Turning the Page! Looking Outward, to Broader Horizons!

[Jade]

--Somewhere Along Dance Island's Coast, Mid-Morning--

"Hey, big bro?" the younger hunter's voice called out. "Isn't that a ship?"

The older and larger of the duo put his hand up, and immediately the younger came to a stop. Blue-gray eyes narrowed as he followed an outstretched finger to observe the sail boat - a simple, small vessel, with only one... No, two figures moving about on top of it, throwing something that must've been what passed for the boat's anchor over the side. And then Kai grabbed the back of his younger brother's head and dragged the both of them down onto the ground, onto their fronts.

"Oof!" said the younger, though his voice was now quiet. He wriggled up to the edge of the cliff to catch up to Kai, propping himself up on his elbows too to continue peering down at the mystery people arriving on the island. "What was that for, big bro?"

"Shhh," came the answer, with a finger pressed up to Kai's lips. "Think for a minute. Why would they arrive on the island here, and not at one of the actual ports? They could be pirates."

A moment of silence passed between the two before the younger came up with another question. "Aren't pirates supposed to have big ships with skulls and crossbones on their flag?"

---

The island they'd arrived at had looked dreary ever since it first showed up on the horizon - and hadn't gotten to look any more inviting in the time it'd taken them to arrive. So close to the island now, they too were subjected to the darker sky and constant, low-level drizzle of rain from on high.

Jaz had initially wanted to pull the ship right up onto the coast, but the section they'd found themselves at was nearly all stone, and that was a good way to tear the underside of their boat up really quick. So, instead, they'd pulled up as close as they'd dared to the stony beach set under a less-than-inviting stony cliff before throwing the anchor over the side to keep their little ship in place.

"Alright, Ama! Last one to shore is a rotten egg!" she announced as she jumped up onto the railing - and then down over the side, into the water.

Oh, that's a lot deeper than I thought, was her first thought.

There wasn't a second.

---

As one of the two figures aboard the ship dropped over the railing and into the water, Kai wriggled back and got onto his knees. "Come on, Tsuyu, we should warn the village, just in case." After getting a few more feet away from the cliff's edge, he stood up and started walking away - but stopped when he realized the younger hunter wasn't following him. "... Tsuyu?"

Tsuyu was still down by the cliff's edge, though he had picked himself up and was leaning further over the edge as if to get a better look. "Big bro, they... They're not coming back up out of the water."

"So what? It's only been a few seconds. Come on, before they get to shore, Tsuyu-" Kai turned around properly to see that Tsuyu was not following directions. Breathlessly, the younger hunter was still watching the water, and the seconds seemed to stretch on into an eternity. As Tsuyu's voice started again, a small and scared sound, Kai was already moving, racing for the closest point where he could safely make it down to the stone shore below.

---

--Remote Hunting Village of Ishi, Dance Island, Early Afternoon--

<sup>Jaz reflexively woke up with a coughing fit, trying to clear her lungs of water - that was no longer there. She calmed down after a few seconds to find herself sitting upward on a mat (that she had been laying on until she woke with a start) on the wooden floor of a small, dim room, lit only by what was either a candle or lantern on the other side of a paper room divider with a wooden frame.

Her trademark XO glasses were missing as well, which she realized she probably should have noticed earlier given the way everything wasn't tinted blue. Her clothes, too, were missing, though whoever had taken them had at least been thoughtful enough to replace them with a surprisingly comfortable robe-like piece of clothing she didn't have a name for, which was thankfully dry.

Having taken stock of the majority of her situation in short order, Jaz turned to the other figure laid down on a mat in this room - Amasagi. She watched the inert swordswoman for a few seconds as a smile crept over her face, thankful that her first crew member was okay... And then scooted over to hover in front of the woman before poking her insistently in the cheek, over and over again. "Hey, psst, Ama, wake up. I think we've been kidnapped by really nice kidnappers."</sup>

[Vio]

^{Amasagi #1}

---

^{“Alright, Ama!” Cricket Jaz barked:
“Last one to shore is a rotten egg!”}

“Pff. You’re really playing that game?” Danziker Amasagi replied, securing her sword—Onibi—to her back, though barely getting to finish her question as the sound of water breaking indicated her Captain’s actions. What she didn’t expect, however, was the lack of a witty retort. Words were absent from the air. “Ah, s#¡+, she’s messing around… Well, time to see how good these new legs are at swimming,” she voiced to herself, taloned toes taking grip of the railing of the sailboat as she stepped herself over and dropped into the coastal waters. By the gloom and weather, it was hard to see the bottom, but rocky outcroppings suggested shallow waves.

