"So what do you plan to do?" King asked her. Merlin merely gave him a side eyed glance as he went on to elaborate. "Without you, we won't be The Seven Deadly Sin's anymore. And that would be bad considering that our work isn't finished yet."
"That would be bad. If I intended to die and leave you all in a lurch," Merlin agreed with a sober expression. "However I plan to give the Boar mark of Lust to my replacement before I go."
"Wait- you mean that you're going to initiate someone into the Sin's?! Can you even do that?" Diane asked in confusion as she looked from one person to another for some sort of explanation.
"She can." Meliodas finally said after a moment or so of careful thought. Watching the various expressions of disbelief, and anger flickering across his fellow Sin's faces. Especially since this little bit of information wasn't exactly known to any of them outside of himself and Merlin.
And they had both decided in the beginning, before even forming the Sin's that they wouldn't tell anyone about it unless they felt that they had absolutely no other choice.
"It's not something that just anyone can do. In most cases, those of us with the marks- will both live and die as Sin's. However in very special circumstances...if one of us becomes too ill or suffers lethal injuries- we can pass our marks on to a replacement. But there is a very specific stipulation."
"A stipulation?" King and Ban asked in unison.
Meliodas closed his eyes and sighed before slowly saying. "Yes. It takes a very special and unique individual to become and bear the mark of a Sin. If there is no person available, then the mark- which is a special sort of enchantment- goes dormant until another person similar in nature to the previous one, is born."
"So...does that mean that Merlin needs to find her replacement? Or has she already found them?" Gowther asked.
"I'm guessing that she wouldn't have bothered to say anything about the subject unless she'd already found her replacement and simply wanted our approval." Meliodas said as he looked Merlin straight in the eye and scowled as he tacked on, "It's Ichigo, isn't it?"
"Yes."
"I see." Was all that Meliodas could think to say as the others began to fire off questions. Some about passing the mark on. Others about what Merlin intended to so with her little bit of remaining time.
Rukia still hasn't come back. I wonder if everything is okay? Ichigo thought as she sighed and took a look around the cozy little cottage/dungeon/witches coven/cave thingy that her friend had called her home for the past ten years.
It was an abysmal little place, in her opinion.
Little better than an honest-to-god medieval dungeon. Complete with discarded human remains- and yes- she wondered just how many people may have expired in there. Rats, spiders and other really creepy things that made her sort of...nervous.
Which was why she had lied about going to rest. And instead spent the past few hours cleaning the place up a bit.
She had thought that Rukia might appreciate a cleaner and less...human remains and rat/spider infested living space. One where the two of them didn't have to fear creepy things crawling into bed with them and possibly trying to eat their faces while they slept.
After all, she hadn't quite figured out just how the smaller woman had managed to get along on her own all this time without suffering from some sort of plague. Or even a staph infection from cutting herself on something.
There were pieces of glass, rusted metals and shit everywhere. She was beginning to wonder if Rukia had purposely designed the place to be some sort of ghoulish death trap of some kind.
Hell, she had stubbed her toe on a questionable item a little while ago and nearly died from it. Or at least that was what she was going to tell Rukia, if she ever decided to come home, that is.
And of course sprucing up the place tied into the previous discussion that her friend had spoken to her about too. After all, the two of them couldn't have kids around such a dirty, unhealthy space.
God knew what they might get themselves into.
Still... Absently resting one of her hands over her stomach, she tried to imagine what they're future children would be like. The fact that her friend wanted tiny, fragile little people to running around, still stumped her a bit.
Their baby would be a tiny, perfect mix of them both. A family to help us thrive in dark times.
Was there ever a concept that both filled her with both a fuzzy sort of warmth and such unfathomable dread at once?
Honestly it still puzzled her as to why Rukia would want kids. Especially with her. There were millions- in her opinion anyways- of guys dying to fall into her bed.
All she had to do was crook a finger and they'd flock to her like stupid, horny little flies.
No wait- referring to men as flies was a terrible analogy. And yet it was very true nevertheless. Rukia was a sexy little thing. Regardless of what form she was in. Though if Ichigo were being honest, she preferred her normal form over her curvaceous one anyways.
Especially since Rukia rarely used her normal form anymore. And she'd...just really missed seeing her friend's real face all these years. Among other things. Seeing her real face was simply...really nostalgic to her and made her feel happier than she had been since they had parted ways.
Sitting back on her heels, she sighed and set the rag that she'd been using to try and clean some of the...too-questionable-not-to-be-blood stains, from the floor. It was starting to get late, and she was starting to get a bit hungry too since she'd totally forgotten to eat anything for lunch earlier.
Maybe it was time to call it a day?
Looking around, she absently took note of the various things still in need of being done and felt the overwhelmingly irresistible urge to set fire to the place. She mulled it over for a few minutes, taking the time to weigh the pro's and con's.
Finally coming to a decision she threw aside the cleaning supplies in her hands with a disgusted sound and started walking for the door.
She'd burn this damned place to to the fucking ground and if Rukia complained any then she had two words to totally justify destroying everything in this retched place.
Bubonic plague.
