When the Ice Phoenix landed and everyone came off, Opal came out crying while hugging her husband and son and nearly fainted when she saw the fainted Zip and Void until the two explained that they were just unconscious because they were exhausted.
Nadir soon came out bawling as she hugged her father while Jasmine was helping her unconscious husband into the house so that she could tend to him.
After Opal was able to calm down she finally noticed the many Paladins and Knights as well as the beautiful as a Goddess, Madrid with her Phoenix in it’s small form.
“Um… honey, who is this beautiful miss and these men?” She asked.
Nil took her hand and pulled her over, “This is the Saint Priestess of the Light Ice Goddesses Church, Madrid and these are Priests and paladin of the church. They came to set up a temple in our village.” Nil said.
“My my, the Sainte…” Opal froze after she put her two hands clapped together and looked at her husband, “Honey, did I hear wrong? The Saint Priestess? As in the Ice Swam of the Ice Goddess order?” She asked. “Honey… have I really grown so old?” She asked hugging him with tears in her eyes.
“WHAT!?” Nil sudden shouted upon hearing her wife’s sudden and very dangerous group of words. “W-wait what are you thinking?!” He said.
“Even though we have six children, have you already tired of me now that we have noble ranks?!” She was nearly crying.
Suddenly a childish laugh came and she looked at the laughing Xero.
“Mother, it’s not like that, Miss Madrid is madly in love with my PE teacher at the Magic academy, she doesn’t think of father like that.” Xero laughed at the ridiculous scene that showed to him. He was almost out of breath from laughing.
“M-my my…” She said taking a step back and liking at Madrid, “I-i think I said something wrong in my confusion from my worries.” She said trying escape.
Xero began to laugh harder, he knew his mother was airheaded and a little dumb but she still felt embarrassed when she realized something.
“Would you like to come inside, we have freshly dried and prepared Winter Sunshine Herb Tea and Cold Heat Flowers and Winter Sunflower cookies.” She said with a smile while a few drops of sweat appeared on her head.
Madrid just smiled as if she did not hear, “Men please go around and survey the area. I’ll deal with choosing the location after looking at the map of the area and speak with Sir Nil.” She said as she felt some of the temple knights getting aggresive so she shooed them away before they could cause trouble.
Only after most of the temple knights and knights had left did they proceed inside while Madrid made sure to keep them outside. That said the Priest still followed but she did not mind. The Priest was amazingly a level 60 Head Priest dispatched by the headquarters to administer and protect Nil and his family. They were quite serious about the protection of the family though that was a hidden mission.
“Wow, these herbal tea aren’t that bad, although I’ve drunken quite a number of higher quality tea, nothing really beats fresh mountain herbs found in nature and cultivated by nature itself.” she sighed as she drank the tea.
“Your holiness…” Nil began but she raised her hand.
“Just Miss Madrid, you can call me Holiness when in front of those brainwashed or braindead fanatic’s like those Temple Knights who believe only in praise towards the goddess and even imagine me as the incarnation of the goddess Polarie herself.” She snorted.
“Saintess, it isn’t good to insult our own subjects.” The priest said in a casual manner while drinking.
Madrid snorted to that.
“... Miss Madrid, exactly why are ‘you’ here?” Nil asked.
It seemed like a simple question but the person to whom it addressed was not simple at all. As the Saint Priestess, she was the second highest power in the Ice Goddess’s Order. She was the symbol and idol of the order alongside her familiar.
“Because the Pope sent me to ensure your family's safety. In fact, he wanted to make a big commotion with me moving personally to draw in several Light and Dark Church to this village so that the Holy Church does not move against your family.” She explained.
Jasmine, who had joined after making sure that Zip was properly in bed, made a desperate expression when she heard that. “What has our family done to enrage the Holy Light Church?!” She asked with apparent resignation.
“Nothing but the fact that the children of this family summon Demon familiar that have all developed into Devil’s is a fact. You should know, demons may not have the potential to reach the peak of the world besides a few ‘Mythological Beasts’ of legend, Devil’s are different. Almost all Demon lords are devils and an existence such as a demon lord is at the peak of hell.” Madrid said.
As they heard this Opal, Xero, Nil and Jasmine exchanged glances before looking at Nadir.
“Um… Miss Madrid, I think it might be wrong, after all my sister summoned a Spirit.” Xero said.
“Oh? Now that you mention it, we know of the familiars of the men but not the women, please can we see them?” Madrid asked.
