Break Out (Open)

“There you are, gotcha!” Prophos triumphantly retrieved the soul of a large serpent with a strange device— a staff of sorts with a kind of mystical net and hook on the front that was used to capture serpents— to then put the soul into a large gourd that the Shinjin was carrying on his back.

It wasn’t a common occurrence, but sometimes there was a mix-up, error in paperwork or even just transportation accidents when it came to certain kinds of souls. In this case, a large amount of serpentine souls had been misplaced somehow and collectively found their way to Snake Way. If Prophos had 1000z for every time this happened, he would have 4000z, which wasn’t much but it was hilarious that it had happened four times in his life.

Aside from checking up on some colleagues or anything about new magical artefacts, the Shinjin had nothing else to do during his visit this time. Not that it was his job or anything to retrieve these souls, Prophos had overheard rumors of Ogres being spread thin in this sector of the Otherworld so they weren’t as readily available to set smaller things like this right again.

Besides, he had a feeling something interesting might crop up.

So crop up it did.

A few hundred meters, just within his scope of vision, Prophos saw a Namekian land on a segment of Snake Way, somewhere below on one of the many twists and bends this mysterious path had; and they were being followed by some Ogres— some members of the hell-side border security squad in fact. Prophos had no way of knowing for sure if this Namekian was simply a living being that had crossed the barrier with a Guiding Candle or something similar or if they were indeed dead and were sentenced to Hell, currently trying to go somewhere else.

The question was, what would Prophos do in this situation?

Simple, he saw some more lost serpent souls nearby and chose to use them as a form of distraction to try and cause the Ogres running this way to lose ground while feigning a slip up on his part to make it look like an accident. “Ah— damnit, sorry fellas!”

The Namekian gave a nod as he passed by, and Prophos returned the gesture quickly to avoid the Ogres noticing it. To Prophos’ pleasant surprise, the Ogres seemed to completely buy into what he had orchestrated. Focusing on the small group of serpentine souls nearby, Prophos shrugged as the Ogres passed him. “I’m a bit busy here too, I didn’t see where they went.”

Eventually the Ogres were rushing on their way again, away from where the Namekian had hidden. While his primary objective was collecting these serpentine souls, Prophos did kind of see where the Namekian had gone. So, while doing his job, the Shinjin wandered in that general direction. The Namekian had hidden himself in what looked to be a largely unused guard station.

Approaching casually and on the lookout for more of the lost souls, Prophos gave the Namekian a short wave. “Hey there. Are you alright? I’m gonna guess that you’re new here.” Whether it was by way of Guiding Candle or death was of little consequence to Prophos, and as far as the Shinjin was concerned the specifics were up to the Namekian to share. The same could be said as to why or how they managed to get some Ogres on their case. “I am Prophos. Are you willing to share your name as well?”

“Straight up death, huh? My condolences.” Prophos bowed politely. He had heard a few whisperings of this ‘Lottus’ character when arriving here. There was a strange surplus of multiple similar mortals as of late, from what Prophos had heard. It was clear that whoever caused this was a huge problem, especially if they had annihilated a whole planet. “So I’ve heard, mostly from Ogres talking about it in passing.”

From what Prophos could tell, it had happened at least a few more times prior to his own return here. He had no real idea just how many planets had been razed either, but clearly it was more than zero planets, and that was not good.

“Indeed, I am a Shinjin.” Prophos motioned to his special earrings that he chose to wear on the thread of a necklace rather than on his ears. Should the Namekian take a closer look at said earrings, he would notice that the colours were quite unique— orange orbs set into chrome black fasteners with black ring hooks.

“Vale..?” Prophos looked surprised, then immediately disgusted at hearing the name— but it was not disgust from personal experience with the individual, he just knew of negativity surrounding that name. “I must warn you Gandigan, that is not a name to mention lightly, many well read Shinjin understand that whom you may be speaking of is a blight on our history. Some sweep it all under the rug and say it is a legend. Others, such as myself, believe differently. He and three others from ancient times caused untold havoc in the early days of the universe until they were supposedly sealed away; they were known as the Four Horsemen. Cyprus, Nidhogg, Retemed, and Vale. Conquest, War, Famine and Death.”

Four names, never again repeated and given to other Shinjin, for the wounds they left behind were too chaotic to ignore. “They threatened the balance of the universe once, and if they still exist, if indeed the seals upon them were broken, they are likely to do the same again.” Prophos wasn’t exactly the most traditional Shinjin, he had views that some of his own kin may consider insane or something like that, but the horrid legacy left by those four was too much.

“Indeed, they are what we call Potara, we have had them for as long as we can remember. Some say they were very powerful magic items once.” Nowadays it was more of a status indicator or unique fashion choice; the true magic of the Potara has long since been lost; but Prophos had an idea of what it may have been and was sure he could potentially recreate it. “For the most part, at least in my experience the colours that a set of Potara possess have different meanings.” Most of which Prophos truthfully cared little about, but he liked to share knowledge all the same.

“Ah, don’t worry about it. I wouldn’t expect folks not born of the Otherworld to have heard about them unless their actions were at all recorded in mortal history.” Even so, history keeping of the mortal realm and Otherworld were very different, as were their perspectives. “Wait, another? You say that you saw another one of them? That doesn’t bode well...”

