[She starts in surprise and turns a baffled look on him] What?
[But a second later she connects the dots and makes a thoughtful noise.] Because I could see who killed him, right? I... never thought about using it for something like that before. [Well, she was still learning. There was a lot about her powers she hadn't thought of before.]
...I wish I could've been there to help out. [She has a feeling though, based on what she's inferred from his talking about his world, she might not have fared too well.
Lbr here, Yuri probably would've been labeled a latent criminal or something p. quickly.]
[She looks a tad embarrassed. In the face of 'could be helping police officers finding killers,' the fortune telling they did seems pretty weak in comparison. She fidgets with her hands, tapping her fingertips together as she considers.
Alright, well, it wasn't all bad now that she thinks about it.] Hisoka-- She's someone I lived with. She couldn't do all that I did, seeing peoples' deaths and all, but she was helping me with my other abilities. She was teaching me how to do fortune telling and things like that, and...
Kagemi--shadow reading. Hisoka and I can both do it. It's... [How had Hisoka described it?] Being able to follow traces that can lead to missing people or things. If someone needs to find someone, they'd come to Hisoka. If we had something that belong to them, or even just a picture and the last place they were seen, we could follow a path to lead us to them. It works about the same for lost objects too-- That's the sort of cases Hisoka usually took on.
I was... just learning and starting to help out.
As for the mitori-- the ability to see peoples' last memories... I didn't know about that until recently. It's a power descended from the shrine maidens that used to live on the mountain where we lived. I... guess there must be one somewhere in my bloodline. I haven't really thought about what to do with it, though.
[Probably NOT carry on the traditions of those shrine maidens, thankyouverymuch.]
[ Doesn't know what to do with it, huh. Kogami decides to revisit that a bit later, there might be a way she could help him and Akane in the future. Right now he'd still like to learn more about where she comes from. ]
It sounds like a unique ability even where you're from. ... I saw a vision of corpses wearing shrine garbs when I tried to help you back there. [ He glances at her apologetically before focusing back on the road. Even though it was an accidental exchange of memories, he was still the one who triggered it and seen things he shouldn't have without permission. ]
Oh. [Right. She almost forgot about that-- she knows exactly which memory it was too. Honestly, that wasn't the worst one he could've seen...which is certainly saying something.
She's not sure where to start with that though, so for a long moment she's quiet as she gathers her thoughts. When it looks like he just might not be getting an answer at all, she speaks up.] I live at the base of that mountain now, more or less. [Not directly at the base, but a town close enough.] It's abandoned now, a famous suicide spot. It was a famous suicide spot before it was abandoned too, though.
There used to be-- [No. She pauses, thinks, then starts again, trying to make the explanation as easy to follow as possible.] The religion around the mountain as tied heavily into water. All life comes from water, all life should be returned to water. The mountain was sacred, and it believed that dying on the mountain was one of the best ways to 'return' to the water. So... people would come to end their lives there; there was no stigma attached to suicide if they did it on the mountain.
That's where the shrine maidens came in. A person would pick a shrine maiden of their choosing and go up onto the mountain. The maiden's job was to stay with them, to watch them commit suicide and witness their last moments. They'd use mitori to take in their secrets, sins and emotions at their time of death, keeping them with the maiden forever. [Yuri pauses a moment and gives a barely audible sigh.] So they wouldn't be alone, I guess... [There's an odd tone, like she sort of admires that, or maybe it's almost wistful?
Either way, she moves on.] One day a man came to the mountain intending to kill himself, but... he got scared. He knew the woman would lean all his secrets by looking at him, and he panicked. He didn't want her to know the things he did--whatever those were. So he ran once she lifted her veil, and she chased after him because you're not supposed to be on the mountain alone. He killed her, and destroyed her eyes and dumped her body in the sacred river.
...Then he went and killed every shrine maiden he could find and did the same until he eventually killed himself. The shrine maidens that fled settled in surrounding villages and never returned, so the mountain was abandoned and a lot of the traditions and religion were lost.
[ That's a lot to take in. Kogami lets the young woman finish speaking, having chosen to listen intently rather than interrupting her with more questions. Those can come later. It's a shocking story, but at the same time, he's not entirely offended or surprised. He's seen all kinds of psychological breakdowns under stress.
Every world has their scumbags. ]
...Under the right circumstances, man will do just about anything to protect what they don't want to give up. Desperation leads to an irrational view of judgment. It makes you wonder if the secret he wanted to take to his grave was worse than what he's already remembered for now.
I think... [Yuri hesitates a moment, sparing a quick glance to Kogami out of the corner of her eye. He seems fairly laid back and willing to accept pretty much anything Yuri throws out without judging her, which Yuri can appreciate. Her thoughts often took dark turns and the morbid fascination she held death in tended to turn people away, but...
She releases a breath slowly and shrugs] I think humans-- people, anyone really, can convince themselves of anything. If he did all of that, surely he justified it to himself, that it was the 'right' decision. It's society that decides if he's right or not. He probably thought it worth it to keep that secret at the expense of his reputation after his death...
I think I'd like to think that, at least. It makes me feel a little better to think he truly believed it was worth it, like somehow that makes it'a little less senseless. [Yuri goes quiet again and shakes her head] I'm not sure if that makes sense.
Not senseless, like committing suicide on a specific mountain ever made sense in the first place. [ He's still a little skeptical about that religion there. ... Or any religion for that matter. ]
There was something in the water there, but it wasn't life.
[She shoot shim a furious look from the corner of her eyes] You can't say that when you don't know.
