Error Always Does Harm [Erchanhardt, Yugiri]

It was quite rare that Erchanhardt ever felt any degree of hesitation or fear about anything. He felt profound confidence in his every action, had done all in his power to avoid allowing himself to look back on his decisions. But in asking Yugiri to meet with him today, Erchanhardt could not help but feel some prodding sense of dread in his heart.

His talk with Rio had made him keenly aware that he simply could not cotninue to leave Yugiri in the dark about his regrets. She had been quite honest with him about her own fialings, had always been quite up front with him when they traveled together, and yet he had never dared to tell her the truth. He could not abide that thought any longer, and so he had naturally decided to speak with her, whenever she had the time.

So, now, he was simply sitting atop one of the buttes of the American midwest, under the shade of a single tree, a pot of tea resting gently on the ground with two cups. The view was quite lovely, but he almost could not think to admire it.

It seemed serious when she arrived, cocking her head from the sporty attire she had picked up for herself to wear. Cat form seemed to be something she found herself in less and less nowadays. Not that she minded. It was nice to not get around naked and have to be preoccupied with changing if she needed to for the situation.

This situation though required her to be serious and the cat state wasn't really fitting, especially since he knew of her nature as a human so she took a seat down and crossed her legs. Something was up and she'd get to the bottom of it.

"So what's up Erchanhardt? You seem all set up for something important."

She said it like it was stating the obvious but she didn't want to sit here in awkward silence if it might develop into that. Best to nip that in the bud as quick as possible.

"Ah, right to the point. I ought to commend you for that, you know."

With a bit of a sad smile, Erchanhardt poured two cups of tea now, internally centering himself for the conversation that was to come. It had been far too long in the making.

"I suppose I owe you an apology, before I begin. I have refrained from telling you much of my life for quite some time now, even after all that you have told me of your own. I have promised you as much, and in truth, I have never once forgotten that promise. You asked me if I carred shame, if I carried regret. I certainly do."

Glancing outward at the badlands below, Erchanhardt found it rather difficult to look at Yugiri now. Perhaps that was only right.

"You asked, when I first brought you to my home, if I had no other family. I did, many centuries ago. The Burgstaller were a family of many clans and bloodlines, and in those days the estate was filled with life. I sometimes still feel as if those voices are missing, in truth. But the aims of the Burgstaller were ones which could not be called righteous. To create the perfect human, to become immportal through whatever means necessary. Planned breeding, culling of those lines deemed too weak, stealing away those outsiders who carried in them what was seen as necessary for us. It was all simply deemed acceptable, and I allowed it as head of the family for centuries. It was all that I knew.

"I made grave mistakes for my family and for my country. I assisted in the deaths of countless who did not deserve it, for I never once thought to truly consider my actions. Only after seeing what I had done with my own eyes, after hearing the cries of those who had been wronged by me, did I realize my error."

He chuckled humorlessly then, a cruel laugh at his own failure more than any sort of amusement.

"I still, in the end, did not change for my own sake. But for Adalwolfa, who I never wished to walk the path I had walked, I would do anything. The Burgstaller would not change, no matter how I insisted. I would have certainly been culled, had Ada put into my place. There was nothing else to be done. I removed the Burgstaller from this world with my own hands, the very same hands which had led them for so many centuries. My own flesh and blood. Even now, knowing that they sought nothing which I can abide, I carry with me the weight of that crime. I carry with me the knowledge that, in the end, I killed them all simply so that my daughter would never walk the path I did. They were my blood, but in the end, Ada alone was my family."

He spoke and she listened. She listened until he was finished. Yugiri's lips were sealed and reserving whatever condemning tone she might've given. She didn't flinch and when he was done she looked out towards the horizon thoughtfully.

"Okay."

She acknowledged what he had said. If only for the sake of trying to reassure him that she wasn't dazed or dumbstruck over his life.

"I see. Well, hmmm. I can't really judge you I guess. It's not like I can really act like my family are so great and innocent of crimes. We've put ourselves above the law for way longer than your existence, since before the world came into form even. Your family wanted to escape death, but my family are the reason why people die."

Yugiri didn't really know where she was going with this but continued regardless.

"People fear that which they can't see, it used to be death. Now it's an uncertain future. Death's a trivial thing for a lot of people who are alive now. You feared a future, I feared a future. We all fear it Erchanhardt. I'm sorry you felt like you had to kill them, but we're a product of our upbringing and you chose between the continuation of those perverted ideas or the protection of your daughter. I can't really spreak from the perspective of a mother, but I think Chidori would choose her kids over the rest of us in a heartbeat. Doesn't matter if it was Rio, Yushiro or even me. I guess it's just a parent's love."

Erchanhardt couldn't quite say that he was too terribly surprised by Yugiri's response to what he'd said. He was hardly bothered by her nonchalance; if anything, he found it tremendously reassuring. He found that the whole affair was far too easy to become absorbed in, and to in turn lose sight of himself in.

