Kimen stopped in front of an old abandoned house where she had been living the past few weeks. It was a large place; over grown, boarded up, the last slivers of white paint peeling away. It wasn't surprising the place had a few ghost stories circulating around it but Kimen had found no ghosts there. It was just a creepy looking place that was probably once a beautiful home in its prime. The child pushed open the large metal barred gate, which made a loud groan. "This is it!" Kimen said proudly, gesturing towards the house.

Kent looks at the house and shudders. "Last time I was in a place like this a bunch of cultists were making magical circles. Luckily I was able to stop them before they completed their ritual." He shook his head, knowing that Kimen wouldn't be summoning demons. Still, the place made him slightly uncomfortable.

"Well, if it brings back such bad memories you could always wait out here. I shouldn't take too long." Kimen laughed nervously. No doubt Kent wouldn't be pleased seeing his own experiments with magic circles in there. Unfortunately it was too large for the child to immediately destroy.

"Nah, I can handle it. I'm a grown man after all." Kent was more worried about Kimen living in such a dangerous place. It didn't seem to stable, and it was probably abandoned for a reason. Not a lot of places this beat up generally remained standing too long. "Besides, I doubt there's anything you're hiding in there that would surprise me at this point."

"Hm... I guess you are right." Though Kimen was certainly expecting Kent to yell at her. She started down the pathway ahead of Kent, weeds brushing against her bare legs until she made it up to the porch. The boards creaked in protest under the child's weight. "Be careful coming through this part Mr. Kent." She warned as she slipped through the door.

Kent tested his weight on each of the steps, slowly creeping his was to the door. He was never exactly a lightweight, and wearing iron over your body wasn't exactly the best way to make you any lighter. With a very timid step he followed Kimen through the door.

Kimen had disappeared already into one of the other rooms by the time Kent had entered. The interior of the house appeared just as run down and neglected as the outside. Here there was a red carpet ripped and worn and fading on the floor. It was so dusty that Kimen's footprints had made a trail indicating which rooms he frequently visited. Here also was a broken, mostly collapsed stairway that once lead up to the second floor where a tall window was shining light into the room. Cobwebs hung in the corners catching the breeze that was circulating through the house as most of the windows were now glass free. One thing here might have seemed a bit out of place; giant purple unicorn plush that was sitting at the bottom of the stairs staring vacantly at all who entered. Though it was uncertain whether Kimen left his plush toy there to guard the place or to greet the lonely child when he came home.

The unicorn said nothing to Kent in response, and why would it? It was just a stuffed unicorn after all. It sat there motionlessly. In the back of the house down the hall there was the sound of running water as Kimen was filling a bucket of soapy water to scrub the floor in the room next to the entryway clean of magic circles.

Kent smiled. "Thought so. Good pony." Kent stretched and looked around the house a bit. Water. That's a good sound. Kimen wasn't completely without resources. Within a few seconds he wandered into one of the rooms with books spread out and marks on the floor. Kent blinked for a moment with a vacant expression. "...Oh. Well then."

The magic circle Kimen had made spanned completely across the floor allowing for little room to maneuver around, especially with all the books scattered about in there. Many were open, some with numerous book marks. In addition to the circle there were also markings upon the walls too. Complicated calculations, some test symbols, here and there a thing scribbled out, crossed out, corrected, started with one color of chalk and finished with another, little notes that wouldn't make any sense to anyone but the child writing them and only then sometimes. It was a tangled mess of problems even Kimen couldn't unravel anymore. "Oh. I guess you found it." Kimen blushed a bit with embarrassment as she entered the room with a bucket and scrub brush, "I was trying to figure out how to make a teleportation circle without having a connecting secondary circle or connected item belonging to the target. I don't think it works, but I gotta clean it up just to be safe." She explained.

"Well umm..." Kent tried to say something, "it's... very good that you're keeping up with your studies then." He coughed a bit, awkwardly. "A umm... a lot of kids would... slack on that stuff, you know?" He rubbed the back of his head, trying to find better words.

The child was bracing for the knight to scold him but what came out of the older man's mouth instead took him by surprise. "Y-you're not going to yell at me, Mr. Kent? I mean, I know you don't like it when I practice magic I was kind of expecting...Well, you know. Not praise." Kimen placed the bucket onto the floor then reached up towards the Kent while standing on his tip-toes, placing his small hand on the knight's forehead to check if he wasn't feeling well.

"I'm not encouraging this, but there's nothing I can do to change you." Kent stated. "At the very least, you're persistent, and that persistence will get you through a lot of challenges in life. While I do wish magic wasn't a part of it, you're showing some of the traits that the Legio Aurea would have looked for in young knights." He brushed the child's hand away from his forehead. "I umm... have been doing a lot of thinking, to say the least."

Kimen smiled up at Kent. It seems that he had grown a lot since he had come here. The life he was living in Shrike was probably having a good influence on him. "I am glad, Mr. Kent." Kimen said, kneeling down to the floor and taking hold of the soapy brush. "I can take care of cleaning up the books and everything in here if you wouldn't mind gathering up my belongings in some of the other rooms. I don't have much but it is a bit scattered."

