I do not own Seven Deadly Sins or any of their characters. I have never read the manga. I've only watched the show as far as it's on Netflix.
Blacksmith
Oswald sighed as he dunked the blade he had just finished hammering into its cooling trough. He didn't mind working as a blacksmith. He just hated that he couldn't go watch the fighting festival in Vaizel. Or take part. He hated the idea of hurting others, but fighting in a festival would be fun. He could test himself without having to worry about anyone actually getting seriously hurt. He lifted the blade, setting it back on the anvil and staring at it. Yet another perfectly average blade that he wouldn't be payed for. He attached the sword's hilt and secured it before setting the sword off to the side. Then, he pulled out another of the blades he had put in the water earlier. He set it down and began to attach a hilt, only to freeze as the hair all over his body stood on end and his skin prickled so hard it actually hurt, like needles stabbing into him in a wave. He dropped the handle, eyes rising to the horizon in the direction of Vaizel.
"It...can't be," he breathed. "That's impossible. They can't have...wouldn't...I know? No. It's not them. They're all still..." His eyes fell to the hilt still in his hand, his knuckles long since white and his hand trembling. "But then...who..."
He dropped the hilt, grabbing his finished sword and its scabbard and ran outside to where there was a pure white horse tied to a post, a gilded saddle on its back. He slashed its reins and jumped onto the saddle just as the door flew open and a Holy Knight with fancy silver armor ran out.
"My horse!" he shouted, Oswald completely ignoring him and riding hard toward Vaizel, the sword hanging across his back now. "Get back here! Hey, that's my horse!"
He grit his teeth, leaning forward and resting his hand on the horse's side. "Please, I need you to hurry. I know it's not fair, and it's going to hurt, but I need you to get me there as fast as you can without dying."
The horse surged forward, streaking across the open plane. As they grew closer to Vaizel, smoke began to appear on the horizon. Then flames, massive blazes throughout the town of Vaizel and the land around it. Oswald narrowed his eyes.
"Four, five, six, seven, eight, nine," he counted quietly to himself. "Nine of them. No. Three of them are just Holy Knights. They're too weak to stop them, though. But there's no question it's them."
He drew his sword, a bastard sword with a ring pommel, a silver grip with the last half-inch of the guards' ends pointed upward, and a custom grip made out of three metal rods twisted around the hilt. Its scabbard was red with gold at the opening and the end. He glanced at his reflection in the blade's side, seeing his irises were an angry red, his black hair blowing in the wind from the horse's gallop. He closed his eyes for a moment, then opened them again, seeing blue eyes staring back at him from the blade. He sighed, looking to the front again. He was close now. He pulled on the horse's reins and it slowed to a stop, panting. He hopped down and patted it on the side of the neck.
"Thank you. You go ahead and head on back. Take your time though. You've worked enough for today."
The horse turned, walking back the way it had come and Oswald turned to the front again, seeing several floating fireballs in a sort of cloud around a young blonde boy, one holding a broken sword with a green serpent hilt. Just outside of the cloud of fireballs was a girl with long black hair, Holy Knight armor, and a jousting-lance-like weapon. Just as he saw them, the fireballs began to explode.
"Who...that's not possible," he breathed. "She can't be...what the hell's going on here?"
"Who the hell are you?"
Oswald's head snapped to the side, staring at the young boy in a light blue sweatshirt floating on a green pillow, the boy seeming to think that Oswald was as strange as he seemed.
"You're floating?" Oswald asked. "How? You aren't Goddess Race. Are you a fairy? You must be young to not have wings yet."
The boy's face turned pink instantly. "Shut up! Just because I don't have wings doesn't mean I'm a kid!"
"So then, if you're that one, where's..." he turned, staring as the blonde boy with the green sword hilt and a guy with a red leather jacket red leather pants, and silver hair crashed into each other in mid air, the by trailing smoke and the man trailing blood, both crashing to the ground. Then, two women walked toward the pair, coming from the directions they had flown from. The woman that had fought the blonde boy was completely unscathed, and the other was a girl with short silver hair, bright red lips, a ninjato with a gold tsuba, light purple armor over a light pink shirt, both of which had a round opening over the chest to expose her cleavage, black combat underwear, and light purple greaves starting from about a third of the way down her thighs.