Splosh! The breaking water filled her ears, but so too did a sensation that was entirely unfamiliar. The partial weightlessness that came with wading and swimming had abandoned her entirely, the freedom of the water cast aside by something altogether more dreadful. A last second protest by her anatomical companion had been cut short by the very same sensation. The water was deceptively deep, though the distorted surface remained tantalisingly close as cold and darkness swallowed her…

^{—— ??? ——}

“Kh… Kyack!” A coughing fit was the first lucid moment that Miss Danziker experienced after that, as if she’d woken all asudden from a nightmare. But no matter how hard she coughed and choked as she raised to a sitting position, it was all reflexive. No water came out, no saline tang, just a few raspy and dry, heaving coughs as she took a moment to regain control of her body and confirm to her brain that her lungs were fine. “Wh– What happened…?” The question hovered for a moment before she realised that she had been awoken by the very person who had more than likely gotten her into this situation, Cricket Jaz, who seemed to have completely forgone her usually disjointed style in favour of something far more rustic and traditional.

A similar garb adorned her own body.

“Where are we? Ah–! I remember… One second I was climbing off the boat,” the swordswoman recalled, brushing her black bangs aside as they seemed adamant to obscure both eyes—the reason for that was soon made apparent as they waved from side to side and were accompanied by an avian trill from somewhere above. Meiwaku was fine. “And then the next– Owch!” She didn’t get a chance to finish her sentence, receiving a firm jab to the forehead from a slate-coloured bill, which quickly accompanied the woman’s outcry with a pained squawk of its own.

^{“Watch it, you idiot!” Ama bit:
“That hurts you, too…!”}

^{“Caw…!”}

“Ugh… So. It wasn’t a bad dream?” Ama asked, finally forcing bangs to settle over her left eye as her crane company settled itself and started preening. Aside from the occasional pull of avian neck movements, she ignored it and focused her attention on Jaz, thankful that there was at least one familiar entity present. “You remember anything? Or are you just going off a hunch that they’re nice…?”

---

SPOILER: Click to show

{Post Synposis:—}
<sub>Awakened by Jaz, Amasagi mostly reclaims control of conscious action and tries to piece together what happened.

Notes:— ——</sub>

---

Danziker Amasagi | #e44d2e
Meiwaku | #778899
Cricket Jaz | #4b9eec

[Jade]

"Wh- What happened...?"

Jaz tilted her her head, but didn't answer - content to just let Ama get her bearings for herself. She did, at least, give the other woman some space now that she was awake, backing up a little just in time for Meiwaku to decide to be a nuisance again.

"Nope! It all actually happened," she answered, sitting upright with her legs crossed, hands on her knees. "Guess I must've misjudged how deep the water was, haha! We'll need to be more careful about that, since I guess we're both hammers!" Jaz laughed at her own mistake for another minute before she tilted her head the other direction from the way she had just a few moments prior, putting a finger up to her chin and tapping. "Also, just a hunch. I'd guess we're both in the same boat - or jumping out of it, as the case may be - vis a vis 'knowing what's going on'."

The sound of something sliding against the wooden floor caught Jaz's attention, and she turned her head to look back over her shoulder. Behind her, the divider had been slid out of place, and now there was a kid standing there and looking at them with eyes as wide as dinner plates. He looked to be maybe just over the line to classify as a teenager, if not a little younger, with shockingly vibrant teal hair pulled back in a messy, low ponytail that Jaz definitely approved of given her own hair "style" choices. The boy was dressed in clothes that certainly matched the style of what captain and swordswoman had found themselves dressed in, though more of a rough-and-tumble look, with an archer's chest guard tied over one side of it.