The three looked at each other before they lifted their hands and from it, three small things appeared. One a fairy with a farmer’s hat and overalls that Opal had stitched together making the blonde haired fairy look cute. White stone Jar with the words ‘Spirit Pot’ spinning in the air and a fist sized gem with an ‘eye’ in the front. The body was no longer smooth and had shattered and reformed into a complex crystal and had a pink color now.
The flow of mana in the gem spirit was many times smoother than it had been at the beginning after two months of constantly sucking up mana from the Uncommon Mana stones. Along with the meditation and breathing technique that she once had, Jasmine’s own channels have been steadily opening and her Mana pool expanding by using the effect of the familiar to loosen her channels.
“Oh my.” Madrid giggled, “It seems the devilish men only look for fairies and spirits.” She laughed.
“Saintess, please be a bit more considerate for the situation they are in and their current worries.” The head priest said a bit ashamed that he had to correct her.
Madrid smiled, not taking into consideration at all what he said. “This is interesting though, if you had more girls it would be interesting to see if the family was not just a Devil family.” She said.
“W-what do you mean?” Nil asked.
“I mean to say that if males summon demons and the women of your family summon spirits and fairy, your family will prosper greatly in the future. Sadly there is only one girl and we cannot see such a thing at this time.” Madrid said and looked at Jasmine smiling.
The young woman soon blushed as she realized what Madrid was insinuating.
“Miss Madrid.” Xero suddenly called out and drew her attention to the boy that was sitting on the edge of his seat, “I’ve always been wondering since I met Ernest and Silvia at the camping trip and even more now that I met the Head Priest of the Dark Holy Order. What is the difference between the Holy Light and Light Church and the Dark Holy and Darkness God order?” Xero asked.
The Head priest smiled and answered for Madrid, “I can answer that with more certainty than miss Madrid, she spent most of her time training while I am more of a scholarly figure. The difference between the orders with the world Holy in their name pertains to the presence of Holy magic. Not all gods use holy magic, they may have it forming their body but they cannot use it. That is different from the Dark Holy order’s god and the Holy Light Churches god that they forcefully proclaim is the king of the Gods. Both gods are the only ones known to use holy magic.” He explained.
“Eh? Then is it similar to what Ernest did to Night Gale? Form a Devil by mixing Light and Holy magic when creating it?” Xero asked.
Madrid giggled, “Although the boy wishes to join the Light church, the Dark Holy Church really wants him because Night Gale would function as an Idol for the Dark Holy Church. He is even more eyed by the Holy Light Church because of his familiar threatens their order. Until now there have only been one other Idol in the Dark Holy Order while they simply need to have Angelic creatures as their Idol.” He said.
Xero frowned a bit.
“If you want to add Holy Magic to your devil, I suggest against it, it might ruin her path that was already set. On the other hand if it was done to an Imp it would have been better since holy magic would burst the body and make it resistant and attune to it.” She said.
“Is it hard to merge Holy and Demon magic?” he asked.
The head priest and Madrid both nodded in sync, “Think of it in this manner, try to merge Fire magic and water or ice magic, what would be the outcome?” The Head priest asked.
“Obviously they would cancel each other out.” Jasmine said.
“That is the normal course but what happens when you're forcefully merge fire and water mana? I mean truly merge it.” The head priest asked.
“It blows up, it was taught in school.” Xero said.
“That is the learning period, have you ever seen the power it can produce if one successfully merges it?” the Head priest asked.
Everyone shook their head.
“Okay, let's put it in this perspective. We shall take Sir Nil as an example, your familiar is level 41 and you should have an idea of its full strength. Now it is Ice type, if you made a spell like the Inferno Howl and activate both breaths together, more than 80% of the mana channels used are the same and the two mana would have to merge. It would blow up but what happens if it merged and created the spell.” The head priest said, “This kind of spell has been dubbed ‘Chaos Spells’ because if a level 41 monster successfully uses this spell, a creature or maybe even 15 levels above them would not get out of it without some moderate or even serious injuries.” The Head priest said.
The Null family sucked in a cold breath when they discovered this kind of power but they also realized that there was a large price to pay in the form of mana that was a huge cost not to mention to time needed to train such things.
“Can you understand now exactly why the Dark Holy order is so powerful? Many of their familiar users have normally dark or demon creatures and they train these people to merge Holy or Light magic into the creatures so that it creates unique light attribute dark creatures or even Holy Dark creatures such as what had happened with Ernest who unexpectedly did everything himself without realizing how big his actions were.” Madrid chuckled.
“Wouldn’t the Dark Holy Church get more powerful like that then?” Jasmine asked.
