Arthur had been in a rush for quite some time. The bounty for fighting Angel hadn’t turned red. He could, in theory, still defeat the Celestial Spirit Mage and the Oración Seis for their bounties. Though that would risk changing things. Would that stop Wendy from joining Fairy Tail? She’d still get dragged into the Edolas affair, wouldn’t she? He’d need to be around for the Eclipse Gate, but Lucy didn’t have all the Gold Keys so it’s not like she needed all of them to summon the Celestial Spirit King. Of course if he wanted to take out the Oración Seis, he shouldn’t have teleported away his guildmates. He’d need the backup.
Still the boat ride represented an enforced relaxation. And that meant it was time to try out the Silver Keys he’d bought with the last job reward he’d received. But first he opened his HUD menu. Some new bounties had appeared. They wanted him to build a super weapon. And to beat his guildmates. And to befriend his guildmates. Well… teleporting them away probably didn’t help with that. He felt a little guilty about that. Still Kiria would have started a fight with Natsu and he didn’t want that. It was better for them if they did not come along, even if it made it harder for him to get a few bounties later on. After all, even if it wasn’t to happen in the next 10 years, the fate of any dragon slayer that didn’t die first was to become a dragon. And Georg and Byaku indicated it wasn’t far from some of the guild. Skullion’s team probably had a decade at least, unless May Your Life be Eventful messed that up. But the others… Only 10 members of the guild showed in the manga, and one of them dragonfied.
But right now it was time to contract with his new keys. He’d spent over a fifth of his earnings from the job on them. But before he hit things off on the wrong foot. He opened his HUD. He still had 300 CP. He hadn’t really gained much since the dragon. That worried him. But he still was working on things like acquiring dragon lacrima. He had an idea of what it might cost him, though, and well it might cost him 200 CP.
Still that left him 100. While he’d love to grab something more, he looked at the sheet of options and selected Binary Stars. He didn’t want a repeat of the little horse incident. This time he’d get off on a good foot with his summons.
He started with the gate of canis minor. It ought to get him a nikora, a weak type of celestial spirit. It had cost him the least of the three keys he’d bought. The equivalent of $200. It was a vanity summon, whose purpose was to look cute. The little ‘dog’ appeared. Bipedal, big, drill-like nose, and in his case blue-furred with white highlighting markings, almost in an inversion of his own hair.
The contract was easily made. He could summon it whenever, and it wanted to sit on his lap and sleep. He was happy enough to allow that, as he moved onto the more combat relevant Celestial Spirits. He wasn’t certain what they were, but they cost more than the canis minor key at least.
Next was the gate of pegasus. He wasn’t certain what to expect. But he was somewhat surprised that what emerged looked like a bronze pegasus. The entire entity was made of bronze, its feathers finely worked, its hooves immaculate. It was oddly pegasus like. At least until it reared onto its hind legs and started shadow boxing in the middle of forming a contract, a halo shining around its head. The pegasus spirit, Enif, agreed to rather lenient terms, any time, any why, but only on the condition that Arthur summoned him only at peak output. It meant maintaining him with other spirits or long term would be more difficult.
The final key was for the gate of Orion. Arthur was glad he’d decided to do this summoning on the deck instead of in his cabin. Orion was big. Large enough that his summoning still caused issues, with him pushing this aside. Orion, the Giant Hunter. And apparently designed by a Final Fantasy character artist given the number of belts he was wearing. He almost looked like a mummy. He was actually amicable enough, only having one condition for his contract; that Arthur didn’t go too long between summonings, and preferably gave him a chance to fight from time to time.
The process was easier and far more painless than with Equuleus. And with it done. Well he couldn’t summon any of the new spirits again so soon after dismissing them - and Orion was unfortunately too large to keep on the boat - so he summoned Kochab. The big blue bear liked to play catch might as well do so.
The next day it was time to summon Enif again. There was a real chance of befriending it after all.
“Whyareweonaboat?” The bronze horse demanded.
“Because I’m sailing south to Ishgar,” Arthur answered.
“Boatsareslow. Slowsucks. Weshouldgofast,” Enif said, starting to spread its wings and fly fast in a circle around Arthur.
“I can’t teleport that far, and the lizardhawk and Altair can’t fly me that far.”
“Areyouslow?” Enif stopped midair, just floating there, and glaring.
“Can you fly me that far?” Arthur asked.
“Onlyfast.”
“You can only fly fast not far or you can only fly me that far while going fast?”
“TheactuallyIdon’tknow,” Enif said, landing its head lowering. Then it raised it again. “Believeinmeandwecanflybeyondbeyond!”
“We’d be lost at sea.”
The horse’s bronze lip began to quiver. It wanted to fly. It wanted to fly far and fast. His HUD still showed the bounties for obtaining allegiance from the Silver Key Spirits. Arthur debated if risking getting lost at sea was worth it to give this crazy horse what it wanted. “You’d not risk getting your summoner killed,” Arthur said, remembering their greatest taboo. The horse wouldn’t be suggesting this if it didn’t really think it could do it.
“Ofcoursenot.”
“We need to go south east, and you need to be careful to find land, ok?”
The horse nodded.
“Let me get my shield.”
“Land!” Enif declared. They’d been flying for far too long, and far too fast. And not nearly straight enough. He felt dizzy, drained, and weak.
Enif came in for a landing among the trees of a forest, speaking his words too fast together in his perpetual rush forward. “Imayhavemissedtheshore. Summoneryoudon’tlooksogood. Areyoualright?”
Arthur twitched a bit. “Too fast. Way too fast. Sorry but gotta close the gate now.” He’d learned something, the peak output in their contract wasn’t peak stats, it was peak magical output. Which meant keeping Enif summoned was like the magical equivalent of sprinting full out, and Arthur felt like he’d just sprinted an entire magical marathon as if he’d been being chased by Acnologia.
So he was exhausted, hungry, and lost in a forest. Assuming he was in Fiore at all, the north had two major forests based on the map he’d scanned on the boat. Waas Forest near Cait Shelter, and another unnamed one which surrounded some mountains. He wasn’t sure though which he was in, and his only idea of north was that he’d been going south.
He sighed, and began to continue walking in the direction that Enif had been flying and reached for his bag of food. It was not there. It was not where he’d landed. It must have fallen off the horse in mid flight.
He drew his sword. Time to find some souls - and hopefully more tangible things - to eat.
“Should we tell this to the Oración Seis? If we’d not gotten here early we’d never have seen him,” One of the dark mages, positioned in a tree stated.
“We’re supposed to let the legal guilders into the trap first,” Another said.
“It’s just one guy, and if we beat him we can show how useful we are, and maybe Angel will…” A third suggested.
“Yeah,” The group said in unison.
