Excellent! I'll escort- No, no, I mustn't. I'll have someone escort you to the kitchen. Just listen to the head chef. From now on, come to me for your work, okay? Ask for Alan Leeay. That's my name." The man, Alan, stretches over the desk to pat the doppelganger on the head before sitting back down opening a drawer to pull out…
"…is that a snail?" Kane whispers out loud to himself. His hand absentmindedly reaches for a piece of jerky to eat whilst he watches this like some sort of absurdist TV show.
The man lifts a receiver out of the snails shell, Kane softly whispers "what the fuck?" to himself, and presses a button. As soon as he does, the empty static of the pip-boy's radio crackles to life.
"Hello, Suko. Could you please send someone to my office? I'm terribly busy, but I need someone to escort this confused little scamp to the kitchen for his work." Kane hears Alan speaking the doppelganger, and at a second's delay from the radio. It's disorienting, least of all because this implies that the snail is somehow a radio.
"That must be Kane. I think he got confused and couldn't find his room. I'll have someone take him ta the kitchen, and then I'll show him home myself afterwards. Should be a full shift today." He hears the forewoman's voice, but… that's definitely the snail speaking, isn't it? They don't have computers, but they do have snail-based radio?
Snadio?
"Oh, that'd be just wonderful! Thank you, dear Suko."
"No prob. Later." And then she hangs up. Alan puts the receiver down, and the snail says 'gachank' as it settles into place, as if mimicking a mechanical sound.
"What the fuck." Kane whispers to himself again. He doesn't know whether to be horrified or not. Is it psychic snails? Is that what he's dealing with? And the pip boy can pick up on psychic snail waves? "What the absolute fuck?"
"Be a dear and wait outside for your escort, would you? I'll see you tomorrow!" Alan waves, and Kane dazedly has the doppelganger leave his office. At least that guy seems to like him quite a bit, for some reason. If he's lucky he'll manage to work his way into a different role every day.
That is, assuming he's here for much longer. He should really pick up the pace, before whatever is happening here gets worse.
The same janitor that found the secondary passed out in a closet comes to escort him to the kitchens, grumbling about 'stupid mindless freaks' as he does. Kane puts that half of his mind to the back, he should be able to have it just follow orders whilst he focuses more on the primary.
Yesterday was supposed to be skill farming, but he'll have to do some more of it today. What, exactly, though?
For some reason, his mind is blanking on things that people can do. He considers picking up litter, but most of the litter is paper rubbish around the base of the manor. It seems as though most of the town is just housing, with very little in the way of shops or infrastructure.
Putting aside questions of how that works, he instead thinks about what people must do for fun around here.
So, he has his primary wander around until it finds a tavern. At the same time, the secondary is doing prep work in the kitchen. Peeling potatoes, dicing onions, cutting carrots, and the like.
He finds a bar, simply named The Bar, and enters. It's quite empty, because it's not even noon and most people are working, it turns out. There's a tired man behind the counter, mindlessly drying the same glass.
The primary ignores him, in favour of going to take a seat at the bar next to a woman nursing a beer.
"Drinking competition?" He asks unprompted, using every bit of dissociation from acting through a clone to get through the blatantly awkward conversation starter.
She lifts her head, raising an eyebrow at it. When it just stares blankly at her, she rolls her eyes.
"Ah, what the heck. I was just gonna get plastered anyway. Barkeep! A round o' your strongest stuff, will ya?" She calls out, raising her half-empty tankard to get his attention.
Now, it's time to figure out just how alcohol works for this weird hivemind of his. Award Quote Reply88GravityfunnsSunday at 2:32 AMReader modeNewAdd bookmark Threadmarks Threadmarks Chapter 10 - Grinding, you might also call it New Threadmarks GravityfunnsSunday at 2:33 AMNewAdd bookmark#10Congrats! You drank a seasoned old woman under the table without breaking a sweat. Take x1 Silver Trait ticket
It was… shockingly easy. Certainly, he drank enough beer that he's pretty sure he'd normally be dead, whilst she is just draped over the table giggling. But the only true detriment was that his primary stopped interpreting his commands so easily. He's holding it upright with a mental hand, which does take some focus away from the secondary cooking. It's just stirring a pot of pasta right now though, so there's no huge loss.
