Steampunk Girl Sets Things On Fire

Miko returns the broken pinwheel to her and Mizuki can't do anything about it. She frowns at it, disappointedly tucking it away into her satchel. "You might want to double-check before you buy anything from kids," Miko warns, patting Mizuki's shoulder.

Mizuki nods, glaring at the little kid who's still beaming. Must be nice scamming an adult of a quarter of her fortune. What a way to start the morning. Miko waves her farewell, wishing her luck for the rest of the day while subtly reminding her not to get scammed a second time by children.

Mizuki scoffs at this, earning a laugh from the older woman. As she meanders through the road, she catches sight of a couple of guards causing trouble yet again. Naresh seems to be missing from the plaza today, good timing, either way.

"Hm, I really don't know what to do today…" Mizuki sighs, strolling down the road. She has memorised the layout of the city even without the reference of a map. Parallel to the street with Hinata's home is another line of houses.

Leading towards the center is the plaza surrounded by an array of shops. Same goes for the streets that lead out of the plaza. Mizuki keeps a lookout for any new people who might need her help. To her luck, she hears the sound of a high-pitched 'Ting!' to her right.

From a shophouse at her side comes a girl who's only a little shorter than herself. She has a bob cut, hair a light shade of auburn. She has something resembling goggles over her eyes and somehow, it matches with the rest of her outfit. She's zipped up in a loose jumpsuit, the colour of grease.

Mizuki stands in a daze and the girl hobbles towards her, knocking into her. Mizuki takes a step back, holding the girl to support her.

"Ah! Ah! Ah! Did I hurt you?!" she apologises, looking up at Mizuki. "I'm Ether, awkward time for introductions though." Mizuki narrows her eyes at Ether, wondering why her face is so ashen and messed up with dirt. Mizuki catches a whiff of smoke in the air.

She looks past Ether, an expression of pure shock ridden on her face. Her under eye twitches. In the background, townspeople are seen rushing towards a flaming building, the door left ajar. "Uh, uh, isn't that supposed to be a problem?" Mizuki points at the building.

Ether raises an eyebrow in question. Turning back to the building, she calmly releases Mizuki, snapping her fingers. A summoning circle appears in front of the door, prompting the townspeople to stand back warily. When the circle vanishes, the fire's gone. Mizuki blinks in confusion. "How did you do that?"

"I like to play with fire, it's my specialty," Ether grins, lifting her hand and in the center of palm, there is a lit flame. Mizuki takes a wary step back. As she does, she hears a loud 'Bing!' somewhere around her. She turns her back, hoping to find the source of the sound.

When she turns back, she finds herself being knocked square in the forehead by a palm-sized alarm clock. Mizuki falls, letting out a groan.

Ether panics, clutching onto the busted clock that's next to Mizuki who is on the verge of tears. Mizuki sniffles, rubbing her achy forehead as she glares daggers at the cursed object. Ether cradles in her arms. Mizuki frowns, "You're more concerned about that thing?! It hit me in the head, I could've died!"

"You're not dead, though?" Ether blinks. Mizuki wants to fall unconscious. It's at this point when a yellow exclamation mark appears over Ether's head. Mizuki dreads what she has to say, reluctantly meeting Ether's eye. "I have a favour," she requests.

"I don't even know who you are," Mizuki sighs.

"I'll upgrade your weapons in exchange for this task. I promise I'm not bad at this," Ether lifts up her pinky. Mizuki stares doubtfully. She doesn't know if she's supposed to believe a girl who doesn't look more than eighteen at most and literally set a building on fire three seconds ago. Ether fidgets with the trinket in her hand.

"What do you need?"

[Steampunk Girl Sets Things On Fire: Commission Accepted]

"Also you need to guarantee that I'm going to get discounts from you in the future," Mizuki demands, raising her pinky this time, as childish of a gesture it might be. Ether shakes her head, slowly putting Mizuki's pinky down.

"If you get closer to me, I might be willing," Ether giggles. "Either way, I need you to get in a good word with the mister from the armoury. I don't think he likes me very much," she continues, pointing at the store. "Greg, was it? He kicked me out of his shop."

"George," Mizuki corrects. This is why they don't get along. "Are you sure there's nothing else you need help with? Your house is half-burnt by now."

"Never said it was mine," Ether sticks out her tongue. And that's probably worse, Mizuki frowns. Brushing herself off, Mizuki stands, still grieving at the loss of a potentially good day and the horrid achiness in her forehead.

She trudges towards the armoury, looking back at Ether who quickly hurries back to the house. Halfway there, she's stopped by an agitated woman who scolds her aggressively whilst wagging her finger through the air. It's hard to believe Ether takes it seriously.

"Ah dear," Mizuki huffs, pushing the door of the armoury open.

"It's you again," George welcomes at the sight of Mizuki. "Is there anything that you need help with?" he continues. Mizuki nods, though she has to pause for a couple seconds more as she comes up with an impromptu game plan as to how she's going to do this.

"Have you heard of Ether?"

George's face falls. His eyebrows crease. "Why?"

"She was hoping I'd drop a good word about her with you. Not sure what's up with that but I was going to ask if you're cool with her," Mizuki continues, though she's quite aware of the fact that he doesn't have the best impression of her.

"She keeps coming by and stealing scrap materials of my armour to fix up her weird thingamajigs! I can't even get my uncle outside to make spare weapons for me to use because she keeps stealing them," George whines, very angrily cleaning a metal breastplate. Mizuki nods sympathetically, hoping to interject when George speaks up again. "Last week, she told me she would fix my clock and she hasn't returned it to me yet!"

Mizuki stifles a laugh, very well knowing the state of that clock. "If I told you she fixed it properly, would you be willing to have her around again?"

George scoffs. "I'll have to think about it when I have it back."

"Aren't you both friends?"

"Never!" George interrupts, his face flushed as he slams the breastplate down. He turns, hoping to find an escape from the situation when he knocks face-first into a locked door. He rubs his nose, this time opening the door before he tries to walk past it. Mizuki purses her lips at his. Sometimes she wonders if everyone's crazy by default.