“Oi, anyone up there?” The - presumed - legal guild mage below said, looking up at the dark mages. “Yeah. Why are you in a tree, are you stuck? I need to help something stuck in a tree get out, so if you’re stuck I’d be happy to help you down.”
“Shit, he’s spotted us. We’ve got no choice now,” one of the dark mages said, before jumping down out of the tree towards him. “We are the dark guild Efreet’s Turban, and this isn’t your lucky day,” the landing mage said, drawing forth his scimitar and beginning to swing it around in a rather impressive display.
“Look, I’m a mage. I don’t want to fight bandits right now. Give me some food, and I’ll forget this affront,” the wanderer said.
“We’re all mages,” the sword-spinning bandit said.
The armored wanderer looked at him. “You’re mages? You sure? You don’t feel like you’re mages. I’ve never met a mage with so little magical energy in Guiltina. So this is why Kiria calls Ishgar weak?”
One of the swordsmen charged towards him, blade clanging off his suit of armor, before his black sword was sweeping, biting deep across the chest, and seeming to come back for the death blow before he fumbled his sword completely dropping it to the ground.
“Look, I’d really rather not kill people. But I have a standing bounty to crush dark guilds. So why don’t you guys give me some food, and surrender?”
“We’ll show you to look down on dark mages, everyone use your magic!” The guildmaster of Efreet’s Turban screamed, everyone’s swords alighting in unison before they began to charge the man en masse.
Arthur raised one hand, space warping into a wall in a dome around him, before pushing back out, hitting them like a wave of solid lead as it sent them flying into the trunks of trees, against rocks, through bushes, and in general out of the clearing.
“I’m tired. I’m hungry. I’m in a bad mood. Give me your freaking food and surrender or I will take my sword and eat your souls.”
Arthur felt better now that he had something to eat. Really he should have just tried to eat the darkness while sleeping on the ground last night. He’d uploaded a fair bit of the Guild Master’s knowledge into his Archive too. Just had to stab him in the leg. It was hard to resist the urge to just kill him and feel that sweet recharge of magical energy, though.
Still, he’d gotten an incomplete map of the area, knowledge of how to use their holder magic which had been simple enough to just upload into his mind, and very valuable information. Specifically, the fact that the Oración Seis were in this forest looking for something and waiting for the Magic Council to try and stop them with an alliance of Legal Guilds.
It was the Oración Seis arc. So if he wanted to save Aries before Lucy could he needed to get hunting. Enif had dropped him into a lucky spot. And it was a good place to hunt dark guilds, it appeared. Though he was unsure what ‘destroy’ meant. Did he have to murder them entirely? He wasn’t murdering a dozen people for 2 CP. Though he was rather drained and if he was going to fight the Oración Seis.
A vine shot down from the trees above wrapping around his throat like a noose and he started really rethinking that no killing rule.
Brain was not pleased. The Alliance of legal guilds he had been expecting had not arrived, but his Archive magic was sending him signals that the net which had been supposed to let them through only to close like a noose around them was instead being torn apart by some raging monster of a mage. They seemed to be just stumbling from one of their underling-guilds to another with no plan or intent, and Brain knew they needed to be prepared to find and catch the alliance of 4 guilds when they arrived.
But it was possible this man was a scout from that alliance. And he seemed to be using Archive magic of his own. Given it was one of the magics that Brain developed while working as a researcher for the Magic Council, and to his knowledge only a small handful of individuals, all associated with the Council, knew it, that indicated all the more that this was a scout.
“My prayers, we’ve got a problem to deal with.”
If he’d not dropped his potion satchel he’d have magical recharge potions ready. But no, he just had to drop it. And he didn’t want to just outright murder these small fries. But each fight he had less magical energy remaining. He’d had to fall back from the last guild because their magic shotgun had left him with a whole set of bleeding wounds; a spell that wouldn’t have even scratched him if he wasn’t running on empty.
If he killed them he’d not be running on empty. And they were trying to kill him. So why shouldn’t he.
Arthur turned around, ready to go and find, and bloodily murder, the entire Naked Mummy guild, when he saw them approaching. But they weren’t alone.
The Naked Mummy ‘marksmen’ were guiding a group of six individuals towards him. Not only were their appearances rather distinctive, marking them out as more important individuals, but he recognized some of them. There was a man with a face that looked like it was carved from extremely angular stone. A black haired man with a snake twined about his body. Another black haired man who Arthur thought was the leader, though he seemed to be asleep on a magic carpet. A guy with a face full of tattoos and a skull headed staff. Maybe the staff was the real leader, that might have been it; it’d been a long time since he read the arc and he was fuzzy on the details only remembering the leader was a twisted piece of work with a super powered evil side and the staff was alive and involved with him somehow. And then the pair he could remember and recognize from the manga. A man with yellow hair propped up in a way that looked like a rooster’s comb; Racer who used slowing magic to appear super fast. And last a woman in a barely there dress composed of feathers, which was a bit more see through when you were seeing it in person than in a manga; Angel the Celestial Spirit Mage who was his target.
Arthur created a warp of territory magic and teleported away. He might be able to beat them each one on one. But exhausted, running so far on empty that a guild of weaklings had left him rather significantly wounded, and six on one? It wasn’t happening.
Brain clicked his tongue a little. The enemy had teleported away, but judging from how close he’d still been to the Naked Mummies, he couldn’t have teleported far. If trash like Naked Mummy could wound him, he wasn’t a threat to any of the Oración Seis alone, they could spread out, limit his movements, encircle him, and bring him down fairly easily.
Something was bothering him about their behavior, though. Several guilds that had been laying in wait had been defeated. Their survivors had talked about a mage in shining armor. This one fit that description; brightly shining armor, strange green-silver shield that was too large for them, and teleportation magic. Were they a lone agent? If so they had to be exhausted from battles, and at this point were no threat compared to the alliance of guilds; his information sources within the council had warned him about. Or were they part of a group, an entire guild which all dressed the same to confuse enemies? Was another dark guild moving into the region?
There wasn’t time for this distraction. The Guild Alliance would be here soon.
Arthur sagged against the tree. His wounds hurt like hell, and probably needed to be bandaged. But it wasn’t the blood loss that was bothering him. They really were just flesh wounds.
He looked at the black sword in his hands. Could he really resolve himself to kill people. To destroy their very souls? He’d done it to werelions, and it had felt good. They lived in tents, they had weapons. They weren’t people, but they were people. And he’d killed them.
He’d gone out specifically to do so. But they’d been killing travelers. They were murderers and a threat to people around them. But these people had just found a lone traveler and tried to kill him. They were here trying to help a group of murderous psychos take over the country with an ancient superweapon.
What particular right to live did they have?
Arthur rose to his feet, holding his sword. And then he felt a hail of bullets cutting his sword arm.
“I’ve found the little runaway pig!” One of the Naked Mummy mages shouted.
