Mirage (Kage Manako)

"Oh that," the man remarked with a nonchalance that indicated he found the topic boring, "You just have to wish for it."

Kage, thinking to himself, 'Surely it can't be THAT easy, can it? Well one way to find out.'

Kage says " I wish that the damage would be fixed that was caused by my doing."

"Ohohohoho, I like you already!," the man stood with an ear-to-ear grin and placed an arm across his chest with a small bow, "Your wish is my command."



Before Kage knew what was happening, he found himself free-falling from the deck of the ship once more, the storm he had accidentally used to destroy the city still blowing wildly just below him!

Kage looks around and says, " That was easy, now to fix this mess." Kage looks for a river, since he did see one before around here. He spots it, but it's clouded up by the sandstorm. Kage pulls his hat tightly to his head, and says "Hope this works."


He swings his sword, not to the ground, but aimed upward at such an angle that he would shoot toward the river and hopefully, land in it.




~ Kage Uses Wind Attack

As Kage attempted to accelerate himself backwards, downwards, and out of the storm, he found he was too close to the storm center, and was already sucked in by the current, which carried him swiftly down, around the curl of the microburst-like winds, and spit him back into the air as if he were just so much debris.



"That will never work," the man from before noted as he appeared just behind Kage, who found himself rising higher and higher in the air in propulsion from the storm, "What in the world are you planning?"

Kage turns around, and says, "You again!"

Kage says, "Ok, I wish this sandstorm was gone and myself, the crew of the Sunset Arrow, and the Sunset Arrow itself were safely back on the ground."

"As you wish," the man smiled, made a small bow, and vanished. In a moment, Kage found himself atop a high building, perfectly safe for the moment, and technically on a ground level, but with no visible way down. The Sunset Arrow was on the ground itself, of course, but its crew were in similar predicaments to himself, and clearly bewildered.

Before anyone could react, three figures came running from the Temple of the Heart, one of them - a man in full armor with a large blade - swinging said blade at the temple, the resulting current causing the temple to fracture in half and crumble into a large cloud of smoke. By the time the smoke cleared, the ship itself was taking off into the air, the three temple thieves aboard it.

"That didn't go as you planned, I take it," the wish-granter smiled with something resembling pathos for Kage's predicament from where he had perched across the rooftop, "Perhaps it's not too late though..."

Kage says, "No, its not, I wish that myself and the crew of the Sunset Arrow were on the deck of the Sunset Arrow."

Mouthing a silent protest to this course of action, as if it were suicidal, the man took a deep breath, moving into the bow with a raised brow, "If that is your wish..."



The next thing Kage heard was Captain Zeaken's voice as he moved into a fighting stance, "Get off my ship!"



With a sadistic smile, the man in the armor hefted his blade and swung, knocking the khamele from the deck with the current from the swing, along with three other crewmen.

"If I were you," the wish-granter sighed from just behind Kage on-deck, "I would wish the thieves off this ship sooner rather than later."

Kage says, " I wish the thieves off this ship."

No sooner had the dust-skinned man made his bow than the three temple thieves, along with a third of the crew, promptly vanished.



"Well," the man snorted with laughter, "Not a very honest lot you're protecting, are they? I bet if you wished all the adulterers and murderers off the ship, we'd be standing alone."

Kage thinks to himself, ' So, this fella is some sort of wish granter, and by what just happened, i gotta be careful about how I phrase things.'

Kage says, " I wish that the crewmembers I just sent away would appear on the deck of the Sunset Arrow, with the exceptsion of the 3 thieves who came out of the Temple of the Heart, also, the Heart and the Eye of Osiris would appear in my hands." Kage then opening his hands, hoping that this would work as planned.

"Five... six... seven!," the man cackled as the missing thieves, scared out of their wits, and the two artifacts appeared exactly as specified.

The cuffs on his wrists vanishing, the wish-granter gave Kage a smile that was somewhat unsettling, "Well, mortal hero, you've done it. Seven wishes, and I'm free of my contract. Now that I've settled that, I think I'd like to try on those things in your hand. Legend has it that whoever collects the pieces of Osiris becomes a god, after all."

As Kage sees the artifacts appear in his hands, he puts them away. Kage says, "Well, I thought something was amiss, so you used me to free yourself from your contract."

Kage grips his hilt, stares at the now-free wishgiver, and says, "But these artifacts don't belong to anyone but the anubians, and are not meant for mortals."

"I would certainly agree with you on the final point," the man's thin black lips curled in a condescending smile, "But you forget; the Anubians are mortal, and so are you."

With a few gestures of his nimble hands, the artifacts crumbles in Kage's grip into dust that flew on the wind to the bizarre creature, melding with his hand and eye seamlessly, which themselves took on a strange glow.

Then, with a smile of pure evil, he outstretched a hand toward Kage, "Now, I have a wish for you, 'Master'; I wish you to Hell!"

Suddenly, a terrible wind dashed forth from the creature's hand, knocking Kage from the deck as the ship above vanished in a blinding cloud of sand identical to the one that had caused the trouble in the first place.

As Kage looks around, he thinks to himself, 'No.....not again.....'

Kage fell for what felt like forever, something below him finally forming on the desert surface; it appeared to be a city of stone amidst the mountains!

Kage sees the village, and thinks, ' Well, I don't know if I should try it again, but it's that or I may not survive, so......'


Kage aims at the ground, and with a swift motion, swings his sword at the ground, just enough to make a wind strong enough to slow his desent, but not hard enough to hurt anything that might be underneath him.


~ Kage Uses Wind Attack

Sure enough, the tactic worked, and Kage landed safely, harming only a light circle of sand around his feet if scattering could be considered malicious, but the safe solution to one dilemma lead immediately to another, immediately recognizable as a haunting wind whistled through the abandoned stone ruins; where was we?

Kage lands, dusts himself off, and thinks to himself, ' Well, this doesn't look too promising.'
As he starts to look around, he puts his hand on his hilt, not sure where he is at.

The old ruins had once been a city, it seemed, but all that was long washed away by the sands of time. There were no bones or goods to indicate that anything had lived here for thousands of years, and given the lack of the latter, whatever had at the time had traveled light for a city dweller, or perhaps the place had been victimized by grave robbers. Indeed, the only loose items Kage could find were oddly fist-sized rocks that had presumably fallen loose from the surrounding walls.

Amidst the stone walls, Kage found numerous engravings, many of them resembling Anubian hieroglyphs, although the statues that lined some of the walls, the doorways in particularly, were decidedly human, and each curiously had a heart-sized hole carved into the chest.

Kage looks at the statues, and says, "Hmmm...that's odd, though I wonder..." Kage starts to read the encryptions on the walls, or what he can understand.

The hieroglyphs were somewhat indiscernible to Kage, who did not understand the language, but clearly the engravings around them hinted at this being some sort of myth, akin to a stone storybook. Upon closer inspection, the pictures showed the following symbols;

FRAME ONE

_O
=o=
-III

FRAME TWO

_O-`]
/II_II

FRAME THREE

-------O
['.----(o=
II___//|

Kage scratches his head in thought, and says, " Well, this......would be better if I could speak Anubian." Kage starts to sift though the rocks, hoping to find at least a pair of fist-shaped rocks that were still in one piece.

With a bit of searching, Kage found what he was looking for. Of course, most of the fist-sized rocks were pretty well intact, and very round, as if purposely carved for something.