Crafterlife: Strange Fashion Edition

Haru has made his way over to Gwen's for the simple reason for an alternative outfit. He needs one of these because he is currently sans a shirt or jacket. This is not a beach and highly uncommon for Haru. Thankfully he still has his pants on and both shoes. "Gwen," he walks around, doing the Travola meme of looking to one side. "Gwen?" the other side. It does dawn on him he could just chim Gwen, but whats the fun in that. Bring personal connections back! Shop! Also he gets distracted looking at shirt options. Notably the guys section is highly limited, but its enough to eyeball a shirt with his blue, non monocle'd eye.

It does not take long for someone else to also approach the area and eyeball the same section Haru is eyeballing. Except this one has fairy-like features, with pointy ears and dark wings, andshe's inching her way in with a deep blush, knees touching each other as she hugs herself; her outfit is some sort of semi-skimpy-ish black getup falling somewhere in the zone between 'battle bikini' and 'cocktail dress'. It might not be immediately obvious to recognize Uta, given how the style is highly unusual for the wearer, but if it is not the face that gives it away, Haru might (or might not) identify her from a dead giveaway: the Songbird Pendant.

When Uta notices that someone else is close to her, she emits a yelp, blushes even further, and takes a leap back.

"W-welcome to the Chain Mail Bikini Plus One, celebrating Spriggan September with a collection highlighting Elegance in Darkness!" Tug at hem of her skirt, in a vain attempt to cover more of her thigs. "M-My name is Uta Furore! G-Gwen and Morri cannot be around at the moment, but if you leave a message, you can be contacted as soon as possible!"

Haru knows a great many things. How much conductivity exists between gold and silver. The Konami code. The travel velocity of an unladen swallow. He especially knows his handiwork! The accessories he forges are all tailored to people and moments instead of mass produced. A true artisan! So when he turns around sharply and notices Uta in her outfit, he declares loudly, "Uta!" Finger point. "Are you moonlighting as a lady of the night?" The joke made more sense to him when he thought of it. Spriggan. Dark. Lady. Outfit.

Also Haru is shirtless so he has no grounds on the 'what are you wearing?!' department.

"As an edgelord, I approve," Haru says, in a somewhat mock tone of the edgelord part. Of course his last name is Nox so he may have just had a mental breakdown seeing as he looks like he hasn't slept in ages. "Elegance in Darkness. Muah hah hah," he says as a hand goes to his monocle'd eye in dramatic flair. He completely forgot why he needed Gwen, or a store associate, for a moment. "I approve. Although it doesn't cover much. All that health-fu and kung-fu has done you good." Sage nod. Fit and Fine. "I'll take one of those in the men's section," he looks around a moment, "and I get guy's fashion is a bit more challenging but where the deuce IS the men's section?"

"I am moonlighting as a -model-!", Uta protests, fists balled at her side, shoulders raised to protect the sides of her face, stomping one heeled shoe to underline how she's taking exception. Cheeks flush. "I apparently signed a modeling contract at a point in time when I was too distracted to think about what I was doing!" That doesn't narrow it down. "Product placement life."

The compliments seem to make her squirm and flush even more, but at least she has the presence to stand still in place. Her posture might get a bit stiff and the frequency of crossing her arms in front of herself and subconscious tugging might increase. "First of all, I'll have to establish that I'm moonlighting as a model, not as a sales clerk. That said, I will try to help if I can. And exactly on that topic, I..." Hesitation. "...I don't know, to be fair." Eyes closed, she looks down and away. She exahles. "I've given up looking for it." She pinches the bridge of her nose. "I'll give it to you straight -- we'll probably clear Aincrad before we manage to find the men's section. It's robes and tube tops for you from now on." Her eyes open again, and she looks the other way, arms crossed, mumbling. "And you'll have to ask Morri where the skimpy edgelord stuff is. This is her department." Tug skirt. Refresh flushing that had started subsiding by now.

Now Haru is normally very good at active listening. Eye contact. Affirmative body language. He steps foward at the end and leans in. The human's head turns to look at Uta's face from one angle. Another. "Its like a Damage over Time effect, but with your face," he points out the blushing. Then he gives a poke to Uta's cheek if allowed and followed by a pinch. A squish. A tug. "Is the modeling contract part of long term training to establish a physical Arte of eternal fire?" He stops assaulting Uta's personal space as he straightens up. A thumb is pointed to himself, "I am excellent with Fire. One might say, I'm hot." Eh, eh? The shirtless punster takes pride in the easy pun.

