The next, what Arthur assumed were several, days were days of pain and suffering. Arthur had awakened in a dungeon. No one would tell him anything of use, he was bound with magic sealing stone, and about the only information he received was that God Serena was going to see to it that he was tortured for information the moment he was well enough to torture.
Arthur was continually reassured that the Oracion Seis and Minerva still seemed to be alive according to his HUD informing him of active bounties. He hoped that’s what it meant.
He really didn’t have a good sense of time. Medicine was force fed to him, his head was foggy and unclear, and the pain was horrible. He was blacking in and out of it for a time, occasionally being questioned, but he didn’t think he was coherent enough to give them anything.
It could have been a day, or weeks, before Wendy was admitted into his cell. Serena was there behind her, the orange haired man scowling down at him and the young healer as she placed hands on Arthur. Wendy and Carla didn’t show a single sign of recognition when they were in there with him. But Serena also didn’t seem to recognize them. He was carrying Arthur’s shield and sword; almost like they were his trophies.
He tried to ask questions once he was healed. But all that got him was a punch to the gut from an angry God Serena, and a curt, “Now that you’re healed I can hurt you all I want. You’re going to pay for what you did.”
The hours that followed showed Serena was most noticeably not pleased with him. He seemed to relish personally helping the interrogators ‘motivate him’. Beatings, breakings of limbs, removal of finger nails. Serena was careful to do nothing that Wendy couldn’t heal. Arthur lost track of the time that he was spending there quickly as he hung from shackles of magic sealing stone. He finally passed out during a flogging, only to wake up to Wendy’s crying face. And then he was taken back into the ‘interrogation’ chamber and Serena’s loving attention.
Arthur wasn’t sure if he’d answered any questions during this period. He wasn’t sure if Serena had bothered to ask any. He could only remember pain, and agony. Only certain of the fact that God Serena kept hurting him for the sake of hurting him with the most smug, arrogant, asinine smile on his face all the while, heaping verbal abuse on the physical, taking pleasure in talking about how Arthur was worse than the shit he wiped off his shoe.
“I don’t think he can take anymore of it right now. Well all good things must come to an end. Don’t take him to the girl yet, take him to his cell and let him sleep first, so he’ll know what comes of opposing a god, maybe in the morning he will be more willing to answer questions,” Serena ordered the lizard people who dragged him back to his cell.
Jellal had made up his mind. Arthur had saved them, they would find a way to save him. From the Magic Council. From the Four Gods of Ishgar and all the Wizard Saints. It didn’t matter. “Arthur would do it for us.”
Angel wasn’t sure she believed that. She had she’d admit enjoyed their time together. The Oracion Seis had been family in a way. Brain had saved them all from the Tower of Heaven together. But as much as they were each ‘equal’, Brain had been clearly and firmly in charge. Oh, Sawyer and Erik had thought he cared for them, but she’d never really believed it. She wasn’t alone there. Macbeth had fully accepted him as a second father, but that didn’t stop him from being constantly terrified that Brain would abandon him for the least failure. Richard had always treated the Oracion Seis as a means to the end of finding his brother.
She was sure Arthur would abandon her just as quickly if she just stopped staying on his straight and narrow path. A part of her was happy he was captured. It gave her back her freedom. She could do what she wanted, no longer fearing that he’d come after her if she strayed.
Except she’d been using him to keep Erik from coming after her. And Jellal was ultimately just as bad as him. And Arthur had been planning to leave. And he’d given her this miserable, terrible hope that her little sister was alive. That Yukino was fine and if she redeemed herself they could be together. That all they needed to do was get her a pardon, was to do enough good that it was recognized and they could be together again.
And then he had gone and got himself arrested too. What was the chance of a pardon if she went and rescued him from the Magic Council itself? How were they even supposed to rescue him? The Council hadn’t reformed yet since the Tower of Heaven incident. The ongoing hunt for Jellal had drawn in the two strongest of the Four Gods of Ishgar.
“Your plan won’t work,” She said looking at Jellal. “We’re not dealing with a council of bureaucrats, we’re dealing with the Four Gods of Ishgar. If you could remember how to do a Thought Projection that could play at being a Wizard Saint on its own maybe then we could do it, but with your magic in shambles it’s hopeless.”
