Part 7

"So, like an actual god, really," Haruko had said as he was cleaning a puddle on the floor. "No bullshit?"

"Yup, so do you believe me now?" Aoi said this as she was sitting on Haruko's bed, swinging her feet.

Haruko wrung out the cloth into a bucket on the floor.

"I guess," he said, then walked over to another puddle. "I’m kind of afraid of what you would do if I said no."

"You don’t have to be afraid; it was by mere chance that I found you. I am just looking for the others," she said, placing her finger into a puddle on the floor. Soon after, the puddle disappeared.

"Others?" Haruko asked as he turned to the girl.

"Yup, in total, there are six elements. Fire, earth, air, life, death, and..." The girl stopped talking and held out her hand.

"Water," she said, as all the remaining water on the floor began to flow to her hand.

Haruko watched in amazement.

Aoi was playing with the water in her hand. Moving it around as if the liquid were a snake. She clasped her hands on the water and pulled them apart, revealing three small birds made of water that started flying across the room.

She pointed her finger at the bucket near Haruko, and the water birds flew into the bucket.

(To be able to do this is amazing.)

Haruko squeezed out the cloth, emptying the water into the bucket.

~The sun goes down. I feel the light betray me~

The sound startled Haruko.

"Shit my phone."

~The sun goes down. I feel. The light betray me~

Haruko began looking for his phone.

~The sun~

He later found his phone in the bathroom and looked at the caller ID.

Alexis M. (Baby Sis.)

~It's like I'm paranoid, lookin' over my back. It's like a whirlwind inside of my head~

"What's going on now?"

Haruko swiped up on the phone and brought it to his ear.

"Hey Alexi-"

"HARUKO WHAT ARE YOU DOING RIGHT NOW?!!!" Alexis screamed into the phone, causing Haruko to pull the phone away from his ear.

In the bathroom, he heard her voice echo throughout. When he heard the phone go silent, he brought it to his ear.

"Have you calmed yourself down yet?"

"Is there anyone else in the house?"

The question surprised Haruko.

"Um…..I…."

"Just answer the question."

There wasn’t a way he could answer the question plausibly.

Haruko stood there in the bathroom.

"Yes, there is a girl here; it’s kind of complicated now. She kind of landed on my balcony. We’re both in my room at the moment.”

There was a pause on the other side of the line.

"You’re both in the room right now," she asked, concerned.

"No, we are not doing that, if you must know. What with the questions, Alexis?”

"Haruko, please listen to me," Alexis said, causing Haruko to stop what he was doing.

She sounded serious.

"Someone or something destroyed part of the protection barrier seal around the house."

"The what seal?" Haruko said as he walked out of the bathroom.

He was confused.

"It's a barrier magic spell that—listen, that's beside the point—two of the five seals are destroyed. If three or all the seals are destroyed, the house will be defenseless."

That statement surprised Haruko.

Alexis, do you know where the seals were destroyed?" Haruko said, speaking into the phone.

Aoi was sitting on the bed, watching Haruko.

There was silence on the phone from her side.

"The front gate and the entrance door"

(The front gate and entrance door.)

"Are you su-"

Shrrrrrr

There was a faint noise that echoed throughout the house, which surprised the two in the room.

"What is going on?" Haruko said.

Aoi had looked up at the ceiling.

Suddenly, there were letters and magic symbols appearing on the wall, fading in and out.

(What the hell?)

The words and symbols started disappearing from the walls.

"What is going on?" Aoi said as she got off Haruko's bed.

Looking around, Haruko placed the phone in his ear.

"ALEXIS, SOMETHING HAPPENING, WHAT GOING ON?" Haruko shouted on the phone.

"The spell has been broken completely."

"Wha-"

"Haruko, listen close; the seals are not important; what is important is the anchoring point. It is the main part of the spell that keeps it together. That part of the spell in the kitchen"

Haruko's eyes widen.

Haruko ran towards his entrance door.

"Hey, what is going on?" Aoi shouted to Haruko.

"Stay there." Haruko opened his door and headed down the hallway.