He stood there quietly for a moment, just making eye contact first with Jaz, then Amasagi - and then turned back around to whatever was on the other side of the room divider. "They're awake!" he shouted, and then disappeared behind the room divider, slid right back into the place it had been before he moved it.

"I mean, to be fair," Jaz turned back to Amasagi, sliding right back into what she'd been saying without missing a beat. "If they were trying to actually keep us here, I think they chose the wrong construction materials. And the clothes seem a little too nice for, y'know, people who have been kidnapped. Though I guess maybe they're just working with what they've got?"

"You haven't been kidnapped." The room divider was slid out of place again, and this time there was an older man standing there, wearing clothes that matched the younger boy's - and, speak of the devil, there he was as well, peeking out from behind to get a glimpse of the two women. "I mean, really, is that any way to talk about the person who fished you two out of the water? And, by the way, what the hell was that about? It was like you two hit the water and just sank."

"Like anchors!" Jaz cheerily added, which initially prompted a nod of agreement from the young man, followed by a look of absolute bewilderment. "Yeah, that was my bad. Forgot the 'look before you' part of 'leap', haha!"

[Vio]

^{Amasagi #2}

---

“Pft. Almost drowning. Great start to our journey,” Amasagi said with an exaggerated roll of the eyes, gaze shifting to avian legs as she adjusted to both a somewhat rude awakening and the understanding that she was now little more than a brick in the water. She had never been a particularly prolific swimmer, but now? Well, the curse of the sea was now very much her problem. “Shame I didn’t get wings,” she grinned, realising that to properly raise herself she had to push her torso up and tuck her legs, else the uneven arrangement of ankle and knee worked against her.

A kid…? Irises of soft red quickly focused upon the sight and sound of intrusion as a door slid open, exposing a youth of barely maturing years whose aesthetic seemed indicative of a huntsman or scout. Their own interest seemed just as great, wide-eyed and soon thereafter shouting to individuals unknown as he disappeared once more behind the wooden lattice and paper screen.

^{“I mean, to be fair…,” Jaz continued unperturbed:
“I think they chose the wrong construction materials…”}

Meanwhile, Miss Danziker quickly gave the room a once over, listening to her Captain’s quick assessment of their decidedly unusual situation. Not too far away from where she had been placed, closer to the wall, the familiar form of her sword had been set upon a simple wooden stand—one that was perhaps a little too small for Onibi’s overall length and yet supported it all the same. This alone proved the implications of their environment, though verbal confirmation was swiftly given as the sliding door opened once more, exposing the image of an adult clad in similar attire to the accompanying boy.

^{“…It was like you two hit the water and just sank.”}

“Mm. The water was deeper than we thought it was,” Amasagi confirmed and smiled as her Captain laughed off the whole ordeal, as disregarding of the potential fatality of it as one could be. “And, I didn’t know I couldn’t swim,” she admitted, taking up Onibi and partially unsheathing it to check for water damage on the blade. There was none. Meiwaku seemed to have finished preening for the moment, bending its neck about and side-eyeing the strangers.

“Anyway,” the swordswoman continued, ignorant of the slow and steady motions of her anatomical hitchhiker as it moved forwards. “Thank you for rescuing us… Uh– Who are you?” The question hung in the air for a moment, much as Meiwaku hung ever closer to the woman’s left ear, kept out of her periphery by the way her bangs currently fell…

---

SPOILER: Click to show

{Post Synposis:—}
<sub>As Jaz and Amasagi discuss, another figure speaks to them!

Notes:— ——</sub>

---

Danziker Amasagi | #e44d2e
Meiwaku | #778899
Cricket Jaz | #4b9eec
Unknown [NPC] | #2e2874

[Jade]

The young man just stood there staring at the two women, one still sitting on the floor and the other checking on the bizarre blade she'd been carrying. "How do you not know you can't...?" he started to ask, then screwed his eyes shut and put his hands up, palms toward them. "You know what? Forget I asked."

"Who are you?"

The younger boy pushed past the older one, nearly knocking him forward into the floor with his enthusiasm. "I'm Tsuyu, and that's Kai!" he beamed, pointing first to himself, then to the annoyed young man. Before Tsuyu could continue, Kai palmed the kid's head and dragged him back so that they were standing side-by-side.