A silver ticket for that seems wild. As does calling a woman in her twenties old. Fortunately, he can just accept the former and ignore the latter, and nothing will be wrong at all.
"That hic was might… 'mpressive, yungun. Geehehee. Ain't seen… someun' with a constitution like yers in a while. Most've'm are up in the manor, gettin'… brainwashed by ol' Gaet."
Kane stiffens, carefully turning his primary to look at her. It takes a lot of effort to have the secondary continue stirring it's pasta.
"Brainwashed?" The primary questions, it's voice slower than usual but still intelligible.
"Yerp. Yeap. Don't know how. Jus' know that he ain't got no healin' fruit. No sir. Geehehee." She cradles the empty tankard against her face, seeming content with being absolutely blackout drunk at lunch time.
"Could… you… tell… me… more?" Kane has to draw out each word to say it correctly without the subconscious muscle memory of the primary being functional. By the time he's finished, she's snoring peacefully.
He sighs and lets it lay down over the bar whilst he does his roll.
[Perfumer] |Common Trait|
You smell nice, that's about it. You have no distinct scent, you smell like what the person that's smelling you likes.
Eh. Kind of a stealth skill. If he's hiding from a dog that likes roses, he could hide in a rose bush. Maybe it subconsciously makes people like him more too, but that's not likely to be too substantial of an increase.
He wants to wait for the woman to wake up, so he continues letting the primary rest so he can look at the secondary's area.
It's… still stirring pasta. Now that he's got the focus though, he can eavesdrop on conversations at least. Or, that's the plan. The smell of this food is really making him hungry, in a way that jerky and apples won't suffice.
No one's paying attention to it. Of course they aren't, it's just an assistant chef after all. He casts it's eyes around the kitchen, certain that for a feast there must be some finger foods. He was expecting cocktail sticks, but on the centre island just behind him it spots a platter of sushi. Multiple different kinds, every kind he knows in fact.
He waits, like a tiger stalking a deer. It's Eagle Eyes watch everyone, and the second no one is watching it's hand snaps out and picks up a piece of sushi. It puts it in it's mouth quick as a flash and turns back to the pasta.
It tastes incredible. The fish is fresh and the rice is perfectly cooked. But, of course, he can't just steal more. That would be insanely risky. Kane settles his stomach with the apples and jerky which, to be fair, are pretty good in their own right.
Over the course of the next couple of hours, his secondary is rotated through quite a few dishes. Mostly on the less skilled tasks, like assembling dozens of sandwiches, or stirring pots. The chefs that aren't mindless husks- a disturbingly small portion of the people here, as he slowly realises- all talk relatively freely. It's a shame that they just want to complain about their bosses.
He gathers a few important things though. Suko, the forewoman he first met, apparently has a preternatural ability to tell where the people she's looking for is, and when they're slacking off. So, essentially, the perfect manager.
Alan, on the other hand, is her brother. He's not gathered much other than the fact that he's apparently standoffish to most people, and there's a weird rumour about him swallowing fish whole. Him and Suko are both two of the three members of the King's Retinue, an elite group of bodyguards, and have been for as long as anyone can remember.
The third member, and also the strongest, has only been referred to as 'The Revenger'. She apparently isn't in a management position, so most employees don't see her often.
Kane is so caught up in eavesdropping that he almost doesn't notice when the woman wakes up. Her eyes flutter open and she groans lowly, rubbing at her temples as she sits up. Kane hastily has the primary follow suit, it's own head aching slightly, but now far less addled.
"What… How much did I…" She glances down at it and frowns. "Oh. Right. Don't challenge a drunk ta drinking competition." She mutters darkly under her breath. Kane sincerely hopes she's not being as serious as she looks.
"Who're you anyway? Did you even introduce yourself?" Her eyes narrow in distrust.
"Kane." It replies, it's voice even despite Kane hurrying. Should he feel guilty? Hopefully not, but he certainly does anyway.
"Hmph. Katie. Now, given the fact that you're still here, should I assume you're goin' ta pay me back?"
Kane's questions die on the doppelganger's lips. Out of options, he simply has it stand up and start walking away.