"Keep the door closed."

(If the anchoring point or whatever Alexis said was in the kitchen, then...)

As he was running downstairs, he jumped the last few stairs and landed on the floor with a loud thud on the wooden floor.

(Whoever destroyed the spell was in the kitchen.)

Haruko began looking around, and as he did, he saw something floating in the living room.

A gray metal ball: if he wasn’t on edge, he would have missed it.

It was shiny and looked no larger than a basketball.

Haruko walked up to the ball, examining the object.

(What the hell is this?)

He could see his distorted reflection off the ball.

The ball began to float upward toward him.

(Huh.)

Haruko raised the phone to his ear.

"Hey Alexis, Are you sure you got your information right?"

"What do you mean?"

"I’m in the living room, and the only thing here is this wired gray ball. Did one of your spells go haywire?"

"A ball," Alexis replied over the phone.

"Yeah, a ball," Haruko said as he began walking around the object.

Haruko poked the ball, causing the outer surface to ripple and vibrate.

It felt soft to the touch.

Mmhhhh

"What is the ball doing?"

"Nothing; it's just floating here."

Haruko turned his attention away from the rippling ball.

"So, what the hell do I do with this thing?"

Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

A loud buzzing sound broke out coming from the ball, causing Haruko to turn his attention back to the ball.

"Hey, the ball is doing someth-"

"Perforate"

Haruko heard an almost quiet voice.

"Where did that voice come fro-"

Haruko was cut off as gray spikes erupted from the ball and began to converge on the teen.

The spikes were approaching fast, so the teen did the only thing he could think of.

Haruko crossed his arms, covering his face, as the spikes began to converge on him.

There was a loud noise as he was slammed into the wall, rattling several of the picture frames.

Pinned against the wall, Haruko struggled to move but couldn’t.

His breath seemed heavy.

The spikes had pinned him to the wall. Cutting through skin and clothes alike.

Still covering his face, he could feel cuts and blood pouring out across his body.

"Haruko, Haruko, what's going on? Please answer Haruko."

The phone was nowhere near his ear, but he heard his sister screaming on the other side. He placed the phone on his ear.

"Haruko, what's going on?"

"Hey Alexis…. I’m going to have to call you back." His breaths sounded tired.

"Haruko, wait, don’t hang up, Haru-"

Haruko removed the phone and swiped right on the screen to end the call with Alexis.

There was silence.

He heard footsteps.

"So, there was someone here."

A male voice broke out.

Haruko couldn’t see the source of the voice due to the spikes blocking his vision.

"Disperse."

The spikes began to vibrate, causing the teen to wince.

Slowly, the spikes began to retreat, dropping the pinned boy to the floor.

On his hands and knees, Haruko was struggling to catch his breath.

His blood was dripping on the floor. There were cuts all over his body.

Haruko looked up.

A middle-aged man.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

"Sorry about that earlier."

The middle-aged man dressed in a business suit. His gray hair was slicked back. As he walked closer, he was fitting a glove over his right hand.

He looked like a professional assassin, the type you see in video games and movies.

"I was cautious because of the barrier spell that surrounded this house, so I assumed a spellcaster or a magician was here. So, I sent my elixir to scope out the place first. It was a risk I couldn’t afford to be wrong about after I had come this far.

The man placed his palm under the metallic ball.

Bruised and bloodied, Haruko stood up, his eyes never leaving the intruder.

(Who the hell is this guy?)

"My name is Eduard Andrejs." Haruko's thoughts were interrupted when the man spoke. His voice sounded tired and exhausted. "I seek no quarrel with you; I just want to put an end to this long nightmare. I just want the girl that is here."

(Aoi, why does he want her?)

In the living room of a two-story house stood Haruko Matsumoto and a man.

Neither one made a move.

The man stood there, his wrinkled face staring daggers at the teen.

For Haruko, it was an unnerving feeling.

(Is it because of her power? If so, then I have to get rid of this guy somehow.)

"There is no girl here," Haruko lied.

The man sighed.