"Who are they?" Oswald asked, sword trembling slightly.
"They're Holy Knights," the boy said. "My name's King. Now, who are you?"
"My name's Oswald," he said. "So, if you're king, that would make those two Ban and Meliodas, right? Of the Seven Deadly Sins? Looks like the rumors were exaggerated."
"That's a little rude," King said.
"Against those two..." Oswald trailed off, glancing at his sword. "I'll lend a hand."
"You?" King scoffed. "We don't need-"
Oswald sprinted forward, gripping his sword with both hands.
"Hey! Get back here!"
The girl with the ninjato spun, slashing at him but Oswald deflected the slash over himself, stabbing at the opening in her armor. She spun out of the way, slashing back down at him but Oswald twisted, blocking the blade and skidding to a stop, shoving the blade away. Before he could attack again, however, the girl grinned.
"Godspeed Ten Slashes!" she said, sword becoming a blur, striking at Oswald rapidly, only to spark off of his own each time. "What!?"
"I like that one," Oswald said. "Let's see, how'd it go? Godspeed Ten Slashes."
His sword tore into her, mimicking her own attack and sending her flying with the last strike. She drove her sword's blade into the ground and skidded to a stop, staring at him in shock and confusion.
"Allow me, Jericho," the woman said, stepping past her and holding out her weapon, a fireball forming at the end and firing at him.
"Heaven's Shield." He held out his right hand and a massive, glowing, white flower with seven petals spiraled outward from his hand, stopping when it was about six feet across before six circular barriers formed in front of it, each slightly smaller around than the one before it.
The fireball exploded against the first barrier and the woman growled in annoyance, rapidly firing a dozen more, some of them moving to go around the barrier. However, when they did, Oswald swung his hand to the size and all of the circular barriers merged with the flower, which grew and folded, transforming into a dome and blocking everything. Once the fireballs had finally stopped, he let the flower fade and watched the woman in silence.
"Your magic attacks won't get through my shield," Oswald said. "Now, who are you?"
"My name is Guila," she said. "I'm a Holy Knight of Liones, and I'm going to obliterate-"
She was cut off by a spear streaking through the air and spinning, the shaft blasting into her and launching her, before following and beginning to beat her around and around through the air. Finally, it blasted her into Jericho, knocking both unconscious and King sighed, floating down beside Oswald, the spear hovering beside him and his pillow gone.
"You're pretty strong," King said. "Who are you?"
"I'm Oswald," he said. "I'm a blacksmith from one town over."
"A blacksmith with that kind of power?" King asked. "I don't think so. Who are you really?"
"I just told you," Oswald said. "I'm a blacksmith. I saw explosions and came to see if anyone needs help."
"And I just told you, I'm not buying that some random blacksmith has that kind of power," King said.
Just then, a pig skidded to a stop beside Meliodas and Ban, a tiny girl about the size of Oswald's hand seated on the pig's back.
"You really did a number on them King!" the pig said, Oswald simply staring at it, blinking slowly as his brain tried to process that that had, in fact, just happened.
"They're not dead yet, though," King said. "I've still got some questions for the two of them, as well as our mysterious friend here. Take those two somewhere safe."
"You can count on me!" the pig said, grabbing a part of the two unconscious criminals' sleeves and turning to run, chanting, "Piggy trot, piggy trot, piggy trot," as it ran.
"That pig...talks," Oswald said, staring after it.
"Tell me who you really are, or you'll be my next opponent," King said, holing a hand out toward his spear, which turned toward Oswald.
"I already told you, I'm a blacksmith," Oswald said. "I was told my physical skills, like my skill with a sword, came from my father, and that my magic abilities, like my shield, I got from my mother."