"Hey! You don't get ta just geddup and leave, asshole!" She reaches for his shoulder, but it ducks under her hand and breaks out into a sprint.
There's not a shot that he's paying for all of that! They drank through what must've been 12 full tankards of beer, or ale, or whatever they were drinking. And those tankards were huge. The 15,000 berries he technically doesn't even have probably wouldn't even come close.
His doppelganger stumbles as he directs it to push open the door, struggling with the simultaneous actions, but still manages to get out and slam it shut behind it before the woman can catch up. Kane hears an inarticulate yell of rage and decides that, as he's heard, discretion really is the better part of valour. The primary darts around a corner and he frantically unsummons it.
It takes a moment but it does work, and just as he sees the woman storming past the alleyway, his doppelganger dissipates.
His head immediately lightens, both from the mental load of two doppelgangers and the stress of managing what was essentially an entire drunk limb. One that was probably on the verge of some sort of organ failure, at that.
Things are going much better for the secondary. It's work got a little sloppier whilst he was distracted, but it's picked back up now, and things are going well. The meals are starting to look a little more finished now, so hopefully the feast will be done soon and he can get that ticket out of it.
In the meantime he re-summons the primary, mentally noting that it does not in fact appear with the pip-boy, and sends it climbing back over the wall and into town. At this point he's starting to wonder if someone will spot him doing this all the time. It's not as if there's another-
A thought strikes him, and he freezes the primary halfway up the wall.
If Emmet's ship got wrecked here… surely a few others must've also crashed in the past. He aborts his plan to venture back into town, and instead has the primary start skirting the outside of the spiky basin.
Climbing across sideways is quite the difficult task, especially without equipment. It comes oddly naturally to leap between spikes, a subtle benefit that he's noticed only once in the past. He wonders if he's actually any better at it, or if the main benefit is just greater confidence.
Either way, though it takes a while and exhausts the primary quite a bit, it manages to make some decent progress. After only half an hour, whilst the secondary is being made to put the finishing touches on a few meals, he starts spotting the fragmented remains of ships.
Looking outwards, the spikes do continue for quite a bit out. It's possible to navigate in that direction, but the spikes are mostly pointed outwards so getting back would be quite… dangerous. Not impossible though.
The primary starts hopping down to the more ocean-level spikes, keeping a sharp eye out for anything intact enough to hold loot. Eventually he finds just that, half a ship wedged between two spikes. It looks like once upon a time it was a bigger ship than Emmet's, but now it's scrap worse than scrap.
It's enough to make him wonder how on Earth their ship got stuck so deep into the basin, but that can be a question for later. After all, he's finally found a use for Scavenger beyond just being one of many traits making his list look prettier.
The primary drops down onto the fractured deck of the ship. It wobbles a little as the wood lets out an audible crack, but nothing breaks and it's balance holds.
A quick glance of the deck of the ship doesn't show anything still on the surface, though with how fractured and rotted the wood looks, he didn't expect there to be anything left anyway. The real treasure is down below, so that's precisely where he sends the doppelganger. It carefully picks it's way across the deck of the ship, careful to avoid any planks that seem particularly rotted or noisy.
Before long, it's making it's way down the steps to the innards of the ship. It looks like some sort of cargo vessel, perhaps, because the inside is just one big room with a bunch of boxes piled up inside it. Though, it was split in half, so most of them are soaked through with water or shattered beyond recognition.
Again, he carefully navigates the primary through the ruins of the ship, kicking fragmented crates and barrels over to see what's inside.
It's mostly mush. Green mush, brown, mush, yellow mush. All kinds of gross things. A few lucky barrels even have rotted fabrics in them instead, which is much nicer.
It reached the end of the ship without finding anything of note and considered that to be the end of it. But, when he started walking it back to the stairs, he noticed something.
There was a loose plank on the wall beneath the staircase. Intrigued, he walks the primary over and kicks it until it falls off.
Inside there's a bedroll wrapped up in plastic, a lantern on the floor beside it, and a backpack.
Incredibly, they're all perfectly dry.
Now, the lantern could theoretically be useful, and the backpack probably has something interesting in it, but what really excites him is the bedroll. Finally, no more stone bed!