"Kid, you don’t want to do this—to play hero. There will be nothing good that comes out of your self-righteousness to shield her for whatever reason."

Haruko paused.

"You can just go on with your life and pretend this night never happened, and you would be better off. You don’t have to die here tonight."

"You’ll kill me."

Haruko had fought plenty of people over the course of his life that, if they had ended badly, would have ended with him dead.

But this was different.

The teen stood there.

"Just stand aside."

Without thinking, Haruko had rushed the man by running down the hallway. With his right arm damaged, he attempted to attack with his left.

"Shield," the man said. His tired facial expression never changed.

The boy let out a yell as he approached the man.

The metal ball had changed shape and began to spread out to the man's left arm.

As the teen approached, he swung his fist down with all that he could.

The man raised his left arm as the metal was still wrapping around it.

Klang

There was a loud sound as both the man's arm and the teen's fist collided.

Only that, the teen’s fist did not collide with the man's arm.

"What the hell is this?"

Haruko's fist had hit a large object that was almost as large as he was.

The man was now holding a metallic shield.

(How did he create this?)

Not waiting for a response, the teen began attacking the shield.

A punch.

A kick.

A backhand.

Another punch.

Each move had caused the teen pain.

Nothing.

Nothing Haruko did seemed to break the shield or dent it.

"This is getting tedious." The man said this as Haruko kept attacking the shield. "Disperse"

As Haruko was attacking the shield, it had begun to tear apart.

The man held out his right arm and thrust what was left of the breaking shield towards Haruko, hitting him in the chest.

"Impale."

The metallic liquid began to move toward his right hand.

An object began to form in the man's hands.

Haruko grabbed both sides of the shield, attempting to push it off his body.

The man's eyes widen as he sees Haruko grab the broken shield and push it aside. He closed his hand around the object until it formed.

The object wasn’t done forming, but he had no choice but to thrust the baton-shaped object into the boy's shoulder. The teen winced in pain as he felt the object hit his shoulder.

Haruko fell back to the wall behind him and grabbed his shoulder. "Damnit, that hurt."

He removed his hand from his shoulder to take a look at it.

Nothing.

Beside his open, bloodied cuts, there was nothing coming from his shoulder.

(It was the same as the metal from the spikes before, so why did it do no damage now?)

"You’re thinking too much." The man began speaking as the weapon he was creating was finished forming. The shield was gone.

A spear.

"What with that metal of yours?" Haruko questioned.

He wasn’t expecting an answer.

"To answer your question, it is my magic—transmutation magic, to be precise."

Haruko was confused.

"Disperse," the man said in a calm voice as he held the spear forward.

Like the shield before, the spear began to melt away.

"Alchemy was the ancient practice that sought to transform regular metals into gold."

The man held up his palm, and the metallic substance began to slowly creep towards the center of his palm.

"By using a particular metal, I can use my magic to both shape and reshape this metal into anything I so desire."

The gray metallic metal began to form into a ball the size of a basketball.

"Perforate."

With an unnatural speed, spikes began to burst forth towards the boy.

(It's fast.) Haruko thought as he rolled on the floor to evade the spikes.

`You dodge well,"

Breathing heavily, Haruko looked back at the spikes that pierced the wall behind him.

(What the hell kind of attack was that? For just a small ball, both its speed and its range are crazy.)

"Disperse."

The man's voice interrupted the teenager's thoughts.

Suddenly, the metal spikes began to retreat back into the ball in the man's hands.

(Its retraction speed is insane, too. I need to find a way to get past it.)

"For you to have evaded my elixir twice is very commendable, if I must say. You are probably looking for an attack pattern or a weakness to use in your counterattack.”

"!"

"I detest long battles. The more drawn out they are, the more both sides reveal themselves and their weaknesses."

"Cleave."

Still holding the metallic ball, it began to drip into the man's palm and started to spill onto the wooden floor beneath him.

(What the hell is he creating now?)

The liquid started to rise from the floor.

Haruko watched for a couple of seconds as the rising metallic liquid began to harden.