"But if you signed a contract with Morri, you are lucky to be wearing what you are. I figured she might have you walking around in the Morri's Secret catalogue," Haru observes, looking off to the distance and thinking about that one. The thought process is practically visible on his face. "I wonder if Fuka has a similar contract." Thought process visible again. A finger snaps as he looks back to Uta Model, "Wait, does that mean Modeling is a concept and you are a Moonlight Model? Famous for a thing? Was there a runway event I missed where everyone went in Pendragon wares in a fashion off?" The human's one blue eye grows big. Fashion overload.

Somehow that line of thought gets Haru back to the original topic, "Robes are too heavy for what I need. Its the opposite. Working in Miho's forge with the shirt I had is what got me here. Need something lighter. Breathes better." He thinks back to how Fuka handled this, "I suppose I could craft without anything on, but it wouldn't be very efficient means of stopping and dispersing heat. Like when you are going across a desert its better to have clothes on instead of none, ya know?"

There's not much that Uta can do at being pinched but burn 50% more candles. This would seem to indirectly confirm the fire theory. She's so stunned by everything that's happening that her instinctive reaction to deflect Haru's hand away is triggered when the Artificier's hand has already vacated the immediate vicinity of Uta's visage.

There are a few moments of hesitation, after which Uta mumbles, "Well, the contract is not with a single person, but with the whole business, so..." She narrows her eyes. "Or should I have said with 'the whole outfit'? Hmmm..." Headshake. "Anyway, thank the goddesses, I'm pretty sure Modeling is not a concept. It's probably covered by Etiquette, which-"

Freeze. Doctor profession gets Etiquette. "Oh goodness..." she squeaks in terror. "...I am theoretically eligible for one of those..."

"DO NOT THINK DO NOT THINK ABOUT IT!", she repeats to herself. Straighten back! Look straight ahead! Flick menu open! Shimmer pen and notebook into existence. "Right! Order! Men's shirt! Appropriate for forge! I will write it down and pass it on to Gwen! Or Morri! Whoever shows up first!" Ominous sotto voce, "Pray it's Gwen..."

It is too late, Haru is already thinking about it. He intones as deeply as he can, "Uta, your hard work in Etiquette has granted you the title of Moonlight Model. Doth thou accept? Yes slash No." Hands on hip. Laughter. Muah hah hah.

"I can always go with more than one shirt, my style is normally pretty clean so if Morri wants to dirty it up I'm sure Fuka will appreciate it," Haru says in a moment of intelligence. A finger snaps and points up as if to 'make a point'. "The need is rather immediate though. I need to get back to my project and pour more of my heart and soul into accessory crafting. The fate of everyone could very well be in my hands," he goes into edgelord mode, being overly dramatic about...

...well technically its not too far off from the truth if the project bears fruit. "At least one shirt from Gwen would be good. I dig the vest bit from last time I was here, but less layers without making my work partner uncomfortable. Although I don't care /that/ much about what people think of me, I'd hate to set a bad opinion of us Yamaotians. Yamaochians. Yama Moat Tians." Sometimes words just sound strange when you say them. "Hey wait, if you signed a modeling contract, did I? I may have with the whole fish fry, I can't remember. I do remember I punched that fish good." He drops into a good stance. Jab jab. Cross. Fighter Haru. Edgelord Haru. Going through the full spectrum of Harus today.

Uta keeps shaking her head, faster and faster, at the suggestion of Moonlight modeling. That's a hard nope for her.

And then, the requests flow. "Okay, okay, we got this. We can do this. We can find the men's section. Just-" A pause. A raised finger. "Do you have Cartography?" Finger lowers, as Uta's head sinks a bit into her shoulders, "Searching?" Pause. "I'll take Divination..."

She inhales, and with her fist clenched, she announces, "Well, you know what? You have a point! I need not impose arbitrary limits on myself! I shall find the Men's section! And we'll get you some nice shirts!", she announces, spins on her heels (teetering a little -- she's probably not used to the particular kind she's wearing now), and begins to beeline through the racks of clothes. "I have a good feeling about this!", she exclaims, determined, hands held at her temples as if she was trying to activate some sort of psionic power. "I can -sense- the men's shirt calling! They're here! Somewhere!" sharp turn. Teeter. Beeeline. Sharp turn. Clack, clack, clack, stop.

