Ichika Masudo
rosé reticence
In all the upheaval, she had lost Haru, her feline companion for the past decade, who had made the off-hours of her daily life less empty. At first, the long-furred spukami was a poor substitute for all the friendships she had lost to the distance of time, but that was putting it simply; she’d never been able to put a finger on what had occurred to make her so much older than them, nor why... not that she saw much of the mark of years in her reflection. But Haru had helped her, more or less, to make peace with all of it.
Despite her pet’s absence, despite the solitude that came with being the sole occupant of a vast estate, Ichika had found comfort in the old familiarity of her family home in this time. In returning to her roots and walking the grounds, through memories she’d been all too desperate to escape after the death of her father, years before. From which point she had returned only when she had to, or when she began to feel she was being neglectful to the household staff and groundskeepers she had chosen to retain. Or simply for the peace and quiet.
But the reasons for being here were different, now. The fracturing of the Order had highlighted her lack of significant ties to either party of that divide, or perhaps, her unwillingness to choose between them, and Atrisia laid not so far from the border of darkness in the Core. The answer to what she should do was simple, for the Order had changed so much even in her strange lifetime. No longer did it take the fight to the evils in the galaxy as it once did, no longer did it engage in that vigilance, and the galaxy suffered its current state, in part, because of that.
So what now? Not so long after her return home, there was an uptick in ships arriving and departing from another estate in the region, one she had only known as the seat of the Ashina clan, when she was young. In recent years, that had changed, and the Order had turned a critical, unkind eye towards these dissident Jedi that called themselves the Lightsworn, under the Ashina banner, seemingly without so much as a shred of curiosity... but it was far from unusual for the Lords of Atrisia to take matters into their own hands. To take whatever actions necessary to combat a threat. She knew this. The histories and legends bore that out.
Ichika glanced down from her distant stare and deliberations in the early morning light, to the songsteel katana and wakizashi lashed to her side, her blue gaze lingering there for some moments. If the ways of the New Jedi in this day and age were not enough to shift the galactic narrative, then other measures would have to be taken.
She looked back out into the growing day... then, with her mind made up, Ichika stood up from her gentle lean against a pillar, straightened out the collar of her summer clothing, and set out toward the Hirata Enclave to gain a sense of things for herself.
