Cherno Caster [Noir Biopunk/Cyberpunk LitRPG]

Yao gestured casually to what could only be described as a conversation pit; a lowered recess in an alcove, furnished with lavish sofas, rugs, and a wide coffee table.

Krahe denied: “I think I would prefer to stand for now. Let’s… Establish the nature of our business relationship, shall we?”

“An agreeable proposition. We both have our reasons to seek out the other. That you found one of my employees proves either your resourcefulness or your good fortune, both of which are valuable skills. However, were only that the case, you would be waiting for several weeks before I got around to you. In truth, it was the results of my Tarnished Jade Flower test that made me fast-track you over all the other would-be customers and business partners. You see, I came to this land seeking someone who shares the circumstances which led to my spiritual predicament, and I believe that there is a good chance you may be the one.”

While the Talisman Mistress spoke, Casus couldn’t help but take in Yao’s truly out-there appearance. The first things to draw his gaze were her feet, swiftly followed by her hands. The first was because his gaze naturally moved upward, and it stopped when he caught the paper. A substantial portion of the woman's lower left leg was entirely enveloped in paper talismans, bordered in red. He knew of a few Igarian sects that used this format, but there was only one place where these things were common; a place where the presence of the Twin Churches could be charitably described as lightweight, and where the Seven Spokes System was not even the fourth most commonly used method by which people harnessed their Soul Furnaces to surpass base humanity. Her strange sandals only supported Casus' theory, being made of wood and rope, carved to form a strongly elevated, stilt-like piece of footwear that added an easy twenty centimeters to one's height. His gaze then naturally jumped to her hands, and indeed, her entire left arm up to above the elbow was also covered in these paper talismans, ragged scars reaching up from beneath them across her bared flesh.

Then, everything clicked when he saw her right hand. Prosthetic, up to and including the wrist. That was not what alarmed him. It was the style. Bone segments, puppet-like joints. The craftsmanship, the consummate marriage of form and function, it couldn't have been made by any other than the Thousand Puppet Hall of the country of Tiengenzhen. The same craftsmen who had wrought Abbot Razem's right arm and legs, these being some of the few foreign-made grafts to be canonized as holy relics in the last two decades.

To describe the woman's mode of dress as extravagant was an understatement. Casus knew that his own fashion preferences were extravagant, that was the point, after all. But this... Some lesser-learned Seven Spokes adherents might view some parts of her vestment as sacrilege. Indeed, the only substantial article of clothing upon the woman was a pair of loose-legged, bright-red trousers, much like the trousers and long skirts worn by Seven Spokes clergy. However, these were held in place by red cord threaded through many loops around the hem in a zigzagged pattern, affixed to a belt of red rope that rested against the woman's ample hips. Rather than being solidly affixed around the wearer's waist they hung in this precarious manner, and they hung dangerously low indeed, low enough that Casus could readily see the long talisman which, in adhering to her skin, dutifully protected her last infinitesimal shred of modesty. As if that wasn't enough, there were gaping cutouts in the fabric, exposing her bare legs from the sides and doubtlessly creating windows as she walked.

Her top half was, despite being more exposed, marginally less provocative. Numerous long strings of prayer beads and other spiritual jewelry draped down over her sizable bust, which was nearly bare save for the partial covering afforded by all her jewelry... And two more seals just like the one down below, these two horizontal. Besides prayer beads she also wore a number of pendants, and a calligraphy brush whose handle was of the same make as her right hand sat wedged in the center of her chest, affixed to her neck by yet more red cord. He couldn't help but stare at it in an attempt to appraise the thing, considering how it seethed with powerful magic, but between the constant shifting of her flesh and jewelry, he couldn't even target it for long enough to hit the undoubtable wall of anti-appraisal magic.

Her hair was long, black as night, and tied off into bundles, while the shape of her mature face made it abundantly obvious that she hailed from nowhere close to Audunpoint. A golden glow burned in her right eye, while the left was plastered over by a talisman paper with an eye-like glyph that Casus felt to be unsettlingly familiar, though he couldn't place it.

"I thought Banishers were going to be immune to my womanly charms. It is good to learn that I was wrong," came the husky voice. Casus forced his gaze up to meet hers, involuntarily passing over one of the two horizontal seals. She was right, he wasn't immune.

"Pilgrims are human. Of course we aren't immune... Though I suspect one of your stature might bewitch even a corpse," he smiled. It wasn't an attempt at flirting, but an attempt to guess what sort of unorthodox magic she practiced. Talismans like the ones she displayed were among the more common methods by which corpses could be brought to bear as manpower, and certainly among the less grim methods, as they merely puppeteered the body and burned its souldregs as fuel. No worse than a baneworm, and Casus wholly believed that, holding no grudge or prejudice towards baneworms merely for their nature. He still had to suppress his own curiosity; when Yao turned, he noticed something, or rather, the absence of it - movement. Either her chest was stiffer than it ought to be, or she had some sort of invisible support both holding up its significant bulk and preventing undue movement. The only reason he'd noticed was that it came across as somewhat uncanny... But he wholly understood the reason for such measures.

Then, out of nowhere and completely brazenly, Krahe squatted down, tilted her head, and peered into the side of Yao's pants.

"...Don’t mind me, I assure you I am doing this for perfectly innocent reasons.”

For a few seconds, she peered in, looking one of Yao’s legs up and down.

“Your left leg’s really just fucked, isn’t it?”

She craned her head to meet the utterly unperturbed woman's gaze.

"So are the talismans just hiding prosthetics or are they somehow the material?"