Slowly, a large broadsword began to form.

"I hope you won’t mind if I end this here with this weapon."

The man grabbed the handle of the sword and pulled it out of the wooden floor.

"Now then, shall we try this again?" the man asked the teen.

If there was no way out, then he was going to fight. Haruko picked his bloodied body up.

Haruko glared at the man.

As he was about to take a step, a large amount of water shot past him towards the man.

The man jumped out of the way to avoid the water approaching him.

Haruko turned his attention to the source of the water.

Aoi.

She was standing on the stairs with her arm out.

"You."

She looked worriedly at the bruised and bloody teen.

"What happened to you?" she said as she stopped blasting water.

"It's a long story," Haruko replied weakly. "Why in hell did you come down here?"

"I was-"

Aoi was cut off by the man stepping forward.

"You are the girl I have been searching for. I kindly ask you not to make things difficult from here on out and that you come with me."

Haruko turned his attention to the man and stood between the man and girl on the staircase.

The man noticed.

"You are not my concern at this time, child."

"Child, I’m fifteen, and you broke into my house."

"My point is that this does not concern you, only the girl," the man said as he raised the sword. "If you would kindly step aside,"

"Yeah, and you could go fuck yourself."

"If you insist," the man said as he ran towards the teen and the girl.

Aoi raised her arm with her fingers spread out.

The man stopped when he saw the water on the floor begin to rise.

(No chants or materials.)

The water began to fly towards the man, causing him to try and block it with his sword.

As he did, the girl closed her fingers into a fist, and the water began to surround the man.

Haruko watched as the man desperately tried to cut through the rising water. As soon as the water was fully above him, it started to harden.

The man looked up and saw that he was being sealed in a cube-like structure.

(No.) The man thought as the structure trapped him inside. There was a silent shockwave as the structure was fully complete.

Haruko turned to Aoi, then back to the cubed structure.

(Is it over?)

Haruko walked up to the structure.

Haruko placed his left hand on the wall.

Neither cold nor hot.

It felt warm to the touch.

He could see a faint silhouette of the man on the other side of the structure.

(It isn’t ice, just solid water. Could such a thing be possible?) Haruko thought as he lightly knocked on the wall.

Haruko turned to see Aoi walking up to him.

"That should keep him at bay for a while."

Aoi looked at the bleeding and heavily bruised teen.

"Are you okay?"

Haruko fell back and landed on his butt.

That brief fight took a lot out of him.

"Yeah, I think."

Aoi ran up to him and stood between the wall and Haruko. She got a good look at his injuries.

Blood and a lot of cuts.

"I can try to heal your wounds."

Haruko looked at her.

"Listen, you need to run."

"Wha-?" she started to speak, but Haruko had cut her off.

"Hey, that guy is after your power. If he knows about it, then there is a good chance that others know about it also, and they will come for it too."

Haruko spat out some blood that landed on the floor.

"Leave through the front door and try to find somewhere to go or to hide. I can try to hold him for as long as I can. That should give you enough time to get as far away from her as possible.”

Aoi looked at him.

"You would do that for me."

Haruko stared at her.

"I told you that I would help you in any way I could. God or not, I don’t abandon those in need, and I won’t start now."

Beaten and bloodied, his resolve never wavered.

Krrrrrr

It was a small noise, but Haruko heard it.

The sound of glass cracking.

Krrrrrrrrrrrrrkrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Haruko began to frantically look around the living room, but he couldn’t find the source of the noise.

Krrrkrrrkrrrrrkrrrrrrrrkrrrrrrrr.

He looked at the solid wall of water and saw it.

It was a small crack.

Krrkrrrrrkkkkkkrrrrrrrrrrkrrrrrrrrrrrrk

More cracks appeared on the wall of the structure.

Haruko looked at Aoi.

"YOUR WALL IS BREAKING; YOU NEED TO LEAVE NOW," Haruko shouted at the girl.

Aoi quickly turned to the wall.

There was a boom, and the wall broke and collapsed completely.

Shunk!

