Submission (#2086) Approved

"And.. this is supposed to help me 'harmonize my mana' or whatever?"

Liesl pantomimed a sort of nonsensical wriggling motion with her paws as she said "harmonize," squinting skeptically into the gloom at the imposing figure of the Stygian King before her. Her professors had long chastised her inability to sit still, and the destruction that frequently followed any attempts to exorcise her frantic energy. The prospect of breaking things, and of all things breaking them for the benefit of her education, seemed far too good to be true.

"It should do. The results may surprise you," Laurent remarked wryly. He stepped back and settled down in the pool of shadow cast from the candlelit treasure mound that Liesl had spent the past few days cobbling together from local pawn shops, instructed to do so by her garden workers without any awareness that she would in fact be tearing them apart in short order. Though it mostly comprised of rusted-over artifacts and magical instruments of dubious origin (one metal contraption still proudly bore a sticker proclaiming "serious spelunkers only! A compass to direct you straight toward mines of mana crystals"), some of them were patently valuable: a silver teacup winking at her in the moonlight, a gaudy tangle of gems casting colored halos on the floor, a delicate comb with tiny flowers wrought in mother-of-pearl. Several of the pots were decidedly fine china rather than run-of-the-mill ceramics, with careful patterns in gold paint running down their sides.

Bouncing to her feet, Liesl silently mulled over her plan of action. After several long weeks of trekking up and down Bellmoril for the latest chapter of her schooling, she was more than ready to simply unleash chaos upon the unwitting collection of trinkets assembled before her, but it seemed her strictly-enforced meditation hours had managed to impart some mindfulness on her after all. (Although it had ultimately been a satisfying experience, being ordered to bask serenely on a remote cliff for an entire day was a torment she hoped nobody would be heartless enough to inflict on her again.) What if people would miss some of these items when they were gone? Was it really okay to destroy treasures of obvious beauty and value?

(Another, sillier part of her vaguely wondered if she'd be able to put the genie back in its bottle and go back to living an ordinary life if she let herself go all-out wild in the middle of the woods, taking apart some of the finest examples of civilization out there. What if, seized by the mad urge to rage against society, she ran off into the woods after this and never saw her sisters again??)

But then again, she supposed, destruction without heed for worth was probably the entire point of the exercise to begin with. She couldn't deny it would feel immensely cathartic and satisfying to give into every intrusive thought that had ever suggested she just tip that cup off the table, or shatter that display case, or snap that fine chain holding a snooty piece of jewelry together.
Laurent only looked mildly amused at her hesitation, as if every kittom that had come before her had gone through this exact dilemma.

"Let me know if you need a demonstration." Beside him, his pomu hefted an almost comically large sword.

Liesl shook her head. Her mind made up and never one to do things by halves, she took that as her cue to quite literally leap into action. She landed solidly on top of the treasure mound, paws briefly scrabbling for purchase against the glossy surface of a porcelain pot. Heaving all her weight against it, she dislodged it before she could think twice and sent it careening against a nearby tree, feeling something awaken in her as the very expensive melody of its shattering reached her ears.

Within seconds, Liesl had given herself to the task with utter glee. She developed a rhythm for her destruction, smashed pots and cracked bowls interspersed with wrenched-open jewelry clasps and tipped candles. One particularly satisfying string of pearls came apart in a spectacular glimmering rain, the individual pearls rolling every which way and catching the light of the remaining candles (spared only to provide some light to destroy things by). At some point, though she could hardly keep track of the timing, Laurent's pomu joined in, cleaving pots in two with wild abandon and igniting Liesl's natural competitiveness. Refusing to be outdone, she threw herself back into the destruction with doubled vigor.

Liesl was uncertain how long it took to hit the bottom of the treasure pile, but eventually her paws hit solid ground. Though her small frame was heaving with exertion and her paws stung from the jabs of so many wantonly dismantled objects, she felt more disappointed that the whole thing was over than drained as she stepped back. Her handiwork was an unrecognizable heap of material carnage that had its own odd beauty to it, all lopsided shadows and gently glinting textures. Though destruction was hardly something that you usually got assigned a grade for, she knew she had done a rather impressive job, and she puffed her chest out as she glanced to Laurent to acknowledge her handiwork.

The other elnin looked pleased indeed, and she responded with a feral grin.

"I'm not really one for crafting, but my professors say I have a great talent for breaking things," she confessed. "Although I feel a little bad about all the other people who could've appreciated these. I don't keep trinkets around unless they're sturdy, so I was kind of expecting to just resell them before all this."

"The raw material can be recycled," Laurent assured her imperiously, and that was the end of Liesl's short-lived guilt. It was rare that she had an opportunity to unleash her raw destructive talent without a care in the world, and her blood was still thrumming - whether from Laurent's curse or from the lingering adrenaline rush, it didn't matter. Although she was often at odds with her tutors in Bellmoril and their adherence to convention, resonance therapy was truly in another league. She could not help the fierce flash of gratefulness that the garden workers had chosen Laurent's "tutelage" for the last chapter of her resonance journey.