"We're hunters here," Kai added. His eyes narrowed, looking over Amasagi first before moving over to give Jaz a proper once-over. "Now, your turn. Who the hell are you two supposed to be?"

"Cricket Jaz!" Jaz said cheerily, then popped up from her seated position directly onto her feet. "Future King of the Pirates, and we're currently looking for more crew members. You two want to join? I think we could use some people who can swim, just in case Ama or I decide to take another dip, haha!"

Tsuyu's eyes had gone wide as saucers and were filled with stars at the woman confidently declaring herself a pirate - but he was cut off by Kai stepping in front of him, putting himself between the boy and the two women in a protective manner. "Like hell either of us would join your crew!"

It was like a switch was flipped in the boy's head - the stars in his eyes went out and he mirrored his big bro's angry expression as he went up on his tippy-toes to glare at Jaz too. "Yeah! Like we'd join the crew of some two-bit pirates who don't even have a cool flag with a skull on it!"

"..." Jaz tilted her head up, taking her chin between her index finger and thumb while she stared at the ceiling for a moment, oblivious to Kai telling Tsuyu off for saying something nonsensical. After a moment, she nodded, and turned fully to Amasagi. "Kiddo's got a point. We're going to need a Jolly Roger - ah, but maybe it should wait until we have a real boat...?"

Kai stopped and slowly turned his head away from the younger boy he'd been scolding to stare at Jaz in disbelief. Tsuyu seized the opportunity - before Kai could return his attention to him, he'd bounded across the small room, crowding Amasagi with wide eyes. "Is that your sword? Why's it all wavy like that? Is that bird actually attached to you? Kai said it was, but birds don't grow out of people - how's it move like that? Is it some kind of puppet?" The questions came at a fast clip, one right after the other, until the boy finally came to a stop in front of her, looking up at Ama with wide eyes. "Are you some kind of cool bird-puppeteer sword lady pirate?!"

[Vio]

^{Amasagi #3}

---

“Cricket Jaz!” The woman wasting no time on spilling the beans of her identity and her goal was to be expected. Nothing so far had seemed to be able to keep her down, save the sea, and so it came as no surprise when she blurted it all out. After all, when you had such lofty goals, wasn’t it better to announce them proudly than to timidly keep them concealed? It only made sense for her to follow suit.

^{“I’m Danziker Amasagi,” the avian oddity added:
“‘World’s Greatest Swordswoman’ in the making!”}

^{“You two want to join…?”}

“Like hell,” the young man—Kai was the name assigned to the hunter—practically spat. Almost on cue, Tsuyu added his own two cents to the matter. Ama could practically hear the gears turning in her Captain’s head over the hushed but stern scolding that the older hunter gave to the younger. It was then that Jaz made mention of something that the fresh buccaneers had both overlooked. The classic skull and bones of pirate iconography was sorely lacking.

“Nobody’s going to take that tiny thing seriously if it’s flying a Jolly Roger,” the swordswoman stated, well aware of the limited scope of such a small craft. What she hadn’t expected was the youngster to toddle right on up to her and start asking questions. Curious questions about her sword and Meiwaku, the latter of which suddenly decided to make its behaviour known as a slate grey bill started trying to preen her eyebrows. “Ow! Stop that!” Huffing as she batted the bird head away, receiving a few disgruntled trills in response, eyes focused again upon the youth.

“This one’s called ‘Meiwaku’, and it’s very real,” she answered, holding the crane’s cheeks in one hand and pointing to it with a spare finger from the other. “Mm. Basically, I was made to eat a weird fruit and this happened to me,” Amasagi explained, albeit briefly as the subject matter was a bit of a sore one, as she released her grip on his second head and shifted a leg to expose taloned toes. A smile formed on her face. “And, yeah, that’s my sword—it’s name is ‘Onibi’—and the reason it’s wavy is… Hmm… You ever run your hand down a washboard? Same thing, but sword to sword, so when I parry an opponent’s blade it makes their weapon shake…!” She raised her head and looked at Kai. “I’m guessing you dried Onibi as well? Thanks~! Seawater can eat away at a blade pretty quickly… Oh! Actually, that’s a good question: Where are we…?”

