her destination. [color=tomato]"Tempura cycles? If you’re still cold when I get back, maybe we’ll get something to eat. Otherwise, we’ll hunt more monsters. The bestiary is a little empty at the moment."[/color]

Amaryllis smiled, and then turned her gaze back to the unending oceans, grateful for a moment without the haranguing of her Patron.

[color=778899]“Perhaps read a book or two as well.”[/color]