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"[color=00FF36]Aww, if you say so. I'll see if I can bring you some food, 'kay?[/color]"

Haruhi's mouth opened to continue talking...then abruptly snapped shut again with alarming speed as she heard shouting in the street, followed by someone [i]new[/i] arriving. And not someone that hadn't been at the forge before; she probably wouldn't have even stopped talking, were that the case. Someone...[i][b]new[/b][/i].

"I am Captain Ashida Katsuro of the Blazing Fist." A pause. "I was hoping you could help me."

She didn't recognize his voice. She didn't recognize his name. She didn't recognize the organization he was part of. And hey, she was nothing if not friendly, she backed slightly away from Mio and poked her head out of the shop interior, preparing to go out and greet him. Though...she didn't recognize what he was carrying with him, either. She'd spent her whole life working with tools, more--she wagered--than most others in the valley because of her stubborn refusal to use Signs. She could tell the purpose of pretty much any tool on sight; a pick for breaking rocks, a kama for harvesting grain, an axe for splitting wood, a shovel for digging, a hoe and a plow for tilling the soil...

...She couldn't tell what this was, or what it did. But for some reason she didn't understand, looking at it sent a searing blast of anxiety and...[i]terror[/i] racing up her spine like ice. As her mind stuttered and stopped and she nearly tripped over herself as she changed course from approach to retreat, she shrank away, stumbling backwards deeper into the shop and unable to take her eyes off of [i]whatever the thing was[/i] that was in front of her. She dropped the hoe in her hand with a loud clatter and tipped over, falling to the hard floor with a muffle sound of surprise and pain.
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[sup][right][color=00FF36]Interactions:[/color] [i]Mio [@McMolly][/i][/right][/sup]