"Speaking of yur sword skills, how did you copy Jericho's attack?" King asked.
"All she was doing was slashing really fast," Oswald shrugged. "Doing stuff like that's not hard as long as your arms are quick."
"That wasn't just copying someone's movements," King said. "They were too fast for that."
"Well, that's all I..." He stopped, looking to the side, in the direction the pig had gone.
For just a moment, he had felt it. There could be no doubt. One of them was here. But that should be impossible.
"It can't be," Oswald breathed. "Meliodas...can't be..."
"Hey, what the hell are you saying?" King demanded.
"There's something wrong," Oswald said.
"What are you talking about?" King demanded.
"Are you two bickering amongst yourselves now?"
"Mind your own business Guila," Oswald said. "King, can you sense your captain's energy?"
King was silent for a moment before shaking his head. "Him and Diane's energies have been gone for a little while now. And Ban's is fading."
Oswald nodded. "Go help them."
"What about you?" King asked.
"I'm going to deal with these two," Oswald said.
"If you say so," King said.
However, as King turned to leave, a Holy Knight with golden armor and a scimitar with a green blade and four notches missing from the tip of it appeared in front of him, slashing. King's spear blocked it, but the knight slammed a kick into his gut, launching him away.
"Die!" Jericho shouted, Oswald spinning.
Her sword flashed down at Oswald, sparking against his own as he leapt backward. He landed on his feet, skidding to a stop, and sighed. That had been close. He looked up at the two just as fireballs began to flash toward him from Guila. He held out a hand, forming his shield again, already as a dome, and just as the fireballs began to meet the shield, a grid of energy hit the back of the shield from where Jericho had sent it at him in a series of slashes. Finally, the attacks ended and he let the shield fade just as King knocked his opponent's helmet off at the same time as receiving a gash across his stomach, except, he was suddenly a fat, ugly man who was almost double his previous age.
"I told you, you're not breaking my shield," Oswald said.
Jericho charged at him from behind and he spun, knocking her sword away and moving to stab her, only for Guila's weapon to slam into his side, sending him bouncing away across the ground. He rolled to a stop and pushed himself up as fireballs began to rain down at him from above. His eyes widened and he hurled himself to the side, the first fireball exploding on the ground, the concussion sending him flying, the following concussions adding to his speed. Finally, he bounced and rolled to a stop again, pushing himself up just as Jericho reached him, sword pulled back. However, she froze as a massive explosion went off in the distance. Oswald turned, staring toward the explosion, Jericho doing the same.
"What the hell was that?" Oswald asked, pushing himself up. "What did you do?"
"I placed mines around the village," Guila said. "It seems someone just stepped on one. I wonder who it was."
Oswald turned back to them just as Jericho's blade drove itself through his abdomen. His eyes widened and he folded forward slightly, blood dripping off of the bottom of her sword's hilt to the ground. After a moment, she ripped the sword back out, blood splattering along the ground, and he fell to his knees, on hand pressing against his wound as he gagged and vomited up blood.
"You were a fool to believe you could actually face two Holy Knights alone," Jericho said.
"You're..." he vomited up blood again. "Not...human. What...are you?"
Both stared at him in silence for a moment before Jericho raised her sword. "We're the New Generation of Holy Knights. And you're going to die here."
He collapsed, falling to the side and Jericho stopped, lowering her sword after a moment.
"Oh well, I guess he died anyway," Guila said. "Let's go."
They began to walk away and Oswald waited until they were gone before cracking an eye open, checking that they weren't there before gritting his teeth and pushing himself up slowly. Just as he did, a massive pillar of dark black energy exploded into the air in the distance, where he could sense Guila and Jericho. Except, his senses were focused on the darkness. There was n mistaking that power. It was him. Finally, the darkness vanished, leaving a shirtless Meliodas standing in between Elizabeth and the two Holy Knights, dark markings covering the right half of his body. Oswald swallowed hard. In the blink of an eye, Meliodas ripped Guila's hand off, taking the sword hilt she had taken from it, then slashed downward with his broken sword, the ground exploding in a trail toward the two Holy Knights, sending them both flying. Oswald shook his head. He was a monster.
