Her sandalled feet slammed against the dirt road while sticker weeds slashed against her calves as she ran. Her white sundress’ hem was torn

Her sandalled feet slammed against the dirt road while sticker weeds slashed against her calves as she ran. Her white sundress’ hem was torn, and her legs were scuffed with dirt. There were a few scratches that were stained with blood too, but she paid them no mind. 

It was well within the Season of Fire and the heat beat down on her. Normally, the songs of birds, cicadas, and the other sounds of the woods would have filled the air. Instead, there was an uneasy silence interrupted every now and then with the booming sound of gunfire. The screams and lamentations of the village folk as they were rounded up by the disguised marauders. Jeannette knew that they weren’t outlaws. A single look at their fine equipment, muskets well worn and serviceable, sabres sharp and unnotched, and more tellingly, well crafted boots, told anyone with a fine eye that those ‘marauders’ weren’t common bandits. They were well armed, well funded, and trained.

And Jeannette needed to run, to escape. The attacked the mansion first, but she had been trained since her childhood where the backdoor, where the escape tunnels were and where they led to. Bradley Town was only a league away, less than an hour’s run through the woods. Therein lay safety. From there, she could plot her revenge. A pox on the imperials and their neverending greed!

She skidded to a halt. A dozen paces away, from the bushes, came out a couple of marauders. Faces twisted in savage glee. 

“Well, well, well, look what got flushed out. Looks like we’re gonna have some fun tonight,” the first man sneered. 

The second man stepped past the first, and Jeanette’s fingers tightened around the flintlock pistol’s hilt. She stepped back and brought the gun up, and pulled the trigger…

“CUT! NG!” 

Yuriko blinked, and grunted. Again? She glared at the director, Chadwin Summers, who just put down his megaphone and beckoned her closer. He barely glanced at the monitor that played back the scene. Yuriko gracefully made her way to him while keeping a neutral expression on her face. As soon as they were within easy talking distance, she raised a questioning eyebrow and didn’t speak a word. 

The stare off lasted for all of three seconds before Director Summers chuckled and said, “You don’t look frightened enough, Lily. Jeannette here isn’t a hardened warrior yet. She might have been trained, but she hasn’t fought for her life yet.” 

“Wasn’t the historical figure notably stoic?” Yuriko asked. 

“Sure, but following that too closely doesn’t make good cinema. Besides, you know that may not be accurate. Stories are made by the winners, after all.” 

“Alright,” Yuriko sighed. She had to put on a frightened face. That shouldn’t be too hard…but how long has it been since she’d shown fear? Not since the end of the war, she reckoned, when all hope seemed lost. 

Director Summers pouted. “You’ve never been afraid, have you?” 

Yuriko blinked, then shrugged. “Perhaps it’s more than I do not express fear, or find little point to it.” 

“How very brave,” he said dryly. “Well, you should have been taught how to emote fear or despair, right?” 

Yuriko shrugged. “It’s not as if I have enough time for acting lessons. With school, modelling, and other stuff occupying my attention.” 

“I see.” The man visibly struggled with what Yuriko could tell was frustration, though none of it really showed on his face. “Well, why don’t you try some expressions while we shoot other scenes. If you can manage it, we’ll try this scene again later.” 

“I do have another appointment this evening,” Yuriko pointed out, then leaned her Mien on him when he looked just about to explode. “I’ll try my best, of course, but I must leave before four o’clock this afternoon.” She wasn’t exactly lying, but the appointment she had was more along the lines of flying around as Regalia, patrolling the city, and pretty much acting as a superhero. 

It’s been a few weeks since her first foray as Regalia, and her encounter with the young, glowing girl, Brilliance, and her cousin, Speedrun. Then, there was Scarlett and her burgeoning Anima awakening as well as her Altered power. The added complication of Desire appearing here in Astoria of all places rather than where her true body currently resided put a new spin on her domestic life, though it did have the effect of spurring Scarlett out of her spiralling funk. The smol woman finally decided that her feelings weren’t something she could help, and whatever social mores that held her back weren’t worth the mindspace it took. Not that they immediately hopped back into bed together—not that Yuriko would have protested much. 

Thankfully, Desire scratched an itch that had been bothering her for more than a Season, and she could afford to take things slow without going insane. 

Oddly, once Scarlett, and the other club members were liberated from their brain parasites, they’d been affected by something else. It seemed that Altered humans, at least those with combat capable power sets, or even combat adjacent, were somewhat driven towards it. She wasn’t sure if the brain parasite was responsible for that, and it wasn’t as if she could affect someone’s brain or even know what to do to help. She also hadn’t examined other Altered closely enough to determine if they had brain parasites or if they were unique to the Unfettered’s victims. 

She wasn’t close enough to any capes that she could ask to examine their brains, even if Anima perception was somewhat non-invasive, though only in the physical sense, since forcing her Anima into other’s bodies would be traumatic if they resisted, and could lead to damage to their Anima, at the very least. 

