unknownrival | [RL - Tea with Vanessa after lunch.]

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[RL - Tea with Vanessa after lunch.]

Hopefully this would go better than Vanessa's last visit.

Issei sat on the top step of the ones leading up to the temple. Let's see, he'd confirmed that Vanessa would be dressed appropriately, he'd warned the other monks that a woman would be having tea with him, and he'd steeled himself for being teased nigh-constantly during the visit. Unless he was forgetting something, he was ready to receive his guest.

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Issei nodded. "I'd like to be free of the viruses, but I couldn't just not talk to all of my friends on here. And what if something were to happen to one of them and I didn't know because I hadn't been watching the community? I couldn't let that happen, so I've stayed. And so far, I think staying has been the right decision."

"I know a man who'd be quite glad if I was taken away from the community and he didn't have to deal with me anymore."

She brought the teacup to her lips and finished it off, eyes looking off to the side as she took in the...interesting...flavour of the kelp tea, something she'd never had before. It was an odd sort of aftertaste that it provided, but she was certain she could get used to it after a while.

"Really? Who?" he asked, tilting his head a little to the side. "I mean, aside from the crazy people you're involved with, obviously. And did you enjoy your tea? Well, you must have or you wouldn't have asked for a second cup."

"Albert Wesker, one of those 'crazy people' I'm 'involved with,'" she replied, quirking her mouth up into a lopsided smile to hide the fear she felt these days at just his name. She'd been calling him "Sir" for the most part, but even then...well. It still felt wrong even now to call him by his full name. "And yes, the tea was great, thank you."

"Oh. Well, I'm sure no one here that's sane wants you to leave." Issei smiled a little at the compliment. "You're welcome. Is there anything else you wanted? You mentioned a tour, perhaps...?"

"That would be lovely, yes," she replied a little too cheerfully, standing up and rinsing her teacup out in the sink before wiping it dry with a cloth. "I've never been in a temple before. At least, not on good terms, anyway." She smirked.

"Have you been to one before that time you came to trample on me?" Issei asked, also rising from his seat. "I'd be happy to show you around, as long as it doesn't come to that."

"No, I haven't been," she replied, smoothing out the start of her skirt. She smiled faintly at him, watching how short he was in comparison to her in her heels. "And no, I'm not going to trample you again. I don't have my boots on. You're lucky today, kid." And she winked.

"I'll keep that in mind if you ever show up again in boots," Issei replied, starting to lead her out of the room. "I'm afraid our temple isn't that large, but I hope you'll enjoy seeing it nonetheless."

"Nah, I think I'll just stick with high heels for now," she said, waving a hand dismissively as she followed him out, taking in everything she didn't have the time or want to take in before. She ran her hand along one of the walls, tapping out an old English tune as she did so.

"Over here are the living quarters of the monks, but you probably realized that when you found my room," he explained as they walked through the halls. "And through this window you can see our gardens in the back."

"I remember that much," she said, nodding about the living quarters as her fingers ran over door to door. Stopping at the window, she leaned forward a little, peering out at everything in it, everything that was kept nice and tidy...it sort of reminded her of her day with Blackout where he'd been pulling trees out of the ground and taking out his frustrations on him. "That garden is beautiful," she said absentmindedly.

"Thank you. We all do our part in taking care of it," Issei told her. "Our library is just ahead. Are you interested in taking a look?"

"Oh, of course," she responded, walking behind him a little after looking at the garden a moment more and turning back to face him. "Are they mostly religious books or...?"

"There are a lot of those, but we have more variety as well. After all, besides it being a temple, it's our home." Issei pulled open the large doors that led into the library. "I could spend hours in here, but that would probably bore you."

"Oh no, I quite love books. I had to read a massive amount of them, short stories, and poetry in my English classes. Lots and lots of reading and writing. Comes with the territory of journalism."

She moved through the library, fingers running over the books as she looked at spines, pulled a few out and flipped through them. "Well, this is a very nice collection. How long has this temple been around?"

"More than two hundred years, at least," Issei told her, putting back a book that had been left on a table. "Long enough that I'm not sure if our family name is from the name of the temple or vice versa... For some reason details about our founding are kind of vague."

"Two hundred years?" she parroted, looking at him strangely. "That's...a really long time. Are the other temples and shrines here that old as well? Has anyone made a more modern one since things turned about in this new age or what?"

"Oh, there are certainly more recently made temples in Japan, as well as older ones. Just not in Fuyuki, since it's a fairly small town," he answered. "It's certainly at least a little older than two hundred years, anyway. The church that's also in town is much more recent."

"What church would that be, Issei?" she asked after a long moment, pausing to take out a book on world religions and flip through it. It obviously had been read in a while, and it was obviously older, but it still caught her eye. "I didn't think the Japanese were really ones for Christianity, if that's the kind of church you mean."

"The church near the other side of town," he replied, gesturing vaguely in one direction with his hand. "You're right, but Christianity has been growing in Japan, so this church is more modern. No one I know frequents ours, however... I never liked the priest, he disturbed me for years."

Her head jolted up at the mention of disturbing priests, which she knew about herself all to well. She snapped the book shut before replacing and leaning against the bookshelf, arms crossed.

"What was so disturbing about him?"

"Just his whole aura was... he frightened me. I was fairly young when I met him the first time, so I didn't know what it was about him at the time. ...And then recently someone who'd been in contact with him before his death told me exactly how evil he was." Issei shuddered. "I knew I was right about him."

She cocked up an eyebrow at that, a bit of that same anger rising up in her gut, just like it had earlier. She gripped her elbows harshly, though it was hard to see or tell. "What do you mean by 'evil'?" If they were anything like the priests in her world, well...she wouldn't be too happy.

Issei glanced around the library - no one was all that close to them. He lowered his voice just in case. "Last year he was using an ancient magical ritual to summon the incarnation of all evil into the world. He was doing this with the help of a magical servant, which he kept in existence by feeding him children's souls."

There were very few people Issei was genuinely glad were dead, but Kotomine was definitely one of them.

[RL - Tea with Vanessa after lunch.]

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