Arthur warped space moving to him, sword raised to strike the mage down. He froze, hesitating, and the mage raised his shotgun again. “Bullet magi-” The sword moved, its hungry spirit guiding Arthur’s hand, and he didn’t hold it back. He struck down the dark mage and he felt their life force flow into him, felt them fall, a soulless husk. He felt their entire life force flow into him.
He had just murdered someone. They were about to shoot him in the face and kill him. But he had just murdered someone. He felt more bullets striking against his back, piercing his armor but not quite breaking through his flesh. “Get him!” The mage screamed.
Maybe it was best not to think of them as people, Arthur decided, as he raised a hand and teleported the gunman in front of him and stabbed them. It was easier than last time. After all it had felt good last time, the euphoria of life force refilling him working to drown out the guilt. Honestly each kill was easier than the last, just letting the voice of the sword and the euphoria of battle carry him through.
Soon the mages of Naked Mummy were running away. But it was too late. Something had snapped. He teleported them to his side, and he cut them down, one after another, leaving a bloody wake of carnage. And then when he was done he walked away.
Arthur felt like he was going to throw up again. Even with the euphoria of his blade’s song, that ecstasy inducing sensation of life pouring through him, he felt sick. He’d just cut down more than a dozen people like it was some sort of video game. And they were gone. There was no undoing that fact.
He reminded himself that they were in fact trying to kill him. That they had almost killed him. He could actually justify a few of their deaths. But by the end it had just been him slaughtering the defenseless.
Arthur didn’t want to think about that. So he decided to put his mind to other places. Like finding the Oración Seis.
He pulled out Altair’s and Enif’s keys and he opened their gates. Linking up with them through his Archive magic, he could stay here while they found the Oración Seis.
Given the Oración Seis were currently crashing a military airship on their own location, finding it wasn’t exactly difficult for Altair, and Enif was eager to take him to the Oración Seis, but Arthur was somewhat hesitant. He couldn’t fight all six at once. He could, however, go find the alliance and join them.
But if he beat the six alone he got double the reward. And the chance to obtain Aries and even more points by defeating Sorano. Though wasn’t her name Angel? Or was Angel a codename?
Altair had spotted the Oración Seis, though. And the worst part was they seemed to have Wendy. He called Enif back to his position, and kept Altair watching them. He wasn’t sure what his plan was, but Enif gave him a speed advantage. Maybe he could get wherever they were going before they did.
He paused to consider. He was thinking about rushing in to fight one of the 3 most dangerous dark guilds in the country? Continent? It was somewhat hard to tell which to be honest. Six powerful dark mages. Currently running off with a Dragon Slayer, after having defeated 12 powerful mages with ease.
Why?
He looked at his bounty board. The Lion, the Witch and the World of Spirit. He’d failed half of it, but he could succeed at the other half and get 75 CP. Destroy a Major Dark Guild 200 CP. It was doubled if he did it alone. But even if he had help. 200 CP.
He opened up the power market. If he was going to have a prayer in a fight with six demon generals he needed to be better in a fight.
Arthur worked on his Archive. There was another instance of the magic open in the area. The user was not particularly skilled it would seem as they didn’t seem aware of his own. It was easy to access their data and make it his own; it was the magical equivalent of using unsecured public wifi without passwords. It did provide him with what the Guild Alliance had been told about the Oración Seis.
His new cheat power had made maintaining Altair, and even Enif, a lot easier on him. Keeping Enif summoned at maximum power for an indefinite period was not going to be easy, but if he wanted to keep Altair summoned until the spirit died due to not returning to the Celestial Spirit World for too long he could with ease. Even keeping 3 spirits summoned at once didn’t drain him like 2 had previously.
Still he was doubting his choice to retract Enif. Caelum was essential, and so too was Altair. And he simply couldn’t afford the expenditure of energy demanded of keeping Enif summoned, especially not before battle.
His eyes fell on his sword as he considered. It was too easy to kill with it. To kill and just keep killing with it. He felt guilt eating away at him. He could tell himself it was self defense. And at first it might have been. But by the end it had been a slaughter. He was pretty sure that at least a few of the Oración Seis mended their ways. Cobra at least was essential to defeating Acnologia. Angel was Yukino’s big sister and did something sort of big against the Spriggans; maybe saved the main cast from Brandish? Hoteye was the brother of one of Erza’s friends from her time as a child slave. Racer was heroic at the end too, wasn’t he? Midnight and Brain, he was pretty sure continued to be pretty bad, and a bad influence on the others. Of course he couldn’t even remember which one was which or their names so he might not remember as much as he’d like.
Racer had driven a motorbike away from the Oración Seis’s cavern, and then Hoteye, Cobra, and Angel had left the cave as well, splitting off into the woods. Arthur was stumped on why they left. They seemed to just be wandering into the woods to look for individual fights; that Brain had sent them to find Nirvana didn’t occur to him. Maybe the Oración Seis were idiots who relied purely on personal power and not strategy?
Going into the cave would be easy. He could save Wendy. He just had to handle the two most dangerous members of the Oración Seis simultaneously; but one used Darkness Magic, and they likely couldn’t go all out without hurting Wendy and he was fairly sure she wasn’t just a hostage.
He looked at his bounty board. If he went to save Wendy he’d lose the chance to defeat Angel before Lucy did.
Wendy would get saved regardless. But he wouldn’t get the CP if he didn’t go out and complete the bounty.
Besides, Angel had come out into the open. Taking her out would be child’s play.
Altair began to descend from the heavens into actual combat range. This brought its dangers. Altair had been flying as high as he could fly and still, with his eagle eyes, track the enemy. A bird that could barely be seen flying above a forest. Descending down to range to attack Angel, meant coming down low enough that it was obvious that Altair was no ordinary bird.
Still the ambush was effective. It was ultimately a lightning blitz. Altair descended, thunder roared through the forest, as Altair’s lightning struck Angel causing her to fall.
Gemini - taking on the form of Gray Fullbuster of Fairy Tail - began to work Ice Make Magic, firing a series of ice spikes up towards Altair, only for Caelum to fire from its hilltop firing post.
By the time Arthur managed to teleport to the battlefield, the fight was over. Altair was hurt, but ultimately alright, Gemini’s gate had been forced close, and Angel was down for the count.
Arthur took it easy striding towards her, before he felt the familiar drain on his magical energy of Caelum firing a shot. He hesitated, pulling back, as he checked on its status through the Archive link.
Cobra had found Caelum immediately. It wasn’t exactly a fair fight. He needed to get back there ASAP. Unfortunately he had counted Angel out too soon, as she struck him from behind with a heavy ‘sword’. He found himself being knocked forward and flying as his armor cracked and bent. She had summoned a Caelum of her own, in its sword mode.