[That Black Water the villagers had been so wary of was certainly real; she can't really be too mad when she hadn't put much thought into it before either, but actually living it...
Yuri looks away, her anger snuffing out as quickly as it had come. Too exhausting to keep up intense emotions.] It was real. I saw it myself, what the water they believed in could do. Not everything works like how your world did.
[She might sound a little petulant and defensive now, and she winces, feeling bad for it.] ...Sorry.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
well now i'm thinking of a psycho pass AU so thanks for that...!!!
[But a second later she connects the dots and makes a thoughtful noise.] Because I could see who killed him, right? I... never thought about using it for something like that before. [Well, she was still learning. There was a lot about her powers she hadn't thought of before.]
...I wish I could've been there to help out. [She has a feeling though, based on what she's inferred from his talking about his world, she might not have fared too well.
Lbr here, Yuri probably would've been labeled a latent criminal or something p. quickly.]
enforcer kozukata!!
What did you do with your gift back home?
I want this now wtf. take her under ur wing, kogami
Alright, well, it wasn't all bad now that she thinks about it.] Hisoka-- She's someone I lived with. She couldn't do all that I did, seeing peoples' deaths and all, but she was helping me with my other abilities. She was teaching me how to do fortune telling and things like that, and...
Kagemi--shadow reading. Hisoka and I can both do it. It's... [How had Hisoka described it?] Being able to follow traces that can lead to missing people or things. If someone needs to find someone, they'd come to Hisoka. If we had something that belong to them, or even just a picture and the last place they were seen, we could follow a path to lead us to them. It works about the same for lost objects too-- That's the sort of cases Hisoka usually took on.
I was... just learning and starting to help out.
As for the mitori-- the ability to see peoples' last memories... I didn't know about that until recently. It's a power descended from the shrine maidens that used to live on the mountain where we lived. I... guess there must be one somewhere in my bloodline. I haven't really thought about what to do with it, though.
[Probably NOT carry on the traditions of those shrine maidens, thankyouverymuch.]
no subject
It sounds like a unique ability even where you're from. ... I saw a vision of corpses wearing shrine garbs when I tried to help you back there. [ He glances at her apologetically before focusing back on the road. Even though it was an accidental exchange of memories, he was still the one who triggered it and seen things he shouldn't have without permission. ]
blanket warning for heavy talk of suicide
She's not sure where to start with that though, so for a long moment she's quiet as she gathers her thoughts. When it looks like he just might not be getting an answer at all, she speaks up.] I live at the base of that mountain now, more or less. [Not directly at the base, but a town close enough.] It's abandoned now, a famous suicide spot. It was a famous suicide spot before it was abandoned too, though.
There used to be-- [No. She pauses, thinks, then starts again, trying to make the explanation as easy to follow as possible.] The religion around the mountain as tied heavily into water. All life comes from water, all life should be returned to water. The mountain was sacred, and it believed that dying on the mountain was one of the best ways to 'return' to the water. So... people would come to end their lives there; there was no stigma attached to suicide if they did it on the mountain.
That's where the shrine maidens came in. A person would pick a shrine maiden of their choosing and go up onto the mountain. The maiden's job was to stay with them, to watch them commit suicide and witness their last moments. They'd use mitori to take in their secrets, sins and emotions at their time of death, keeping them with the maiden forever. [Yuri pauses a moment and gives a barely audible sigh.] So they wouldn't be alone, I guess... [There's an odd tone, like she sort of admires that, or maybe it's almost wistful?
Either way, she moves on.] One day a man came to the mountain intending to kill himself, but... he got scared. He knew the woman would lean all his secrets by looking at him, and he panicked. He didn't want her to know the things he did--whatever those were. So he ran once she lifted her veil, and she chased after him because you're not supposed to be on the mountain alone. He killed her, and destroyed her eyes and dumped her body in the sacred river.
...Then he went and killed every shrine maiden he could find and did the same until he eventually killed himself. The shrine maidens that fled settled in surrounding villages and never returned, so the mountain was abandoned and a lot of the traditions and religion were lost.
no subject
Every world has their scumbags. ]
...Under the right circumstances, man will do just about anything to protect what they don't want to give up. Desperation leads to an irrational view of judgment. It makes you wonder if the secret he wanted to take to his grave was worse than what he's already remembered for now.
no subject
She releases a breath slowly and shrugs] I think humans-- people, anyone really, can convince themselves of anything. If he did all of that, surely he justified it to himself, that it was the 'right' decision. It's society that decides if he's right or not. He probably thought it worth it to keep that secret at the expense of his reputation after his death...
I think I'd like to think that, at least. It makes me feel a little better to think he truly believed it was worth it, like somehow that makes it'a little less senseless. [Yuri goes quiet again and shakes her head] I'm not sure if that makes sense.
no subject
There was something in the water there, but it wasn't life.
no subject
[That Black Water the villagers had been so wary of was certainly real; she can't really be too mad when she hadn't put much thought into it before either, but actually living it...
Yuri looks away, her anger snuffing out as quickly as it had come. Too exhausting to keep up intense emotions.] It was real. I saw it myself, what the water they believed in could do. Not everything works like how your world did.
[She might sound a little petulant and defensive now, and she winces, feeling bad for it.] ...Sorry.
no subject
I can't know what I don't see for myself, Yuri. I'm not even sure if I'd believe your powers if I hadn't experienced it.
[ Skepticism, evidence, these things are just part of the job. ]
If I offend you, please accept my apology.