"You go and see all the sights humanity has to offer, and ride all the roller coasters for me, ok~?"
KIANA figured that fulfilling her promise to Elysia would be a rather simple matter. Oh, it would almost certainly be long. Given how big Earth was, there were almost certainly too many coasters to count. She suspects that was Elysia's intention. To give her something to do so that she would constantly have something to strive for, however simplistic it may seem.
However, KIANA expected it to be a matter of going to each roller coaster and then riding them, just as she did with Elysia before.
So what in the world was money, and why did she need it to go on?
She had been at the ticket booth for far longer than she should've been, at first just because of the issue with her name, but then apparently she needed this 'money' substance to be able to go on.
Ultimately, she managed to get by by using a similar tactic to her earlier barrier issue.
That is, she used a Herrscher authority to solve the dispute.
She says solve but just as with the power of Void, she had no way to control it yet, so instead of subtly making the ticket seller let her in, she accidentally used Shade of Finality: Sentience to put a large crowd of people around her to sleep.
It worked though, and she got in fine after that, so she wouldn't complain.
That was how she found herself in the park, looking for an attraction to ride. However, she noticed that she seemed to be getting a lot of stares from other park goers and it was starting to make her nervous. Had they seen her knock out that crowd outside? It was an accident, she didn't mean to!
"Hey! Miss Princess! Can I get a picture!" Suddenly a small human was in front of her.
"A… picture?" KIANA was a little confused, both at what a 'picture' was and why this girl came to her specifically. A larger adult walked up to her as well and held the smaller one back.
"I'm sorry, I'm not sure if you're on duty or not, but my daughter just loves princesses, and wanted to get a picture with you." As the woman spoke, she held up a small box with a sheepish look on her face.
"Sure… that's fine." Even if this 'picture' happened to be a threat, KIANA was confident she could handle it.
So she was a little caught off guard when the small 'daughter' ran to her side and looked at the bigger woman. KIANA followed her gaze and stared at the picture taker. She thought she heard a small sound from it and tensed, but suddenly,
"Ok, all done! Thank you so much!" It was over already? Nothing even happened. However, the woman caught her curious look and flipped the box over, revealing a small glowing screen.
And on that screen was her and the child.
Ah, so the 'picture' was just a captured moment of time. That made sense. However, she didn't quite know why the girl thought she was a princess…
At least until she looked over and saw other women in long dresses like hers scattered around the park, all of them taking pictures with people.
Now it made sense, she was confused for a princess because she was dressed like one. That was a miscalculation on her part. The only other humans she had seen before, Elysia and her friends, were all dressed in a manner more outgoing than what she saw from the crowds.
At least she had the foresight to disperse her wings. She wasn't sure she could explain that away.
She looked at the girl she had taken a picture with, who was now laughing happily as she saw the picture. So easily amused by something so small. Suddenly the girl turned to face KIANA again. Now she was holding a booklet of sorts.
"Can I get your autograph?!" This girl was a bundle of unfamiliar terms, wasn't she?
"What is… an autograph?" This time she would figure it out before doing it. Luckily, the little girl seemed willing to answer.
"An autograph! You just write your name here!" As she spoke, she held the booklet out, opened to a blank page. She gave KIANA a thin needle and tapped it to the paper. The needle left a mark on the paper wherever it went. Ah, so this needle would allow her to write on the page. She wrote down her name as best she could, and gave it back.
'K̴I̷A̶N̵A̴' was written on the page in her best possible handwriting.
Which, given that this was her first time writing, was still pretty bad. But the girl seemed happy with it regardless.
"It has such a magical feel! Thank you Miss…" She glanced at the page. "Miss KIANA!"
The woman smiled with the girl, and the two walked away. KIANA found that she had a soft smile as well. Odd, between Elysia and that girl she was beginning to think smiles were contagious.
Her smile faded as she turned and saw a line of eager humans that seemed to have formed while she was with the girl. All of which seemed to have their own small booklets.
This was going to be a long day, wasn't it?
The Sun was beginning to set when KIANA finally called it quits. She believed the experience was valuable and she did have more fun than not, but there was a limit to how much signing and pictures she could take. Her hand was beginning to hurt.
However, she believed it was a day well spent. After all, she got to meet many humans, and got to see them all happy as well.
Plus she managed to practice her writing skills.
However, if there was anything else she learned today, it was that her current outfit was far too conspicuous. She wanted to be able to blend into a crowd when she had to, especially if she wanted to go to amusement parks without being mistaken for a princess. So when nobody was looking, she retreated into an alleyway.
She thought long and hard about what to wear, before ultimately coming to the conclusion that she had been mistaken as a princess because of her long, regal and colorful dress. So therefore she would go the opposite direction for her new outfit. Long and regal would become short and ragged.
With a short flash of light, she looked down at her new outfit. With short navy pants and a short black shirt, there was no way she could be confused for a princess now!
Content with her new outfit, she walked out of the alleyway, gauging to see how many people would stare now. Ideally, the answer would be zero.
.
.
.
They were still staring.
In fact, she thinks that there was now even more staring than before.
What went wrong? She was sure she did everything right? Who in their right mind would think this outfit was that of a princess? She looked out among the people again, trying to see in their eyes what went wrong.
The first thing she noticed was that any children around weren't looking at her.