---

SPOILER: Click to show

{Post Synposis:—}
<sub>More shenanigans!

Notes:— ——</sub>

---

Danziker Amasagi | #e44d2e
Meiwaku | #778899
Cricket Jaz | #4b9eec
Unknown [NPC] | #2e2874

[Jade]

The boy's eyes were wide as saucers as Amasagi fielded the questions lobbed her way - taking in everything as it came, seeing it all with the sort of naïve wonder of youth. Before Kai could intervene and pull him away, Jaz sidled on up beside him, leaning against the wall with a grin plastered across her face. "Cute kid. You two what, brothers?"

The young man frowned at Jaz, but his response was cut off by a more pressing set of questions: "Where are we...?"

"Dance!" Tsuyu answered with a beaming smile. "That's the name of the island, at least. You're in our village, Ishi!"

"Ishi Village on Dance Island!" Jaz parroted, capping it off with a clap of her hands. "I've heard of one of those two before! It's the second one. Never heard of Ishi before. Is this place a new development?"

Tsuyu was clearly about to answer, but a withering glare from Kai stopped the words had a chance to escape. "No," Kai answered instead, "it's not. We're just a... Well. Why don't you see for yourselves?"

---

Jaz kept the clothes she'd woken up in, though now with the addition of her her trademark glasses - fortunately undamaged from her impromptu dip into the brine, though they'd needed a little bit of cleaning to get the lenses clear once more. She lead the charge out of the house in spite of Kai and Tsuyu's insistence on showing them around (and trying to hand her an umbrella), sandals clacking in a satisfying manner as wood hit wood, and eagerly drank in the sights as soon as she was out of the sliding door.

The village was, well... Village was maybe overselling it. It was most certainly quaint, with a smattering of small, wooden buildings like the one they'd awoke in held a foot or two above the ground on short but thick stilts, wooden walkways leading between them and the occasional set of ramps that gave easy access to the ground. Two buildings in particular stood out from the rest - a larger one toward the middle of the community, taller than the rest, and then the visible sloped roof of another standing further out on the edge. The ground itself was visibly marshy, with some flat stones attempting to make solid paths across for those who wanted to avoid the mud and pooling water.

The self-proclaimed pirate breathed in deeply, eyes shut, taking it all in as the light drizzle of rain fell on her while the others caught up. "Ahhhhh," Jaz exhaled. "There's something very refreshing about rain like this. Nice change of pace from the salty air, eh, Ama?"

Kai frowned, standing beside her and holding the umbrella above both of their heads. "It's just rain - it's like this almost all of the time here, there's nothing special about it."

[Vio]

^{Amasagi #4}

---

“Ishi Village on Dance Island! Never heard of Ishi before,” Jaz commented, perhaps revealing a little more about the worldly knowledge she possessed than Amasagi originally would have given her credit for. Her interactions with Miss Cricket so far had suggested a less than studious background, but one could never judge a book by its cover. People were always full of surprises. Jaz was, day by day, turning out to be a surprise in almost every possible sense of the word.

Speaking of words, Ishi was synonymous with one, but ‘village’ certainly was not it. All of the buildings were simple wooden constructs, far more decorative on the inside than they were on the out, though the rustic simplicity of their designs still contributed something to the overall aura of the settlement. Hamlet was probably a better term, for Ishi spanned very little territory, the housing hovering over muddy earth and interlaced with stone paving and wooden walkways, all of which were constantly sodden by fine precipitation.

“Nice change of pace from the salty air, eh, Ama?” Jaz commented, enjoying the discernibly earthy tang to the soft breeze that slightly steered the drizzle to the west. Unlike Jaz, Miss Danziker had taken an umbrella—a simple tool of wooden frame and thin, treated fabric to retain waterproofing—and rested it over her left shoulder in such a way that Meiwaku’s head was both sheltered and partly concealed beneath it. Her own manner of dress had remained unchanged, though there was a complete omission of the use of sandals for reasons that most would not have accounted for.