Prophos sighed, more problems upon problems it seemed. “I can imagine that those four are conniving schemers in some way.” It was possible that they could train Gandigan, or even help on a whim, but Prophos thought it unlikely. “It wouldn’t surprise me if they had an ulterior motive. Some sort of chaos and disorder, no doubt.”

Looking around for a moment, Prophos spotted yet another lost serpent soul, which he retrieved and put into the gourd on his back. “My people do usually reside in the upper realms for the most part, yes. As for me, I’m usually in the mortal realm. I just decided to pay a visit and saw things in some measure of disarray. Ogres seem to be spread a bit thin recently— likely due to the mass influx of souls sent here by that Lottus character that you mentioned.” Prophos gestured to the unique capture device he was holding and the gourd on his back. “I’m using this to gather serpent souls that managed to escape their designated area since their usual caretakers are busy with something else.”

“Did he?” Prophos raised an eyebrow. “I thought it was some other people that made it to the finals, a Namekian local and a martial artist from Earth. That said.. I also heard there was a secondary bracket for those that dropped out of the primary bracket. Maybe he was in that match?” Tournaments weren’t really Prophos’ thing, it was just Budoshi that almost wouldn’t shut up about them so the Shinjin knew some vague details by proxy.

“A magical orb? Hmm. Well, that depends, do you have a physical description of it by any chance? You’d be surprised how unique they can get despite being one kind of shape.” Prophos saw himself as a bit of a magical item enthusiast, so where most people would have given up at the general description of a ‘magic orb’, the Shinjin had lived long enough to appreciate the various simplicities of some mystical items. “It is probably best to keep it out of the hands of those four too.”

Prophos nodded after Gandigan took note of the souls floating around— quite a few were a puffy cloud shape around here at the moment. “Mhm, these are serpentine animals. Some of them have their bodies, some don’t just yet.” But the ones that looked like cloud puffs would surely be hard to differentiate, right? “It might be difficult to notice at first, but if you look closer—” Prophos held a hand up to one of the souls that was floating past him lazily. “— you can see the impression of the scales they once had in life upon their soul.” Prophos also held the device above the soul and a small ring of light appeared on it. “It also helps that they were all already tagged by their caretaker.” He explained, retrieving that soul with the device to then gently place it in the gourd.

“Once I’ve found them all, I’ll be taking them back to their enclosure, hopefully that area has been secured before then or else I might be waiting a while with a gourd full of snake souls.”

“I’ve been told that things just happen that way in tournaments sometimes. I suppose it can be said of a battle without restrictions too.” Prophos didn’t quite fully understand why Budoshi was so into this sort of thing still, but the Tuffle was certainly passionate. “It isn’t my area of expertise, a friend of mine would be quite enthusiastic to talk about a tournament.”

As for the prize of the tournament, Gandigane described it as a grey sphere with a blue star in the center. Prophos found that quite interesting. From what the Shinjin had studied, stars in a particular setup or pattern held great meaning. “A blue star you say? How peculiar, stars are not used lightly within circles of magical study. It is quite possibly a powerful item. It sounds like it emulates some legends from Earth and Namek that I’ve skimmed over.”

Gandigan seemed interested in what Prophos showed him in regards to the souls floating around— even to the point of bombarding the Shinjin with questions. “Sure, I suppose luck has something to do with it. For the most part, anyone with a strong will or high amount of Ki can more easily form a body if not immediately.” Phrophos began, explaining the subtle basics. “In some cases, it does just take time. I believe how old one is also contributes— the older the individual, the more their identity is present in their soul, whereas the opposite seems to be true for someone younger... A bit grim if you really think about it.”

“Well, rumor has it, these legends speak of Dragons— Eternal Dragons to be precise. They are said to exist connected to Earth and Namek— they are known as Shenron and Porunga; the latter I’m guessing you are somewhat familiar with? I know that Porunga has a very important place in Namekian culture. Anyway, both are supposedly connected to seven artefacts each, in both cases theorized to be orbs with sets of stars engraved in them. I don’t know how true this as I’ve never witnessed it myself, but I’ve heard that you can see the shapes of these stars perfectly from any angle you view the orb.” Prophos gave his further assessment in a somewhat excitable manner; happy to have a curious listener present. “Admittedly, I’m more of a general historian. I’m sure the two you mentioned have some further insight if they are closely connected to Namek as well.”

At the mention of Nervan however, Prophos blinked a few times in surprise. “Come again? Nervan?” What a wild coincidence, surely it wasn’t the same Nervan that Prophos knew? Although, Gandigan did specify that they were weird, and that certainly tracked. The Shinjin had to be sure though. “Exactly five feet tall, messy black hair and even messier outfit, pallid purple skin, unmoving facial features at all times, speaks with many voices, impressively pronounced nose?” Talk about questions for questions, at least the reaction to this name was undeniably positive.

“Generally speaking, my people are taught a lot about souls— what we call the basics might be a lot to others. Ogres are taught similarly; with some differing expertise depending on occupation.” It was no surprise that Gandigan hadn’t met many Shinjin, most of them were always here in the Otherworld. “We aren’t an especially common sight in the mortal realm, historically speaking, in terms of fully showing ourselves. A few of us go to the mortal realm completely disguised if we need to. This seems to be changing in recent days though. Other than that, if you haven’t frequented the Otherworld through some other means besides death, the chances of meeting one of us isn’t too high.”