Jellal’s face moved to the ground, his anger at his own impotence written plainly on his face. He hadn’t slept since the message had come. He’d been trying to find some plan that’d allow them to rescue Arthur. He was convinced they owed Arthur that. Angel remained otherwise. Yes he’d taken risks for them, but only in the way that could be deferred. Arthur considered himself a coward at heart, and she’d seen nothing that actually proved otherwise. He wasn’t about to throw himself into the werelion’s den for either of them.
“Then what would you suggest?” Jellal said. “If only I could remember enough, but I can’t. You know these Four Gods better than I. How does one deal with them?”
Angel sighed. She’d been considering what to wear today, dress and face. She had been thinking about splitting off from Jellal towards the south, making for Hargeon, and maybe going to see how things were in Alvarez. But she had to admit she wanted to save Arthur. She just didn’t have a way.
“You don’t. They’re the ultimate force in Ishgar. They’re why the Oracion Seis only had six members, to stay below their notice. Why no one was stupid enough to mess with the council.” The rumors had reached here already. They were talking about it in the inn. A dark mage from the Balam Alliance had fought God Serena in an attempt to release the Oracion Seis. The three were going to be tried asap to prevent other would-be rescue attempts. The word on the street was that all four of them would be executed.
Angel had held out hope the Seis could be brought back together, sans Brain, and that maybe they could find redemption together. Without Brain’s influence she suspected Richard would find redemption on his own. He’d always had a clear focus and purpose. Just the knowledge that his brother was alive, and safe, and that Erza Scarlet could tell him where he was, knowledge that Angel could give him would see to that. Sawyer had tried to stab her. But she’d been stabbing Brain. And he hadn’t done it. With his speed if he hadn’t hesitated Arthur couldn’t have saved her. She was alive because Sawyer hadn’t wanted to kill her even in hot blood and she knew it. He’d not do it in cold blood; he’d not toss her aside like Brain had. He’d be willing to talk to her, and if she explained things, she thought he’d believe her, especially if Erik was there to confirm. Erik and Macbeth both might offer problems. But Erik would know if she lied to him directly. She was a better liar than Brain usually, but Erik’s magic could hear her heart almost always, while Brain’s was only rarely audible. MacBeth’s reaction was the one which scared her.
It was moot, though. Her dream of getting the Seis back together the moment Arthur was gone was destroyed if the Four Gods were going to oversee their execution. And with it her only real hope at finding her adorable little sister again.
“We wait for the verdict,” She said. “They probably won’t execute immediately. A long, slow wasting in the dungeons discourages others,” Unless Arthur had made himself seem too dangerous. He had obliterated the Magic Council’s national branch headquarters. “And we look for allies. We can’t do this alone. Even if it’s just information and freedom of movement they’ll be invaluable. What about Fairy Tail, you and that red headed chick are pretty close, right?”
The next morning Wendy had healed him again, but this time a dark haired man dressed in a black outfit that seemed to scream Dracula entered with her instead of God Serena.
He introduced himself as Draculos Hyberion, currently the top ranked of the Four Gods of Ishgar. He apologized for Serena’s crude behavior, and he began to ask Arthur questions. Arthur couldn’t remember the last few days well enough to know if he’d been asked the questions before. He was reluctant to answer, but soon he found himself sharing with Draculos in exchange for promises of leniency and protection from Serena’s further attention.
He didn’t tell Draculos everything. He didn’t share his true nature. He told the same lie he’d told Natsu about why he trusted Jellal’s possession story. He told the truth of what had happened with Brain at the end, and the half truth that he had chosen to try and work with and redeem Angel because she was really hot. He even confessed his sword’s powers, and how only he could wield it.
Altogether he told more than he should have. Still he was just relieved to eat, drink, and not be tortured for a day. Solitary confinement was a pleasant break from God Serena’s attentions.
