Bored, yet undeniably sharp emerald irises glinted within the annoying sunlight, as the one and only Daelon 'Eden' Verde treated his pale skin to the slightly frustrating heat of Vale's sunny atmosphere. The teenager wasn't yet sure if he preferred this weather to the more colder, brisker environment that was Mistral, but, regardless, it was certainly a change of scenery. Sat underneath the hastily-sewn tarp of a lemonade stand, Eden took a short sip of the sugary sweet drink, before leaning back in the oddly comfortable wooden chair, and releasing a low sigh. He wasn't lazy, for sure - well, that's what he told himself - but he had to admit...drinking lemonade and relaxing in the open air was a lot better than spending 24 hours training, perfecting a style that he has long since became an expert in. True, his marksmanship could probably use some polishing off, but what was the use of constantly stressing his body? Both body and mind needed the occasional rest, and despite the noisy, loud atmosphere of the festival and it's occupants, this was a nice place to rest. Hell, he could even feel his eyes drifting into the deep, dark abyss of sleep...And finally...relief. He was submerged in the darkness, his eyes closed.
Just then, he was quickly jolted awake by a slap across the back of his head by his teammate, Lapis and with the familiar call of...
"What's up, idiot?""The sun and the moon...and apparently, not my beauty rest..." He mumbled the last part, opening one eye to glare at the offending woman. A gloved hand rose from it's resting place to rub the slightly sore spot at the back of his head, ruffling feathery locks of black hair.
"What do you need, Lapis?" "Need? I need oxygen, I want to win the Vytal festival. Come on, Tori is waiting for us in the dorm." The girl responded, her arms crossed, and her feet making an impatient rhythm on the concrete ground.
Knowing that Lapis was an incredibly persistent daughter of a bitch, Eden mumbling an obscenity underneath his breath, stood, grabbing his backpack off of the table as he did.
"Lead the way." The teen frowned, eyeing his abandoned lemonade forlornly.
The clock in the team's dorm room ticked away, each second swallowed up by the constantly moving hand of time. Victoria pressed her closed fist up against her punching bag. The fabric of the bag was lined with kevlar, and inside the bag was dozens and dozens of tightly compacted concrete. Normal punching bags often didn't even last a single punch or two with her before it swung wildly off of its hook and against the wall. As she activated her semblance, she felt warmth race up and down her arm, as her blue aura ignited and danced along her skin. Victoria inhaled deeply before pulling back her arm, in one sharp motion she suddenly exhaled, her fist impacting hard against the stone wrapped in kevlar. She felt the shock wave, but not the pain or shattered hands she would have felt if she did not have her semblance active. As the kinetic energy from her punch died down, she sensed the stone-like material cracking beneath the fabric.
"Over compensating much?" Joked, Lapis as the she entered the room. She took a seat on her bed, scratching her chin as she continued to speak.
Eden stopped at the doorway, leaning against the wall as he watched the two. Inside his mind, however, he was still mourning the loss of his lemonade. Vale really knew how to make the liquid just the perfect amount of sweet. His tongue salivated at the thought.
Staring at himself in the mirror, upon hearing the familiar muffled crack of concrete against her fist from inside the bathroom, Eminence gave a slight sigh when he noticed the brutality of her punch had actually caused the mirror to crack straight down the middle, having almost finished brushing his wet, thick and heavy set of purple coloured hair, just out of the bath, Eminence cleaned the grime off his body quickly, before putting on his garments, dressed and suited, ready for the occasion at hand.
Hand upon the bathroom door, the familiar frigid touch of metal, Eminence pulled on it, allowing the "Human" to walk into the main room of the dorm, where it appeared everyone else was standing.
"If you keep training like this, that's probably going to be the tenth dummy this week! And i don't think we have enough Lien to buy one every hour...! Or forty mirrors a day...!" The heir spoke politely, obviously only meaning this as a joke. He was glad he was in a group filled with such vibrant characters, however none of them knew of his ... actual features, with him hiding the fact he is actually a faunus. Still, he was glad he got to spend time with them, and he hoped one day he could trust them enough to look past who he really was, in time of course.
"Oh, relax, it's fine. My mom's the one who pays for the punching bags... Unless you want me to stop asking her for them and take their place." Victoria replied with a grin. "
As for your mirrors, you can send her the bill too, I'll make sure it ends up where it belongs." Truthfully, she was talking about the trash. She deactivated her semblance, the flames disappeared instantly like a blown out candle.
"In any case...! We should probably go over our plans for the tournament, who'll be going into each round, what we should do to chain our attacks together, that sort of thing? Unless breakfast and lunch sound like a good idea first...?"Lapis slumped back on her bed, stretching her arms out and staring at the ceiling.
"Breakfast does sound good" She murmered
"But we should probably start training, we've not got a lot of time before it all starts" She bounced off of her bed, before flattening her hair with her hand and continuing.
"That is unless comatose boy over here wants to catch some sleep first" she taunted, sticking a thumb out towards, Daelon.
Eden frown-smirked, something unique to him, before straightening up from his leaning position.
"No, your bullshit woke me up. Let's go." He had previously scouted out the festival layout a while back, mostly for places where he could be alone to listen to music or sleep or whatever he wanted to do at the time, and had came upon a bit of a gem, as far as solitary training fields went. Turning around, Eden rose a hand in a 'Come hither' gesture as he made his way out of the building.
The festival was still active, but a lot more manageable, now that some time had passed since the grand opening. Eden paused as he exited their temporary shelter, turning around and walking backwards as he spoke.
"It's a ways off...just gotta go through the sewers, and up through a different grate." He instinctively side-stepped a child as they ran past, still walking backwards.
"Hidden away and all that." Turning around, Eden was about to continue leading, when he came face to face with a rather disturbing scene.
A red-haired chick pigging out on noodles, the broth flying everywhere.
He calmly flicked a flying piece of noodle out of the air, before it could impact his face. His eyes, usually cool and sharp, twitched slightly. He really hated ramen. It reminded him of worms.
He was deathly afraid of worms.
Eminence had almost jumped into action when the flying piece of noodle shot straight for him, though he had no need to rush since Eden had already deflected it with the tip of his finger. Lightly stumbling, Eminence straightened himself up and coughed, a little embarrassed at his preemptive actions.
"Sorry...! I was going to uh... nevermind, you handled that yourself! ... A waste of a noodle though!"Lapis' face grew with glee as she saw the noodle stand, she could hardly even see the girl through her own unsatiable hunger. She almost leapt into the seat, slamming her hand down and ordering the patron to get her a bowl of noodles. A minute or so later and it had arrived, she slammed a not down and began chowing down into the noodles.
The thick purpled haired heir raised an eyebrow when he saw, Lapis lunge for the noodle stand like some form of insatiable grimm, and chuckled at the sight of her literally devouring her meal like a beast from a horror movie. Honestly he didn't know whether to be surprised or afraid. Possibly both. Though the scent of the noodles did make him hungry.
"I think i'll take a bowl myself...!" Eminence spoke, taking a few seats down from, Lapis, he smiled politely, ordering himself a bowl of noodles with PLENTY of meat, needing to sate his canines on something of a less "vegeterian" lifestyle, he tried his best to be polite as he ate, to keep proper form, though the desire to drill into his noodles like Lapis was all the more tempting, he decided to keep himself from doing so.
With a disgruntled frown, Eden collapsed into a nearby seat, propped his chin up on his fist, and watched his teammates eat the nasty worms.
"Training my ass." He said under his breath.
And he still didn't have his damned lemonade.