“Of course but of course the Holy Light church does the same but they follow their God allowing only Light attribute creatures merge with Holy Magic. Silvia is one such person as her Cherub had been a Holy attribute familiar and she self inserted Light magic spells.” She said.
“Self inserted?” Jasmine muttered.
Madrid looked at her and at her gem spirit. Her eye shone momentarily, “I can see into your Gem Spirit, it has only one spell. It lacks incentive to develop into other creatures as it lacks innate spells. It's not a native creature so it requires you to create spells to develop it. As a spirit it would probably develop into human shaped creatures or into something else.” Madrid said.
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“You have an identification ability?!” Xero said.
Madrid chuckled, “Of course not, all I did was simply build a simple spell formula for a spell called Analyze that is used to see basic information and how many Innate skills exist inside a creature. Young miss, your spirit is level 15, this is almost its full potential if you just rely on mana stones to develop it. You need to create some spells to open more mana channels and train it a bit more.” She said.
“I understand Miss.” Jasmine nodded but blushed, “I… I don’t really know well how to build spells.” She said.
“There is that young boy who does.” She pointed to Xero. “Just think of any random spell or specific even who knows it may develop into something unique.” Madrid said.
“I understand.” She said.
Xero who was in deep thought as he felt through Ashley’s spells, “Merging opposite elements make super powers. Does that work for normal skills?” He thought. Then in his mind, the voice of the old Identifier in Gravlin sounded, “One thing to note child, this devil holds hidden skills, her race revolves around the sword, both summoning of swords spirits to form swords and merging them to form more powerful swords but that is the end of it as they will not merge more than once. She requires the forge to grow stronger. Also a tip from an old man, skills have a capacity of merging, learn from that.”
“Her race revolves around the sword, both summoning of sword spirits to form swords and merging them!” He suddenly shouted in his mind.
Before he could even stop himself, Ashley jumped out at his order. “Ashley, can you make a Sword spirit.” He asked.
Everyone was caught off guard and looked as the little Devil summoned out a glowing Sword spirit. Then from his pocket he pulled out a small sword that suddenly expanded.
“Put it in here.” he said and Ashley was surprised but nodded and put the spirit on the pedestal section.
Suddenly the sword began to shine as the two separate skills merged and Xero was not able to keep his hands on the sword but the sword did not fall and shrank and floated in the air as the shining stopped. The small sword very slowly rotated around before suddenly it blew up turning to ashes.
“What happened.” Xero asked.
“Master needs to circulate a lot of mana when it is merging.” Ashley said and summoned out another sword and Xero grabbed it and enlarged it again and Ashley pushed another Sword Spirit into it and unlike before, Xero put a steady flow of mana into it. That said soon he found the sword rejecting his hand he started to put more and more mana to grip it. The sword struggled but soon it stopped as it accepted his mana and the large greatsword shape began to thin out and turn into a thin long sword that soon shrank and flew into the air.
“Greetings master.” A serious knightly voice suddenly came from the now vibrating and tiny floating sword.
Everyone was still shocked from the events when Xero smiled.
“Master, this little one humbly begs master to name this lowly servant.” it said.
“Oh master, why did it have to come out a stuck up one. Lets remake it into someone more interesting.” Ashley said.
“Silence you insolent, Lustful devil! I am masters servant and sword! How dare you disrespect me!” He shouted.
“Huh? This is getting interesting, I’ve been feeling hungry for a while.” Ashley said as her eyes flashed a threatening light.
The little sword insteadly flashed behind Xero’s head trembling while the handle, which had an eye where the crystal was, poked out from behind. “M-master, this devil wishes to kill your servant!” He cried out.
Xero chuckled and looked at Ashley who was looking at the sword before turning to the others.
“Sorry, I was thinking about how you explained merging skills and just suddenly thought of this since I had a hint told by an identifier once.” Xero said and reached behind his head and took the little sword. “I just never expected for the sword spirit to develop like this.” Xero said.
“This is called a flying sword master, unlike the Sword Devil’s Divine Greatsword, this is a monster in itself like the other sword spirits but more powerful. It is much smarter, though it seems this one is defective.” Ashley said.
“This servant is not defective, it is you, foul devil, who has problems!” The sword said in a righteous tone but with a sudden flash of her hand, Ashley grabbed at the little sword only to find that it was gone and hiding behind Xero’s head once again.
“It's very quick, I saw it but it was still quick in my vision.” Madrid said in shock.
“The great sword Grunt used once, he was able to break the sound barrier because the speed depends on the level of strength of the person in command.” Xero said.