The doppelganger pries at the wood until it makes a hole big enough to get in and rolls up the bedroll, strapping it to the backpack which it then swiftly puts on. It picks up the lantern, he intends to just take it back as well, but is surprised to see a button on it.
Obviously he presses it.
The lantern, shockingly, actually lights up, albeit with a dim and flickering glow. At this point, Kane has decided to pretend the disparate technology levels of this place make sense.
The little alcove lights up, giving him a better picture of what was in here.
Which is… not much. There's a sack of mulch in the corner which he hopes just used to be to hold leftover food, and wasn't a toilet. It's quite dusty in here, despite there being no obvious entrance or exit.
All told it looks like a stowaway lived in here for quite a while. Luckily enough there's no corpse, so they at the very least didn't die in the wreck. The biggest surprise is the message he gets as soon as he finishes surveying the room.
Congrats! You've found your first secret room. Take x1 Silver Random ticket
His customary investigation done, Kane hurriedly directs the primary back out of the alcove and up the stairs. The backpack is a little heavy but it was clearly made for a teenager, because it's quite small. The doppelganger manages to get back to the deck of the ship and then up onto the next spike rather easily.
Kane watches on from the map on his pip-boy (the wreck shows up marked as 'Wreckage of the Symphony Crew') to make sure that he's moving it in the right direction.
As predicted, getting back is much harder. At some points the doppelganger has trudge through some shallow water to reach the base of the next spike and climb up it to continue. The time it takes to reach him is fortunately not too bad, because after about ten minutes there's finally something new happening with the secondary.
"Alright, that should be the last meal plated up." The head chef states, waving the dead-eyed helpers down from the pots they were cleaning, "You lot, put the plates on the food carts and start taking them up to the dining room. The actual waiters will handle the delicates."
Kane slows down the primary's progress so that he can focus more on the secondary, putting down a large pot so he can go by the kitchen entrance where the plates are being carted. The bustle doesn't stop just because cooking is done, now there are half a dozen people in expensive gold-accented suits collecting those tall and thin glasses on platters to carry away.
Once it's gotten a few of the plates placed, the secondary starts pushing the cart out of the kitchen, following the horde of waiters up a ramp to a much nicer hallway with a gold carpet running down the middle. Sticking close to the edge, where there's no carpet to catch the wheels, the secondary pushes the cart up to a set of double doors whilst it's opened by someone on the other side. The waiters rush in and start placing platters of drinks down in pre-prepared places around the edges of the room, whilst it itself merely comes to a stop in the entrance.
"Allow me. You will stand by the wall, and should anyone call for assistance whilst a proper waiter isn't present, you will assist them." A snooty looking man tells him whilst helpfully loading the platters onto the table and pushing the cart aside.
Kane walks the secondary over to the wall, trying to be as unobtrusive as possible so that he can watch for anything of note.
The next… He's just gonna call them servants, and try not to think about what's happened to their minds, actually. The next servant that comes along gets told to drag both they're and the secondary's cart back. The one after that is told to go wait by the wall. So, it looks like he got lucky being assigned here then.
And he actually means that too. He just has to stand around and spy on these people, essentially. It's exactly what he wanted.
Though, it's quite boring.
His focus goes back to the primary, hurrying up it's route back to him. He's interrupted when it's halfway back by another notification.
Congrats! You've helped prepare a royal feast. Take x1 Silver Skill ticket
A surprise, though a pleasant one. He was starting to think he'd get nothing at all, so a silver skill is certainly nice. Just that and the silver random make today quite a good day.
Briefly looking around from the secondary, he sees that all of the food has been plated on the table, drinks have been arrayed at the edges of the room, and a few have already been put next to the seats. It's quite a big table, it must be enough for at least twenty people. Are there really gonna be that many?
By the time that the primary has reached his 'quaint' home base, the room has started filling out. There are a few people he recognise, such as the forewoman Suko and the… accountant(?) Alan. Alan gives the secondary a little wave when he notices it, which gets an odd look from Suko and more than a few of the staff.
The primary comes to a stop next to Kane, drawing his attention. He makes it put down the back and the lantern before dispersing itself, because it's both tired and soaked. He grabs the bag whilst he creates a new one and gets a message the moment his fingers make contact.
