CHAPTER 28: THE ROGUE SLAYER P2
~28.2~
*****
“Kye!” came Aisha’s voice as soon as the group appeared on the other side. Astarte transported them directly to the Akaishi compound. “You’re here!” She still had blood on her clothes and hair, though she had at least cleaned her face. Akasha was nowhere to be seen.
“What’s going on?” Allison asked. “Why did you bring us here?”
Astarte pointed out the blood on Aisha’s face. “Akuma Akaishi is dead.”
Kye’s expression changed. She went from confusion to blank. She released her silvery white power, electing to go straight to Radiance. Everyone in the room felt the strange pressure. She covered the entire compound with her power and began analyzing every miniscule mote of mana. She found a trace that began a short distance outside of the compound and ended in the meeting room, with a smaller trace she couldn’t follow on either end.
“This mana is familiar... disturbingly familiar.” She looked at Alethea. “Take a look. Use Radiance.”
Alethea nodded, and she released her own power, glowing in a brilliant pink. She gasped as soon as she examined the mana. “It can’t be...” She met Kye’s eyes, her own wide. “One of us has to go back.”
“No, that isn’t-”
Fully determined, Alethea transformed her aethersteel bracelet into a knife and tried to stab herself, but three different hands quickly caught and stopped her, one belonging to Kye, one to Astarte, and one to Astraia.
“Absolutely not,” Kye said, her eyes showing more determination than anyone present had ever seen. “If that is the solution, I’ll go myself. But no, any major decision like that will be discussed.”
“With whom? There’s nobody in Athas. There’s only you, me, and a small handful of others here that-”
Kye shook her head. “We’ll talk it over with Atlante.”
“What?” She was taken aback. “You would discuss Elysium’s defenses with...” She paused and shook her head. “No, I shouldn’t think like that. Things are different, and you have your real body. No, I’m sorry, love. If you think it’s best, I will follow you.”
Kye nodded. “In any case... no rash decisions, okay?”
“Umm...” Aisha raised her hand. “Why was Lady Alethea trying to stab herself?”
“Huh?” Alethea blinked in surprise, then realized what Aisha meant. “OH. That probably looked like I was trying to commit suicide... Well, that’s not entirely wrong, but the end result isn’t the same for me. I would just go back to the Nexus. It’s the only way to eject myself from-”
“Please, no more!” Aisha said, waving her hands around. “I get the idea. Please don’t hurt yourself to do that! To the rest of us, it’s no different from you dying!”
Kye gestured at Aisha with a ‘case and point’ expression. “We will discuss the defense problem in detail later. For now, we must find the culprit.” Everyone nodded in agreement, and Kye teleported from inside the compound to high in the sky. After gathering enough mana and a short chant, she casted her spell. “<
She continued channeling until she found the same mana as the culprit. The mana only existed at the end of the thin trace where the culprit teleported to. It didn’t move beyond that, but there was nobody there. With a sigh, she returned to the compound.
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“What did you find out?” Allison asked.
Kye shook her head. “Only that the person we’re dealing with is not from Elysium. Their mana ended abruptly. I was able to trace the teleportation coordinates, but the end point was empty and there was no further path. The mana just stopped there.”
Allison narrowed her eyes. “Meaning, that person transmigrated.”
Kye nodded. “The only way to track them is to use magic beyond the three spatial and one temporal dimension. I could try using time magic with Kaylie, but...” She sighed and shook her head. “It would take more mana than I can output in a month to view even ten minutes ago. The cost of multi-dimensional spells is too unrealistic.” She looked at Sanae. “And you can’t wield that much power anymore, either.”
“Unfortunate that this happened after I lost my body, and not before. I very well could have found this person.”
“And higher dimensional magic is even more costly. The fact that those methods would be necessary is good information, though. That narrows the field down drastically.”
Alethea added, “That was clearly a skilled assassin, and their mana was corrupted. It’s not unlike...” Alethea shook as she felt a shiver go up her spine.
“Yeah...”
*****
“I don’t understand,” Yami said. “Why is Atlantis taking a lead role in this? Aneue, I know Aisha is your friend, but Realm 7 isn’t under the Empress’s rule.” Yami frequently visited Kye for dinner. Sanae had started joining them as well a few weeks earlier. Their brother was joining them a lot, but stopped coming. The three were staring at the empty seat.
Kye shook her head. “No, it’s not.”
“But I suppose that’s just how you are,” Yami added with a smile. “My wonderful sister in this life and cousin in a past life.”
“It’s not just how I am. It’s more than that. They’re my people. Every soul in Elysium is in Elysium because of me. I ruled over all of them. Whether they are from Realm 7, a realm under Atlantis, or one of the worlds in the stars far above, they’re all my subjects.”
“You’re going to run yourself ragged,” came a voice from the door. Evelyn walked in and sat down next to Kye. Yami was directly across from Kye. They were the only three to arrive so far. “You shouldn’t directly intervene in every single case. Let the people involved handle it. Have you forgotten how to trust the people?”
Kye was taken aback. She couldn’t look Evelyn in the eye. “Of course, I haven’t.” She did trust people, but she still preferred to do everything herself. “But this case is Aisha’s father.”
Evelyn sighed. “You grew attached to that-”
“Don’t say vampire.”
“I wasn’t going to.” Evelyn glared at Kye. “You grew attached to that girl quite fast.” It was true. Normally, she was much more careful about who she got close to.
“I can’t explain that.”
Evelyn and Yami exchanged glances. “From your perspective, how easily did she grow attached to someone in your lives as Elise and Chloe Arbelle?”
“Hmm...” Yami thought about it for a moment. “Not easily. She took years to open up to anyone, even us. I mean Claude and I. And past that, she took a long time to open up to any instructors we had during our childhood, and it was even worse at the academy. She was always nice to everyone, but also kept almost everyone at arm’s length. So, yeah, to be honest...” she looked up at her sister, “you making friends with Miss Aisha so easily is unusual.”
“Yeah... well... I guess I would say it’s because vampires are oppressed on Elea. They had a hard time before I showed up and told the church to stop hunting them. And... the Akaishi clan took me in while I was trapped there. They were really nice. Akuma was very kind.” Kye looked away, thinking about her trip to Elea a year ago.
As she was silently reminiscing, everyone else started pouring into the dining room. Alethea, Adele, and Michelle sat in a line next to Kye. Liliana and Aliana started bringing food to the table. Rei and the other kids found places to sit around the table, being careful to leave the Venturi sisters’ chairs empty.
“Love, I’m sorry,” Alethea said. “I couldn’t find any other trace of that mana. The culprit may as well have vanished into thin air. Her own mana was masked by Phantom’s mana.” She gave Kye an apologetic smile, but Kye shook her head.
“Thank you for trying.” She leaned over and kissed Alethea’s cheek, earning the ire of Adele and Michelle, both glaring at them.
“Hey, we searched, too!” Michelle said.
Kye smiled, stood up, walked over, and gave each a cheek kiss. “You sure did. Thank you.”
Evelyn was watching intently, and Yami giggled. Rei smiled, Joey expressed no emotion, Kaede cheered, Ariel was ooh’ing and aww’ing, Adriel paid them no mind, and Anna had hearts in her eyes, but Kaylie and Layla each wanted their own cheek kiss. “Mom! Us, too!” She drew a small circle that opened a small window in space between her and Kye. “There, you don’t have to walk over here.”
Kye raised an eyebrow and thumped her daughter’s cheek through the window before forcibly closing it. Everyone else bursted out laughing.
*****
Revision: 2024-9-9