"A-HA!", she exclaims, and pulls out a flat, square box, which she opens to reveal-

There is a squeal, and Uta does a backflip as something blurry, but with the general appearance of a tubular monstrosity, too large to conceivably fit in, jumps out of the box. When she lands, she intones a quick, ominous chant, and a blast of writhing darkness shoots towards the tube, which is blasted at the opposite end of the room.

Uta pants, and shimmers her staff into existence, cautiously approaches the place where the Strange Entity(tm) landed. "So... uh... what's that about your work partner being uncomfortable?" Small talk. Helps keep things grounded, when facing mysterious things.

Haru is doing his shadow boxing. "You can do it," he cheers, cheer boxing, "find that Men's section. Let the turtle necks, scarfs, and belts fly!" Flying belts. Terror. "The legend begins today. Uta, Legendary Lost, now the Legendary Found," he hypes up just in time to see the blurry monstrosity. And then it is nuked. "Ooh," he says as his body reels back in ephiphany, "ephemeral fashion. Wear briefly and then vaporize. Progressive!"

"Oh, they are the popular topic at the forge," Haru notes. Totally not salty about it. Nope. His arms crossing over his chest is just a coincidence. "Another Accessory Forger, like myself. You may have met them. Cait Sith. Sign Language. Makes talking a little challenging since we are using our hands." A pause. "On our tools." Another pause, "To make accessories. Ok, you know what, there is no good way to say that one. We are working on a project at least. Most people stop by to see what they are up to. I'm a bit of a ghost worker. Like a ghost author, but more tan." Shirtless Haru is not selling the 'tanned' look. He is more the shade of a lightly warmed ghost despite all of his adventuring out. Next time he makes an Avatar he will be more mindful of the tan slider. "Most important thing I've done here, outside of Fuka," and he doesn't acknowledge how that sounds, "and the only conclusion I can think of is that if we are successful that it is better off if no one knows I was until we absolutely need to. Its hard to say its noble when, really, no one gives a shirt anyway." Shirt! It made its way back into the conversation. Maybe thats why he has no shirt. He doesn't give a shirt!

"Oh. Tian. Met 'em once. Their ears don't swivel to follow noises," Uta says, pointing at where hypothetical animal ears would be on her head if she went Cait Sith instead of Spriggan. "Hearing impairment," she states, as if it was a diagnosis. Seems nice.

Other end of the shop reached. Crouched, careful peeking out from a counter. Staff extended to poke at some sort of accordion-folded tube.

Poke, poke.

Uta cranes her neck out. Target: inert.

She approaches with hesitation, and after more poking, she picks up the accordion-tube, which turns out to be some sort of tubular hat with jester-like appanedages (rattle-bells and all) at one end, an accordion-like body (so -that's- how it fit into such a small box), and a wide brim at the bottom.

"Uh...", Uta blinks. And then extends the item to Haru. "Here, your solution. I'm ready to bet you can walk into a forge with this on, work there for hours, and it will be such a focus of attention that if you ask people what kind shirt you were wearing, they'll reply, "Er, I didn't really pay attention. Because... that -hat-...' She leans over and whispers, conspirationally, "Meanwhile, you've been shirtless the whole time."

Haru offers a nod at Tian's state of hearing. "Not being able to hear an enemy when they are creeping up on you must not be a pleasant thought," he observes. When the human thinks about it, Tian is not only somewhat at risk. Tian is at high risk. It puts what they are doing for Yamato in a different light. He takes a deep breath and exhales. Serious Haru. The least favorite of the Haru Harum. A hand takes the 'hat'.

"You know," the Artificer says as he puts it on, "you are not wrong." Now he is a shirtless man with a silly hat on. It completes the outfit. Like 'businessman gone mad' or Kefka. A strong shake of it makes sure the bells work. "And hey, the bells won't bother Tian, either. Excellent. It is all coming together. Muahaha!" As the young man laughs, the bells provide an overly jovial jingle that create the thing of nightmares. "You've been a big help," he says to Uta, "as usual. Whenever I need advice, help, or modeling I know who to go to." Jingle jingle. He starts to make his way out with a new hat, "I feel my focus renewed and my ever eroding self esteem reinforced with BELLS ON. Let do this!" He runs out as if he should be yelling Leroy Jenkins. However that meme doesn't exist, so instead he yells something equally innane as he rushes back to the workshop to tap into that lightning. Eccentric Haru, the Haru of refined choice.