Death's End IC II

[Ajadea]

Professor Inkweaver. Calia fights off the urge to flinch, sinking deeper into the persona she has woven for herself. Calia the heartless, all smiles and nothing underneath but the void, with the sort of fearlessness that is only born from utter arrogance and certainty in one's goals. The sort of person who saw the opportunity to join the Six from Shadow and smiled. She isn't sure who Merrelis is, but she recognizes incentive when she hears it. What you want, in exchange for playing their game.

It's more important to charm Maniakh and Malthus, work their guard down inch by inch, than win the trust of these strangers, no matter how much the accusation hurts. The Six are prideful, condescending, friendly only as long as you remain on their side, and so that is what she must be. "There's more to the world than one city, no matter how nice it is," she replies to Elara, which is true enough. Oberon knows enough about her goals that hiding here achieves nothing. "And besides, we've only just met. Isn't it a little soon to be insulting my mental health?" Calia allows a smirk to play across her face. Maybe the mask she wears is a mad one. It would certainly fit very well with the rest of the Six. She hopes Elara would choose not to take them up on it. It would spare her the trouble of killing a nice woman, and eliminate one candidate neatly. If the other tests were like this, perhaps she need not kill these people after all, only survive long enough and surpass her own trial. That was a relief. All bravado aside, none of these four candidates had done anything worse than catch the attention of a psychopath, and she'd rather not kill them if she didn't have to.