It was lonely though. He’d not been unaccustomed to lacking face to face interactions with people; well people who treated him like a person and not just ‘the (mostly in)convenient grocery ringing up tool’. Since he’d come here, though, he’d had people around him. Angel and the brats. His celestial spirits. And Diabolos. He was worried about the last; he’d probably caused some serious trouble for them. A diplomatic incident or something. And what about Minerva? They had held her. Even if she had survived then what?
Arthur brooded as he sat in his cell, anxiety and guilt eating away at him. That and fear. He had anti-magic shackles on his hands, and he wasn’t sure that buying Curse Magic would help him get them off. It protected against spells that would seal his magic, but did that apply to magic negating rocks? If worse came to worst he’d buy it and try. But for now he’d wait in the cell. He’d be a good prisoner and see if Hyberion was able to help as promised.
Still he wasn’t sleeping well that evening.
The next day he was woken by the lizard-guys, and cudgeled a few times by the sadistic reptilians as he was dragged from the cell. He was groggy and disoriented, as he was informed the date of the trial had been set for today.
Arthur found himself given no time to prepare a defense as he was dragged in front of the acting magical council. It still hadn’t actually reformed from when Jellal had caused the entire council to lose face to a point where they had to resign en masse. He was going instead before the King of Fiore and two other high ranking officials forming a tribunal acting in their stead.
As he was dragged into the courtroom, he got to see his prosecuting attorney - God Serena himself still wearing Arthur’s sword on his hip - and his would-be defendant. A man he didn’t recognize. Draculos Hyberion was beside the king, acting as part of the tribunal, the third representative, someone who was merely part of the Fiore government.
The audience for the trial was relatively small. Still Arthur did recognize some faces. Wendy, Erza, and even Fairy Tail’s guild master Makarov were there. As was Jiemma, and three members of the Oracion Seis, Hoteye, Racer, and Midnight specifically, also in chains. He didn’t see Minerva.
What followed felt like a mockery of a trial. Arthur’s legal counsel was simply playing the good cop to Serena’s extortions to the court to have Arthur immediately beaten and given the most torturous execution the law allowed. Their only real advice was to throw himself to the king’s mercy by turning in Jellal and Angel.
Draculos Hyberion was both providing evidence - from his ‘confession’ the day before - and serving as one of the judges. Impartial it was not. Arthur was questioned, and he didn’t bother denying what he’d told Draculos before; it was a damning amount of information already and he knew it. He had confessed to conspiring to see Jellal healed, and working with him and Angel. He’d not told where they were - not that he knew - he’d not really sold them out - at least he could tell himself that - and he’d argued for their goals being noble.
It was enough to ensure that no testimony from Erza about his help with the Oracion Seis was going to save him. And Jiemma - his limbs healed presumably by Wendy - told a very skewed tale of how Arthur had interrupted his attempted sting operation, and illegally fought another guild all out.
Through it all Serena was talking, encouraging them to give him the most extreme sentence, spewing rhetoric about how Arthur was a destructive and dangerous individual. Arthur was worried, fear gripped his heart. He had an escape plan. He just needed to wait and enact it at the right time. Now was the worst time. He could at least wait until he was sentenced and see what it was. But Serena was getting him more and more on edge.
He was not the only one who Serena was grating on, though. Draculos eventually snapped at him, going into a tirade about how the damage to the Council office had been his doing more than Arthur’s.
And then they brought Minerva in for questioning. Arthur hated what he was about to hear, but he trusted she’d disavow him, and claim that he had abducted her and threatened her. He knew Angel had been very clear that she was supposed to do that if brought in as an accomplice.
Minerva’s stomach was knotted. One of the four gods was interrogating her, and she knew she was half a step from being put on trial herself.
Father had told her to say whatever was necessary to rid them both of this enemy in the way of their happiness. Arthur himself had told her to throw him to the wolves in this situation.
So she started to. When God Serena asked her what her relationship with Arthur was, the answer came easily enough. “I was kidnapped.”
But she saw the look on Arthur’s face, and worse than that on Wendy’s. It hurt to look at them, and she felt so very weak lying. But if she let her compassion weaken her here, she would just end up in a cell beside him. She had to be strong.
