[h2]Miina Malina[/h2]

She knew that Skael was going to be cold (and why did the spies have such an attractive boss? That was a bit unfair, it had kept her distracted all the time), but this hat was already getting a bit annoying. Miina was sure she could get used to it… but [i]any[/i] muffling on her hearing was just frustrating. Maybe she could do some sort of inverse-Silence spell to improve it? Something tiny and unnoticeable, just enough to even it out.

That was the thing about travel, it was just… such a dull experience that she had plenty of time to get lost in her own head even more than normal and think about things. Magic, normally. It wasn't like keeping an eye and ear open took too much focus, so…

Maybe that was just her upbringing speaking, though? She should ask one day, see if it was a more active job and that was how the non-mages kept themselves from getting bored while they were travelling.

The greenery giving way to ruins drew the Mystrel out of her musing and into sharper observation. Rudolf was a surprisingly active tour guide, but her real interest was the cloud hanging around the place, and aetherial miasma that she just couldn't ignore. Not like the blight, nor the heavy element down by the water crystal, but rather… black magic? This place had something to do with whatever was going on [i]inside[/i] him, though, right? Maybe it wasn't surprising.

Oh, it wasn't meant to be like this? Of course not, when could they ever just walk from place to place. Miina was sure she hadn't had anywhere near this trouble with just travelling before she joined the Kirins, did one of them have some specific curse or something…

Right, nasty darkness thing (Rudolf had [i]better[/i] give a nice, proper explanation after this) to fight, enough wondering about why later. Shame she didn't have anything white-magic attuned more offensive to use than a [i]Dispel[/i], and that was a very definite melee engagement. But it ought to work, white magic unweaving the bonds that held something aetherial and [i]especially[/i] something attuned to black magic to the world…

If she could get in close. And that scythe looked nasty. 

"[i]Protect[/i]," there, that gave her something (she needed to work on that clothes-repairing spell after this, no doubt), and everyone else an extra layer of defence too… 

And then she ran in [i]towards[/i] the thing. Yeah, yeah, lure it out; wasn't that easier when you provoked it? But she needed to be in touch range for a Dispel. Hopefully someone else got the memo and covered her.