Congrats! You've found a rare item. Take x1 Silver Item ticket
"Oh, rare?" That peaks his interest. He glances around the dining room with secondary and, upon determining that there's nothing happening yet, quickly opens the backpack and peers inside.
"…oh." He deflates.
It's just a bunch of colourful shells. He shuts the bag again and pushes it to the side for now, deciding that maybe he can sell them for something later. More immediately, he starts unrolling the bedroll whilst he starts his three spins, eager to see what he can get before the feast starts.
[Animate Undead] |Elite Ability|
You are able to animate corpses into a variety of undead such as skeletons, zombies, ghouls etc. but you cannot transform them into higher forms of undead such as vampires, dullahans, ghosts etc. Undead possess basic intelligence below human level but can understand orders. You can control up to 100 undead at once, this can be increased through training.
Half distracted by his bedroll, he decides not to properly read that until he's properly set up. His primary finishes forming and he just has it sit against the spikes and close it's eyes for now.
[Novice Drawing] |Common Skill|
You are a novice at drawing about as skilled as an art student, while you are noticeably better than people who don't know how to draw, you aren't good enough to become a professional. You will however improve much faster than other people if you choose to train yourself.
[Guardian Shield] |Uncommon Item|
God of WarAn extremely durable bracelet that can unfold into a supernaturally durable shield faster than the blink of an eye. It can also serve the duty of a bludgeon if need be.
The secondary hears a slight commotion, so Kane quickly seats himself on the bedroll and reads through his gains.
A bracelet that turns into a shield sounds useful, though it doesn't have a cooldown listed anywhere, so he's still unsure what Hoarder does. Novice Drawing is… a skill, sure. It's not bad. Maybe he'll get into drawing.
Then he reads the ability and almost chokes on air. Raise a hundred corpses into undead? It can be trained? Actually, genuine necromancy. He's got two extra bodies and it's insane.
Before he can ponder the implications, and how he'd even get a hundred corpses to raise anyway, the door to the dining room bursts open.
And in walks a man with a calming smile and a stupid crown on his head. The feast has begun.
Hello everyone! Welcome, welcome. And, of course, the guest of honour." Gaet grins wider, tipping his head slightly as he steps aside. A woman with a katana on her waist wordlessly steps to the other side, letting a man step through the door. Emmet.
He looks… inscrutable as always. His wide-brimmed hat shadows his eyes, and his cloak covers his body language. Kane frowns at him, though fortunately enough secondary doesn't react. What is up with him, exactly? He still hasn't been able to figure out what his motivations are, beyond avoiding the cops that is.
Emmet wordlessly takes a seat beside Alan, directly next to the seat at the head of the table. The woman with the sword sits down opposite him, beside Suko.
Gaet stays standing for a moment before putting on a show of reluctantly taking the seat at the head of the table, though the smile never fades from his face.
"I know you all want to eat. My most trusted employees- No, my family." He says graciously, bowing his head slightly, "Emmet here has so graciously agreed to stay. I think he might be the fourth member of my retinue, should he prove strong enough of course. And with excellent timing, because- Well, that's a glum topic for a feast. I hope you'll all treat Emmet just like you've been treating me. Now, you may eat!" He raises a glass up in the air. Everyone save Emmet follows suit with a cheer, with the mysterious man himself merely tipping his hat and lifting the glass slightly.
"Thank ya kindly, evr'y body." He says in a gruff voice before taking a sip of his drink.
Then the feast begins, and people start eating at a polite pace. The room fills with a gentle chatter, mostly talk of trade agreements or servant shift schedules, because apparently nothing else happens here. Emmet stays quite whilst Alan and Suko talk between themselves and Gaet. The sword woman is mostly staying quiet too, staring down Emmet.
Kane isn't sure what to make of it all, to be frank. Secondary is at the opposite end of the room from the retinue, so he can't really hear what they're saying. That leaves him watching, and thinking.
Maybe there's something in the food? Or is it really to do with the king's devil fruit? He said it was the Heal-Heal fruit, but that woman at The Bar seemed to disagree. Alan did mention the idea that secondary was somehow harmed by the 'cleanse'.