He rolled, rising to his feet awkwardly - the dangers of wearing an oversized shield - and managed to block the next blow on his oversized shield, only for the ground to rise up around him in a wave. Angel leapt back, but was too slow as the wave of dirt wrapped around her as well.
But where the aura from Arthur’s chaos shield prevented the taint of chaos from corrupting or twisting the world against him, ending such transformations around it, it didn’t protect Angel. The wave stopped, the earth solidifying again as it neared him, leaving him in a hollow hill. He opened his mouth, breathing in the darkness until there was a faint glow suffusing the area.
Angel was stuck, her body mostly wrapped in the solidified earth, her sword arm and face the only exposed parts.
Arthur’s hand moved in front of his body. He held up his middle and index finger, thumb moving to push down on the other two. It was his chuuni thinking pose, a reward for a minor bounty. It was unclear if it did anything other than a placebo, but it might raise his cognitive faculties by 10%. He’d won it by beating Roy in a game of checkers while repeatedly saying “Chuuni thinking stance” between each move. It’d gotten Roy to pointedly not talk to him for 2 days; so even if it was a placebo it had been worth doing.
With Hoteye fighting here, and Cobra fighting at Caelum he needed to stop and think about his next move. Neither Caelum nor Altair could defeat their enemy alone. If he went to help one of them by the time he could go to the other it’d be too late; and the longer he considered the more true that became. Cobra was a combat mind reader; Arthur would either need to saturate him with undodgeable attacks or lose, and especially still drained from battles he wasn’t certain he could do the former. Caelum had been his ace in the hole; able to strike from afar to bring Cobra down. But he needed Altair to act as spotter for that. Caelum was essential to his plan, but ultimately less so than Altair.
Then there was Angel. He could leave her here and come back for her. But he had no idea how visibly distinct this hole was, and if he blasted a hole out of it to make it very much so she might escape. He didn’t want to leave her here to die, but he also didn’t want to let her escape.
Lowering his hand he exited his thinking stance. He knew what he’d do. He’d disarm Angel, and then he’d go to help Altair.
Escaping the cave was easy. He simply raised one hand and let his magic form its wall of compressed ‘space’ before forcing the top up and out away from him. Then he teleported first himself and then Angel onto the lip.
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He made sure to teleport her really onto the lip. The evil celestial spirit mage wore a dress of feathers, with a neckline that went all the way to her navel, and a cape that resembled an angel’s wings. Or it had, before Altair’s lightning bolt had left her outfit burned and charred, half missing in places. He caught her by her cape, letting her teeter on the edge of the pit. It was just a thing to keep her off balance long enough to spy where she kept her keys; he suspected that it was beneath her cape.
Teleporting the pouch into his shield hand, awkwardly grasping it, he knew he could just push her into the pit. But there was some primitive, animal instinct hardwired into his brain that prevented him from kicking a beautiful girl into a pit while screaming “This is Sparta.” It just wasn’t something he could actually go through with. He found himself pulling her away from the pit, as he stepped back himself.
She still held a celestial spirit in the form of a sword. She was still dangerous. Arthur knew this. But he still couldn’t just kick her into the pit. For his trouble of freeing her from it, she spun, her caelum-sword swinging. He caught it with his own magic - what amounted to combined shapeable forcefields, explosions, and teleportation was a pretty potent field of magic - and leapt back.
“Open gate o-” Angel began the invocation even as she reached for her keys. And then she stopped. Her hand had found nothing there. Angel stepped back then, trembling a little. She knew from the beginning she had been fighting a celestial mage. And there was only one reason celestial mages fought. He was there to kill her and take her keys. It was how she had gotten her own keys. She just hoped that she’d not meet that common end; she’d been determined to be stronger and more cutthroat than the rest.
Arthur knew he should just explode her face, knock her out and into the pit. That he should attack. It’d been easy ordering Altair to do so from afar. But looking her in the face it was hard. Well looking at her anywhere it was hard. She had a nice figure all around, and lovely features. And when she ran away her legs were absolutely gorgeous.
Arthur realized that he was lucky she’d responded by running instead of fighting, given he’d trailed off into staring at her for a socially inexcusable period. Still it was time to help Altair. Accessing his Archive he used Altair’s most recent upload to teleport to the location.
Hoteye was still fighting. Altair was doing his best to stay above the reach of the softened earth, but a geyser of dirt shot up to drag him down. The bird shattered it with a surging blast of electricity, but Arthur could tell the fight was going badly for Altair. The eagle could fight one of the Oración Seis alone. But he couldn’t beat one. Of course, he wasn’t alone any longer. And Hoteye wasn’t a hot girl.
Arthur didn’t hesitate for a moment to create a mass of explosive spheres around Hoteye and detonate them. For someone who was in the middle of battle with another foe, focusing magic on bringing them down, and then blindsided by a teleporting enemy, Hoteye’s reaction was excellent. He liquidized the ground, dropping himself down as it rose up to form a defensive armor around him. Against an average mage it would have worked. Against even a Wizard Saint it might have succeeded.
Arthur’s power was enough to make him a magical monster in human flesh. Even compared to the Oración Seis, or a Wizard Saint, it was on another level usually reserved for the Four Gods of Ishgar.
The explosions erupted before Hoteye was even halfway underground. The dirt armor had only risen to his shoulders, and it wouldn’t have mattered if it had reached his head. Only the tendency for this world’s magic to be non-lethal, and the massive durability of its mages, left Hoteye alive and breathing as explosions tore through his impromptu terra cotta armor and cratered the ground leaving him only buried up to his calves.
The Oración Seis wizard fell, and Arthur smiled for a moment, before realizing how far he’d gone towards exhausting his magic, maintaining two celestial spirits in actual battle conditions for so long, and then wasting a ton on excessive force against Hoteye.
Still if he could take out four more he’d get enough CP to buy himself a nice power. And even if he didn’t, he needed to continue. Even if he had help it would only half the reward.
“Come on Altair, we’re walking.” He didn’t have the juice to spend teleporting unnecessarily at this point.
Brain felt one of his six prayers fall. The leader of the Oración Seis, he was a well built, dark skinned man, with gray hair. His face was crisscrossed with a line art tattoo, but when Hoteye fell one portion of it faded away. Brain’s fingers drummed the length of his staff, as he considered the possibilities. Perhaps Hoteye had encountered Jura Neekis. The bald mage might look like a monk-turned-bodybuilder but he was one of the 10 Wizard Saints, recognized as the 10 strongest mages in Fiore. These only included ‘legal’ mages, but Brain had worked with the ministry of magic long enough to know that the Wizard Saints were people to take very seriously. If any of the members of the Guild Alliance were a threat to his plan, it was Jura Neekis. That was why Angel had been instructed to take him out before the initial attack, and why after her failure Hoteye had been sent to search and destroy him while he remained wounded.