"I think ultimately, that if I were sent back to that day, I would do every bit the same as I did. I know fully the weight of that sin upon me, and I know it has stained my hands. But the life that Adalwolfa has lived has made this decision worthwhile. And, I think, my own life has been worthwhile in turn."

Taking a deep breath as he closed his eyes for a moment, Erchanhardt contemplated the response Yugiri had given him. It was true, he supposed, that the fear of death and of the future were unavoidable. Still, he could not help but speak once more.

"I think, ultimately, it is not having killed them which weighs on me the most. It is the knowledge that I might have led them down a different path."

He shrugged, then. There was nothing more to be said, he supposed.

"I apologize if it seems as though I've made a rather great deal over what is ultimately an event 500 years behind us. I simply could not abide the knowledge that I had yet failed to tell you the truth."

She nodded like she was satisfied with that answer. Yugiri was much the same as she made clear to Chidori. Even if she lived through that moment again and again where she chose whether or not to do what she had to walk. She would. An infinitely more selfish decision which tore her family apart--at least Erchanhardt had something noble to back up his decision.

"Yeah, but let's be real. Deluding ourselves with maybes is a waste of time. You can reflect and try to picture how things could have been different but at the end of the day you don't get to have that second chance to see how it could've been. That's a fantasy, you know?"

There was a small grin when he apologised, something about the way he said it seemed unfitting. It made her think how much of a big tough guy he looked like but he was just as soft as he was imposing inside. Sensitive soft, not weak soft.

"It's fine. Should we call it even then? I know about your family and you know about mine."

She put her hand down as an offer to help him up. Despite how if there was no supernatural things going on here the girl would struggle, if not find it impossible. It was the gesture though that mattered here.

"Ah, you are certainly not wrong. In the end, those thoughts serve only to distract us from the truths of our life, from those facts of the past which we must strive to accept."

Naturally, Erchanhardt took Yugiri's hand in his as he stood. He did his utmost not to use her for too terribly much leverage-- she was, after all, a good bit smaller than he. Even so, there was some degree of reliance upon her, a show of trust on his behalf.

"Well, I think we could certainly call it as much. But there is something so very clinical about that perception of things, would you not agree? I should like to think of things as less of a transaction, and simply as the trust between friends."

Well, he supposed the two were likely a bit closer than simply 'friends,' weren't they? He had said as much to Rio, after all, that he considered Yugiri to be his family. But it was rather odd to simply say as much in plain words, wasn't it?

"Where will you be traveling next? I have lacked much in the way of destination for a short while now."

Yugiri pulled him up, as much care as he took with her Hakuda stance trying to embody stillness. The steadfast position could probably make it a bit easier to get him up in the entirety.

"Mhm, I suppose. Sorry, maybe it was a little too casual way to put it but trust is a transaction you know. It's like handing a bit of paper to someone cause you know once you wrinkle that paper it'll never be like it was originally."

She grinned while thinking about it, where did she want to go to next? That was a good question. So far she had just wandered, focusing entirely on herself but she couldn't lead this life of selfishness forever. She could better herself all she wanted but there were others.

"I think I ought to stop putting it off and deal with my zanpakuto. I think in the last year I've gone through enough that I feel more comfortable in facing it. I've forgotten it's name in how long it's been and out of fear, hurt it with neglect and viewing it as a monster because I feared what I did and how I had treated it. Chidori and my family weren't the only ones I hurt to walk you know Erchanhardt."

Now she just had to figure out the how. The Gotei was an option but she didn't want to return to them. The two vizard groups of old had faded, either folding into another conglomerate or changing into some twisted unrecognisable thing before it finally died in full.

"I suppose that is quite true, isn't it? One must always be ready for what might happen to said paper in the hands of another."

Mulling over Yugiri's answer for a moment, Erchanhardt crossed his arms in thought. He knew quite plainly that matters of zanpakuto and other such shinigami techniques were beyond him, for rather obvious reasons. The question, however, was how he might best assist her.

"Well, if you feel confident in facing it, then I can hardly see much reason to dissuade you from pursuing such a course of action. It is my understanding that the zanpakuto is a part of oneself, yes? To what degree would that influence this?"

Honestly, he really had no grasp on these things, but he was making his best attempt for her sake.

It was a bit confusing though, Yugiri didn't know much about being a vizard and frankly, the matters of zanjutsu were already a bit beyond her. She had attained shikai and then ran immediately from it. Maybe she should go to Rio but Rio only understood matters of a zanpakuto. Could she still refer to her manifestation as such with how hollowfied it was?

"I do not know. Frankly I have always denied the hollow part of myself. I do not know where to go in regards to it."

She smiled faintly. Pulling her zanpakuto out of the kido sheathe she concealed it in. Yugiri looked at the jet black weapon and thought.

"That's why I always fight with all three other fields of shinigami fighting methods except my zanpakuto."