“Do not compare this lowly servant to the soulless ones. This servant has many abilities and can double the speed of master’s flight as well as keep my ability to transport. This servant can even hide master's presence and possess a small fraction of masters aura allowing this servant to become imperceivable to the eye of any except the most perceptive.” He said as the body faded but there was a very small distortion around his edges as it showed that he could only use so much.
“This is quite interesting.” Madrid said.
Suddenly Ashley appeared next to her, “Miss, unlike the common Sword Devil’s Divine Greatsword, this sword possesses a soul and will not vanish after 1 hour, also it is bound to each person. Under your control, even if Grunt had a Greatsword, he would not escape.” Ashley whispered like the devil.
Instantly Madrid’s eyes became slightly bloodshot as she looked at the devil, “What is your price?” She asked.
Ashley grinned, “Master is pathetically weak at this moment, as long as he is spending time here, your temple knights should spar and train master with very heavy exercise.” She said.
“Deal!” Madrid said.
“Also, master’s family is wholly incompetent with magic and master is only good with year 1 magic, I hope you can help…”
“Head priest, after you get established, get someone to tutor the Nil family. It will help us build friendly relations.” She said and looked back at Ashley.
“And a rare mana stone.” She said sticking her hand out and the woman casually pulled out a rough gem like white stone but thought a bit, “What element?” she asked.
“Earth.” Ashley said since she knew that Xero wanted to make the walls of the city and use the Earth controlling sword to keep improving the village but uncommon and common mana stones would be wasted after a few uses, common ones especially so she asked for a rare so that there would be a surplus of mana for Xero to use.
Madrid took out a brown rough gem with many mysterious writing on it and Ashley took it and handed it to Xero in a breath and returned with a Greatsword in one hand and a sword spirit in another.
“Just fill the sword until it's about the size of a common sword and when I add the spirit keep feeding it. If it repels harder almost breaking loose use more mana and keep a firm grip.” Ashley said and instantly shoved the spirit in the sword.
With clear instructions it shined and Madrid easily handled the mana output until the sword was finished and when it was done, it turned into a beautiful blue longsword that seemed to be made of ice while the handle seemed to be made of blue feathers.
“Greetings master.” a respectful and beautiful voice said making one easily imagine a beautiful knight with long silky skin and blue hair kneeling down. The image the sword gave was many times different compared to Xero’s sword and it went to show that this sword was hundreds if not thousands of times better than Xero’s.
“Master, this humbly servant begs master to bestow a name upon this servant.” she said.
Unlike Xero’s who nearly begged, this one was held more self respect and seemed more ‘knightly’ compared to the other. If one were to compare, it would feel like Xero’s Flying Spirit Sword was a child pretending to be an adult while Madrid’s was a true honorable knight that passed through the baptism of blood and battle before arriving here.
“I’ll call you, Love Chaser.” She said.
The eye on the sword looked at her and she coughed, “Master, this humble servant is aware of master's reason for making this servant but this humble servant ask to take the naming of this servant seriously.” She said clearly showing her dissatisfaction of the name.
Madrid giggled, “Alright, how does Snowflake sound then?” She asked.
“This humble servant thanks master for such a name.” She said and slowly her blade shined and the light and flashed towards her heart. Madrid simply lifted her robe to look and found that over her heart was a tattoo of a sword but suddenly it moved up to her shoulder and to her hand appearing at her left palm.
“Master, this lowly servant asks for a name as well.” The little sword that belonged to Xero said.
“Okay, what about Knighty? Hmm no… Edge! Blade? Justice? Edgar!” Xero shouted.
Nil laughed, “Oh that's a good one son.” Nil said.
“...” the little blade was frozen unable to reply while Opal sighed, “So he inherited it as well.” She said.
“Inherited what?” Madrid asked curiously.
“His father's horrible naming sense. Just like his brothers and sister.” Opal said smiling wryly.
“Master… please take it seriously.” he said unable to keep up knightly talking style.
“I am taking it seriously?!” Xero said. “Then how is Blade?” He asked.
“I’m a sword not a blade.” The sword replied and sighed, “the one before, Edge, that seems at least okay.” He said
“Great!” Xero smiled as he watched the little sword vanish and appear on his chest before moving to his hand. With a thought the tattoo came out becoming the sword and melded back. “Cool it comes out with a thought and I can feel a really strong link with it. If I can make a few more I can make really a really cool fighting weapon group.” Xero said.
“Sadly master, each person can only have one. The sword is directly living in your body so that as master grows, it will grow with master. If it breaks it will vanish into your body just like a familiar would and spend several hours to repair itself.” Ashley said making the boy sad.