"Dammit," Oswald sighed. "Just my luck."
He began to limp forward, his gait evening out after a moment before he began to jog, then finally run. However, before he could get far, Meliodas, who had been attacking everyone except the now full-sized silver-haired girl from the pig's back, indiscriminately, formed the darkness covering his body into a wing and took off, heading toward King and his opponent. He crashed down hard and instantly moved to drill a punch into King's opponent's gut, only for the man to catch it. Then, Meliodas disappeared, reappearing to drill a knee into the man's jaw as he leapt into the air, then slammed into him on the way back down. Oswald slowed to a stop beside King, turning away from Meliodas.
"Are you alright?" Oswald asked.
"I'll be fine," King said, holding a hand to the gash that stretched diagonally across his entire torso's front. "You need to get out of here."
Oswald looked over at the battle, seeing the man Meliodas was fighting drill a punch into Meliodas, sending him blasting into the ground. "That guy's powerful to be able to fight against Meliodas and win."
"His name's Helbram," King said. "He's strong."
As they watched, Helbram and Meliodas began to fight, Meliodas manipulating the darkness on his body to fight Helbram, forming a sword, an axe, moving it to block Helbram's sword, forming a shield, a pair of massive, clawed hands. Meliodas was fast, but Helbram was somehow managing to keep up, and to actually win. Except, just as Helbram managed to actually wound Meliodas, Meliodas' Magical power suddenly spiked, the darkness growing into spikes over his body, like it was trying to take control.
"What's going on?" King asked. "What power is that?"
"Go find Ban," Oswald said. "Meliodas wounded him earlier. You should make sure he's okay."
"I'm more worried about Elizabeth at this point," King said. "I'll be back. And when I am, you're going to answer my questions, for real this time."
Oswald nodded, still watching Meliodas' fight. Just as King left, Helbram, apparently having just gotten some powerup, slammed his sword inti Meliodas' gut, sending him blasting into a cliff. Oswald swallowed hard, running toward the cliff. He couldn't let Meliodas be captured. He couldn't stop it, but maybe he could keep Helbram busy long enugh for Meliodas to wake up. Just as he neared the top of the cliff, however, a giant, a girl with brown hair and an orange one-piece suit, appeared behind Helbram, swiping at him with a gigantic hammer, barely missing.
She gently pulled Meliodas from the cliff face and turned, swiping at Helbram rapidly, demanding to know if he was the one that hurt Meliodas. Finally, she slammed the hammer into the ground. "Mother Earth Catastrophe!"
The ground exploded instantly, a massive wave of destruction ripping the ground asunder, chasing Helbram, who retrieved Jericho and Guila before getting onto a flying manta ray, fleeing the attack. Oswald felt the cliff tremble and turned to run, only for the ground to give way under him. However, the giant caught him with the same hand that was holding Meliodas.
"Thanks," Oswald said.
"Who are you?" she asked.
"I'm Oswald," he said. "I'm a blacksmith, who also happens to be good with a sword and have some magic powers."
She stared at him before turning back to the front. Then, she jumped, leaping onto a massive half-dome of stone that had spikes on the underside, the thing hovering in the air over Helbram and the others. Once on it, she slammed her hammer into it and it exploded into the ground instantly. After several moments of the dust settling, Dian slid to the ground and set Oswald down before hugging Meliodas against her cheek.
"Diane!" the silver-haired girl, Elizabeth, Oswald assumed, called out, running over with Ban and the pig following at a walk. "Sir Meliod-" She was cut off by Ban passing her and slamming a punch into Meliodas' jaw just as Diane set him on his feet, sending him exploding into a rock a dozen yards behind Meliodas.
"That aughta do it," Ban said. "Had to pay you back for before."
"Yeah that's cool," Meliodas said.
"I was so worried!" Elizabeth said, running over and helping him up.