“And he was so horrible to you, just the thought of it brings tears to your eyes?” Serena said, spinning around and gesturing to the tribunal. “Just think what sort of monster this individual must be. Threatening beautiful young ladies with torture and worse all for his own twisted pleasure!”
Minerva’s fists clenched. The only one here who had threatened her with torture was Serena himself. “... by the guild my father took me to,” She added. “After my father attempted to blow it up while it was fully occupied. He stopped my father who had been involved in the fights there for nearly a year profiting off of th-” She knew she’d messed up going that way. Angel had been clear: disavow them entirely, she was of more use in getting them free from the outside than going down with them. They were a team, and you didn’t let some sense of honesty get your team in trouble. But she had just wanted to wipe that smile off of Serena’s face.
This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“What does what your father was doing have to do with your relationship with the monster on trial here?!” Serena cut her off, spinning around and stamping a foot down towards her, his hand stretching out as he sank almost to one knee, his finger poking her in the throat.
Minerva screamed a bit.
“Serena, I want to hear it,” Hyberion said. “Jiemma’s conduct is relevant here.”
Serena scowled at her, and Minerva found herself telling the truth. Well the truth except for Wendy’s involvement. That didn’t really come up. Her heart was pounding the entire time. Her father was going to kill her. But once she’d started he was going to kill her no matter what. She’d said too much in those first few sentences. She’d cast doubt on his story.
Arthur was panicking for real after Minerva’s testimony. She’d told mostly what happened. It might save him from a few charges. But it’d do nothing about the ones that mattered. And he didn’t need to look behind him to see the sheer murder that Jiemma was exuding.
When he tried to bring it up, asking the king and Draculos to make sure that he wasn’t allowed to hurt Minerva afterwards, Serena had hit him, a powerful blow to his chest which cracked ribs.
And then they began questioning the Oracion Seis members about Arthur’s previous connection to them. Arthur wasn’t sure whether to be happy or scared when Racer gave a rant about how much he hated being on trial as an ally of someone he was trying to kill, and volunteered to be the executioner for Arthur’s sentence. If nothing else it at least put a doubt into Serena’s argument that he was their ring leader.
The Oracion Seis refused to say much. They escaped during the battle due to damage to their cells inflicted during the battle and took the opportunity to try and attack Arthur out of revenge.
The hearing was over fairly soon after. Arthur was not informed of his final fate. But he no longer could hold off on his escape plan. Minerva very well might be in danger. He let them march him into the magic sealing stone cell, and waited until his guards began chatting with each other about how doomed he was, and all he could look forward to was interrogation until interrogation and finally breaking.
Once it was clear they believed he was firmly in the cell and not a danger he looked at his purchase HUD and selected the item he’d had an eye on. A small jar appeared before him, he squeezed it between his thighs as he brought a shackled hand to it, twisting the lid to open it before pulling out a black ball with a red X printed on it.
He managed to get it into his mouth before the guards noticed. They started shouting, opening the door, and rushing into his cell, only for Arthur to appear outside of it and close the door. They reached for their keys and Arthur warped them into his hands, and then the X Balls. It was time for a jail break.
Arthur paused though. The Oracion Seis were something he had to deal with one way or another. There was a Bounty for getting the gang back together at least to the extent of heroism they had in canon. If he escaped alone they’d still be on the chopping block. His execution hadn’t actually been ordered, yet at least, but he couldn’t help but think it was coming.
“Hey, Hoteye, your little brother is alive,” He said approaching Hoteye’s cell, a wall formed from his territory magic shaping and pinning the remaining lizard-person guards against the walls.
Hoteye’s head rose, the man’s eyes staring in towards Arthur. Arthur smiled back at him. “I can’t say I know where he is, but I can tell you the name of one of his friends who might,” He made sure to emphasize the word friend.
“One of Wally’s friends?” Hoteye said, a moment before Arthur teleported the door from his cell.
“Yeah, they were slaves together in the Tower of Heaven. She met up with him when Jellal caused his ruckus there recently. I’ll help you find him, and get you out of here, all three of you,” He raised his voice loudly. “On certain conditions.”