Suddenly, Kane hears a loud crash. He startles upright, secondary looking around frantically and wondering why no one else has noticed. It's only when a second, louder crash resounds that he realises his mistake.
It was his main body hearing it, not the doppelganger. It's been a while since the crash, not long enough for him to have healed fully but at least he's got a lot of energy back. He grabs the primary around the waist in an air whip and throws it up, catching itself halfway up the wall and using the momentum to frantically climb up.
Once at the top it cast's it's eyes all around. There's nothing damaged nearby, which at least means that Kane himself probably isn't under attack.
A third, far louder boom sounds out, loud enough that both primary and secondary hear it. The feast continues on, it's participants apparently oblivious. Gaet smiles, and Kane can't tell if it's at something someone said, or something more sinister.
Regardless, this time the primary saw where the explosion came from. Off over to where he recalls the river being there was a massive burst of fire and heavy black smoke. Something crumbles and collapses into the river, and the cloying smoke hovers around the area.
This isn't the best vantage point. The primary quickly drops down from the wall, slowing itself down on outcroppings of rock but ultimately not caring much for damage. His main body uses the pip-boy to guide it to the river at a dead sprint, as fast as it's body can run.
It arrives just in time to see an ominous black ship pulling up at the docks. It's covered in threatening spikes, and manned by a dozen people wielding angry-looking weaponry. A tall woman stands at the forefront of the ship, wielding a lance as long as she is tall.
The primary is too far away to hear, but it's obvious that they're all yelling as she charges off the ship, smashing her way through the few people on the dock and leading the charge into the manor.
The timing of this is conspicuous. Barely a few minutes after the start of the feast? How could they have known?
And what would he even want to do about it anyway?
He knows that this Gaet guy is suspicious, at least. These people, pirates from the looks of things, obviously want to raid this place. Could he let them hurt people just for his own goals, or perhaps more importantly, what would he be able to do even if he wanted?
Not much. But there's at least one person he wants to help.
Emmet. Right now, he's not sure if Emmet genuinely didn't care about him or if the man had his head messed with somehow. Until he confirms that, he has to act like they're still working together.
Resolve firmed, he sends the primary running down the river towards the manor. The nice thing about Iron Man is that, even if his doppelgangers are injured or tired, they'll still be at basically full power until they die. That means it can run as fast as he wants it to.
For good measure, he finally uses primary to redeem the Dread Helm, putting it on whilst it runs to mask the fact that it's a clone. He left the sword with himself, so unfortunately he doesn't have any options for arming it.
When it reaches the manor the port-side doors are already blown open, the pirates having streamed inside. Secondary can hear a ruckus downstairs, and though the party guests now seem more on edge, they still seem to assume everything is fine. Everyone except for Emmet, for… some reason.
He keeps secondary prepared for action whilst he sends primary on a different mission. Rather than head into the manor it loops around the port, right into their ship.
Hey, they're looting the place. What's wrong with doing a little looting himself?
There's no one on board, at least not on the top deck. It does a loop around looking for spare weapons lying around, and finds a few. He doesn't waste time deliberating and just takes the pistol and the scimitar, the primary holding one in each hand as it hurries back into the manor.
There's no time for a thorough looting unfortunately, and if they didn't leave guards behind then there's probably not much of value anyway. Either that, or the guards are below deck with the valuables.
As he enters the manor, the first thing he notices is that there's surprisingly little damage. Just a few chipped walls and some shaken staff. The servants are, of course, completely unbothered.
The primary blitzes past the shocked staff, following the trail of minor destruction left by the crew. Another surprise hits as he realises that they're cutting a direct route straight to the dining room. Completely ignoring all the doors and alternate stairways in favour of chasing down one specific place.
The secondary becomes aware of this as the double door to the dining hall explodes open, slamming into the walls on either side hard enough to knock them off their hinges. The woman steps forward, glaring down at Gaet.
"No one has to get hurt, except for him." She says threateningly, hefting her lance to point it at him threateningly.
"Azami, Azami. You'd think you'd learn by now." Gaet chuckles, shaking his head ruefully.
The now-named Azami falters, her massive lance lowering slightly.