Of course while Jura was the largest threat he was not the only one. His guildmates Lyon Vastia and Sherry Blendy were worth noting at least. Sherry Blendy’s doll magic could turn various objects - or non-human creatures - into animate servants of her will. While Lyon Vastia possessed Ice Make Magic, allowing him to create weaponized animals out of ice.
It was similar to the magic possessed by one of the four Fairy Tail mages; specifically Gray Fullbuster. Though Gray apparently specialized in the static instead of dynamic version, creating constructs of inanimate ice. It was a rather basic magic, and while Brain had never studied ice make in particular, he had some experience with wood make magic even if he would not call it combat ready levels. He was at least familiar with the theories behind it, and how to combat it. Not so much Natsu Dragneel. Fairy Tail’s ‘dragon slayer’. He used fire magic supposedly designed to kill dragons, one of the Lost Magics. His bio characterized him as hot headed, and with little to no foresight. Erza Scarlet, the so-called Fairy Queen, had been the second priority target. But Cobra’s snake had bit her, and the venom should keep her from rejoining the battle if it did not kill her entirely. Which only left Lucy Heartfilia out of the Fairy Tail mages. A Celestial Spirit Mage like Angel, she summoned spirits to fight for her. Given Cobra had reported an encounter with one such spirit, which had fired into the woods, when he went to find a vantage point to observe the area, it was possible she was involved in taking out Hoteye.
Possible, but unlikely. Brain’s unwitting informant, Hibiki Lates of Blue Pegasus, used Archive magic. A shock to Brain as he had not actually taught anyone else it after developing it in his job as a magical researcher. There had been notes, of course. The council had access to a fair bit of that research, but it was complicated magic highly demanding of a mage’s skill. Someone else possessing it was an unpleasant surprise. Still they were an inept fool in its use. He had managed to access it, and he was following along with Hibiki’s own coordination of the Guild Alliance. Lucy was with him, and if she was directing a spirit from afar he wasn’t aware of it. Unfortunately there were holes; while he had some contact with the other Guilds, it was only his fellow guild mates that were well tracked. Even then it was only a pair of them, the air mage Ren Akatski and the snow mage Eve Tearm. He was still in contact with them and they hadn’t reported such a battle, but that might just be an element of timing. That only left three. Ichiya Vandalay Kotobuki, perfume mage, and leader of the four from Blue Pegasus, was - despite Hibiki’s glowing praise as a mage - a well known idiot and womanizer. Though Brain had to wonder if he was as much an idiot as he seemed, as he had disappeared from Hibiki’s own Archive connection, almost as if he suspected that it might be compromised. There was also Wendy Marvell. Hibiki’s Archive had almost no information about her except that she apparently was a support mage. Brain’s own told him more than enough. She was a member of Cait Shelter, the guild formed of the survivors of Nirvit who held the true secrets of Nirvana, and a master of the lost art of healing magic. She was also bound up in the cave beside him. She had not dealt Hoteye his critical blow, nor was she the one whose Celestial Spirit had fought Cobra.
That accounted for all 12 members of the Guild Alliance sent to destroy Oración Seis. And it didn’t account for what was happening. There was a 2nd Archive network, but this one was well guarded. Brain was attempting to tease his way inside even now, but it would require more direct contact. Someone had summoned a celestial spirit that fought Cobra. And the only one he could think of was that mage who he had sent the monkeys of Naked Mummy after almost an hour ago. The fact that he couldn’t contact them through his own telepathic network was concerning. He hadn’t even found where Nirvana was yet, and he had lost one of his five prayers, 3 dark guilds were completely outside of his carefully managed communication web, and another two were still licking their wounds from earlier conflicts.
And now Angel was reporting back that the mage who had been fleeing Naked Mummy had appeared before her with ‘overwhelming magical power’ and stolen her keys. He scowled. The bitch was apparently worse than useless. He’d destroy her himself when she dared show her face again, just to make certain that if things went poorly all six seals would be broken, and that Zero would ensure he didn’t lose alone.
Still it would seem he made a terrible error in not pursuing the wounded mage in person and in force. If he had defeated 2 of the Oración Seis almost simultaneously, and left a 3rd wounded, he might be far more dangerous than the entire Guild Alliance. “Midnight, wake up, I have a job for you.”
“Yes, father?” The sixth member of the Oración Seis finally opened his eyes. A young man with black hair and pale skin, he was dressed in black. He had fought the previous battle while asleep. Now that was a luxury that Brain could no longer afford him.
“There’s a troublesome mage who needs to be killed,” Brain said.
“Yes, father,” Midnight smiled.
At 18 years old, Natsu Dragneel was a fit, youth, with pink, spiky hair, and skill in fire dragon slayer magic. As the protagonist of the manga Fairy Tail he was of course much more than that. He, and Gray Fullbuster, were rushing through the woods in hot pursuit of the Oración Seis on the desperate mission to rescue Wendy Marvell and bring her back to Erza Scarlet to cure the latter of the venom currently killing her.
They did not have time to stop and fight Midnight when the dark mage crossed their path. But when you run into an enemy exuding a deadly bloodlust there’s only one natural response.
Gray formed and launched a barrage of spikes of ice, letting them fly towards the dark mage, in a heavy assault. Natsu’s own fire dragon’s roar sent a blast of fire straight towards the dark mage. Neither even got close to him. His magic twisted the fire and ice both, sending them spinning around him before launching back towards Gray and Natsu respectively.
The two mages weathered the blows, but they had been heavy attacks. “Natsu, leave him to me,” Gray said. He wasn’t certain how he intended to fight this mage, the plan had been to avoid any solo fights, but he couldn’t let one of the Oración Seis get to Erza when she was wounded like that, even if Lucy and Hibiki were there with her.
“But,” Natsu began. He didn’t like the idea of leaving his main rival to fight a mage radiating that sort of killing intent, and who had just left them both on their asses at once, alone. It gave Gray a chance to pull ahead, and left his friend in intense danger. He grabbed Wendy’s talking, winged, anthropomorphic ‘cat’, Carla, and began to run. “Take him out, Gray,” Natsu shouted, as he ran.
Midnight was annoyed. He didn’t want to let one of them pass him, but his task wasn’t to kill these two, and he couldn’t afford the time and effort to stop the fire mage. He raised a hand, trees bending and snapping in Natsu’s path, only for a hammer of ice to form above him forcing him to jump back and out of the way.
“He’s not your opponent, I am,” Gray reminded the dark mage firmly.
“You’re merely in the way,” Midnight replied, turning back towards Gray for the fight.
“Kii, I see a fight, kii!” Altair shouted.