“Conditions?” Racer asked while glaring at Arthur.
“The same I gave Angel. You try to make amends and help the world,” Arthur said, even as he knew he’d lost the carrot. After all, how could he help them get a pardon now? “It doesn’t have to be in Ishgar, but if I release you, your actions will be on me, so you have to help people not harm them.”
Racer scoffed. Hoteye nodded. “If you can really help me find Wally, I’ll do it.”
“Hoteye, you can’t be serious,” Racer said. “After all he’s done? He turned Angel against us.”
“I’m only part of us because it would help my little brother, if it does not do so any longer,” Hoteye began.
“I didn’t turn Angel against you, Brain did,” Arthur said irately. Who knew how long before someone came to investigate some alarm or detection spell. Not that his Archive was detecting any.
X-Balls weren’t the only thing he’d purchased. Magic Skill Level 5. If he was going to find Minerva and get her out safely while containing Serena and fighting another of the Four Gods he was going to need a real trump card. And he had to hope he’d made the right choice in one. Still his Archive magic had become an all-in-one detection tool. And his mind was brimming with ways he could use his territory magic. Like getting his keys back the moment he was willing to risk revealing himself.
His Archive had found them, he’d made sure it could track them even before this upgrade. Aries’s key was separated from the others. Still if he just knew who was carrying them about he’d have made them into convenient tracking devices.
“Gonna explain that bit?” Racer said after a few moments had passed.
“Brain tried to kill her because she’d lost her keys. She was no longer considered valuable enough to be in the Oracion Seis. I arrived barely in time to block his magic. Simple as that.” Arthur shrugged.
“You really expect us to believe that?” Racer asked.
“I can,” Hoteye said. “I do not believe for a moment that Brain wouldn’t have cut any one of us loose if he considered us no longer useful. You’ve said it yourself, Angel wouldn’t have dared go up against Brain without a strong incentive.”
“You’re really buying this stuff that he’s saying?” Racer whined.
“Aren’t you?” Hoteye answered, standing now beside Arthur.
“Fine, I’ll go straight. Better that than being executed here. Do you actually have a plan on how to deal with this situation?” Racer said and immediately the door to his cell vanished, and then his manacles next.
“What about you, Midnight?” Arthur asked, looking into Midnight’s cell.
“Fine,” The dark mage said. A moment later the last currently imprisoned member of the Oracion Seis was free. And immediately after Midnight stepped from the cell one of the walls of the dungeon distorted, the stone itself twisting to crash against Arthur. It slammed him against a wall, but it failed completely to breach his armoring territory.
Racer was hitting him then, blow after blow, and Arthur reached for his Archive magic. Or more he offloaded part of his mental function into the Archive, using it to think and in effect overclock his brain. He was still moving super slow, but he was thinking at a pace to keep up with the unaffected Racer.
His ‘space’ wrapped around Racer and Midnight both, beginning to squeeze around them. “What was that?”
“You killed my father! You think I’m just going to roll over without a fight after that?” Midnight said.
“No intention of keeping your oaths then?” Arthur asked.
“I do,” Hoteye said, his hands raised as if to show that he surrendered.
“Midnight was going for it, I couldn’t leave him to do it alone,” Racer said. “No way one of us was taking you alone.”
Midnight suddenly shattered through Arthur’s ‘space’ transforming into a demonic ogre as he did so. He surged forward a massive claw hitting Arthur in the chest and sending him flying.
Thinking at more than ten times his normal speed was excellent for keeping Arthur calm. Angel had told him about Midnight’s illusions. They relied on light. As the demonic entity battered him, Arthur’s mouth and hands opened and darkness poured out of them. “Dark Dragon’s Miasma,” He voiced as the tunnel went black.
The pummeling stopped. Or more it became evident it’d never begun. “What’s your plan for getting out of here without me?” Arthur asked in absolute darkness.
“Serena’s coming,” Hoteye said, his Heaven’s Eye magic having allowed him to see the entrance to the tunnel.