"Sorry," Meliodas smiled.
Oswald looked around, not seeing King, but finding Ban staring at him.
"Who's this guy?" Ban asked.
"I'm Oswald," Oswald said. "I'm a blacksmith."
"A blacksmith, huh?" Ban asked. "A blacksmith who can fight two Holy Knights single-handed? Sorry, not buying it."
"He fought Guila and Jericho?" Meliodas asked.
"Yeah," Ban said. "You were out cold, but I was just conscious enough to see some of it. He was able to copy on of Jericho's techniques, and then he had some barrier spell that blocked Guila's attacks."
"Impressive," Meliodas said.
"Jericho was just slashing really fast, and my shield I got from my family, or, so I've been told," Oswald said. "I've actually never met my family."
"What, you're an orphan?" Ban asked.
"I think mistake would be more accurate," Oswald said. "Growing up, I was always treated like garbage. Everyone hated me, just because I existed. There was this one girl who was always beating me up for being alive, telling me I should just die. That I had no purpose in this world."
"A girl huh?" Ban asked, grinning. "Sounds like she liked you."
"She tried to kill me," Oswald said. "Nearly did a few times."
Ban fell silent.
"Like I said, I was always a mistake," Oswald said.
"That's not true," Elizabeth said. "You weren't a mistake. Even if no one wanted to admit it, you were never a mistake."
"You're wrong," Oswald said, staring at the ground. "But thank you." He looked up at Meliodas. "You're Meliodas?"
"That's right," he nodded.
"The real Meliodas?" Oswald asked. "From all those years ago? The traitor?"
Meliodas' head tilted to the side a little, eyes narrowing. "Do I know you?"
"No," Oswald said. "We've never met before. It's just...you're younger than I expected."
"I get that a lot," Meliodas said.
"You were my hero when I was little," Oswald said.
"That one's not quite as popular," Meliodas said. "So, you said you were a blacksmith?"
"Yeah," Oswald nodded. "Although, I don't get payed for it. I make the swords and the shop's owner takes all the money. He just feeds me the scraps. Just enough to survive."
"Well, you're welcome to come with us," Meliodas said. "We could use your help, if you really did fight two Holy Knights alone."
Oswald nodded, smiling.
"Just a second," Ban said. "There's something that's been bugging me. That hole in yur shirt, and all that blood. You were clearly stabbed, but you've got no wound. How is that possible?"
"I have really limited healing magic," Oswald said. "I was able to seal the wound, but it took me a minute, which is why there's so much blood."
Ban nodded. "Sounds useful."
"Says the guy that got cut in half and is fine now," Oswald said.
"Touché," Ban smirked. "Alright, let's get going. I could use a nap."
Just then, rubble off to the side shifted and they all turned, seeing a Holy Knight kneeling in the middle of it with a purple barrier around him and a girl with short purple hair lying in his arms, unmoving.
"Who's that?" Oswald asked as Elizabeth walked over to them.
"Griamore and Princess Veronica," Ban said. "Elizabeth's sister."
"Elizabeth is a princess?" Oswald blinked.
"That's right," Meliodas nodded.
"So then, it was Veronica that set off Guila's mine?" Oswald asked.
"Yeah," Ban nodded. "She saved Elizabeth from it."
Oswald nodded. "I see."
He glanced at Meliodas again before turning just as the ground shook. Slowly, his eyes rose, taking in the gigantic green pig standing behind them, a building resting on top of its head like a hat.
"Uh...is that...normal?" Oswald asked.
"Oh, that's Hawk's Mom," Ban said. "She carries around the captain's bar for him."
"Hawk?" Oswald asked.
"The master," Ban said, gesturing at the talking pig."
"Oh," Oswald said. "Of course."
After another minute of Elizabeth saying her goodbyes to Griamore and Veronica, as well as asking Griamore to bury Veronica beside some lake, the sins that could fit in the bar all jumped up onto the pig and went inside, Ban bringing Oswald onto the pig with him.
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