Kent nodded. "I'll see if I can find some. I'll assume your things are the ones that don't have spider nests in them." Kent walked off to the other rooms trying to find books or other scattered possessions. He passed the stuffed animal a couple of times, making sure to stop in front of it, point his finger, and say "Stay," just to get some strange sadistic pleasure out of a pony doing what he asked.

Kimen's stuff was indeed quite scattered about the house. In the bathroom there was a bag full of laundry that still needed to be done, a toothbrush, a happy looking rubber duckie, and a couple of clean towels Kimen had apparently set out for a bath later tonight. In the kitchen there were a couple of books lying open on the table next to an assortment of feathers, rocks, and strange little odds and ends. There was also books in the living room as well as a couple of toys, a pillow, a blanket, and a flashlight indicating that this was where the child had been sleeping. Mr. Periwinkle stayed where he was, staring blankly at the door at the foot of the broken stairway each time Kent passed which probably wasn't very surprising.

Kent returned with a few bags he had found which he had placed Kimen's things in as neatly as he could. "So," Kent tried to start up a conversation, "what else did I miss while I was in Shrike? Hopefully there wasn't a demon attack or something I should have helped with." He chuckled.

"I never heard of any demons attacking." Kimen said scrubbing away at the last wall. The room didn't have to be spotless, just cleaned away enough that Kimen's notes and circle were destroyed to the point that they couldn’t be restored in anyway if found by someone unsuspecting. After a moment of thinking about the events of the past couple of months though the child stopped in their work and quickly turned around looking excited "OH! I should have mentioned this sooner Mr. Kent! I met someone from your world! Someone who knew you!"

Kent was caught off guard. "Wait. My world? Who knew me?" Kent's mind flashed through his head of all the people he knew, and there were simply too many for him to guess. "Who is it? Were they a knight?" Kent's head was racing. This certainly wasn't something that he was expecting.

"Yeah! I think he said his name was Edmund. I met him in the park not long after I finished making this. He seemed really nice!" Kimen went back to scrubbing, sure that Kent would be excited by this news. It was probably very lucky for someone to have another person from their own world show up here especially when it came to two people who knew each other.

Kent smiled at the mention of Edmund's name. "I knew him indeed! He was the Centurio's son. Not a real knight, but, we often called him Sir Edmund regardless as a sign of respect." He tried to think of what to do. "I should probably leave a note with someone to ask him to come to Shrike. I didn't hear much from the order when I was out hunting demons. I'm sure he can catch me up."

Kimen finished scrubbing away the last of the remaining marks and dropped the brush back into the bucket with a 'plop', splashing water onto the damp floor. "He seemed interested in seeing you and catching up with you as well, Mr. Kent." That task finished, Kimen turned to address the rest of the mess which included all the books and chalk she had left scattered about. She cupped her hands and called out into the other room, "Mr. Periwinkle! Come in here!" Immediately, the ears of the stuffed unicorn sitting by the stairs perked up and it stood, toddling into the room on its stumpy plush legs, expression as vacant as ever.

Kent smiled with a bit of excitement. It had been a long time since he had seen any of the people from his world. It would definitely be an interesting meeting... wait. Kent turned to see the unicorn waddle its way into the room. "...It walks... of course it walks. Why wouldn't it walk? It makes perfect sense..." Kent picked up the wine bottle from ealier and took another swig, not breaking his stare on the toy. "...I need a bigger bottle."

Kimen laughed at Kent's reaction to the walking plush unicorn, "Well, I kind of needed it to walk, Mr. Kent. It will listen to commands directed to it and carry things all to the extent of its capabilities but that is just about it. Its still just a plush toy, Mr. Kent." Kimen stepped out into the center of the room thinking that it might be best taking the easy route in collecting all this stuff. He didn't want to keep Kent waiting very long and since he seemed to be a little more okay with magic... Kimen took in a deep breath and stood very still, flattening his palms out so they were parallel with the floor. After a while nothing happened, but then the books started to slowly lift up, floating off of the floor. The open ones snapped shut loudly, a few wobbled threatening to drop. The bits and pieces of chalk rolled over the floor and slid into their box.

Kent opened his mouth as if he was about to scold Kimen, but, quickly closed it, feeling awkward. He looked at all of the things suddenly moving on their own and floating through the air. "You know what? I'm... just going to wait outside then. You... seem to have this handled." Kent excused himself and left, getting out of the room filled with floating things and confusing magical shenanigans.

The books stacked from largest to smallest into three separate, small floating piles. A zipper opened in the plush unicorn's back, opening revealing a large pocket in which to store things. Kimen directed her energy into pushing one pile of books over to it, and placing them inside. The zipper closed quickly shut shortly after. "Right. That should do it! Come along Mr. Periwinkle!" The child made her way out of the room, two stacks of books drifting along after her like two balloons tethered to her wrists. The unicorn followed too, but with its stubby legs and heavy burden of books it did not move quite as fast. "Ready Mr. Kent!" Kimen said once both she and the unicorn had made it outside of the front door.

Kent nodded, though, a bit weary of the unicorn this time. As the two finally exited the house, Kent began leading the way back to Truce. "I think I heard Lucass say he was waiting for us to take a ferry back to Shrike." He chuckled. "Don't worry, I'm sure he'll take you flying soon enough. You might actually enjoy that."