Arthur didn’t stay any longer. His silver keys were with a powerful magical presence at the entrance to the dungeons. He wasn’t about to fight Serena in a tunnel. Instead he went to check on Aries’s key. His space rose up and wrapped around himself and the Oracion Seis members about him and at nearly the speed of thought they were gone.
Serena’s magic slammed through the dungeon, his Cavern Dragon Slayer magic causing it to warp and squeeze shut, before he sent a second pulse of magic through to open it again to find his quarry fled.
Draculos was surprised that his personal wards against spatial magic in the castle had been breached. It wasn’t unbelievable. That was far from his magical specialty, and there were several mages in Fiore alone who could have maybe done it. But it had been done. He looked out towards the torrential rain that had begun pouring in. The weather had been sunny this morning, and spatial magic of this magnitude…
The God of Ishgar shuddered. That storm was the sign that something big was brewing. Something very big.
Princess Hisui screamed in horrified shock when a group of dark mages appeared in her bedroom. She’d be inspecting the golden key that God Serena had given her as a gift, the key of Aries the Ram. And then suddenly 4 of the prisoners from the castle dungeon had appeared not just in the castle proper, but in her bedroom. The two structures were not actually adjacent to each other, and there were spells to help prevent just such a thing. Hisui didn’t know too much about that, though. She was just a child.
A child with 4 grown men suddenly standing around her, three of whom she recognized as dreaded members of the infamous Oracion Seis. The fourth she didn’t recognize but he immediately reached forward and took the gold key from her hand.
“Sorry, miss, but this belongs to me,” The man said.
Hisui’s eyes naturally glanced to where she kept her silver keys, as she said in all the royal dignity the scared girl could muster. “It’s mine. God Serena gave it to me.”
“God Serena is a thief who has no right to lay claim to it, and a thief’s gift is no rightful claim,” The man said.
The other three were beginning to whisper.
“Oi, this is the princess isn’t she,” the blonde, Racer, stated. “If we take her as a hostage they won’t be able to…” Suddenly his legs were hanging in the air three feet in front of his body, his hips resting on a pair of circular portals.
“Rule number 1 of reforming and seeking redemption. You do not kidnap small children,” the man who had taken her key said.
“I must second this,” the largest man of the four stated; Hisui recognized him as Hoteye. “If we are to find redemption we cannot start by abduction.”
“Or killing,” The man with the golden key said.
“Then how do you suggest we get out of the castle?” Racer asked.
The man glanced out of the window. Rain was coming down hard, a sudden, terrible storm having blown in without warning. And then they were gone from the room, leaving Hisui alone and terrified.
Serena was furious. The most dangerous fugitive in living memory was loose and running about and it was pouring rain. What was worse was it was not some natural storm. His gale dragon slayer roar was more than enough to disperse natural rainstorms but had merely made this one stop for a moment before it reformed. There was some high end spatial magic gathering it together. Maybe if he targeted the right portion of it he could get rid of it. But he suspected he had to deal with the source: the Fairy Knight Lancelot.
He’d bluffed Lancelot into avoiding excessive flight in the last battle, claiming to be able to track his teleportation. Would that work again? Was the storm a sign the man had figured out how the heavenly eye of the gale dragon worked? It certainly blocked his ability to send his vision up into the sky to scout. And with the very very strict clause that he mustn’t cause excess collateral damage he couldn’t just rip and tear his way through until he found the man.
Serena howled in impotent frustration. And then calmed himself. So he needed to move fast. He took the man’s oversized shield from his arm and cast it aside. So much for that trophy. It was just dead weight as far as he could tell. Lighter than you’d expect. But you didn’t need a shield when you were one such as him.
He gathered the gale beneath his legs. He couldn’t go full force, but he could still leap. He might not know where Lancelot was, but he knew his goal. The girl Minerva. She hadn’t been kept in the high security - what a laugh - wing of the capital dungeons, but had been allowed to stay in the castle as a ‘guest’ under heavy guard of knights.
Her rescue had been Lancelot’s objective last time. It was probably his objective this time.