"What do you mean, witch? This is my first assault on your base!" She yells, inflamed, and raises her lance over her head. Kane is shocked she can even lift that thing, up close it looks even bigger. It must weigh more than twice her own body, but she holds it like a toothpick.
"Katie, Alan, Suko. I ask that you please sit out this fight and leave it to Emmet." Gaet remains seated and calm, as if nothing of note were happening at all. Emmet stands up with a heavy sigh, drawing his rifle from behind his back.
"Awlright, 'll see what I c'n do." He drawls lazily, pointing the barrel of the gun at the attacking pirate, "Ain't nothin' personal." And he pulls the trigger.
Somehow, Azami manages to bring the lance down just in time to block. The bullet slams into the lance… and seems to do nothing at all. Emmet visibly falters.
"…wha-" He's cut off when, with a strangled yell, Azami rears back and throws the lance directly at Gaet. It crosses the room like a bullet, with enough force to knock more than a few people back against the wall, secondary included.
All Emmet could do was active that strange pulse attack he used on the plate man, pushing the lance slightly off course. Instead of slamming straight through Gaet's chest, it merely cuts a hole through his side and continues unopposed, even burrowing through the wall behind him.
Kane almost throws up at the sight of the gaping wound in the man's torso.
And, somehow, he looks completely unbothered.
"Tsk tsk. You really, really shouldn't have done that." He shakes his head, as if she spat on his face instead of speared him through with a lance.
"What are you talking about?" Azami snaps at him, as her crew finally starts to file in behind her, "You're basically done for!"
Gaet merely laughs. A golden glow emits from his right hand, as he lifts it up to his torso. Before everyone's eyes, the gaping wound seems to reverse, regressing into nothing more than unblemished skin. Soon after, even his clothes are knitted back together.
It's like nothing happened at all.
Azami almost physically rears back, and even his retinue look on in amazement, as if they'd never seen it before. But, wasn't he acting like this had all happened before?
"I'd call this facade over. Katie." He gestures at the woman with the katana that has up until now remained silent. She rises to her feet and casually strides over to the pirate, her face blank and cold.
The other woman grits her teeth, clenching her hands into fists. Her gamble didn't pay off, and now she's left without a weapon.
Katie comes to a stop, silently staring up at her.
Azami stares back, confused.
The silence stretches on, no one daring to break it.
"Dammit!" Azami curses before desperately slamming her fist down at the smaller woman. Katie scoffs, and in a flash has her sword drawn.
In the next moment, Azami's arm drops to the floor. A gasp runs through her crew.
"Ha. Gahaha! Gah haha!" Gaet bursts out into wild, crazed laughter, doubling over and clutching his stomach as if he can't take it.
"O-oh, gods, that's precious. You really thought- Oh, wow." He grins widely, miming wiping away a tear as he straightens up.
"You know, it's never even a fight. Not against her, at least. They call her the Revenger for a reason." He chuckles again, whilst everyone just stare at him. Save for Azami, who is staring at the stump where her arm used to be in shock.
"Okay, okay. I've had my fun. I suppose Emmet will do for now." Gaet laughs one last time before holding his right hand up above his head. The glow forms, bathing the room. Slowly, the wall begins to knit together, the lance drags out of it across the floor, even Azami's arm slips back into place like the misplaced arm of an action figure.
Kane stares on in astonishment through the eyes of the secondary. What insane power, to put everything to rights so easily. This is clearly no healing devil fruit.
He suddenly decides to have secondary look around too, to gauge everyone else's reactions, only… they're not reacting at all. They all just stare straight ahead, glassy eyed.
Azami starts getting pulled backwards, like a puppet on a string, until she flies out of the door with a sudden slam. Her and her crew seem to vanish in the wind, not even primary sees them. The servants and staff out in the hallways appear unaffected by whatever the effect is, but everyone else…
By the time he turns his attention back to the feast, everyone is chatting again like nothing ever happened. His heart starts pounding, confusion and fear mixing in a violent medley in his gut.
Something is very, very wrong. That was like… some sort of play, being put on for one man's entertainment and one man alone. And now he continues like nothing even happened. That's not healing, obviously. It's not just reversing time either though. So… what is it?
And how does someone beat that?
Congrats! You uncovered a royal conspiracy. Take x1 Golden Trait ticket