“Well it seems rather balanced this ability, no one has too many if it is like that.” Madrid said.
Ashley grinned, “Of course, that does not apply to myself. This is actually a method for me to create minions.” She laughed.
“That is quite unfair.” Madrid said.
Ashley just grinned before vanishing into her seal.
The group just chatted for a while, while Madrid and the women actually spent most of the time talking about the spirits, though Nadir didn’t understand much. Jasmine decided to make skills relying around things like magic control and first had a basic mana bolt skill formed and then mana bomb which were simple spells that could be developed.
This lasted until a someone walked inside. “You Holiness, Saint Priestess, we have a problem. Several minutes ago, groups from the Dark holy, Dark Ice, Light Fire and Dark Fire churches suddenly all arrived one after another and the Fire and Ice groups are having large arguments about placement locations. Please come out and mediate before problems arise!” A young priest appeared shouting.
Madrid frowned and guessed it would happen but not so fast, she at least hoped that the Light Ice order would have set up before they arrived but they moved much quicker than she had expected. “Let’s go, once we stop the fighting we shall return and decide in a serious conversation about it.” She said and quickly ran out and using her sword the first time, who taught her the basic way to stand and use the flying ability, Madrid vanished without leaving a blur.
“Wow.” Xero muttered.
It took a little more than ten minutes for her to return and with the scholar and Nil, her and the Head Priests walked into the little office and they began a large discussion about how the distribute the spaces. It was decided that the ‘workers district’ would hold the two Fire gods orders because Fire gods are also gods of smith and craft which is revered by the craftsmen and dwarfs since the Light fire god is a dwarf and the Dark Fire is a Cyclops, the old kind.
The Dark Holy and two Ice orders decided to put on the east side of the original village within the space that would be within the range of the walls that Xero was building. It was within five kilometer range.
When the locations were decided, the groups finally relaxed and each separated into different groups.
Only after all the groups were gone, besides Madrid that stuck around after giving orders to the Head Priest to go start making the Chapel, Xero finally wanted to do what he most wanted as he held single Rare mana core.
A proper Lord’s manor has already been planned out by Nil, since he wanted to give his family a good home worthy of their noble title, Xero asked his father for the blueprints he made. Then he told his Sister to completely store everything in the house and for everyone to leave because he was going to completely remake the house and pulled out the earth control sword and the rare mana stone and Nil understood his plan.
With Nil’s confirmation, Nadir and the women stored everything and removed the two unconscious boys, the six year old and the baby and left the encircled palisade of the manor. Soon the ground shook and suddenly a large wall burst from the center of the house destroying it and Xero floated around and landed at the top as he placed down the mana stone.
The wall shook as it began to form into a square and rapidly grow and push the wood out of the way. With him controlling, even the palisade suddenly all fell and were pushed away with the earth leaving a cleared space with a large earth square. With the blueprints out the stone began to expand to for the lord's manor formed purely of stone with two floors above the ground and one underground that was formed into a space that would function as the treasury. With the rooms on the top floor along with a more respectful office for Nil as well. A meeting hall, dining room and kitchen made of stone was placed on the first floor with a large fireplace, hearth and chimney in the meeting room to allow a strong warm fire to heat the room.
Mana gushed from the mana core as the dirt rapidly turned grey and compacted into solid stone just after a large amount of dirt broke off making many windows and doors in the house.
Then Xero jumped along the road, 50 meters away from the front door and 10 behind the group and the wall rose once more but with the effect of the rare mana stone the wall slowly expanded and began to circle the manor and connected at the back forming a circled wall with 100 meters in diameter around the manor. The wall was 8 meters tall and at the spot Xero was standing a gate space formed while the wall thickened to 5 meters thick with a stairway along the wall to climb onto the wall. Then soon the area around the wall began to change into a two 12 meter high double gatehouse but it was just two towers around the gate with a circular stairway on the inside to allow someone to look around at a distance and watch the area from the manor and give quick reports should anything happen.
Only when the walls were completely solid stone did Xero walk down and smiled at his father. “Father, I have prepared a respectful home, though it’s not as good as one built by masons, I have made it as best as possible and it would only need wooden floors and windows installed and it will be finished.” Xero said as he handed back the blueprints.
Nil was smiling as his son, “It’s fine as it is, let's go inside quickly and put those windows in or else your brothers will freeze. Then we can put down our things again.” Nil said.
Madrid watched in shock looking at the walls and mansion before following behind to ask about how he made all that.