^{“It’s just rain…”}

“Mhm. Reminds me a little of my hometown,” the bird-woman added, similarly taking a moment to enjoy the soft and woody scents that permeated the air of Ishi, as well as the generally cool and more tolerable climate. Truly, it was a momentary paradise and respite from seasalt and scorching sun. “Just, a lot more mud and a lot less housing,” she added, remembering that she had originated from what most people would have considered a small village by today’s standards.

“You’re saying it’s always raining like this here? Don’t you get dry seasons or snow in the winter?” Amasagi asked as she turned to cast her soft red eyes over Kai and Tsuyu, the latter of whom looked up to her as if she had just presented an absolute anomaly. Kai’s expression said little. Not even a glare that had already established itself as a trademark of the hunter’s disposition.

“…Mid to late winter is the driest part of the year,” they answered rather sharply after a momentary silence. “Other than that, it just rains like this for about three quarters of every month.” There was an unusual dichotomy between Amasagi’s comprehension of the situation and Kai’s experience of it. On one hand, that sounded like an absolutely absurd amount of rainfall, while on the other, it was only a fine drizzle. She was no meteorologist, but she did a little bit about how groundwater worked, and to have such obviously muddy ground meant two things: Kai’s claims were supported and this was a very low altitude settlement close to the water table…

---

SPOILER: Click to show

{Post Synposis:—}
<sub>Rain!

Notes:— ——</sub>

---

Danziker Amasagi | #e44d2e
Meiwaku | #778899
Cricket Jaz | #4b9eec
Kai [NPC] | #2e2874

[Jade]

Jaz laced her fingers together behind her head and closed her eyes in order to simply listen and feel. The voices of the people she was with, the sound of rain hitting the umbrella over her head now, the coolness of the day and rain. Her expression slipped into her typical standby - a confident, easy grin.

Any sort of lull that might've existed in the conversation after Kai's explanation of the island's constant dreary weather was shattered before it could form, as Jaz inhaled sharply through her nose and pulled a face. "Ahhhhh. That would explain it, wouldn't it? You get weather like this day in and day out..." She shook her head from side to side, then stepped back out from under the umbrella with a definitive clack of her wooden sandals, then turned back to the group with a grin on her face. "But hey, it takes all kinds, right? I've heard Dance was a rainy place, but to think it's this wet? It's hard to believe a place like this exists outside of the Grand Line!" Jaz laughed to herself, holding her arms outstretched around her, palms facing upward toward the overcast heavens, looking for all the world like a kid playing in the rain for that one moment.

"It's a wide world out there," she continued, letting her arms fall back to her sides and turned her back to the group, "and I can't wait to see as much of it as I can."

Kai's grip on the umbrella's handle went tight enough to turn his knuckles white for the briefest of moments, then relaxed as he sighed and began moving to catch up with Jaz. "Hey, hold on! Where do you think you're going, off on your own, you damn pirate-?!" His own sandals clattered as he hurried up behind her, with Tsuyu laughing as he tagged along behind him and attempted to drag Amasagi with him.

---

"Ye sure I can't just turn it on for a little bit, Cap?" The question originated from the bulky, rotund man in a thoroughly-drenched poncho - doing a poor job at disguising his even bulkier armor that clanked together as he moved. "I swear, if ye have me workin' out here in the rain much longer, I... I... Achoo!" The other figures gathered under the relative protection of the forest's canopy snickered at their fellow's plight, as the large man shuddered in his armor then set to looking for a handkerchief on his person.

"Of course not." The woman's voice silenced the laughter - though not the blowing of the armored man's nose, which prompted a sigh from the "Cap". "If you go wasting it now, we won't be able to charge it again until we get back to the ship - and I'm not going to have you wandering off in the middle of this operation. Man up, Chili, and quit with that-" Another elephantine blowing of his nose into the handkerchief ripped through the relative quiet, and she clenched her gauntleted hand tightly. "Infernal. Racket."

Chili sniffled pathetically and shifted where he stood. "R-right you are, Cap... My 'pologies... But gosh, it sure would be nice to warm up a little, somehow... I-I don't s'pose none of you brought any cold medicine, didja?"