Getting out of Crocus wasn’t a problem. Arthur could have done that with ease. Unfortunately he needed to find Minerva, and Serena had his stuff. His Archive could do the former, and he was still tracking his keys from here. The problem was the former took time, and his stuff included his Chaos Shield which protected the wearer from the twisting of reality. Such as his territory magic. He wasn’t completely sure how he was going to get it back.
Overclocking his mind was giving him more time to consider, but it was also a noticeable drain on his magical power. He needed to come up with a solution before it was too late. And he couldn’t just keep hopping around the castle to avoid knights, but he didn’t dare take Racer, Hoteye, and Midnight far afield either. At least not until he’d figured out how he was going to keep an eye on them.
And this insufferable storm just kept building and building. It was making his Archive magic go into red alert too, high end spatial magic all through it. It hadn’t identified the purpose yet, but for magic of this power and complexity, Arthur could only assume it was one of the Four Gods; was this what the real God Serena was capable of, or was this what Draculos could have done with prep time?
Suddenly magic hit him. He fell to his knees, dropping his canister of X-balls. It was a spell that inflicted pure pain, surging it through his entire body from his throat, even as he could feel it draining him of his magical power.
A man was approaching through the rain. A dark haired, dark dressed man: Draculos Hyberion, for the time being still considered the number one mage in all of Ishgar. Arthur felt the magic drain tugging at his energy, making it hard for him to focus or gather his own magic to counter it. The Archive was still running, analyzing the spell and deciphering how to break it down, but Arthur felt naked and vulnerable, unable to move or stand.
His Territory Armor darkened. For a moment he could not breathe. No light. No air. Nothing was being allowed to pass through it. It was enough to end the spell in seconds, and the moment it did the magic field became merely a distortion again and not its fully black void.
“I should have expected no less after the fight you gave Serena,” Draculos stated.
“I don’t want to fight you,” Arthur said. “Don’t make me fight you.” He teleported his container of X Balls back into his hand.
“You’re the one making me fight you,” Draculos said. “Surrender and this ends.”
The Oracion Seis were preparing themselves, but none of them wanted to be the first to rush one of the Four Gods.
“Let’s teleport out of here,” Racer said, barely audible over the storm.
“Not without Minerva,” Arthur said as the rain pelted down against his armor, a constant drain on its energy. He looked at Draculos. “She’s innocent, but you have to realize that if she stays with her father he will do horrible things to her because of her testimony.”
“She’s already in protective custody for that reason,” Draculos said. “If that’s all you’re concerned about, leave the Oracion Seis here to pay for their crimes, end your storm, and go. Any real battle between us would be far too destructive.”
“My storm?” Arthur cried back. “I thought it was yours?”
“I had hoped you were an honest man,” Draculos said, “If you’re going to make such ploys with me then I guess I was wrong about letting you leave being an option.”
“I’m serious this isn’t my storm,” Arthur fell to his knees as Draculos’s magic caught him again. It was just a glance and he was being drained.
Arthur’s armor blackened again, but this time when he reappeared red lances were ready striking against his armor. Draculos was moving, but with Arthur’s mind overclocking Draculos wasn’t fast enough. A garotte of magic caught him, and the portal opened. Immediately Draculos’s head was in his hand, a portal around his neck keeping it connected.
“I’m serious, this isn’t my storm, can we stop fighting and figure out what this spatial magic is?”
“You are, aren’t you,” Draculos said. He could break the portal, but he knew the real implication. If Arthur had caught him like this he could have done worse. His enemy wasn’t fighting to kill; it gave him reason to suspect he was honest.
Arthur felt his space being disrupted. He banished the portal, shunting Draculos’s head back where it belonged. He couldn’t hold it much longer. His armor was shattering, and the world seemed to be tilting to a side, the color bleeding out of it. Draculos and the Oracion Seis vanished. Everything was disappearing around Arthur.
It was spatial magic. His Archive had already been screaming about it. But it wasn’t something to try and fight him. It was something that was transporting the world around him to another dimension, his personal ‘space’ had helped resist and struggle against it, and Arthur was now being stranded in a space between. He could flee, push his space fully back into Earthland’s reality and escape. Or he could teleport himself through the portal to the dimension on the other side.
The answer was immediately clear. He was going to Edolas.