There are plentiful reasons to strike with one's nail.  To fell a foe, naturally, but also for the sensation of grass or a vine giving way and to know that an inanimate life is forever changed because of an action taken.  To crumble a furniture piece or statue, to hear the crack and burst, and to wonder at its repair on a return visit.  To slash at the air in challenge, to beat at a fragile section of wall and open a pathway for exploration or convenience.

Even to hit something a nail could never harm holds satisfaction, the tink of metal on metal (or dream-metal on dream-metal, if such a difference matters) giving reassurance and understanding of one's place in the world: right here.  Or if not satisfaction then a release for frustration, as one could perhaps experience after dozens of failed attempts at a single task.

But on this occasion, there happens to be instead of a tink a thunk, ringing out in low echo.  Foliage clears away to reveal a new passage, and the wall behind it can be walked into, mysteriously enough, despite none of those things having been struck at all.

Beyond the edge of the wall is more wall, and retreating seems not immediately possible.  It's somewhat concerning until there isn't any experiencing being to be concerned.

That was a suspicious thump. The sound of something the approximate size and shape of a toddler, impacting soft earth.

Peter investigates, on the reasonable assumption that no one else will bother.

There is something approximately the size (depending on whether you count the horns) and very approximately the shape (likewise) of a toddler, standing up from the location of the thump.  It gazes at Peter impassively.

"Коничиуа*," Peter says, offering a hand. "You alright, mate?"

*Narrative concessions to the fact that Peter is speaking in Russo-Japonic pidgin will now cease unless it's funny.

For some reason the not-a-toddler gives the impression of alternating looking up and down very quickly rather than per se nodding.  This causes a light scraping-jangling noise to come from within its head.

It wouldn't be the first yōkai-or-whatever to have some trouble with human-oriented gestures.

"Where'd you fall from, anyway? Did somebody toss you out one of the windows?" Peter cranes his neck. "None of them are open..."

The short thing with the empty eyes examines its surroundings, turning at intervals with a deliberation not at all toddling.  There's a sharpened piece of metal with curved and intricate engravings slung on its back.

(It's in a wide yet somehow claustrophobic space, enclosed by soaring walls in what it has no way of knowing are the Gothic style. There's snow on the ground, and a handful of lifeless trees with silvery bark, which might at one time have borne cherry blossoms. The air is cold, and the sky is paper-white. This is not a place of honor.)

...those eyes... the stars don't fall in them, but there's still something familiar there. He looks at eyes like those over the breakfast table every day.

"You're not meant to be here at all, are you," he says quietly, mostly to himself.

It doesn't answer, and instead swipes investigatively at the snow with its swordy lancey thing.

Snow puffs up into the air and falls slowly.

Idly, Peter draws on a drop of miraculous power and calls up a radiant little orb to illuminate the falling snow, making it glitter. (He's not actually sure where the miracles come from anymore, with his magister dead, but he can do them.)

It slashes at the air to watch the flakes eddy, then ventures out into a deeper patch of snow.  It sinks in with a little more weight than it looks like it ought to have, and then jumps out with much less, drifting up and then down with an odd floatiness.

(Can it pogo the snow? Oh, no go.)

Peter considers the odd little manikin as it frolics.

It doesn't seem to be a thing of Ninuan (though he should check with a sibling - Eddin, probably, being the most functional) but it's not entirely Creational, either. It's at least not visibly offended by the concept of things existing, unless that's why it keeps hitting things with its little sword - but that really seems to be more of an investigative gesture than anything.

"Do you have a name?" he asks, for want of a better question.

It repeatedly turns its whole body side to side, wiggly-like, rather than shaking its head.

Cute?

"I don't suppose you've got some grand quest I should help you on, either."

It slashes at the snow, once, in some opaque attempt at communication.

"...huh. I suppose it wouldn't be that surprising if you did have a grand quest, come to think of it... are you trying to destroy something?"

Weird nod!

"...would you say it's a glorious battle that you're fighting?" Peter wonders. "Out of curiosity."

(He's good at miracles of Domain; even a major divination won't be too much trouble. And it'll get him a better class of answer than yes-or-no guessing.)

Slashnod slashnod slashnod.

Adorable???

"Give me a moment," he says, and then he focuses on the pyre in his heart, the one that's been there since Aslan took it from himself and put it there, the blaze of Glory.

What is the glorious battle of the creature before me? What glorious ends does it seek? What glorious deeds has it committed?

The glory of this little traveler is thus:

It has slain countless foes: husks, wicked sorcerers, a handful of small gods. He should not underestimate it. He could likely destroy it, if that was what it came down to, but it would not be an easy fight.

It has brought hope to those it comes across. These sparks of hope linger, in a world that is... somehow untouched, by the catastrophe that reduced the World Ash to flinders and ruined even the unimagined vastness of Ninuan.

Its greatest foe is... not Aslan, as Peter thinks in a panic when he sees the shape of her, but perhaps a cousin to him. A thing of unmitigated, searing, all-consuming GLORY. A god of radiance. A perfect thing that perfects the world around herself.

Peter wobbles on his feet a bit, then sits heavily in a snowbank. (He does not worry for his trousers. It is inglorious to be stained, and they wouldn't dare.)

A being which can be staggered without use of nail or spells is not usual, but of course this one is already strange, with his soft-looking shell and odd set of cloaks.  (Which he is not bothering to keep dry, but of course it takes a rare fortitude to sit at the feet of the boastful one and listen to his precepts to find the rare useful thought in the mire of absurdity, even if they've met and even if he would consider it useful.  Certainly this vessel soaks in hot springs without removing its cloak.)

This vessel has seen lots of creatures which are not very much like the other ones it has seen.  This being is strange, but not in his strangeness.  Perhaps if he sits too long this vessel will wander off or strike him with its nail to discover if that gets him going again, but before either of those it will wait the requested moment.

"...Sorry," he tells the little creature. "Trying to process a lot of information at once."

There's somewhere out there. Across Big Lake, beyond the Sunless Land... there's somewhere else, a place that still exists, a place that as far as he could tell didn't even notice everything falling apart. He wonders if there's even more. Maybe the Ash was just one tree in a forest, and its fall just part of the cycle of such things. That alone is almost too much to process. But it's... good. Probably. It's good.

And this little creature is trapped into what appears to be a perfect Flower Rite against Peter's own domain. Glorious battle, against Glory itself; such things weaken the foundations of the world. This bit of world doesn't have a very stable foundation to begin with. Fortunately, the Flower Rite more or less stopped working when the world ended, but he's still concerned.

"Do you know where your enemy came from? This - Radiance?"

Because if she's a Mimic they have much bigger problems.