“Hmm?” Arthur was walking, buying time for him to recover before the next fight, not daring to teleport directly into their nest with 2 of the Oración Seis still waiting. He could handle their leader. He was fairly confident of that if only because it was practically his best possible match up of magic, given he remembered the man specialized in Darkness Magic, and Darkness Dragon Slayer Magic had given him the ability to draw vitality and magical energy by eating darkness especially magical darkness. But after going over his resume in the Archive he was certain Darkness wasn’t his only magic, and facing him and another mage whose magic they didn’t even have a record of how it worked made Arthur wary. “Who?”
“Kii! Midnight, and a male stripper! Kii!” Altair screeched.
“Male stripper?” Arthur asked. But it didn’t matter. He was raising up the virtual console of his Archive magic and readying his map.
“Kii! He just took off his clothes for no reason! Kii!” Altair shouted.
So Gray. He was fighting Gray. “Kii! Two strippers now! Kii!”
It didn’t matter, Arthur decided. It was time to move. He was tired but he could still teleport two.
Angel ran into the cave, panting heavily from the exertion. “Brain, that mage we left to Naked Mummy. He’s not normal. His magical power skyrocketed. He took my keys, and-”
“I got your earlier report,” Brain said. “I half thought you were smart enough not to come back here. But it seems I continue to overestimate you,” He leveled off his staff, a beam of darkness firing from it towards Angel.
She might have lost her keys, but the gate of the chisel had never been closed. The caelum she had summoned was still in her hand as a sword, transforming into its default flight mode, the form of a large robotic sphere over which an angelic hung.
It took the blow for her. “Bastard!” She shouted as she dove from the cave front. Brain’s darkness magic shot forth, dozens of thick, tendrils of darkness, ending in the faces of damned souls tearing through the celestial spirit forcing its gate closed. She had some other magical skills, but none were up to the task of magical combat, and in a straight up fight with Brain she’d have been hard pressed at the best of times.
She should have known better than to trust him. They were a guild. They had worked together for years. He had helped her escape slavery under the cult of Zeref. But she should never have trusted him.
“I’m sorry, Angel, but if you’d had the good sense to fight until a true defeat I wouldn’t have to do this now,” Brain said emerging from the cave. “It’s just insurance, you see. In case I need him.”
Angel stiffened. He was talking about Zero, Brain’s alter ego, the madman obsessed with destruction of everything. His last case emergency measure to get back at anyone who defeated the Oración Seis.
“Now be a good girl, and die. Darkness rondo!” The magic was too widespread for her to dodge, and while she might survive the attack, she’d not survive the follow up. She turned away, eyes closing as they averted from her certain doom. She was going to die, and she never even found out if her little sister had survived or not.
“Thanks for the meal.” The annoying voice was familiar to her; hated even. It was the unidentified mage who’d bumbled in here and upset all their plans.
“I see what she meant, I don’t think even the Wizard Saint had such magical power. Though maybe he just wasn’t serious yet,” Brain said. “No matter. Darkness capriccio!”
The beam of darkness, circled by a spiral of deep red energy, shot out towards the new arrival. And they breathed in, the darkness diverting as it flowed into his mouth. Brain could feel the mage’s magical energy growing stronger as he ate.
“Slayer magic?” He whispered half under his breath. One of the legendary lost magics. Could this be some variant of Darkness Slayer magic?
“Dark dragon roar!” Blackness erupted from the mage’s mouth, tearing through the ground where Brain had stood, and digging a deep furrow.
Brain, though, had - of course - dodged it. Still the beam’s speed, and the crater it had created, were impressive. The beam had nearly collapsed the cave where the prisoner was kept, and it had blown away the shallow water he had stood in, and created a crater deeper than he was tall, and had created a furrow in the ground between the mage and him with just its air pressure.
“Territory magic, and dragon slayer magic,” Brain said. “Quite the prodigy, aren’t you? Still I have to wonder, why are you here? You weren’t part of the Guild Alliance that the council sent for us, so you must have your own reasons, correct?” He was buying time. Racer should be back any minute now, and he could contact Midnight telepathically and call him back.
“I got lost in the woods,” Arthur answered, drawing his black sword from its sheath. “And then dark mages kept attacking me.” He leveled the sword towards Brain. “And you’re their leader, aren’t you? So how about you surrender quietly and I’ll,” Arthur’s confidence began to fade, as guilt rose up inside of him. He didn’t think he could actually use this sword to kill another person again. Not if he didn’t have to. And he didn’t have to kill here. “Let you live,” He said in a weak, faltering voice.
“You’ll let me live?” Brain said. “Do you even know I am? I am the most brilliant wizard of our generation, I have personally created over a hundred spells. That Archive magic you use? It was my invention. Even Wizard Saints come to me to teach them more about magic. And you will let me live?”
“Yeah,” Arthur stated before he felt a sudden surge of energy, just pure destructive and explosive force forming in front of him and exploding against the mage’s oversized shield. The wizard rolled and tumbled from the blast, but it was nothing that’d do more than hurt through the armor he wore.
Brain had no intention of letting him rise to his feet, though. He pointed his staff at the mage, and focused. “Blast Magic - Grand Explosion!” He might not be able to match the power of that darkness dragon’s roar, but he could make certain he didn’t give them a chance to get their wits about them.
Brain wasn’t about to relent, firing off another blast immediately. But the eagle Altair charged towards him. The bird was fast, too fast for him to dodge, talons tearing him across the chest before it wheeled around for another sweep. Brain spun his staff, raising it and unleashing a torrent of darkness at the bird.
And then he felt something push into his back, a blade sinking to the hilt into his flesh. He gasped, as Angel pushed against him from behind, a dagger plunged deep inside of him.
“Traitor,” Brain’s staff, or the skull that capped it, shouted out, twisting enough to turn its head towards Angel
“He tried to dispose of me like trash,” Angel said, pulling the knife out, preparing to plunge it in again.
The staff lunged at her, striking out ramming into her stomach. Arthur pushed his shield against Horologium, the grandfather clock spirit having summoned itself to protect him. Angel was quickly being overwhelmed by the staff. And then a blur of color flashed in front of Arthur’s vision, and Angel fell. Racer had returned. He had struck her - several times - and taken her weapon.
But before he could drive it into her, he found his hand empty. Angel’s knife was now in Arthur’s hand, a minor precursor to the solid wave of force that hit Racer, visible only as a discoloration of the air as Arthur’s personal ‘space’, the territory which gave his Territory magic its name, slammed into Racer’s back and sent him rag dolling into the shallow lake. “Enough killing,” Arthur said. He wasn’t sure how he’d have dealt with Racer’s speed if he’d been paying attention to him, instead of Brain.
The staff wasn’t down, though. It turned towards Arthur and flew for him, striking him in the gut and then the jaw before he could react, and then it swept his legs. A beam of purple-black ‘light’ fired from it, but Arthur’s mouth opened, the darkness magic curving towards it.