She absently watched several scenes where actors showed fear. The exaggerated expressions enlightened her, but when she looked in the mirror and mimicked said expressions, she noticed that her eyes betrayed nothing but confidence. She couldn’t quite manage it, and after another dozen takes, Director Summers simply threw up his hands and said, “Good enough. We’ll revisit this another day if we need to.” 

Afterwards, Yuriko readied herself for another scene, this one more suited to her temperament. It would be a fight scene that would involve several combatants and it would be an escape from imprisonment scenario. Thankfully, her upcoming costume wasn’t that elaborate, and it didn’t take much time to remove makeup from her face and body. The choreography was simple enough even if it was more for show than actual good fighting. Almost no lines, too. 

She finished the scene in a single take, and afterwards, her schedule was free for the rest of the day. It was barely two o’clock in the afternoon, and it would take an hour to drive back to Neo Prism City. 

Zach wasn’t on set today, more’s the pity. She enjoyed chatting with him now that he’d loosened up after that tiff with the Homelander. 

Now that was a fun fight, even if they didn’t do more than throw fists at each other. She learned quite a bit regarding the Bladeless Sword in that fight, though the improvement was more on quality than any significant shift. She could probably find the proper frequency to cut through any intangible thing in less than a minute now, rather than the several it took to overcome the infamous cape’s invulnerable skin, though it didn’t quite translate to cutting concepts, or in proper parlance, Ennoias. 

It had occurred to her that her Ennoia could cut other Ennoias too, though what it meant exactly, she didn’t quite know. It wasn’t as if she fought foes that utilized Ennoias all that often, nowadays. Why, she still wasn’t sure how a cape’s abilities were powered. It wasn’t Animus as she’d notice that immediately. It wasn’t Elemental energies, or rather, not all of them used ambient Elemental energies. She thought it was either an internal, physical energy, like an intangible quality like stamina, or they drew esoteric dimensional energies from underneath the layer of reality. The same dimensional energies that caused people to Alter. 

Hmmm, it was probably the latter, right? Or a mixture? However, some capes subconsciously apply their power using Ennoias. That, she recognised. Homelander’s invulnerable skin came from applying an Ennoia, of metal skin, of protection, or some such, and was fueled by that internal energy source to his body. But then, he could have also applied a Physique Refinement too, though that still meant he’d need an Ennoia. 

Based on his personal history, however, the man just became invulnerable from the very start of his career. Either way, that meant cutting an Ennoia negated its effects. It was probably temporary, because just as all things can be cut, so do all things can be healed or mended. 

“Good work, Miss Lawson! See you tomorrow!” A peppy assistant said as Yuriko exited the studio and was headed to the parking lot. 

“Thanks, see you tomorrow.” Yuriko said with a slight smile, noting the faint pinking of the young man’s cheeks. She noticed that there was an odd glint coming from the sclera of his eyes, but they disappeared when he looked away. She huffed. That wasn’t the first time she’d seen something like that, and it wasn’t because of her Mien or anything sordid, like that. 

Word on the street was of a new recreational substance that brought an amazing experience for a few hours. It didn’t have any harmful aftereffects to the body, but was horrifically addicting. The withdrawal symptoms could be managed, but the misery the process caused was often more than most people could bear. That meant that Glimmer, the tainted, street variant, was a restricted substance, if not outright illegal. It also cost roughly a hundred Torries a hit, which amounted to a couple of GiJin of powder, either swallowed or snorted. 

She sighed as she entered her Nitsuda Civilian, started the engine, and began her drive towards Neo Prism, and from there, home. She spread her perception aura and noted a couple of cars leaving the parking lot at about the same time she left. One of them turned south at the interstate while the other turned north, the same direction she took. She paid it no mind, not even when she arrived at the city’s vicinity and was consequently trapped in a jam. It was only when the car, more than fifty paces behind her, followed the same turns she took that she paid more than a passing attention to. 

However, just as she crossed Winderfield, the car peeled away and she shrugged the odd thought off. It was closer to three thirty by the time she arrived at Oakmont Estates. She parked at her spot and climbed up to her apartment. Nobody was home, but that was expected. 

Desire was wandering around Neo Prism familiarising herself with the culture and technology in Astoria. She hadn’t been around for Dragon Fall, so the glimpse of what was available here had come as a shock. She wouldn’t meet Scarlett until later in the evening as the young woman attended makeup classes for the weeks she missed earlier. 

Yuriko meditated for a few hours and put her attention to what happened in Shangria, though only for an hour or so. What she learned from the celestial auroch was impressive, but it required more than a bit of introspection before she could properly internalise it. In the meantime, she prepared dinner, then some snacks, and then shucked out of her civilian clothes and into her costume. 

As soon as it was dark, she flew out of the window, made sure she locked up behind herself, and flew towards Brookshield, the southeastern district of Neo Prism City. The meeting point was on the roof of an apartment building that sported a billboard portraying a divorce advocate’s services using a pretty, older woman waving goodbye while holding a fan of Torries. 

She landed next to the struts and was somewhat surprised to see that she hadn’t been the first there.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep