#(''tonitoni desperately trying to save face in front of her coworker'' challenge failed)

[abyssmalice]

no plan survives the enemy or bullheaded girls - continued / @sercphs

As they say, fake it till you make it.

The shining pinnacle of advice that you've dutifully followed since you were raised to the position of Harbinger - and thrown into the shark-infested, blood-tainted waters that is working with your colleagues.

(Really. A nine year old child, made to contend with peers far more senior and just as powerful - you weren't actually born with your arrogant carefreeness, as much as you behave otherwise. And so, if a child is supposed to stand on the same level as them...)

And so, wearing the mask of the reckless fool, you gladly act the part over the years - until the fear and hesitation melts away into certainty and confidence. Until your peers were less akin to scary monsters gazing down at you, and more akin to the annoying coworkers you blithely complain about for real. Until life gives lemonade because you skipped over the lemons part.

Still, the lemons are technically still there. Fear and the haunting echoes of yesteryear, just buried somewhere that it doesn't show anymore.

The crumbling floor gives away to more than just an endless pit. It shakes that little box in your head where you stuffed your childhood weaknesses; as you go from standing on solid ground to nothing, your eyes glimpsing the darkness all the way below - a memory comes to the forefront, involuntarily.

It's a very similar, disgustingly familiar memory. You are a couple years younger and instead of being inside some ruins, you're outside, in the wintry forests of Snezhnaya. There are flying wolves. A cliff. Your foot slips—

(you're screaming your brother is yelling the Abyss swallows you both whole, only spitting you back out in the end)

The memory both ends and cuts off with something grabbing your arm. In the past, you continued to fall, falling for what felt like forever - nothing stopped the drop, back then. But in this moment, though you feel gravity's pull, you don't feel the accompanying wind and force of actually plummeting into the depths. You're staring and staring at the cascading darkness, but it just doesn't rush up to meet you, like it did that time.

Very strange. Huh. You blink. Another blink.

Then blink some more, as your ears and brain start to work together again, and you realise someone's holding your arm, and that someone is saying—

"What?" A placeholder reply, as your brain reboots, starts turning the cogwheels after they came to such a sharp halt. "I'm—hey! I know what I'm doing! And, you - this is still a victory, and this isn't dangerous! Which is to say, everything is fine and you're a dummy! Like you and everyone else always are."

You finally get the sense of mind to use Cryo, willing it into a long pike to stab into the bedrock as some support to hold onto. You then proceed to glare (pout) at Arlecchino with your fiercest staring (squinting) eyes. "Anyway, I'm fine, so how about you let go so I can climb up? Because I don't need your help! A-And I didn't need the rescuing either! I would've been fine!"