And then a flash of fire burnt across the staff and it began to zoom away burning.
“Where’s Wendy?” The voice was a stranger’s. Arthur’s magic was already teleporting the staff back to his hand as he turned towards them. It was a pink haired youth in an open waist coat and a scarf. Natsu Dragneel; the individual he’d get 400 CP for killing as well as Fire Dragon Slayer Magic. Or a protagonist’s luck for befriending.
Natsu had seen the end. Not all of it. Merely Racer knocking out Angel, and then being knocked out. But at the very least, it was enough to tell him that the stranger wasn’t actively murderous at the moment. He didn’t stop him from approaching Racer, and rolling him over, even if it took the idiot hero a moment to realize why.
“I presume the cave that Brain came out of,” Arthur said, squeezing the staff with his territory magic, until it stopped trying to wriggle free.
Natsu rushed into the cave, and emerged a few moments later with the young girl, Wendy, and the small, talking, anthropomorphic, blue cat Happy. The other small, talking, anthropomorphic cat, Carla, which had arrived with Natsu ran up to Wendy and hugged her.
Arthur could hear Natsu explaining to Wendy that Erza had been poisoned by a snake, and needed her and Carla to rush back and heal her, when Arthur rose to his feet.
“If someone’s dying, I might be able to help you get her there quickly,” He said. “My Territory Magic ought to be able to make the range.”
Natsu stopped and looked at him, and then at Wendy. “Really?”
Arthur nodded. “I should have enough gas left in me for 2,” He said, placing hands on Wendy and Carla. “Ready?”
All eyes were on Wendy, and she nodded. And then she was gone. Arthur had expected questions. He was a stranger. In a place crawling with dark guilds. He could have been lying and deceiving. But Natsu had just trusted him.
Maybe it was part of being a Shonen Protagonist. Or maybe Natsu could smell lies.
“Great, now send me to Gray!” Natsu said, grasping him by the shoulders.
“I didn’t hack Hibiki’s maps for where Gray is,” Arthur replied.
“Hack?” Natsu asked.
Wait… He’d had Archive automapping via Altair at the time. Altair had seen the battle. “I’ll get you as close as I can.” And then he was alone, with 3 unconscious dark mages.
Cobra had heard it all. Or enough of it. He had missed portions. But he had heard the final conflict. Brain’s scream of traitor as Angel had stabbed him in the back, and Racer’s ensuing defeat. He wrapped his hands around his throat and squeezed. The only prayer left to the Oración Seis was their guildmaster. And only when they all fell would he be free.
Cobra wasn’t going to volunteer to be captured. But he’d break the last seal his way, squeezing his throat until everything went black.
Arthur walked over to Brain. The man was bleeding out. Without medical attention he would die. He could teleport him to Erza’s location, and hope that Wendy would be able to heal him. And risk that he becomes Zero and kills someone. Risk that someone makes use of his magical knowledge. Of course he should be the one to do that if anyone. He opened his Archive and set to work.
Archive was all about turning knowledge into data. It could make maps on its own by having linked individuals explore the region. It could obtain knowledge of Nirvana’s construction from the magic itself. Opening Brain’s brain was within its capabilities. But not before he died.
There was the sound of movement behind him, but Arthur didn’t have time to look. Something was changing in Brain’s mind. The lines on his face had faded, except for 1, when he’d taken down Racer. And now it was fading. Brain’s flesh was growing pale, going from a deep brown, to a paler white than was the norm for Ishgar.
Arthur realized what this had to mean. He reached for his black sword, pulling it from the sheath as he felt the twisted, vileness of Zero’s magical energy. The movement behind him stopped - Angel deciding that continuing to play dead was the best idea at the moment - even as Arthur brought his sword swinging down.
A blast of magic sent Arthur flying back as Zero rose to his feet. Zero’s hand moved to his wound, fingers feeling his fresh blood, and then he looked at Arthur. The dark distortion of light which demonstrated active Territory Magic wavered around him. “A magic from the Eastern Continent, quite a rare sight here,” The dark mage said. “Still, as much as I’d like to kill the bitch who stabbed Brain’s body, I think you need to be destroyed first. Blast magic - continuous explosion!”
Arthur reinforced his own magic. He’d made a barrier around himself before - skin tight like moving, living armor - but now he needed to put some real force behind it. He was running out, though. He couldn’t win a sustained fight. Though he wasn’t sure Zero could live long enough to sustain one. The wound in his back was deep.
Zero took the chance to grab Brain’s staff. It was ultimately a focus for magic. Not something Zero would normally need. But limited to his less effective combat magics he would need the edge. Especially with the wound. Given he’d completely failed to harm his enemy with his blast magic that was only further proven. Blast after blast had erupted against Arthur’s barrier, but it’d not been noticeably weakened in the least. That was bothersome.
Arthur’s hand stretched out. He needed to end this quickly. He was tired and weakened, and he couldn't rely on his magic blocking a second such barrage. “Dark Dominion Magic - Dimension Black,” Arthur invoked. It was the first spell he’d really made himself. A blend of his Territory Magic, and the Darkness of his Dragon Slayer Magic. Ultimately an attempt to make a dimension to carry his shield in, it had formed something far more dangerous, a realm of darkness and dissolution of being. His shadow surged forward across the ground as a wave.
Zero felt it, something pulling at him. Not completely dissimilar to his own Genesis Zero. He slammed his staff down into the darkness, a blast shooting from the bottom. He fed it the living staff, to free his own feet and leap back, the darkness surrounding and consuming his staff before disappearing.
Arthur sagged. He was tired and weak. He’d dropped his sword to cast his spell. But he only saw one option now.
And Zero seemed to be the same. His hand swept towards Angel. “I know your weakness. Blast…”
Arthur’s sword was in his hand and he was teleporting behind Zero. He could feel the hunger in the sword sing, and he yielded to it, allowing the blade to guide his movements in battle.
Zero was spinning. He’d gauged his opponent. He knew his speed. He was fast enough to finish the spell, before the enemy would react to his own teleportation. Fool. “Magi-”
The black sword clove through Zero’s chest, cutting his head and right shoulder off. Arthur shuddered as he felt the Zero’s soul be destroyed, and converted to magical power flowing into him. Felt the man’s entire being used to restore his own. And the horrible, twisted scream Zero loosed as his entire being was sucked into the sword, his blast magic faltering as the very magical energy that would have fueled it flowed back through his body, was absolutely terrible.
“Thanks for the meal,” Arthur said in a cold, self-loathing voice. He’d killed again. It had been a situation of kill or be killed however. Zero would have killed him if he hadn’t killed Zero. He had enough blood on his hands today, one more wouldn’t matter much in the grand scale of things. And it hadn’t been like the last members of Naked Mummy. He hadn’t been drawing Zero in to murder him. This had at least been self-defense.