Something had landed on the floor near the left side of Haruko. Whatever it was went through the wooden floor and was sticking out.

Haruko lowered his eyes to it.

The object looked like a gray javelin spear.

There was red liquid dripping down the object.

The teen drifted his eyes upward, following the javelin. As he did, he saw more red liquid dripping down the spear.

Several solid pieces of water landed on the floor with a heavy thud.

His eyes crept up, and he saw it.

Blood.

Haruko's eyes widen when he sees the source of that blood.

Aoi.

The blood was coming from her.

As she stood there, a javelin pierced her lower midsection. Blood was seeping into the white t-shirt and dripping down her right leg.

"It was a good idea to slightly move when you did."

The man appeared, looming over the small girl in the hallway.

"I would have hated for this weapon to actually have killed you." The man grabbed the end of the javelin that pierced the girl.

With a grunt, the man lifted the spear and the girl off the floor. Haruko watched as her feet left the ground.

"To build a new home, we need you in one piece and alive."

The man swung his arm, and the girl's body flew off the spear, hitting a wall in the hallway with a loud thud.

Aoi's body had bounced off the wall and fallen to the ground below.

Haruko attempted to run to her but was stopped when he felt a stabbing pain in his right leg.

The man had stabbed him with the spear.

The pain had caused him to fall to the floor.

"You really don’t know when to give up, do you?" The man said this as he pulled the spear out of the kid's leg.

“Gahhh!" Haruko yelled out in pain as he grabbed his leg.

"Disperse."

The spear began to melt away, returning to its ball form.

The man then turned his attention away from the teen and began walking toward the girl.

Haruko watched as the man got closer and closer to the laid-out girl.

"Wait... get away from her, you bastard," Haruko said, struggling to pick himself up.

The man looked at the teen, and without a second thought, he kept walking towards the girl.

The teen wasn’t his target.

The girl was, and more importantly, her power was.

The man keeps moving forward.

"I'm not going to let you take her," Haruko said, standing up.

The man stopped walking and slightly turned toward the teen.

Haruko tensed up.

"You won’t let me take her. Pride and arrogance will always be the ends of the foolish. You can’t protect her, let alone yourself."

The man began to walk toward the girl lying on the floor. Each step creaked across the wooden floor in the hallway.

"You’re struggling to stand up; you're nearly out of breath. You have taken more damage than you would like to admit.”

You're very close to death’s door."

"…………."

"You're free to run away if you want; despite our transgressions earlier, I will give you my word that I would neither pursue nor cause any further harm to you should you choose to leave."

Haruko stood there.

A way out.

Haruko glanced slightly at the door behind him.

"I'm pretty sure you have a family and maybe even a couple of friends—people you care about who also care about you. Do you really want to die here? For them to discover your dead body, and for the girl you just met. A foolish way to go out, if I were to say so."

Haruko glanced down at Aoi's body on the floor. Her chest was still moving, which meant she was still alive. He was watching her breathe.

The man was watching the teen closely.

"Think very well about the course of action you are planning to take; you would not get another chance as good as the one I am offering now."

The teen looked at the girl on the floor.

The teen clenched his fist.

His answer was clear.

"No."

"Excuse me."

"I am not running now. I’m going to beat you and save her," Haruko proclaimed.

The man sighed. "You’re really going to throw your life away for a girl you just met."

Haruko stood in the hallway.

"It's not really throwing my life away if I beat you."

"There are no abilities you have that you can speak of; you are hanging on by a hair's breadth, and you think you can save her, let alone beat me."

Haruko clenched his fist.

"Even if, by some very slim miracle, you were to beat me, you would never truly be able to save her."

"What do you mean by that?" Haruko asked.

The man turned to him.

"Do you really think that I am the only one who knows about this girl and her abilities?"

The man reached into his suit and pulled out a piece of paper, which he tossed to Haruko.

"From the moment she entered this city, this notice was put out to all magic cabals within the city."

"Notice?" Haruko said, looking at the paper. "What is this?"