To be specific, they couldn't look at her since they were having their eyes covered by the larger adults.
Though, when she looked closer, she realized that the adults' faces varied.
Now KIANA would hardly claim to be an expert on emotions, having only had them herself for a grand total of one day, but it seemed that some people, mostly women, were staring at her with… anger? Disgust? Something along those lines.
Whereas the rest of the people, no matter the gender, were staring at her with… shock? Happiness? No, something subtler than that. She couldn't quite determine what it was, but it didn't seem to be the same pure happiness she experienced from the children she took pictures with.
This seemed to be a darker sort of joy.
She retreated back into the alleyway.
Ok, she had gotten a good glimpse of what other humans were wearing, and she believes she figured out why they kept staring despite her outfit change.
It seemed that she was now wearing too little clothing for what humans typically wore.
A simple remedy, she just needed to add some more to her outfit.
With another flash of light, she was now in a similar outfit to before, but with one key difference.
A navy blue jacket that now covered her up more.
There! Now she looked much more natural.
Exiting the alley in the opposite direction from before, she once again gauged the reactions of the people.
Other than a short glance here and there, the results were much better.
KIANA found it quite odd, what a simple jacket did to change a human's reactions.
The Sun had long set by now, and the streets were practically empty. It seemed that without the light of the Sun, humans were less likely to be out and about. Perhaps they could not see in the dark as well as her?
Either way, she took the opportunity to experience the quieter side of civilization. She was currently sitting on the sandy beach, staring out to the ocean she had landed in when she got here. It was odd, sitting on the sand. It felt coarse and irritating, yet also smooth and gentle. It was a curious feeling. She stood up and patted the sand off of her.
When she was done, she planned out her next actions. When it was open, she would return to the amusement park and actually experience it without spending all her time taking pictures with people.
After she was done? She supposed she would just move on to the next town. She wanted to experience as much of humanity as she could, so she couldn't just stay in one place.
It would be best if she traveled at night, so that she could fly with less chance of being seen. How convenient that humans gave her the perfect window to move about unseen. Given her luck in finding an amusement park on her first try, it seemed smart to continue along the coast if she wanted to find others.
This was the best way to fulfill her promise to Elysia.
Dr. Tesla was at a roadblock.
Not a literal roadblock, no. She was more than equipped to get past those.
Rather, she and Einstein's investigation into the destruction of the 4th Divine Key was at a roadblock. They couldn't properly analyze the wreckage of the satellite until it was fully excavated from the ocean and transported to them. So for now, they were stuck looking through the news in the surrounding area to see if anyone happened to see what became of the meteor that crashed into the Key.
That meant for Tesla, she was stuck searching through social media in a vain hope.
Vain was the correct word.
Seriously, how did none of these idiots notice anything suspicious about the debris falling from the sky. All she was seeing was 'It's a conspiracy!' and 'The End is nigh!' Was there not a single critical thinker among them who spotted what caused the crash?
It didn't help that most of the posts in that area were from tourists at Homu Land, who didn't even see the flaming satellite crash!
As she was stewing in her search and realizing the harm of social media, she noticed a somewhat familiar name pop up, with an image from Homu Land.
"Say, Mophead. Siegfried's brat is still at St. Freya, right?"
Einstein turned her chair from her computer, who despite having a similar lack of progress as Tesla was taking it much more easily, and was even chewing bubble gum to boot.
"Yeah, according to Welt's last report, she's doing pretty well for herself there. Except for her grades, which he says are on the brink of failing. Why do you ask?"
"Hm, just out of curiosity, there's not a chance she snuck out on a trip to Homu Land recently, yeah?" Tesla was staring at her screen, wondering if her eyes were playing tricks on her.
"Welt's last report was yesterday, so probably not. Did you spot something?"
"Just that Homu Land apparently got a new princess suddenly, who happens to have white hair and be named KIANA." She showed Einstein the post she found, of a child standing in front of said white haired princess.
Einstein just tilted her head.
"It's definitely curious, but I doubt it's her. Her hair is too long and those don't look like hair extensions that can be taken off. Plus her eyes are the wrong color."
Einstein looked closer at the screen and zoomed in to the picture. "Ok, good. For a moment I thought they looked like the Herrscher of the Void's eyes, but they lack the distinctive pupil shape. Whoever this KIANA is, I don't think they're Kiana Kaslana."
Tesla didn't seem so ready to give up her suspicions.
"And you don't think it's odd she appeared the day of the crash in the closest town to said crash?"
Einstein sighed. Tesla could be very stubborn when she wanted to be. Before she could respond, an alert pinged from her computer, and she went over to check.
Tesla noticed her stop, and got up hesitantly.
"Did something come up? Did they finally get the wreckage out?"
Einstein's face was hard and unreadable.
"Yeah, they got the wreckage out, and were on their way here. But it looks like they had to stop to deal with a minor Eruption."
She started moving to the door. "Get a squadron of Titans ready for departure, we can go and provide backup." She gave Tesla a small smirk. "And maybe if we're lucky, we can meet your little suspect." And with that she walked through the door.
Tesla sighed, before getting up herself.
"You don't need to make it sound so childish."
Author's Note: KIANA's new outfit is somewhat of a mix between two of Kiana's outfits from GGZ, her torn outfit as the Herrscher of the End, and her undamaged outfit.