With Brain’s death it’d be that much harder for them to access Nirvana, and Zero’s life force had been strong. It had been stronger than all the werelions, or all of Naked Mummy combined. He was more than topped off with power to burn.
He turned around to see Angel frozen in place. She had begun to rise to her feet. She had woken up a little bit ago, and was just waiting for a good chance to escape. But he had just outright killed Zero. She’d decided he was one of the good guys, but they weren’t the biggest on lethal force. And now she felt her heart pound with fear.
He was looking at her, and the magical power he had shown against Brain felt like a fraction of what he had now. This was it.
“Please don’t kill me,” Angel pleaded, tears forming in her eyes. “I’ll do anything you want.” Her clothes were burned and tattered from Altair’s lightning, her body was sore and tired, her magical energy was expended, she was completely unarmed; she couldn’t even work up a minor bit of (outlawed) charm magic, she only had enough to maybe requip her dagger once more. If he wanted to kill her it would be like squashing a bug. She had wanted to fade away into the air like an angel. Not be killed like a bug.
“Anything?” He asked.
Angel began to pose a bit. She wasn’t above using a man’s lusts to control them. It wouldn’t be the first time. And she didn’t want it to be the last either. “Anything. If you keep me safe I’ll do whatever you want,” She said, keeping the disgust she felt at herself and him out of her voice.
“Will you renounce the Oración Seis?”
“What Oración Seis? Brain is dead. And Racer… well once you kill him, he won’t matter either.”
“Will you renounce the Oración Seis?” Arthur repeated. He got 150 CP for destroying the Oración Seis. It hadn’t ticked off yet. And while he suspected that killing Brain and getting the rest arrested was good enough, well he wanted the CP. Getting Angel to renounce them should help.
“Yes. I think I did anyway the moment I stabbed Brain.” The organic link on his face had vanished then, and the prayer she’d held in her heart as one of them had as well. She’d given up on the guild deep inside at that moment at least. But Angel couldn’t dwell on that. Angel was still looking for a way out.
She sashayed towards Arthur. She was pressing her lips together, making certain to swing her hips, and to put on a show. Keep him thinking with that piggish part of his brain until she could get him to teleport her out of here, and to lower his guard. Killing him in his sleep wouldn’t be too hard. He was already sheathing his sword. He didn’t have the raw killer instinct to play these games.
“Will you renounce your contract with Aries?” He said.
Angel paused for a moment. With Aries? Not with her spirits. Or even just with her gold spirits. It was possible for him to recontract with them without her actually breaking them. But he was a celestial spirit mage. He knew enough to know that it would reduce her ability to fight back if she dissolved the contracts. So if he was trying to disarm her why only Aries? And if he wasn’t… was he stupid enough to actually give her her keys back? “Of course. Done,” She said, dissolving the contract. “Now why don’t we go somewhere alone, together, before this place is crawling with the council?”
“Will you turn over a new leaf, and live life as a good person?”
“Anything, you say,” She said, finally getting close to him. She was wrapping herself around him, pressing her body against his. He was starting to blush from it. And she smiled. It didn’t matter how powerful he was; she could eat a stupid virgin alive. Maybe she’d not kill him yet. He might prove useful once she got him to give up on this idea of ‘living life as a good person’ or taught him a new definition of good.
“Will you live in a way that will let you face your little sister?” He asked, and he felt her heartbeat speed up through their contacting flesh.
Angel recoiled from him like she’d touched a live electrical circuit. “I don’t have a little sister,” She lied.
“Yukino isn’t your little sister?”
“She’s dead. It doesn’t matter anyway.” At least that’s what she’d let Brain believe. She’d tracked her little sister down in her time as part of the Oración Seis. But Brain or the Council would have made Yukino suffer for the connection if she’d made it known. Besides, she had too much red in her ledger to go back to Yukino now.
“She’s dead?” Arthur was fairly certain Yukino was alive. He hadn’t done anything that should change that. “Did you see her die?”
Angel pulled back and turned away. She was quiet for a few moments.
“If you could see her right now what would you do?” Arthur asked, turning his back on Angel and walking towards a large, black T that hadn’t been there when he’d started fighting Brain. Racer had brought it, and dropped it when he’d come to intervene. It looked like a great, black coffin, except that it was for some reason T shaped.
“It doesn’t matter. She’s not,” Angel said. “If she was… how did you find out about her, even Brain didn’t know about her?”
Arthur mentally began to cuss himself out. He wasn’t forbidden from revealing metaknowledge or anything, at least not to his knowledge, but it could really complicate things. “I have my sources. Besides I’m the one you’ll need help from if you want to avoid being taken in and thrown into a dungeon for the next decade. If you could see her again, right now, what would you do?”
Angel was shaken by this. Looking down towards the ground, tears threatened to form in her eyes. The possibility was there. She’d not found her little sister, but even if she did it wasn’t like she could be with her. Not with the massive amount of crimes that checkered her past now.
Arthur’s eyes were on his bounties; well they were being overlaid across his vision. Redeem a villain. It was a bounty. “I don’t know where she is, but she’s alive. She’s on the path to becoming a celestial spirit mage herself.”
“What good does that do?” Angel shouted turning towards him, tears in her eyes. “I’d just drag her down with me if I went to her.”
“Then why don’t you live a life that won’t drag her down? Promise me you’ll live a life where you can meet your sister again and I’ll let you go.”
“That’s all it would take?” Angel said. And then she laughed a hollow, empty laugh. “It’s probably too late to let me go anyway. The Guild Alliance will be here soon, and even if I could slip by them, the Magic Council would find me.”
Redeem a villain. There was never going to be a better chance than Angel. Never going to be a better chance than now without spending CP on a cheat power… and was that even real redemption for the bounty? “I’ll help you escape this place,” Arthur said. “But you have to promise me, you’ll live a life where you can meet your sister again as her guardian angel and not the demon that drags her down. Also, what’s in the box?”
Arthur had failed to notice it earlier, but there was a large, black, T shaped box. It resembled a coffin, if someone had decided to spread out the deceased’s arms and then built the coffin around them.
“Yukino; is she really alive?”
“There’d be no point in me lying to you about that,” Arthur stated.
“Jellal is in there. He was a dark wizard who infiltrated the council. Brain wanted to revive him to get his knowledge about Nirvana. It’s a life support system keeping him alive in his coma.”
Arthur’s internal swearing intensified. Jellal was important. He was supposed to redeem the Oración Seis. He was also necessary in pretty much every post-timeskip arc. Arthur couldn’t leave him comatose. Brain was going to use Wendy to heal him. Arthur would have to set that right; and stop the Council from arresting him before he could.
“Angel, come here, I’m going to hide you both until I can take you somewhere safe.”