"It is a bounty designation. Since magic was introduced to the world on a global scale, certain rules and regulations were implemented to keep it in check. Those magicians or spellcasters whose very existence or abilities deviate too far from the natural laws of order have their lives forfeited."

Haruko stood there, staring at the bounty notice. There were a bunch of thoughts going through his head, but he couldn’t shake one.

"Her power isn’t magic based, so why would anybody from a magic society cabal or whatever deem her life forfeited?" Haruko asked the man, who stood there, not moving. "ANSWER ME!"

"To tell you the truth, I have no idea why such an order was permitted. That order exists for whatever reason, but I couldn't care less. That is not the reason I am after the girl; my leader has his own reasons for wanting the girl."

"Wha…"

"As long as that order exists, she will always be hunted down. If not by me, then by others. But if you really intend to pay no heed to my offer, I will eliminate you here and take the girl."

Haruko tossed the paper aside and raised both of his fists in a boxing stance.

"N…….no…….." A quiet, faint voice broke out.

Haruko looked past the man to see Aoi struggling to pick herself off the wooden floor. There was blood pooling under her. She looked at Haruko, and he could see that blood was pouring out of her mouth.

"Please….don’t….after everything you have done for me since I've been here, I can’t let you throw your life away, no matter how noble you believe your reason may not be for me. You have no part in this."

Haruko stood there, unable to respond.

But-

"I’m not leaving you," Haruko said.

He was stubborn.

Aoi paused, looking at the teen, then closed her eyes.

"Please forgive me," she said as she weakly held out a hand toward Haruko.

She then opened her eyes with a glare of ferocity, which had startled the teen.

"What are you doi-" Haruko was cut off as a huge blast of water hit him.

"Nghhh!" Haruko tried his best to stay connected to the ground, but his body flew back into the entrance door of his house.

The girl never taking her eyes off him increased the pressure of the water blast, causing him to slam into the door, breaking it off its top hinges as Haruko was blasted out to the front yard of the house.

The blast of water stopped as Aoi lowered her hands.

"So that's what you were doing, protecting the fool." The man said this while watching the event happen before his eyes.

Barley stood heavily injured and bleeding, and Haruko attempted to run back into the house to protect her.

Before he got to the door, Aoi held out her hand, causing all the nearby water to form a wall. Suddenly, she closed her fingers into a fist, solidifying the water.

Haruko slammed his shoulder into the hard wall of water.

The man heard the teen hitting the wall and yelling.

"I commend you for not dragging the boy into this." The man said this as he turned his attention to the girl. "As such, I will give you my word that I won’t make any attempt on his life, but for you, I will make no such promise to you."

The man began walking toward the girl on the floor until he was looming over her.

The girl looked up at the man standing over her.

Suddenly, a blue-colored light began to emit from under her, mostly under her hands and feet.

The man was watching her.

"What are you doing now?"

The light began to surround her body.

Not waiting to see the end result of what the girl was planning to do, the man brought his spear down to try and stab her in the leg.

There was a ‘ting’ as the tip of the spear hit the floor, stabbing into the ground.

The girl had vanished.

"What the"

There was a flickering blue light on the other side of the room. The man turned his attention to the light.

(Was that teleportation? No that was..)

The light completely faded out, and there stood the girl. She was leaning on the wall with her arm. Her other arm was pressed against her midsection to stop the bleeding.

She was breathing hard.

The man pulled the spear out of the ground.

Light began to surround the girl's feet.

Aoi angrily started at the man and ran out the sliding window, leaving the man inside the house.

"It seems she still had a few tricks up her sleeve. Disperse."

The spear began to melt back into its ball form.

"Hunt."

Floating in the air, the ball began to expand. The man had no intention of what was being created. There was a loud growling sound as he started out the window. The man turned back to the beast he had created using his metal.

A large gray metal dog with the appearance of a golden retriever.

The large dog sniffed the blood that was left behind by the girl. The dog looked at the man.”

"Let’s go."

With that statement, both the man and the large dog left the house through the sliding door in pursuit of the girl.