[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/5FqwUwv.jpg?1[/img]
[h3][b][color=00aeef]Chinami Nadakai[/color][/b][/h3][/center]
[@Dezuel][@Letter Bee]

Chinami strangled the venom that wanted to continue to pour from her lips, her expression most keenly akin to annoyance. She knew she was probably going slightly too far, but now that she'd started, a large part of her wanted to go all the way, to mercilessly push forward until she'd burned these fledgling social bridges to ash. Some part of her acknowledged that drive to [i]finish[/i] things as [i]habit[/i] of all things. After all, in a twisted way, she worked very well with Suzakura when it came to putting others in their place.

Suzakura was... not quite as clever as he perhaps thought he was. His jokes were puerile. His taunts were childish and obvious to the point that only those with exceptionally thin skin would be taken in by them immediately. However, he was also extremely annoying in his relentlessness, unrepentance and nigh-unkillability, and [i]that[/i] more than anything else was what got under people's skin, the fact that he could get away with nearly anything without lasting consequences. And all the while, Chinami would hang back and -as was her habit- watch carefully, examining the cracks he opened in others' facades, quietly digging deep into their core selves and motivations. And then, if she had to? She'd use her discoveries to tear them apart. In a lot of ways, she could say there was something far more viscerally satisfying about destroying someone with nothing but words. She knew it wasn't exactly right for her to feel that way, but it was the reality of things. Uncommon though the occasion was, she enjoyed it.

So, she could absolutely lean into that, destroy this bond before it had any chance to really matter to her. These two... Normally, she needed days or more of incidents to fully dig into someone enough to rip through them... But these two were so painfully open that she already had nuclear levels of ammunition. It would be so [i]easy[/i]. But was that what she really wanted? She wasn't sure.

Chinami lightly smacked Reverio's hand away with a scowl, sighing in resignation, [color=00aeef]"You really don't understand what you were doing, huh?"[/color] Her eyes had traces of disappointment in them. [color=00aeef]"Dinner? As if. I have more important things to do than being strung along."[/color] She sighed again at Ken's... sufficient and yet strangely empty feeling apology but nodded slightly all the same. [color=00aeef]"Neither of you get it."[/color] Her jaw set. [color=00aeef]"Since when did I ever imply that this was going to be a repeat performance. I only came here today to return the coat, nothing else. We aren't friends. Hell, we're not even friendly acquaintances, just allies of convenience. And frankly, that old saying is bullshit. The enemy of my enemy is not, in fact, my friend. They're just the enemy of my enemy. If they also happen to be my ally and friend, then that's just a happy coincidence."[/color]

She crossed her arms, looking suddenly tired. Some unusually large part of her preened at the compliments, but she shoved it down nonetheless. [color=00aeef]"I'm not brave, just stubborn. Frankly, if it weren't for the fact that what Nightman was doing pushed several... particular buttons of mine, I never would have interfered in your fates. So, don't assign unnecessary altruism to my actions."[/color]

[color=00aeef]"As for what Nightman wanted..."[/color] Chinami's face screwed up into several complicated expressions before finally settling on a strange neutrality that seemed to put a small slump in her shoulders. [color=00aeef]"I doubt it was anything so grandiose. I talked to him a bit before I left. At the end of the day, he was just a man who lost his way, corrupted by an easily abused power and beaten down by failure. Nothing complicated, just human nature. No..."[/color] She huffed. [color=00aeef]"He just wanted to take power from those he felt didn't deserve it. I don't see what further 'truth' could possibly need to be uncovered."[/color] That was what she wanted to believe, certainly. The last thing she needed was for Nightman to simply be the tip of the iceberg to a full-on genuine conspiracy to awaken some sort of long-forgotten evil or other bullshit. She didn't want it to be true. She wanted it to be [i]over[/i] and [i]done[/i] with. And she most certainly wasn't going to encourage the fantastical "heroic" delusions of a pair of boys that wanted their trials to mean something, to be part of some greater villainy for them to defeat. Why risk them pointlessly throwing themselves at danger? Why risk herself being dragged into it again?

Quite notably, she did not address either Nightman's fate or the "burning star".

[color=00aeef]"And besides, royal line? [i]Me[/i]?"[/color] Chinami snorted in what seemed to be genuine amusement, a series of chuckles breaking from her lips, before she sobered up and wiped away a tear of mirth. [color=00aeef]"As if. That would be the day. Somehow, I doubt archeology is the profession you take up when you have a royal legacy to fall back on."[/color] Then again, as far as she knew, it was never about the money so much as the passion her parents had been concerned with... even power. They had, after all, sought out magical ruins and objects above all else. [color=00aeef]"Until yesterday, I'd not so much as shared the same air as anything royal... unless we're talking ancient artifacts and such."[/color] She shrugged noncommittally. She knew her mother's life well enough from when they were handling legal documentation to reenter society to say for certain that Harumi was no royal. Though, her father was... less certain and his birth origins unknown to her mother. Apparently, it had been a shotgun romance and marriage of passion between the two, but Chinami was not even slightly surprised at the careless impulsiveness. It was what she'd come to expect from them. Even so, he wasn't royal. He couldn't be. Someone would have noticed. At least one person would have made a comment on it with her in the vicinity... [color=00aeef]"Unless Nightman was rocking a 'royal sensing' Gift in his hoard, I can't see how he'd think I was. He only seemed to have the cliff notes of my past, and if I were somehow a royal, not even I was aware of that fact, nor my mother for that matter."[/color] She chuffed and shrugged with a smile. [color=00aeef]"Besides, even if I were one, it's not like there's any way to tell."[/color] Honestly, she really wasn't sure why Reverio would jump to such a wild theory so quickly. What evidence other than coincidence was there to suggest it?